Stigmata

by Colin Falconer

  ‘I don’t ask them to come.’

  ‘Who do you think you are? This laying on of hands is to stop forthwith. Do you understand me?’

  ‘But she helps so many people, Reverend Mother!’

  ‘Sòrre Bernadette, you are far too gullible. She is making a fool of you and you cannot see it.’ She turned back to Fabricia. ‘It is to stop. Now. Do you understand?’

  ‘Yes, Reverend Mother.’

  ‘Good. Now get out of my sight. Both of you.’

  XXXVII

  THE ABBESS ENFORCED a strict Rule. Instead of the soft bed and bearskin rugs she had had in Saint-Ybars, they had given her a hard plank bed with a thin covering of straw.

  The bell woke them in the middle of the night for the service of matins. She had already come to hate the sound of that bell. Still groggy with sleep, she pulled her black habit over her chemise and got out of bed, her feet freezing on the cold stone as she searched in the dark for her wooden clogs. Then she went down the stairs and across the icy cloister to mumble through the psalms in the gloomy choir stall with the other novices. When she first arrived her breath formed white clouds on the air even as she sang the offertory, and she could not even feel her fingers touch together when she prayed. She had to break a skin of ice on the trough in the cloister just to wash. What would it be like here in winter?

  A few hours’ sleep. Then the bell again, for prime. They broke their fast with dry rye bread and water, mixed with a little wine. Nothing more, as most of what they produced – the fruit from the orchard, the grapes from the vineyard, the milk and butter from the cow – was sold in the village or bartered for milled grain and firewood.

  They had all been assigned their chores. Fabricia had been made cellaress, a lonely occupation, but she supposed that from the beginning the abbess had wanted to keep her separate from the other novices. The cellar was in the undercroft below the dorter. It was a gloomy cavern, but now that summer had finally come to the mountains the air inside was scented with hops and old apples and cheese.

  She would spend the mornings counting the garlic and jarring the honey, only breaking off when the bell summoned them yet again to the chapel for more prayer. They went back to their cells after compline, a few hours’ sleep, the bell again, and then it all began once more. There was little time or opportunity for friendship, or even for conversation. Besides, some of the other novices had taken vows of silence.

  She remembered what Simon had told her once, in that other life she had had, in Toulouse. It is not enough just to love God. If you will bear the vows you must have a disposition sufficiently robust to serve him for all your years, not just one or two.

  Fabricia felt hungry and exhausted all the time and there was no prospect that she would ever feel anything else. I don’t know if I can live this way the rest of my life, she thought. I miss the life I had, and I miss the life I dreamed of having. But there’s no choice. I suppose I’ll get used to it.

  The morning after her interview with the abbess, instead of going to the gate after prime and working her way through the line of pilgrims come to ask her to lay hands, she went straight to the cellar to start her chores. Flies circled slowly above a long table; fat bluebottles crawled frustrated over the linen cloth that had been placed over a bowl of warm goat’s milk. A wasp danced frantically around the lid of a honey pot. Where to start? There were olives in sacks in the corner that should be put in jars for preserving.

  By now they will be calling out my name at the gate, she thought. It seems cruel to deny them their hopes. But what can I do? The abbess rules my life now. In a way, she was relieved it was forbidden her, for it drained her of the little energy she had, though she felt ashamed that she should feel so.

  Her hands ached; her feet hurt her too much to stand. She sat down heavily on a stool and removed her gloves. She should wash the wounds and put on a fresh linen bandage before she started work. She made her way painfully back up the stairs and along the cloister to the water trough.

  She filled a wooden bucket and set it on the ground. The sun bounced off the surface of the water, quicksilver, and she blinked and closed her eyes. When she opened them again, the water swirled and dipped and in the depths she saw dead-eyed men running through the dorter, their daggers drawn. Sòrre Bernadette was sprawled on the floor, naked and half dead, with blood on her thighs. A handsome man with green eyes and gore on his shirt stood over her with a knife.

  She threw off her wimple and stuck her head into the trough. The shock of the cold water banished the vision. She looked around. Just a pleasant Midi morning with mare’s tails chasing a blue sky. Where did such nightmares come from? She was going mad, she was sure of it. ‘Please, My Lady, make this stop,’ she murmured.

  What was happening to her? When would this end?

  XXXVIII

  IT HAPPENED ON the feast of Mary Magdalene. They were at compline; Fabricia was half-dozing in the choir, longing for the liturgy to end so she might snatch a few hours of sleep before the next office. The abbess collapsed suddenly, her face the colour of beet, froth forming at her lips. Sòrre Bernadette and several others carried her from the chapel, the sacristan running after them.

  Afterwards Fabricia went back to her cell with the other novices, fell instantly into a black and dreamless sleep. She was woken by the sub-prioress, pulling her to her feet even before she had opened her eyes.

  ‘You must come,’ she said, and led her through the dorter in her shift.

  The abbess’s cell was little different to her own: bare stone walls, straw on the floor, a hard pallet for sleeping. The room was lit by a single taper. A large wooden crucifix hung on the wall above the abbess’s bed, and the Lord Jesus seemed to writhe with every flicker of the candle in the draught.

  The old lady wore only her shift. Her hair was grey and shorn close to the skull, her face swollen and purple as if she had been choked. Someone had placed a rosary between her fingers. She was making a wet, gasping noise as if she were drowning. The sacristan and the infirmarian knelt beside the bed, praying.

  As Sòrre Bernadette walked in, the sacristan said: ‘We have sent the porteress to find the priest.’

  Bernadette turned to Fabricia. ‘Can you help her? At least keep her alive until the priest gets here?’

  ‘I have been forbidden.’

  ‘She forbade you. Not me.’ And then to Fabricia’s astonishment, Bernadette took her hand and went down on one knee. ‘Please, Fabricia. You have a special gift, from God. You have no cause to love her, I know, but I have known the abbess from when I was a novice and I believe her a good woman at heart. Help her.’

  The infirmarian and the sacristan moved aside for her. Fabricia fell to her knees. She placed both her hands on the old woman’s chest and closed her eyes in prayer. The Our Father, ten Hail Marys. When she was finished she got back to her feet.

  ‘Is that all?’ the sacristan said.

  ‘What else do you want me to do?’

  ‘But . . .’ She turned to Bernadette. ‘I expected more.’

  ‘Do you smell that?’

  The other two nuns frowned. One of them said: ‘It smells like flowers.’

  ‘Lavender,’ Sòrre Bernadette said.

  They all looked at the abbess. There seemed to be little change in her condition. Fabricia turned to Bernadette. ‘May I return to my bed now, sister?’

  ‘Of course. Thank you, Fabricia.’

  She went back to bed. In moments she was asleep.

  XXXIX

  TWO DAYS AFTER the feast of the Magdalene, the abbess was sitting up in bed, sipping broth. She did not look as formidable to Fabricia without her wimple and habit. She appeared smaller somehow, though no less stern. Fabricia hoped for reconciliation with her.

  The porteress had fetched the priest from Montclair and he had given her the extreme unction. The next morning she had rallied. Now look at her, Sòrre Bernadette said. She will outlive all of us.

  ‘I am glad to see you recovered,’
Fabricia said.

  ‘It was just a fainting spell,’ the abbess said. ‘There was nothing much wrong with me in the first place.’ Fabricia saw the infirmarian exchange glances with Sòrre Bernadette.

  ‘You wished to see me, Reverend Mother?’

  ‘Indeed I do. I have disturbing news.’

  ‘My parents are well?’ Fabricia said, alarmed.

  ‘This is of much greater consequence than the health of your family. You have heard that the Pope has sent a crusade against the heretics the Count of Toulouse has fostered here in the Albigeois all these years?’

  ‘It will not affect us here, surely?’

  ‘The Pope’s holy Host have taken Béziers. Everyone inside the walls has been slaughtered, praise be to God, the city burned, even the cathedral.’ Bernadette put a hand to her mouth. ‘They have tasted God’s vengeance for their sinfulness, to the last man, woman and child.’

  ‘What about the priests?’ Bernadette said.

  ‘They had the chance to leave and they chose to stay. They are as guilty of harbouring heretics as the Count himself. They will answer to God now.’

  Fabricia crossed herself. ‘I thought they came to make war only on the heretics, and on the Count’s soldiers.’

  ‘Anyone who gives shelter to heresy spits in God’s eye.’

  My mother is a heretic, Fabricia thought, and my father loves her. As do I. Does that make us heretics, too? Does this mean we will burn, no matter how many masses we partake, how many confessions we make?

  ‘That is ghastly news,’ Bernadette said.

  ‘It is God’s holy wrath, retribution against sinners. We should celebrate the return of holy law to the Albigeois.’

  ‘But what has this to do with me, Reverend Mother?’

  ‘The infamy you bring us with your so-called healing and other hysterical nonsense was never welcome here. But in times such as these, it could be calamitous. You are to leave here, today.’

  Fabricia turned to Bernadette for support, but she seemed as shocked as she. ‘But she laid hands on you,’ Bernadette protested to the abbess.

  ‘You should not have allowed her to do such a thing! You think she raised me from the dead, is that it?’ She pointed an accusing finger. ‘Even to consider it is a blasphemy. Only Our Lord has the power to heal. Will you give her the credit every time any one of us wakes from a faint?’ The blood rose to her cheeks. The effort of shouting had exhausted her. ‘She is to leave here immediately.’

  ‘But where shall I go?’ Fabricia said.

  ‘It is no longer my concern. I have judged you unsuitable for this life. Now go. Leave me in peace.’

  *

  Fabricia waited for the porteress to open the gate. She no longer wore her habit, just the simple brown tunic of a village girl. Her few belongings were tied in a bundle. Sòrre Bernadette ran across the cloister with several other nuns and threw herself on her knees. ‘I cannot believe she would do this to you. What are you going to do?’

  Fabricia was shocked and embarrassed to see the sub-prioress crying at her feet so she dropped down to her knees beside her. ‘I’ll be all right. I shall go back to Saint-Ybars and to my family.’

  ‘I pray that He will keep you safe.’ She pushed a bundle with bread and cheese into her hands. Sòrre Marie, the porteress, was crying now, too. The other nuns watched from the other side of the cloister, their faces hard.

  Fabricia stood up and went out through the gate. What am I going to do now? she thought. It seems nowhere I go is safe.

  XL

  The Minervois, Pays d’Oc

  WHAT A MISERABLE place.

  Godless, Father Ortiz had said. ‘If the Devil had a birthplace, it is here; the very air is tainted with heresy. Turn over a rock and a heretic comes crawling out.’

  They followed the old Roman road, straight as an arrow, mile after tedious mile of it. There were stagnant land-locked pools on either side, some yellow scrub and salt pans. The heat was dashed at them by the fierce winds that blew off the Golfe du Lion.

  The horses twitched and switched their tails, tormented by countless midges, while the cicadas rattled and hummed. No birdsong here; the local people had eaten them all. Simon felt something sting his neck and slapped at it. He felt light-headed. His body itched and stank under the black woollen habit. He glanced over at Father Ortiz. His face was blotchy red and shining with sweat and he barely had strength to swat at the flies. His mouth was open, panting in the heat.

  We suffer for God. It is the way we show our love.

  He squinted against the glare. There was a long line of horsemen ahead of him, two by two, each with a red cross on their white tunics. They rode upright, as they had been trained to do. Their discipline was faultless. And such horses they rode! Huge spirited animals, swinging their crupper cloths and tossing their heads, made more fearsome by their canvas hoods.

  The squires rode behind, their masters’ long shields slung on the sides of their own horses, three azure eagles on a sable background, the device of the house of Soissons. Each of the baron’s knights had brought with them a small troop of foot soldiers and some cavalry, their vassals, friends and relations, their squires and sergeants. A dozen knights; perhaps three hundred men-at-arms, by Simon’s calculation. Not a large army, but not a small one either.

  Simon and Father Ortiz rode at the rear on their poorer mounts, alongside the supply carts. The armour was packed in there; the coats of chain mail were only for the knights, because of its expense, though a squire might have a mail hauberk that reached to his knees if his master was generous. A sergeant might have a broigne, a jerkin sewn with strips of leather. The common soldiery made do with a shield and a prayer for luck.

  They had been assured that Béziers was only two leagues more, three at most, and it was there that they would finally join the Host. Their plan had been to link up with the crusader army in Nîmes, but they had been delayed on the way from Toulouse when Father Ortiz caught a fever, had lost almost a week while he recovered in a monastery outside Millau. By the time they arrived the great Host had already started its advance to the south. They prayed for better fortune and God had granted it; the next day Baron Gilles de Soissons arrived from the north with his army, on their way to join the crusader force, and he had offered them escort.

  Simon sagged in the saddle, sore and thirsty and faint with heat. Father Ortiz threw up a hand to halt and he supposed that he needed to rest. Simon and the two servientes with which the Bishop had furnished them stopped also. The soldiers rode on, except the two at the rearguard some twenty paces back.

  There was a woman by the side of the road, rocking gently back and forward on her heels, clutching a bundle of rags to her breast. What made Father Ortiz stop? Simon wondered. Nothing unusual to this. The road was full of pilgrims and the poor.

  One of the servants got down from his horse and went over to her. ‘What has happened?’ Father Ortiz asked.

  He spoke to her in the langue d’oc. ‘She says her child is sick, Father,’ he said.

  ‘Bring her here.’

  Leaning from his horse, he uncovered the filthy bundle she was holding in her arms. It was an infant, newly born, its head of a gross size and misshapen. ‘The child is dead,’ he said.

  She shrieked and drew away.

  ‘What is your name?’ he asked her. ‘Where are you going?’

  She didn’t answer. Father Ortiz got down from his horse. ‘Give me the child,’ he said. There was some quality to his voice that made her obey, half mad as she appeared to be. ‘The child is dead,’ he repeated, ‘and we must now look to his soul. Do you believe in Jesus your Saviour and his Holy Apostolic Church?’

  The woman’s eyes were huge, like a child’s. She nodded. She had no strength to resist Father Ortiz’s charity.

  ‘Has he had water poured on his head by a priest?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘Then we shall baptize him here and he will have a Christian burial so that his soul might be saved
in heaven. Do you go often to church?’

  Another barely discernible nod of the head.

  Father Ortiz turned to his servants. ‘We must bury the child,’ he said and ignored their looks of complete astonishment. The ground was baked hard and it seemed to Simon the poor men were as near fainting as he was. But they did as they had been ordered, scraping a shallow grave from the pale dirt.

  Father Ortiz performed a hurried baptism using a little water from the leather bottle at his waist, and then he took the stole from a satchel on his saddle and spoke the words of committal. All the while the two soldiers of the rearguard, who were now their only protection on the lonely road, grumbled and shook their heads, disgusted that he should have inconvenienced them so for the sake of a peasant woman.

  The infant was placed into the shallow grave and covered over. It will surely be dug up again by foxes or dogs as soon as we are gone, Simon thought.

  They remounted their horses.

  ‘What about the woman?’ Simon asked Father Ortiz.

  ‘We shall take her with us.’ He led her to his horse and told her to get up into saddle.

  ‘Father Ortiz?’ Simon asked. ‘Is this wise?’ He supposed what he meant was: is this dignified?

  ‘I shall walk.’

  ‘Then you must have my horse.’

  ‘No, it is my decision. It is what Jesus would have done.’

  And that is why Father Ortiz walked the rest of the way to Béziers. For, as he said, that was what Jesus would have done and he could do no less.

  Béziers

  When they arrived, the crusader Host had already been and departed. Fifteen thousand souls had lived in the town once. They were still there, but they lived no longer. Simon did not trouble himself to see them, but he could smell them. They were mostly charred, he was told; what was left of them anyway.

  The afternoon heat lay ponderous on the burned stones, the citadel exhaling the stink of butchery. Fragments of grey ash still floated in the air. Here and there black smudges drifted upwards. A wall of the cathedral shimmered and fell as he watched. The air was heavy with the drone of meat flies. Vultures and crows dozed on the walls, replete. Dogs yelped and fought over scraps, though there was plenty to be had. No human sound.