The hymn "O Salutaris Hostia," sung by over a thousand strong voices
abetted by several thousand more uncertain ones, echoed from the
hillsides. The entire clergy of Orvieto, from the pope down to the
lowliest subdeacon, had come out of the city, and so had most of the lay
population. But Daoud's attention was drawn, not by the great procession
coming down the cliffside road, or by the crowd in the meadow around
him, but by the astonishing change that had come over the landscape.
It was as if some devastating disease had struck all the growing things
of the region, from the tallest trees to the very blades of grass. The
leafless groves raised black, skeletal arms up to the bright blue sky,
like men praying. The vineyards on the slopes were gray clumps of
shrubbery. The meadow grass on which he stood was yellow and brittle; it
broke to bits underfoot.
He had known, of course, that such changes came over the European
landscape each winter. But to see such desolation with his own eyes was
more amazing, even frightening, than he realized it would be. Soon the
Christians would be celebrating the birth of Jesus the Messiah, whom
they believed was God. Seeing death in the landscape all around him,
Daoud found it easier to understand why these idolators might feel
driven to worship a God who rose from the dead.
He hoped it would help his mission that the wave of enthusiasm for the
miracle at Bolsena had swept everyone in Orvieto from the pope on down.
He hoped they would have neither time to think about the Tartars nor
interest in dealing with them.
But this miracle and all the talk about it made him uneasy. The frenzy
in the Christian faces around him might be turned, he thought, in any
direction. It must be the same frenzy that had driven generations of
crusaders to hurl themselves against the Dar al-Islam.
Fra Tomasso was at the very center of the furor. It was he who had sent
word from Bolsena that in his judgment the miracle was indeed authentic.
Might this new preoccupation distract him from his efforts to prevent
the alliance?
And there was something else, something that revived a terror buried
deep in Daoud's soul. Jesus, the crucified God of the Christians,
stirred in this miracle. As a boy growing up among Muslims, Daoud had
renounced belief in the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. Now he
felt again his father's ghostly hand on his shoulder, and the hairs
lifted on the back of his neck.
"Look at the sick people and the cripples lining the road," said
Lorenzo. "I would not have thought there could be that many infirm
people in Orvieto." He and Daoud stood side by side, at a spot where the
road between Bolsena and Orvieto passed through a wide valley, their
horses tethered in a nearby grove of poplar trees. They had moved back a
few paces from the edge of the road to make room for a dozen men and
women on stretchers, wrapped in blankets, who had been carried here by
Franciscan friars from their hospital.
All around Lorenzo and Daoud stood Cardinal Ugolini's men-at-arms,
servants, and maids. Ugolini's entire household was here except for the
few of highest rank who would march with the cardinal, who marched
behind the pope.
Fearing that Scipio would go uncared for, Lorenzo had brought him along,
holding him on a thick leather leash. The gray boarhound paced nervously
and growled from time to time.
In the meadow across the road the pope's servants had erected a pavilion
without walls--just a roof of silk, gold and white, the papal colors,
coming to three points held up by a dozen or more stout poles. There
Pope Urban would say mass after receiving the sanctified cloth.
Daoud glanced down the road to where Sophia stood. They had agreed that
in public it would be best for them to appear far apart from each other.
She was dressed as any well-to-do Italian woman might be, her hair
covered with a round, flat linen cap bound under her chin, a
midnight-blue chemise with long, tight sleeves, and a sleeveless gown of
light blue silk over it. Beside Sophia stood a slighter figure in gray
veil and gown. They had their heads close together, talking.
"Who is that with Sophia?" Daoud asked Lorenzo.
"Oh, Rachel, I think." Lorenzo studiously examined Scipio's head for
fleas.
"She appears in public with Rachel?" Daoud said angrily.
Lorenzo shrugged. "No one knows who Rachel is." He slapped Scipio's
rump. "Sit."
"I did not like Sophia visiting Rachel," Daoud said. "Even less do I
like their being seen together in public."
Trumpets shrilled and drums sounded as the hymn came to an end. Daoud
looked toward Orvieto. The road that wound down past the gray-yellow
folds of tufa was filled with people.
At the head of the procession walked the pope in gold and white, and the
cardinals of the Sacred College in bright red. The middle of the long
line was bright with the purples of archbishops and bishops and the
variegated raiment of the nobility. The rear was dark with the grays and
browns of common folk.
From this distance Daoud could not see Pope Urban's face, but there was
no mistaking the beehive-shaped mitre with its glittering triple crown.
Lucky for the pope the weather was cold, thought Daoud. Wearing those
heavy vestments on a hot day would surely kill the old man. That today
he chose to go on foot showed how much this miracle meant to him.
Daoud turned and looked to the west. The marchers from Bolsena were
close, and people were falling to their knees all over the meadow.
_I will have to kneel, too, and seem to worship their idols. Forgive me,
God._
Daoud saw Sophia and Rachel drop to their knees.
_Surely they think as little of this as I do._
Coming toward Daoud from the west was a great banner that offended his
every religious feeling. Painted on the red cloth were the head and
shoulders of a bearded man, Jesus the Messiah, with huge, staring eyes.
On his head was a plaited wreath of thorns, and behind it a disk of
gold. From the nail holes that pierced his upraised palms fell painted
drops of blood.
An idol, such as the Koran forbade and the Prophet had come into this
world to destroy.
And then he thought of the great crucifix that hung in the chapel of
Château Langmuir outside Ascalon, and his mother taking him by the hand
to pray before it.
"Because _He_ lived and died here," he remembered her sweet voice
saying, "that is why we are here in this Holy Land."
He felt momentarily dizzy. They, his mother and father and all these
people here, thought that the bearded man, with the wounds of
crucifixion in his hands, was God. And he had believed it once, too.
No, God was One. He could not be a Father who reigned in heaven and a
Son who came down to earth. God was glorious and all-powerful; He could
not be crucified. God was the Creator; He could not be part of His
creation.
And yet--the cold hand still lay upon his shoulder. A gentle hand, but
it frightened him.
All around Daoud the infidels were throwing themselves on their knees,
even on their faces, in the road before the advancing banner. A man in a
black robe was walking before the banner bearer. Despite his long gray
beard there was something about his staring eyes and wide, downturned
mouth that reminded Daoud of a fish.
The bearded priest, Father Kyril, was holding up by its corners a white
square of linen. That, thought Daoud, must be the altar cloth on which
the drops of blood had fallen from the wafer of bread. As he walked he
slowly, solemnly, turned from side to side to allow people on both sides
of the road to see the cloth.
"_Kneel_, David, for God's sake!" Lorenzo ground out beside him.
His curiosity had made him forget himself. He dropped to his knees,
feeling dry grass prick his skin through his silk hose. Lorenzo knelt
beside him, gripping the dog's collar. The sick and crippled people
lying beside the road were wailing and holding up their arms in
supplication.
Again Daoud asked God's forgiveness for his seeming idolatry.
Father Kyril and the altar cloth were only a dozen paces away, and now
Daoud could see the brown bloodstains on the white cloth. Amazingly they
appeared to form the profile of a bearded man.
As a cold wind against his spine, he felt his long-buried fear of the
wrath of the Christian God.
The big hound, right beside him, let out a thunderous bark. Daoud
started with surprise. His heart pounded in his chest.
Scipio barked and barked, so loudly Daoud put his hands over his ears.
Father Kyril took a step backward. People who had been venerating the
bloodstained cloth turned with angry shouts. The hands of the
men-at-arms escorting Father Kyril twitched, groping for the weapons
they were not carrying.
"Scipio!" Lorenzo gave the hound a sharp slap on the side of the head.
The dog kept up its barking. Father Kyril had stopped walking and looked
frightened. He clutched the stained cloth to his breast. At a word from
him, Daoud thought, the crowd would tear to pieces the dog, Lorenzo, and
perhaps Daoud himself.
Lorenzo grabbed Scipio's muzzle with both hands, forcing it shut. Scipio
kept up a growling through his teeth. Lorenzo growled back, "Be still!"
He wrestled the dog down until the lean gray head was pressed into the
grass.
"Barking is the only way he knows to greet the Savior," said Lorenzo
with an ingratiating grin, looking up at the people glaring at him.
"There could be a devil in that dog," a brown-robed friar said
ominously. But Scipio relaxed under Lorenzo's hands, and those around
Daoud and Lorenzo turned back to the procession.
Daoud was furious. Lorenzo's damned dog had been like a stone in his
shoe ever since they set out from Lucera. Lorenzo was a valuable man,
but he insisted on attaching others to him who caused endless trouble.
Like the dog. Like Rachel.
A scream rose above the music, so shrill Daoud put his hands over his
ears again.
"My God! I can see!" A woman was standing, clasping her hands together
and flinging them wide again and again. One of the Franciscans threw his
arms around her, whether to rejoice with her or restrain her, Daoud
could not tell. But she pushed him away and went stumbling after Father
Kyril. From the way her hands pawed the air, Daoud suspected she could
not see very well, but she shouted with joy all the same.
She joined a crowd of people, many of them waving walking sticks and
crutches, others with bloodstained bandages trailing from their hands.
One man, Daoud saw to his horror, was missing a foot and was limping
along in the dirt road, without the aid of crutch or cane, on one whole
leg and one stump bound with a dirty cloth that ended at the ankle. His
face was red, sweat-slick, and blindly ecstatic.
Behind the rejoicing invalids walked rows of clergymen from Bolsena.
Daoud recognized a familiar figure in the foreground, Fra Tomasso
d'Aquino, his cheeks crimson with cold and exertion, his black mantle
blowing in the wind. He had spent the last two weeks, Daoud knew, in
Bolsena investigating the miracle and overseeing preparations for the
altar cloth to be brought to Pope Urban.
What did he think now, Daoud ached to know. Would he still work as hard
to defeat the Tartar alliance? Did this miracle mean Daoud had gained
ground or lost ground?
A sudden silence fell over the meadow. Pope Urban, with trembling hands
upraised, approached Father Kyril, whose back was to Daoud.
Father Kyril went down on his knees before the pope, holding up the
white cloth over his head like a banner. Then the pope also knelt,
somewhat shakily, with the assistance of two young priests in white
surplices and black cassocks. Urban reached up for the cloth and pulled
it down to his face and kissed it.
_He is seeing that cloth for the first time, and yet he seems to have no
doubt that he is looking at the blood of his God that died._
Daoud felt a chill that was colder than the December air.
* * * * *
Daoud pushed his way to the edge of the open pavilion, where the pope,
assisted by Father Kyril and Fra Tomasso, was saying high mass. A band
of musicians blew on hautboys and clarions, sawed at vielles, stroked
harps, and thumped on drums.
The white cloth with its strange rust-colored stain was stretched on a
gilded frame above the altar. Daoud felt uneasy whenever he looked at
it. Just when it seemed he had found the key to wrecking the union of
Tartars and crusaders--a miracle. What did it portend?
Memory showed him his mother and father celebrating Easter, standing
hand in hand before the altar at Château Langmuir, receiving Holy
Communion--the Sacred Host--from their chaplain. When he was old enough,
his mother had told him he, too, would be allowed to take Jesus into his
heart by swallowing the Communion wafer. What a strange belief! But at
the time it had seemed beautiful.
_I bear witness that God is One, that Muhammad is the Messenger of
God...._
He glanced around the pavilion, and saw many faces he had come to know
in the last few months. There was Cardinal de Verceuil with his big nose
and small mouth. There was Ugolini, the size of a child, dressed up as a
cardinal, blinking rapidly, looking rather bored. In the front row of
standing worshipers were John and Philip, the Tartars, in silk robes.
Beside them, Friar Mathieu, the Franciscan, cleverest of Daoud's
opponents. Daoud gauged him to be a genuinely holy man, if an infidel
could be called holy.
And next to him was the pale young face of the Count de Gobignon.
As Daoud looked at him, de Gobignon looked back, and his eyes widened
slightly.
_One day, Count, you will die by my hand._
The mass began, and even though there must have been five thousand
people in the valley, there was complete silence. The quiet was eerie.
At a Muslim religious celebration this large, the crowd would be
chanting in unison, there would be music, dervishes singing and dancing;
impromptu sermons would be delivered in various parts of the crowd by
mullahs or by ordinary men moved to speak. Here all was focused on the
center.
Pope Urban rose to speak. He had removed his mitre to say mass. His
white hair, his long beard, and his trailing mustache seemed much more
sparse than they had been when Daoud had first seen the pope, last
summer. His face was as pale as his hair, and his hands trembled.
A few months ago Daoud had heard Urban's voice rise robustly from the
center of his body. Today his voice was high and thin and seemed to come
from his throat. He told the story of the miracle of Bolsena, and
explained that Father Kyril was a priest from Bohemia who had developed
doubts about whether Christ was really present in each and every
consecrated Communion wafer. Could a small piece of bread really become
the body of Jesus when a priest said a few words over it?
_Where is the illness?_ Daoud's Sufi-trained eye told him it was deep
within Pope Urban; it had sunk its claws into his chest.
_I do not think this pope has long to live._
Ugolini had told Daoud that Urban wanted desperately, before he himself
died, to strike a death blow against the Hohenstaufen family. He wanted
Count Charles d'Anjou, brother of the King of France, to wrest the crown
of Sicily from Manfred, but King Louis had thus far forbidden his
brother to make war on Manfred.
King Louis wanted a different war, a joint war of Christians and Tartars
against Islam. Thus far, the pope had withheld his approval of any
Christian monarch's allying himself with the Tartars.
As Urban heard the approaching wings of the Angel of Death, might he be
more inclined to grant Louis what he wanted?
The crowd was no longer silent. Daoud heard waves of murmuring run
through it as people relayed the pope's words to those who were too far
away to hear him. He noticed now the hawklike profile of the Contessa di
Monaldeschi. She was seated in a chair in front of the worshipers on the
side of the pavilion opposite Daoud. A plump young boy in red velvet
stood beside her.
Seeing her, Daoud looked for Marco di Filippeschi. He could not be sure,
but the back of a dark head on this side of the pavilion looked like
that of the Filippeschi chieftain. Those organizing this ceremony would,
of course, be careful to separate the leaders of the two feuding
families.
Pope Urban continued: Father Kyril, realizing that he was doomed to
eternal damnation if he did not overcome his doubts, had set out on a
pilgrimage to Rome. But Rome had fallen on evil days, its streets turned
into battlefields by the Ghibellini followers of the vile Hohenstaufens,
and Father Kyril found no peace there. He decided to ask the prayers of
the pope himself at Orvieto. That decision was rewarded before he even
reached here. Two months ago, while saying mass at Bolsena, on his way
to Orvieto, and praying that his doubts be resolved, Father Kyril raised
the Sacred Host over his head after the Consecration, and hundreds of
witnesses saw drops of blood fall from it to the cloth spread on the
altar.
And now--Pope Urban gestured to the cloth spread above the altar--we can
behold with our own eyes the blood of Christ Himself and see this
proof--which, having faith, we should not need to see--that Jesus lives
in the Blessed Sacrament.
"We propose to offer triple thanks to God for His generosity in granting
us this miracle," said Pope Urban. "First, let the day on which Father
Kyril saw the Host bleed be celebrated henceforward as the feast of the
Body of Christ, Corpus Christi. Let this be proclaimed throughout
Christendom.
"Second, to house and display this most sacred relic, the blood of Our
Savior Himself, let a great and beautiful new cathedral be built here at
Orvieto, which will forever be the center for the veneration of the body
of Christ."
Daoud sighed inwardly at the thought of still another great building
dedicated to idolatry.
Yet the chapel at Château Langmuir had been such a lovely and quiet
place.
As the pontiff's words were repeated, the murmuring grew louder.
Someone near Daoud said, "But the miracle happened in Bolsena." Someone
else hushed the person who protested.
_I should not wonder if these cities went to war with each other over
such a relic_, thought Daoud.
"Finally," said Pope Urban, oblivious of the discontent his previous
proclamation had caused among the citizens of Bolsena, "we command that
all priests of Holy Church shall read a special office on the feast of
Corpus Christi of each year, commemorating this miracle. God has willed
that there should be dwelling with us here at Orvieto the most gifted
scholar and writer of this age, Fra Tomasso d'Aquino."
Daoud saw that Fra Tomasso's face was almost as bright a red as a
cardinal's hat.
"And we charge our beloved and most gloriously gifted son, Fra Tomasso,
with the duty of writing this office."
D'Aquino rose heavily from a bench on the right side of the altar.
Puffing, sweating despite the chill of the day, he bowed to the pope
with hands clasped before him.
_A great honor, that must be_, Daoud thought. Fra Tomasso was silent for
the moment, but he would write words that would be repeated by thousands
of priests all over the world as long as Christians celebrated this
feast. D'Aquino was more than ever indebted to the pope. If the pope
were to want d'Aquino's help in persuading the French to go to war
against Manfred, he would collect that debt.
Looking at Fra Tomasso as he sat listening to Pope Urban talk on about
his plans for the feast, for the cathedral, for the office, Daoud saw a
glow on those rounded features that made him uneasy. Daoud had felt that
with Cardinal Ugolini and Fra Tomasso stirring up opposition to the
alliance throughout Christendom, he had but to wait for the plan to die
of old age.
He could no longer be sure of that. Fra Tomasso's opposition to the
alliance had a fragile basis at best, and this miracle might have
shattered it.
The blood of the Messiah had power to change the course of events. Daoud
felt himself trembling.