Quest of Hope(23)

Within each hovel the peasant women were hard at work as well. Some, like Arnold’s wife, kept busy carving bowls and forks, platters and spoons, or pleating baskets with rushes gathered in the autumn. Berta spent much of her time spinning. This year she was skillfully turning coarse flax into good linen thread. The prior had ordered higher taxes to offset a poor grain harvest, and Berta’s spinning helped provide for her obligations.

It was just two days past mid-March, less than two weeks before Easter, when Berta became ill. She had suffered aches and an unusual weakness in her legs through much of Lent, but she had attributed it to the added privations of the season as she readied her soul for Holy Week. For days Heinrich stood faithfully by his mother’s bed, often dabbing her brow, so he was surprised when she silently slipped from her bed and out the door into the freezing rain, only to return a few hours later with a small satchel stuffed beneath her cloak. “Shhh,” she whispered. “Ask nothing, boy, to bed with you.”

Baldric rose just before prime of the next morning, and as he was tearing at some stale bread he heard Berta calling his name. “What is it, woman?”

“Baldric… a word?”

Baldric ambled into the woman’s room. Now a burly man of nearly twenty-three, he filled the doorway. He stared at her with his narrow-set eyes and picked at his brown beard. “So what is it?”

“I am dying.”

“Aye. And what of it?”

“You shall have charge of my children. The law shall let you have the harvest until Heinrich is of proper age. Methinks a half-hide’s harvest a fair payment for their care till then.”

“Humph!” scoffed Baldric. “You’ve three brats and I’ve no wife to mind them.” He leaned close to the woman. “Add your dowry, then I shall agree.”

Berta was too weak to argue and handed Baldric a box she had set beside her. “The day I wed I was given two ewes and a boar hog, three shillings and this table. The ewes have dropped lambs and the shepherds say they now mark twelve ewes and one ram for us. The boar yielded and we’ve credit for ten pigs in the swineherd … six due for taxes. Kurt added a shilling for his work with the carpenters and from one good harvest. Your father gave ten shillings, though Kurt spent some on woollens, thatching, and some harvest tools. Here’d be all the coins that are left, ‘tis no more.”

Baldric took the little chest and counted the silver. He looked hard at Berta. He knew she feared for her soul and he leaned close to her face. “So, on the Virgin you do swear this to be all?”

Berta felt suddenly nauseous. She had no intention to give Baldric all. That would mean she’d need to give him her golden relic. Surely, she imagined, she would burn forever if she gave it to the likes of Baldric! Yet, if she swore a lie on the Virgin would she not also perish? Her mind and heart raced. She closed her eyes.

Finally certain she was damned for either choice, Berta chose the sin that did not advantage Baldric. “Aye, Baldric, ‘tis all.” She shuddered. All her life she had worked so very hard to avoid the Pit, and in this one moment all had been lost! She groaned.

The man smiled smugly, but before he could speak, Berta hissed. “Hear me: the monks know all. Should you try to cheat my children, they will serve you justice.”

Baldric grinned. “There’d be one more thing.”

Berta closed her eyes.

“I needs honor m’father’s gift to Heinrich’s sons-to-be. You remember—the parchment with the abbot’s promise?”

Berta lay motionless. She said nothing for nearly a minute while Baldric waited. Then she slowly dug her hand deep into the recesses of her straw mattress and retrieved a flattened roll. She handed it to him without a word.





The gray sky hung heavy beneath the noon sun of the next day. Effi was playing with a ball of linen thread like a bored kitten and Axel was busy jabbing the hearth with a smoking stick. Berta called hoarsely for her eldest son. “Boy … come here,” she whispered.

Heinrich entered his mother’s bedchamber. She nodded weakly and bade him sit by her side. “I needs speak of things. I’ve asked for Arnold to fetch the bailiff and Father Gregor. You must be here when they come. Now, hear me.” The woman raised herself up on one elbow. “Honor the ways and make me proud. Make your father proud.” She fell back. “Do you remember my story of the ox that coveted the saddle, and the horse the plough?”

Heinrich nodded solemnly.

“Good. Do not seek change, allow what is, to be.” She sighed a little, then her tone changed. “Obey your uncle. I have given him charge over you all. Care for your sister…”