NO, GOD DID NOT WELCOME MY FATHER.
Heaven spat into his grave, and a fierce wind blew from the northeast. It ripped off my rabbitskin cap, and skipped it across the graveyard, and I only just caught it before it rolled into the water.
We buried him right next to the grave Bertie and I dug for Giscard, the miner from Provins. I squeezed a clod of gritty earth in my left hand, and crumbled it, and trickled it into the grave. We all did. The earth whispered, it chuckled.
I didn’t feel anything. Not sad, like I was when we buried little Luke. Not relieved. I mean, I just felt numb. I still do. I know I should care. Perhaps I will later.
After the burial, Serle embraced me and so did Simona and Gennaro and Bertie. Turold clasped my hands, and a number of Milon’s knights and men bowed to me and expressed their sympathies. Not Wido and Giff and Godard, though—they weren’t there, and Rhys was sitting with Lord Stephen. Then Milon grasped my right elbow, and led me out of the graveyard; we walked back through the Land Gate, and climbed up onto the walls.
The wind was pulling the clouds to pieces. They looked like wool before it has been carded.
“This is where I used to come with Lord Stephen,” I said. “Quite often. He told me that one of God’s greatest gifts to us is memory. Because it can console us.”
“You are a knight,” Milon began. “My knight.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And a good young knight.”
“I don’t think I am.”
“Very good,” Milon said. He tapped his head and then his heart. “I watch you. You hope; you care…”
“Too much, sometimes,” I said.
“And you bravee,” said Milon. “You save Bertie. And in Soissons…” Milon tapped my arm. “You are a knight,” he repeated, “but you still have duties to Lord Stephen. Yes?”
“Oh yes!” I said.
“He will not fight no more.”
“What do you mean?” The nape of my neck tingled.
“He will not fight no more. Maybe not stand up no more.”
“No!” I said. “That’s not right. I’m sure it’s not.”
Milon said nothing.
“I’ve been sitting beside him the whole time, almost. Yesterday he moved his lips. He’s starting to suck water from a sponge. And his eyelids flickered. They didn’t before.”
Milon laid a hand on my left shoulder. “Maybe he die,” he said in a firm, warm voice.
“No!” I said. “He won’t. I’m sure he won’t.”
“Maybe he live,” said Milon. “But he will not heal for a long time.” He paused. “Your duty to Lord Stephen is to help him…home.”
Milon looked at me.
“But I can’t! How can I? I’ve taken the Cross. I can’t break my vow.”
For a while Milon waited. The wind was driving all the cloudshreds out to sea. He rubbed his nose.
“This crusade is bad and worse,” he said, and he sucked his right forefinger and held it up.
“But if we go home we’ll never see the Holy Land. Sir William has wrecked our dream of journeying to Jerusalem.”
Milon blew on his forefinger. “Jerusalem and Saracens? No! Constantinople and Christians? Yes! Désastre!”
“That’s what Sir William thought.”
“What is your dream, you?” Milon asked me. “To be young crusader knight? To fight? Or lead your people in your own manor?”
“Well…,” I said. “Both!”
Milon shook his head and smiled. “Which more difficult?” he said. “Not easy for you. Not easy for me without you! But I tell you, your duty is to care for Lord Stephen. You go home. Lord Stephen’s wife…Lady Judith. Good woman. Strong woman.”
“Yes,” I said.
“You explain her. And Sir William’s wife…”
“Lady Alice.”
“Yes, you talk to her.” Milon shook his head. “No way is easy way. But now you find Mair, your mother, yes?”
I drew in my breath. “You did know about her,” I said. “That’s why you had that ring engraved on my sword.”
Milon smiled. “Lord Stephen,” he said. “He told me secret.”
“It’s all because he helped me,” I began miserably, “because he tried to…”
For a while we sat on the wall, and questions began to race and chase each other in my head.
Alone? How? How do I find a boat to take us back across the Adriatic? And there’ll still be snow in the Alps, won’t there? In March? How long will I have to wait before we can cross them? I know Lord Stephen’s going to get better, but what if he gets worse? If he dies…What are all the other questions I haven’t thought of?
Milon smiled and nodded. He said of course I couldn’t take Lord Stephen on my own.
“Rhys and Turold are Lord Stephen’s men,” he said. “They go with you. Not good for me, but…” Milon shrugged.
“Thank you,” I said.
“And Simona,” Milon added. “Crusade bad for Simona. She go to Venice with you.”
“Does she know?” I asked.
“Gennaro tell her now.”
“What about Serle?”
“Serle? He come with me.”
“But he and Simona…”
Milon shrugged again. “Love-sorrows,” he said. “Many as seashells.”
After this, Milon told me that a merchant galley from Split docked here only last night and if the bora has blown itself out by then, she’ll leave the day after tomorrow morning, and make a run straight across the Adriatic to Venice. “No pirates in winter,” Milon informed me.
“But that’s too soon,” I said. “I can’t get ready by then.”
“Must,” said Milon curtly.
“But I can’t. Packing everything. I’ve got to talk to Serle and Bertie. And what about Bonamy? Rhys and I will both have to exercise him tomorrow, before such a long sea journey.”
“No horse on merchant ship,” Milon said slowly, not taking his eyes off me for a moment.
“What do you mean?”
Milon shook his head.
“But I must take Bonamy!” I cried. “I must!”
“Horse transports take horses,” Milon said, “not merchant galleys. No horse transports now to Venice.”
“I’ll ride there, then,” I said fiercely. But even as I said it, I saw how impossible that would be.
“You, Turold, and Rhys buy horses in Venice,” Milon said. “I give you money, much money. Money to go home.”
“Poor Bonamy!” I cried.
But really, I meant poor me.
“Simona help you in Venice,” Milon said. “After crusade, Bertie and I come to England. Yes?”
“Yes, sir.”
It all seems so far away.
Milon punched me lightly on my chest. “We bring Bonamy,” he said.
I sniffed.
“Bertie…,” I began, “he’s so…”
“I know,” Milon said warily. “My sister’s son.”
“Sir, please take care of him.”
“You, Arthur. You take care Lord Stephen.”
“I will. I will,” I said.
I’ve sailed hundreds and hundreds of miles in my head and my heart today. In different directions.
Down into the dark earth with my father, Sir William de Gortanore.
And now this. This long journey…