Ellis Peters - The Heretic's Apprentice

“He never made any secret of what he thought,” said Elave. “He’d argue his point, and with good sense, too, even to priests, but there was none of them found any great fault with him for thinking about such things. What are wits for unless a man uses them?”

“That’s presumption,” said Aldwin, “in simple folk like us, who haven’t the learning or the calling of the churchmen. As the king and the sheriff have power over us in their field, so has the priest in his. It’s not for us to meddle with matters beyond us. Conan’s right, listen and say Amen!”

“How can you say Amen to damning a newborn child to hell because the little thing died before it could be baptized?” Elave asked reasonably. “It was one of the things that bothered him. He used to argue not even the worst of men could throw a child into the fire, so how could the good God? It’s against his nature.”

“And you,” said Aldwin, staring curiosity and concern, “did you agree with him? Do you say so, too?”

“Yes, I do say so. I can’t believe the reason they give us, that babes are born into the world already rotten with sin. How can that be true? A creature new and helpless, barely into this world, how can it ever have done wrong?”

“They say,” ventured Conan cautiously, “even babes unborn are rotten with the sin of Adam, and fallen with him.”

“And I say that it’s only his own deeds, bad and good, that a man will have to answer for in the judgment, and that’s what will save or damn him. Though it’s not often I’ve known a man so bad as to make me believe in damnation,” said Elave, still absorbed in his own reasoning, and intent only on expressing himself clearly and simply, without suspicion of hostility or danger. “There was a father of the Church, once, as I heard tell, in Alexandria, who held that in the end everyone would find salvation. Even the fallen angels would return to their fealty, even the devil would repent and make his way back to God.”

He felt the chill and the shiver that went through his audience, but thought no more of it than that his traveled wisdom, small as it still was, had carried him out of the reach of their parochial innocence. Even Fortunata, listening silently to the talk of the menfolk, had stiffened and opened her eyes wide and round at such an utterance, startled and perhaps shocked. She said nothing in this company, but she followed every word that was spoken, and the color ebbed and flowed in her cheeks as she glanced attentively from face to face.

“That’s blasphemous!” said Aldwin in an awed whisper. “The Church tells us there’s no salvation but by grace, not by works. A man can do nothing to save himself, being born sinful.”

“I don’t believe that,” said Elave stubbornly. “Would the good God have made a creature so imperfect that he can have no free will of his own to choose between right and wrong? We can make our own way towards salvation, or down into the muck, and at the last we must every one stand by his own acts in the judgment. If we are men we ought to make our own way towards grace, not sit on our hams and wait for it to lift us up.”

“No, no, we’re taught differently,” insisted Conan doggedly. “Men are fallen by the first fall, and incline towards evil. They can never do good but by the grace of God.”

“And I say they can and do! A man can choose to avoid sin and do justly, of his own will, and his own will is the gift of God, and meant to be used. Why should a man get credit for leaving it all to God?” said Elave, roused but reasonable. “We think about what we’re doing daily with our hands, to earn a living. What fools we should be not to give a thought to what we’re doing with our souls, to earn an eternal life. Earn it,” said Elave with emphasis, “not wait to be given it unearned.”

“It’s against the Church fathers,” objected Aldwin just as strongly. “Our priest here preached a sermon once about Saint Augustine, how he wrote that the number of the elect is fixed and not to be changed, and all the rest are lost and damned, so how can their free will and their own acts help them? Only God’s grace can save. Everything else is vain and sinful.”

“I don’t believe it,” said Elave loudly and firmly. “Or why should we even try to deal justly? These very priests urge us to do right, and demand of us confession and penance if we fall short. Why, if the roll is already made up? Where is the sense of it? No, I do not believe it!”

Aldwin was looking at him in awed solemnity. “You do not believe even Saint Augustine?”

“If he wrote that, no, I do not believe him.”

There was a sudden heavy silence, as though this blunt statement had knocked both his interrogators out of words. Aldwin, looking side wise with narrowed and solemn eyes, drew furtively along the bench, removing even his sleeve from compromising contact with so perilous a neighbor.

“Well,” said Conan at length, too cheerfully and too loudly, shifting briskly on his side of the table as though time had suddenly nudged him in the ribs, “I suppose we’d best be stirring, or we’ll none of us be up in time to get the work done tomorrow before Mass. Straight from a wake to a wedding, as the saying goes! Let’s hope the weather still holds.” And he rose, thrusting back his end of the bench, and stood stretching his thick, long limbs.

“It will,” said Aldwin confidently, recovering from his wary stillness with a great intake of breath. “The saint had the sun shine on her procession when they brought her here from Saint Giles, while it rained all around. She won’t fail us tomorrow.” And he, too, rose, with every appearance of relief. Plainly the convivial evening was over, and two, at least, were glad of it.

Elave sat still until they were gone, with loud and overamiable good-nights, about their last tasks before bed. The house had fallen silent. Margaret was sitting in the kitchen, going over the day’s events for flaws and compensations with the neighbor who came in to help her on such special occasions. Fortunata had not moved or spoken. Elave turned to face her, doubtfully eyeing her stillness, and the intent gravity of her face. Silence and solemnity seemed alien in her, and perhaps really were, but when they took possession of her they were entire and impressive.

“You are so quiet,” said Elave doubtfully. “Have I offended you in anything I’ve said? I know I’ve talked too much, and too presumptuously.”

“No,” she said, her voice measured and low, “nothing has offended me. I never thought about such things before, that’s all. I was too young, when you went away, for William ever to talk so to me. He was very good to me, and I’m glad you spoke up boldly for him. So would I have done.”

But she had no more to say, not then. Whatever she was thinking now about such things she was not yet ready to say, and perhaps by tomorrow she would have abandoned the consideration of what was difficult even for the world’s philosophers and theologians, and would come down with Margaret and Jevan to Saint Winifred’s festival content to enjoy the music and excitement and worship without questioning, to listen and say Amen.

She went out with him across the yard and through the entry into the street when he left, and gave him her hand at parting, still in a silence that was composed and withdrawn.

“I shall see you at church tomorrow?” said Elave, belatedly afraid that he had indeed alienated her, for she confronted him with so wide and thoughtful a stare of her unwavering hazel eyes that he could not even guess at what went on in the mind behind them.

“Yes,” said Fortunata simply, “I shall be there.” And she smiled, briefly and abstractedly, withdrew her hand gently from his, and turned back to return to the house, leaving him to walk back through the town to the bridge still unhappily in doubt whether he had not talked a great deal too much and too rashly, and injured himself in her eyes.