“The heart of a jewel,” I whispered. . . . How marvelous.
“So many relics—a kingdom’s worth. But I cared only for one. Which I located easily enough. It was small, a mere fragment of rib. But then . . .” His voice grew rough. “I discovered a terrible truth—a truth for which I’d had no warning whatsoever.” He held up his hand, and in the firelight I could see a shiny scar on his palm—a recent burn.
“The relic marked you?” My eyes went wide.
“For so long I heard twaddle about the power of relics. But I never believed it.” He rubbed his palm. “Not till now.”
“Does the rib burn everyone?” Might it burn me?
“No.” His eyes glittered in the firelight. “So I fashioned myself a pack to hold the rib I could not touch, and I found a stick to carry the pack, and I made my way south. And that is the tale of the rib.”
What a fine tale it was. To stand in the heart of a jewel, with a kingdom’s worth of relics. To see—to know—the rib of Saint Peter. I smiled, curled in the moldy hay. Some folk the rib burned, it seemed, and other folk it warmed.
That night I dreamed of Saint Peter at the gates of paradise, thanking me for his rib. The gates were warm, and Saint Peter was warm, though he smelled odd. The gates were soggy, somehow. . . .
I awoke to the stink of wet wool, and a half-dozen sheep nestled around me.
“Boy?” came a voice, though I could not see Secundus for the pile of sheep. ’Twas like being smothered by a wet smelly cloud.
I struggled my way out of the flock, the sheep bleating their annoyance. The poor creatures had not been shorn since the pestilence, and mist beaded on their shaggy coats, and they watched with bland eyes as we departed.
I accepted some cheese from Secundus, though cheese is only rotten milk, and put my lips to his flask, and made sure his pack was secure on my hump, the pack with the rib of Saint Peter.
All day we hurried under low clouds, the air filled with the smells of wet fields. We traveled through a village where barking dogs made sure we did not linger, though several wagged their tails, which shows that even dogs can be liars, and when I told them my name they trailed us repeating Boy, Boy, Boy! till we were away.
Our road joined another. We came upon a laborer with a large bundle on his back: a bundle that turned out to be an old man with a crippled foot.
“Ye cannot manage a single step without jostling,” the old man was shouting. “You are the slowest creature since Satan fell from heaven. . . . Ho there, pilgrim,” he called to Secundus. “Walk with us. Perhaps your pace will inspire this worthless son of mine.”
Were my son to carry me, thought I, I should thank him with every step.
The old man pointed to his leg twisted sideways. “I’ve a bad foot, you know. I go to Saint-Peter’s-Step to be cured. The town has a relic stored in a great strong chest, but on feast days the good priests reveal it so that all who come may know its blessings.”
“So I have heard,” murmured Secundus.
I glanced at Secundus. Would he mention that we were protecting the relic? Apparently not.
In due course the old man—having chided his son for jostling, and the clouds for drizzling, and Secundus and me for dullness—said he needed to rest, and Secundus begged our leave.
“I declare,” Secundus whispered to me, “pilgriming would be the world’s greatest pursuit were it not for other pilgrims.”
I giggled because it was true and because jesting is joyous, even in drizzle.
At that moment a thought struck me: the old man had said not a word about me! He had not called me hunchback or monster, and neither he nor his son made any sign of protection. It could not be kindness, no, for the old man did not strike me as kind. It must be they did not notice.
So stunned was I that I reached for my hump, which was wrong for I never must touch it, but curiosity overwhelmed sense. The hump was there same as always, with the pack atop it like the shell of a beetle. . . .
The pack hid my hump. The pack with the rib of Saint Peter.
Would the pack hide my hump from other folk’s eyes? Now I could not wait for more people!
We came upon a traveler and then several, pilgrims and merchants and cripples, men and women and boys and girls, all heading to the feast day of Saint-Peter’s-Step. They nodded as we passed, or spoke. But not one made the sign of protection. A party of ten pilgrims drank from a small barrel they carried, yet even they did not curse or taunt me, and well do I know how wine fuels taunting.
With each passing stranger, I stood taller. To that soul, I would think, I am only a boy. A boy and a servant and naught else. And so though our travel worsened as people and oxen churned the road into muck, my steps grew lighter. Thank you, Saint Peter, for hiding my hump.
We passed a bend in the road, and there appeared a town grander than anything I had ever known, with a forest of smoking chimneys and a wall wrapped like a bandage around its outside, and a great stone bridge so long that I could not throw a pebble its length. Guards stood at the bridge’s near end, and every soul who passed had to hand them a coin, or some other payment for coins are hard to come by.
“Ah. Tollmen,” murmured Secundus, and a woman with a basket of piglets laughed a bitter laugh, and over their squeals she asked the Good Lord to inflict tollmen with what they deserved.
The crowd pressed hard and restless toward the bridge but the tollmen would take their time, and whilst others minded I did not, because in one two three four days I would be home again, and would have the rest of my life to recall this.
A vintner argued that his wine was not worth being taxed, that indeed it would sicken them, but the tollmen shook their heads and took a cup of his wine as their coin. A farmwife led a gaggle of geese up to the bridge, all of them hissing as she paid eggs to the tollmen.
Before us walked three nuns in gray habits, their heads together against the sins of the world. “The holy orders pay no tax,” the first nun announced to the tollmen.
The tollman peered at them, for the nuns shuffled and hunched in a queer manner. At that minute the habit of the second nun quite erupted, and out flopped a rooster with an angry screech, causing everyone to jump, even the nuns and most especially the tollmen, who had not expected the sisters to be smuggling a fowl.
Oh, the crowd laughed.
“I had no idea—” began the second nun as the first nun cried, “We owe no tax if we haven’t the bird!” And indeed they did not, for the rooster flapped away, crowing that he had evaded the nuns and the tax and the chopping block.
Then ’twas our turn, Secundus and me, the crowd still chuckling. “Are ye a real pilgrim?” one tollman asked Secundus. The other tollman looked me over but his expression did not change, and he paid no notice of my hump beneath the pack of Saint Peter.
“My boy carries our food,” Secundus answered, coughing, “and I a humble offering for the altar. Surely you have plumper birds to pluck”—which again set the crowd to laughing.
The tollmen motioned us through, and so we crossed the bridge.
Behold: I was walking over water deeper than men. Oh, the genius of God and masons. “Milord? Should we not warn the townsfolk that monks will try to steal their relic?”
“That is not our task, Boy. Our task is to keep it safe.”
6 Saint-Peter’s-Step
Saint-Peter’s-Step! Thick was the crowd and thick the stench, of people and smoke and everything else. Here was a lady with a white mule and three servants; there a troupe of pilgrims in prayer; here a housewife selling wine from her doorstep; there beggars with crippled legs but lusty voices. My stick tripped one person and another, so I crept along not knowing where to squirm. And then I lost Secundus.
By the goodness of heaven I lost him for only a minute, but oh, how my heart pounded in that one minute’s time. “Secundus,” I screamed, but my voice could not pierce the din, and the crowd pressed in, and everyone, it seemed, wore pilgrim garb.
Secundus appeared, his face
tight with anger, and lifted his hand so I thought he would strike me. But instead he reached into his robe for a length of rope that I tied around my waist with shaking fingers, such was my relief that he’d found me. We set off, Secundus leading me as a man leads a dog, but I did not mind for I would rather be a found dog than a lost soul. Several people looked at the boy led by a rope, but thanks to the pack of Saint Peter not one called me hunchback or monster.
On we went, past men selling pies and men selling fish and women selling buns still warm. One man shouted that he had the greatest of relics, and held before him a board displaying bits of metal and cloth and glass. A fine lady pilgrim bent over the board, her handmaid beside her.
Secundus paused. He pointed to a sliver of wood. “And what would that be?”
The relic dealer pointed. “That is from the boat that carried Saint James all the way from the Holy Land to Spain.”
How I marveled. Wood touched by the hand of Saint James—and anyone could buy it!
“I have just purchased his one other piece,” announced the fine lady—and fine she was, for though she herself wore pilgrim wool, her handmaid’s gown was trimmed in squirrel. “Would you like to see?” She smiled at me—a true smile that felt like sunshine—and held out a slim gold case with as many compartments as I have fingers. Within each compartment lay a wee fragment of bone, except for one with a sliver of wood.
“Now I have nine saints plus the boat of Saint James.” The lady turned to the relic dealer, and her smile hardened to iron. “What else have you to sell me?”
Dazzled by the fine lady’s relics and smile, I followed Secundus. We came to a street where every booth and every door displayed crutches, men shouting that a crutch purchased in Saint-Peter’s-Step would aid any cripple. Beyond was a street of cobblers, with more shoes and boots than I could imagine—shoes of leather and cloth, some with bells and some with laces, ladies’ pattens with high soles so as not to tread in mud, and slippers for indoors, and thick boots that would last a man some years.
We came to a great square full of people: friars with cowls and nuns in their habits (though no nuns smuggling roosters!), and pilgrims with badges pinned to their hats. Men sold beeswax candles and beeswax feet, for wax is as precious as coins, and can be molded into any sort of offering. We reached the steps of a great church. Clouds of incense drifted out its doors whilst clouds of pilgrims drifted in. A preacher stood on the steps. “Let me tell you of Rome,” he cried.
Secundus’s head came up, and he pushed closer.
“The pope has declared this year—this year of our Lord 1350—as a Holy Year,” continued the preacher. “All sinners who travel to Rome this year will receive a pardon.”
For a moment Secundus’s face held an expression of longing such as I never have seen.
“And the miracles to be found in Rome! Why, a woman leper touched the tomb of Saint Peter and was cured straightaway—”
“Lepers,” Secundus scoffed. “That’s all they ever speak of.” He shouldered his way inside, and I had no choice but to follow.
This church, too, looked like the heart of a jewel. Color filled the windows, even in the gray dusk. The ceiling blazed with candles, and cloths hung on the walls. At the far end stood the altar, glittering with gold and candlelight. There sat a chest with open doors so that all might see its contents.
We made our way forward, and all about lay the injured and crippled, their feet painful to behold. Many had crutches. Men and women prayed before the chest, and eight guards stood around it with pikes, watching every pilgrim who approached.
Secundus studied the guards, and the windows behind them—tall narrow windows, topped with pointed arches—and the space around the altar. Closer we drew. I could see the precious relic. . . .
’Twas a shoe. A cracked man’s shoe, dusty. The sort of shoe a poor man might give to a beggar.
Do you know who appeared at that moment? The crabby old man from the road. He shouted at the crowd as his son bore him forward, and waved a crutch at the guards. “I should like to kiss Saint Peter’s shoe!”
“No one may touch this holy relic,” answered a guard.
The old man flourished a glittering blue stone.
The guards looked at each other, and stepped aside so that the son could carry his father forward. He laid his father before the altar, and the old man placed his gem upon it. He smiled in triumph—
And he snatched up the shoe with his grubby old hand!
The crowd gasped.
“No!” cried the guards, lunging.
“No!” Secundus’s eyes went wide.
The old man pressed the shoe to his lips, and set it down with a cry: “I am cured. ’Tis a miracle!” He pulled himself to his feet. Though he could not put weight on his crippled foot, he could walk well enough whilst crutching, and he crutched his way out of the church.
The pilgrims rejoiced at this miracle, and many knelt in prayer. But the guards scowled, and Secundus scowled as he watched the guards close ranks in front of the chest.
“Milord,” I whispered, “the shoe almost was stolen.”
“The guards did their job.” But he did not sound happy, and he frowned as he pushed his way back to the street. “The crowds are worse than I feared. Let us find an inn—”
His head snapped up and his eyes grew hard.
I sniffed: bread and saffron and sweet wine and stewing apples, and a stink . . .
A dog in a doorway. A stinky old dog that broke wind in his sleep, loud enough for folk to hear, and to chuckle at the stench.
Secundus forced a smile. “Quite amusing,” he said, though he did not sound amused.
How curious that he should not like stinky dogs when he himself had a smell. I pondered this as I trailed him. Though Secundus’s smell was somewhat different. If only I could name it . . .
At last we came upon a house where a plump wife sold eels and wine and beds by a fire. “What a sweet angel,” she exclaimed when she saw me, for she did not notice my hump, and she ordered her daughter to serve us.
The daughter was young and slight but full of life, and she, too, did not notice my hump. She brought me a fine piece of honeycomb, and laughed like a burbling stream as the dogs pressed around my legs. “Why, you’re as sweet as honey to them. I wish they loved me so.” She asked where I came from, and sighed when I said I’d walked all the way from the manor. “How fine your home must be.”
I looked around at the wide fireplace and the windows of waxed cloth. “’Tis not so fine as this.” My goat shed had no windows at all.
She laughed her burbling laugh. “Listen to you! If you don’t eat that honeycomb, I shall gobble it down myself.” Off she trotted, leaving me to slip the honeycomb to the dogs (for in truth I do not care much for honey) and to marvel at how lovely it was to talk to another soul—a soul my own age who was even a girl!—without being jeered at or mocked. She treated me like I was a normal boy, just like the others.
So I settled myself in a corner, enjoying her laughter burbling over the hubbub, and I warned the dogs not to break wind or ’twould upset Secundus who was drinking with the other pilgrims, and they promised not to. A brindled mongrel bitch settled beside me with her four fat puppies, and she rested her head in my lap whilst they nursed and smiled her good dog smile, and another dog with shaggy black fur made certain that not a drop of honey remained on my fingers or behind my ears, and all the dogs lay close and the puppies, too, when they finished their meal, not one of them stinking, and at that moment I was as happy as ever I have been because I had dogs to love me and a miracle freshly witnessed, and not one person that day called me names, most especially not the daughter with her burbling laugh.
How fine it felt to walk without stares and curses. Without fearing stones. To enjoy the smiles of ladies, and the laughter of girls.
A notion sprouted like a weed inside my head: how fine ’twould be if my hump were gone, so that I could know more smiles and comfort and safety. If I could live
as something other than hunchback or monster.
Stop, I ordered myself. You should not think so, Boy. ’Tis not right.
But the weed would not stop growing, no matter how I tried to pluck it.
7 Feast Day
I awoke in a pile of dogs. Today was the feast day. Today Secundus and I would save the relic of Saint-Peter’s-Step!
Around me snored other pilgrims. Secundus himself had claimed the table, and he lay like a corpse with his hat over his face, clutching his staff to his chest.
The plump wife bustled about as her daughter stirred a pot on the fire. The girl giggled at the sight of me in a pile of dogs, and her giggle lightened the room.
Beside the fire sat a blind man telling a story—a story the daughter had heard, for she nodded, but pilgrims gathered around the man as they woke, and I gathered, too, for who does not like a good story? The tale began in the Holy Land, where Saint Peter set out to spread the Good Word. He crossed the salty sea—so the blind man recounted—and landed on the shores of France, and walked all the way to a mountain. There he met a beggar woman so poor that she had no shoes even in the snowy depths of winter. So Saint Peter gave his shoes to the beggar woman and returned to Rome, where he later was killed by the wicked Roman emperor. The beggar woman sold one shoe for food, but she kept the other because it was holy, and pilgrims came to see the shoe of Saint Peter, and in time the monastery of Saint-Peter’s-Mount flourished atop the mountain.
(Here the blind man paused. The daughter filled a bowl with stew and wrapped his hands around the bowl, and he thanked her as he ate with his fingers.)
A town grew at the base of the mountain, the town of Saint-Peter’s-Step. But the pilgrims who climbed Saint-Peter’s-Mount rarely lingered in the town below, and the monks of the monastery gave no thought to the needs of their neighbors. Then came the pestilence. The cowardly monks in the monastery left the relic unprotected, and the earnest townsfolk brought the shoe down to safety. Now great wealth came to Saint-Peter’s-Step, each day bringing more people, all from the blessings of Saint Peter’s shoe.