Chapter 58 The Bishop
The Bishop
The bishop is horrified. “I can’t believe you entered her cell.”
Lukas doesn’t answer. He cradles his head in his palms.
“How could you? Do you realize what this does to the Church? To your order? If word gets to Rome, your friars will be disbanded.” Lukas closes his eyes.
That’s right, thinks Jan. Close your eyes.
Close them to reality the way you always have.
The way you have since we were children. “How could you be so stupid?”
Not only did his brother break into the hold and set the girl loose, but he ran without covering his tracks.
Like any sane man would. Like any man of the Church.
One of his Franciscans helped to bandage his ribs, but that’s not the worst of the damage.
To himself, to his brotherhood of friars.
And to all Jan’s carefully laid program.
He has no contingency for a missing saint.
The sun is rising, and the bishop has no plan.
Willems reports that gossip is already flooding the town, coursing through the market, over the wharf, through the Lakenhalle.
Jan pictures the dawn scene, as it’s been reported to him: misty light, the streets filling with people, the smoldering remains of bonfires.
The maid entering the parlor of the anchorhold to find the window bolted.
She knocks. She knocks again. No answer.
The woman drops the porridge and runs from the parlor, around to the cathedral entrance.
Even from the nave, down the long aisle, anyone can see that the door to the cell is gaping wide.
A small crowd gathers. The hold is vacant but for a thrice-knotted belt curled on the floor.
The maid holds the rope away from her with loathing, like Eve throttling the serpent, as she marches from the church and yells for a hammer.
With the fury of an avenging angel, she pounds nails into his brother’s belt, anchoring it to the cathedral door.
I pay that woman’s wages, he thinks.
The cat is out of the bag, he thinks.
“How could you be so careless?” Jan brandishes the belt that Willems pulled off his cathedral. Even Willems had been unable to mask his disgust when he tossed it on the manor table. “There are a thousand other women I could get you, and you pick the anchoress. Why, why would you do this?”
Lukas mumbles something into his hands.
“What? Speak up, man.”
Lukas raises his head. “I thought she would save me.”
Jan stops in his tracks. “Save you? You’re her confessor! How could she save you?”
“She is with God.”
Jan scoffs. “She is excommunicated.” Or she will be. He has to work quickly. The legate will be rising soon, expecting the trial of miracles to begin. Jan’s anchoress has vanished from her cell and his brother’s belt has been seen dangling like a noose on the cathedral door. It’s bad.
Lukas moans. “I thought she would bring me to him.”
The woman has ruined his brother. “She bewitched you.”
Lukas looks up. “No.”
Jan is nodding, pacing the length of the room. “It’s not unknown.”
“Aleys is no demon,” says Lukas.
“One of you is. And, Brother, I pray it isn’t you.”