“Take these children from us, and I will condemn you before the King. We are, if you have even for a moment forgotten it, the King’s Jews, and you will not do such a thing.”
“No,” said Godwin in the same meek and eloquent manner. “I would do nothing without your consent, Magister Eli. I haven’t come into your house with the pretense of any demand. I come with a request.”
“And what could that be? Mind you,” said my father, “I am prepared to take this stick and beat you to death.”
“Father, please,” I begged him to stop and listen.
Godwin accepted this as though he had the patience to be stoned in public without lifting a finger. Then he made his intentions clear.
“Are there not two of these beautiful children?” he said. “Has not God sent two because of our two faiths? Look at the gift he’s given to Fluria and to me. I, who never expected to have the devotion or love of a child, am now possessed of two, and Fluria lives daily, without disgrace in the loving company of her offspring, which might have been torn from her by someone cruel.
“Fluria, I beg you: give one of these beautiful girls to me. Magister Eli, I beg you, let me take one of these beautiful girls from this house.
“Let me take her to Paris to be educated. Let me watch her grow up, Christian, and with the loving guidance of a devoted father and uncle.
“You keep close to your heart always the other. And which you choose to come with me, I will accept, for you know their hearts and you know which one is most likely to be happy in Paris, and happy with a new life, and which is more timid, perhaps, or more devoted to her mother. That both love you, I have no doubt.
“But Fluria, I beg you, realize what it means to me as a believer in Jesus Christ, that my children cannot be with their own, and that they know nothing of those most important resolves their father has made: to serve his Lord Jesus Christ in thought, word, and deed forever. How can I return to Paris without begging you: give one of the girls to me. Let me raise her as my Christian daughter. Let us divide between us the fruit of our wicked fall, and our great good fortune that these beautiful girls have life.”
My father went into a fury. He rose to his feet, clutching his walking stick.
“You disgraced my daughter,” he shouted, “and now you come wanting to divide her children? Divide? You think you are King Solomon? If I had my sight I’d kill you. Nothing would stop me from it. I would kill you with my bare hands, and bury you beneath the backyard of this house to keep it from your Christian brethren. Thank your God that I’m blind and sick and old and can’t tear your heart out. As it is, I order you out of my house, and insist that you never return, and do not seek to see your daughters. The door is barred against you. And allow me to put your mind at ease on this account: these children are legally ours. How will you prove otherwise to anyone, and think what scandal you bring upon yourself if you do not leave here in silence and give up this brash and cruel request!”
I did everything in my power to restrain my father, but with a sharp elbow he pushed me to the side. He swung his walking stick, his blind eyes searching the room before him.
The Earl was stricken with sorrow, but nothing could touch the look of misery and heartbreak in Godwin. As for Meir, I couldn’t tell you how he was taking this argument because it was all I could do to put my arms around my father and beg him to be quiet, to let the men speak.
I was in terror, not of Godwin, but of Nigel. Nigel was the one after all with the power to seize my two daughters, if he chose, and to subject us to the harshest judgment. Nigel was the one with money enough and men enough to seize the girls and lock them up in his castle miles from London and deny me that I would ever see them again.
But I saw only gentleness in the faces of both men. Godwin was again weeping.
“Oh, that I have caused you pain, I am so sorry,” he said to my father.
“Caused me pain, you dog!” my father said. With difficulty he recovered his chair and sat down again, trembling violently. “You have sinned against my house. You sin now against it. Get out of it. Go.”
But what surprised everyone at this moment of passion was that Rosa came into the room and in a clear voice asked her grandfather to please say nothing more.
Now with twins, even identical twins often are not doublets in heart and soul. As I’ve already hinted to you, one can be more inclined to directness and to command than the other. So it was with my daughters, as I’ve said. Lea behaved always as if she were younger than Rosa; Rosa it was who often decided what they would do or not do. In this she resembled me as much as she resembled Godwin. She resembled my father as well, as he was always a man who spoke with force.
Well, forcefully, Rosa spoke now. She said to me in the gentlest yet firm manner that she wanted to go to Paris with her father.
At this Godwin and Nigel were both deeply moved, but my father was speechless and bowed his head.
Rosa went to him, and wrapped her arms around him, and kissed him. But he would not open his eyes, and he dropped his walking stick and balled his fists on his knees, ignoring her as if he did not feel her touch.
I tried to give him back his walking stick as he was never without it, but he had turned away from all of us, as if coiled into himself.
“Grandfather,” said Rosa, “Lea cannot bear to be separated from our mother. You know this, and you know that she would be afraid to go to a place such as Paris. She’s fearful now of going with Meir and Mother to Norwich. I am the one who should go with Br. Godwin. Surely you can see the wisdom of this and that it is the only way for all of us to be at peace.”
She turned and looked at Godwin, who was regarding her with such loving-kindness I could scarcely bear to see it.
Rosa went on, “I knew this man was my father before I ever saw him. I knew that the Br. Godwin of Paris to whom my mother wrote with such devotion was in fact the man who had given me life.
“But Lea never suspected, and now wants only to be with Mother and with Meir. Lea believes what she would believe, not on the strength of what she sees, but what she feels.”
She came to me now and put her arms around me. She said to me gently, “I want to go to Paris.” She frowned and seemed to be struggling to form her words, but then she said simply, “Mother, I want to be with this man who is my father.” She kept her eyes on me. “This man is not like other men. This man is like the saintly ones.” Here she referred to those strictest of Jews who try to live entirely for God, who keep Torah and Talmud so totally that they have acquired with us the name Chasidim.
My father sighed and stared upwards, and I could see his lips moving in prayer. He bowed his head. He stood up and made his way to the wall, turning his back to all of us, and he began bowing from the waist as he prayed.
I could see that Godwin was overjoyed at this decision on the part of Rosa. And so was his brother, Nigel.
And it was Nigel who spoke now, explaining in a low respecting voice that he would see that Rosa had all the clothing and all the luxuries that she could possibly need, and that she would be educated in the finest convent in Paris. He had already written to the nuns. He went to Rosa and kissed her and said, “You’ve made your father very happy.”
Godwin appeared to be praying, and then he said under his breath, “Dear Lord, you have placed a treasure in my hands. I promise you that I will safeguard forever this child, and that hers will be a life rich in earthly blessings. Please, Lord, grant her a life of spiritual blessings.”
At this I thought my father would lose his mind. Of course Nigel was an Earl, you understand, and had more than one estate, and was used to being obeyed not only by his household but by all his serfs and everyone who encountered him. He didn’t realize how deeply his assumptions would offend my father.
Godwin saw the picture, however, and again, as he had before, he went down on his knees to my father. He did it with utter simplicity as though it were nothing for him, and what a picture he made there in his black habit and san
dals, kneeling before my father and pleading with him to forgive everything and trust that Rosa would be loved and cherished.
My father was unmoved. Finally with a deep sigh he gestured for everyone to be silent, because by this time Rosa was pleading with him, and even the proud but gentle Nigel was begging him to see the fairness of it.
“The fairness of it?” my father said, “that the Jewish daughter of a Jewish woman should be baptized and become a Christian? Is that what you think is fair? I should see her dead before such a thing should be allowed to happen.”
But Rosa, in her boldness, pressed close to him and wouldn’t let him take his hand from hers. “Grandfather,” she said, “you must be King Solomon now. You must see that Lea and I are to be divided, because we are two, not one, and we have two parents, a father and a mother.”
“It’s you who have made the decision,” my father said. He was speaking wrathfully. I never saw him so angry, so bitter. Not even when I had first told him years ago that I was with child had he shown such anger.
“You are dead to me,” he said to Rosa. “You go with your mad and simpleminded father, this devil who worked his way into my confidences, listening to my tales and legends and would-be instruction, all the while he had his wicked eye on your mother. You go ahead, and you are dead to me and I will mourn for you. Now leave my house. Leave it and go with this Earl who has come here to take a child from a mother and grandfather.”
He left the room, easily finding his way out, and slammed the door behind him.
In that moment I thought my heart would break, that I would never know peace or happiness or love again.
But something occurred then, which affected me more deeply than any spoken words.
As Godwin stood and turned to Rosa, she slipped into his arms. Irresistibly she was drawn to him, and lavished her child-like kisses on him, and laid her head on his shoulder, and he closed his eyes and cried.
I saw myself in that moment, as I had loved him years ago. Only I saw the purity of it, that it was our daughter he held close to him. And I knew then that there was nothing I could or should do to oppose this plan.
Only to you, Br. Toby, do I admit this, but I felt a complete release. And in my heart I said my silent farewell to Rosa, and my silent confirmation of love for Godwin, and I took my place at Meir’s side.
Ah, you see how it is. You see. Was I wrong? Was I right?
The Lord in Heaven has taken Lea from me, my child who remained with me, my faithful, timid, and loving Lea.
He has taken her, as my father in Oxford refuses even to speak to me, and mourns for Rosa who is yet alive.
Has the Lord passed judgment on me?
Surely my father has learned of the death of Lea. Surely he knows what we face here in Norwich and how the town has made of Lea’s death a great cause for our condemnation and possible execution, how the evil hatred of our Gentile neighbors may break out against all of us once again.
It is a judgment on me, that I let Rosa become the ward of the Earl and go with him and Godwin to Paris. It is a judgment, I can’t help but believe it. And my father, my father has not spoken a word to me, nor written a word since that very hour. Nor will he even now.
He would have left our house that very day, if Meir hadn’t taken me away immediately, and if Rosa had not gone that very night. And poor Lea, my tender Lea, she struggled to understand why her sister was leaving her for Paris, and why her grandfather sat silent as one made of granite, refusing to speak even to her.
And now my tender darling, brought to this strange city of Norwich, and beloved of all who laid eyes upon her, has died, helplessly, of the iliac passion as we stood by unable to save her, and God has placed me here, imprisoned, until such time as the town breaks out in riots and we are all to be destroyed.
I wonder if my father is not laughing at us, bitterly, for we are surely undone.
CHAPTER TWELVE
The End of Fluria’s Story
FLURIA WAS IN TEARS AS SHE FINISHED. AGAIN I WANTED to put my arms around her but I knew this wasn’t proper, and wouldn’t be tolerated.
I told her once more in a low whisper that I couldn’t imagine her pain in losing Lea, and I could only do quiet homage to her heart.
“I don’t believe the Lord would take a child to punish anyone for anything,” I said. “But what do I know of the ways of the Lord? I think you did what you thought right when you let Rosa go to Paris. And Lea died in the course of things as a child might die.”
She softened a little when I said this. She was tired and perhaps her exhaustion calmed her as much as anything else.
She rose from the table and went to the narrow slit of a window and appeared to be looking out at the falling snow.
I stood behind her.
“We have many things to decide now, Fluria, but the chief thing is this. If I go to Paris and persuade Rosa to come here, to act the part of Lea …”
“Oh, do you think I haven’t thought of this?” she asked. She turned to me. “It’s much too dangerous,” she continued. “And Godwin would never allow such a deception. How could such a deception be right?”
“Wasn’t it Jacob who deceived Isaac?” I said. “And became Israel and the father of his tribe?”
“Yes, that’s so, and Rosa is the clever one, the one with the greatest gift for words. No, it’s too dangerous. What if Rosa cannot answer Lady Margaret’s questions, or recognize in Little Eleanor a close friend? No, it can’t be done.”
“Rosa can refuse to speak to those who’ve abused you,” I said. “Everyone would understand this. She need only appear.”
This hadn’t occurred to Fluria obviously.
She began to pace the floor and to wring her hands. All my life, I’d heard that expression: to wring one’s hands. But I’d never seen anyone do it until now.
It struck me that I knew this woman better now than I knew anyone in the world. It was an odd and chilling thought, not because I loved her any less, but because I couldn’t bear to think of my own life.
“But if it could be done, for Rosa to come here,” I asked, “how many in the Jewry know that you had twins? How many know your father, and knew you in Oxford?”
“Too many, but none will speak of it,” she insisted. “Remember, to my people, a child who converts is dead and gone, and no one even mentions her name. We never made mention of it when we came here. And no one spoke of Rosa to us. And I would say it is the best-kept secret in the Jewry right now.”
She went on speaking as if she needed to reason through it.
“Under the law, Rosa might have lost all her own property, inherited from her first stepfather, simply for converting. No, there are those who know here, but they know in silence and our physician and our elders can see that they remain quiet.”
“And what of your father? Have you written to tell him that Lea is dead?”
“No, and even if I did he would burn the letter unopened. He promised me that he would do this if ever I wrote to him.
“And as for Meir, in his sorrow and misery, he blames himself for Lea’s taking sick because he brought us here. He imagines that, snug and safe in Oxford, she might never have taken ill. He has not written to my father. But that does not mean that my father does not know. He has too many friends here for him not to know.”
She began to cry again.
“He will see it as God’s punishment,” she whispered through her tears, “of that I’m sure.”
“What do you want me to do?” I asked. I wasn’t at all sure we would be in agreement, but she was obviously clever and reflective and the hour was late.
“Go to Godwin,” she said, and her face softened as she spoke his name. “Go to him and ask him to come here and calm the Dominican brethren. Have him insist upon our innocence. Godwin is greatly admired within the order. He studied with Thomas and Albert before they left to begin their preaching and teaching in Italy. Surely Godwin’s writings on Maimonides and Aristotle are known even here. Godwin
will come on my account, I know that he will, and because … because Lea was his child.”
Again her tears flowed. She looked frail standing there in the candlelight with her back to the cold window, and I could hardly bear it.
For a moment I thought I heard voices in the distance and some other errant sound in the wind. But as she did not appear to hear it, I didn’t say anything about it. I wanted so to hold her as my sister, if only I could.
“Maybe Godwin can reveal the entire truth and be done with it,” she said, “and make the Black Friars understand that we did not kill our daughter. He is a witness to my character and my soul.”
This obviously gave her hope. It gave me hope too.
“Oh, would it be a great thing to be rid of this terrible lie,” she said. “And as we speak, you and I, Meir is writing for sums of money to be donated. Debts will be remitted. Why, I would face utter ruin, all my property gone, if only I could take Meir with me away from this terrible place. If only I knew I had brought no harm to the Jews of Norwich, who have in other times suffered so much.”
“That would be the best solution, no doubt of it,” I said, “because an imposture would carry dreadful risks. Even your Jewish friends might say or do something to undo it. But what if the town won’t accept the truth? Not even from Godwin? It will be too late to insist upon the old deception. The opportunity for an imposture would be lost.”
Again I heard those noises in the night. Soft shapeless sounds, and others more piercing. But the falling snow seemed to muffle all.
“Br. Toby,” she said, “go to Paris and put the entire case before Godwin. To him you may tell everything, and let Godwin decide.”
“Yes, I will do this, Fluria,” I said, but again I heard those noises and what sounded like the distant clanging of a bell.
I gestured for her to let me approach the window. She stepped aside.
“That’s the alarm,” she said in terror.
“Perhaps not,” I said. Suddenly another bell began to ring.
“Are they burning the Jewry?” she said, her voice dying in her throat.