The Road To Jerusalem (26 page)

Inside at the wedding ale it took a while before the drunken men realized what had happened; for various reasons most of them had not seen the bride run out. But then they collected themselves and on unsteady legs they initiated the chase for the runaway bride while someone—no one ever found out who it was—yelled, “Bride-robber, bride-robber, bride-robber!”

The drunken men then staggered back to grab their swords and spears. They saddled their horses with fumbling fingers, while worried women peered after the fleeing bride, who was still in sight, running toward the road to Skara.

Arn came riding up in at a leisurely pace, his stomach churning. He was in no hurry because he knew that the night would be dark without stars or moon, and so he would have to seek a place to camp. He had no hope of reaching Arnas before noon the next day.

Suddenly a young woman came rushing toward him with her clothes in disarray, a wild look on her face, and her arms flailing about. He stopped his horse, dumbfounded, and stared at her, incapable of either understanding what she was saying or uttering a friendly greeting.

“Save me, save me from the demons!” the woman cried, and abruptly fell exhausted to the ground before the hooves of his horse.

Arn got down from his horse, puzzled and frightened. He could clearly see that his neighbor was in trouble, but how was he to go about helping her?

He squatted down next to the small, gasping female body and cautiously reached out his hand to stroke her lovely brown hair, but he didn’t dare. When she looked up at him, her face filled with happiness and she started talking in confusion about his kind eyes, about Our Lady who had sent an angel to save her, and other things that made him suspect she had lost her wits.

This was how the drunken, raging wedding guests found the runaway bride and her abductor. The first men to dismount instantly grabbed hold of the bride, who began screaming in such a heartrending fashion that they tied her hands and feet and put a gag in her mouth. Two men seized hold of Arn by grabbing both his hands behind his back and forcing his head forward. He offered no resistance.

At once the bridegroom himself, Gunnar of Redeberga, came riding up, and someone handed him a sword. According to the law he had the right to slay the bride-robber caught in the act. When Arn saw the sword being raised, he asked calmly to be allowed to say his prayers first, and the breathless mob considered this to be a Christian request that they could not honorably refuse.

Arn felt no fear when he fell to his knees, only astonishment. Was it only for this that God had spared his life? To be beheaded by a drunken mob who clearly believed that he had intended to do the woman harm? It was too ridiculous to be true, so he prayed not for his own life but for reason to return to these unfortunate people who were about to commit a mortal sin out of sheer confusion.

He must have looked pitiful as he knelt there praying. He was only half a man, with downy cheeks, dressed in a worn monk’s cloak with obvious traces on his scalp of the monks’ manner of shaving their tonsures. And then someone began to pray for Arn in the belief that he was helping the unfortunate in his prayers. Another said that it wasn’t much of a manly deed to slay a defenseless young monk; at least they ought to give him a sword so he could defend himself and die like a man. Murmurs of agreement were heard, and suddenly Arn saw a short, ungainly Nordic sword drop down in front of him onto the grass.

Then he thanked God at great length before he took up the sword; it was clear that he would be allowed to live.

The cathedral dean, Torkel of Skara, had now come so close that he could see everything that was happening clearly, and what he saw, or thought he saw, would be very important.

Because when Gunnar of Redeberga attacked with his sword held high to put a quick end to the wretch who had ruined his wedding feast, he found himself striking at thin air. He had no idea what had happened, even though he didn’t consider himself especially drunk.

He swung again without hitting Arn, and again and again.

Arn saw that the man facing him was defenseless, and he guessed that it might have something to do with liquor. All the better, he thought, since then he wouldn’t risk doing harm to his neighbor.

But for Gunnar of Redeberga what happened was like a bad dream. His friends started laughing at him, and no matter how he swung the sword at that cursed demon, because a demon he must be, the wretch was somewhere else. He did not flee, yet he was always somewhere else.

Arn was circling calmly in the opposite direction with the sword in his left hand, since Brother Guilbert had always stressed that this would be the hardest for his opponent to defend against. He didn’t need to parry much with his own sword; it was enough just to keep moving. He reckoned that the old man would soon tire and give up, and that no one would be hurt, since God had interceded to save them all.

But humiliated and somewhat scared, Gunnar of Redeberga now asked the old warrior Joar to assist him in his lawful task. Joar was an experienced swordsman who had seen how the groom was fooled by simple tricks. So Joar now threw himself into the fight to make short work of the matter. The dean’s desperate protests were of little avail.

Arn, who suddenly found himself in danger, grew frightened and tossed the sword to his right hand, spinning around to defend himself with two quick moves, for the first time fighting in earnest.

Gunnar of Redeberga at once fell to the ground with his throat slashed, and Joar sank down moaning after a lunge struck him in the middle of his soft belly.

The men stood as if turned to stone. The wedding guests had all seen with their own eyes something that could not possibly have occurred, something that had to be a miracle.

But Arn stood still in fright, because he realized full well, after taking part in so much fighting, that the man who first attacked him lay kicking out the last of his life’s blood on the ground. And the other man, who knew how to wield a sword, was mortally wounded. Crushed by his evil deeds, Arn let his sword fall to the ground and bowed his head in prayer, ready in the next moment to suffer the beheading rightfully administered by any of the men present.

But the dean reached his arms in the air toward the sky and began singing a hymn, which at least for the moment made any renewed attacks on Arn unsuitable. And then the dean, filled with the spirit, spoke sternly about the miracle they had just witnessed, how an obviously innocent person had, because of his innocence, received the highest protection. The dean himself had clearly seen the archangel Gabriel standing behind the small unprotected boy, guiding his arms in defense. Soon several of the men declared that they too had witnessed the same thing, in truth a miracle from God, how a defenseless young monk had been able to vanquish two grown warriors.

Now they freed the bride from her bonds, and she too fell into prayer, thanking God for sending someone to rescue her at the last moment. They sang more hymns, but Arn was unable to take part in the singing.

The cathedral dean then questioned Arn about where he came from and decided to escort the poor monk personally back to Varnhem. Gunnar of Redeberga would be carried home to be buried and the gravely wounded Joar would be carried on a litter to his home.

It was a very oddly matched pair that came riding up to Varnhem on that mild autumn morning when the rowan trees and oaks and beeches around the monastery had begun to turn yellow and red.

Cathedral Dean Torkel was in a radiant mood, for God had granted him the opportunity to witness one of His miracles on earth. It was a signal honor.

Arn, who had been fasting since his misdeed and refused to spend the night anywhere but in the cathedral in prayer, was ashen-gray in the face and weighted down by his grievous sin. He was well aware that the dean’s confused talk of a miracle was untrue. God had shown him grace by giving him a sword, with which he could have defended himself without injuring anyone. But he had misused that grace and instead committed the worst of sins. He knew that now he was lost, and it amazed him that God had not smote him to the ground at once when he committed such an unforgivable deed.

When they were let in the cloister gate beneath the two tall ash trees that were the only visible remains of what Arn’s mother had once donated, Arn began praying at once for forgiveness. He slunk into the cloister church to pray for the strength to be able to do honest penance soon.

Dean Torkel proudly asked for an audience with Father Henri, because he had such magnificent news to report.

The conversation between the two men was very strange, and not only because they had a hard time understanding each other. Dean Torkel spoke Latin as poorly as Father Henri spoke Norse, and besides, Dean Torkel was so excited that he couldn’t tell the story sensibly. Father Henri had to ask him to calm down, drink a glass of wine, and then begin at the beginning.

And when it gradually dawned on Father Henri what a catastrophe had occurred, he was at a loss to understand the dean’s giddy enthusiasm.

It was obvious that Arn was no bride-robber. How he could even be accused of something like that was at first very difficult for his uneducated Nordic colleague to explain.

When someone foolishly took it into his head to toss a sword to Arn, it was equally obvious that the result would be one dead and one dying man. But it was (blasphemous thought) as if God the Father were cruelly joking with the wedding guests in that case. Or, perhaps rather, He was punishing them for their ruthless thoughtlessness when a frightened woman ran off and they took the first man on the road to be a bride-robber. The latter displayed despicably barbaric behavior, especially as they then supposed they had the right to slay on the spot the man they had encountered. On the other hand, the laws were such in this part of the world that the poor misguided souls had to some measure acted in good faith.

But the hardest thing to swallow was the dean’s self-righteous notions that he had been granted the opportunity to witness a miracle with the archangel Gabriel standing behind Arn, helping him to wield each stroke of the sword.

Father Henri muttered to himself that if the archangel Gabriel had really seen what was going on, he wouldn’t have rushed to help Arn but instead come to the aid of the foolish drunkards. But he said none of this aloud.

The imagined miracle became a more delicate matter in that Dean Torkel was now asking the cloister’s help to have his account written down properly, while he still had the images clear in his mind and also remembered the names of all the witnesses.

At first Father Henri gave an evasive reply to the request and asked instead to be informed of what the laws outside the walls said about lay brother Arn’s behavior. For a long while Dean Torkel was distracted from his request for written assistance.

The laws said that bride-robbers could be struck down if caught in the act. But not an innocent person, because that would be concomitant to murder.

On the one hand, the law was such that if twelve men swore that Arn was innocent and that a miracle had occurred, then Arn would be acquitted at the
ting
, if the matter went that far. On the other hand, if the families of the dead man, or in the worst case the two dead men, wanted to bring a suit at the
ting
, then the question would arise as to whether Arn, as he clearly was named, had anyone who could serve as his oath-swearers and who were not foreigners. Did Arn have anyone who could be his oath-swearers, and did he possibly belong to any clan?

“Yes,” sighed Father Henri in relief. “The young man does belong to a clan. His name is Arn Magnusson of Arnas, his father is Magnus Folkesson, and his uncle is Birger Brosa of Bjalbo. Eskil the judge is his kinsman, et cetera, et cetera. The boy thus belongs to the Folkung clan, although I am unsure whether he entirely understands what that means. Of course there would be no problem getting oath-swearers.”

“Well, is that so! Praise be to God!” exclaimed Dean Torkel. “I shall hurry to inform the kinsmen that they should not expect success at any
ting
. This is even better, now they won’t have anything against testifying that the account of the miracle is true!”

Despite the fact that the two men of God now seemed to have found a simple solution to a legal problem, they were of much different minds. The dean was so happy he seemed to be hovering a bit above the ground, for his account of the miracle, which he would speak of at great length in the cathedral, had now been saved and would also be recorded in calligraphy on parchment by those who did such things best.

Father Henri, who knew that no miracle had taken place, was relieved that Arn would not be subjected to the harsh and blind justice of Western Gotaland. But he grieved for Arn’s sake, and he grieved for his own sin, for he now realized that he and Brother Guilbert must share the blame for what had happened.

“Could I receive at once the writing help that this great and important matter deserves?” asked the dean, full of bright enthusiasm.

“Yes, of course, brother,” replied Father Henri in a surprisingly deliberate tone. “We shall see to it at once.”

Father Henri summoned one of the scribes and explained in French, which he was sure that the uneducated dean did not speak, that he should keep a straight face and keep writing and make no objections, no matter how demented the whole thing might sound.

When the dean, with a youthful bounce to his step and praising the Lord vociferously, was led toward the scriptorium, Father Henri got up with a heavy heart to seek out the unhappy Arn. He knew quite well where he would find him.

Dean Torkel was a practical man and scrupulous with money, especially his own. His tenant farmer Gunnar of Redeberga had now departed this life most inopportunely in the prime of his life, and without bringing any future farmers into the world. His wedding had also been interrupted in the most distressful way.

After Dean Torkel had recovered from the wondrous aspect of this event—the fact that he had been granted the opportunity to witness a miracle of the Lord with his own eyes—he soon began to ponder the more earthly results of what had happened. He needed a new, industrious tenant farmer for Redeberga; that was the most pressing problem.