Rashi's Daughters, Book III: Rachel (40 page)

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Authors: Maggie Anton

BOOK: Rashi's Daughters, Book III: Rachel
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Rachel and Eliezer exchanged anxious glances.
“When we reached Prague, Peter’s money was gone. Some of the Teutons wanted to attack the Jews there, but Geoffrey would have none of it. Which was just as well because, instead of easy pickings, the Teutons found themselves facing five hundred armed Jews along with a thousand of the duke’s soldiers.”
Jehan shook his head at the memory, while Rachel was filled with pride at knowing that in one place, at least, the Jews had fought back and vanquished their enemies.
“We left Prague in a hurry, empty handed. As we headed into the Balkans, it became more difficult to beg food from the country folk or live off the land. Most towns were closed tight against us, and to make matters worse the mountain passes were infested with bandits who eagerly picked off the stragglers.”
He sighed heavily. “I stayed near the front with Geoffrey and the other knights, and thus I was one of the first to arrive at Belgrade. Word of our numbers and desperation must have reached them, because the place was deserted. Most of us hadn’t had a good meal in weeks, so when bands formed to plunder the town, my only excuse for what I did was my hunger,” he said, his eyelids lowering in embarrassment.
“Belgrade’s storehouses were empty, and in our fury we burned the city. I still can’t believe I was capable of such a despicable act.” Jehan looked up at his hosts, his eyes begging their forgiveness. “We’d escaped repercussions thus far, despite the damage we’d caused, so we felt above the law. That ended at Nis, where a battalion of the emperor’s soldiers was waiting to escort us to Constantinople. The commander distributed food, but the Teutons started pillaging again anyway.”
Jehan let out a deep breath. “A few days later, I was foraging for nuts and berries when I heard a sound like thunder in the distance; yet there were no clouds in the sky. I rode to the forest’s edge, where I saw pilgrims yelling and snatching up their possessions and running back the way we’d come. Suddenly the entire garrison of Nis was bearing down on us, and before I knew it, my horse was racing into the woods with me holding on for dear life.”
Jehan stared into the hearth. “The next morning I retraced my steps, but there was no camp, only a battlefield. Corpses were everywhere—men, women, children, livestock—with jackals and vultures picking at them. Every cart had been demolished, every dish smashed, every container of foodstuff ripped open and spoiled. Slowly other survivors appeared from the forest, including Geoffrey and Peter the Hermit. I wanted to go home more than anything, but I had sworn the pilgrim’s oath.”
“What happened to your brother?” Eliezer asked. “And the rest of Geoffrey’s men?”
“I couldn’t find my brother’s body, but I never saw him again.” Jehan sniffed back tears. “Those of us left, and there weren’t many, collected whatever we could find that was still edible and made our way to Sofia, where the emperor gave us shelter. Eventually other pilgrims joined us from France and Italy, but we heard that most of the Germans had been killed by the Hungarian army.”
Rachel and Eliezer exchanged excited looks. Had the Almighty already exacted vengeance for the slaughter of His people? “Did you learn the names of any of the German leaders?” she asked. “Was one of them a Count Emicho?”
“I’m pretty sure that was one of them.” Jehan scratched his head in thought. “Also a priest, Folkmar, and a monk, Gottschalk, I think, but there may have been others.”
“What happened next?” Rachel asked. A surge of anger against the German pilgrims vied with her eagerness to hear how they had been defeated.
“Emperor Alexius wanted us to wait until the main body of knights arrived, but Peter refused to delay. The French and Germans were quarreling over who should be the leader and how to divide the booty, so they weren’t about to wait for more knights to share it with.”
Jehan shook his head in disgust. “So all of us, maybe eighty thousand strong, crossed the Bosporus and headed for Nicaea. We were camped a day’s ride away when we heard a rumor that the Germans and Italians had taken Nicaea and were looting it. The French were outraged and began a mad dash to the city, followed by the Germans and Italians who thought the French were trying to obtain the spoils first.”
“And?” Eliezer asked when Jehan hesitated.
“The rumor had been started by the Turks, whose army was waiting to ambush us on the road to Nicaea.” Jehan paused, his forehead creased in pain. “It was a rout. The Turks slew the men, sparing only those who surrendered and converted to Islam. The women and children in camp were captured and taken as slaves—those who didn’t drown themselves in the sea first. I managed to escape on horseback to a nearby castle, along with Geoffrey and a few others.”
Jehan’s eyes grew wide with horror. “We had no food or water, and the Turks immediately lay siege. After three days in the heat—you have no idea how hot it gets there in August, worse than an oven—we were so thirsty that we drank our own piss and bled the horses to drink their blood. The last thing I remember is lying in the shade, waiting to die. I was unconscious when the emperor’s soldiers finally rescued us.”
Jehan sighed and regarded his hosts with resignation. “When I woke up in Constantinople, our pilgrimage was over. Emperor Alexius made the few survivors sell their arms and return home. I thought of Troyes, such a prosperous city, and that if I lived there for a year I’d be a free man, not a runaway villein.”
Rachel stared at Eliezer in shock at the enormity of Jehan’s tale. Not only had ten thousand Jews died in the Rhineland, but apparently over a hundred thousand pilgrims had lost their lives on this fool’s errand.
“Now that you’ve reached Troyes, what do you intend to do?” Eliezer asked Jehan.
“I’ll find work,” he replied. “With all the men gone on pilgrimage who will never return, there must be jobs that need doing.”
The solution came to Rachel in an instant, and she couldn’t help but smile seductively. “Would you like to learn to weave?”
 
The next morning Jehan accompanied her to Alette’s, where Rachel was gratified to hear the big horizontal loom working as she knocked on the door. Alette was surprised to see her again so soon and frowned at the skinny youth in dirty clothes (at least Rachel had made Jehan wash his hands and face) at her patron’s side.
Albert’s reaction was astonishing. He began trembling violently as he and Jehan stared wide-eyed at each other. Finally Jehan sputtered, “I never thought I’d see you again.”
Albert closed his mouth, which had dropped open, and swallowed hard. Then he whispered, “What are you doing here?”
Alette wept as Jehan retold his story. Albert had turned back at Belgrade, after breaking his leg in the stampede of pilgrims fleeing Nis’s soldiers. He’d dragged himself into the woods, where Jehan found him.
With gentle questioning by Rachel, Albert confirmed that Emicho’s undisciplined men had been easy prey for the Hungarian army. He had passed the battlefield on his return and seen the Germans’ plundered bodies himself. The horrific memories still gave him nightmares.
Rachel murmured something sympathetic, but inside she wanted to shout with triumph. To make her satisfaction complete, Albert was pleased to accept Jehan as an apprentice weaver after learning that Rachel had an additional loom for the youth to use.
“Should we tell anyone that Emicho and his men have received their punishment?” Rachel asked Eliezer later that night. “Or wait for better witnesses?”
“Say nothing yet. If Jehan and Albert’s tale is true, the news will reach Troyes soon enough.”
She sighed. “I wish I could tell Papa. He’s been terribly melancholy over all those Rhineland Jews dying.”
Eliezer hesitated, lost in thought. “Nobody will talk about it, but I don’t understand what sin of theirs was so great that the Almighty averted His eyes and consigned them to the sword.”
At first Rachel was shocked into silence. The pious martyrs of Worms and Mayence couldn’t possibly have committed sins worthy of such punishment; it was scandalous to think so. Yet hadn’t Jerusalem been destroyed because of its inhabitants’ sins, baseless hatred in particular?
“Papa complained sometimes that they erected too many fences around the Torah, prohibited what was permitted, and made Judaism onerous for the people,” she said. Could that be such a terrible sin?
Eliezer nodded. “I’ve often heard him say that any idiot can prohibit out of ignorance, while it takes a true
talmid chacham
who knows the law to rule leniently.”
“He wrote that into his
kuntres
.” Rachel struggled with her conflicted feelings; no wonder everyone avoided the subject. “It is difficult to believe that they deserved to be slaughtered on that account; yet the Holy One is a righteous judge and therefore they must be to blame.”
“I heard Meir and Shmuel say the pious ones of the Rhineland were blameless, that they were granted the privilege of sanctifying the Holy Name to prove to the world that we were as willing to die for the true faith as the pilgrims were for their heresy.”
“What did you say in return?” Rachel asked with apprehension. She was sure his response would provoke them.
“I didn’t say anything. Pesach was there and he shared the letter we got in Mayence, the one written by a martyr who died with Samson and Catharina.” Eliezer blinked back tears. “Nobody could say much after that.”
“What was in it?”
“Wait while I recall the words properly. They were very powerful.” He collected his thoughts, and then recited slowly,
“Let me relate the power of this holy day, awesome and full of dread; today Your Kingship will be exalted. The angels are dismayed, seized by fear and trembling as they proclaim: Behold the Day of Judgment! On Rosh Hashanah it was inscribed and on Yom Kippur it was sealed:
How many shall pass away and how many shall be born; who shall live and who shall die, who at his predestined time and who before his time; who by fire and who by water; who by sword and who by beast; who by hunger and who by thirst; who by storm and who by plague; who by strangulation and who by stoning; who shall rest and who shall wander; who shall be tranquil and who shall be afflicted; who shall be at peace and who shall be tormented; who shall be impoverished and who shall be rich; who shall be brought low and who shall be exalted.”
He stopped and took a deep breath. “There was more but I can’t remember it exactly.”
Rachel swallowed hard, too awed to speak. Eventually she whispered, “You don’t need to remember more, that was plenty.”
“The letter is signed Rabbi Amnon, but Dulcie said she doesn’t recall any Amnon living in Mayence.”
“It’s an Italian name, maybe he was there for Shavuot.” Suddenly a terrible thought occurred to her. “I hope Papa wasn’t there when you read this. He’s melancholy enough already.”
“He was not only there, but he made a copy of it.”
“I suppose it would be difficult to keep such compelling words from him.” She sighed.
Eliezer took Rachel’s hand. “Your father wasn’t unhappy about it. He told us he’d heard of a prayer like that, except its concluding line was, ‘But repentance, prayer, and charity avert the severe decree.’ ”
“Surely the German Jews did all those things,” Rachel said.
“Then perhaps Meir and Shmuel are correct.”
“Oh, Eliezer, I don’t want to be here when the other pilgrims come back,” she cried out. “I don’t want to die by the sword.” Was that what the August eclipse of the moon warned of?
“Then you and the children must come to Toledo with me.” Eliezer took her in his arms. “Your father can manage without your care for a few months.”
She snuggled up to him. “I hope so.” What a relief to escape from all this talk of pilgrims, massacres, and
anusim
.
 
The second night of Hanukkah was on Saturday, and as had been the tradition in Troyes for generations, Salomon the Vintner’s family celebrated by tasting the new vintage for the first time. Further confounding the pilgrims, who had deserted lands devastated by years of drought, rains that summer had been abundant and the resulting harvests bountiful. Salomon’s community expected a fine product from his vineyard, and they eagerly congregated in his courtyard to sample it.
Salomon took a sip of the new wine and grimaced.
“What’s the matter, Papa?” Rachel looked anxiously at her sisters. Had all their arguing somehow ruined the vintage?
Salomon shook his head as if to clear it. “There’s nothing wrong with the wine. It’s just that suddenly I have a headache.” He reached out to support himself on her shoulder. “And I feel a bit dizzy.”
“The last six months have been difficult,” Miriam said soothingly. “No wonder you’re exhausted.”
“You don’t have to stay up and celebrate,” Joheved said. “We’ll keep the guests entertained so you can go to bed early.”
“Perhaps I am overtired,” he replied slowly. “I definitely don’t feel well.”
Rachel took his arm. “I’ll help you upstairs, Papa.”
He stumbled a little on the steps, but made it into bed without falling. “
Merci
,
ma fille
. You take good care of me.”
Rachel felt a stab of guilt for deciding to spend the next six months in Sepharad with Eliezer. “
Bonne nuit
, Papa. Sleep well.” She leaned over to kiss his brow.
As she drew near, Salomon saw her visage separate into two. He blinked several times to dispel the double image, but there were still twin Rachels in front of him. He closed his eyes to escape the strange sight, and when he opened them again it was dark. Rachel had blown out the lamp.
She came downstairs to great commotion. People were talking loudly, with occasional cheers or shrill laughter. She followed the tumult to its source, where Guy de Dampierre was standing next to Judah, fielding questions from the crowd.
Whatever possessed Guy to attend our Hanukkah party?

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