“Sign and you will live in a palace on Calle de Montcada in Barcelona. You won’t need the revenues: you’ll have all the money you could wish for.”
Eleonor walked across to the table, picked up the quill, and leaned over the documents.
“What guarantees do I have that you will keep your word?” she asked suddenly, glancing at Arnau.
“The fact that the bigger the palace is, the less I’ll see of you. That’s one guarantee. The fact that the better life you have, the less you’ll bother me. That’s another. Is that enough? I’ve no intention of offering any more.”
Eleonor looked up at the two figures standing behind Arnau. Was that a smile on the girl’s face?
“Are they going to live with us?” she asked, pointing at them with the quill.
“Yes.”
“The girl too?”
Mar and Eleonor glared at each other.
“Wasn’t I clear enough for you, Eleonor? Are you going to sign or not?”
She signed.
ARNAU DID NOT wait for Eleonor to pack all her things. To avoid the August heat he set off that evening in the same rented cart he had arrived in.
None of them looked behind as the cart emerged from the castle gates.
“Why do we have to go and live with her?” Mar asked Arnau during the journey back to Barcelona.
“I cannot afford to offend the king, Mar. One never knows how a king may react.”
Mar sat silently for a few moments, deep in thought.
“Is that why you offered her all you did?”
“No ... Well, yes, in part, but the main reason was the peasants. I don’t want her to make any complaint. The king has supposedly given us the revenues from these lands to live on, even if in fact they are tiny or nonexistent. If she goes to the king and says that through my fault those revenues have vanished, he could possibly overturn my decisions.”
“The king ... Why would the king ... ?”
“You need to know that only a few years ago the king published a decree against the serfs, a decree that even went against privileges he and his predecessors had given the cities. The Church and nobility had demanded he take measures against any serfs who escaped and left their lands untended ... and the king did so.”
“I didn’t think he would do anything like that.”
“He’s just another noble, Mar, even if he is first among them.”
They spent the night in a farmhouse outside the village of Montcada. Arnau paid the peasants generously. They rose at dawn and were in Barcelona before the heat of the day.
“The situation is dramatic, Guillem,” Arnau told him once everyone had finished their greetings and the two men were on their own. “The Catalan countryside is in a far worse state than we thought. We hear about it only when there is news, but when you see how bad the fields and properties are, you realize we are in real trouble.”
“I’ve been taking that into account for some time now,” Guillem said, to Arnau’s surprise. “It’s a real crisis, but I could see it coming. We’ve talked about it, if you remember. Our currency is constantly losing value in foreign markets, but the king is not doing anything about it here in Catalonia, and the exchange rate is unsustainable. The city is falling deeper and deeper into debt in order to finance everything it has created in Barcelona. Nobody is making any profit from trade, and so people are looking for more secure places to invest.”
“What about our business?”
“I’ve moved it outside the country. To Pisa, Florence, even Genoa. Those are places where we can trade with logical exchange rates.” The two men fell silent. “Castelló has been declared abatut,” Guillem said eventually. “Disaster is looming.”
Arnau remembered the fat, sweating money changer who had always been very friendly to him.
“What happened?”
“He wasn’t sufficiently cautious. His clients began to reclaim their deposits, and he couldn’t meet their demands.”
“Will he be able to?”
“I don’t think so.”
ON AUGUST 29, the king disembarked after his victorious campaign in Mallorca. As soon as the Catalan fleet arrived at the islands, Pedro the Cruel had fled Ibiza after taking and plundering it.
A month later, Eleonor arrived. All the Estanyol family, including Guillem despite his initial protests, moved to the palace on Calle de Montcada.
Two months later, the king granted an audience to the thane of Montbui. The previous day, Pedro the Third had sent envoys to ask for a fresh loan from Arnau. When it was granted, he gave short shrift to the castellan, and upheld all Arnau’s proclamations.
Two months later, when the six months the law allowed for an abatut to settle his debts had elapsed, the money changer Castelló was beheaded outside his countinghouse in Plaza del Canvis. All the city’s money changers were forced to witness the execution from the front row of spectators. Arnau saw Castelló’s head severed from his body at the executioner’s first accurate blow. He would have liked to close his eyes as many others did, but found it impossible. He had to see it. It was a reminder to exercise caution, and he would never forget it, he told himself as his colleague’s blood ran down the scaffold.
42
HE COULD SEE her smile. Arnau could still see his Virgin smile, and life was smiling at him too. Two years had passed, and despite political turmoil his business ventures were prospering, bringing him handsome profits, part of which he donated to the poor or to Santa Maria. With time, Guillem was forced to admit he was right: the common people repaid their loans, coin by coin. His church, the temple to the sea, was still growing: work was now going on to build the third central vault and the octagonal towers on either side of the main front. Santa Maria was filled with artisans: marble cutters and sculptors, painters, glassmakers, carpenters, and the smiths working on the iron railings. There was even an organist, whose work Arnau followed with interest. What would music sound like in this marvelous church? he wondered. After the death of the archdeacon Bernat Llull and two canons who had followed him, the post was now filled by Pere Salvete de Montirac. Arnau had a good relationship with him. Others who had died by now were the master builder Berenguer de Montagut and his successor, Ramon Despuig. Work on the church was now directed by Guillem Metge.
It was not only with the provosts of Santa Maria that Arnau had close relations. His economic situation and his newly acquired social rank brought him into contact with the city councillors, aldermen, and members of the Council of a Hundred. His opinion was much sought after in the exchange, and his advice was followed by traders and merchants alike.
“You ought to accept the position,” Guillem told him.
Arnau thought about it. He had just been offered one of the two posts of consul of the sea of Barcelona. The consuls were the highest authorities for all aspects of trade in the city. They acted as judges in mercantile matters and had their own jurisdiction, independent of all other institutions in Barcelona. This gave them the authority to mediate in any problem related to the port or port workers, as well as to ensure that the laws and customs of commerce were respected.
“I don’t know whether I could—”
“Nobody could do it better, Arnau, believe me,” Guillem interrupted him. “You can do it. Of course you can.”
Arnau agreed to take over as consul when the two currently in office had finished their term.
The church of Santa Maria, his business concerns, his future duties as consul of the sea—all this created a wall around Arnau behind which he felt comfortable, so that when he went back to his new home, the palace in Calle de Montcada, he did not realize what was going on inside its imposing gateway.