‘Oh, no, no, of course not, but I wonder, has anyone seen these gospels? Or are they speculation on your part?’
‘There is one, though he is not worthy.’ He lowered his eyes, but not before I saw a deep resentment in them. ‘These last months, because of his weak vision and sudden frailty, Brother Ezekiel had been working on a project of great importance with the young translator Anselmo. He was working on the translation of a certain...gospel.’
‘Is this true?’ My master smiled as though the man were not serious.
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘he was given the sanction to accompany the brother to the library.’
‘No!’ my master exclaimed with indignation. ‘Yet you, the librarian, have never been there? That is absurd!’
The other man’s eyes softened, ‘My very sentiments, preceptor.’
‘But how do you know this was their task?’
‘Anselmo told me, perhaps to make me feel even more inferior. In any case when the brother heard that Anselmo was puffed up with pride, he ended his work with him.’
‘No doubt that upset the boy.’
The brother looked about. ‘He was very calm, as is his nature, but his eyes grew black with hate.’
‘I see . . .’ my master said thoughtfully.
The man, perhaps sensing that he had been imprudent, said, ‘Now, if you will excuse me, preceptor, soon the bell will toll, and I must make ready. I hope you will not mention what I have just told you to anyone . . .’ he trailed off.
‘Your words are safe with me, brother librarian. Thank you for a most erudite discussion.’ My master bowed and we began to leave when he suddenly remembered that the aperture would be locked as was customary. ‘Oh, Brother Macabus, if you will be so kind as to let us out?’
The brother searched his vestments. ‘The cook’s assistant must still have the keys, preceptor, I gave them to him when the poor cook was . . . detained. You will have to leave via the north transept door.’
‘I see,’ said my master with a smile.
Moments later, after entering the church, my master said that it was a pity that our investigations of the organ would have to wait, but it was far too dangerous to pursue this matter with the inquisitor roaming about. Instead we left through the north transept and found ourselves within the stormy elements, at the perimeter of the graveyard.
‘So is Macabus a suspect now, master?’
‘It is possible. He was all too ready to incriminate Anselmo, perhaps to save his own skin by diverting us . . . To be librarian and have the library denied you, especially when it is purported to hold such treasures, and to have one much younger and less experienced given the sanction to use it, must have caused him a great deal of shame. Never underestimate this emotion, for no man is more capable of hatred, Christian, than a man who feels he has been unfairly or shamefully treated. We also know that he had access to poisons, and that he knows Greek . . .’
‘So if he does not know it as well as Anselmo, that may explain the errors in the note?’
‘Yes, you could be right, and yet I am not convinced of anything. Did you notice that he was right-handed?’
‘What about Anselmo? He also had a motive.’
‘Yes . . . too many possibilities too little time . . .’
‘Master?’
‘Yes, Christian, what now?’
‘I am confounded. Greek, Hebrew, Aramaic!’
‘Firstly we must differentiate between the Old and New Testaments.’ He winced, for the wind assailed us. ‘The New Testament was given to us in Greek from the first. The Old Testament was handed down to the Jewish people in Hebrew, and then translated into Aramaic and Greek. Macabus was correct, however, in saying that Greek may have corrupted the original intentions of Moses and other Hebrew writers of the Old Testament, because a translation is never an easy thing. If we take, for instance, the word ‘soul’ and translate it into Greek we arrive at the word ‘psyche’, a very good word as words go, but also one that has been given a meaning by the Greek philosophers that was not intended by the Old Testament authors. You see to the Greeks ‘psuche’ or ‘psyche’ also includes the function of the mind and reason, in Hebrew the equivalent means only soul as a spiritual entity.’
‘It is such a fine distinction, master, for thinking is a function of being that constitutes the soul.’
‘Yes but a distinction is most significant when it is least obvious.’
‘So when translating one cannot escape the distortions produced by one’s philosophy and politics?’ I said.
‘Precisely,’ he answered.
‘It is all much clearer now . . . but master, before when you were speaking to Brother Macabus, you sounded as though you knew very little about translations.’