“Where am I, Father?” he asked carefully, when the cup was empty and the priest had lowered him back against the bed-pillows. “What has happened to me?” His voice still sounded strange. Had he been screaming, also, in his delirium?
“Do you not remember?” The priest’s voice was gentle. He looked down at Jean with pity.
Jean turned his face away. He did not want his question answered after all. “I am tired,” he said, trying to keep the panic from his voice.
“We found you three days ago, beside the road. You had been set upon by thieves.”
Jean groaned. His donkey. His donkey had been taken into the woods.
“Two of them lay dead on the road near you. The others had fled, leaving you there. We thought you were dead also, and were astounded to find you still alive. We carried you here to Prevote Venissieux, where we have been tending you with the help of the innkeeper’s wife. She knew what to put on the poultice and what herbs were needed in your drink to ease the pain.”
“Where is my—” Jean could not finish.
“All we found of your belongings was that barrel…’’ The priest’s voice trailed off.
Jean closed his eyes. “All is gone? Everything?” His donkey and his purse?
“Not everything,” the priest said.
Jean glanced at the barrel standing beside his bed. He remembered it now, the empty one. Even thieves could not be bothered carrying off an empty barrel. “Everything,” he said dully.
There would be no new kirtle for Mathilde, no tunic for Gilles, no dowry for Jeanne.
There would never be an apprenticeship for Simon.
“You have your life,” the priest rebuked him gently.
He had no money to buy next year’s spices. He was ruined; they all were. He had seen his mother’s smile and let her carelessness slip over him.
“Yes, my life,” he said, pronouncing it as though it were a curse. How could he go home like this? How could he face Mathilde with nothing to offer but an empty barrel?
The tall man shifted on the wooden stool. Jean remembered he was talking to a priest. “I owe you thanks,” he said.
“We did what any Christian would have done.” The priest made a dismissive gesture with his hand.
Jean looked at him. Surely he knew that was far from true.
“For which I cannot even repay you,” Jean said. The words were bitter in his mouth, tasting of charity. It was not a spice he cared for.
“We will be repaid.”
Jean would have told him how charity was repaid, but it was not right to say such things to a priest. The priest took his silence for weariness and left him. Soon after, however, one of the pilgrims came in.
“Father suggested I might read to you,” he said, holding up his Book of Hours.
Jean shrugged. They were paying for his keep.
The pilgrim sat down quickly and began flipping through the pages of his book, looking for a passage to read. Something uplifting, he had probably been told, to raise Jean’s spirits and fortify his faith. He found the page he wanted and looked up with a determined smile.
Where had he seen that expression before? Jean looked at the pilgrim more closely and recognized him from his dream of being in heaven. The pilgrim began to read slowly, emphasizing the fortifying parts.
He had not skipped purgatory after all.
***
One or another of the pilgrims was nearly always at his bedside. They tried to pray with him, but he gave them no encouragement. They sat by his bed reading aloud from the lives of the saints while Jean lay trying to think of a way he could feed his family and wondering how they would make it through the winter. Perhaps Mathilde had not spent everything he had given her last year. Perhaps she had had a good yield from the little garden she kept. They could sell the eggs from her hens and make do with porridge, and in spring they could sell the hens to buy some spices for next year’s trip…
And how would he carry the spices to Cluny and Lyon without a donkey?
Jean went round and round the problem, like a rat in a wooden box, but it always came back to that. He could no longer sell spices. He must return to them with nothing. Mathilde and the boys did not need his help with the garden or the hens. He would just be another empty belly to feed through the winter.
It would be better for them if he never returned at all.
Jean became aware of the silence in the room. He looked up. The pilgrim was gone. The priest stood just inside the door, half in shadow, watching Jean. Was he real or a dream? His face had the same expression now as when he had caught Jean daydreaming on the road and bade him walk with them.
“Is it possible to take on another’s sorrow, Father?” Jean asked.
The priest walked over to his bed. “Is that not what our Lord did for us?”
“I thought he took on our sin.”
“What is the root of all sorrow?”
“Sin,” Jean said obediently. He knew his catechism. It had nothing to do with this seeming transference of grief that he had unwittingly embarked upon.
When the silence stretched out, Jean looked up. The priest gazed back at him calmly, giving no indication of what he sought. Revealing nothing, as unreadable as fog.
The fog from his dream of Jeanne wrapped itself around Jean.
“Loss,” he said, his voice flat and certain. “Loss is the root of sorrow.”
The priest nodded gently. “It is what we lose that shapes us, not what we have or what we gain. ‘My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?’ So spoke our Lord on his cross. And in that moment we knew him for who he was, because of what he had lost. For our sakes. Yes, it is possible to take on another’s sorrow. But very rare.”
***
“I never wanted her sorrow,” Jean murmured when the priest had left. “It was only a superstition.” He said it again, louder, defying the twilight shadows creeping across his room. “It is only foolish women’s lore. I did not buy her sorrow.” He felt better then, and slept.
In the morning the sunlight falling through his window bleached away his fears, leaving only the clarity of his misfortune. When the priest appeared at his door Jean stared at him without interest.
“It is the Sabbath,” the priest said. “I have come to pray with you, since you cannot go to Mass.”
“I cannot pray,” Jean said.
“Then I will pray for you. You need only bend your head.”
Bend his head. Bend to God’s will. Was it God’s will that he be destroyed? Was it God’s will that his family go hungry, that Gilles would not sell spices with him and little Jeanne would have no dowry and Simon would never be a blacksmith?
Whether he bent his head or not, these things had already happened. Only they did not know it yet, Mathilde and Gilles and Simon and Jeanne. They would not know it until he went home and told them.
The priest stood by the door, watching him.
“Why do you keep after me?” he cried.
The priest came to his bedside and knelt down beside him.
“Because you are a soul in change,” he said. “And a soul in change might find its way to God.”
“Or not,” Jean said.
“Yes,” the priest replied. “Or not.” He bowed his head and began to pray.
Celeste entered the pilgrim’s hostel at Lyon. She had ridden off impulsively after her argument with Isavel. Now she stood at the door of the hostel, feeling like a fool. A Lady would have her husband’s men-at-arms escort her wherever she cared to go. Even a widow would send her man or have her priest arrange an escort, not come herself. She hesitated on the threshold.
“Lady Celeste.”
She turned, startled. “Father Jacques.” She swallowed, forcing the surprise out of her voice. “I am glad to find you here.” She looked past him: a group of pilgrims sat at the table he had left to come to her. Several were watching their exchange. His pilgrimage to Jerusalem! He had had to wait—what?—ten days? Had she been with Pierre that long?
“I was told you went to Paris.”
Celeste blushed. “I have been visiting my brother, Pierre. He lives just outside of Lyon.”
“Pierre. Paris. Perhaps the innkeeper mistook the message.”
Celeste blushed again.
“Have you come looking for me?”
“Yes,” she said quickly. “I—my maid and I—would like to join your pilgrimage.”
He looked startled. “But your journey was to the Basilica de Fourviere, here in Lyon.”
“I mean to go to Jerusalem,” she said, surprising herself as she said it. Jerusalem? Why would she go to Jerusalem? But she found herself smiling. Jerusalem. It sounded far away. It sounded safe and free and golden: the Holy City. No one would dare to laugh at a woman who had pilgrimaged to Jerusalem.
“I have a letter of permission from the Abbess.” She drew the Abbess’ letter out of her scrip and handed it to him. It was the permission that she had been given to journey to Cluny, but Father Jacques might think that she had stopped off at the abbey on the way to Lyon and requested a second permission for a longer pilgrimage.
He would discover her deceit at once if he could read. Celeste drew in a silent breath. There was no avoiding this moment. She had never met a monk who could not read, but she remembered Mistress Blanche asking Father Jacques to read from her Book of Hours during a rest stop on their journey to Cluny. He had sat beside the woman with the book in his hands, and never once looked down at it. He must have memorized every story in it, Celeste had thought at the time, and only later had it occurred to her why he would do so.
He took the letter but did not look at it. “Have you considered this?”
She met his gaze without comment.
“A pilgrimage is a serious undertaking, Lady Celeste.”
“It is.”
Father Jacques sighed. After a moment he said gently, “We sometimes travel long distances to speak to those who are far from us. Do you think that God is distant?”
Celeste’s lips tightened. This was the way priests talked: in riddles, meant to trick you. How should she know where God was? She had thanked him for her cure at Cluny, but he had not answered her. Instead, Lord Bernard had shown up, and the peddler had disappeared with her ring. She had begged Holy Mary to give her an empty womb. She had received no answer from her, either.
“Do you have your husband’s approval this time?” Father Jacques asked, when it was clear she was not going to answer his riddle.
“My husband placed me in the Abbess’ care, and she has approved my pilgrimage.”
“I see.” He glanced briefly at the letter before handing it back to her.
Celeste looked down, hiding the relief she was sure must be evident in her face as she returned the permission to her scrip.
“This is a much longer pilgrimage. There will be hardships and danger, sometimes more than one can bear. It is possible that your… problem… can be resolved in some other manner. God does not always require a pilgrimage.”
She took a deep breath. What problem was he referring to?
“Sometimes we require it of ourselves,” Father Jacques continued, “to make atonement for our sins, or fortify our faith, or free our souls from the weariness of despair.”
Her feet are frozen to the cold stone floor; she cannot bear to see inside the room. Something happened there, something to drive all hope away forever—
She willed her mind clear. Father Jacques was watching her. Could he, like the gypsy, see some hideous flaw in her, some unrepented sin? She swayed and would have stumbled, had Father Jacques not caught her shoulder.
“Those who go on pilgrimage are blessed,” she said, clutching his arm.
“Such blessings come at great cost.”
What cost did he mean? Oh, what did it matter? There was a cost to everything, including staying here now that Isavel had sent a message to her husband. No, she must get away! She needed time to sort out what had happened in her husband’s castle, time to decide what to do. Time to learn whether there was another infant to consider, and a sin to account for. A pilgrimage would give her that time. She let go of his arm and straightened, raising her chin to look at him levelly. Whatever evil thing she had done in her past, whatever failures had been tallied up against her, she would be cleansed of them in Jerusalem. If this priest would not take her, she would find another way.
“Do you need to go?” The quiet intensity in his voice surprised her. Her eyes brimmed with tears, the answer so tight in her throat she could not say it.
He nodded. “That is the way one should feel about Jerusalem.”
***
“What does Lord Bernard say about this pilgrimage?”
Although Isavel had asked the question, Celeste addressed Pierre when she answered. “He does not know about it. But you may tell him if he comes here looking for me.” He must know the truth, in case Isavel was right about Lord Bernard. “I am sorry I did not tell you sooner. I have only today learned that we are leaving tomorrow morning.”
“Your escort stayed in Lyon all this time?” Pierre asked.
“One of our party was ill. He is recovered now. They are at the pilgrim’s hostel.” It was only a small lie, of no importance.
“Do you have the Holy Church’s permission?” Isavel demanded.
“I have a note from the Abbess of Sainte Blandine.” She spoke sharply, looking at Pierre, not his presumptuous wife. Surely the woman would not dare ask to see it.
“Why did you not mention this while you have been with us, Celeste?” Pierre asked.
“I am sorry.”
“How many are in your party?” A worried frown creased his brow.
“Eight.” She hoped she had remembered correctly. “And a priest, our confessor. We are enough to protect ourselves, dear brother.”
“This is not right!” Isavel cried. “She must return to her husband.”
“I will, when my pilgrimage is finished.” Again she spoke for Pierre’s sake, and she gave him the truth. Where else should she go? Marriage to Lord Bernard had been the final step in raising her above her grandfather; she would not descend again.
***
Celeste pulled her horse to a stop to bid Pierre farewell before joining the group of pilgrims waiting for her. Pierre patted Marie’s shoulder, making her blush furiously, before sending her off.
“Be gentle with Marie,” he said to Celeste, ‘She is devoted to you.” He kissed Celeste on both cheeks. “And be gentle with yourself, sister.”
She returned his embrace.
“If you see my husband, tell him that I am well, and safe.” She looked toward the group of pilgrims. “And that I look forward to being reunited with him after my pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostella.” She could not look at him as she mouthed the lie.
“I will pass on your words to him.”
He knows. She looked aside, ashamed. “God be with you, Pierre,” she said with difficulty.
“God go with you, Celeste.” He waited till she looked at him, and smiled at her. “Go with my blessing, sister.”
***
There were six pilgrims waiting with Father Jacques: a middle-aged Lady wrapped in her pilgrim’s cloak against the dampness of the morning; her maid, a saucy brown-haired girl who had pushed her cloak aside, revealing her red linen kirtle; the Lady’s son, a tall, skinny boy who appeared to be about fourteen; two men-at-arms who took their orders from the Lady; and an older, sour-faced man introduced as the Lady’s cousin. The boy and the men-at-arms did not wear pilgrim’s cloaks, but one was tied behind the boy’s saddle. The sour-faced cousin clenched his cape around his chest, scowling from time to time at the dishevelled bundle behind the boy’s saddle.
“We have a lengthy journey, which will afford us numerous opportunities to come to know each other,” the Lady’s cousin said, as soon as the initial greetings were over. His voice was high for a man, and he spoke through his nose. “I suggest we commence at once.”
Behind his back, the boy lo
oked across at his mother’s maid and pulled a face which perfectly imitated the officious cousin’s. The maid coughed into her handkerchief.
Celeste looked at the group of pilgrims, wondering why Father Jacques had questioned her motives.
The men-at-arms spurred their horses into an easy canter and the group set out.
While they rode, the others told stories of their homes and families, or speculated on what they would see and do in the Holy Land. Celeste remained quiet. She did not notice the things they pointed out: a small red fox peeking at them from behind a bush, a sweet thrill of birdsong, the suggestive shape of a cloud and what it signified.
Lady Yvolde rode up beside her. “Are you in mourning?” she asked gently, looking at Celeste’s black kirtle.
“I—”
I lost my son. If she said it, Lady Yvolde would be full of sympathy, and she would have to pretend a sorrow she did not feel. She barely remembered the child, and though she had tried, she could not recall his death. No. She was done with grief.
“I stayed at an abbey before I came on pilgrimage. I have been ill, but I am well now.”
Lady Yvolde nodded. They rode together in a pleasant silence.
The days ran into one another. No new memories occurred to Celeste as she rode. Had she remembered as much as she was going to? Yet still nightmares pursued her, fragments catching her unaware in the shadow under a bush or the stray comment of a companion. Finally, she took Marie aside at a rest stop and asked her outright what had happened just before she became ill.
Marie looked startled. “Etienne died,” she mumbled when Celeste repeated her question.
“I know that,” Celeste said, annoyed. “Do you remember anything else, something I might have forgotten?”
“Is this a game?” Marie asked. “Because I need more hints.”
“I am weary of games,” Celeste said.
The Sorrow Stone Page 19