The Burning Road

by Ann Benson

  Was it expensive, she wondered, when his father gave it to him, more than six hundred years before? And what coin of which realm had he used to purchase it? The proud parent of Alejandro Canches had probably gone to a bookbinder to have the journal made, so that when the son went off to be educated he might have a permanent place to document the blossoming of his intellect. Sometime during the boy’s medical studies in Montpelier, his entries had switched from Hebrew to French. It was these later writings that Janie had painstakingly deciphered, word by word, through correspondence with an Internet group of Francophiles who reveled in la langue française ancienne. She had never shown the book itself to anyone but Caroline.

  But no matter how many times she turned the pages and read the words, there were questions that could not be answered. Now that she had time on her hands, and a reason to seek distraction, she turned to it more and more. It was beginning to make her nuts.

  “Why did you suddenly drop out of sight there?” she wondered aloud.

  Half of everyone had died in London in the year 1348.

  “Or did you run, like I did?” she asked again of the ancient physician.

  But if he’d run, why would he have left something of such importance to himself behind? She couldn’t envision him as the kind of man who would abandon something so precious.

  “Well, you died sometime, so rest in peace.”

  The old wooden Adirondack rocker made a thin but rhythmic creaking as she moved slowly back and forth with the book open before her. I left Bruce behind, and he was important to me.

  But these were different times.

  Weren’t they?

  3

  In different times, there would have been other materials that might be used for the task at hand, but now Kate had to sacrifice something so that it might be accomplished. She watched with pained dismay as Alejandro tore up one of her two remaining shifts and used the long white strips to tie the injured man securely to the table.

  “We shall buy you another,” he reassured her.

  “No doubt the Free Companies have left the weavers undisturbed that they may see to the making of women’s finery,” she said almost bitterly. “Another one shall not be easily had, Père.”

  “I know,” he said with a half-smile of apology. “Had I a shirt to spare, I would have used it instead.”

  “Why not the dead man’s clothes?”

  Karle protested. “Would you send him to meet his God naked? Since the time of Adam, men have been covered before God.”

  She sighed heavily. “It would have been better if we had the means to make some rope. Surely a proper vine grows somewhere nearby and has escaped the burnings.” She glanced at the semiconscious man who was now firmly secured to the boards of the table with the torn strips of her former finery. “In the meantime, I suppose my shift has gone to good purpose.”

  “Aye,” Alejandro said. “He must not roll or he may bleed red again.” He leaned over and spoke gently into his patient’s ear, though he thought it unlikely that the man could hear him. “We shall return soon enough. You will be safe here. Try not to cry out.”

  He hoped they would find the man alive when they came back. He did not speak of his doubts.

  When they set out just before dawn with the body of Karle’s unnamed soldier on the travois, the light was still thin, and as the forest deepened around them they had to step carefully. After a time, long beams of light began to ease their way. Small hidden beasts stirred in the bramble as the intruders progressed over the little-used path. Each time the caravan breached some sacred avian territory, the air would fill with the caws of protesting birds. But none of the offended came down from the heights of the treetops to ward them off. Their gruesome, bloating cargo was sufficient deterrent.

  “A curse on your horse,” Karle said as he struggled forward. “He is a miserable, intractable beast. Were he mine, I would beat him with a sturdy branch for such behavior.”

  “He has never liked the smell of death,” Alejandro explained. “That is why he balked. And I have suffered from the ill effects of a balking beast quite enough in my life. I do not wish to do so again.” The sight of the donkey rising up in protest filled his memory, accompanied by the scream of the young Spanish girl as the moldering cadaver in the donkey’s cart tumbled to the ground—the beginning of his tortuous flight through all of Europa, with its painful ending in London. He shoved it away and adjusted his grip on the wood poles of the travois. “Must we carry this thing?” he said. “Can it not as easily be dragged?”

  “Aye, and we will leave a trail across the forest floor that even a nobleman could follow,” the Frenchman Karle answered. “May it please God that Navarre does not ride out in search of me before we return for Jean. It was dark when I erased our tracks last night, and I was rushing to escape. I cannot be sure they are well enough hidden.” He glanced backward nervously and surveyed the trail their footfalls left in the sticks and leaves. “We will need a pardoner of extraordinary skill to erase the sin of our footprints on this forest floor.”

  “A cut branch will do better than any pardoner, I think, and will surely come cheaper,” Alejandro said.

  “There’s a bit of truth, God knows,” Karle panted. “And here’s another: I must rest for a moment.”

  After a few minutes, the unlikely trio resumed their pressing mission of mercy. In one hand Kate carried Alejandro’s small spade, a pitiful thing compared to the sturdy iron shovel the blacksmith Carlos Alderón had forged for him so long ago in Spain. Would that I had a pardoner back then to ease the consequences of that “sin,” he thought. But what pardoner would buy back the sins of a Jew? And at what exorbitant price?

  A fly landed lazily on his nose. He blew upward and it lifted off in search of another sweaty victim to bother, finally settling on the corpse.

  Yet what sin was it to be seeking knowledge? he wondered.

  His steady, trudging footsteps lulled him into remembrance.

  Almost ten years ago. The thought filled him with terrible remorse and he sank deeper into melancholy with each plodding step through the forest. Chaotic years of pestilence and turmoil and flight, of forced wandering through the whole of Europa, the last few years spent trying to elude the warring forces of Edward Plantagenet and a slew of that English king’s own cousins, all French royalty, none of whom seemed to understand that the true ruler of Europa was a pestilence so foul that its own Creator must surely quake in its presence. For a long decade Alejandro had watched the plague subside, return, subside, return, running hither and yon through France, England, Spain, Bohemia, and anywhere else its carrier rats could hide, sending to their graves in bruised and putrid condition nearly half the citizens of those “enlightened” societies. For one-tenth of a century he and the girl had fled from one “safe” place to another, hiding their identities, only to find that no place was really ever safe enough. Always, to see the golden child with the Moorish-looking man would raise someone’s eyebrow. Who did she resemble, the little beauty? Surely, their incredulous looks would accuse, she cannot be your daughter. And I have seen that face, or one so like it, before …

  They had spent the first cold winter hiding outside Calais, moving from one abandoned cottage to the next, always just a pace or two ahead of those who sought him for the handsome bounty his head would earn. He heard whisperings of a ghetto in Strasbourgh, and they rode there in a state of hopeful anticipation.

  On that winter afternoon they found not the expected safe haven, but confutatis, maledictus. Jews milled about the town square with their bundled possessions, surrounded by ready archers, having been herded there from Basel and Friedberg by frenzied Christians who shouted rabid, nonsensical accusations of poisoned wells. How he had admired the courageous Christian deputies of Strasbourgh who repeatedly said they could find no complaint with “their” Jews; he had prayed to whichever God would listen for that wisdom to prevail. But on the afternoon of Friday the thirteenth, he watched in horror as an angry mob dragged
the sympathetic deputies of Strasbourgh out of the council hall and replaced them with sympathizers. On St. Valentine’s morn, the Jews were given their choice: baptism or burning. Perhaps a thousand had come forward to receive the sacrament of St. John. The rest, some said fifteen thousand, were burned, many choosing self-immolation within the ghetto over slow roasting with their kin on the common platforms.

  He could almost feel their ashes drifting down around him, and the snickering of his balking horse seemed to fill his ears. The mud of the rutted roads seemed to fly up fresh in his face, blinding him, bringing tears to his eyes. Alejandro felt himself sinking into the horror, crying out for mercy, praying for deliverance.…

  He was surprised when he was rescued from his own abyss by Kate’s gentle voice.

  “Père …”

  She had seen this expression on his face a thousand times before, the glazed look of pain he seemed unable to hide. It came upon him often, unannounced, like the shadow of a mountain, and took away all of his light.

  “Père, we are here.”

  He seemed momentarily confused. “Wha—where?”

  “The clearing.”

  “Ah, yes,” he said in an unsteady voice. “So soon, then?”

  It was not lost on their companion, this quiet, practiced ritual of salvation. The Frenchman Karle read their expressions, and suspected that the daughter had rescued the father many times before. She has brought him back from some awful memory, he observed to himself as he lowered his ends of the poles. Almost mechanically, Alejandro did the same.

  “Hardly soon enough,” the young Frenchman said as he flailed his arms about to rid them of the stiffness. “Would you punish yourself further?”

  The physician took another moment to recover himself as Karle watched him carefully. He shook his head to clear it out and rubbed his face briskly. “No,” he said quietly, “this much punishment will do for now.” He reached out and took the spade from Kate, then pressed its tip into the soil, testing the firmness. “It seems soft enough here,” he said. “I will loosen the dirt, if you will scoop it away.”

  Karle nodded and got down on his knees. After every few thrusts Alejandro made into the soil, Karle used his bare hands to shove aside what had been loosened. Kate lent her hands to the task, and before long the hole was too deep to scoop from its edge. Karle stepped down into it and continued removing the dirt. They stopped digging when the rim of the hole was as high as his chest.

  “This will suffice, I think,” Karle said.

  It should be fully a man’s height deep, Alejandro thought to himself, or the animals will come. But he had seen far shallower graves, mass graves where hundreds of plague victims had been covered by what seemed like a mere shovelful of dirt, and this hole seemed almost a royal crypt in comparison. He extended a hand to Karle to help him climb out, and together they rolled the body into the grave, along with the severed arm of the other man.

  When the dirt had been tamped in place again, both men stood silent at the graveside. Kate was surprised that the Frenchman Karle, so eager to see his dead comrade properly buried, had so little interest in seeing to the man’s eternal soul. From Alejandro, such disdain was only to expected: he openly despised all Christian ritual. But soon it came clear to her, for the Jew and the Frenchman were staring at each other, preoccupied with their mutual mistrust. Prayers for the dead man were forgotten.

  Ah, Père, she thought sadly, when shall you lose your bitterness, if ever? He was terribly slow, she knew, to accept any newcomer into his confidence, and until he felt safe he would keep his deepest thoughts to himself.

  But the Frenchman was not so cautious or shy. “Well, it is done, then,” Karle said as he stood before them. “I could not have done this alone, and I am more grateful than I can say for your help. You do not know me at all, and yet you came to my aid. Perhaps this indicates some kinship of which we are not aware.” He stepped out of the clearing and broke three long, leafy branches off a nearby tree. “Compliant green pardoners for the trespass of our feet, and very cheaply had. We will drag these behind us as we walk out again, and I dare any noble to discover the sins of our footsteps.” He handed a branch to each of the others. “And perhaps on our way out of these woods, we new kin can uncover our similarities. Perhaps we shall explain to each other why it is that we are all hiding.”

  But Alejandro and Kate said little as the trio walked out of the forest. Guillaume Karle did not give them opportunity.

  “The battle was a complete travesty,” he said. “Once a mercenary from Firenze told me of a word they use there—fiasco—to describe when everything goes wrong. Well, nothing more could possibly have gone wrong in this battle. We were outnumbered, outarmed, and Navarre’s men were far more dedicated than we expected, though it seems uncanny that such a fiend could inspire loyalty of that sort.” He let out a pained sigh. “We rose against his forces yesterday afternoon, as we had heard that he intended to confiscate a goodly cache of wool from a farmer who had wisely stored it away. The man stood to make a decent sou when he sold it, a profit his cleverness surely merited! But Navarre would have it sent to the weavers to make winter tunics for his followers … it is not enough that he has taken every sack of wheat and every length of sausage between here and Bohemia; now he must have the means by which these poor souls cover their backs against the coming cold! And of all the great good fortune, the queen and all her ladies were in the castle at Meaux. Feasting on delicacies, while all around them peasants starve to death.”

  Food! Kate felt her stomach stir. She daydreamed as the Frenchman talked, of the golden loaves that Alejandro had always, in their earlier travels, pulled from some secret hiding place in his pack—a habit he had acquired from a well-admired but long-dead comrade. And I, the little fool, thought it was magic! Now I know it was wisdom. She glanced at Alejandro and saw the unsettled look on his lean face. No doubt he dreams of those same magic loaves as he listens to this Frenchman’s complaints.

  Karle kept walking and talking, dragging his branch behind him, every now and then looking back. “We stood our ground, and were gaining; victory seemed but a thrust away.” Then anger crept into his voice. “But out of nowhere came two knights returned from crusade. The ill luck of it cannot be believed! Cousins, one English, one French. But both sworn to uphold a lady in distress, no matter how disgustingly royal the knave she makes her bed with.”

  His bitterness seemed almost unholy in its depth. “They were too much for us; they came with horses and swords and bows, and we could not stand against them with our pitiful sticks and knives. By now that wool is on its way to Navarre’s weavers. No doubt it was passed directly over the bodies of those who died to protect it.”

  He seemed not to require refreshment, but thrived on his own words. “They treat the peasants as little more than animals, yet they expect them to produce, produce, produce! But there is not a plow to be had in all of France, thanks to the plundering of the Free Companies … and even if there were, what nags they have not commandeered are too decrepit to pull the plows. And should there by some miracle be horses and plows, there is no seed. It has all been eaten.…”

  They had heard these grumblings of discontent in their travels, but had, of necessity, stayed low, ignoring the growing chaos. Yet Guillaume Karle related the dire condition of France with evocative passion and heart. And as Kate listened to the recounting of his efforts on behalf of the downtrodden peasantry, she began to understand that Karle had taken the burdens of King Jean’s lowest subjects onto his own shoulders and was as much a fugitive as they.

  Substantial shoulders they were; she could not help but notice. He was a well-built, handsome man of unusual stature for a Frenchman. He was fair like her own people, and she found herself staring at him as the words poured out of his mouth. His step was firm and purposeful, and his gray eyes sparkled with the fire of excitement. He seemed to have found his way past the horrors of the previous night’s coup de grâce, and was already plotting anew.


  Before the sun had reached its full height, familiar landmarks began to come into view. They stopped in a small grove of trees when the cottage was perhaps only a hundred paces away.

  “I see no sign that anything is amiss,” Alejandro said as he peered through the branches, “but the quiet itself is bothersome.”

  “Compared to the din of battle, it is a blessing,” Karle said. He started to rise.

  Alejandro caught him by the wrist. “Wait.”

  “What of Jean? Should he not be attended to?” Karle said. He tried to pull his arm free.

  Alejandro gripped it more firmly. “Were he going to die of his wounds, he would already be dead. Be patient. Trouble is not always so quick to reveal itself. What the eyes cannot see, the heart can sometimes feel. And right now, my heart distrusts the peace that my eyes see.”

  Reluctantly, Karle crouched down again. He stared for a few moments through the branches. “Neither my heart nor my eyes report anything to me.”

  Alejandro grunted cynically as he peered through the trees. He turned back to Karle and said, “Your heart is young. When it is of an age with mine, you will know that it may be broken at any moment. I had a dear companion once who was a skilled warrior. He told me many times that such serenity as lies before us now can be disrupted in an instant.”

  They stayed where they were, silently watching the cottage for several minutes.

  “There is no one there,” Karle finally said. “Let us see to the injured man. I will take him back to his family, then I will try to see to the ones we left behind.”

  Once again Alejandro put a stop to his youthful enthusiasm. “Wait here. I will go ahead to see that there are no unwelcome visitors. I think perhaps you may be more hunted than I at the moment.” He rose slowly from his crouch. “I shall come back for you if it is safe to come forward.”