LITMIR.BIZ

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Which is of course commendable in itself.” The inquisitor’s voice grew more somber. “It is a troubling case. The boy’s name is not properly Juan, but Mehmoud. He himself has never been baptized, but it appears that he likes to call himself after his father or, perhaps, the Evangelist or another Saint John. His father is Juan Maria Delgado—formerly Fazoud Aben Fazoud—of Calamocha, who accepted the holy Faith into his heart and was baptized, along with his wife and his children by her, six years ago. Our young author, however, was Juan Maria’s son by his concubine. Juan Maria has ceased to cohabit with her as his wife, and now she lives beneath his roof as sister only. Alas, he made it a condition of his own Baptism that, having been put away, his former concubine must have the choice whether or not to accept Baptism for herself and the children she bore him, of whom Mehmoud is the eldest living. Whether rightly or not…I seem to recall making some formal protest when the case first came to my attention…this condition was granted them, and the lady chose to remain unbaptized, along with her son and daughter.”

      Don Felipe studied the old man to whom the bishop had assigned him as Ordinary. Elsewhere, the episcopal courts might contend hotly with the inquisitorial as to which should judge heretics, but here in the diocese of Daroca, bishop and inquisitor seemed to vie with each other only in laxity. Thus far, the young priest’s duties as his bishop’s representative to the Inquisition had proved more social than onerous. At the same time, the mild old French Dominican seemed never entirely to have accustomed himself, even after decades of living and working on this side of the Pyrenees, to the free relationships among Christian, Jew, and Moslem that had existed in Spain for centuries, and still continued to exist, in friendly pockets, even despite the terrible riots and massacres of Jews in great cities not quite a century ago, and the current Holy War into which the Castilian queen had drawn her kingly husband of Aragon against the Moors of Karnattah.

      “If the author of this ‘Vision’ remains unbaptized,” Don Felipe pointed out, wondering that Fra Guillaume had not commented further on this point himself, “then his case belongs to no Catholic court, neither yours nor his Reverence the bishop’s, to judge.”

      “That would be very true, were it not a case also of proselytizing. This manuscript was found in the possession of one of our lad’s little playmates, Béatrix Cabaza, the child of a fine Old Christian family. It was her mother who brought it to Juan Maria, and he, being no longer Moor but sincere Catholic, wisely chose the Holy Inquisition as that authority to whom the matter must be reported.” Fra Guillaume sighed. He would clearly rather have been dozing in the sun with some holy book resting open on his lap.

      “What, then, are we to do, my brother?” Don Felipe awaited the answer in some suspense. Heretical the book certainly was; yet its author, while undeniably of the age of reason and obviously well educated, was still of tender years and, being unbaptized, might remain unaware that his work was anything more than a diverting romance drawn upon spiritual rather than secular themes.

      After another sigh, Fra Guillaume replied, “The boy has been in the cell since yesterday afternoon, when his father brought him to me. Juan Maria, having passed the night, as I believe, with a business acquaintance in this town, has been waiting outside the tribunal since early morning.”

      Don Felipe nodded. “I believe I noticed him. A tall man of middle age, well dressed, with somewhat shaggy black brows?”

      “That was he. A good man. I regret that I have not some sort of vestibule where he might wait with greater comfort.” At one time, the Inquisition’s Daroca tribunal had been housed in a monastery on the outskirts of the city; but for one reason or another it had been moved several times, to end, some years ago, in a few rooms beneath the arcade of a wealthy merchant’s home, flanked by shops to right and left. “I had thought,” Fra Guillaume went on, “that this matter might be disposed of with the minimum of formality. If the bishop’s office makes no objection, we might proceed as far as a little gentle application of the first degree, and manage to dismiss our young culprit back into his father’s custody as early as tomorrow.”

      By “the first degree,” Fra Guillaume meant the threat of torture. This being in itself a form of torture, it ought not, formally speaking, be applied except in last resort, after careful consultation and deliberation. Already in a few months, however, Don Felipe had come to trust the old inquisitor as a man who would always choose the smoothest and least painful course for all concerned, who would take no step unless he judged that thereby he could end the matter as quickly and satisfactorily as possible. Better, surely, that the boy be subjected to the threat and returned home at once, than that he should remain weeks in prison, costing all the labor of a full inquisitorial investigation for what was, after all, little more than the childish romance of an unbaptized brain, based on misinterpretation of Christian doctrine.

      The Ordinary nodded. “His Reverence’s office will make no objection, even at this stage, to some judicious use of the first degree.”

      “Then I think,” said Fra Guillaume, “that we may as well proceed.”

      They repaired to the audience chamber and Fra Guillaume sent his one assistant to fetch the prisoner. Fra Guillaume’s assistant was a lay brother even older and slower than his master; the Inquisition was to call upon the bishop’s resources should need arise, but as far as Don Felipe could learn the need had not arisen in this diocese for years. The young priest had time while waiting to ponder whether or not the rolls of dust round the edges of the floor had grown measurably larger since his last visit.

      Once, the Inquisition had been a weapon to strike fear into the armies of Satan. The Dominicans still boasted of how, with God’s help, they had stamped out the deadly peril of Albigensianism some two centuries and a half ago. How had the proud army decayed! At least here in Aragon…and only in Aragon, of all the kingdoms of Spain, had the Inquisition ever been planted.

      Some attempt had been made to return Fra Guillaume’s present audience chamber to the fabled black-and-white austerity of earlier ages; but here and there the black draperies were torn or moth-eaten, and in many places the white paint was already worn away, leaving the former bright colors of murals and floor tiles showing through, while the long table and chairs were at best only dark brown.

      Fra Guillaume’s lay brother brought young Mehmoud in and gave him a three-legged stool to sit on before the tribunal, then shuffled back to stand at the door, his hands folded into the sleeves of his coarse habit.

      Looking around guardedly, with many apprehensive glances across the table at Fra Guillaume and Don Felipe, the young offender adjusted the position of his stool three or four times, hitching it minutely here and there across the painted tiles, until the inquisitor sternly bade him cease, when he finally sat still, head lowered.

      “Well, Mehmoud,” the inquisitor began, almost genially, “what have you to confess today?”

      “Juan,” the boy mumbled. “My name is Juan.”

      “If you were baptized, it might be Juan. Until then, it is Mehmoud.”

      Mehmoud lifted his head and stared back, anger struggling in his face with fear. “Then I have nothing to confess! And…and if I did…how could you listen to it?”

      Don Felipe shut his eyes, grateful that the boy was directing his stare principally at Fra Guillaume. The image had flashed unbidden into the Ordinary’s mind of the boy Ihesu debating in the Temple with the rabbis of Jerusalem. Even so must the divine Child have appeared, dark-eyed and olive-skinned—all paintings and illuminations to the contrary, Felipe de Alhama de Karnattah was aware what the Messiah’s true race would have been. Even so might the boy Ihesu have lifted one brown hand to push a lock of straight black hair away from His high forehead.

      Yet surely the holy face of Ihesu would not have been stained, at this age of His earthly life, with tears. Surely neither His hand nor His voice would have trembled before His mortal elders. And then it came to Don Felipe that whom young Mehmoud really reminded him of was his own boyhood friend Hamet. Flooded with relief, he opened his eyes and looked again at the author of the heretical Purgatorio.

      “It is not a question,” Fra Guillaume was saying, “of the holy sacrament, but rather one of practical jurisprudence.

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