Blood Secret

by Kathryn Lasky

  Today I have to go on one of my least favorite errands—to the Convent of Santa Ines on Calle Doña Maria Coronel. I do not like this convent. Some of the nuns are really crazy there. And that is why I have to go: to deliver the fresh pursalane and the aloe vera and then tell them about the egg whites for the blistering, although they should know all this by now. You see, these are the nuns who devote themselves to the memory of a noble woman, Doña Maria Coronel. They celebrate her chastity, for she deliberately disfigured her face with burning oil when King Pedro I demanded her as his mistress. To this day many of the nuns do the same. Their wounds become infected. The disfigurement is not required to join the order, but the new mother superior is said to encourage it. This woman, Mother Angelica, is a cousin of Friar Torquemado, the confessor to Queen Isabella. I once heard Papa say that Friar Torquemado was not quite right in his mind. So I guess it must run in the family, because since Mother Angelica came to this convent there are many more disfigurements. Papa has gently tried to speak to her about this, about how these young women could better serve Jesus if they were healthy. But she says it is a test of their faith. She is so proud in her disfigurement. Is not this kind of pride also a sin?

  “Luis, dear boy.”

  “I have the pursulane and the aloe vera.” I put the package into Mother Angelica’s hands as quickly as I can. I try to look only at her hands.

  “Bless you, child. Bless you.”

  There is one very strange thing about the older nuns who disfigure themselves. Their skin never wrinkles in the normal way but is unnaturally shiny on the surface. But beneath I sense a withering. I do not know what else to call it. Mother Angelica’s face is so weird. I can see even hidden in the shadows of her wimple, that single eye peering out, the right eye, for the left is gone. The empty socket puckers into a pit of red crimpings like a seam in which the threads had been drawn too tight. Her face is all pulled to one side. Half of the upper lip is gone, melted away like tallow.

  “Papa says if this does not work, he will send over a lotion of wine and myrrh.”

  “Oh yes. How kind. Yes, my dear, yes.”

  How can her voice sound so normal coming out from such a monstrous face? I turn and run down the street. And you know what? This is the strangest. I feel her eye following me—not the one that is there, not the right one. But the left one that was boiled out.

  When I get home, I head for the cellar room where Papa grinds the herbs into powders. “Where are you going?” Mama shrieks. “Why are you back so soon?” Mother asks, and touches the St. Francis medal at her throat. “You can’t go down there yet,” she barks. “Go outside and play.”

  I feel my face harden. I hate this. More and more they treat me like a baby; more and more I am having these feelings of being left out. Then I hear footsteps coming up from the cellar. It’s Papa who comes through the door first, Don Gabriel follows him, then José Catalan and Gaspar and Isaac Alonso. What is this? What is going on in the cellar? None of these men is a doctor, or an apothecary.

  But when the last man comes, I nearly gasp out. It is my uncle Tomás Mendez, the repostero major, the king’s chief butler. What is my uncle doing here?

  Mama starts to speak. “I am sorry—”

  Papa breaks in. “I think the time has come, Brianda.”

  “Yes,” says Uncle Tomás, and then in a lower voice, “he turns thirteen next month, does he not? He would be bar mitzvahed had he studied.”

  Bar what? Studied what? I don’t know what they are talking about.

  “All right, gentlemen.” Papa is brisk. “I think you should take your leave in the usual manner. Don Gabriel, you first from the front door. Remember the packet of theriac powders I gave you. Hold it prominently.” Don Gabriel is already on his way out. “José, from the back door, and Gaspar, you through the courtyard. Your brother Isaac from the front door in five minutes. Tomás, you will wait and take a glass of wine. I have a good new bottle of tinto. We shall explain together to Luis. Come, Brianda; come, Luis; come, Tomás.” I follow Papa to the cellar.

  Everything looks just the same. Papa’s worktable where he keeps his mortars and pestles for the grinding is in place. The little coal brazier for boiling herbs still glows. On a shelf in jars filled with spirits, organs of various animals float, waiting for Papa’s dissection tools. Papa walks over to a cupboard where he keeps splints. He takes out a long, rectangular box.

  “Come here, my son.”

  I watch and am completely mystified as Papa takes from the box a small skullcap and puts it on. Tomas also puts one on and then, to my surprise, they place one on my head. Then Papa begins speaking words in a language I have never heard.

  “Baruch ata Adonai Elohainu melech ha’olam malbish arumim.”

  “Papa, what are you saying?”

  “Blessed are You, Lord our God, Ruler of the universe, who clothes the naked.” Don Miguel pauses. “That is the language of our faith, Luis. I am just learning it. It is Hebrew, and I just said the blessing for wearing a new piece of clothing.” He taps the skullcap he has just placed on my head. “You see, I know so few blessings and words in Hebrew.” I look surprised. “You think because I am a doctor I know everything? Oh no, I am just starting to learn. Tomás as well, and look, he is the secretary to the king.”

  “What do you learn, Papa?”

  “We learn how to be Jews.”

  “Jews? We are to be Jews?” I am completely confused.

  “We were Jews once long ago—your great-great-grandparents—but we were forced to convert, and now as Conversos, as New Christians, they begin to treat us worse than when we were Jews. So many of us think, what kind of religion is this where they now make laws against the New Christians, where they persecute us, often violently, and try to exclude us?”

  My own father feels excluded. This very thought sparks like tinder in my head. I thought only kids felt excluded.

  “How do you mean, Papa? Who is being left out?”

  “Don Gabriel, an alderman. Fray Alonso Hoyeda says Conservos cannot hold office.”

  “I know about him, Papa, but everyone says that friar is crazy.”

  “He is crazy. And he has great influence with Friar Torquemado.”

  “Queen Isabella’s confessor.”

  “Yes. There were troubles three years ago. You might have been too young to remember. The menudos resented that the Conversos had many of the high-paying jobs in court. Pressure was brought to bear on the king, and the king agreed to write to the pope in Rome asking for permission to establish a council of inquisition.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The Inquisition is to be a group of men from the church who would look into matters of faith to be sure that everyone practices the true faith, the faith of the Roman Catholic Church, because some Conversos were suspected of secretly practicing their old religion.”

  “But Papa, you are practicing your old faith.”

  Don Miguel nodded somberly. “But do I want to belong to a faith that preaches hatred?” He smiles reassuringly. “Don’t worry. We shall be careful.”

  I touch the medal of St. Francis of Assisi just like the one Mama wears. She had given it to me on the occasion of my First Communion. “That is why,” Papa says, “you must continue to wear your medal. We must give appearances of our Christianity.” Papa pauses and looks troubled for a moment. “Besides, the medal was a gift of love and love does not change. St. Francis loved all things, and there is always more to learn from loving than hating.” He brushes his thumb lightly down my cheek. “But do not fret, Luis. So far the king has not appointed the men to the council of the Inquisition. It is Tomás’s feeling that the king wants none of this. But in the meantime, we men like Tomás and Don Gabriel and Don Gaspar and Isaac and Don José Catalan have indeed come back to the faith of our fathers. We want to be Jews even if we must be secret ones. And so we plan a Seder.”

  “Secret Jews,” I whisper. “Do Rosita and Elena know this secret?” Papa nods. So at last I am
included in something. But it feels scary.

  My part is coming up. In another minute Papa will ask me to say the four questions—that is my job as the youngest at the Seder table. But the problem is, no one can remember what the fourth question is. No one at this table has ever been to a Passover dinner before. I see these grown men with gray in their hair fumbling for words. It is not just the four questions that they are unsure about. There are many other things as well. But the men try to piece together what they have heard and what they think they might have heard. But still the dinner is nice.

  “Ready, Luis?” Uncle Tomás asks.

  “Yes, Tío.” I clear my throat and begin. “Why is this night different from all the other nights? Because on all other nights we eat leavened bread and on this night we eat only unleavened bread, matzo.” And I hold up a piece of the unleavened bread that Mama baked two days before, at night when the maid was gone and would not notice. Next question. I take a big breath and hold up a horseradish root: “Why on this night are we supposed to eat especially bitter herbs?”

  And now the third question. I pick up a piece of parsley and hold it by the stem: “Why on this night do we eat parsley?”

  José Catalan breaks in. “I think the proper question—although, Luis, you are doing excellently—is ‘Why on this night do we dip twice the parsley in the salt water?’” I nod and begin the question again.

  But still no one can remember the fourth question. Tomás said that the questions would be answered as the story of the Jews’ flight from Egypt was retold, and this is the part of the Seder, the story of the Exodus, that most interests me. Their flight from slavery. But it gives me a shudder to think about those men Papa spoke of, the men of the Inquisition. They might be able to have the power to make slaves out of the very people who sit at this table, make them slaves or perhaps kill them. And then we too, like those in ancient Egypt, would have to flee.

  As I eat the food, I begin to see that this is the strangest meal that I have ever eaten. It is not just that the food is different but that each dish is a symbol for something else. The parsley dipped in salt water is supposed to remind people of the sweat and tears of the enslaved Jews of Egypt. The green parsley itself is a symbol of hope and the coming of spring. There are certain times when we are to drink wine from our cups, but no one is quite sure when. But, still, I think, even though we are in the cellar, I have never seen such a beautiful table. Mama laid the table with the best linens, and over this is a cloth of the most beautiful lace that had been made by a cousin’s great-grandmother. So it doesn’t really matter to me if the men cannot remember everything about this meal called Seder, because now I no longer feel left out. Now I feel that I belong to something older than time and bigger than Spain, more important than kings and queens and more precious than all the riches and relics of any cathedral.

  This is my favorite part of the meal: At the end we all stand up and, raising our wine cups, say together the words “Next year in Jerusalem!” In that moment I really do feel something in me, some unnamable part, maybe my soul, join with those ancient ones of the Bible with the little children, their mothers, their fathers, the grandparents who stood on the edge of the Red Sea and waited for it to part. Jerusalem—what a lovely sounding word. It is like bells in my ears. I think that when I grow up, if I ever marry and have a daughter, I shall name her Jerusalem. It would be the most beautiful name in the world.

  But I think Rosita will be the first of us married. I see her sneaking out to meet Juan Sebastian. I can’t believe Mama! Can she not tell that Rosita is going out to meet a boy? Under her scarf my sister has her hair piled high and I think she has rouged her cheeks. You don’t go to the convent like that. I plan to follow her.

  As soon as Rosita rounds the corner after leaving the Convent of the Incarnation and steps into an alley, she takes off her scarf. I see it all from a niche in the wall of the alley that is a perfect fit for a small boy like me. I see her pull out a shiny piece of obsidian from the pocket of her kirtle and peer into the blackness. She is pleased with her reflection. I could almost hear her heart skip a beat, however, for when she looks up she sees two nuns walking toward her. They look up and smile at her, terrible, ghoulish, lipless smiles. They are from the convent of Santa Ines. “Bless you, child,” they whisper, almost conspiratorially.

  Rosita begins to thread her way through narrow streets to another alley. I shadow her expertly. She turns down an alley with no name, but in the middle of a dark stone wall there is a rust-colored door. She enters it and I am left outside. A terrible feeling creeps through me. An icy fear. I am so frightened for Rosita suddenly. I turn and run.

  Last year when I walked like this behind my parents and between my two sisters to midnight mass on Christmas Eve, I was shorter than both Rosita and Elena. Now I am taller, nearly as tall as Papa. And last year when I walked to Mass I had been a Christian, and this year I am a Jew. But I shall take Communion as I always do. I shall kneel in prayer alongside Mama and Papa and my sisters. My prayer, however, will be much different. The words on my lips will be those of the Paternoster and the ones in my heart will be the Hebrew ones I have learned in the past few months, those of the Shema.

  Tonight after the mass, after we return to our house on the Calle de Jeronimo, Papa leaves by the back door through the courtyard. He will wind his way through the dimmest alleys to the church of San Salvador, the church where José de Catalan and Don Gabriel still serve on the governing body. Pedro Fernandez Benedeva, a deacon of the church and father of one of the church priests, will meet with them. He will give a report on the weapons he has brought into the cellar of his house. The men are preparing. I have followed Papa maybe thirty times since September, when it was found out that indeed men had been appointed to the tribunal of the Inquisition. Now on this Christmas Day the men of the tribunal have finally arrived in Seville. But Papa and his conspirators will be prepared. Arms have already been distributed to many important Conversos. All I know is that the inquisitors must not be allowed to take office. For this will be worse than when the pharaohs ruled in Egypt.

  I hide in a tree in the neighboring courtyard where I can watch and know when the men have all entered the church, and then I sneak into the reliquary of the church to listen. The shadows are thick and I do not like to think what is inside the boxes and small caskets that rest in the niches. They are holy relics. In one there is a finger of St. Sebastian, and in another a piece of hair from St. Jude. Death swims around me, but this is the only place where I can hear what Papa and his conspirators say. They are in the cellar beneath me and I can listen through a grate in the floor. I have listened over the weeks and heard the men speak of Jews and New Christians who have been tortured and killed in other cities. So I know that I have nothing to fear from the bones and organs of dead saints. No, it is just the living that I fear. But tonight the men take a long time to get inside the church and it is cold up in the tree. At last they are inside and I get ready to jump from my perch, but just then shadows slice across the doors of the church. I am petrified. I cannot take a breath.

  “This way!” a voice hisses.

  “Juan Sebastian,” another calls in a low whisper.

  Juan Sebastian! What is Juan Sebastian doing here? He knows! Fool that I am. I had thought for a long while that Rosita had stopped seeing him, but a month ago I suspected they were seeing each other again. What has she told him now?

  I am paralyzed in a waking nightmare. Time is slow, moments seem endless. I see men, the king’s men, go into the church. I hear shouts, but they sound muffled and now Papa…Papa is first. His hands are bound. His face an eerie white. A ribbon of blood curls down my papa’s cheek. The other men follow. I begin to scream, but no sound comes out.

  I know that I have to get back to our house and warn Mama. And just as I turn the corner, my heels grind into the cobbles. I am too late. One moment stretches into endless ones as I watch Mama and Rosita and Elena led away. Elena and Rosita are put into a separate
wagon, and I hear the police chief direct the driver to take them to the Convent of the Sacred Virgin, many leagues out of the city of Seville. Mama, however, is to be taken to the office of the Inquisition. So I follow. I do not know where such an office is, but I certainly have not imagined that the wagon would stop at a wine shop behind the Plaza Major. There are three wagons lined up outside the shop—all with prisoners, their hands bound and now cloth sacks covering their heads. And there is something very curious I notice. The wheels of the wagons have been wrapped in cloth as well as the feet of the horses. The horses’ mouths have been muzzled. The door to the wine shop opens and the prisoners are led in.

  That is the last time I see my parents until nearly two months later, on February 6, 1481.

  But I have learned my first lesson of the Inquisition: The Inquisition comes in silence.

  It did not take long for them to rename our street. It was soon called La Calle de Muerte, the street of death. It was named after Mama and Papa, burned at the stake in the first auto-da-fé of the Inquisition. Within days of their arrest, everyone knew that it was because of Rosita that the conspirators were discovered. But I still do not believe Rosita was truly a traitor. She loved Juan Sebastian. She trusted him. But what does it matter now? I live between the shadows, in a time between time. I sleep in the old house of the lepers. No one comes near there. It is the safest place I can be, really. If I were discovered, they would throw me into prison. Girls they send to convents, but boys of my age—and I am soon to be fourteen—they send to prison. And where are these prisons? No one knows for sure, but it is said there are caves and dungeons beneath the city.