Barry Unsworth - The Ruby In Her Navel

At first, as I rode away, though the sun was high now and the countryside flooded with light, thoughts of my father's night life continued to obscure my mind, like mist that was slow to disperse. I saw him still in the dimness of the church, groping to his place in the choir, with scarce light enough to give him guidance. Sometimes perhaps, being old and drowsy, he would fall asleep during the singing. Would there be someone appointed to watch for this? If my father slept, would someone lay hands on him, shake him awake?

From this I fell to thinking yet again of all I had lost by the change in him, and neither the beauty of the day nor the exercise of riding could take my mind from this. Perhaps it is true that the frustrating of hope makes the desire seem in memory stronger, as Saint Augustine maintains in his 'Confessions' – I think it is to be found there. I do not know, after these years that have passed, whether it was the idea of knighthood that drew me, to battle for the good under God and the King, or whether it was simply the wish to join an order that belonged to my rank in life, to do what was required of me, as my father had done, and his father before him. I know only that I wanted it with all my being.

I was seven years old when my father sent me from our home in Apulia to the court of Richard of Bernalda, where I spent seven years as a page.

The loneliness and the longing for home were tempered – even then – by pride in the calling. There were ten other boys of my age there and eight girls, all the children of nobles. We boys shared the pride and did our best to conceal the sorrow, and with the girls it was something of the same – there was one girl there that I loved and we talked together when we could contrive to meet.

This is what you were born for, my father said, on this our first parting – my father, who not many years later was to give my birthright away. You are the only son, the destiny of knighthood began with your birth, it is for this you must be sent away, to learn manners, wait on the ladies, serve at meals, help to take care of the armour and the horses. He did not expect tears from me, so there were none, but my mother wept.

The sense of destiny was there already, even in unhappiness; it grew greater as the unhappiness grew less, as I learned to ride and fight. By the age of fourteen I had abandoned miniature weapons and was already practised at managing lance and sword on horseback; true, it was not a charger yet, but a stallion and restive enough. Riding home through the smiling countryside, bright spring flowers at my feet, larks singing overhead, on the eve of a mission for which I felt no eagerness, I remembered my ardour of those days; with a sort of arid pride I remembered that I had been the strongest of my companions, always first at the practice lists.

I was bare-headed and the sun was hot; I stopped to pull on my velvet cap that came fashionably low over the brow. Then I allowed the mare to go her own placid pace, remembering the dusty courtyard where we practised, the heavy, snorting breaths of the horses, the gallop, the levelled lance, the straw-filled effigy twitching and swaying there as they jerked it on the ropes, the triumph when I pierced it and dashed it to the ground, the sacking agape as the belly of straw was spilled out.

A year later and I was shield-bearer to Hubert of Venosa, went hunting with him and attended him at the lists and learned to manage his war-horses and to fight on foot with sword and dagger so I could protect him in battle if he were unhorsed. Then, in a skirmish outside the walls of Salerno my father advanced too far, was surrounded, tumbled from his horse and taken captive. And with that recklessness of his my dream of knighthood was over, the splendour of the armour, the shine of the silver on the shield, the bright silk across the saddle, the enemy before your face.

On the day when my father beat at the monastery gates I had the best part of two years to wait before my time came for the vigil and the blessing of the weapons and the flat of the sword against my neck.

Hubert might have kept me for the time, he was always generous. But the armour I would wear when I knelt to be dubbed, who would pay for that?

Who would buy for me the war-horse, an animal bred for weight and very costly? How would I come by the weapons, and the trappings for the horse, more costly still?

What would have become of me I do not know. I might have returned to England, to my mother's people, and sought my fortune there. Then came delegates from the Seneschal's Office on a visit. Shows of various kinds were put on for them. We squires did our tilting at effigies and our mounting at the gallop and our sword exercises. I distinguished myself and was noticed and my situation was explained to the visitors. A question or two, a quick reply, and I returned with them to Palermo, to the Palace, where I entered on a different kind of preparation. I was to be one of the King's Household Guard, a body whose duty it was to guard his person when he appears in public, and whose numbers were kept small – there were never more than fifty at any one time, including officers, all of good family. There was no bar to enrollment on grounds of race or creed, and this by the King's own wish, who put his trust more in diversity than sameness. Shared by all were loyalty, skill with weapons and the obligation to speak Greek, the common language of the island.

I was set to study Greek, my knowledge of which was imperfect at that time since I had grown up in courts where the language was French. These lessons were a great boon to me, as it proved, they led me to a love of studying, and this is with me still. My teacher, finding me an apt pupil, perhaps unusually so, introduced me to Latin, though in the main it was later, during my years in the Diwan, that I made strides in this language. I was also taught wrestling, and the ways of fighting when space is limited and the opponent close, which was mainly the use of the dagger and of a sword shorter and lighter than the one I had been used to. There were holds and blows which we learned, designed to disable a man or even to kill him, and we spent some time each day in lifting weights and doing exercises that make the body strong.

In all these matters I think I can say I did my best to excel. My disappointment at failing to become a knight was still keen, but I looked forward to the day when I would don the uniform of the household guards, a splendid uniform with a plumed cap and a tunic worked in silver thread on a scarlet background and a polished leather belt and embroidered leggings that had a line of silver at the sides. My role would still be one of service, I would be protecting the King's sacred person and helping to uphold his state, I would be near him, I would live in the light of his presence.

However, none of this came about. Another question, another answer, in Arabic this time, changed my life again. Now, as I made my way back through the Conca d'Oro, as it narrows towards the city and the harbour beyond, where I would take ship next day, I felt my life narrowing too and the knowledge of loss constricted my heart.

It was still dark when I embarked next morning. The two who were to accompany me to Cosenza were waiting at the dock. One of them, Sigismond, I recognised; the other, who gave his name as Mario, was new.

Both were brawny and impassive, as usual with those who are engaged in these duties. I would have been happier without an escort, but the rules of the Diwan obliged me to have one: I was carrying money to pay for the birds and to meet my expenses for the second part of my journey; there were some who knew this and others who would guess it. In accordance with my usual custom, I kept some coin in the purse at my belt – an empty purse convinces no one. But the bulk of the money I wore strapped across my abdomen below the shirt.