The Hand of Fatima

by Falcones, Ildefonso

  ‘Tomorrow’, the surgeon interrupted him, ‘you can speak to the librarian on Mesa’s behalf.’

  The Morisco looked at the permit thief. His almond-shaped eyes, glassy with the wine, stared searchingly at him.

  ‘Fate is fickle,’ joked Hernando.

  In spite of the fact that these scoundrels guaranteed his safety, Hernando did not get any sleep that night, but was constantly on the alert for anyone passing by him. He was still in danger and knew full well that a couple of gold crowns would be more than enough for many of those taking refuge there to smuggle him out of the cathedral. They came and went, arguing or joking, and for all the risk of sacrilege or excommunication they would be perfectly prepared to betray him. There was only one thought that could calm his torment and he clung to it, trying to not think of his dead family or his life in ruins: Barbary!

  The peal of bells announcing the service of lauds brought all the groups of fugitives in the garden to their feet. Hernando stretched, ready to join them before the flood of priests, musicians, singers and other cathedral employees began to overwhelm the area. He stopped, however, when he saw his night-time companions still lying idle.

  ‘Aren’t you getting up?’ he asked the surgeon, who lay next to him.

  ‘We know a better way to start the day, and it’s not at the command of the bells. Wait and you’ll see. One coin says yes!’ he exclaimed.

  ‘I agree,’ the Diver accepted the bet.

  ‘Two says he won’t manage it!’ bet Luis.

  ‘I’ll take that wager!’ Mesa cried.

  ‘Look,’ said the surgeon, pointing at a man standing in front of them. He was three or four paces away, between some orange trees in the middle of one of the pathways that ran from the cloister into the garden.

  Hernando watched him: he was bald, he had his eyes half closed and his mouth in a tight smile, as if wanting to hide his lips, although a tooth stuck out between them; he was standing like a statue, with a flat marble floor tile balanced on his head.

  ‘What’s he doing?’

  ‘Palacio? Wait and you’ll see.’

  Along with the people, some stray pigs and packs of dogs had also invaded the garden. They chased after the priests, in hot pursuit of the lingering scent of breakfast on their hands, or poised to lick the flagstones where the fugitives had eaten. Hernando noticed how some of the dogs put their tails between their legs and started running at the mere sight of Palacio.

  ‘Why—?’

  ‘Quiet!’ interrupted the Diver. ‘There’s always one that doesn’t know him and rises to the bait.’

  He started watching again precisely at the moment when a dirty hound with a kinked tail sniffed the man’s shoes and ragged red breeches. The dog turned round and round looking for the perfect spot and when it finally cocked its leg ready to urinate over Palacio’s leg, the man calculated the trajectory and tilted his head. The tile slid off, its full weight landing on the animal’s back. Rudely interrupted in the act it ran off, howling with pain. Still motionless, as if to salute his audience Palacio smiled broadly, uncovering his protruding tooth.1

  ‘Bravo!’ shouted Mesa and the surgeon, as they held out their hands for their winnings.

  ‘He always does this?’ asked Hernando.

  ‘Every day! Regular as the bells,’ answered the Diver. ‘Despite the fact on some occasions he has been forced to run from the dog’s owner, if it has one. We give odds of ten to one on the dog’s owner appearing,’ he added with a laugh.

  That night Hernando did not sleep in the garden.

  ‘Only yesterday at nightfall, probably at the same moment as he was sending his men to keep watch on the streets around the cathedral, the count requested an audience with the bishop,’ Don Julián explained after lauds, when he had heard the Morisco’s account of the previous night’s events. ‘I’ve been told he was beside himself with anger. I don’t think the bishop agreed to receive him, which means the Count of Espiel will do everything in his power to seize you. If he has to send a raiding party to kidnap you, he’ll do it. I’m sure of it.’

  ‘It was just a horse to him, Don Julián! A reject from the King’s stables! Why go to all this trouble?’

  ‘You’re wrong: it’s not just a horse, it’s his honour! A Morisco has sullied his name and trespassed on his rights; for a noble there is no greater insult.’

  Honour! Hernando remembered how, years ago, the knight who claimed descent from the Roman Quintus Varus had gone as far as to risk his life when he merely suspected someone had dared cast aspersions on his lineage. Then he recalled how he had made money from the gullible gentleman, and how he had run to hand it to Fátima. His Fátima . . .!

  ‘As you well know,’ continued Don Julián, interrupting his thoughts, ‘as well as being the librarian I’m also chaplain of the San Bernabé chapel, one of the three small chapels behind the main altar. Tonight I’ll get you a set of keys to its grille. While the gatekeepers are closing the cathedral and moving people out, you can hide in a cupboard there. I’ll empty it out during the day. Let a reasonable amount of time elapse, then come out. Find yourself some other place to sleep, but be careful to stay hidden. Even with the temple closed there are guards, especially in the treasury.’

  ‘You shouldn’t take such risks. If they find me . . .’

  ‘I’m old now, and there’s still much you can do for us, even if it’s from Barbary. God knows, you have suffered many setbacks, but the hope of our people rests on you and those like you.’

  The priest tried to convince Hernando that the other fugitives would not be concerned about his nocturnal absences. Hernando had not forgotten his promise to intercede on behalf of Mesa, the permit thief. The priest listened sadly and wearily promised to do what he could for him. Meanwhile, the Count of Espiel increased the vigilance in the streets. His henchmen stripped Aisha of the food she was bringing in, despite the fact this was also considered sacrilege and grounds for excommunication. It was this that finally convinced Hernando of the need to shelter inside the mosque at night. Don Julián, with the help of Abbas, who begged the priest to keep Hernando ignorant of his intervention, tried to find a way for him to escape to Barbary. Aware that this was the Morisco’s only chance, the count also turned his attention in this direction: his spies, with plenty of money and few scruples, paid off or intimidated all those involved in such dealings.

  Hernando found it relatively easy to avoid the gatekeepers who were chivvying out anyone still inside the cathedral grounds after vespers. Yet he couldn’t prevent his heart beating frantically, or his hands sweating. He was trembling so much that the bunch of keys he was carrying started to jingle. To him it sounded like a loud clang and he looked anxiously from side to side. Don Julián had oiled the lock and hinges of the excessively tall metal grille at the entrance to the small San Bernabé chapel.

  ‘Come on, out of the cathedral!’ he heard the gatekeepers demand, their voices raised but not shouting, as he shut the grille behind him. To his left the cupboard mentioned by Don Julián was concealed behind a magnificent tapestry.

  However, Hernando stood captivated by the reflections cast on the chapel’s white marble interior by the light from the oil lamps hung from the roof of the cathedral and the thousand flickering candles of the chapels and altars. He had passed by that chapel countless times but now, his fingers stroking the marble altar and altarpieces that completely covered the wall, he noticed how very different it was from all the rest. San Bernabé’s chapel was a gem of the Roman style so difficult to introduce in lands so intensely Catholic as those ruled by King Philip. The different scenes on the altarpieces had been sculpted by a French master in white marble, and contrasted strongly with the profusion of colours, gilt mouldings and dark or apocalyptic images which adorned the rest of the cathedral.

  Hernando took a deep breath, trying to saturate himself with the serenity and beauty that reigned in the chapel. Then he heard the gatekeepers return from closing the cathedral’s entrance gates. Th
ey began to check the grilles on each chapel. Hearing their laughter and banter, he jumped for the tapestry, and managed to get inside the cupboard just as the gatekeepers peered into San Bernabé’s chapel.

  That night he did not leave his hiding place. Exhausted after many nights filled with painful nightmares, he curled up on the floor and let sleep overtake him. He was awoken by the noise that broke out in the cathedral at dawn, and had no difficulty slipping out of the little cupboard: the office of prime was under way at the main altar and choir, at the far side of all the new building work. Not wanting to be caught with the keys he hid them beneath the lowest bar of the grille, tied on with a rusty piece of wire.

  Hernando did not leave the cupboard in the nights that followed either. He was frightened of being discovered, and so slept half sitting, hugging his legs to him, or standing up. Sometimes he just wept: for Fátima and his children, Hamid and all those he had lost. He had the whole long, tedious day to recover his strength. Each evening he bade a speedy farewell to his companions of the first night, and paid no heed to their curiosity. From a distance one morning he looked on as Mesa, the permit thief, was removed once and for all and handed over to civil justice. The guards were waiting in the street outside the Perdón gate. Aisha had appealed to the faithful brothers of the community to take Hernando food, and each day one of the many Moriscos came to the garden with supplies. Aisha also had to seek refuge among the Moriscos when the cathedral chapter unceremoniously evicted her from the courtyard house of Calle de los Barberos for not paying the rent.

  ‘To recover the back rent they’ve taken everything our brothers gave us,’ she sobbed. ‘The straw mattresses, the saucepans . . .’

  But Hernando had stopped listening to her: he felt that the last thread tying him to his previous life had broken; the house where he had found a happiness apparently forbidden to followers of the only faith was no longer his.

  ‘And the Koran?’ he suddenly interrupted, saying the word out loud. Astonished, Aisha glanced rapidly all round her in case anyone had heard.

  ‘I gave it to Jalil when they warned me of the eviction.’ Aisha paused for a few moments. ‘What I didn’t hand over was this.’

  With these words she discreetly slipped the hand of Fátima, the small gold necklace his wife had worn, into her son’s fingers. Hernando stroked the pendant; the gold seemed tremendously cold to the touch.

  That night, hidden in the cupboard in San Bernabé’s chapel, and with tears in his eyes, he kissed the hand of Fátima a thousand times. His wife’s scent filled his senses and her words echoed in his ears, the words Fátima had pronounced right there, in the house of the believers: Ibn Hamid, always remember the oath you have just sworn, and keep it, come what may.

  He swore to Allah that one day they would again pray to the One God in that sacred place. He squeezed the gold necklace in his hand. Keep it, come what may, Fátima had solemnly insisted. He kissed the necklace one more time and tasted the salty tears which soaked his hand and the gold. He had sworn to Allah! He had also sworn to put the Christians at her feet . . and now Fátima was dead. He had to keep his oath!

  He left his refuge and came out into the faint light of lamps and candles. He tried to work out how much time had gone by but inside the cupboard he lost all sense of it. Come what may! he repeated in his mind again and again. The cathedral was silent, except for a murmur of voices coming from the sacristy of the Punto, in the south wall. That was where all the implements for celebrating ordinary masses were kept, together with the cathedral’s treasure and relics. The main sacristy was on the right, followed by the sacrarium, in the chapel of the Lord’s Supper. Next to that, in the chapel dedicated to Saint Peter, stood the wonderful mihrab built by al-Hakam II, now defiled and converted into yet another ordinary sacristy.

  His heart in his mouth, Hernando passed around the high altar and the choir stalls, built in the centre of the cathedral. His attention was fixed on the entrance to the Punto sacristy, from where he could hear the guards’ voices. He reached the back of the Villaviciosa chapel, in the same nave as the mihrab. He skirted the chapel until he came to a halt with his back against its south wall, just in front of the believers’ holiest place, only nine columns away.

  Today I swear to you that one day we will pray to the one God in this sacred place. The oath he had made to Fátima echoed in his ears. Come what may! she had demanded of him. Suddenly, in the shelter of the forest of columns erected in homage to Allah, he felt strangely calm. The murmuring of the guards became the chanting of thousands of believers. For centuries they had prayed in unison in this very place. A shiver ran down his spine.

  He had nothing to purify himself with; neither clean water nor sand. He took off his shoes, raised hands wet with tears to his face and rubbed. Then he did the same with his arms, rubbing them up to the elbow. After running his hands over his head, he lowered them to his feet and continued rubbing as high as his ankles.

  Then, oblivious to everything around him, he knelt and prayed.

  Every day, hidden from the others’ eyes, he took care to purify himself properly before the cathedral gates were closed, using water from the garden well among the orange trees. At night he repeated his prayers, trying to reach Fátima and the children through them.

  Sometimes the guards emerged from the Punto sacristy to patrol the cathedral, but as though warned by God Hernando always noticed in time. He pressed his back to the wall of the Villaviciosa chapel and did not move, hardly daring to breathe as the guards passed through the building chatting unconcernedly.

  His companions of the first night disappeared one by one. Only Palacio continued every morning to try to hit the unhappy dogs drawn to the smell of his breeches and shoes.

  Whilst the ecclesiastical judge deliberated on his asylum and Don Julián unsuccessfully tried to overcome the problems the Count of Espiel’s constant vigilance and tricks posed for his escape, Hernando lived only for the moments when he knelt facing the kiblah. In a place so defiled by the Christians, he could still feel the vibrations of the true faith.

  Night after night the cathedral belonged to him. It was his mosque! His and all the true believers’; no one could take it from them.

  ‘Make way!’

  Behind three mace-bearers, more than half a dozen armed men, attired in red uniforms bordered with gold and coloured slashed breeches, burst through the Perdón gate into the garden. It was the morning of All Saints’ Day, the first day of winter.

  The Bishop of Córdoba himself, richly attired and surrounded by a large number of cathedral chapter members, waited at the gate of the Bendiciones arch.

  ‘Today, before the solemn mass,’ Don Julián had commented to Hernando that morning when he saw how busy the cathedral was, ‘the Duke of Monterreal, Don Alfonso de Córdoba, who has just returned from Portugal, plans to attend to honour his dead.’ The Morisco shrugged his shoulders. ‘I agree,’ conceded the priest, ‘it matters little to you, but I advise you not to stay inside the building during his visit. The duke is one of the Spanish grandees. A descendant of the Great Captain, he belongs to the house of Fernández de Córdoba and his men do not like people hanging around him. Making an enemy of another Spanish grandee is the last thing you need!’

  ‘Stand aside!’ shouted one of the duke’s men, violently shoving an old woman who stumbled in her escape.

  ‘Son of a whore!’ Hernando blurted out. He tried to catch the woman, but could not prevent her sprawling to the ground. As he bent to help her he noticed it had gone very quiet around him and several of those who were beside him stepped back. Still bending down, Hernando turned his head.

  ‘What did you say?’ the man hissed, coming to a halt.

  Hernando, still trying to help the old woman to her feet, held his gaze.

  ‘It wasn’t him,’ he heard the woman declare. ‘I let it slip, excellency.’

  Hernando shook with rage to see the cynical smile with which the man received the old woman’s words. Although s
afe from the Count of Espiel, he was a prisoner dependent on the aid of his brothers. Each day he received whatever food they could provide for him, as if he was a beggar. Day after day he listened to his sobbing mother’s tales of woe, and now a weak, elderly woman had to speak out in his defence.

  ‘Son of a whore!’ he muttered again when the servant, apparently satisfied, made to continue on his way. ‘I said son of a whore,’ he repeated, straightening up and letting go of the woman.

  The footman turned sharply and reached for his dagger. Those who still had not moved away from Hernando now did so as quickly as they could, and several of the lackey’s companions retraced their steps to see what was going on. The duke’s party was just entering the garden through the Perdón gate.

  ‘Put up your weapon!’ a priest watching the scene scolded the servant. ‘You are in a holy place!’

  ‘What’s going on here?’ one of the duke’s company asked. The servant held his dagger to Hernando’s chest. The other two men held him immobile.

  The duke himself, preceded by a servant carrying a long rapier held point upwards, and hidden between the chancellor, chamberlain, secretary and chaplain, was obliged to stop. Out of the corner of his eye Hernando could just make out the aristocrat’s luxurious robes. Behind the duke several richly dressed women were also waiting.

  ‘This man has insulted one of your excellency’s servants,’ a bailiff from the nobleman’s court answered.

  ‘Put your dagger away,’ the duke’s chaplain ordered the servant, coming up to the group. He waved his arms around in the air to push the cords of his green hat out of his eyes. ‘Is this true?’ he enquired, turning to Hernando.

  ‘It’s true and I claim sanctuary,’ replied the Morisco proudly. At the end of the day what difference did it make, one nobleman or two?

  ‘You cannot claim sanctuary,’ the chaplain stated calmly. ‘Those who commit a crime in a holy place lose the right to asylum.’

  Hernando went weak and felt his knees buckle. The servants who had him by the armpits pulled him upright.