Temple of The Grail (19 page)

‘As always,’ he said benevolently. Turning to my
master, he asked, in an amiable way, if we had found the abbey interesting. ‘I
have seen you wandering about, asking many questions, observing, as does any
good physician.’

There! I had indeed been correct. He had been following
us.

‘I find your abbey exceptional, Brother Setubar. Only
today I have learnt so much.’

‘Have you indeed?’ The old man raised his brows and
narrowed his eyes a touch.

‘Yes . . . and one thing puzzles me.’

The man leant solicitously in my master’s direction. ‘If
I may be of assistance?’

‘This is the thing, venerable brother, abbeys for the
most part display an immeasurable preoccupation with past accomplishments
which, at times, you might agree, tends to border on the sin of pride. Here,
however, no one can tell me much beyond one or two generations, much less who
founded the abbey and when.’

‘As you can ascertain from your own lips, preceptor,
we Cistercians are not vainglorious like those Cluniacs you may know in the
large cities. We walk the hallowed halls built by our forefathers and we sing
God’s praise in the stalls built from their sainted hands, and we pray each day
in our venerated church that we might preserve our humility and our temperance.
What else is there to know?’

‘It is only that I am intrigued as to the origins of
your monastery.’

The old man nodded his head thoughtfully. ‘As is
always the case, thirteen brothers – the mirror of Christ and his twelve
apostles – set out to find a lonely place, a place where they could feel
the spirit of God most readily; a place far from the temptations of a wicked
world. The rest you see before you. It is simple.’

‘Yes, you are indeed so secluded that, in fact, not
one of your abbots has ever attended a meeting of the general chapter. To some
this might appear strange.’

An evil look passed over the old man’s face. ‘It is
very difficult for an abbot to leave his monks, there are too many
considerations, there is the weather, and time of year, for as you know we are
very often not able to travel the road that leads out of the forest. And there
is also the distance, as you have seen for yourself. In any event, the things
that are discussed at such gatherings have little to do with our small
community, preceptor. They are only for those whose motivations are governed by
political considerations, those who live in the shadows cast by kings and
popes. We, on the other hand, live in the shadows cast by the great mountain
that feeds us and quenches our thirst.’

‘Yes, that is another thing that I have learnt today,
venerable brother.’ My master cleared his throat and at the same time changed
the subject. ‘So you have lived here all your life?’

‘What has that got to do with anything?’ he answered.

‘I was hoping that you could tell me, for I also am a
lover of architecture, how long it has been since the new additions were made
to the church.’

The old man frowned, ‘Additions?’

‘Yes, surely you must remember. For I was only
speaking to Brother Macabus today on that very topic, only I forgot to ask him
. . .’

‘Ahh, yes, yes. I’m afraid my mind is becoming addled.
The additions . . . it was so long ago. Forgive me,’ he shook his head.

‘It is of no consequence, once again curiosity.
Perhaps the abbot might help me. In any case we must not take up any more of
your time, Brother Daniel needs his rest,’ my master said very quickly.

‘Nonsense!’ said Brother Daniel with emotion.

‘No Daniel,’ Setubar affirmed. ‘The preceptor, who is
also a physician, can see the pallor on your cheeks. Come and I will read to
you from the gospels.’

‘The pallor on my cheeks!’ the man said indignantly. ‘Am
I a maiden that I must wear a sanguine expression?’ Then, ‘Are there any more
raisins?’

‘No more today, as I have told you before.’ Setubar
locked Daniel’s arms into his and directed him to the ambulatory, but before
they could enter the south transept, Daniel called out to us without turning,

‘’Let the hymn baptise you with the nine resonances of
water. Beware, the antichrist is at hand!’

We remained for a little while in the Lady Chapel and
then strolled out into the graveyard through the north transept door and into
the cold winter day, meditating on Brother Daniel’s revelations.

‘So, brother Setubar did not remember the church
alterations. Is that significant?’ I asked.

‘It would have been more significant if he had.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘What do you mean how do I mean, boy! There were no
alterations . . . I simply made that up, so when he suddenly made excuses for
his lapse in memory I knew that he was not being truthful.’

‘But you said Brother Macabus –’

‘I know what I said.’

‘But then you have lied yourself!’ I said aghast.

‘Dear boy, lies are an abomination unto the Lord!’ he
exclaimed fervently, adding without even the slightest hint of guilt, ‘but a
very present help in times of trouble!’

‘So what did you find out by lying?’

‘Christian, you must learn to think with the head God
gave you. Setubar, a man who can quote word for word from the old book, a man
whose eyes are as sharp as his, is not in possession of an addled mind.
Besides, the old are known to have very fine memories of distant events, even
though they cannot remember what they had for breakfast, as Daniel has
admitted. Setubar should have remembered something so significant as the
alteration of a church. No I do not know as yet why he lied, but I have my
suspicions.’

At this point it began to snow, not lightly as earlier
in the day, but a heavy, pregnant fall, more appropriate to winter than to
spring. I patiently followed my master as he walked among the graves whose
positions were denoted only by white crosses. My master, who had always been
unperturbed by death, whistled as he inspected every cross and there were
indeed several.

I drew the cowl over my head to protect it from the
snow, which even now found its way into the collar of my habit and down my
back. Suddenly I heard my master say ‘Aha!’ with such exuberance that I slipped
on the icy ground, and narrowly escaped falling face down onto the grave of
Sibelius Eustacious.

‘Eureka!’ he exclaimed.

‘Master?’ I asked, a little annoyed.

‘Eureka,’ he said, amazed that I did not recognise it.
Then impatiently, ‘Archimedes . . . Eureka! In other words
mon ami
, I’ve
got it!’

I shook my habit of snow and said, not too politely, ‘What
do you mean, you’ve got it?’

‘Look at this!’ he pointed to a headstone of moderate
height. It was situated nearest to the mountain wall that cradled the abbey,
quite a distance from the others. I walked over to it and my master grabbed me
by the arm in his excitement and said, ‘What do you see? Come now for I am cold
and we are losing light.’

I looked at it closely. It was a rectangular stone
upon which only the shape of a sword was carved.

I told my master what I saw and he looked at me and
said with irritation, ‘Dear Christian, I too can see! No, I do not mean that
you should describe it to me, I mean to know if you recognise it.’

It was as though I had suddenly become blind, for the
more I looked the less I saw.

‘Dear boy!’ he exclaimed. ‘How can you not know it? It
is a Templar grave!’

‘A Templar grave?’ I said, stunned. Why should I have
recognised it? In the East men were buried in haste, with rarely a wooden cross
to mark their remains.

Kneeling with some difficulty Andre removed a portion
of the shallow layer of snow covering the grave. ‘This is an old grave. It must
have been an important monk, for no other headstone can be found here . . .
very interesting.’ He stood looking around. ‘This is perhaps finally making
some sense.’

‘But that would mean . . .’

‘Do not make assumptions, Christian, it may be the
grave of a wealthy knight who, on his way to the holy land – partaking of
the generosity of the monastery – died here of something or other.’

‘But ...’

‘We must wait before committing these things to our
hypothesis, we must first take a look at the great book in the chapter house.
Come, lest we draw attention to the headstone.’

So we left the graveyard and as we rounded the
courtyard, passing first the abbatial church then making our way to the
cloister buildings, we came upon the bishop ambulating toward us. My first
instinct was to turn and walk the other way and I could tell from my master’s
momentary hesitation that he too felt the same, but we could not avoid him.

He walked towards us with unsteady gait, for walking
was not a simple matter for the bishop. Not only did his considerable size
impede his progress – I dared not imagine what layers of fat must be
hidden beneath his ecclesiastical vestments – but also a vacuous haziness
that I suspect was the result of a good deal of monastery wine.

On our journey to the abbey, my master had commented,
rather unkindly, that the bishop was like a man who wore ill-fitting clothes. I
noted his sumptuous ermine and velvet, his absurdly huge pectoral cross,
catching the meagre light and throwing it back in brilliant colours, and I
realised that my master was right. For all his regalia nothing served to soften
the troubled expression that had long ago settled on his blotched face, leaving
deep furrows and wrinkles, clouds of mistrust and disdain. My master enlightened
me that his appointment in France made him an outcast at the king’s court, as
he was seen as a papal infiltrator, sent to spy on France. He, in turn, viewed
everyone with derision, perhaps feeling that he deserved a better position than
an inconsequential bishopric, miles from Rome, and further still from any
chance of career advancement. Whatever the case, he was a man capable of the
deepest hatred, so it seemed to me, a man envious of all men, as though he
moved inside a storm; his mere presence appeared to signal bad weather.

The bishop reached us huffing and puffing and paused,
catching his breath and patting his paunch as a pregnant woman pats her belly,
lovingly.

‘Dear preceptor,’ he said after a moment, in his voice
a suspicious magnanimity, ‘I have been looking for you in every place!’ In a
lower voice, ‘I must speak with you on matters of extreme delicacy.’

‘I am your willing servant,’ my master bowed with
humility, but in his tone I noted some annoyance.

‘Yes . . . yes . . .’ he looked about him with a frown
of importance. ‘Last night we were witness to an abominable crime. The
inquisitor was right. The Devil roams these evil corridors and none are safe
who seek the truth in the name of God.’

‘Those whose eyes look for evil will find it in every
place, your grace, even in God himself,’ my master said calmly.

‘Come now, preceptor, we must not be careless! There
is an evil working here that is more powerful than you know. Rainiero has
warned us to keep
en garde
. The next to die could be one of us,
therefore I am here to advise you that we are to travel in pairs and stay in
our cells as much as possible, until such time as these proceedings are
dispensed with.’

‘And did the inquisitor also advise you to wear a
garland of angelica as named by our Brother Linaeus to be efficacious as a
safeguard against evil?’

‘No.’ The man was wide-eyed, not knowing, as I knew,
that my master was commanding the tool of Aristophanes. ‘Do you recommend it,
preceptor?’

‘Only when the moon is full, your grace.’

‘Oh,’ the man said gravely, nodding his head, and,
looking up at the deeply overcast sky, added, ‘Most wise. One never knows . . .
We are told of men who conjure up demons to exercise power over inquisitors.
Incantations which, when recited several times, can put an enemy out of the
way! Keep an eye on that Jew, preceptor. It is, after all, common knowledge
that Jews are responsible for everything of a diabolical nature. Much can be
attributed to their designs. Have we not all heard of the terrible acts
committed in Saxony and other places, where they regularly steal the host in
order to use it for their own evil purposes, causing it to cry out in agony
– as it is tortured and is made to relive Christ’s sufferings – and
to produce miracles of every kind!’

I gasped and my master gave the bishop a reproachful
look. ‘Your grace, let us not frighten my young scribe with such stuff, none of
which has been witnessed, nor proven. We all know that whenever a genuine
inquiry was held into these accusations its findings always exonerated the
Jewish community. A learned man should be above superstitions which occupy the
feeble minds of the wretched and the poor.’

‘Indeed,’ the bishop squared his shoulders, his voice
icy as the wind, ‘the fact remains, preceptor, that even those of the converted
species, in their heart of hearts, reject the purity of Christianity. That is
why they steal the host, and also why they kidnap Christian boys and murder
them in fiendish rituals . . .’

I could see that Andre was becoming exceedingly annoyed.
The bishop, not altogether dull in his senses, saw it also and changed the
subject with a diplomatic flair. ‘But, of course, I sought you on another
matter, a matter of utmost importance, as I have said.’ He said this last line
with a flourish of his hand, and his amethyst ring flickered in my eyes
dazzling me, the spell only broken by the gloom of the cloisters as we entered
them through the arched aperture. Far away I heard a bird cry out, perhaps an
eagle. Otherwise the day was strangely still, the air frigid and damp. I longed
for a warm cup of ale to gladden my heart.