Sarum - Edward Rutherfurd [194]
At last, mother and son retired to their rooms.
Alone in his room, Petrus prepared his bed carefully. He did so in a strange manner.
Instead of lying down on the couch beside the wall, he began to dismantle it, removing the slats of wood on which the mattress rested and placing them on the floor. The pillow cushion he discarded. Then he stripped. Under his clothes he was wearing not linen, but a hair shirt: a coarse garment which he had managed to acquire from Martinus, and the prickly discomfort of which had already brought his skin out in a rash. Dressed only in this, he lay down on the bare boards, his head on the stone floor. His feet were cold. He shivered slightly. But this, he knew, was how the great men of the Church, men like Germanus of Auxerre, mortified their flesh, and he was resolved to do likewise. And this was how Placidia found him, asleep, later that morning.
During the next day, he paid two more important visits. The first was to the dune.
He rode through the gate and walked his horse slowly past the camp of the Germans, who watched him curiously. He ignored them however, and headed for the little house at the far side of the place, that was occupied by Tarquinus. There he halted, and called to the cowherd to come out.
Tarquinus emerged suspiciously. After the incident of the day before, everyone at Sarum knew that strange changes had come over Petrus. No one could be sure what might come next.
Petrus came straight to the point.
“Bring the idol of Sulis out of the shrine,” he ordered, pointing to the little hut beside Tarquinus’s house.
Unwillingly Tarquinus went in and came back with the little stone figure.
“There will be no more pagan gods at Sarum,” Petrus announced. “The idol must be broken up. Give it to me.”
But Tarquinus clutched the little figure close to his chest.
“No.”
Petrus stared at him. Was the cowherd defying him?
“I can make you,” he threatened.
Tarquinus said nothing, but he did not loosen his hold. Petrus looked into his eyes and saw that they were full of hate. He had no doubt that Tarquinus was laying curses on him; but though such a thought a month ago would have terrified him, now he found that he did not even care.
“Very well,” he said coldly. “You are to leave Sarum. For ever. Collect your things and go.”
Without a word, Tarquinus turned and went back into his house. A few minutes later he reappeared with a few belongings. Not even looking at Petrus this time, the old man shuffled out of the dune; and once outside, he went down the path to the empty settlement of Sorviodunum and the river. Pulling a small boat from its mooring, he stepped into it and paddled down stream; only as the current caught him and swept him southwards did he turn and mutter:
“I’ll be back, young Porteus. And so will she.” He stroked the little stone figure. “But your Christian eyes will never see us.”
From the dune above, he saw a thin column of smoke rising. Petrus was burning down his house and the little shrine.
It was a few hours later that Petrus arrived at the house of Sulicena. The girl was standing in front of the door, her large eyes watching him approach. She was dressed only in a thin robe tied with a girdle round her waist, and as he saw her slim figure he felt his familiar lust rising again.
She stepped forward, obviously expecting him to dismount, but he did not. For a second he felt his hand tremble, but he controlled it. She looked curiously at his shaved head.
“I am leaving for Ireland,” he told her coldly. In a few words he explained his conversion and the vows he had taken. She stared at him in disbelief.
“You mean you’ll never lie with a woman again, as long as you live?”
He nodded.
She laughed aloud, and for some reason Petrus found himself blushing. But when she found that he was serious, he saw a hint of scorn appear in her face.
Finally she moved to stand beside his horse, stretched up her arm, and before he could stop her, ran her hand down his leg. She looked directly into his eyes.
“You feel nothing?