Cathedral of the Sea (53 page)

“All right,” he heard the girl reply.

“Let’s see. I’ve risked my life for you, and I’m going to risk it again if anybody discovers I am hiding three Jewish children under Santa Maria church. I’m not prepared to do so if when I get back here you’ve all run off. What do you say? Will you wait for me here, or do you want to go out into the streets again?”

“We’ll wait,” the girl said resolutely.

Arnau returned to an empty house. He washed and tried to tend his wound. He bound it up, filled his old wineskin with water, took a lantern and oil to fill it with, a loaf of dry bread and salt meat, and then limped back to Santa Maria.

The children had not moved from the end of the tunnel where he had left them. Arnau lit the lantern and found himself facing three fearful young deer too frightened to respond to his attempt to reassure them with a smile. The girl had her arms round the other two. All three were dark-skinned, with long, clean hair. They looked healthy and attractive, with gleaming white teeth, especially the girl.

“Are they your brothers?” Arnau asked her.

“We’re brother and sister,” she said eventually, pointing to the smaller of the other two. “He is a neighbor.”

“Well, I think that after all that’s happened and what’s still to come, we had better introduce ourselves. My name is Arnau.”

The girl did the honors: she was called Raquel, her brother was Jucef, and their neighbor’s name was Saul. Arnau asked them more questions by the light of the lantern, while every so often the children cast anxious glances toward the cemetery behind them. They were thirteen, six, and eleven years old. They had been born in Barcelona and lived with their parents in the Jewry. They had been going back there when the mob had attacked them. The slave, whom they had always called Sahat, belonged to Raquel and Jucef’s parents. If he had said he would go to the beach, he would do so; he had never failed them.

“Well,” said Arnau after listening to them, “I think it might be useful to have a look at where we are. It’s been a long time, more or less since I was your age, since I’ve been here—although I don’t think anybody has moved.” He was the only one to laugh. He held the lantern up and crawled to the center of the necropolis. The children remained rooted to the spot, terrified at the sight of the open tombs and skeletons. “This is the best I could think of,” he apologized when he saw their looks of terror. “I’m sure nobody will find you here while we wait for things to calm down outside—”

“What will happen if they kill our parents?” Raquel interrupted him.

“Don’t think of that. I’m sure nothing will happen to them. Look, come here to me. There’s a space with no tombs that’s big enough for all of us. Come on!” He gestured energetically for them to approach him.

In the end he succeeded, and the four of them gathered in a small space that allowed them to sit on the floor without having to touch any tombs. The Roman cemetery was exactly the same as the first time Arnau had seen it, with its strange pyramidal tiles and big amphoras with skeletons inside. Arnau placed the lantern on one of them, and offered the children the water, bread, and salt meat. They all drank avidly, but would only eat the bread.

“It’s not kosher,” explained Raquel, pointing to the meat.

“Kosher?”

Raquel explained what kosher meant, and the rituals that had to be performed before members of the Jewish community were allowed to eat meat. They went on talking until the two boys had fallen fast asleep on the girl’s lap. Then, whispering so as not to wake them, Raquel asked Arnau: “Don’t you believe what they say?”

“What about?”

“That we poisoned wells.”

Arnau did not reply for some time.

“Have any Jews died of the plague?” he asked.

“Lors.”

“In that case, no,” Arnau asserted. “I don’t believe it.”

When Raquel also fell asleep, Arnau crawled back out of the tunnel and headed for the beach.

THE ATTACK ON
the Jewry lasted two days. All that time, the outnumbered royal forces, together with members of the Jewish community, tried their best to defend the district from the constant assault of an enraged, zealous mob who in the name of Christianity dedicated themselves to pillaging and murder. In the end, the king sent enough soldiers to quell the riot, and things slowly returned to normal.

On the third night Sahat, who had fought alongside his masters, was able to get away and meet Arnau on the beach opposite the fish stall, as agreed.

“Sahat!” came a voice in the darkness.

“What are you doing here?” asked the slave when Raquel threw herself on him.

“The Christian is very ill.”

“Is it ... ?”

“No,” the girl interrupted him, “it isn’t the plague. He doesn’t have any swellings. It’s his leg. The wound has become infected and he has a high fever. He can’t walk.”

“What about the other two?” asked the slave.

“They’re fine ... and my family?”

“They’re waiting for you.”

Raquel took the slave to the platform by the Plaza del Born doorway at Santa Maria.

“Here?” asked the Moor in a puzzled way when the girl slipped in underneath the wooden planks.

“Quiet,” she said. “Follow me.”

They made their way along the tunnel to the Roman cemetery. They all had to help get Arnau out; Sahat crawled backward pulling him by the hands while the children pushed him by the feet. Arnau had lost consciousness. The five of them, with Arnau draped over Sahat’s shoulders and the children dressed in Christian clothes the slave had brought them, headed for the Jewry, making sure they stayed in the darkest corners as much as possible. When they arrived at the Jewry gates, which were guarded by a large contingent of the king’s men, Sahat explained to the captain who the children really were and why they were not wearing their yellow badges. Arnau, he said, was a Christian, but had a fever and needed to see a doctor, as the captain could see for himself. The captain took a quick look at the wound, but soon moved away in case Arnau was a plague victim. But what in fact opened the gates to the Jewry for them was the generous purse of money that the slave slipped into the captain’s hands while he was talking to him.

“N
OBODY IS GOING to harm those children. Father, where are you? Why, Father? There’s grain in the palace. I love you, Maria ...”

Whenever Arnau was delirious, Sahat made the children leave the room. He called for Raquel and Jucef’s father, Hasdai, to come and help keep Arnau still when he started fighting the soldiers of Roussillon and threatened to reopen the wound on his leg. Master and slave kept watch at the foot of the bed, while a female servant put cold compresses on his forehead. This had already been going on for a week, during which time Arnau received the best care from Jewish doctors as well as constant attention from the Crescas family and their slaves, most of all Sahat, who watched over him day and night.

“The wound is not that serious,” said the doctors, “but the infection has spread to the whole body.”

“Will he live?” asked Hasdai.

“He’s a strong man” was all the doctors would say as they left.

“There’s grain in the palace!” Arnau shouted again a few minutes later. He was sweating and writhing on his bed.

“If it hadn’t been for him,” said Sahat, “we’d all be dead.”

“I know,” said Hasdai, who was standing next to him.

“Why did he do it? He’s a Christian.”

“He’s a good person.”

At night, when Arnau was resting and the house was quiet, Sahat would turn to the east to kneel and pray for the Christian. During the day, he patiently made him drink as much water as possible, and take the potions the doctors had prepared. Raquel and Jucef often came into the room, and if Arnau was not delirious, Sahat let them stay.

“He’s a warrior,” Jucef said on one occasion, his eyes wide open in amazement.

“I’m sure he has been,” agreed Sahat.

“He said he was a
bastaix,”
Raquel objected.

“In the cemetery, he told us he was a warrior. Perhaps he’s a warrior bastaix.”

“He only said it to keep you quiet.”

“I would wager he is a
bastaix,”
said Hasdai. “From what he says now, at least.”

“He’s a warrior,” the young boy insisted.

“I don’t know, Jucef.” The slave ruffled his black locks. “Why don’t we wait until he’s better and can tell us himself?”

“Will he get better?”

“Of course. When have you heard of a warrior dying from a leg wound?”

After the children left, Sahat would go up to Arnau and touch his burning brow. “It’s not only the children who are alive thanks to you, Christian. Why did you do it? What drove you to risk your life for a slave and three Jewish children? Live! You must live! I want to be able to talk to you, to thank you. Besides, Hasdai is very rich; I’m sure he will want to reward you.”

A few days later, Arnau began to recover. One morning, Sahat found that his fever was noticeably lower.

“Allah, whose name be praised, has heard my prayers.”

Hasdai smiled when he was able to confirm the improvement.

“He will live,” he went so far as to tell his children.

“Will he tell me about his battles?”

“Son, I’m not sure ...”

But Jucef started to imitate Arnau, whirling the dagger about to take on an imaginary group of attackers. Just as he was about to slash the wounded man’s throat, his sister grasped him by the arm.

“Jucef!” she said to him sternly.

They turned to look at Arnau, and saw him staring at them from the bed. Jucef was terrified.

“How do you feel?” Hasdai asked him.

Arnau tried to answer, but his mouth was too dry. Sahat gave him a glass of water.

“Good,” he managed to say after a few sips. “What about the children?”

Pushed forward by their father, Jucef and Raquel came to his bedside. Arnau tried to smile.

“Hello,” he said.

“Hello,” they replied.

“What about Saul?”

“He’s well,” Hasdai reassured him. “But now you must rest. Come on, children.”

“When you’re better, will you tell me all about your battles?” Jucef asked before his father and sister dragged him out of the room.

Arnau nodded, and smiled again.

Over the next week, the fever completely disappeared, and the wound began to heal. Arnau and Sahat talked whenever the bastaix felt strong enough.

“Thank you,” were his first words to the Moorish slave.

“You’ve already thanked me, remember? Why ... why did you rescue us?”

“The boy’s eyes ... My wife would never have allowed me to ...”

“Maria?” asked Sahat, remembering how Arnau had said the name during his delirium.

“Yes,” said Arnau.

“Would you like us to tell her you are here?” Arnau’s mouth tightened and he shook his head. “Is there anyone you’d like us to tell?” When he saw Arnau’s sorrowful expression, the slave did not insist.

“How did the siege of the Jewry end?” Arnau asked him on another occasion.

“Two hundred men and women murdered. Lots of houses looted or burned.”

“That’s terrible!”

“It’s not as bad as it might have been,” Sabat insisted. Arnau cast him a surprised glance. “We were lucky in the Barcelona Jewry. From the Orient to Castille, Jews have been slaughtered without mercy. More than three hundred communities have been completely destroyed. In Germany, Emperor Charles the Fourth promised a personal pardon to any criminal who killed a Jew or helped destroy a Jewry. Can you imagine what would have happened in Barcelona if instead of protecting us, your king had granted a pardon to everyone who killed a Jew?” Arnau closed his eyes and shook his head. “In Mainz, they burned six thousand Jews at the stake. In Strasbourg, they burned two thousand in a huge funeral pyre in the Jewish cemetery, including women and children. Two thousand at once...”