Cathedral of the Sea

His words reverberated from the stone walls of the vast chamber. Arnau’s legs felt heavy after all those days in the dungeon ...

“The tribunal could take your silence for a confession,” said the bishop.

“No, I don’t deny them.” His legs began to ache. “Why does the Holy Office take such an interest in my relations with Doña Eleonor? Is it a sin to—”

“Be careful, Estanyol,” the inquisitor cut in. “It is for the tribunal to ask the questions, not you.”

“Ask them, then.”

Nicolau could see Arnau moving unsteadily, shifting his weight from foot to foot.

“He’s beginning to feel pain,” he whispered in Berenguer d’Eril’s ear.

“Leave him to think about it,” replied the bishop.

They began to whisper together again. Arnau could sense the four Dominicans’ eyes fixed on him once more. His legs ached dreadfully, but he had to resist. He could not bow down before Nicolau Eimerich. What would happen if he collapsed to the floor? He needed ... a stone! A stone on his back, a long road to carry a stone for his Virgin. “Where are you now? Can these people really be your representatives? I was little more than a boy, and yet ...” Of course he could resist now. He had walked across all Barcelona with a stone that weighed more than he did, sweating, bleeding, with everyone’s shouts of encouragement ringing in his ears. Was there none of that strength left? Was a fanatic friar going to defeat him? Him? The boy bastaix admired by all the other boys in the city? Step by step, fighting his way along the path to Santa Maria, and then returning home to rest until the next day. His home ... those brown eyes, those big brown eyes. Then all at once, with a shudder that almost knocked him off his feet, he realized that the person who had spoken to him in the dungeon was Aledis.

When they saw Arnau suddenly straighten, Nicolau Eimerich and Berenguer d’Eril exchanged looks. For the first time, one of the Dominicans’ stares wavered, and he looked toward the center of the table.

“He’s not going to fall,” the bishop whispered nervously.

“Where do you satisfy your needs?” Nicolau asked loudly.

That explained why she had known his name. Her voice ... Yes, that was the voice he had heard so often on the slopes of Montjuic hill.

“Arnau Estanyol!” The inquisitor’s cry brought him back to the tribunal. “I asked how you satisfy your needs.”

“I do not understand your question.”

“You are a man. You have had no physical contact with your wife for years. It’s a very simple question: where do you satisfy your needs as a man?”

“For the same number of years, I have had no contact with any woman.”

He had answered without thinking. The jailer had said she was his mother.

“That’s a lie!” Arnau gave a start. “This tribunal has seen you embracing a heretic. Is that not contact with a woman?”

“Not the kind of contact you were referring to.”

“What can drive a man and a woman to embrace in public”—Nicolau waved his hands—“if not lasciviousness?”

“Grief.”

“What grief?” the bishop wanted to know.

“What grief?” Nicolau insisted when Arnau did not reply.

Arnau still said nothing. The flames from the funeral pyre lit the chamber. “Grief because a heretic who had profaned the sacred host had been executed?” the inquisitor insisted, pointing a bejeweled finger at him. “Is that the grief you feel as a true Christian? Because the weight of justice fell on a monster, a profaner, a wretch, a thief... ?”

“He did nothing!” Arnau shouted.

All the members of the tribunal, including the clerk, stirred in their seats.

“Those three men confessed their guilt. Why do you defend heretics? The Jews ...”

“Jews! Jews!” Arnau faced them defiantly. “What does the world have against them?”

“Do you not know?” asked the inquisitor, anger in his voice. “They crucified Jesus Christ!”

“Haven’t they paid enough for that?”

Arnau stared at the men ranged in front of him. They were all sitting up attentively.

“Are you saying they should be pardoned?” asked Berenguer d’Eril.

“Isn’t that what our Lord teaches us?”

“Their only salvation is through conversion! There can be no pardon for those who do not repent,” shouted Nicolau.

“You’re talking about something that happened more than thirteen hundred years ago. What do the Jews born in our time have to repent for? They are not to blame for what might have happened all those years ago.”

“Anyone who accepts the Jewish doctrine is making himself responsible for what his forebears did; he is taking on their guilt.”

“They only adopt ideas, beliefs, just like ...” At this, Nicolau and Berenguer gave a start. Why not? Was it not true? Didn’t that poor man who had died under a hail of insults and given his life for his community deserve the truth? “Just like us,” Arnau said in a loud, firm voice.

“You dare equate the Catholic faith with heresy?” roared the bishop.

“It is not for me to compare anything: I leave that to you, the men of God. All I said was—”