The Canterbury Tales: A Retelling by Peter Ackroyd (33 page)

This merchant was as careful as he was astute. He raised the money and handed the two thousand sovereigns to some Lombard bankers, who gave him a bond in recognition of full payment. Then he rode back as cheerful as a chaffinch. He knew that he had made a profit of a thousand francs on the deal. No wonder he sang and whistled as he returned home.

His wife met him at the gate, as was her custom, and all that night they celebrated their good fortune with some amorous turns in bed. The merchant was out of debt. The merchant was rich. At break of day he embraced her, and began kissing her again. At the same time he fucked her hard.

‘No more,’ she pleaded with him. ‘Haven’t you had enough?’ Still she played with him for a little longer.

The merchant turned on his side after she had pleased him, and whispered to her. ‘Well, wife,’ he said, ‘I am a bit annoyed with you. I don’t want to be, but I am. Do you know why? You have come between myself and my dear cousin. You have sown a little seed of division between me and John.’

‘How? Tell me.’

‘You never mentioned to me that he had paid back the money I lent to him. He gave you cash in hand, I believe. But he feels aggrieved that I did not know about it. As soon as I started talking about loans and repayments, I realized that there was something wrong. Yet I swear to God that I wasn’t referring to him. Do me a favour, dear wife. Always tell me, in future, if I have been repaid in my absence. Otherwise I might start asking debtors for money that they have already given me. Do not be remiss in this.’

The wife was not at all put out by his rebuke, but answered him boldly enough. ‘By the holy Mother of God I defy that false monk, that so-called cousin John! I didn’t pay any attention to this bond, or repayment, or whatever you call it. I know that he brought some cash to me, but I assumed that he was giving it to me for your sake. I thought that he wanted me to dress up, to entertain and be entertained in your honour. He has been given hospitality here often enough. I thought he wanted to repay me in kind. May God’s curse fall upon our dear cousin. But since I see you are displeased with me, I will come to the point. You know well enough that I always pay my debts on time. I pay you your just tribute night after night. I am running out of double entries. Should I ever fall behind in payment, you may chalk it up. I will soon honour the debt. I swear to you that I have spent everything on fine clothes and on hospitality. Not a penny has been wasted. Don’t I look a credit to you? So don’t be angry. Let us laugh and play. You can play on my body, if you wish. Bed is the best payment of all. Forgive me, my dear husband, and come beneath the sheets. You will not regret it.’

The merchant realized that there was no alternative. It would have been madness to criticize her any further. What was done was done. ‘I forgive you, dear wife,’ he said. ‘But, in future, try not to overspend. Keep your money in your purse, I beg of you.’

So ends my story. God be with you. And may you always be worthy of credit!

Heere endeth the Shipmannes Tale

‘Well spoken, Shipman,’ Harry Bailey said. ‘By the body of Christ, I enjoyed that tale. May you sail around the coasts for ever and a day, master mariner! But may that false monk, cousin John, have nothing but bad luck for the rest of his life! Let this story be a lesson to all of us. A monk is nothing but an ape in a man’s hood. The monk made a monkey of the merchant, and of the merchant’s wife. Never let one of those rogues enter your house.

‘Now let us go on. Who is it to be? Who is going to tell the next story?’ He rode up to the Prioress and, with as much modesty as a young maid, addressed her. ‘My lady Prioress, by your leave – if it doesn’t offend you – I wonder if you would be so good as to entertain us all with another tale? Only if you wish to, naturally.’

‘Gladly, sir,’ she replied.

The Prologe of the Prioresses Tale

Domine dominus noster

Oh Lord, oh Lord, how great is thy name! How thy marvels are spread over the world! The wise men of the earth praise you. The little children pray to you. The suckling infants proclaim you and your glory. I will praise you, too, out of my own poor mouth. I am a feeble woman, but I hope to find you in my heart.

I hope to find words in honour of you, Lord, and of the purely white lily, blessed Virgin, who bore you. I will tell my story for her sweet sake. I cannot increase her honour, of course, since she is the root and source of all virtue. She and her blessed Son are the salvation of the world.

Oh Mary, full of grace, the unburned bush burning in the sight of Moses, you who did receive the Holy Ghost descending from the seat of the Lord God. In humility of spirit you found the wisdom of God within you. Your heart was lightened by the weight of the Lord. Oh holy Virgin, help me to tell my story!

Hail holy Mother, no one can express your magnificence or your modesty. Who can number your virtues? Who can measure your bounty? You guide men into the light of the Lord. You anticipate their prayers and plead for them before the throne of the Almighty.

My learning and knowledge are so weak, holy Virgin, that I cannot express your mercy or your love. Your light is too bright for me to bear. I come to you as an infant, scarcely able to speak. Form my broken words uttered in praise of you. Guide my song.

Heere bigynneth the Prioresses Tale

In a great Asian and Christian city there once stood a Jewish ghetto. It was financed and supervised by a lord of that place, intent upon making as much profit as he could from the vile practice of usury. It is evil money, accursed by Christ and His saints. Yet the ghetto was open. There were no gates, and all the citizens could walk or ride through its main street.

There was a little Christian school at the end of this street, where its young pupils learned the rudiments of their faith. Year after year the children were taught how to read and how to sing, in the way of all small boys and girls. Among these children was a widow’s son, some seven years old. He attended school every day.

His mother had taught him to kneel down and say a Hail Mary whenever he came across an image of the Virgin. His mother had told him that he must always pray to the blessed Lady, even in a crowded street. And of course he obeyed her. An innocent child learns quickly. When I think of him I cannot help but recall the image of Saint Nicholas, who, at the same young age, did reverence to Christ.

This little boy was seated on his bench one day, studying his primer, when he heard some other children in the class singing out ‘Alma Redemptoris’ in praise of the Mother of our Saviour. He drew closer to them, listening very carefully, and after a while he had by heart the words and the notes of the hymn. He could sing the first verse by rote.

He was too young to know what the Latin words meant. But then he asked a schoolfellow to explain it to him, and to interpret it in simple language. He went down on his knees and begged him so many times that his young friend eventually agreed to translate it for him.

Then this fellow explained the hymn. ‘I have heard that this song,’ he said, ‘was composed in honour of the blessed Virgin. It is meant to praise her, and to beseech her to come to our aid when we are about to die. That is all I know about it. I am a chorister, not a student of grammar.’

‘So this hymn was written in honour of the Mother of God?’ the innocent boy asked him. ‘I am going to make sure that I have learned it by heart before the Christmas season. I don’t care if I am scolded for not attending to my lessons. I don’t care if I am beaten three times a day. I am going to learn this song in honour of Our Lady.’

So his comrade taught him the words, syllable by syllable, until he could repeat them without any mistakes. He began with the first verse:

As I lay upon a night,

My thought was on a maid so bright

That men call Mary, full of might,

Redemptoris mater.

He mastered the notes, and sang out the hymn boldly wherever he went. He sang it when he walked to school in the morning, and when he came home again in the afternoon. He was devoted to the praise of the Virgin.

As I have said before, this little boy always made his way through the ghetto on his way to school. So he sang out ‘Alma Redemptoris’ earnestly and brightly as he passed through the Jewish quarter. He was blissfully unaware of his surroundings. He simply wanted to honour Our Lady.

But then the enemy of mankind, Satan himself, rose up among the Jews. He was full of bitter poison. ‘Oh people of the Old Testament!’ he called out. ‘Is this right? Is this fitting? Can you allow this child to walk among you uttering blasphemy? It is against your reverence. It is against your Law.’

So, from that time forward, the Jews of the neighbourhood conspired against the little boy’s life. They hired a murderer, and told him to wait in a dark alley close to the route of the child on his way to school. This cursed man seized the boy and cut his throat; then he buried him in a pit.

It was a cesspit where the Jews were accustomed to squat and shit. Oh cursed people, children of Herod, what will be the consequence of your evil deeds? Murder will out. That is certain enough. The blood of the murdered boy will cry out. The children of God will hear the voice!

Oh holy Christian martyr, pure virgin child, you will now sing for ever in the halls of eternity. You will be the companion of the white celestial Lamb. You will be one of those seen in visions by the great evangelist Saint John of Patmos. You are one with the virgin martyrs who sing perpetually.

The poor widow, the mother of the young boy, watched and waited all that night. But he did not return home. At first light she left the house and, with pale and careworn face, she searched the streets for any sign of him. She enquired after him at the school, and there she learned that he had last been seen singing in the ghetto.

So the poor woman followed the footsteps of her child and, half out of her mind with grief, she visited all those places where she hoped that he might still be found. She called out to the blessed Virgin and begged her for help. Then she began to walk among the Jews themselves, asking whether any of them had seen her small son. Of course they all denied even so much as glimpsing him.

But the grace of Jesus entered her heart and guided her to the place where her son had died. She came into the alley where the cesspit had been dug, in which his little body was buried.

Oh great God, whose praises are sung in the mouths of the innocent, how great is Thy power! This is what happened. This jewel of chastity, this emerald of innocence, this ruby of martyrdom, sat up in his filthy grave and, with his throat cut from ear to ear, began to sing. He sang ‘Alma Redemptoris’ in a clear strong voice that could be heard throughout the ghetto.

All the Christian people in the neighbourhood gathered together to watch this miracle. They called for the magistrate at once, and he arrived very quickly. He heard the boy singing. He gave thanks to Christ, and to our Saviour’s heavenly Mother, before ordering that all the Jews of the quarter should be arrested.

The child was borne on the shoulders of the crowd and carried in procession to the abbey; he sang all the way. His mother was carried, fainting, beside him. No one could persuade her to leave the side of her small son. She was another Rachel, inconsolable for loss of her child.

The magistrate ordained that the Jews with knowledge of the murder should be put to death immediately in the most shameful and terrible way. He could not countenance their unholy crime. Some of them were torn apart by horses. Some were hanged, drawn and quartered. ‘Evil shall they have,’ he said, ‘that evil deserve.’

The little child lay upon a bier before the high altar, where a mass was said for the sake of his soul. After the service was over the abbot and the monks made haste to bury the child in consecrated ground. And, as they sprinkled holy water over the bier, the child once more rose up and sang ‘Alma Redemptoris’.

The abbot was a saintly man. The monks were holy, too, or ought to have been. So the reverend father began to question the boy. ‘Dear child,’ he said to him, ‘I beseech you. I call upon you in the name of the blessed Trinity. Why are you singing?
How
can you sing, when your throat is cut from side to side?’

‘My throat is cut as deep as my neck bone,’ the child replied. ‘In the course of nature, I would be long dead. But Jesus Christ has deemed it fit that His power should be known to the world. He has performed this deed in honour of His sacred Mother, the blessed Virgin. That is why I am able to sing “Alma Redemptoris”.

‘I have always loved the Virgin above all others. She is, in the light of my faulty understanding, the source of grace and mercy. She appeared before me at the moment of my death, and asked me to sing this hymn in her honour. You heard it. When I had finished singing, it seemed that she placed a small grain of seed upon my tongue.

‘Wherefore I sing again, more clearly than before, in praise of Mary. Until this seed is taken from my tongue, I will sing ceaselessly. She has told me everything. “My little child,” she said, “I will come for you. When the seed is taken from your tongue, do not be alarmed. I will not forsake you.”’

The holy abbot then reached over to the boy, and took the seed from his tongue. Whereupon the child died peacefully. The abbot was so moved by this miracle that the salt tears ran down his cheek. He fell to the ground, upon his face, and did not stir. All of the monks then went down upon their knees, weeping and calling upon the blessed Virgin. Then they rose and with reverent hands took the child from his bier; they placed him in a tomb of marble, in the chapel of Our Lady. He lies there still, thanks be to God.

Oh little Saint Hugh of Lincoln, you were also slain by the Jews. Your death, so short a time ago, is still fresh in our memory. Pray for us sinners now, and at the time of our death. May God have mercy on our souls. Pray for us, Mother of God, so that your grace may descend upon us. Amen.

Heere is ended the Prioresses Tale