Leper's Return

by Michael Jecks

  One of the early symptoms of the disease was that the victim found breathing difficult and the voice became hoarse. Poor Joseph had endured his illness for over four years, Ralph had been told, and the monk usually found his speech difficult to understand, but today he quickly understood that he was needed.

  At the main gate he found a young woman waiting. She was in her early twenties, plain of face, but with an inner strength that showed in her grave, solemn features. Ralph could see that she was no gentlewoman. Her clothing was clean, but certainly not expensive; the fabric had torn in several places, and had been carefully mended.

  As he approached her, Ralph’s attention was on her face. The woman was paying him no heed: she was watching Joseph. And unlike everyone else whom he had seen observing a leper, her face held no fear, no horror or disgust, but only an expression of compassion and utter sadness. It made him want to stop and memorize every detail of her as she stood there, radiating kindness like a modern Magdalen. When he came close, he saw that her cheeks were streaked with tears.

  “You asked for me?”

  “Yes, Brother. I have been sent by the Dean to tell you that another man has got the disease.”

  “Oh, I see.” Ralph closed his eyes briefly. He had five inmates already. Another would be a strain on his resources. The almoner had already hinted that the harvest had not been as good as had been hoped, and that it would be best if the lepers could reduce their demands on the church. He dismissed the thought with a shrug. “I shall come immediately.”

  Inside Crediton’s collegiate church, the candles and sconces threw a dim light compared with the bright sunshine streaming in through the windows. There weren’t many people there. It looked as if monks and lay-brothers were almost alone; only a few of the local people were attending. That was no surprise, for nobody wanted to be reminded of the illness. One woman sobbed, and a man at her side held her protectively by the shoulders. Ralph felt certain they were the parents; their grief was so obvious. Not far from them, Ralph was surprised to see the knight, Sir Baldwin, his head bowed in prayer.

  The Dean, in his capacity as vicar of the parish, was holding the service as the monk entered. Ralph walked to the altar and knelt, making the sign of the cross and bowing his head in prayer before looking over at this latest victim.

  Edmund Quivil felt like a twig that had fallen into a rushing torrent; he was being swept along by a course of procedures he couldn’t comprehend. Wrapped in a shroud, he’d been carried in here on a bier as if he was already dead. His movements were mechanical as he obeyed the Dean’s instructions. Canons brought forward a pall as he lay down on the ground, and it was draped over him while the requiem mass was chanted. Then Clifford’s sonorous voice continued, droning on in the curious international language of the Church.

  And then Quivil remembered the significance of the rite.

  He almost cried out. It was an effort not to leap up. This was the end of his life. From now on he was dead, to the Church and to the Law.

  It had been explained to him the night before, when the Dean had visited him to confirm that he did indeed have leprosy. That was hard enough to accept. Quivil was not yet twenty. He had been courting Mary Cordwainer for six months now, and their banns were to have been read in the little church at Sandford when he had developed the fever. It had come quickly, leaving all his bones aching, and then it was gone. But it had returned, and this time it had brought with it a dull headache that made movement torture, and his nose started bleeding profusely.

  The herbarer had been very helpful. When the second attack had struck, the monk had kindly come to visit him, and had given him a powder which had reduced the pains a little, but when this second fever had somewhat abated, the monk had become noticeably anxious. He had seen the little discoloration on Quivil’s hand. And soon it was not one, but many. The yellow-brownish lumps multiplied over his face and hands. That was when Quivil had been brought to the town on a cart and subjected to a detailed examination.

  He shuddered, squeezing his eyes tight shut. It was only yesterday, and now his life was ended.

  Edmund felt the silent tears trickling down his cheeks. He opened his hands once, to study with disbelief the little nodes on the skin of his wrists; he reached up to touch his face, feeling the faint lumps. It was impossible that he should be a leper! He was young and fit, not a mutilated cripple with only a few years to live. It must be a mistake! The brother herbarer would come in and rescue him from this living nightmare: it couldn’t go on.

  But the solemn voice continued its message of doom. No hurrying brother came to rescue him. He lay uncomfortably until the mass was ended, and then there was silence. It was as if his heart had in truth stopped beating.

  Ralph rose to his feet. The Dean was kneeling and praying, and as he finished and stood, Ralph could see the tears glistening. The two men stared at each other for a moment, sharing the pain and sadness of the occasion, as if they were accomplices in Quivil’s destruction, and then Clifford gave a rasping sigh and walked to the door. Ralph put his hand on the leper’s shoulder, and the young man gave a start, looking up at him with desperation. The monk tried to give him an encouraging smile, but Ralph’s face felt as if it was going to crack. Uttering a prayer to God for strength, he helped Quivil up, and walked with him to the door.

  Outside, Clifford waited with the other brothers near a newly dug grave. The last stage of the rite had to be completed. Quivil found himself being laid down again, and while he stared up at the priest, Clifford sprinkled dust on his head three times. “Edmund Quivil, you are dead to the world. Be alive again to God.”

  Now Ralph took him by the shoulder once more, and while the monks chanted the Libera me, led the leper away to his living purgatory: unalive, though not yet dead.

  John saw the pair walking away, and he shook his head sympathetically. Everyone in the town had heard the news about poor Quivil. Gossip of that kind spread quickly.

  But the little Irishman didn’t have time to dawdle in the street, he had things to do. He walked back toward the church, and was about to turn up his own road when he heard his name being called.

  “Yes? Sir Baldwin, how are you this fine day?”

  “Well enough, John,” Baldwin said. He pulled off his gloves and stuck them in his belt. Truth be told, he wasn’t at all content. Witnessing one of his villeins being put through the Office for the Seclusion of a Leper had blunted the pleasure he had felt earlier on seeing what good weather the day promised. “What are you up to, though?”

  “Me, Sir Baldwin?”

  The knight studied his innocent face. “Yes, John, you! I have been hearing rumors about you.”

  “Ah, surely you’d not listen to villainous talk about me, sir?”

  “That would depend on how untrue the talk was, wouldn’t it, John?”

  “But you know I’m an honest trader, sir. I’d never break the town’s laws.”

  “Really? By the way, did you hear about Isabella Gilbard?”

  John forced his voice to sound casual, as if he had not only not heard of her, he was sure he wouldn’t want to either. “Isabella? No, I don’t think so.”

  “I let her buy her freedom from my manor so she could marry. She was wed in June, but now I hear she has given birth to a bouncing boy—only three months later.”

  “It’s a terrible thing when people behave like that,” said John, nodding his head sagely. “Young churls today don’t have the manners their grandparents had.”

  “Quite. It means she was fornicating before she was married; before she bought her freedom. I suppose I shall have to impose the lairwite on her.”

  John pursed his lips. The lairwite was the fine imposed on bondwomen who proved to have weaker morals than they should, and who gave birth without first going through the formal and necessary process of marrying. The fine could be enforced when the woman subsequently married in an attempt to conceal her incontinence. And John knew as well as the knight that there was another fine,
the childwite, for the man who had made her pregnant.

  But the fine was imposed on women who were unfree—serfs. It existed to prevent villeins from breeding large numbers of bastards who would then become a drain on an estate. And John was not involved with an unfree woman. He smiled up at the knight confidently. Baldwin seemed to have forgotten his presence for a moment, and was lost in thought, staring over the road at the new church. John was interested despite himself.

  “But, Sir Baldwin, surely you wouldn’t pursue her now, not when you’ve already freed her?”

  The knight turned slowly and studied him, and suddenly John wanted very much to be somewhere else. Baldwin was known to be kindly and generous, a man who treated all men with respect and courtesy, but now the knight’s eye was cold, his voice scornful. “John of Irelaunde, I am the Keeper of the King’s Peace. It is impossible for me to condone deliberate flouting of the law—by anyone. How would it look if I were to allow Isabella to commit this crime without punishment? Other criminals might think me an easy touch. Oh no, John. I have my office to consider in her case—and in others.”

  “Well, Sir Baldwin, I’m glad I’ve never been guilty of such a crime,” John said lightly, but he avoided Baldwin’s gaze.

  “You’ve never given birth to a child, you mean? Or do you mean you’ve never tasted the pleasures of illicit love? Are you so innocent, I wonder?”

  John grinned weakly. The knight’s words were hitting too close to the mark, and there was a terrible certainty building in him that Baldwin had guessed about his nightly trysts. The direction of this conversation was not to John’s liking, especially when another thought struck him: if news had already come to Baldwin, the gossip in the town must have reached a level which could put him—and her—in some little danger.

  It was getting late. John made some apology and scurried off homeward, all the way conscious of the knight’s stare on his back. It was a relief to slam his gate shut behind him. He rested for a moment with his back to it as if bracing himself against a sudden attack. The knight had unsettled him, that was a fact. “Sodding bastard! He was winding me up!”

  And back down the hill, as soon as Baldwin saw the little man dart inside his yard, for all the world like a rabbit pelting into its warren at the sound of the hunter and his dogs, the knight’s face broke into a smile. He gave a loud guffaw, and had to lean on a fence while he laughed until the tears came.

  “And now take the hint and leave the good wives of Crediton alone, you lecherous little git!”

  Sitting before the door to the inn, idly watching the traffic in the street, Jack the smith raised another quart of ale and gulped.

  With the slight breeze, he felt refreshingly cool after the searing heat of his smithy, and it was a relief to be able to sit and drink away his thirst, nodding affably to the townspeople as they passed. Few would ignore the smith, for he was an essential part of the town. When tools snapped, he mended them; when horses needed reshoeing, he made them; when cartwheels broke, he had to fit the new steel rims to protect the wood. In all aspects of life, there was little that didn’t require his skills at one point or another.

  He finished his drink and collected his small barrel, newly refilled with ale, which he installed on his little handcart, and set off home. There were two chains he must repair, taking out links and replacing them with new ones, an old knife that needed a fresh rivet in its hilt, and he must forge a new axehead. It would take time to finish all that, and he hoped his apprentice was stoking the fires and getting the temperature up.

  It was when he had only travelled a few yards, while he was reviewing these jobs, that he saw the man sitting huddled at the side of the road, clapper in hand and bowl before him, calling out to all passers-by. “God bless you, lady!” and “God save you, sir!” as the coins were hurriedly tossed to him, while the donors averted their gaze and hurried by.

  Jack strode on, his face fixed firmly forward, prognathous features unmoving.

  “Sir? Can you spare something for—”

  “Not for you, pervert!”

  “But we need food and drink, same as any man, sir. Couldn’t you—”

  “Leave me alone! You sickening bastard, you should never have been born. You make me want to vomit—aye, and all others who are normal!”

  The leper stared at him, and opened his mouth to speak, but as he did so, the smith reached down and picked up a large cobblestone, weighing it in his hand. The light of a kind of madness was in Jack’s eye, and the leper was suddenly afraid. He looked away nervously, certain that at any moment the heavy stone would crack against his head. There came a loud thud, and when he looked to his side, he saw the dent on the wall where the cobble had struck.

  “Don’t ever talk to me again, or next time I’ll smash your skull!” Jack hissed malevolently, and walked on.

  Neither he nor the leper noticed the man leaning against the wall of the inn. Neither of them knew he was a guard at Matthew Coffyn’s house—nor that he had overheard their argument. At the moment he wasn’t greatly interested in what had passed between the leper and the bigot, but if the guard, William, had one conviction, it was that any piece of information might become useful. He had docketed and stored the exchange in his mind before the smith was swallowed up in the crowds.

  4

  Thomas Rodde leaned on his staff and rested while he waited. The old man at the gate had refused to let him enter until his master had agreed. It made Rodde give a fleeting smile. As if anyone who was healthy would want to walk into a leper hospital!

  The sun was warm on his tattered tunic and robe. It was good to feel the heat. For so many months now he had been living in the north, where the sun was insipid compared to the south.

  Thomas could remember hot, balmy days in the southern lands. He had gone there with his father several times when he was apprenticed to the craft, visiting places of pilgrimage in far-flung countries like Castile and Rome. But that was before he had become leprous: that life was over. Sometimes he recalled it with a kind of wonder, like a magical dream in which reality could be suspended for a while, but he tried to avoid thinking about how he had lived. There was no point: he was determined not to torment himself with wondering how things might have been, or how he might have developed. After all, he could easily have died in a foolish accident at any time. It was as likely as his managing to live to a ripe old age.

  “There they are.”

  The old leper pointed along the road. Thomas turned to see Ralph and Quivil approaching. The man with the monk was staggering as if drunk. His eyes held a frantic terror. Thomas had once seen a horse fall after jumping a wall. It had put a fetlock into a rabbit hole. Afterward it had stood shaking, the leg shattered, with eyes rolling in shock and fear. Thomas clenched his teeth. He had seen the same panicked horror in too many eyes over the last years.

  Brother Ralph noticed Thomas Rodde, a bowed figure clad in the tattered clothing that denoted another leper, but he had no time to think about him yet, for at the gate Quivil halted, eyes wide, like a horse refusing a jump. The monk spoke gently. “Quivil, come inside. You know you—”

  “No! No, I can’t! This is all a mistake.” He shook his head emphatically, his feet planted firmly.

  “You have to come in. You know that.”

  “I…I can’t. I’m all right now. It’s all an accident. I have to go home.”

  “Edmund!”

  Ralph spun to see the same young woman who had summoned him from the chapel. She stood behind them in the road, and the monk realized she had been waiting for them.

  “Mary?” Quivil cried, and was about to go to her, when Ralph gripped his arm urgently.

  “You mustn’t! Quivil, think, man. You’re a leper: you are defiled—you’re already condemned, do you want to ruin her life too?”

  “No, it’s a mistake, I’m not ill,” the leper groaned, but the insistence was gone from his voice.

  Mary Cordwainer covered her face with her hands. Her body was racked wi
th tortured sobs. “I didn’t believe it, I thought you’d be all right.”

  Quivil stood still, as if turned to purest marble. His fists clenched in his despair. When he spoke, he heard his voice rasping with the hurt he had to give her, his woman. “Mary, I’m dead. I’m nothing. You must look after yourself.”

  Ralph slowly released his grip. Quivil stood shaking, his eyes screwed tightly shut, then they opened with an almost audible snap, and he lurched through the gate and into the grounds of the leper hospital. The girl gave a small cry, and sank to her knees, head bowed, face hidden in her hands. Ralph wanted to go to her and comfort her, but he thought better of it. There was nothing for him to say; no words of sympathy could compensate her. He shook his head, and was about to follow Quivil, when Rodde stepped forward.

  “You are the master of the hospital?”

  Ralph hesitated, then gave a nod. He already had one extra mouth to feed, and didn’t need another.

  Thomas Rodde saw the wariness in his eyes and smiled. “I have need of a place to stay, Brother, and would be grateful if I could make use of your hospitality, but I won’t be a burden to you. I can pay for what I eat.”

  “Where are you from?”

  Rodde saw the doubt in the man’s face and grinned. “I used to live at a hospital in the north, but it was sacked by the Scots. I have a letter here, though.” He held out a note. The brother took it warily. It was rare for a leper to move far from his birthplace, and Ralph wasn’t sure about this confident man. The letter was from the brother of a small lazar house near Carlisle, and confirmed that his hospital had been destroyed by marauding Scots. It also mentioned Thomas Rodde by name and stated that he was not expelled.

  Ralph handed the note back with relief. All too often wandering lepers were those who had been evicted from their old hospitals for disobedience. Their sins had to be extensive for them to suffer the punishment of homelessness and loneliness. “Of course you’re welcome. Christ Himself orders us to aid travellers.” It wasn’t the money that made Ralph make up his mind, it was the edge to the calm voice, as if the stranger was close to the end of his tether. Ralph motioned toward the hospital. Thomas picked up his bundle, swinging it over his shoulder in a practiced movement and walked slowly inside.