The Horse Healer

by Gonzalo Giner

  At his side, a boy shook exaggeratedly while being recriminated harshly. He was bending a red-hot horseshoe and seemed unaccustomed to doing so, because each hammer blow was bending it farther out of form.

  “Hold it tighter with the pliers! No … Don’t hit it that way. Don’t you see how you’re splitting the metal?”

  The gigantic individual breathed in and shouted hatefully.

  “You must be an idiot. Let me.” He pushed the boy brusquely, took the pliers and the beaten piece of iron. He only needed to hit it five times to set it right.

  When he was done inspecting it on both sides, he plunged it in a basin of cool water, and at that moment he saw Diego and Marcos amid the dense cloud of steam that rose up when the hot iron was cooled. Though he didn’t recognize their faces, he smiled and changed his manners as soon as he’d sent the boy away.

  “I have to admit that every day I have less and less patience for the scarce spirit of sacrifice and the lack of nerve in this generation of young people. This one you just saw may be the worst one I can remember.” His deep voice echoed like thunder. “What can I do for you two?”

  “They have told us you are responsible for the stables, you make the horseshoes, and that you are also a recognized horse healer.” As soon as he’d finished the phrase, Diego shot a glance at Marcos to warn him, remembering his previous comment.

  “No, they haven’t lied to you. …” the friar admitted, waiting for further explanation.

  “I would like to be able to learn at your side,” Diego said at once.

  “Learn at my side? What is this about?” Rather disconcerted, the man took off his leather gloves and left them on the anvil. “I don’t know who you are. … Nor what you’re after, and even less who sent you here. But whoever it was, you’ve made a mistake. I don’t teach anyone who hasn’t taken vows.” He loosed the hammer and scratched the crown of his head, bothered by the time he was wasting with these intruders.

  “You wouldn’t have to start from zero with me.” Diego tried to approach from another angle, despite the setback. “I know how to forge horseshoes, I can manage horses well, and besides that, I have knowledge of the albéitar’s work.”

  That last word provoked a sudden change in attitude in Friar Servando.

  “Albéitar?” A grimace of displeasure crossed his face. “That’s a Moorish profession. You aren’t one of those mudéjars who run rampant in Castile?” He cleaned his hands on his apron and studied him with an unpleasant expression.

  Marcos was quiet, waiting for his opportunity.

  Diego, somewhat frustrated by the lack of progress, believed it was the moment to mention Friar Benito.

  “We are good Christians and I assure you that infidel blood does not run through our veins. I understand my proposal might strike you as strange, but if we have come to you, it is because you were recommended by a Cistercian brother I knew in Toledo. It was he who spoke to me of the library this monastery possesses and the immense riches inside it, but even more, of you. It is from him that I know you are good, the best in your profession.”

  “Who are you talking of?”

  “Friar Benito.”

  “Good old Friar Benito …” His face softened. “And you say you met him in Toledo … And he spoke well of me to you?” Undoubtedly, the reference had made him happy. “But I still don’t understand how you managed to come to me, if you know we don’t accept anyone from outside.” He scratched his beard pensively. “I respect that man very much … I don’t know what he could see in you that would lead him to recommend you to me, but believe me, I’m going to find out.”

  He took a piece of red-hot iron from the fire, shapeless, and passed the hammer to Diego.

  “Show me what you know how to do.”

  Helping himself to the pliers, Diego held the iron over a gauge and began first to smooth it out and isolate it and then to curve it without overusing the hammer. Once he was happy with it, without losing more time than necessary, he handed it over.

  Friar Servando slowly looked over his work without talking.

  “What would you give to an eyesick horse?”

  “I would make a paste of mastic and put it inside,” he responded, almost without thinking.

  “And if it was an animal with laminitis, where would you begin?”

  “I would bleed it in its hindquarters and then prepare a salve of barley and straw to rub in.”

  Friar Servando thought of something more difficult.

  “What would you use to soften a stubborn callus on the knee of the beast?”

  “If it was ulcerous and in bad shape, I would try with a mixture of dry pig manure, salt, and sulfur, all mixed with wine.”

  “Do you know Latin?”

  “I read it well, and Arabic too.”

  The man began to warm up to the idea of having him by his side, being accustomed to suffering the habitual ignorance of his helpers, many of them unacquainted with the world of horses and the majority of them illiterate.

  Diego went on talking.

  “I know how to treat some colics, geld a stallion, and also what the best cure is for cramping or against flying pests. I think I can tell when a horse’s stomach is bothering it and how to calm it down when it’s angry,” he said, looking into the monk’s eyes. “I know that you harbor great knowledge apart from your experience. I pray you share it with me, please. Until now, what I have learned of this noble office I owe to a wise albéitar I knew in Toledo and to the books I was able to read in those years. Help me to finish my education, even if I am not one of you. In exchange for the trouble, I could take care of those tasks that you find most bothersome. And of course, I would promise to serve you in anything you needed. What do you say?”

  Friar Servando kept silent and began to think. He liked the idea, but he still needed to be sure.

  “Follow me. …”

  He turned to a mare tied to the wall.

  “Name me the parts of her leg.”

  Diego approached the animal and touched the various parts as he named them.

  The friar lifted a leg and asked him to do the same with the hoof. Diego explained to him where the cleft, the crown, the heel buttress were, and defined the water line, the corner, and the bulb.

  “That’s good. … I see you are very well prepared; till now you’ve been correct with everything.” He knocked at the hoof three times with his knuckles and looked at him. “What would it sound like if she had foot rot?”

  “Like an empty barrel.”

  Marcos listened to them feeling rather stunned. He thought the best thing would be to pass unnoticed.

  “If the horse puts its weight on its foot, and the knee goes over the vertical line, what would you call that deformity?”

  “It’s a lateral fault, buck-kneed, and if the opposite happened, it is calf-kneed,” Diego answered, more calmly.

  Friar Servando could scarcely conceal the excellent impression the boy was making on him.

  “Follow me now down the hall; we are going to see other horses. I want to know if you can figure out what condition they’re in.”

  Diego looked at the first. Just one look in its eyes told him what was happening.

  “It’s uncomfortable or angry, I don’t know which.”

  Friar Servando admitted it had just been disciplined for leaping over a fence.

  The following one had its eyes almost closed. Diego raised his voice and it closed them even more.

  “This mare is frightened, and I don’t think it’s just shyness.”

  “She’s been that way for a few days, it’s true,” Friar Servando said. “She has a bad eye infection, but you couldn’t know that. It’s true that if she were very frightened, she would act the same way.”

  Without finishing the phrase, he pointed out a male that watched them from afar.

 
“And that one?”

  The animal opened its eyes exaggeratedly and its upper eyelids were extremely wrinkled. It whinnied intensely and its nostrils were highly dilated.

  “He seems dispirited, like something is worrying him a lot.”

  “That’s enough …” He turned back to the forge, picked up a piece of raw iron, and buried it in the coals. “I admit you’re capable but I can’t tell you anything until I have my superior’s approval.”

  Suddenly Friar Servando fell quiet, realizing that Marcos was there, and turned to him.

  “And you?”

  “I don’t have his learning, but I’m not afraid to work. Give me whatever job, the most pressing one, and you’ll discover that I won’t give you any problem. I’m a worker with a strong willingness to do things right.”

  “I like what you’re telling me. …” Friar Servando looked at his weak arms and legs. “The work I can offer you is hard. Do you dare?”

  “Try me,” Marcos answered.

  “Since I will have to arrange food and lodging for you, and for your animals as well …” Those words sounded glorious to them. “I will have to take half your wages. The work begins after morning prayers and ends with the evening prayers, after dinner. Now, go clean the stables, and you”—Diego assumed he meant him—“don’t ever call yourself an albéitar again in my presence. Use the Latin term veterinarius or if you want, horse healer, it’s all the same to me. That is what I will call you from now on. If I manage to speak with my superior, tomorrow you will come with me to visit a client, outside the monastery.”

  “I thank you for it,” Diego said.

  “Don’t patronize to me. I hate courtesy. I only require loyalty and sincerity. I reject people who try to cover up reality with excuses. If we accept you in this monastery, you will have to follow certain norms and rules that are sacred among us. Don’t neglect them.”

  He arched his enormous brows and adopted a serious tone to stress the importance of their behavior.

  “You will only give an opinion when it is asked of you, whether you understand or not. I will not allow you to compare the treatment you receive with that of the friars, nor the food, and you must always respect them. You will be silent throughout the premises and you will not be able to explore them without my permission. You will help in everything I ask of you, and that includes any kind of cleaning or maintenance tasks. And for now, that’s all.”

  “Pardon me, but I have a question. Could I see your famous library?” For Diego, that was a matter too vital to be forgotten.

  “Before that, you will have to win my trust. If that happens, maybe after some time, I will tell you that any reading you do will be guided. That is how I think. I will not say that science is bad, but it has do be well dosed so that it doesn’t damage the conscience. That will be my job.”

  He sat down next to the anvil and gave a final warning.

  “Don’t take any action without consulting me. I expect loyalty from you. And last of all, remember always that if there is one thing I hate, it is people hiding things from me. … Ah, and also, I will expect you at Mass every day, and at sexts, nones, and vespers.”

  In spite of the challenges they would have to survive to live every day, Diego felt happy. Marcos and he had managed to get into the monastery, he was almost accepted as apprentice, and that meant his education could continue. He didn’t like the name veterinarius or being called a horse healer—he preferred the term albéitar—but it was far from the most important thing. Although Friar Servando’s character seemed the exact opposite of Galib’s, Diego wanted to believe that his knowledge was broader.

  He thought about the library. Among those stones, caressed by the tranquility of silence, reposed a great part of human wisdom. As though it were a precious treasure, there it was, waiting for him, until the moment when that obstreperous friar blessed him.

  Diego closed his eyes and saw himself submerged in thousands of pages, unraveling their theories, absorbing their science … an awareness that would improve his diagnoses, would make his hands more skilled when he operated, and would stir his intuition so he would see further than the external signs of illness.

  But Marcos, who hadn’t seen any special advantage in being in the monastery, didn’t care for Friar Servando. Unlike Diego, he started to doubt whether this had been the best decision. Though he was safe from his pursuers, what awaited him seemed discouraging.

  Both, from the same moment, and with different thoughts, began to sweep the stable, obeying the friar’s first command.

  III.

  Friar Servando did not call Diego the next morning to accompany him on his visit. Nor did he give any explanation. In fact, for the following week he disappeared from the monastery without anyone knowing where he had gone or why.

  Obeying his directions, when they had finished cleaning the stables, Diego and Marcos cleaned out an enormous pit into which the latrines emptied, located in the monastery’s cellars. It took them three whole days, and when they finished, they changed to another job that was less arduous but more dangerous.

  The new task consisted of unclogging all the gargoyles that bordered the top of the church and cleaning the moss and filth from the roof tiles. To get to those places, they had to climb wood scaffolds and make a crane to raise the containers of water they needed for cleaning the stone. Armed with coarse brushes, some tied to long rods, they did their work, accompanied by an icy wind.

  That took them three whole weeks and made Marcos sick.

  When Friar Servando was back in the monastery, Diego watched his friend’s cold get worse day by day. He began to get really worried when, apart from a fever, Marcos began to blather, remembering his first thefts and cons nostalgically, or reliving the brutal beating that had been the cause of his escape from Burgos.

  Diego spoke to Friar Servando, asking him to excuse Marcos from work for at least two days, since the coming days would be colder and windier. But the friar didn’t like the idea and wouldn’t tell Diego when he thought his apprenticeship would begin either.

  “Son, vigor is a virtue for all Christians. …” was the first thing he said. “And on occasion, there come hard tests that God presents to measure our strength.” He crossed himself. “And now, get back to your work and don’t bother me anymore. When you’re done with the roof of the church, you’ll continue with the cloister. And please, don’t be so anxious to accompany me. Everything will come in its proper time. Remember that to be a good healer, you need to exercise patience. You have to practice it a great deal so that one day, it will become a virtue in you.”

  That same morning Diego had to tell Marcos he had not been relieved of his duties and they went back up on the dome, explored the buttresses, and reached the cupola in the center of the nave, the last area they had to clean. But Diego didn’t let him work, not that first day or the following two. Since no one could see them at that height, as soon as they had ascended, Diego covered Marcos with two blankets to protect him from the bad weather and make him sweat out his sickness. Marcos passed hours in this way, curled up and sleeping, leaned against a low wall.

  From there, Diego observed the work in the scriptorium, where he saw a group of monks copying books and embellishing them with drawings on the page. They worked behind windows filled with an abundant curtain of light, not far from where Diego was scraping the stones.

  The next week, Marcos recovered his health and his good humor.

  That improvement coincided with the beginning of the labors inside the cloister and the chapter house beside it. Both agreed that if the first was beautiful, the second was even more so.

  The roof supported nine vaults held up by four columns in the center and others built into the walls. The cinnamon-colored stone changed tone when struck by the light, and especially at midday, the effect it produced was incredible, almost magic.

  Diego and Marcos had a ha
rd job there but it was more gratifying than the previous ones. They scrubbed the stone floor and the benches until they gleamed, and then they carefully cleaned the columns and walls.

  “From what I could hear yesterday, we are right under the library,” Diego remarked while he used a chisel to clean a leaf carved into one of the columns.

  “You have too much faith in that man.” Marcos sighed. “You think he’s going to let you go with him to teach you what he knows, and that after he’ll open the doors to the scriptorium, but I don’t think he’ll do either of the two.” He had to lower his arms a moment until the blood began to circulate again. He was cleaning the ribs of the vaults and the job required him to keep his arms raised. “As I see it, we’re living a farce. He’s cheated us like two idiots, you’ll see.”

  Soon they heard steps. When they looked to the cloister, they saw a group of friars in a procession. They were headed to the church to pray the terce, which Diego and Marcos had fortunately been excused from. They respected the monks’ silence until they saw them disappear.

  “I take a man at his word and Friar Servando promised,” Diego responded, without abandoning the previous conversation.

  “And I believe in my intuition.”

  “Intuition, you say? Intuition is a very necessary ability for an albéitar, since our patients don’t tend to talk much.” He smiled at him.

  “It’s always worked for me. That’s why every time I see Friar Servando, it reaffirms what I just said: He’s using us.”

  “Maybe it’s true, but he’s the only person who can help me right now. If he wills it, I can finish my education, and he has the power to open the doors to the library for me or to keep them sealed. I don’t want to imagine that he’s lied to me; I prefer to think it is hard for him to believe us. Sometimes we come to erroneous conclusions early on. That could be what’s happening with Friar Servando. For example, take the feeling you get being in a place like this one. …” He explored the room with his gaze. “I’m excited by such beauty and grandeur. And you?”