Joan sighed and looked her in the eye.
“The word ‘inquisition’ means a search. The inquisitor has to search out heresy and sin. Even when there have been accusations, the trial is not based on them or restricted to them. If the person on trial refuses to confess, they will search for the hidden truth.”
“How will they do that?” asked Mar.
Before he replied, Joan closed his eyes. “If you’re asking about torture, yes, that is one of the ways.”
“What will they do to him?”
“They might decide torture is not necessary.”
“What will they do to him?” insisted Mar.
“Why do you want to know?” said Aledis, taking her by the hand. “It will only torment you ... still further.”
“The law forbids death or the loss of any limb under torture,” Joan explained, “and suspected heretics may be tortured only once.”
Joan could see how the two women, their faces streaming with tears, sought some comfort in that. Yet he knew that Eimerich had found a way to make a mockery of this legal requirement. “Non ad modum iterationis sed continuationis,” he used to say, with a strange gleam in his eye; “Not repeatedly but continuously,” he translated for the novices who did not yet have a good grasp of Latin.
“What happens if they torture him and he still doesn’t confess?” asked Mar, after taking a deep breath.
“His attitude will be taken into account at the moment of handing down a sentence,” Joan said, without further explanation.
“Will it be Eimerich who sentences him?” asked Aledis.
“Yes, unless the sentence is life imprisonment or burning at the stake; in that case, he will need the bishop’s approval. And yet,” the friar went on, anticipating the women’s next question, “if the Inquisition considers that it is a complex matter, it has been known for them to consult the boni viri, between thirty and eighty people, not members of the Church, so that they can give their opinion as to the guilt of the accused, and the appropriate sentence. That means the trial drags on for months and months.”
“During which time Arnau would remain in jail,” said Aledis.
Joan nodded. The three of them sat in silence. The women were trying to take in everything they had heard; Joan was remembering another of Eimerich’s maxims: “The jail is to be forbidding, placed underground so that no light, and especially no sun or moonlight, may enter. It has to be harsh and tough, in order to shorten the prisoner’s life to the point that he faces death.”
FILTHY, IN RAGS, Arnau stood in the center of the chamber while the inquisitor and the bishop put their heads together and started whispering. The clerk took advantage of the interruption to tidy his papers. The four Dominicans continued to stare at the prisoner.
“How are you going to conduct the interrogation?” Berenguer d’Eril asked.
“We’ll start as usual, and as we progress, we’ll inform him what the charges are.”
“You’re going to tell him?”
“Yes. I think he is the sort of person who will react more to dialectic pressure than to a physical threat, although if necessary ...”
Arnau tried to withstand the looks from the black friars. One, two, three, four ... He shifted his weight onto his other foot and glanced again at the inquisitor and the bishop. They were still whispering to each other. The Dominicans, on the other hand, were observing him closely. The chamber was absolutely quiet apart from the inaudible whispering.
“He’s growing nervous,” said the bishop, glancing up at Arnau before turning back to the inquisitor.
“He is someone who is used to giving commands and being obeyed,” said Eimerich. “He needs to understand what the situation is; he has to accept the tribunal and its authority, and submit to it. Only then will he respond to interrogation. Humiliation is the first step.”
Bishop and inquisitor continued their conversation. Throughout the whole time, the Dominicans did not take their eyes off Arnau. Arnau tried to think of other things: of Mar, or Joan, but whenever he did so, he could feel one of the Dominican’s eyes clawing at him as if he had guessed what he was thinking. He shifted his weight time and again, felt his unruly beard and unkempt hair. In their gleaming gold robes, Berenguer d’Eril and Nicolau Eimerich sat comfortably behind the tribunal bench, glancing at him and continuing their discussion at their own leisure.
After a long pause, Nicolau Eimerich addressed him in a loud voice: “Arnau Estanyol, I know you have sinned.”
The trial proper had begun. Arnau took a deep breath.
“I do not know what you mean. I consider I have always been a good Christian. I have tried—”
“You yourself have admitted to this tribunal that you have not lain with your wife. Is that the attitude of a good Christian?”
“I cannot have carnal relations. I do not know if you are aware that I was already married before, and could ... could not have children then either.”
“Are you telling the tribunal you have a physical problem?” said the bishop.
“Yes.”
Eimerich studied Arnau for a few moments. He leaned forward on his elbows and then hid his mouth behind his hands. He turned to the clerk and whispered an order to him.
“Declaration by Juli Andreu, priest at Santa Maria de la Mar,” the clerk read out from one of his pieces of parchment. “‘I, Juli Andreu, priest at Santa Maria de la Mar, questioned by the grand inquisitor of Catalonia, do declare that approximately in the month of March in the year of our Lord 1364, I held a conversation with Arnau Estanyol, baron of Catalonia, at the request of his wife, Doña Eleonor, baroness, ward of King Pedro. She had expressed to me her concern at her husband’s neglect of his conjugal duties. I declare that Arnau Estanyol confided to me that he was not attracted to his wife, and that his body refused to allow him to enjoy relations with her. He said that it was not a physical problem, but that he could not force his body to desire a woman for whom he felt no attraction. He further said that he knew he was in a state of sin’”—Nicolau Eimerich’s eyes narrowed—“ and that for this reason he prayed as often as he could in Santa Maria and made substantial donations toward the construction of the church.”’
The chamber fell silent again. Nicolau stared fixedly on Arnau.
“Do you still affirm that you have a physical problem?” the inquisitor asked finally.
Arnau remembered his conversation with the priest, but could not remember exactly what... “I cannot recall what I said to him.”
“Do you admit that you had this conversation with Father Juli Andreu?”
“Yes.”
Arnau could hear the clerk’s quill scratching across the parchment.
“Yet you are calling into question the declaration by a man of God. What possible interest could the priest have in lying about you?”
“He might be mistaken. I do not remember exactly what was said ...”
“Are you saying that a priest who was not certain what he heard would make a declaration like the one Father Juli Andreu has made?”
“All I am saying is that he might be mistaken.”
“Father Andreu is not an enemy of yours, is he?” intervened the bishop.
“I have never considered him one.”
Nicolau spoke to the clerk again.
“Declaration by Pere Salvete, canon at Santa Maria de la Mar. ‘I, Pere Salvete, canon at Santa Maria de la Mar, questioned by the grand inquisitor of Catalonia, declare that at Easter in the year of our Lord 1367, while I was saying holy mass, the service was interrupted by a number of citizens of Barcelona who alerted us to the theft of a host by heretics. The mass was suspended, and the faithful left the church, with the exception of Arnau Estanyol, consul of the sea.’” “Go with your Jewish lover!” Eleonor’s words rang out in his head once more. Arnau shuddered, exactly as he had when he first heard them. He looked up. Nicolau was staring at him ... and smiling. Had he seen his reaction? The clerk was still reading the declaration: ‘“... and the consul answered that God could not oblige him to lie with her...’”