But, if he was lacking in all other qualities, Jeremy did possess a goodness of soul that you mustn’t overlook. As with holiness, that isn’t something I’ve ever myself possessed. But, as with holiness, it is something that must be recognised in others. And, unlike holiness, it is something to be valued. Tomorrow, I’d let him wake me, and dress me, and feed me, and bring me my false teeth, and comb and arrange the blond wig I told everyone I had to wear to keep my scalp warm. And I’d smile at him, and think of something pleasant to say. The moment I was done with Theodore, I’d lead him about Canterbury and show him where tree sap had been turned to beer — and I’d do nothing to persuade him it hadn’t actually happened. Sooner or later, even he’d complete his training. After that, he’d be sent off to risk himself on converting the tattooed savages who dwelt in the forests beyond the wide northern sea. Before then, he might as well be shown some of the love he’d be preaching to others.
Outside, all was dark. All was silent. I might achieve a little sleep before morning. Or I might lie choking in more of the foetid smells cast off by Jeremy. Whatever the case, it was cold over here by the window. And at last, I realised, I did feel very tired.
Chapter 5
I was back with Theodore. The window of his room was now fully unshuttered, and I could see that it looked over a small garden. A warm breeze came through it, and the sound of birdsong. Looking ghastly, but more with it than the previous day, Theodore had got himself propped into a padded armchair that allowed him to see out of the window.
‘You will forgive me for not rising to greet you,’ he said with surprising firmness. ‘At our last meeting, I tried to discuss a favour that the Church would have of you. Because of the change in your status attendant on your return to England, this is not a favour that we can demand, and I shall understand if you feel that a conflict of interest prevents you from rendering any assistance.’
I smiled and took up the undisturbed wine. A bug had crawled into it and, without any consideration, died there. But I fished this out and flicked it on to the floorboards. Wulfric lifted a cup of something hot to Theodore’s lips, and I waited for him to gather more of his ebbing strength.
‘While you were away,’ he continued, ‘I had a letter from Rome. The Holy Father is involved in a matter of great delicacy with the Emperor in Constantinople. This involves the damnable heresy of the Monothelites. It is a shame that news of your own presence in the Mediterranean world did not arrive in Rome until after your return to England. It would have been most convenient had we been able to avoid all the delays of a correspondence between Rome and Canterbury.’
‘Monothelitism is dead and buried,’ I said, speaking carefully. ‘I sealed the decree against it myself twenty years ago. We blamed everything on poor dead Sergius, and I drafted a grovelling letter of apology from the Emperor to the Pope. Why should the matter still give trouble?’
‘Because it may now have been pulled, still twitching, from its grave,’ Theodore gasped. He took another sip and tried to sit upright. He failed, and Wulfric had to lift him higher on to the pillows. ‘You must have learned on your travels of the Emperor’s great victory over the Saracens. There are hopes in Constantinople that Syria may be recovered for the Empire. Because of this, the Imperial authorities are looking again at an accommodation with the heretics in that province.’
Syria to be recovered? That was news to me. I may have spent a fair chunk of the previous summer in Damascus. But, shut away in the Caliph’s palace, my news of the world beyond its gates had been sketchy at best. Still, it made sense that, if we were doing well against the Saracens, keeping Rome sweet would now be of secondary importance.
‘Of course,’ I said, trying for a tone of reassurance, ‘there’s nothing we can do to put pressure on Rome.’ I broke off and grinned. The we in that sentence had been an entirely accidental slip. ‘Do forgive me, Theodore: there’s nothing the Empire can do to Rome. The days are gone when a Pope could be arrested in the Lateran and dragged off to some Eastern monastery. Certainly, the council you held a few years back in Hatfield was far outside the Empire’s jurisdiction or sphere of influence. No one who signed its Acts can be in the slightest danger. Surely, if the new Emperor wants to go whoring among the heretical Churches of the East, all Rome needs to do is mutter a few complaints and wait for the military balance on land to swing back to the Saracens — and it will do that, I assure you.’
But Theodore didn’t look much assured. He moved his head a fraction of an inch and looked at a forbiddingly large sheet of parchment unrolled on one of the tables in the room. I glanced at the tiny writing that covered it. Whoever had produced that must have done well and proper for his sight. Even in bright sunshine, I wasn’t planning to wear out my own eyes on reading it. I looked back at Theodore. He was the theological expert. He’d spent half a century telling everyone who’d listen that I was just a smooth-talking fraud. If he wanted any help from me, he could at least begin by summarising whatever complaints he’d received from Rome.
But he gave me a bleak smile and went into English. ‘Do me the favour, Brother Aelric,’ he said, of explaining the Monothelite heresy to Brother Wulfric. It is beyond my abilities to do so in English. But you do have the advantage of being a native.’
I raised my eyebrows and looked into the wine jug. Explaining that mass of gibberish in Latin was challenge enough; why else, after all, had Rome looked so implicitly for advice to Theodore with his Greek and Syriac? Asking even me to put it into a dumpy language like English might well be seen as evidence of senility. But Theodore was in earnest. And Wulfric was looking at me with the first glimmerings of interest in two days. I sighed and drank deeply. I thought to give a summary of the account I normally gave my students in Jarrow. But that was in Latin, and the subtleties just didn’t translate. If I was to get anywhere at all, I’d have to make a fresh start, and without preparation.
I think I’d lost the boy long before ending my digressive hunt for equivalents in English of Substance and Will and the various shades of Person. His eyes had certainly glazed over by the time I was able to launch into the critical matter of how the Will of Christ might relate to any of these. But he managed to keep a polite look on his face as my voice droned on and my throat began to ache from the effort of speaking for so long and with so much complexity in a language in which I might still be fluent, but in which I no longer thought.
And Theodore was highly delighted. ‘Well said, Brother Aelric!’ he gasped, now in Syriac. ‘Well said, my Lord Senator Alaric. Age has not taken a jot of your talent for clear and shining evasion.’ I smiled modestly and had another drink. I could take it as read that I’d been put up to my lecture less for Wulfric’s enlightenment than to give Theodore an excuse to start ripping into me as he had in the old days. Sure enough, he shifted on his pillows and glared at me with open hostility.
‘You have only overlooked your own part in bringing this gross heresy into the world, and how it was you who made sure it was maintained just so long as it suited the Empire’s political convenience. The moment it had outlived its usefulness, you dropped it like a hot brick. The scandal would have been all the greater had anyone by then still believed that you had any religious convictions at all.’