Pope Joan_ A Novel - Donna Woolfolk Cross [179]
Remarkable as the wall was, this was only the beginning of Leo’s ambitious plans for the city. Dedicated to “restoring all the places of the saints,” Leo embarked upon a great plan of rebuilding. The ring of anvils sounded day and night throughout the city as work went on in one after another of the city’s churches. The burned basilica of the Saxons was restored, as well as the Frisian church of San Michele and the Church of the Sancti Quattro Coronati, of which Leo had once been cardinal.
Most important of all, Leo began the restoration of St. Peter’s. The burned and blackened portico was completely rebuilt; the doors, stripped of their precious metal by the Saracens, were covered with new, light-diffusing silver plates on which myriad sacred histories were carved with astonishing skill. The great treasure that had been carried off by the Saracens was replaced: the high altar was covered with new plates of silver and gold and decorated with a massive gold crucifix set with pearls, emeralds, and diamonds; above it a silver ciborium weighing over a thousand pounds was mounted upon four great pillars of purest travertine marble, ornamented with gilt lilies. The altar was lit by lamps hung on silver chains, garnished with golden balls, their flickering light illuminating a veritable treasure trove of jeweled chalices, wrought silver lecterns, rich tapestries, and silken hangings. The great basilica gleamed with a splendor that outshone even its former magnificence.
OBSERVING the vast amounts of money pouring forth from the pa pal treasury, Joan felt troubled. Undeniably Leo had created a shrine of awe-inspiring beauty. But the majority of those who lived within sight of this glittering magnificence spent their days in brutish, degrading poverty. A single one of St. Peter’s massive silver plates, melted into coin, would feed and clothe the population of the Campus Martius for a year. Did God’s worship really require such sacrifice?
There was only one person in the world with whom Joan dared raise such a question. When she put it to him, Gerold considered soberly before replying. “I have heard it argued,” he said finally, “that the beauty of a holy shrine provides the faithful with a different form of nourishment—food for the soul, not the body.”
“It’s difficult to hear the voice of God over the grumbling of an empty stomach.”
Gerold shook his head affectionately. “You haven’t changed. Remember the time you asked Odo how he could be certain the Resurrection had taken place, since there were no eyewitnesses?”
“I do.” Joan flexed her hand ruefully. “I also remember how he answered me.”
“When I saw the wound Odo gave you,” Gerold said, “I wanted to strike him—and would have, if I hadn’t known it would only make things more difficult for you.”
Joan smiled. “You always were my protector.”
“And you,” he bantered, “always had the soul of a heretic.”
They had always been able to talk like this, free from the world’s restraints. It was part of the special intimacy that had bound them from the very first.
He looked at her now with a familiar warmth. Joan was keenly aware of him; she felt his nearness like a touch on her naked skin. But by now she was skilled at disguising her feelings.
She pointed to the pile of petitions on the table between them. “I must go hear