The friar hunched under his cloak as his exhausted mule stumbled deeper into Rome. For years he had hungered to visit this most holy of cities, yet now he couldn’t even summon a flicker of interest in the buildings rising above him, in the laughter and voices spilling out from open doorways, in the distant rush and tumble of the Tiber, or in the twinkling lights of the Leonine City rising to his right.
He didn’t even scan the horizon for the silhouette of St Peter’s Basilica.
Instead, all he could think of was the pain in his hands and feet. The cold had eaten its terrible way so deep into his flesh and joints that he thought he would limp for the rest of his life.
But of what use were feet to a man who wanted only to spend his life in contemplation of God? And, of course, in penitence for his foul sin—a sin so loathsome that he did not think he’d ever be able to atone for it enough to achieve salvation.
Alice! Alice! How could he ever have condemned her to the death he had?
He should welcome the pain, because it would focus his mind on God, as on his sinful soul. The flesh was nothing; it meant nothing, just as this world meant nothing. On the other hand, his soul was everything, as was contemplation of God and of eternity. Flesh was corrupt, spirit was pure.
The friar sighed and forced himself to throw his cloak away from hands and feet. Comfort was sin, and he should not indulge in it.
He sighed again, ragged and deep, and envied the life of the gatekeeper. Rough, honest work spent in the city of the Holy Father. Service to God.
What man could possibly desire anything else?
Prior Bertrand was half sunk to his arthritic knees before the cross in his cell, when there came a soft tap at the door.
Bertrand closed his eyes in annoyance, then painfully raised himself, grabbing a bench for support as he did so. “Come.”
A young boy of some twelve or thirteen years entered, dressed in the robes of a novice.
He bowed his head and crossed his hands before him. “Brother Thomas Neville has arrived,” he said.
Bertrand raised his eyebrows. The man had made good time! And to arrive the same day as Pope Gregory…well, a day of many surprises then.
“Does he need rest and food before I speak with him, Daniel?” Bertrand asked.
“No,” said another voice, and the newcomer stepped out from the shadows of the ill-lit passageway. He was limping badly. “I would prefer to speak with you now.”
Bertrand bit down an unbrotherly retort at the man’s presumptuous tone, then gestured Brother Thomas inside.
“Thank you, Daniel,” Bertrand said to the novice. “Perhaps you could bring some bread and cheese from the kitchens for Brother Thomas.”
Bertrand glanced at the state of the friar’s hands and feet. “And ask Brother Arno to prepare a poultice.”
“I don’t need—” Brother Thomas began.
“Yes,” Bertrand said, “you do need attention to your hands and feet…your feet especially. If you were not a cripple before you entered service, then God does not demand that you become one now.” He looked back at the novice. “Go.”
The novice bowed again, and closed the door behind him.
“You have surprised me, brother,” Bertrand said, turning to face his visitor, who had hobbled into the centre of the sparsely furnished cell. “I did not expect you for some weeks yet.”
Bertrand glanced over the man’s face and head; he’d travelled so fast he’d not had the time to scrape clean his chin or tonsure. That would be the next thing to be attended to, after his extremities.
“I made good time, Brother Prior,” Thomas said. “A group of obliging merchants let me share their vessel down the French and Tuscany coasts.”
A courageous man, thought Bertrand, to brave the uncertain waters of the Mediterranean. But that is as befits his background. “Will you sit?” he said, and indicated the cell’s only stool, which stood to one side of the bed.
Thomas sat down, not allowing any expression of relief to mark his face, and Bertrand lowered himself to the bed. “You have arrived on an auspicious day, Brother Thomas,” he said.
Thomas raised his eyebrows.
Bertrand stared briefly at the man’s striking face before he responded. There was an arrogance and pride there that deeply disturbed the prior. “Aye, an auspicious day indeed. At dawn Gregory disembarked himself, most of his cardinals, and the entire papal curia, from his barges on the Tiber and entered the city.”
“The pope has returned?”
Bertrand bowed his head in assent.
Brother Thomas muttered something under his breath that to Bertrand’s aged ears sounded very much like a curse.
“Brother Thomas!”
The man’s cheeks reddened slightly. “I beg forgiveness, Brother Prior. I only wish I had pushed my poor mule the faster so I might have been here for the event. Tell me, has he arrived to stay?”
“Well,” Bertrand slid his hands inside the voluminous sleeves of his robe. “I would hear about your journey first, Brother Thomas. And then, perhaps, I can relate our news to you.”
Best to put this autocratic brother in his place as soon as possible, Bertrand thought. I will not let him direct the conversation.
Thomas made as if to object, then bowed his head in acquiescence. “I left Dover on the Feast of Saint Benedict, and crossed to Harfleur on the French coast. From there…”
Bertrand listened with only a portion of his attention as Thomas continued his tale of his journey, nodding now and then with encouragement. But the tale interested him not. It was this man before him who commanded his thoughts.
Brother Thomas was a man of some interest, with an unusual background for a friar, although not for more worldly men. The Prior General of England, Richard Thorseby, had been extremely reluctant to admit Thomas Neville into the Order of Preachers—the Dominicans—and had examined Thomas at great length before finally, and most unwillingly, allowing him to take his vows.
Men like Thomas were usually trouble.
On the other hand, Thomas could be extremely useful to the advancement of the Dominicans—if he was handled correctly.
Bertrand smiled politely as Thomas told an amusing anecdote about ship life with the rowdy merchants, but let his train of thought continue.
Why had Thomas chosen the Dominicans? The mendicant orders, of which the Dominicans were the most powerful, were orders which took their vows of chastity, poverty and obedience very seriously. Indeed, “mendicant” was the ancient Latin word meaning “to beg”. Friars remained poor all their lives, were not allowed to own property or live luxurious lives…unlike many of the higher clergy within the Roman Church.
If Thomas had chosen to join the more regular orders of the Church, Bertrand thought, he could have been a bishop within two years, a cardinal in ten, and could have aspired to be pope within twenty. Yet he chose poverty and humbleness above power and riches. Why?
Piety?
From one of the Nevilles?
From what he knew of the Nevilles, Bertrand could not believe that one of their family would have chosen piety above power, but then one never knew the wondrous workings of the Lord.
“And so now you hope to continue your studies here,” Bertrand said as Thomas’ tale drew to a close.
“My colleagues at Oxford— ”
Bertrand