Cathedral of the Sea (16 page)

“W
HY DO THEY keep building the scaffolding higher and higher?”

Arnau pointed to the rear of Santa Maria church. Angel looked up and, his mouth full of bread and cheese, muttered an explanation neither of them could understand. Joanet burst out laughing, Arnau joined in, and in the end Angel himself could not avoid chuckling along with them, until he choked and the laughter turned into a coughing fit.

Arnau and Joanet went to Santa Maria every day. They entered the church and kneeled down. Urged on by his mother, Joanet had decided to learn to pray, and he repeated the phrases Arnau had taught him over and over again. Then, when the two of them split up, he would race to his mother’s window and tell her all he had prayed that day. Arnau talked to his mother, except when Father Albert (they had found out that was his name) appeared, in which case he joined Joanet in murmuring his devotions.

Whenever they left the church, they would stand some distance away and survey the carpenters, stonemasons, and masons at work on the new building. Afterward they would sit in the square waiting for Angel to have a break and join them to eat his bread and cheese. Father Albert treated them affectionately; the men working on Santa Maria always smiled at them; even the
bastaixos,
who came by bent under the weight of their stones, would glance over at the two little boys sitting next to the church.

“Why do they keep building the scaffolding higher?” Arnau asked a second time.

The three of them peered at the rear of the church, where the ten columns stood: eight of them in a semicircle and two more farther back. Beyond them, workmen had started to build the buttresses and walls that would form the new apse. The columns rose higher than the small Romanesque building, but the scaffolding went on up still farther into the sky. It was not surrounding anything, as though the workmen had gone crazy and were trying to make a stairway to heaven.

“I’ve no idea,” Angel admitted.

“None of that scaffolding is supporting anything.”

“No, but it will,” they suddenly heard a man’s firm voice say.

The three of them turned round. They had been so busy laughing and coughing they had not noticed that several men had gathered behind them. Some of them were dressed in fine clothes; others wore priests’ vestments, enriched with bejeweled gold crosses on their chests, big rings, and belts threaded with gold and silver.

Father Albert was watching from the church door. He came hurrying over to greet the newcomers. Angel leapt up, and choked once more on his bread. This was not the first time he had seen the man who had spoken to them, but he had rarely seen him in such splendid company. He was Berenguer de Montagut, the person in charge of the building work on Santa Maria de la Mar.

Arnau and Joanet also stood up. Father Albert joined the group, and bent to kiss the bishops’ rings.

“What will they support?”

Joanet’s question caught Father Albert just as he was stooping to kiss another ring: “Don’t speak until you’re spoken to,” his eyes implored him. One of the provosts made as though to continue on toward the church, but Berenguer de Montagut grasped Joanet by the shoulder and leaned down to talk to him.

“Children are often able to see things we miss,” he said out loud to his companions. “So I would not be surprised if these three have noticed something that has escaped our attention. So you want to know why we’re building this scaffolding, do you?” Glancing toward Father Albert for permission, Joanet nodded. “Do you see the tops of those columns? Well, from the top of each of them we are going to build six arches. The most important one of all will be the one that takes the weight of the new church’s apse.”

“What is an apse?” asked Arnau.

Berenguer smiled and looked round. Some of the group with him seemed as anxious to hear his explanation as the boys were.

“An apse is something like this.” The master builder joined his hands together in an arch. The children were fascinated by his magic hands, and others in the group crowded forward to see. “Well, on top of all the rest,” he said, separating one hand and pointing to the tip of the other first finger, “we put a big stone called the keystone. To do that we first have to raise it to the very highest scaffolding—right up there, can you see?” They all peered up at the sky. “Once that is in place, we’ll build the rib vaults of these arches until they meet the keystone. And that is why we need such tall scaffolding.”

“Why are you doing all that?” Arnau wanted to know. Poor Father Albert gave a start, although by now he was growing used to the boys’ questions and comments. “None of this will be visible from inside the church, because it’s all above the roof.”

Berenguer and a few of the others laughed. Father Albert sighed.

“Of course it will be visible, my boy, because the roof of the present church will gradually disappear as we build the new structure. It will be as though this tiny church were giving birth to another, bigger one.”

Joanet’s obvious disappointment unsettled him. The boy had become accustomed to the small church’s sense of intimacy, to its smell, its darkness, the atmosphere there when he prayed.

“Do you love the Virgin of the Sea?” Berenguer asked him.

Joanet glanced at Arnau. They both nodded.

“Well, when we have finished her new church, the Virgin you love so much will have more light than any other Virgin in the world. She will no longer be in darkness as she is now. She’ll have the most beautiful church you could ever imagine. She won’t be shut in by thick, low walls, but will shine among tall, delicate ones, with slender columns and apses that reach up to the heavens: the perfect place for the Virgin.”

They all looked up at the sky.

“Yes,” Berenguer de Montagut went on, “the Virgin of the Sea’s new church will reach right up there.”

He and his companions set off toward Santa Maria, leaving Father Albert and the boys behind.

“Father,” Arnau asked when the others were out of earshot, “what will happen to the Virgin when they take down the old building, but haven’t finished her new church yet?”

“Do you see those buttresses?” the priest replied, pointing to two of the ones being built as the back part of the ambulatory, behind the main altar. “In between them they are going to construct the first chapel, dedicated to the Lord Jesus. That’s where they will put the Virgin, together with the body of Christ and the sepulcher containing Saint Eulàlia’s remains. That way she will come to no harm.”

“Who will look after her?”

“Don’t worry,” said the priest with a smile. “The Virgin will be well looked after. The Jesus chapel belongs to the
bastaix
guild; they are the ones who will have the key to its railings, and will make sure she is looked after.”

Arnau and Joanet knew the
bastaixos
well by now. Angel had reeled off their names when a line of them appeared, bowed beneath their enormous stones: Ramon, the first one they had met; Guillem, as hard as the rocks he carried on his back, tanned by the sun and with a face horribly disfigured by an accident, but gentle and affectionate in his dealings with them; another Ramon, known as “Little Ramon” because he was smaller and stockier than the other one; Miquel, a scrawny man who did not look strong enough to carry the huge weights, but who succeeded in doing so by straining all the nerves and tendons in his body until it seemed they might explode; Sebastìa, the least friendly or talkative of the group, with his son Bastianet. Then there were Pere, Jaume, and a seemingly endless list of others, all of them men from La Ribera who had committed themselves to carrying the thousands of stones needed for the new church from the royal quarry at La Roca to Santa Maria de la Mar.

Arnau thought of the
bastaixos,
and the way they gazed at the church as they arrived bent double under the weight of a stone; the way they smiled when they were relieved of their load; the mighty strength of their backs. He was sure they would look after the Virgin.

THE OPERATION BERENGUER
de Montagut had told them about took place within the next week.

“Come at first light tomorrow,” Angel had told them. “That’s when we’ll put the keystone in place.”

The two boys made sure they were there. They ran toward the workmen who had gathered at the foot of the scaffolding. Between laborers,
bastaixos,
and priests, there must have been more than a hundred people present. Even Father Albert had taken off his robe and was dressed like all the rest, with a thick piece of red cloth tied round his waist.

Arnau and Joanet joined the throng, saying hello to some and waving at others.

“Boys,” they heard one of the masons say, “when we start to raise the keystone, I want you to stay well away from here.”

The two boys nodded in agreement.

“Where is the stone?” Joanet asked, looking up at the builder.

They ran over to where he pointed, at the foot of the first and lowest scaffold.

“Good heavens!” they both exclaimed when they saw the huge circular stone on the ground.

Many of the men stared at it as admiringly as they did, but said nothing. They knew how important this day was.

“It weighs more than six tons,” one of them said.

With eyes like saucers, Joaner looked inquiringly at Ramon, the first man they had seen carrying a block of stone.

“No,” he said, reading the boy’s mind. “We didn’t carry this one here.”

There was nervous laughter at his comment, but it soon died away. Arnau and Joanet watched the men file past, looking alternately at the stone and at the top of the scaffolding: they had to raise more than six tons some thirty yards in the air, by pulling on cables!

“If anything goes wrong ... ,” the boys heard one of the men say as he crossed himself.

“We’ll be caught underneath,” another man replied, twisting his lips.

No one was standing still. Even Father Albert, in his strange attire, kept moving among them, encouraging them, slapping them on the back, ralking animatedly. The old church stood there in the midst of all the people and the mass of scaffolding. Curious onlookers from the city began to gather at a safe distance.

Finally, Berenguer de Montagut appeared. He gave nobody time to stop and greet him, but leapt onto the lowest level of scaffolding and began to address all those present. As he did so, some masons tied a huge pulley round the stone.

“As you can see,” he shouted, “we have rigged up tackle at the top of the scaffolding so that we can raise the keystone. The pulleys up there and the ones round the stone are made up of three separate sets, each of which has another three coming off them. As you know, we cannot use capstans or wheels, because we need to move the stone sideways as well. There are three cables to each pulley system. They go all the way up to the top, and back down again.” He pointed out the path of the cables; a hundred heads followed his gesture. “I want you to form three groups around me.”

The masons began to divide the men. Arnau and Joanet ran to the rear of the old church and stood with their backs to the wall, watching the preparations. When Berenguer saw that the three groups had formed, he went on:

“Each group will haul on one of the cables. You,” he said, addressing one of the groups, “are to be Santa Maria. Repeat after me: Santa Maria!”

The men all shouted: “Santa Maria!”

“You are Santa Clara.” The second group called out the name of Santa Clara. “And you over there are Santa Eulàlia. I’ll call you by those names. When I shout, ‘Everyone!’ I mean all three groups. When you are in position, you have to pull in a straight line, and keep your eyes on the back of the man in front of you. Listen for the instructions from the mason in charge of each group. And remember: always pull in a straight line! Now line up.”

The mason leading each group made sure they were in line. The cables were made ready, and the men picked them up. Before the boys could start wondering what was going to happen, Berenguer shouted again:

“Everyone! When I give the word, start to pull—gently at first, until you can feel the cables grow taut. Now!”

Arnau and Joanet watched the three lines pull until the cables were taut.

“Everyone! Pull hard!”

The boys held their breath. The men dug their heels into the ground and started to pull. Their arms, backs, and faces tensed. Arnau and Joanet stared at the huge block of stone. It had not budged.

“Everyone! Pull harder!”

The order rang out round the church. The men’s faces went purple with effort. The wooden scaffolding started to creak. The keystone rose a hand’s breadth from the ground. Six tons!

“More!” shouted Berenguer, his gaze fixed on the keystone.

Another few inches. The boys had almost forgotten to breathe.

“Santa Maria! Pull harder! Harder!”

Arnau and Joanet looked toward the Santa Maria line. Father Albert was among them. He had his eyes shut and was pulling with all his might.