My Lord, the Hermit Page 5

  He had heard Midge say, ‘What have I done?’ and the voice seemed to be coming from a long way away.

  He had heard the girl breathe, lightly. He saw the colour rise in her cheeks and as she blushed and turned from him, he could feel twin emotions of ecstasy and dismay. He had given Joanna his mother’s brooch because he loved her, and because he had wanted her to remember him. They might never meet again. He had parted with his greatest treasure, and yet it was right that he should do so.

  Since then he had had no more than a few minutes’ sleep at a time, in six days. He slept and dreamed and woke. He could not eat. He could not work. He was feverish and leaden-limbed.

  ‘I will run away,’ he said. He spoke the words aloud. His voice was hoarse. He left the church, turning his back on it. He had tools, acquired one at a time, here and there. Some had been given him in the quarry, some he had made himself. He could easily strike out the rivets that bound the cuffs to his ankles, and then he could go. It would mean breaking his oath, but it did not seem to him, in that moment of despair, that that was of the slightest importance. He could never finish the chapel, and in any case, since he had not built it alone, the consecration of the chapel would not release him from his oath.

  The sun was high and warm on his face. In his weakened state, it seemed to beat him back, back into the chapel. Why? There was nothing there. …

  With one part of his mind he was aware that he was on the edge of madness. He found himself standing before the altar. He lifted the cross high, intending to dash it to pieces on the floor, in rejection of his oath. Then he desisted. The cross was not his to destroy. He had cut the wood, true: but the rest of the workmanship had been provided by others, even down to the paint which had been laid upon it only last year. The cross was no more his to dispose of than the church was. He replaced it on the altar. He said, ‘Help me!’

  There was silence around him.

  Well, he would go. There was nothing to prevent him from leaving, once he had struck off his chains. He could go anywhere and do anything. His mother had died two years previously, so he need not think of her. Midge and Herkorn would understand. He could take on work as a mason, or a carpenter, or even become a soldier, though that would mean binding himself to serve another man, which he did not particularly wish to do. There was war in the land, they had told him, and it might be that he could make himself some money by capturing the odd knight … enough to buy a small piece of land somewhere, and settle down to farming it. …

  There was a movement in the doorway behind him, and the dog barked. He knew it was a woman, for he could hear the whisper of her robe, and the murmur of her voice as she hushed her child. He could hear the little one’s fretful wail.

  He could not bear it. Why must they come to him for succour, who had nothing but despair in his heart? He could not help others, who could not help himself. He was too tired. He had not slept properly since … when? He leaned on the altar, and closed his eyes. Perhaps she would go away. But no, she would not go away. They never did. No doubt she thought he was very holy, leaning there, praying, whereas the truth was that he was too tired to stand upright.

  The child cried again, and again she hushed it. There was no strength in her voice, either. She had probably walked for miles, carrying the child in her arms.

  He could not help her.

  Again the child cried.

  Oh, Lord. Not of myself, but of your strength, help her. I am an empty vessel, useless to your purpose. But help the child, and I will … what can I offer? No, I cannot! You cannot ask that of me!

  The child whimpered.

  The man got his fingers round the edge of the altar, and pushed himself to his feet. He turned and made his slow way out of the chapel into the light. The woman held out her child to him. It was a boy of some four or five summers, with a festering head wound. He was delirious.

  ‘Help me,’ whispered the woman.

  The hermit smiled at her. He straightened up, and took the child from her. The boy cried. The man began to hum an ancient song, a lullaby which his nurse had sung to him, years ago. The fear in the woman’s eyes receded.

  Joanna walked in the meadows by the river with the Lady Elizabeth and her two daughters. The prospective nuns were dressed simply, in grey, and the Lady Elizabeth wore a veil over the wimple and gorget on her head. A steep hillock rose to the curtain wall on the southern side of the castle, and because of the roughness of the terrain there, no proper houses had been built outside the walls; only peasants’ hovels. On this side of the castle, however, to the north and west, the land sloped gently down to the river, and then spread out in a pattern of well-tilled strips, farmed by the peasants and freedmen who lived within and without the castle walls. In the meadow beside the river a shanty town of hard chalk blocks, or cob dwellings, had risen to house the workmen. A cluster of buildings in yellow stone surrounded the spare ribs of the new chapel, towering above all.

  ‘The new abbey,’ said the Lady Elizabeth, pointing it out to Joanna. ‘My brother builds and endows it, under the direction of Father Hilarion. When it is finished, I shall be its first abbess, and my daughters will join me within its walls.’

  Joanna looked at the two colourless girls, and looked away. She did not know whether to commiserate with them, or congratulate them. The elder of the two, who was more lively than her sister, smiled at Joanna as if to say, ‘It doesn’t matter; we are resigned to our fate.’

  ‘It is a beautiful site,’ said Joanna, being diplomatic.

  ‘The convent buildings are nearly finished,’ said the Lady Elizabeth. ‘It will attract women of property from all over the south-west. If you don’t wish to marry Julian, you should think about joining us, Joanna.’

  ‘I will think about it,’ said Joanna. But even as she promised, she shuddered. The sun was warm on her head, and there were swans floating nearby on the river. A breeze lifted tendrils of hair across her cheek, and a workman, wheeling a barrow, smiled at her, and ducked his head as he passed. She did not think she could bear to be shut up behind convent walls, deprived of the sight of swans – and the appreciation of men. Especially if it meant being confined to such depressing company. There was no getting away from it, she thought; her aunt and cousins were decidedly miserable. It came of having holy thoughts, she supposed. Then she thought of Keren, the hermit, and of his joy in giving and she fell to wondering – not for the first time – how such a great sinner could be so joyful.

  They were close in among the buildings. The master mason, a middle-aged man with a harassed expression, was talking to Father Hilarion. The four women joined the men. Father Hilarion was inquiring about the progress of the work.

  ‘Late,’ said the master mason. ‘We have lost time again this week. The stone-cutters are nervous, working at the quarry so far from the castle. They fear Sir Bevil and his men will fall on them one day.’

  ‘I will ask the Count to set a guard on the quarry,’ said Father Hilarion. ‘The building of God’s house must not suffer through man’s folly.’

  This echo of Midge’s philosophy made Joanna smile. Father Hilarion looked at her, seeking to discover the source of her mirth. She hurried into speech.

  ‘Is there something amiss, Master?’ she asked the mason. ‘You appear worried.’

  The mason was fidgeting from foot to foot, glancing up now and then at a particular portion of scaffolding on the wall above. ‘Trouble between two of the men,’ he said. ‘A little bad feeling … always has to be watched, when they work so high up. They should not work on the scaffolding when they are disgruntled, but then, we must not lose more time. …’

  ‘I will speak to them,’ said Father Hilarion.

  ‘No, father,’ said the foreman. ‘It is a mere nothing.’

  ‘It is not a mere nothing, if it disrupts the building of God’s house. Ah, is it some more of that superstitious nonsense?’

  ‘No, no. Merely that one of our men was forbidden to leave the work party at the quarry yester
day to visit the hermit. We could not allow one man to wander up there alone, you see, with Sir Bevil’s men roaming the forest. Now he is surly, and has quarrelled with his brother, and when they work so high. …’

  Father Hilarion expelled his breath with some force, but before he could speak, a cry was heard overhead, followed by a crashing sound, and a sickening thump. Men ran to the base of the wall, dropping tools and scattering building materials. Over and above the hubbub rose a cry, ‘Thomas!’ It was the desolate cry of a man bereaved.

  A burly man in homespun lay on his back amid rubble at the foot of the wall. He had fallen from scaffolding which swung on chains from the wall high above. His trowel was still in his hand, and his eyes were open, but his body was twisted.

  ‘Is he hurt?’ ‘He won’t die, will he?’ ‘It is a judgment on him.’

  The man strove to lift himself. He screamed with agony. Joanna knelt beside him, and thrust her rolled-up cloak beneath his head.

  ‘Am I dying?’ asked the man.

  ‘That is as God wills,’ said Father Hilarion. He bent and pulled the man’s legs straight. The man groaned, but did not lose consciousness. Joanna remembered the way Keren had touched her, and wished he could have been there. Surely he would not have been so rough!

  ‘It is God’s will, then,’ said Thomas. ‘For I swore by the Cross that I would take food to Keren five days since, and I did not. We were gambling that afternoon, and I thought it would not matter if I delayed one day; and the next day we ate the food that Master Midge had given us, and I thought to get some more, only then we were prevented from leaving the quarry to go up the hill, and I am forsworn. It is God’s judgment on me.’

  ‘Come, now,’ said Joanna, taking the man’s hand in hers. ‘Keren would not say so, I am sure. He is not so petty-minded.’

  ‘Ah. Do you think he will forgive me?’ His eyes were feverishly bright. His hand moved within hers.

  ‘I know so. Did he not heal me?’

  ‘I heard.’ His eyes wandered round the circle of his companions, but it was noticeable that he did not look at Father Hilarion. ‘Forgive me, brother. I had no right to say such things to you. Kiss my wife for me, and the children.’

  ‘Come, now,’ said the master mason. ‘Cheerily, good Thomas. You are not going to die.’

  ‘Yes. I can feel nothing in my legs, and that is a sure sign. Lady, do not let me go! Hold on to me!’

  ‘I am holding you fast,’ said Joanna, suiting action to words. She looked up at her aunt and cousins, for help. They were on their knees, somewhat apart.

  Father Hilarion raised hand and voice. ‘Repent, forswear your superstitions, and be returned to the fold. …’

  ‘I would not die unshriven,’ cried the man. His strength was failing. His eyes went to the wall from which he had fallen. ‘There is a curse on this place. I did not believe it, but it is true. The Church will not be finished, unless the hermit helps us. Hold me fast! Shrive me! I am falling …!’

  She lifted him, but it was all over. She held a dead body in her arms.

  Father Hilarion’s nostrils flared. ‘Superstition! The man was delirious! Back to work!’

  One by one the men drifted away, but they did not resume their work. The foreman stood to one side, twisting his hands, and looking to the hills. Joanna closed the dead man’s eyes, and folded his arms across his chest. There was silence all around them. Work had ceased on the church.

  CHAPTER THREE

  MIDGE the Fool went looking for the Lady Joanna, and found her wandering in the meadows beyond the unfinished church.

  ‘Why, lady: here’s folly to mope when the sun is shining!’

  ‘A man is dead,’ quoth the Lady Joanna, ‘and he died unshriven, although a priest was to hand. A man hungers, because I took his bread and did not replace it.’

  ‘If fault there was, lady, that fault was mine. Herkom has sent meat and bread up there this afternoon.’

  ‘Yet he may be dead already. I have been talking to the workmen here. They say Keren has not been seen in the quarries for about ten days – since we saw him. Apparently there is some arrangement whereby he is given a block of stone, for so many days of work in the quarry. Father Hilarion frowns to hear this. He says the men are grown superstitious, that they have turned away from the Word of God. The men say Keren is a good workman, and that their labour is made light when he works beside them, and goes badly when he is absent. He has become a talisman to them. The master mason says there are always deaths in quarries and on high buildings such as this, but so far there have been no deaths in the quarry. Only here, on the church. The men say this is because Keren is there to help them at the quarry, and because he is always ready to drop his tools to care for their hurts. They say the church here will never be finished unless Keren works on it with them.’

  ‘Lady, what is this to you?’

  ‘He healed me.’ Yet her eyes avoided his.

  ‘He has healed many, lady. Come, cease your sighing, and turn your mind to lighter things. You were looked for this morning. We had a fine rehearsal of the fight of St George and the Dragon, and my Lord Julian acquitted himself so doughtily that Herkom had to beg a plaster from one of the waiting-women, for his head.’

  ‘Julian is a fool.’

  ‘He is no scholar, lady. He is young and untried, but there is no malice in him, and he is ready to sit at your feet. Smile on him, lady, and he will be as wax in your hands.’

  She sighed, ‘Perhaps. I have a riddle for you, Sir Fool. How can a good man do evil things, and an evil man, good?’

  Midge caressed his chin, and looked sideways at the Lady Joanna. And she continued to frown on the river as it flowed by.

  ‘There is good and evil in all of us,’ said Midge at last.

  ‘That is no answer. Do you think a man loses his earthly desires when he vows himself to God?’

  ‘I think not. It is well-known that Father Hilarion scourges himself from time to time, and it is rumoured he wears hair breeches as well as a hair shirt on Fridays. Lady, let me turn your mind to more joyful things. I have a song for you to learn in the character of the Princess. It is a sad enough song to suit your mood at the moment. The Princess sings it when she is bound to the rock, waiting for the approach of the Dragon. She sings of the knight of her dreams, and begs Heaven to send him to her.’

  ‘Truly I am a prisoner of the Dragon of Ill-humour. Well, I will learn your song, but not now, for I am sad today.’

  She seated herself on the river bank. Midge sat down beside her.

  ‘Well, lady. It shall be as you wish. There is a song for St George, too, but I will not ask my Lord Julian to sing it, for he cannot hold a tune. But little lord Amory could sing the doctor’s Cure Song, which is very jolly and full of jokes, and there is a fine stamping dance for the Saracen knight.’

  ‘Is there no joyful song for me to sing? I will try not to be so doleful.’

  ‘Indeed, yes. But it is a love song, full of praise of your lover. The words are, perhaps, not best suited to my Lord Julian. I will work on it for you, to make it suitable.’

  ‘Tell me of the lovers for whom you wrote this pageant. This was some time before you came here? I know you have been with my uncle for some years now, but. …’

  ‘Four years come Michaelmas. Nay, this was some ten or eleven years ago, when we served a puissant lord far away. When I say “we”, I mean Herkom and I, for we were brought up together. Many a buffet has he saved me from with his strength, and many a punishment have I talked him out of, with my wit. For he has always been a stupid, obstinate fool, who prefers to tell the truth, when it would be wiser to be silent. And I have always been a crooked weakling.’

  ‘And your two lovers before? Am I like your previous Princess?’

  ‘Nay, lady. She was small and light of foot, and her voice was like a bell, so sweet that you had to bend your ear to hear her. She was full of merriment to those who knew her, but shy in company.’

  ‘She sounds l
ike Joyeuse. And what of your St George in times gone by?’

  ‘He was young and high-spirited. There was no horse he could not ride, and no knightly art at which he did not excel. He saw no evil in men, and he was greatly loved.’ Midge sighed.

  ‘It ended badly?’

  ‘Sadly, lady. She died in childbirth, and he was so stricken with grief that he followed her to the grave soon after.’

  Joanna was silent. She envied the good fortune of that long-dead couple, who had loved each other so greatly that death could not hold them apart. Julian would never mourn for her like that, nor she for Julian. A small figure in black had been in their sight for some time, wandering in the meadows by the river. Now and then he bent down to pluck something from the grasses, and put it in his pouch.

  ‘Now there,’ said Midge, pointing, ‘is someone who might be able to answer that riddle of yours. He does not often come down into the valley. He must have need of herbs which are only to be found at the water’s edge.’

  Her lip curled. ‘A hedge-priest?’

  ‘There are hedge-priests and wandering friars, as there are evil men and good. That is Father Ambrose, whose mission in life is to comfort the sick at heart. He has no fixed boundaries to his parish, and he sleeps wherever night overtakes him. His password is “mercy”, he is kindliness personified, and welcome wherever he goes; except where Father Hilarion holds sway. Our proud chaplain is so far above the hedge-priest that he finds it difficult to understand him. Yet of the two, if I had to make my confession, I would choose Father Ambrose, for he is wise and understands human frailties. The penances he lays upon us are within reason, and there is no man who does not feel the better for having spoken with him.’ The Fool stood up. ‘As for me, I must away to prepare a frolic for the Count’s supper table. He is in no humour for ill-prepared jests at the moment.’