But I didn't care about myself or how I was clothed. I was too entranced by the sight below.
I thought I saw a river moving through the houses, a ribbon of silver in the darkness, and the vague shape of what must have been a very large cathedral with its inevitable cruciform shape. On a great rise, there stood what had to be a castle. And all the rest was the rooftops crowded together, some utterly blanketed in white and others so steep that the snow had somewhat fallen away.
Indeed the snow was falling with a delicious softness that I could hear.
Louder and louder came the great chorus of overlapping whispers. "They're praying, and they're frightened," I said aloud, and heard my voice very immediate and close to myself, as though I weren't in this vast expanse of sky. A chill came over me. The air enveloped me. I felt the snow on my face and hands. I wanted desperately to hear the lost music one last time, and to my astonishment I did hear it in a great swelling echo, and then it was gone.
I wanted to weep in gratitude just for that, but I had to find out what I was meant to do. I didn't deserve to hear the music. And the idea that I could do something good in this world gripped me as I fought back tears.
"They're praying for Meir and for Fluria," said Malchiah. "They are praying for all the Jewry of the town. You must be the answer to their prayers."
"But how, what will I do?" I struggled to form the words, but we were very close to the rooftops now, and I could make out the lanes and streets of the place, and the snow covered the towers of the castle, and the roof of the cathedral that gleamed as if the starlight could shine through the drifting downfall, making all of the little town very plain.
"It's early evening in the town of Norwich," said Malchiah, his voice intimate and perfect, and undisturbed by our descent or the prayers rising in my ears. "The Christmas pageants have only just ended and a time of troubles for the Jewry has begun."
I didn't have to ask him to go on. I knew the word, "Jewry," referred to the Jewish population in Norwich and to the small area where most of them lived.
Our descent had become more rapid. Indeed I did see a river, and for a moment, I felt I saw the prayers themselves rising, but the sky was thickening, the roofs were like ghosts beneath me, and I felt again the wet brush of falling snow.
We found ourselves now passing into the town itself, and slowly I found myself standing firmly on the ground. We were surrounded by close half-timbered houses that seemed to slant inward dangerously, as if they'd tumble down on us in an instant. There were dim lights in tiny thick windows.
Only small snowflakes were swirling in the cold air.
I looked down in the dim light and saw that I was dressed as a monk, and I recognized the habit immediately. I wore the white tunic and long white scapular, and the black hooded mantle, of a Dominican. There was the familiar knotted cord of a girdle around my waist but the long scapular covered it. Over my left shoulder was a leather book bag. I was stunned.
I put up my hands anxiously and discovered that I'd been tonsured, and that I had the simple bald pate and ring of trimmed hair that monks of those times wore.
"You've made me what I always wanted to be," I said. "A Dominican friar." I felt such excitement that I couldn't contain it. I wanted to know what I carried in the leather book bag. "Now listen," he said, and though I couldn't see him, his voice echoed off the walls. We seemed lost in the shadows. In fact, he was not visible at all. I was alone here.
I could hear angry voices in the night, not very far away. And the chorus of prayers had died away.
"I'm right beside you," he said.
For a minute I felt panic, but then I felt the press of his hand on mine.
"Listen to me," he said. "It's a mob you hear in the next street, and time is short. King Henry of Winchester sits on the English throne," he explained. "And you may reckon this to be the year1257 , but neither of these bits of information will be of interest to you here. You know the time as well perhaps as any human of your own century, and you know it as it cannot know itself. Meir and Fluria are your charges, and all the Jewry are praying because Meir and Fluria are in danger, and as you well understand, that danger may extend to the entire little Jewish population of this town. That danger could reach as far as London."
I was utterly fascinated, and wildly excited, more so than I'd ever been in my natural life. And I did know these times and the peril that had surrounded the Jews of England everywhere.
I was also getting very cold.
I looked down and saw that I wore buckled shoes. I felt woolen stockings on my legs. Thank Heaven, I wasn't a Franciscan and consigned to sandals or bare feet, I thought, and then a giddy sensation gripped me. I had to stop this nonsense and think of what I was meant to do.
"Precisely," came Malchiah's intimate voice. "But will you take pleasure in what you mean to do here? Yes, you will. There is no angel of God who does not take joy in helping humans. And you are working with us now. You are our child."
"Can these people see me?"
"Most definitely. They'll see and hear you, and you will understand them and they will understand you. You will know when you are speaking French or English or Hebrew, and when they are speaking those tongues. Such things are easy enough for us to do."
"But what about you?"
"I'll be with you always, as I told you," he said. "But only you will see and hear me. Don't try to speak to me with your lips. And don't call for me unless you have to do it.
"Now go to the mob and get into the very thick of it, because it's turning in a way that it should not. You are a traveling scholar, you've come from Italy, through France, to England, and your name is Br. Toby, which is simple enough."
I was more eager to do this than I could express. "But what more do I need to know?"
"Trust your gifts," he said. "The gifts for which I chose you. You're well-spoken, even eloquent, and you have great confidence in playing a role for a certain purpose. Trust in The Maker and trust in me."
I could hear the voices in the nearby street growing louder. A bell was tolling.
"That must be the curfew," I said quickly. My mind was racing. What I knew of this century seemed scant suddenly and again I felt apprehension, almost fear.
"It is the curfew," said Malchiah. "And it will inflame those who are making the trouble, because they're eager for a resolution. Now go."
Chapter Six - The Mystery of Lea
IT WAS AN ANGRY MOB, AND FRIGHTENING IN APPEARANCEbecause it was not all rabble by any means. Many carried lanterns and some had torches, and a few even carried tapers, and many were richly dressed in velvet and fur.