Sylvia

by Bryce Courtenay

  Rosa still longed to visit Cologne with me and then an opportunity eventually came when she received a message from the monastery of a most delicate matter. It was a request from the abbot and was delivered by a young monk who wrung his hands and blushed scarlet, but eventually stammered out his requirement. Rosa came to see me, as she had no idea how she might comply. I saw it immediately as the opportunity for her to visit Cologne that we had been waiting for. And so she requested an interview with the abbess.

  She had knocked on the door of the chapter room one morning after the abbess had whipped the day’s miscreant novices and was writing their names in the book of punishment. ‘Come!’ the abbess called. Then looking up and seeing Rosa, ‘What is it, Rosa?’ she asked impatiently. ‘I am busy, so be quick!’

  ‘Magistra, there is a need for me to go to Cologne,’ Rosa said directly.

  ‘Need? What need?’

  ‘An urgent need, Magistra.’

  ‘This is a convent, we do not have urgent needs, Rosa. We contemplate the blessed Saviour and conduct ourselves in prayerful repose as the Virgin Mother Herself has taught us.’

  ‘Yes, Magistra. Then it is a reposeful and contemplative urgent need,’ Rosa insisted.

  ‘Don’t talk nonsense, Rosa! What is it you want? I don’t have all day. No, you may not go to Cologne!’ All this said in a single breath.

  ‘Not even for the abbot’s piles?’ Rosa asked, all of an innocent expression.

  ‘Piles? Abbot! What of the abbot’s piles?’

  ‘The monastery has asked if we have an unguent for such a malady, as the poor abbot suffers mightily.’

  ‘And do we?’ the abbess asked primly, looking down her nose.

  ‘Nay, but we may get one,’ Rosa replied.

  ‘Where? How?’

  ‘In Cologne, Magistra.’

  ‘How know you this?’ the abbess demanded to know.

  ‘Little Sister Sylvia, Magistra.’

  ‘Ha! Her! How?’

  ‘She knows a famous herbalist who is an expert in this malady, Magistra.’

  ‘Methinks that one thinks she knows all there is to know. How doth a young woman know of such a treatment? It is a thing of old men.’

  ‘A past tutor, Father Paulus, did suffer much and she did find this unguent that relieved it and brought him much comfort,’ Rosa said inventively.

  ‘With her it’s all about knowing. Her head is empty of common women’s things and filled with ointments for piles!’

  ‘Yes, Magistra, she is very clever.’

  ‘Clever! I think not. She knows not how to starch a wimple, but everything there is to know about men’s bottoms! You may ask her to fetch this ointment for the abbot herself.’

  ‘Nay, Magistra, she has her vow of silence to the outside world. As you know she may not leave the cloister of St Mary’s where she spends her time in contemplation and reposeful prayer to the Virgin,’ Rosa lied, her expression remaining earnest and sincere.

  ‘Tush! Very well then, you may go. But I warn you not to spend time with that one. She will corrupt thy peasant innocence!’ Then to Rosa’s astonishment she added archly, ‘It would not surprise me if the archbishop required her presence for reasons other than her singing.’

  ‘Thank you, Magistra,’ Rosa said, curtsying to the abbess. But then, as she turned to leave, her sense of fairness prevailed and she said, ‘Little Sister Sylvia knows well how to starch a wimple or knead dough or chop wood and scrub floors, Magistra.’

  And so that is how Rosa was in Cologne with me when my faith was at last confirmed and I witnessed the mysterious hand of God at work in a way that confounded reason and had no explanation. This was to take place during mass at St Martin’s on the Sunday.

  The previous day’s journey to Cologne from the convent had been one of mixed pleasure, the pleasure of Rosa’s company on the one hand and the odium of Sister Angelica on the other. The two nuns sent along to supervise me would usually chatter all day during the course of the journey while generally not saying a word to me. But on this occasion it was the dreaded Sister Angelica and a nun, Sister Freda, whom I did not know well. During the cart ride Sister Angelica took great delight in enumerating my shortcomings to the other nun, who soon joined in this spirit of general bitchiness, until Rosa could contain herself no longer.

  ‘I am not a nun and I know myself to be your inferior, but if you continue to chastise Little Sister Sylvia thus I shall report you to Magistra!’ she threatened.

  This sent Sister Angelica into gales of laughter. ‘And you think you will prevail? Ha! Magistra thinks less of the archbishop’s little singing whore than do I.’

  ‘Whore?’ I said, confounded. ‘Who do you call a whore?’

  Sister Angelica ignored me and spoke directly to the other nun. ‘This little peasant wants us to believe that it is her singing that doth attract the archbishop. But we know hers is a voice that is forbidden by Magistra for its raucousness. My brother, the bishop, tells how the archbishop is a randy sort and has a gleaming eye for a comely wench.’ She paused and sniffed, ‘Although what he sees in her I cannot imagine!’

  ‘Your brother would know, of course,’ I spat. ‘He who is a frequent visitor to Ali Baba’s, the well-known Cologne winkelhaus!’

  I wished I’d swallowed my tongue instead,as the moment I saidthese words I regretted them. If I expected Sister Angelica to seem rebuffed I was to be disappointed.

  ‘Aha!’ She turned to Sister Freda triumphantly, barely able to contain her laughter. ‘And how would you know this?’ she asked. Then together they screamed with laughter. ‘The little whore who sees my brother in the whorehouse!’ she spluttered through her mirth. ‘Did he like you? I think he told me you were his favourite,’ she lied. ‘Is that why he so readily agreed that you might join us at the convent? A reward for favours past, eh?’ This brought fresh gales of laughter.

  ‘I was the singer there!’ I shouted. But I knew she had beaten me all hands down.

  Sister Angelica clapped her hands. ‘Magistra will be delighted to hear of this! The clever one who thinks herself the next Hildegard is nothing but a little whore! The archbishop’s little whore!’ Then she asked, ‘Does he hear your confession afterwards, my little songbird?’ More laughter followed and I could see how Sister Freda admired her companion’s clever serpent’s tongue.

  It was well-known among the girls that the bishop was a most wearisome and messy task to service. He had great difficulty ‘rising to the occasion’ and Fatima, his favourite courtesan, would have to scold him severely and whip him until his holy bottom was ruby red, and then he’d beg for forgiveness and ask if he might be permitted to sweeten her. Then with his soft bishop’s hands he would spread her with honey over her breasts and stomach and the other lower part and proceed to feast upon her. It was all very tame by many standards but also very messy as the bishop lay on large silk cushions, which could not be used again. Nor did he pay for her services or for the wine he drank. Fatima would complain and say the task should be shared among the girls. ‘Why must I be the one to spend two hours cleaning myself afterwards?’ she’d protest. ‘For days, no matter how hard I scrub, I stink of honey!’ Master Yap would pat her on the shoulder and chuckle. ‘Never mind, darlink, zat Jesus man is not so stupid, eh? If he vants he can choose from all in Christendom, but the infidel’s pussy is still always most definitely the sweetest!’ Then he’d place a silver coin into her hand. ‘Buy some of zat nice smellink from roses you can get from Frau Sarah.’

  Despite my anger, of course I could not say this to Sister Angelica. I had already said far too much and if the nun should talk to her brother, Master Yap’s winkelhaus would soon enough cease to exist. Instead I bit my lip and remained silent, fighting to contain my tears, when I felt Rosa’s arm about me. ‘Take no notice of them, Sylvia,’ she said quietly. ‘They have no manners.’

  Rosa had never been to Cologne and was as astonished as I had been when I had first arrived with the ratcatcher. She marvelled
at the houses and streets filled with milling crowds, carts creaking, beasts of every domestic kind – goats, sheep, pigs, donkey’s mules, horses – a-neighing and braying, baaing and snorting, cackling and crowing, and all the while the almost deafening hum of people everywhere. She sniffed and coughed, holding her nose at the festering alleyways, then threw back her head to wonder at the lopsided and precarious upper parts of the houses that touched and seemed to hold each other up like wrestlers bent each to the other and so preventing both from crashing to the street below. As we passed through the markets many of the women recognised me as the Petticoat Angel and placed bread and sausage and wine, cabbages and cheeses in the cart, calling out their blessings to me.

  I had not mentioned this weekly occurrence to Rosa, as it never failed to mortify the nuns who were meant to be my supervising superiors. But on this occasion and after the chastisement from Sister Angelica, I confess I played the part to the full. I laid my hands on the heads of several women who rushed to fill the cart and then to touch me. The two noble bitches watched as the women turned tearful, grateful for the Petticoat Angel’s doubtful blessing.

  ‘They treat you like a saint,’ Rosa exclaimed, awe-struck.

  ‘The food is for the street children. We are blessed at such generosity,’ I said, more than a little sanctimoniously, raising my voice so that the two nuns, who glared silent and truculent, could hear.

  Sister Angelica still attempted to have the last word. ‘Only the cretinous peasant may turn a whore into a saint,’ she smirked.

  But this time Rosa was her equal. ‘Ha!’ she spat. ‘Only a person of noble birth would be so overwhelmingly possessed by the devil as to make such an ignorant remark!’

  I had not previously denied myself this ritual blessing in the marketplace as perhaps I should have, for I told myself I had no right to such attention. But it meant that when Nicholas met the cart at St Mary’s it would be near filled with food for his hungry street-children followers. Father Hermann named this weekly bounty ‘Sylvia’s Saturday Loaves and Fishes’. When I mentioned to him that I was unworthy of this adoration and felt myself a hypocrite, he’d chided me, ‘Sylvia, the Lord works in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform and He has placed His hand upon thy head. Do not now wish His blessed touch be denied to you.’

  So, if in the end Sister Angelica had won the contest of the cart to Cologne, then it was not by much. The following morning the mass was to be held at St Martin’s and we had arrived before the Angelus bell to prepare for it. The square outside was empty as the sun was not yet up and the dawn light was only just penetrating the dark interior of the church as we knelt in front of the altar to say our personal prayers for the opening day. Soon the worshippers began to arrive; as usual they were the old women and some old men and a smattering of pilgrims. The spectre of death hovers over the old and they are conscious that opportunities to confess their sins and prepare for their entrance to the Gates of St Peter must be grasped at every opportunity, while the young, with lots of time to spare before facing their Redeemer, snuggled impiously in their beds against the early-morning blush of the departing winter.

  The mass commenced and I had just completed singing my part in the Gloria in Excelsis Deo directly after the Kyrie and the archbishop had started to intone the opening prayer to the mass when the chanting outside first caused some disturbance. It soon grew so loud that the archbishop’s voice could no longer be heard and the congregation began to murmur. Still on our knees in front of the altar, I opened my eyes and looked back to see that many of the old women present had risen and now moved as quickly as they might to the doors of the church to see what was causing the disturbance outside. The archbishop seemed still to be mouthing his praying and the two officiating clerics, waving their arms, yelled at the top of their voices for the congregation to keep calm and remain at prayer. It was obvious that they themselves were beginning to panic, and soon the entire congregation was heading willy-nilly towards the doors. Meanwhile, the four of us from the convent remained on our knees, afraid to offend the furious archbishop, although, I confess, I had to resist the temptation to jump to my feet and join the curious throng.

  The archbishop, suddenly grown impatient at his helpless clerics, forsook his praying and with his shepherd’s crook in his right hand strode towards the door where a great confusion reigned. In his absence we ceased our praying and turned to watch the milling mayhem as the clerics tried to stop the congregation from leaving the church. Three dozen determined old women were more than a match for the two aging clerics and they were soon brushed aside. After some minutes, with the help of the castigating and belaying archbishop who, using his crook, rained impious blows upon the backs and shoulders of his clerics, some semblance of order was restored. The church doors finally clanged to a close to deny the congregation any further knowledge of whatever was happening in the square.

  The chanting outside now became muffled as the congregation was once more restored to their seats. It became possible for the archbishop to be heard. And heard he was! He commenced to deliver a furious sermon on the evils of Eve who forced Adam to take a bite from the forbidden fruit, and with their eviction from the Garden of Eden, public nakedness had become a mortal sin. Whereupon he made the congregation swear a denial of all they’d seen under the threat of forbidding them to ever again partake in mass or to receive the holy oil if they should mention to any person outside the walls of the church what they had now definitely not seen. He then commenced to pray.

  The four of us from the convent who had remained within the church had no notion of the goings-on outside. I grew wretched for a lack of knowing and my curiosity could scarcely be contained. The archbishop’s sermon, so clearly directed at what was going on in the square, remained a complete mystery. We did not know that a thousand women stood naked outside, as he did not say as much, but simply preached of the perfidious Eve and her wickedness and referred to an uncleanliness and abomination that the congregation recently thought they’d witnessed but hadn’t, since their memories had been purged. Even the chanting was distorted and it was impossible to interpret the words, so that there were no clues to help me comprehend.

  It was all very confusing and I confess that when he proceeded to read the prayer of the day, my mind was not possessed of piety but otherwise engaged in the thought of Brother Dominic’s expulsion from Rome for his writings on the subject of reason and truth. I clearly understood that I had just witnessed the monumental hubris of the archbishop when he had simply expunged what the congregation had just witnessed, denying them the divine unction and the bread and wine of forgiveness if they should persist with what they knew to be the truth. Thus I had not heard a single word of the archbishop’s prayers when quite suddenly I felt myself possessed of an urgent need to remove my habit. I did not for one moment think that my naked form would be unseemly in the church, or even bring me or others shame. Within me I had a sense of absolution and purity, as if at that moment I was purged of all wickedness. I could feel the burning light of the Holy Spirit descended upon me. From my lips, without reason or forethought, came the shouted chant, ‘Our children in Jerusalem!’

  It evidently took some time to bring me out of the trance I had fallen into. I hadn’t felt the urgent and persistent shaking of the two clerics, both mortified and weeping at the sight of my nudity, nor had I felt the archbishop’s blows as he used his shepherd’s crook to beat furiously upon my shoulders and my naked back, so that now his stave lay broken in three pieces at the foot of the altar. As my eyes cleared, I saw that I was not alone in my trance: Sisters Angelica and Freda as well as Rosa knelt naked before the altar with their eyes closed and their sensibilities not yet returned. They too chanted the words, ‘Our children in Jerusalem.’

  The two clerics, whimpering and fearful, held our habits as the archbishop, his eyes near popping from his head, shouted at them to cover our nudity. They had no idea how this might be done. As they tried to gather up a habit and place it ove
r the head of one of the three naked forms still in a trance, the nuns grabbed at it and impetuously thrust it away, their eyes yet closed and their chanting continuing. The archbishop became so angry that he picked up the longest part of his broken crook and now commenced to beat the clerics. They cowered at his feet and, first casting aside the habits, brought their arms up to protect their heads against his furious blows. ‘Dress them, you fools!’ he shouted, his mouth spit-flecked and his face grown purple.

  I hastily moved to the garments, anxious to find my own. As I crouched to where the clerics cowered with the archbishop standing over them, one of them suddenly shouted, ‘Look! Look at her back, your Grace!’

  The archbishop paused and turned to look where I crouched, the broken stave still raised. I glanced back, fearful that he might strike me, only to see that he seemed struck by some invisible force. He stood a moment perfectly still, his mouth half opened as if about to speak. The broken stick dropped from his grasp and clattered to the flagstones. I watched, fearful, as he clutched at his heart, then his great bulk descended slowly to his knees as he collapsed, his head crashing to the flagstone floor, his eyes turned back into his head, his mouth gone slack. He gave a small convulsive jerk and then lay still.

  I found my habit and my boots and dressed as quickly as I might with the two clerics kneeling in prayer over the dead archbishop, hysterically reciting the last rites. I looked about and saw that the church was empty, although in my trance I had not heard the congregation depart. Beset by a terrible fear, I had no idea what to do next. Then, as I had done in the marketplace in Uedem when Frau Anna had spat upon me, I began to sing. Almost immediately the two nuns and Rosa emerged from their trance.