P. Doherty - The Templar

‘We will pay for that,’ said Alberic. ‘Innocent blood never goes unanswered.’

‘It’s the fault of our leaders,’ Hugh declared. ‘The bishops, counts and nobles. They should impose order; there must be stricter discipline in God’s Army.’

‘But they are God’s enemies,’ Imogene retorted.

‘Who are?’

‘The Jews. They crucified the Lord. They said His blood should be upon them and upon their children.’

‘But Christ’s blood is meant to cleanse and sanctify,’ declared Hugh.

‘Or punish,’ added Alberic, but his voice lacked any conviction. ‘In truth,’ he sighed, ‘are they any different from us?’

‘The Jews,’ Eleanor asked, ‘or the Turks?’

‘Both!’ Alberic muttered. ‘The Jews? Who are they but God’s children. Who are we? God’s children. Who are the Turks? God’s children, yet still we kill each other for the best possible reasons.’ He glanced round. ‘But are we God’s children? Or is there no God and we are what we are, killers to the heart?’

His companions stared in puzzlement.

‘Father,’ Godefroi asked, ‘do you regret coming?’

‘No.’ Alberic shrugged. ‘I do not regret; just wonder.’

‘But the Turks stole Christ’s fief, His Holy City.’ Beltran leaned forward, his unshaven, cold-pinched face bright in the firelight. ‘His Holiness the Pope says it’s our sacred duty to recover that fief, the Lord’s domain, now in enemy hands, and restore it to its rightful owners. Surely, Father, if someone came to seize my house or your church it would be our duty to regain possession.’

‘The devil rides a black steed,’ intoned Peter Bartholomew, sweeping into the tent and sitting down uninvited. He stared around, eyes all fearful. ‘I have heard the news,’ he continued. ‘The last days are upon us. Soon we shall see even more wondrous signs and listen to heaven-shaking news.’

‘But what is that to us, brother?’ Eleanor asked gently.

‘The Lord Satan sows dissension here where there should be none,’ Peter declared. ‘We have sworn to do God’s work. Is that not right, brothers and sisters?’ No one answered.

Eleanor watched Hugh closely. He had insisted that amongst the Poor Brethren, only the titles ‘brother’ and ‘sister’ should be used, and that each member must recite every day seven Paters, three Aves, two Glorias, the Dirige psalm and the Salve Regina. He had also compelled the Poor Brethren of the Temple to agree that money, plunder and the spoils of battle be shared equally. Discipline would be enforced, any violence against the innocent ruthlessly punished. Eleanor wondered about the Jews; those she herself had met seemed harmless enough, rather gentle, shy and frightened. True, she’d done them little good, but definitely no ill.

‘You know our rules.’ Hugh sipped at his wine. ‘We stand by them. One more thing! Listening to what happened to Rainald. If we are captured,’ he lowered his cup, ‘let us not be cowards, but go to God with pure hearts, yes?’

A murmur of approval greeted his words. Hugh paused as Norbert joined their circle and squatted down.

‘I heard you.’ The monk pushed back his cowl. ‘I was outside,’ he coughed and rubbed his stomach, ‘waiting for my belly to settle. I heard you mention the Jews, the Turks. Do you know what I think?’ He gestured round. ‘We are all killers. No…’ He lifted a hand against their protests. ‘Tell me, each of you, have you not lost your temper with a brother or sister and thought you could kill him or her? Have any of you said that?’ The Benedictine’s wrinkled face broke into a smile, lips parted to show blackening teeth. ‘Remember,’ he whispered, leaning forward, ‘the thought is the father of the word, which is the mother of the deed.’

‘But your answer,’ Hugh asked, ‘is that it? That we are all killers?’

‘It’s not an answer.’ Norbert chomped on his gums. ‘Just something I have learned. Killing is about the will — that is what the great Augustine said. I mean…’ Norbert’s rheumy eyes stared at Eleanor, and his long fingers went out as if he wished to catch the tendrils of her black hair. ‘If I planned to carry out an attack on your sister, to ravish her…’ he playfully thrust his balding head forward; in return, Eleanor pulled an expression of mock-fear, ‘then kill her, would you not have the right, Hugh, to defend her?’

‘I would kill you!’

‘No.’ The monk laughed sharply. ‘I said defend her. The two are quite different. Killing is about the will, what you intend to do.’

‘You are a scholar of Augustine,’ Alberic teased. ‘You hold to his thesis of a just war.’

‘Nonsense!’ Norbert cackled. ‘Oh, I’ve heard of Bonizo of Sutri’s arguments about that, and how the Pope confers titles on warriors such as our glorious Count Raymond to justify their wars.’

Eleanor caught the sarcasm in Norbert’s words.

‘Titles such as Fidelis Filius Sancti Petri — Faithful Son of Saint Peter. Nonsense! The phrase “just war” is a contradiction in terms! How can a war ever be just?’

‘So,’ Godefroi asked, ‘what is your reply? Why are you here?’

‘Why not?’ Norbert retorted. ‘Oh brothers, I do not mock you. None of us knows why we really do anything. Why am I a monk? Is it because I have a vocation to follow the rule of St Benedict? To serve Christ? Or was it to gain advancement and learning? Or because I sickened of listening to my mother couple with her lovers and wished to follow a more chaste life? Why have we come here? I tell you this.’ Norbert’s voice fell to a whisper. ‘There are as many reasons for our pilgrimage as there are pilgrims. We may be crucesignati — signed by the cross — but we are all different. Ask yourselves but don’t judge yourselves. Remember, our lives are taken up not by what we want to do but what we have to do!’

Eleanor pondered on Norbert’s words as she, Hugh and Godefroi walked out across the camp, the silence broken by the neighing of horses, the barking of dogs and the cries of children. Lantern horns gleamed from the poles outside the great lords’ tents. Camp fires flickered and crackled as they were banked down for the night. A cloud of smells greeted them: burnt oil, cooked food, wet straw and sweat, all mingling with the foul stenches drifting in from the latrines.

‘Why are you here, Eleanor?’ Godefroi abruptly asked as they stopped before her tent.

‘Because of you,’ she quipped, ‘and you because of me?’

Godefroi laughed self-consciously and shuffled his mud-caked boots.

‘Our life, as Brother Norbert said,’ broke in Hugh, eager to save any embarrassment, ‘is about what we have to do, or not do.’ He stood, hands on hips, staring up at the sky. ‘I know why I am not here,’ he continued quietly. ‘I am not here to kill innocent men, women and children. I am not here to plunder and pillage, ravage and rape.’ He sighed deeply. ‘I am here because I am here. True, I want to see the wonders on the other side of the world. I want to walk the streets of Jerusalem as Our Beloved Lord did, yet there’s something else…’ He shrugged, grasped Eleanor by the arms and kissed her gently on each cheek. Godefroi followed suit, though more awkwardly, then they were gone, their voices shouting farewells through the dark.

Eleanor undid the tent flaps. The lad guarding the tent was fast asleep beside the makeshift brazier. Eleanor roused him and gave him some slices of cheese in a linen rag. Once he was gone, she built up the brazier, tidied the tent and waited for Imogene to arrive. She’d glimpsed the widow woman deep in conversation with Norbert after the meeting had ended. Eleanor recalled Imogene’s words about the Jews. She sat down on a coffer and watched a wisp of mist curl into the tent, thinking about Godefroi’s question. Why was she here? To plead for pardon for the death of her drunken husband? To shake off the guilt of his death and that of her boy child, that glorious little spark of life, that flame that burnt so fiercely yet so briefly in her soul? For Hugh, the brother she adored, father and mother to her? Was it one of these or all of them? Was she part of something she would come to regret? The stories of Count Emicho, William the Carpenter and others revealed terrible savagery. She shuddered at the fate of those poor Jews, yet was she any different from the killers who had butchered them? Surely she was! Nevertheless, Hugh and Godefroi had assured her that once they crossed into the valleys of Sclavonia, fighting would break out, and they too would have to kill.