There Will Be Wolves (3 page)

The tone of his voice astonished her even more. “But look,” she protested. “He’s already lacking a finger. He has stolen before. He must have known the punishment. If he valued his hand so much, why did he steal?”

“How do we know? How do we know what has driven the poor wretch to steal? How do we know what he has had to bear?”

“That is of no matter.” Ursula dismissed his words with a shrug. “Stealing is a crime. A crime against our fellow men, a crime against God. There’s no excuse for it.” She knew she was right. “Perhaps this time he will learn his lesson properly. If he repents of his sins and returns to God’s laws, those men will be doing him a favor.”

The axe paused for a fleeting moment, then flashed down. The young man screamed while the crowd around him cheered. Bruno pulled Ursula away almost viciously.

Ursula gave one backward glance and made a grimace of distaste at the sight of the blood streaming over the block. Then she put the sight out of her mind. She looked curiously at Bruno. He looked as if he would be sick.

“What a strange boy you are,” she said.

T
he next day dawned dull and oppressive. There were ominous rumblings of thunder in the air. Ursula looked up at the sliver of sky that she could see between the houses on the narrow street; if it rained she would have to take in all the remedies and herbs she was setting out on the front shutters. David had turned up early again and was sitting with his dog. He was already chattering at full speed—she wondered if he was ever silent. Still, the company was not unwelcome. Her father was feeling unwell and had not yet come down. A stray tabby cat she had been feeding wandered in through the open door and began to wind itself around her feet, mewing softly. The hackles on Samson’s back rose and he growled. David restrained him. The cat, as if realizing that there was no menace from this wounded dog, cast one scornful glance at it and then ignored it.

“You are a brazen little thing.” Ursula laughed, reaching down to scratch it behind the ears. “Two weeks ago you were so wild and unfriendly you wouldn’t let me near you and now look at you, you little beggar. Warm milk in the stomach makes for friendship, it seems, as far as you are concerned.” She straightened up, only to see Mistress Elke sailing down the street toward them, her maidservant trailing behind.

No! thought Ursula in a panic. I can’t deal with her again. Father will be down in a minute, let him tend to her. She dropped to her knees and crouched below the level of the open window. At the same time the cat, becoming impatient, leaped up onto the shutters. David looked at Ursula in astonishment, but she signaled to him to be silent. It was just possible that Mistress Elke had not seen her—she had been turning her head to chivy her maid when Ursula had caught sight of her. Ursula, feeling slightly foolish, crept on hands and knees through the straw on the floor toward the stairs. Just at that moment, however, Mistress Elke’s voice boomed out, loud and strident.

“Fetch your father, my girl. I’ll have no dealings with
you….”
The words stopped in midsentence. “Why …? Where did she go? Faith! She was here just a second ago. I turned my head for just a moment, and now she’s gone! There’s naught here but a cat. The devil himself couldn’t have disappeared more quickly!”

Unable to control himself any longer, David began to giggle. Mercifully, Master William came down the stairs just then. He took in the scene, but only shook his head and went quickly over to deal with Mistress Elke. Ursula gained the stairs and darted up them to her room above.

The day passed quietly. It was Good Friday and all the Christian population of Cologne was preparing for Eastertide. Ursula went to church in the morning, her father in the afternoon. As a devout and humble Christian, he would participate in the dramatic ceremony of creeping to the cross on his knees in the darkened church of Great St. Martin. Again, David had stayed all day, but this time he had brought some bread and cheese for his noon meal. Being a Jew, he could not share their food. Toward late afternoon, at the time when the workers would be finished and heading for their homes, Ursula found herself glancing more and more often down the street. Without actually admitting it to herself, she was wondering if Bruno would come again. When he did appear, however, she was busy putting her wares away for the night and his voice startled her.

“Hello! Have you heard the news?” he called out as he strode up to the shop. “How goes your dog?” he asked David as he caught sight of him.

“Better, thank you. Much better,” David replied with a smile. In fact, the dog had begun to trot around the place almost nimbly. Ursula had
renewed the poultices and the swelling had gone down considerably. There had been no sign of fever at all.

“What news?” Ursula asked.

“There’s a holy man camped in the meadow by the Church of the Apostles. Peter the Hermit, they call him. He comes from the Frankish lands, and they say he is telling of wondrous things. Tomorrow, Holy Saturday, he will preach. I intend to go hear him—will you come with me?”

“Yes,” Ursula answered. “I would like that. My father also spoke of him and wishes to go. Shall we make our way together, then?”

“By all means. I’ll come by early; if we make haste we shall be able to get close enough to hear and see him clearly. They say he has been rousing multitudes since he left his homelands, and a whole host of people follow him. He is preaching a holy pilgrimage—something called a crusade—to liberate Jerusalem from the heathen yoke.”

  *  *  *  

The next morning, Bruno and David arrived together. Leaving David to care for Samson, Ursula, her father, and Bruno set out for the field where the Hermit was to preach. Soon they saw that others were following the same path. People thronged together, the normal excitement of the Easter weekend heightened by this new furor.
The talk seemed to be of nothing else but the strange monk and his preachings. Ursula was astonished by the number of people walking along with them but even more astonished when they arrived at the Church of the Apostles. Although the Hermit, also called Little Peter, had not yet arrived, the meadow was already full of his followers, speaking in a bewildering variety of dialects. Most of the dialects were Frankish, but there were others Ursula had never heard before and was at a loss to identify. Many of the people wore red crosses stitched or painted crudely onto their tunics and cloaks.

They had barely arrived when a shout rose up from the multitude. Coming up the hill from behind the church straggled a short procession. Leading it was a donkey, and seated on it was a man clad only in filthy rags. He passed directly in front of Ursula. She could see that he was barefoot and unshaven. His beard and long, stringy locks of hair were black, his face dark and sallow. He was as thin as the poor emaciated beast he rode. As he passed by, people surged forward to touch him, or failing that, to pull hairs out of his donkey’s tail to keep as relics. The sparse number of hairs remaining testified to the number of people who had already collected theirs.

“Cured a woman near death with childbed fever, they say!” a woman next to Ursula avowed as she thrust past. “Just one hair!”

Ursula stared at the Hermit with disapproval. In a town situated on a river, and with the number of wells around, there was no shortage of water. Being godly did not necessarily mean being dirty, as far as she was concerned. Beside her, Bruno looked equally unimpressed. Then, as Peter reached the steps of the church, he stopped. He looked around. Seated as he was on the donkey, everyone could see him. The donkey itself drooped disconsolately beneath him as if mourning the loss of its tail hairs. Peter reached both hands out in front of him in a peaceful gesture, but his eyes seemed to flash in the sunlight. There was something both compelling and wild about him. The rabble was silenced almost immediately.

His voice rang out. He spoke in a Frankish dialect, but was echoed instantly by a translator in the Germanic dialect that was most common along this part of the Rhine. The effect was doubly impressive.

“I come with a message from God!” The two voices seemed to fill the meadow. “I come to call you into God’s service! Our brethren in the East are crushed and dying under the yoke of the infidels. Our churches are being desecrated. Jerusalem itself—holiest of all cities—is lost to us!” There was an intensity and magnetism about the Hermit as he spoke that was almost hypnotic.

Ursula found herself caught up by it. Gradually, as she listened, she forgot it was the
translator’s words she heard, forgot her first impressions of distaste. She felt as if Peter’s words were being etched directly onto her brain. Around her, the immense crowd was equally spellbound.

The Hermit paused and then began again, even more urgently. “Our fellow Christians cry for our help! Our blessed pope, chosen by God himself, has called upon us to answer their cry. He has called for a Crusade—a holy Crusade—to force a way through to Jerusalem and liberate our brethren. I am answering that call, and
you
will answer it with me! Many already follow me, many more must join.” He paused again. There was a stir in the crowd, but still no one spoke.

“Men, women, children, noblemen, serfs, beggars, even thieves and criminals, join me! Pope Urban has promised absolution to every one of you who participates in this venture. Forgiveness of all your sins! Your lives will be washed clean, your place in Heaven assured! After we have succeeded in God’s holy work you will return
pure
to a new life. New lands will be yours for those of you who wish to stay. The way to Jerusalem will be open to all of us again. Jerusalem will be
free!”

At this, as if released from their hypnosis, a roar went up from the people assembled around the monk.

“Jerusalem! Jerusalem!” The cry grew louder and louder.

Ursula was shocked into awareness of what was going on. She looked around her with growing uneasiness as the noise reached a frenzy. Instinctively, she reached for her father’s arm. When she turned to look at him, however, he was still staring at Peter as if mesmerized. At that moment Peter raised his hands again, and, although this time it took several moments, at last the people quietened.

“At the end of the month,” he commanded. “At the end of this, the month when we mourn Christ’s death and celebrate his most glorious Resurrection, we will gather and we will set out on our quest. Leave your homes. Leave your debts and your cares and your tiresome, troubled lives. Join me to march for God and to slay any who would oppose us. The cross, red as the blood of our crucified Savior, will be our symbol. Victory is certain to be ours.
God wills it!”

The clamor of the crowd rose again, louder than before, and now there was no quelling it.
“God wills it! God wills it!”
Then, a mob now, they began to surge toward the man on the donkey. Only the actions of a gang of strong body servants were able to clear a path for the Hermit as he rode off.

Ursula found herself shoved roughly from behind. She clutched even more tightly to her father’s arm. She heard him gasp as he, too, was pushed and forced up against the bodies in front
of them. Her face was pressed into a sweating, roughly shirted back, and for a moment she panicked, almost suffocating. The jostling of the people around her caused her to lose her footing. She regained it, but realized with sudden horror that her father had fallen. She lost her grip on his arm and before she could help him the crowd swept her out of reach.

“Father!” she screamed. A hand grabbed at her and she yanked herself away in terror.

“Ursula! It’s me!”

The hand caught hold of her again and she recognized Bruno. “Father!” she cried. “He’s fallen!”

Bruno squeezed past her. By dint of sheer strength, he elbowed his way through to the older man and shielded him with his body as he helped him rise. Ursula managed to get to him as well. Then the three of them fought their way to the edge of the heaving mass.

“Come,” Bruno said, not allowing them time to rest. “We must get out of here. “This is an insanity.”

They made their way out of the meadow, but even then could not get completely away from shouting, wrought-up people. The streets of the city itself were crammed, and all normal business had come to a halt.

“I’ve never seen people like this.” Ursula panted as she helped her father along behind Bruno. “I can’t understand it.”

They were near the Jewish section of the city. Ursula recognized a respected Jewish scholar and his wife coming toward them. At the same time, a knot of men pushed past her from behind. Ursula could smell the stale odor of beer and wine, mixed with sweat and filth. The men were dressed in coarse woolen cloaks with flaming red crosses roughly painted on the shoulders. As they came abreast of the Jewish couple, the leader reached out and pushed the old woman aside. His companions, following his lead, forced the man to stumble into the gutter.

“Out of the way, Jews!” the leader cried. “Killers of Christ! Make way for those who would defend him!”

The man reached out instinctively to protect his wife, but the leader knocked him flat with one blow. Ursula heard her father exclaim in horror. She watched as the men strode off, laughing and shouting triumphantly, and then she and Bruno ran forward to assist the couple.

The elderly man picked himself up and dusted himself off with dignity. He reached for the hand of his wife, who was sobbing helplessly, and comforted her.

“I am not hurt, my love, do not distress yourself. But Bishop Hermann will hear of this. The archbishop of Cologne is a good friend to the Jews in this city and he will not tolerate such indignities.” He turned to Ursula and Bruno.
“Thank you, my children, for your concern, but we are perfectly all right.”

With a courteous bow to Master William, they continued on their way. Ursula stood looking after them. She was shaking with anger as she reached for her father’s arm again, but mixed in with it was fear. What was happening here? She turned to her father. He was staring after the man and his wife, obviously dazed and still confused with all that had happened.