Pieter was summoned to Paulus’s side and ordered to climb atop the beast. The red-faced priest laced his furious indignation with nearly every known expletive and even threatened Alwin with his staff! It was Maria’s gentle insistence that finally quieted the old fellow as Alwin and Heinrich lifted him atop the unhappy donkey’s back.
Despite the tragedy lying in their wake, the wayfarers began their journey northward in high spirits. They traveled several hours along the rapidly rising highway ascending from the wide green valley of the Aare River. Looking back only once, they paused to bid a final farewell to the distant, craggy, snow-capped mountains appearing behind a rising curtain of morning haze. The ragged horizon seemed so very, very far away. It was hard for them to imagine that they had come from even farther places.
“Somewhere beyond is my home,” lamented Benedetto. The minstrel had said little since Burgdorf, and the trauma of Olten had nearly finished him.
“Your home is with us now,” said Frieda. She set her hand lightly on the man’s shoulder. “You are one of us.”
“Si,” he answered. “Grazie, signora. It is true, but sometimes I do yearn for the past.”
“The past, good minstrel, is just that,” Heinrich offered with a hint of introspection. “Methinks it is oft a good place to remember, but not a good place to dwell.”
“I sometimes pretend I’m sucking lemons with Brother Stefano and the monks at San Fruttuoso,” said Helmut. “Now that is a good place to remember and to dwell!”
“Aye!” answered a chorus of others.
The pilgrims stared for a while longer at the distant view, then turned to look forward. During the brief respite, a cloud of heavy melancholy moved in to hover over them. Quiet conversations carried them to faraway homes and distant places, to the way of life before the crusade. Heinrich now felt especially despondent. For all his bravado just moments before, fear of the past had abruptly ensnared him, and he began to perspire. What of Weyer? he wondered as dread filled his belly.
Conversations fell to whispers, then ended altogether as blank stares were fixed at the horizon. The way of the past had cast its spell.
“Enough!” cried Pieter suddenly. “Enough of this. You have left the old order behind. Do not go back to it. You must live life freely and without fear, bound only by the laws of grace.” His voice was firm but not harsh. He leaned on his staff and reached for Maria. “Believe in what you have become.”
Sudden chills of inspiration tingled along his listeners’ spines, and in that moment the power of evil oppression was broken. Heaven had sprinkled the old man’s mouth with admonitions of hope, and the brave pilgrims were now ready to press on.
Heinrich and Alwin shifted Paulus’s sacks to make room for Pieter. “He’ll not be refusing us again,” insisted the baker. “He will do as we say!”
Alwin looked at Pieter and shook his head. “How old is he?”
“Nearly seventy-eight,” Frieda replied. “But my heart tells me he still has much to teach us. He’ll not be taken from us yet.”
The sun was directly overhead when Pieter was finally hoisted upon Paulus. He did not complain nearly as much as the beast below him, though he admitted a certain wounded pride. “Ah, it is what it is,” he finally muttered. “Lead on, Wil. Lead us on.”
Chapter Fifteen
A FAREWELL, A MONKEY, AND A CARAVAN
The region of Liestal lay southeast of Basel. It was a land of lumpy-shouldered mountains and easy valleys. Small fields of spelt and rye checkered clearings here and there, and hardwood forests covered what was not green with pasture. It was a quiet place, save for the bountiful numbers of songbirds fluttering happily amongst the heavy boughs. Tucked out of sight were the timber farmsteads of the mountain peasants. From their hidden chimneys, thin columns of smoke streamed slowly upward like white ribbons, rising from the unseen hearths hidden deep within the mountains’ many nooks.
Rudolf was flushed with excitement. It had been just over a year since he had left his family to join with a different band of crusaders that had passed nearby. He began to point to familiar landmarks—first a few, then many more as they grew closer. “There! Herr Ernst’s well! And see, down there, old Emil’s mill.”
He began to trot ahead, down a long descent toward a waiting valley. Laughing, the others followed close behind, with poor Pieter grumbling atop his bouncing perch. At last, Rudolf stopped. He held his breath and licked his lips nervously as he and his friends faced the homestead.
The house was a long rectangular structure, “built of mostly hardwood logs, judging by the bark still hanging on some,” reckoned Heinrich. The baker stared at the rock chimney standing proudly at one end. “Better than a smoke-hole!”