Cathedral of the Sea

by Ildefonso Falcones

  This time Joan did not doubt for a moment the truth of what he was told.

  “Brother Berenguer’s penitent is your own sister,” he told the king as soon he was brought before him, “Queen Constanza, who begs that you bring her to your palace, by force if necessary. Once here, free from her husband’s pressure and placed under your protection, she will reveal all the details of the treachery.”

  Accompanied by a battalion of soldiers, infante Don Jaime presented himself at Framenors to carry out Queen Constanza’s wishes. The friars allowed him in, and the infante and his soldiers went directly to see the king. All his protests were in vain: Constanza left for the royal palace soon afterward.

  The king of Mallorca had little more success when he appeared before his brother-in-law.

  “Since I gave my word to the pope,” King Pedro told him, “I will respect your safe conduct. Your wife will remain here under my protection. Now leave my kingdom.”

  As soon as Jaime of Mallorca and his four galleys had departed, King Pedro ordered Arnau d’Erill to make haste with the trial against his brother-in-law. A few days later, the magistrate ruled that all the lands of the unfaithful vassal, who had been tried in his absence, were to pass into the hands of King Pedro. Now the king had the legitimate excuse he had been seeking to declare war on the king of Mallorca.

  Overjoyed at the possibility of reuniting the kingdoms that his forebear Jaime the Conqueror had divided, King Pedro sent for the young friar who had revealed the plot to him.

  “You have served us well and faithfully,” the king told him. This time, he was seated on his throne. “I shall grant you a favor.”

  Joan had already been told by the royal messengers that this was what the king intended to do. He had thought hard about it. He had joined the Franciscan order at his teachers’ suggestion, but as soon as he had entered the Framenors convent, he had been sorely disappointed: Where were the books? Where was the knowledge? Where could he work and study? When he finally spoke to the prior, the old man patiently reminded him of the three principles of the order, as established by Saint Francis of Assisi: “Complete simplicity, complete poverty, and complete humility. That is how we Franciscans must live.”

  But Joan wanted to investigate, to study, to read and learn. Hadn’t his masters taught him that this too was the way of the Lord? Whenever he met a Dominican monk, he was filled with envy. The Dominican order was mainly devoted to the study of philosophy and theology, and had created several universities. What Joan most wanted was to join their order and to be able to continue his studies in the prestigious university at Bologna.

  “So be it,” the king decreed after hearing Joan’s argument. All the hairs on the young friar’s body stood on end. “We trust that one day you will return to our kingdoms endowed with the moral authority that comes from knowledge and wisdom, and that you will apply that authority for the benefit of your king and his people.”

  26

  May 1343

  Church of Santa Maria de la Mar

  Barcelona

  ALMOST TWO YEARS had gone by since the Barcelona magistrate had ruled against King Jaime the Third of Mallorca. All the bells in the city were ringing incessantly; inside Santa Maria, still without walls, Arnau listened to them with a shrinking heart. The king had declared war on Mallorca, and the city had filled with nobles and soldiers. On guard outside the Jesus chapel, Arnau could see them among the ordinary people who had flocked to the church and the square outside. Every church in the city was holding a mass for the Catalan army.

  Arnau felt weary. The king had assembled his fleet in the port of Barcelona, and for several days now, the bastaixos had been working nonstop. One hundred and seventeen ships! No one had ever seen such an array: twenty-two huge galleys all fitted out for war; seven potbellied transports for carrying horses; and eight big troop ships with two or three decks, for housing soldiers. The rest of the fleet was made up of medium-sized or small boats. The sea was covered in masts as the ships maneuvered in and out of the port.

  It must have been in one of those galleys that Joan, in his black habit, had sailed off to Bologna a year earlier. Arnau had accompanied him to the shore. Joan jumped into the boat and sat with his back to the sea, smiling at him. Arnau watched him settle, and as soon as the oarsmen began to row, he felt his stomach wrench and had to fight back his tears. He was on his own.

  He felt the same even now. He looked around him. The church bells were still ringing from every bell tower in the city. Nobles, clergymen, soldiers, merchants, artisans, and the ordinary inhabitants of Barcelona were thronging Santa Maria. His fellow guild members stood on guard beside him, and yet how lonely he felt! All his hopes, all his life’s dreams had vanished just like the old church that had given way to the new one. There was nothing left of it. No trace at all of the Romanesque church: all he could see was the huge, wide central nave of the new Santa Maria, bounded by the soaring arches and the roof vaults. Beyond the columns, the exterior walls of the church were still being built, with each stone being patiently placed on top of another.

  Arnau looked up. The keystone of the second vault in the central nave was already in position, and now work was going on to place the ones in the side naves. The birth of our Lord: that had been the subject chosen to be sculpted on the boss. The presbytery roof was almost completely finished. The next one, the first over the immense central nave, was still incomplete. It looked like a huge spiderweb: the columns of the four arches were still open to the skies, while the keystone hung in the center like a great spider ready to leap out on the finest threads to devour its prey. Arnau could not help staring up at the slender columns. He knew how it felt to be trapped in a spider’s web! Aledis was pursuing him more and more insistently every day. “I’ll tell your guild aldermen,” she threatened whenever Arnau hesitated, and so he sinned with her, again and again. Arnau turned to observe his fellow bastaixos. If they only knew ... There was Bartolomé, an alderman, and Ramon, his friend and protector. What would they say? And now he did not even have Joan with him.

  Santa Maria itself seemed to have turned its back on him. Now that it was partly roofed over, and with the buttresses in place to hold up the side naves of the second vault, the city noblemen and rich merchants had begun work in the side chapels, determined to leave their mark in the shape of coats of arms, images, sarcophagi, and every kind of decoration sculpted in stone.

  Whenever Arnau came to the church these days in search of help from his Virgin, there was always some merchant or nobleman busy among the building work. It was as though his church had been stolen from him. The newcomers had appeared all of a sudden, and they often paused proudly at the eleven already built chapels of the thirty-four planned all round the ambulatory. By now the birds of the coat of arms of the Busquets family could be seen in the All Saints chapel; the hand and lion rampant of the Junyent family in the Saint James chapel; Boronet de Pera’s three pears carved in the keystone of the Saint Paul chapel; the horseshoe and stripes of Pau Ferran in the marble of the same chapel; the arms of the Duforts and the Dussays and the font of the Font family in the Saint Margaret chapel. They had even forced their way into the Jesus chapel! There, in his chapel, the chapel of the bastaixos, work had begun on the sarcophagus for Bernat Llull, the archdeacon of the sea who had begun the building work on the new church, next to the coat of arms of the Ferrers.

  Arnau passed by nobles and merchants, his gaze lowered. All he did was carry stone and kneel before his Virgin to ask her to free him from the spider pursuing him.

  When the religious services were over, the entire city made its way down to the port. King Pedro the Third was there, decked out for war and surrounded by his barons. While infante Don Jaime, count of Urgel, was to stay in Catalonia to defend the frontier of the Ampurdán, Besalú, and Camprodón, which were adjacent to the lands on the mainland ruled by the king of Mallorca, the other nobles were all sailing off with the king to conquer the island. They included infante Don Pedro, the senes
chal of Catalonia; Pere de Montcada, admiral of the fleet; Pedro de Eixèrica and Blasco de Alagó; Gonzalo Diez de Arenós and Felipe de Castre; Father Joan de Arborea; Alfonso de Llòria; Galvany de Anglesola; Arcadic de Mur; Arnau d’Erill; Father Gonzalvo García; Joan Ximénez de Urrea; as well as many other noblemen and knights, all of them equipped for battle, with their soldiers and those of their vassals.

  Maria, who had met Arnau outside the church, pointed to them, shouting for him to look where she was pointing.

  “The king! The king, Arnau. Look at him! Look at the way he bears himself! What about his sword? Can you see it? And that nobleman over there? Who is he, Arnau? Do you know? Look at all those shields, their armor, the pennants fluttering ...”

  Maria dragged Arnau all the way along the beach to Framenors. There, some distance from the nobles and soldiers, stood a large group of filthy, poorly dressed men. They had no shields or armor and wore only long, stiff tunics, greaves, and leather caps. They were busily climbing on board small boats to take them out to the warships.

  Their only weapons were flat swords and spears!

  “Is that the company?” Maria asked her husband.

  “Yes. The Almogavars.”

  The two of them watched in the same respectful silence as all the others on the beach staring at these mercenaries who had been taken on by King Pedro. The conquerors of Byzantium! Even the children and women who, like Maria, had been impressed by the nobles’ swords and armor, surveyed the Almogavars with pride. They fought on foot and wore no protection, relying entirely on their skill and dexterity. Who could possibly laugh at the way they were dressed or the weapons they carried?

  Arnau was told this was what the Sicilians had done: they had laughed at them on the field of battle. How could such a ragged group hope to fight nobles on horseback? And yet the Almogavars defeated them and conquered the island. The French had done the same: the story was told throughout Catalonia to anyone who would listen. Arnau had heard it on several occasions.

  “They say,” he told Maria now, “that some French knights captured one of the Almogavars and led him before Prince Carlos of Salerno, who insulted him, calling him a poor wretch and laughing at the Catalan company.” Arnau and his wife were still watching the Almogavars climb on board the boats. “So then the Almogavar, in front of the prince and all his knights, challenged their best captain to single combat. He said he would fight on foot, armed only with his spear. The Frenchman could be on horseback, in full armor.” Arnau fell silent, but Maria turned and urged him to go on. “The French laughed at the Catalan, but accepted the challenge. They all made their way to an open field near the French camp. There, the Almogavar first killed the Frenchman’s horse, then took advantage of how unwieldy he was fighting on the ground and soon defeated him. As he was preparing to cut the knight’s throat, Carlos de Salerno promised the Almogavar his freedom.”

  “It’s true,” someone added behind their backs. “They fight like real devils.”

  Arnau could feel Maria clinging to him, gripping his arm as hard as she could while she stared at the mercenaries. “What are you looking for, woman? Protection? If you only knew! I’m not even capable of facing my own weaknesses. Do you think any of them could hurt you more than I am doing? They fight like devils.” Arnau stared at them: men who were happy to go off to fight, leaving their families behind. Why ... why could he not do the same?

  It took hours for all the men to board the ships. Maria went home, while Arnau wandered among the others gathered on the beach. He met several of his companions on the way.

  “What’s all the hurry?” he asked Ramon, pointing to the small craft that were continuously coming to take on more and more soldiers.

  “You’ll soon see,” Ramon answered.

  At that very moment he heard the first whinny of a horse, soon followed by hundreds more. The army’s horses had been drawn up outside the city walls; now it was their turn to embark. Several of the seven buses were already full of horses, brought from Valencia with the noblemen from that city, or from the ports of Salou, Tarragona, or from the north of Barcelona.

  “Let’s get away from here,” Ramon warned Arnau. “This is going to turn into a real battlefield.”

  Just as they were leaving the beach, the grooms led the first steeds down to the water. They were huge warhorses, which kicked, snorted, and threatened to bite, while their handlers struggled to control them.

  “They know they’re off to war,” Ramon told Arnau, as they sought cover behind the boats drawn up on the beach.

  “They know?”

  “Of course. Whenever they’re put on ships, it’s to go to war. Look.” Arnau peered out to sea. Four of the flat-bottomed buses drew up as close to the beach as they could and opened their stern doors: they splashed into the water, revealing the gaping hulls inside. “And those who don’t know,” Ramon went on, “are made nervous by the ones who do.”

  Soon, the beach was filled with horses. There were hundreds of them, all big, strong, powerful beasts, warhorses trained for combat. The grooms and squires dodged in and out, trying to avoid the rearing, biting animals. Arnau saw several of them fly through the air or flinch as they were caught on the receiving end of a flashing hoof. Everything was bedlam.

  “What are they waiting for?” asked Arnau.

  Ramon pointed to the ships once more. Some of the grooms were wading out to them, leading their horses.

  “They are the most experienced ones. Once they are on board, they will attract the others.”

  And so it proved. As soon as the first horses reached the ships’ ramps, the grooms headed back to the shore. The horses immediately started whinnying loudly.

  That was the signal.

  The rest of the herd plunged into the water, splashing so much that for a few moments they disappeared entirely from view. Behind them and on either side, a few of the most expert horsemen followed, cracking their whips and driving them toward the ships. Most of their grooms had lost the reins by now, and the horses swam or floundered on their own, careering into one another. For a while, there was total chaos: shouts from all sides, the lash of whips, animals neighing and struggling to climb up onto the ramps, roars of encouragement from the beach. Then, gradually, calm returned to the shore. The ramps were raised, and the horse transports were ready to set sail.

  The order to depart came from admiral Pere de Montcada’s ship. All 117 vessels began to pull out of the harbor. Arnau and Ramon walked home along the beach.

  “Off they go,” said Ramon, “to conquer Mallorca.”

  Arnau nodded without a word. Yes, off they went. On their own, leaving behind their problems and their heartbreak. Cheered off as heroes, their minds set on one thing: war. What he wouldn’t have given to be among their number!

  ON THE TWENTY-FIRST of June of that same year, Pedro the Third attended mass in the cathedral of Mallorca, in sede majestatis, wearing the traditional robes, attributes, and crown of the king of Mallorca. Jaime the Third had fled to his possessions in Roussillon.

  The news reached Barcelona and spread through the mainland; King Pedro had taken the first step toward keeping his word of reuniting the kingdoms split on the death of Jaime the First. Now all that was left was for him to conquer the territory of the Cerdagne and the Catalan lands on the far side of the Pyrenees: Roussillon.

  Throughout the long month that the Mallorca campaign had lasted, Arnau could not get the image of the royal fleet leaving the port of Barcelona out of his mind. When the ships were already some way from the shore, everyone on the beach split up and returned home. What reason did he have for following them? To receive care and affection he did not deserve? He sat in the sand until long after the last sail had disappeared beyond the horizon. “Lucky them, to be able to leave their problems behind,” he said to himself over and over again. Throughout that month, whenever Aledis lay in wait for him on the track up to Montjuic, or when afterward he had to face Maria’s loving attention, Arnau could hear the shouts a
nd laughter of the Almogavar company, and see the fleet slipping into the distance. Sooner or later, he would be found out. A short while earlier, while Aledis was still panting on top of him, someone had shouted from the track. Had they heard the two lovers? They lay for a while holding their breath; then Aledis laughed and fell on him again. The day he was found out... it would mean disgrace, expulsion from the guild. What would he do then? How would he manage to live?

  When on the twenty-ninth of June, 1343, the whole city of Barcelona came down to meet the royal fleet assembled in the mouth of the River Llobregat, Arnau had made his decision. The king had to fulfill his promise to conquer Roussillon and the Cerdagne, and he, Arnau Estanyol, would be part of his army. He had to get away from Aledis! Perhaps if he did that, she would forget him, and when he got back ... He shuddered: after all, this was war; men would die. But perhaps when he returned he could take up his tranquil life with Maria once more, and Aledis would no longer pursue him.

  King Pedro the Third ordered his ships to enter the port of Barcelona in strict order of hierarchy: first the royal galley, then that of infante Don Pedro, then Pere de Montcada’s, followed by the one Lord Eixèrica commanded, and so on.

  While the rest of the fleet waited, the royal galley made its way into port and sailed round it, so that everyone who had gathered on the shore could see it and cheer.

  Arnau heard how everyone roared their approval as the ship passed in front of them. The bastaixos and boatmen were standing close to the water, ready to build the pontoon for the king. Also waiting next to the bastaixos were Francesc Grony, Bernat Santcliment, and Galcerà Carbó, all of them Barcelona aldermen, and other guild aldermen. The boatmen began to maneuver their craft into place, but the aldermen told them to wait.