The inquisitor then gestured for Asa to come to the body. There was silence. ‘Touch with two fingers the mouth, the navel and the wounds,’ he said.
Asa stood over the dead bundle on the stone floor of the chapter house, perhaps saying a silent prayer. I could see him tremble a little as he leant forward and did as he had been commanded; firstly he touched the mouth, then the area of the navel and the man’s disfigured head.
There was a pregnant pause and then a sudden gasp. I could see nothing, for monks had left their seats and were standing as a great agitation took hold of everyone. I heard voices crying out, ‘It is true! It is true!’ and again, ‘The murderer!’
‘Lo, behold! The cry of blood from the earth against the murderer!’ the inquisitor exclaimed.
I did not see it, but I was to learn later that blood had oozed from the mouth of the carcass.
The judges and my master stepped down from the dais to have a better look. I could only see the tops of their heads.
‘But the body has been moved,’ I heard my master argue, ‘when it should have been left out in the open air without movement for some hours, with breast and stomach bare to ensure a thorough coagulation of the blood!’
There was a loud murmur. I heard voices disputing whether the bleeding was occasioned by antipathy or sympathy, by the remains of the soul in the body, or by the wandering spirit of the dead man.
The inquisitor ordered quiet, saying, ‘The causes are sometimes natural and sometimes supernatural. In this case it matters little, the blood is there, it is a sign that this man is lying in the name of the Devil!’
At about this time the cook began to laugh hysterically (having been aroused from his previous stupor by the great commotion). Incredulity filled the room, even the inquisitor was startled. I pushed my way to the front in order to see.
‘You are the Devil!’ the cook spat at the foot of the inquisitor, and his voice having acquired a semblance of its old strength roared and reverberated around us. ‘I am glad that I have finally confessed my sins to God, for now I can savour death! But not this good, kind monk who has done nothing! I am the murderer, I am the heretic! I have denied the past for long years, and I soon will be cleansed and purified en la flama – the flames of the Espirito Santo. But you? If there is justicia, if there is fairness in this miserable world, may you suffer agonies as I have suffered in knowing you and having followed you into the arms of the Devil! You betrayed us because you loved power and you lay with the bishops and the pope and denied all that you taught us! Yes, is true, I wanted the end of Rome, the end of the pope! But this is not different from what you also had one time believed with all your heart . . . and yes! The emperor! I would give my life for him because he hated the church!’
‘He was the antichrist! Guards, seize this man!’
The guards moved forward to take the cook, but he was strong, and with the power afforded him by anger, pushed them away as one would an annoying insect.
‘No! I know what you came for . . . you came for me, not these poor monks . . .!’
The inquisitor smiled, and stayed his men with one hand.
‘All of my life I lived hiding from the past like a rat, como un ratón. Used by Frederick, used by the Ghibellines . . .’ He sighed deeply. ‘A used man today is used no more! When I met you, Rainiero Sacconi, I was very young, and you used me also, used all of us and like an orange you spat us out when you were convertido, converted, changed, transformed into a whore who licks the hems of bishops’ skirts by killing all of us that you knew from those days . . . mi amor, my love, Teresa una mujer perfecta, you burned her to death! But first, you tortured her little body until there was nada, no more life, bringing her naked with others to the crowds, and they spit on her, and poke at her. After the humillación, her body was tied to the pyre and lit like a torch, and her beautiful hair, gold like copper, turned black and melted on her little skull as she fell, because the ropes they break, and her little lungs choked on the smoke, and her heart exploded from the great heat. And I . . .’ he cried like a child, ‘I was in the crowds, like a coward, cobarde! I did not die with all of the ones that I once knew! O qué miseria! Wretched, wretched coward that I am! I did not save her! She was so brave that when she saw me, she smiled! She smiled because she was happy qué había escapado – the coward had escaped! And God forgive me I was glad also!’ He covered his face with large twisted hands and wept.
‘Tell me what I want to know.’ Rainiero had the same look on his face that I recalled my master having in the library when he pursued the secret codices – ravenous.