Bellarion the Fortunate (Historical Novel). Rafael Sabatini

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СКАЧАТЬ for they trudged a full mile before they came to a brook that flowed westward towards the river. It lay in a dell amid mossy boulders and spreading fronds of ferns all dappled now with the golden light that came splashing through the trees. They found a pool of moderate dimensions in a bowl of grey stone fashioned by the ceaseless sculpture of the water. It was too shallow to afford a bath. But the friar’s ablutionary dispositions scarce seemed to demand so much. He rinsed face and hands perfunctorily, whilst Bellarion stripped to the waist, and displaying a white torso of much beauty and more vigour, did what was possible in that cramped space.

      After that the friar produced from one of the sack-like pockets of his habit an enormous piece of sausage and a loaf of rye bread.

      To Bellarion who had gone supperless to bed this was as the sight of manna in the desert.

      ‘Little brother!’ he cooed in sheer delight. ‘Little brother!’

      ‘Aye, aye. We have our uses, we little brothers of Saint Francis.’ The minorite sliced the sausage in two equal halves. ‘We know how to provide ourselves upon a journey.’

      They fell to eating, and with the stilling of his hunger Bellarion experienced an increasing kindliness to this Good Samaritan. At the friar’s suggestion that they should be moving so as to cover the greater part of the road to Casale before the noontide heat, Bellarion stood up, brushing the crumbs from his lap. In doing so his hand came in contact with the scrip that dangled from his girdle.

      ‘Saints of God!’ he ejaculated, as he tightened his clutch upon that bag of green cloth.

      The beady eyes of the minorite were upon him, and there was blank inquiry in that ashen, corrugated face.

      ‘What is it, brother?’

      Bellarion’s fingers groped within the bag a moment, then turned it inside out, to reveal its utter emptiness. He showed his companion a face which blended suspicion with dismay.

      ‘I have been robbed!’ he said.

      ‘Robbed?’ the other echoed, then smiled a pitying concern. ‘My surprise is less than yours, my son. Did I not say these woods are infested by thieves and robbers? Had you slept less soundly you might have been robbed of life as well. Render thanks to God, Whose grace is discernible even in misfortune. For no evil befalls us that will not serve to show how much greater that evil might have been. Take that for comfort ever in adversity, my child.’

      ‘Aye, Aye!’ Bellarion displayed ill-humour, whilst his eyes abated nothing of their suspicious glance. ‘It is easy to make philosophy upon the woes of others.’

      ‘Child, child! What is your woe? What is the full sum of it? What have you lost, when all is said?’

      ‘Five ducats and a letter.’ Bellarion flung the answer fiercely.

      ‘Five ducats!’ The friar spread his hands in pious remonstrance. ‘And will you blaspheme God for five ducats?’

      ‘Blaspheme?’

      ‘Is not your furious frame of mind a blasphemy, your anger at your loss where there should be a devout thankfulness for all that you retain? And you should be thankful, too, for the Providence that guided my steps towards you in the hour of your need.’

      ‘I should be thankful for that?’ Bellarion stressed the question with mistrust.

      The friar’s countenance changed. A gentle melancholy invested it.

      ‘I read your thoughts, child, and they harbour suspicion of me. Of Me!’ he smiled. ‘Why, what a madness! Should I turn thief? Should I imperil my immortal soul for five paltry ducats? Do you not know that we little brothers of Saint Francis live as the birds of the air, without thought for material things, our trust entirely in God’s providence? What should I do with five ducats, or five hundred? Without a single minted coin, with no more than my gown and my staff I might journey from here to Jerusalem, living upon the alms that never fail us. But assurances are not enough for minds poisoned by suspicion.’ He flung wide his arms, and stood cruciform before the youth. ‘Come, child, make search upon me for your ducats, and so assure yourself. Come!’

      Bellarion flushed, and lowered his head in shame.

      ‘There . . . there is not the need,’ he answered lamely. ‘The gown you wear is a full assurance. You could not be what you are and yet the thing that for a moment I . . .’ He broke off. ‘I beg that you’ll forgive my unworthiness, my brother.’

      Slowly the friar lowered his arms. His eyes were smiling again.

      ‘I will be merciful by not insisting.’ He laid a hand, lean and long in the fingers as an eagle’s claw upon the young man’s shoulder. ‘Think no more of your loss. I am here to repair it. Together we will journey. The habit of Saint Francis is wide enough to cover both of us, and you shall not want for anything until you reach Pavia.’

      Bellarion looked at him in gratitude. ‘It was Providence, indeed, that sent you.’

      ‘Did I not say so? And now you see it for yourself. Benedicamus Domine.’

      To which Bellarion sincerely made the prescribed answer: ‘Deo gratias!’

      CHAPTER II

       THE GREY FRIAR

       Table of Contents

      They made their way towards the road, not directly, but by a course with which Fra Sulpizio—as the friar announced himself named—seemed singularly well acquainted. It led transversely across the forest. And as they went, Fra Sulpizio plied Bellarion with questions.

      ‘There was a letter, you said, that was stolen with your gold?’

      ‘Aye,’ Bellarion’s tone was bitter. ‘A letter worth many times five ducats.’

      ‘Worth many times . . . ? A letter?’ The incredulity on the friar’s face was ludicrous. ‘Why, what manner of letter was that?’

      Bellarion, who knew the contents by heart, recited them word for word.

      Fra Sulpizio scratched his head in perplexity. ‘I have Latin enough for my office; but not for this,’ he confessed, and finding Bellarion’s searching glance upon him, he softened his voice to add, truly enough: ‘We little brothers of Saint Francis are not famed for learning. Learning disturbs humility.’

      Bellarion sighed. ‘So I know to my cost,’ said he, and thereafter translated the lost letter: ‘This is our dearly beloved son Bellarion, a nutritus of this house, who goes hence to Pavia to increase his knowledge of the humanities. We commend him first to God and then to the houses of our own and other brethren orders for shelter and assistance on his journey, involving upon all who may befriend him the blessing of Our Lord.’

      The friar nodded his understanding. ‘It might have been a grievous loss, indeed. But as it is, I will do the office of your letter whilst I am with you, and when we part I will see you armed with the like from the Prior of the Augustinians on the Sesia. He will do this at my word.’

      The young man thanked him with a fervour dictated by shame of certain unworthy suspicions СКАЧАТЬ