Baudolino (13 page)

"Who is this cleric?" Baudolino asked eagerly.

"Boron," Abdul replied. And so it was that the next day they went out to find Boron.

He was a cleric of Montbéliard, who, a vagrant like his similars, was now in Paris (and a regular visitor to the library of Saint Victoire), and tomorrow he would be God knows where, because he seemed to pursue a plan of his own of which he never spoke with anyone. He had a great head with a mop of hair and eyes reddened from all his reading by lamplight, but he truly seemed an ark of learning. He fascinated them at this first meeting—in a tavern naturally—asking them subtle questions on which their teachers would have spent days and days of disputation. Can sperm freeze? Can a prostitute conceive? Does the sweat of the head stink more than that of other parts of the body? Do the ears flush when one feels shame? Does a man grieve more over the death of a beloved or over her marriage? Must nobles have drooping ears? Do the mad worsen during the full moon? The question that fascinated them most was that of the existence of the vacuum, on which Boron considered himself wiser than any other philosopher.

"The vacuum," Boron said, his tongue already thick, "does not exist, because nature has a horror of it. The fact that it does not exist is evident for philosophical reasons, because if it did exist it would be either substance or accident. It is not material substance, because otherwise it would be body and would occupy space, and it is not incorporeal substance, because otherwise, like the angels, it would be intelligent. It is not accident, because accidents exist only as attributes of substances. In the second place, the vacuum does not exist for physical reasons: take a cylindrical vessel..."

"But why," Baudolino interrupted, "are you so interested in demonstrating that the vacuum does not exist? What does the vacuum matter to you?"

"It matters. Yes, it matters. Because the vacuum can be either interstitial, that is, between one body and another in our sublunar world, or else extended, beyond the universe that we see, closed by the great sphere of the celestial bodies. If that were so, there could perhaps exist, within that vacuum, other worlds. But if it is demonstrated that the interstitial vacuum does not exist, all the more reason why the extended vacuum cannot exist."

"But what do you care whether other worlds exist?"

"I care. It matters. Because if they did exist, Our Lord should have sacrificed himself in each of them and in each he should have consecrated the bread and the wine. And hence the supreme object, which is testimony and evidence of that miracle, would not be unique, and there would be many copies of it. And what value would my life have if I did not know that, somewhere, there is a supreme object to be found again?"

"And what would this supreme object be?"

Here Boron tried to truncate the discussion. "That's my business," he said, "things that are not good for the ears of the profane. Let us speak of something else. If there were so many worlds there would have been so many first humans, so many Adams and so many Eves, who have committed original sin infinite times. And therefore there would be so many Earthly Paradises from which they were driven. Can you think that something sublime, like the Earthly Paradise, could exist in so many copies, as there exist so many cities with a river and a hill like that of Saint Geneviève? Only one Earthly Paradise exists, in a remote land; beyond the realm of the Medes and the Persians."

They had come to the core of the discussion, and they told Boron of their speculations about Prester John. Yes, Boron had heard a monk talk about this question of the Christian kings of the Orient. He had read the account of a visit, many years ago, by a patriarch of the Indies, to Pope Calixtus II. It told of the effort the pope had to make to understand his visitor, thanks to the extreme difference of
language. The patriarch described the city of Hulna, where a river flows that originates in the Earthly Paradise, the Physon, which others call the Ganges; and where, on a mountain outside the city, stands the sanctuary containing the body of the apostle Thomas. This mountain was inaccessible because it rose in the center of a lake, but for eight days every year the waters of the lake withdraw, and the good Christians of the region can go and worship the body of the apostle, still intact as if he were not dead, but, rather, as the text described him, with a star's shining face, red hair falling to his shoulders, a beard, and garments that seemed just sewn.

"But nothing tells us that this patriarch is Prester John," Boron concluded cautiously.

"No, of course not," Baudolino replied, "but it tells us that for a long time there has been talk about some distant region, blessed and unknown. Listen to me: in his
Historia de duabus civitatibus,
my beloved Bishop Otto reported that a certain Hugo of Jabala once said that John, after defeating the Persians, tried to go to the aid of the Christians in the Holy Land, but was forced to stop on the banks of the Tigris because he had no vessels to carry his men across. So John lives beyond the Tigris. Am I right? But the great thing is that everyone must have known this even before Hugo spoke of him. Let's reread carefully what Otto wrote, and he did not write at random. Why should this Hugo have to explain to the pope the reasons John had been unable to assist the Christians of Jerusalem; why should Hugo have to justify John? Obviously because in Rome there were those already nursing this hope. And when Otto says that Hugo mentions John, he adds
sic enim eum nominare solent,
as they generally called him. Why did he use this verb in the plural? Clearly not only Hugo but also others
solent,
are accustomed to, and hence already in those days that was what they called him. Further, Otto writes how Hugo affirms that John, like the Magi from whom he was descended, wanted to go to Jerusalem, but then Otto doesn't write that Hugo asserts John did not succeed, but, rather, that
fertur,
it is reported,
and that some, others, in the plural,
asserunt,
assert that he did not succeed. We are learning from our masters that there is no better proof of the truth," Baudolino concluded, "than the continuity of the tradition."

Abdul whispered in Baudolino's ear that perhaps Bishop Otto also occasionally took a little green honey, but Baudolino jabbed an elbow into his ribs.

"I still don't understand why this priest is so important to you," Boron said, "but if he has to be sought, it must not be along a river that comes from the Earthly Paradise, but, rather, in the Earthly Paradise itself. And on this point I would have many things to say...."

Baudolino and Abdul tried to press Boron to tell them more about the Earthly Paradise, but Boron had abused the hogsheads of Les Trois Chandeliers, and said he could no longer remember anything. As if they had had the same thought and without saying a word to each other, the two friends grasped Boron under the armpits and carried him to their room. There, Abdul, though with some parsimony, offered their guest a touch of green honey, on the tip of a spoon, and they shared another drop. Boron, after remaining stunned for a moment, looking around as if unable to grasp precisely where he was, began to see something of Paradise.

He spoke, and he told of a certain Tugdalus, who seemed to have visited Hell and Paradise. The nature of Hell was not worth talking about, but Paradise was a place filled with charity, joy, gaiety, honesty, beauty, holiness, harmony, unity, charity, and eternity without end, defended by a golden wall beyond which you could discern many chairs decorated with precious stones, with men and women seated there, young and old, dressed in silken stoles, their faces glowing like the sun, with hair of purest gold, and all singing Alleluia, reading from a book illuminated with golden letters.

"Now," Boron said sensibly, "to Hell all can go, you have only to wish it, and sometimes those who have been there come back to tell us something of it, in the form of incubus or succubus, or some other
troubling vision. But can you really believe that someone who has seen these things has been admitted to the Heavenly Paradise? Even if that had happened, no living person would have the immodesty to recount it, because there are some mysteries that a modest and virtuous person should keep to himself."

"God grant that never on the face of the earth such a person, corroded by vanity, appear," Baudolino commented, "to prove unworthy of the trust the Lord has bestowed on him."

"Now then," Boron said, "you must have heard the story of Alexander the Great, who arrived on the shore of the Ganges and supposedly reached a wall that followed the course of the river but had no gate, and after three days of sailing he saw in the wall a little window, at which an old man was looking out. The travelers asked that the city pay a tribute to Alexander, king of kings; but the old man replied that this was the city of the blest. It is impossible that Alexander, great king but a pagan, had arrived at the celestial city, and therefore what he and Tugdalus had seen was the Earthly Paradise. What I see at this moment..."

"Where?"

"There." And he pointed to a corner of the room. "I see a place where meadows extend, lovely and green, decked with flowers and scented grasses, while all around a sweet odor wafts, and, breathing it, I feel no more desire for food or for drink. There is a most beautiful lawn, with four men of venerable aspect, crowns of gold on their heads and palm fronds in their hands ... I hear singing, I sense a balsamic aroma, O my God, I taste in my mouth a sweetness as of honey.... I see a church of crystal, with an altar in its midst from which flows water white as milk. The church, from the north, seems a precious stone, on its austral side it is blood-colored, to the west white as snow, and above it shine countless stars more splendid than those in our sky. I see a man with hair white as snow, beplumed as a bird, his eyes almost indiscernible, covered as they are by snowy, drooping lashes. He points out to me a tree that never ages and cures
of any ill one who sits in its shade, and another with leaves all the colors of the rainbow. But why am I seeing these things this evening?"

"Perhaps you have read of them somewhere, and the wine has brought them to the surface of your soul," Abdul said then. "That virtuous man who came from my island, Saint Brendan, sailed the seas to the farthest confines of the earth, and discovered an island all covered with ripe grapes, some blue, some purple, others white, with seven miraculous fountains and seven churches, one of crystal, another of garnet, the third of sapphire, the fourth of topaz, the fifth of ruby, the sixth of emerald, the seventh of coral, each with seven altars and seven lamps. And before the church, in the middle of a square, rose a column of chalcydon with, at its top, a turning wheel covered with rattles."

"Ah, no, mine is not an island." Boron flared up. "It's a land close to India, where I see men with ears larger than ours, and a double tongue, so that they can speak with two people at once. And many crops: it seems they grow spontaneously...."

"Of course," Baudolino glossed, "we must remember that according to Exodus the people of God were promised a land dripping with milk and honey."

"Let's not confuse things," Abdul said. "In Exodus it's the Promised Land, promised after the fall, whereas the Earthly Paradise was the land of our forefathers before the fall."

"Abdul, this isn't a
disputatio.
Here it's not a question of identifying a place where we will go, but of understanding the nature of the ideal place where each of us would like to go. It's obvious that if such marvels existed and still exist, not only in the Earthly Paradise but also on islands where Adam and Eve never set foot, the kingdom of Prester John must be very similar to those places. We are trying to understand what a kingdom of abundance and virtue is like, where falsehood does not exist, nor greed nor lust. Otherwise why should one be drawn to it as to the supreme Christian kingdom?"

"But there must be no exaggerating," Abdul wisely insisted. "Otherwise nobody would believe in it any more: I mean, nobody would believe any more that it is possible to go so far."

He said "far." Shortly before, Baudolino believed that, in imagining the Earthly Paradise, Abdul had forgotten, for one evening at least, his impossible passion. But no. He thought of it still. He was seeing the Paradise, but in it he was looking for his princess. In fact, he murmured, as the honey's effect slowly faded: "Perhaps one day we will go
langan li jorn long en mai,
you know, in May when the days are long...."

Boron began to laugh softly.

"There, Master Niketas," Baudolino said, "when I was not prey to the temptations of this world, I devoted my nights to imagining other worlds. A bit with the help of wine, and a bit with that of the green honey. There is nothing better than imagining other worlds," he said, "to forget the painful one we live in. At least so I thought then. I hadn't yet realized that, imagining other worlds, you end up changing this one."

"Let's try for the present to live serenely in this one, where the divine will has placed us," Niketas said. "Now that our incomparable Genoese have prepared for us some delicacies of our cuisine. Taste this soup of different varieties of fish, from fresh water and from the sea. Perhaps you have good fish also in your parts, though I imagine that your intense cold does not allow them to grow plentifully, as in the Propontis. We season the soup with onions cooked in olive oil, with fennel, and herbs, and two glasses of dry wine. You pour it on these slices of bread, and then you put in some
avgolemenos,
which is this sauce of egg yolks and lemon juice, diluted in a hint of broth. I believe that in the Earthly Paradise Adam and Eve ate like this. But before original sin. Afterwards, perhaps they resigned themselves to eating tripe, as in Paris."

Baudolino, among his not very rigorous studies and his fantasies on the garden of Eden, had now spent four winters in Paris. He was eager to see Frederick again and, even more, Beatrice, who in his giddy spirit had now lost every earthly feature and had become an inhabitant of Paradise, like Abdul's distant princess.