A Rich Young Man

A Novel Based on the Life of Saint Anthony of Padua

John Edward Beahn

• Publisher: TAN Books
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781618902030
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Denominations

St. Anthony of Padua has been a friend to millions of Catholics asking his help to recover lost objects. But few seem to know much about his remarkable life. The son of a knight in the court of Portugal's king, he renounced his heritage of wealth and power to become a Franciscan priest. In the years to come, he earned international fame as a preacher, reformer, miracle worker, champion of the poor, and Doctor of the Church. A generation ago, the American Catholic novelist John Edward Beahn presented Anthony's life and legends in a biographical novel, A Rich Young Man: A Novel Based on the Life of St. Anthony of Padua, published in 1953. This imaginative re-telling of the saint s story, based on historical records and traditions, now comes to life again in the TAN Legend series of biographical fiction. The tale unfolds in the epic setting of medieval Europe of the thirteenth century. Monarchs, courtiers, churchmen, knights, nobles and serfs maneuver like chess pieces in an elaborate game of alliances and conflicts between Church and state, Christian and Muslim, Catholic and heretic. Anthony's story takes us from North Africa where divine providence saved the young friar from his mistaken zeal for martyrdom to Italy and France, where his extraordinary gifts and heroic passion for God blazed a path to the rescue and conversion of countless souls. This TAN Legend edition of A Rich Young Man: A Novel Based on the Life of St. Anthony of Padua paints a rich, fascinating portrait of an astonishing saint who turned the medieval Christian world upside down.

PART I

1

LISBON knew nothing of the family De Bulhom before 1147. In that year, Don Raoul de Bulhom came from the north with the armies of Afonso Henriques to reclaim the city from the Saracens and to remain there with his wife and son. Lisbon speculated, but none could learn De Bulhom’s origin, either as to family or country. Similarity of the name De Bulhom to De Bouillon inspired a conjecture that Don Raoul bore in his veins the blood of the great Duke Godfrey; but Don Raoul neither affirmed nor denied the speculation, and thus confirmed it by default.

Don Raoul’s son, Roberto, almost permitted the De Bulhom line to expire. He had a knight’s powerful body, but his placid, cheerful disposition turned him toward a peaceful life. When he was twenty, he began construction of Castle de Bulhom and became so engrossed in that activity that he did not marry until he was thirty.

Don Roberto built the great castle on a shelf, a little above the level of the city on the slope of St. George’s Hill. Above it was the Cathedral, and on the summit above both was the Fortress of St. George. His project drew townsmen and innkeepers to build along the road from the city to the castle, and they built, one next to the other, to the very edge of the slope.

The outer walls of the castle displayed neither the cheerfulness nor peaceful intent of their builder. The building dominated Lisbon as a gloomy mass of stone without windows. Narrow slots, from which bowmen could drive off attackers, pierced the walls at regular intervals. The one entrance was the sally port, an arched tunnel cut through the west wing to connect the road from the city with the interior courtyard.

The sally port tunnel was sufficiently wide to accommodate a team of oxen drawing a cart and sufficiently high that a tall man on horse could ride through it upright in his saddle. Entrance through this could be blocked by closing the heavy wood and iron gates at the outer end or by closing the grilled iron gates at the inner end. The sally port was so designed that a small group of raiders could be trapped between the outer and inner gates, then slaughtered by bowmen from slots in the side walls or by fire and hot oil poured down from openings in the ceiling.

The tunnel opened into a courtyard, a large rectangle formed by the four wings of the castle. It was open to the sky and paved with cobblestones. The four walls around it, unlike the grim outer walls, were cheerful with doorways and three levels of windows.

In the east wing, directly across the courtyard from the inner opening of the sally port, was the principal entrance—twin doors of oak that opened into the Great Hall, with its dozen windows. The first doorway beyond the two windows on the right was the entrance to the living quarters of the family, which occupied the remainder of the wing.

Through the hours of light, except at midday, carts rumbled heavily on the cobblestones of the courtyard, anvils in the forge and armory rang almost continually, grooms and horses fought loudly but without rancor. The lighter chorus of human voices swelled and diminished with the labor of the day. In the first hours of the morning, knights and squires grouped noisily before the stables while they waited for grooms to bring the horses. Only at midday and at night did the clamor cease.

Don Roberto had completed the castle two years after his marriage but his wife lived only three years to enjoy it. When she died, after the birth of their son, Martinho, Lisbon knew that a man who had married for the first time so late in life would not enter readily into a second marriage, and the De Bulhom line again depended on the one son.

Young Martinho went far to the north country as squire in the service of the King’s brother. Lisbon did not see him from his thirteenth year until he returned in 1194 with his sword of knighthood and his royal bride from the Taveiras of Asturias. They saw then a broad-faced, heavy-jawed youth, confident in the strength of his powerful body and proud in his heritage. They saw, too, a young and pretty Dona Tereza, whose low, happy laugh contrasted with the intensity of her husband.

Soon after, Lisbon’s sharp tongues wagged the news of Dona Tereza’s dowry—the whole rather than a part of her family’s lands along the River Tagus. Her dowry, joined to Don Martinho’s lands in the valley north of the city, made the family De Bulhom the wealthiest of Lisbon.

Lisbon’s tongues wagged again in 1195 when Don Martinho’s son, Fernando, was born. Dona Tereza had not recovered as she should and remained some months in bed. When she did arise, she was delicate and could walk no farther from the castle than to the Cathedral or ride, in the chaise, no farther than the city walls. Fate again held continuation of the De Bulhom name to one son.

Thereafter, Lisbon’s interest in the family De Bulhom changed steadily and imperceptibly. The city became accustomed to Don Martinho, with a group of his knights or with only his knight commander, riding slowly through the narrow, crowded streets; accustomed to the food and fuel and clothing that flowed from the castle above to the needy below; accustomed to Master Fernando serving Mass each morning in the Cathedral and to the parents who waited afterward in the emptied church until he joined them.

2

FERNANDO walked calmly and quietly at his mother’s left in small imitation of his father at her right. He could maintain his calmness and gravity until they descended the steps of the Cathedral and had taken a step forward on the road to the castle. There, where his father’s requirement of silence and gravity ended, Fernando’s tongue and body reclaimed their freedom. With gay abandonment he related the events of the night, of the morning, and of the sacristy; then ran before his parents to explore anew the familiar road, to shout each new discovery, to point each new interest. August heat held no greater power than January cold to suppress him.

“Fernando!”

He dropped the stone he had lifted in his search for lizards and looked back at his parents. His father’s expression was ominous; he looked quickly to his mother. For the moment, he felt misgivings as her black eyes looked at him steadily and seriously; then his heart lifted again as she smiled and her white teeth gleamed from the surrounding darkness of her face. He smiled quickly in return and ran toward them.

“Can we not train the boy to hold his tongue, Trese?” Safely at his mother’s side Fernando carefully avoided looking at her even when he knew she had turned to glance at him. If he turned his head his eyes might meet his father’s.

“Fernando is noisy, Martinho,” she scolded with soft indirectness.

“He talks without end, Trese,” his father persisted.

When his mother spoke again, her voice had softened more as it always did when she was troubled. “Does he talk more than before, Martinho, or are you more aware of his talking?”

“Trese, you are not fair,” Don Martinho protested sharply.

The road lowered gently before them to the towering bulk of Castle de Bulhom, where it seemed to end abruptly against the great stones of the east wall. On either side of the road, olive trees formed straight lines into the depths of their orchards. Dull green leaves, unruffled in the morning stillness, foretold the heat of the day. The hill and the Fortress of St. George behind shielded them from the morning sun, but the sky was cloudless, and the month was August.

Don Martinho pointed toward the heavy stones of the castle and let his arm sweep away to include the olive trees and the country beyond. “Which will be master, Trese—Fernando de Bulhom or Castle de Bulhom?”

Fernando’s mind grappled with the strange question. His father’s voice was angry, but it held also a tone of foreboding, as though this castle that was their home could suddenly become a monster and devour them. His eyes ranged along the great stones of the wall, laced with mortar and the bowmen’s slots. His mother seemed to understand the question.

“Please, Martinho, I was unfair,” Dona Tereza admitted softly. “But you are too tense—so anxious…”

Fernando waited for the scolding that must follow withdrawal of his mother’s protection. But when his father spoke again, all traces of temper had disappeared. “Trese, I am more sensitive now to his faults. If the King appoints me, I may become even more sensitive. But if I am not the king’s magistrate, Fernando’s faults remain, and we must still correct them. Someday, all this will be his. He will have the power of this wealth. He will be responsible for all these people.”

Slowly at first, then more quickly as his parents discussed other matters, Fernando’s spirits regained their accustomed level. With difficulty he remained silent through the remainder of their walk. He was relieved when, at last, he followed his mother through the doorway into their quarters.

In the trencher room, a waiter prepared the table for breakfast. The room was small and plain, its stone walls bare with an incongruously large window open to the noise and confusion of the courtyard, and a table with four benches placed around it. Don Martinho’s accustomed place was at the end of the table nearest a door leading into the kitchen. Dona Tereza sat at the right of her husband, between him and Fernando, whose bench was nearest the window. Three knives and three goblets were on the table.

“Sir Thomas?” Don Martinho asked.

The waiter straightened from his work. “Sir Thomas went early into Lisbon, Don Martinho. He left no message.”

Fernando waited until his mother and father were seated, then pulled his own bench beneath him and recited grace. He fixed his mind firmly on the necessity for continued silence.

“You had a birthday last week, Son?”

Fernando nodded quickly at his father. “On the feast of the Virgin,” he said and smiled.

“And you were eleven?”

Fernando hesitated, warned by the question. His eyes darted toward his mother, but Dona Tereza studied the table before her. His smile faded. “Yes, Father,” he said.

Don Martinho leaned his big body forward over the table to emphasize the intensity of his words. “Fernando, you are only eleven, but you talk more than most men.” His voice was sad rather than stern. “You begin to talk as soon as your foot touches the ground before the Cathedral, and you will not stop until you sleep at night.”

The waiter brought the bread and meat of breakfast. The noises of the courtyard magnified in the silence of the room. Don Martinho paused. He examined the meat before him, lifted a piece of bread, and turned it critically. His manner was elaborately patient and oppressive until the waiter finished his work and fled through the door into the kitchen.

“Fernando, all your energy is in your tongue. Your mother must awaken you each morning, must brush your hair, must care for your clothes and your shoes. You talk at home, and Canon Joseph complains that you talk at school. In a few years, you will want to enter service in some other house as squire. Your master will not endure your talking as we have. Any master will demand improvement or will send you home as unworthy of knighthood. Or, if he keeps you, you know what he will call you.” Don Martinho’s voice had been low and even, but now it rose suddenly with contempt. “Sir Triple Tongue!”

Fernando held his gaze steadfastly on the food before him. Belatedly, the offending tongue endeavored to disown its guilt. He looked up only once—a startled look when his knife slipped from his hand and rattled loudly on the wood of the table. The noises from the courtyard dominated the room.

“This afternoon,” Dona Tereza said, “I shall need an escort into the city.”

Fernando glanced up hopefully but turned his eyes downward again immediately. “Perhaps you will need both of us, Trese,” he heard his father say, and raised his head quickly again.

The return of Sir Thomas interrupted them. Chain mail and great sword rattled in the outer passage while the knight commander stripped the camail from his head. When he appeared, he had not delayed to towel his wet hair and face, though there was no urgency in his manner. He smiled as he paused casually at the doorway.

“God’s Morning!” he said—“Dona Tereza!—Don Martinho!—Master Fernando!” as he looked at each in turn.

The knight commander was a big man, an inch or two taller than Don Martinho, with wide shoulders and slender body. He was not handsome—a nose broken at least once and a blunt, heavy chin denied the possibility—but his alert smile and deep-set eyes imparted a singular impression of loyalty and devotion. When he walked to the vacant bench at the side of the table opposite Dona Tereza, he carried the weight of the chain with distinctive grace.

“There was trouble in the city this morning, and I took a group of the men down. That trouble was already settled, but we stumbled on three men—archers from Anglia—beating one of King Sancho’s knight couriers. The courier was that braggart, Roberto, who talks so much. He was hurt, but he was still anxious to talk. He said he had been here for two days, but when he left Coimbra, the King had already selected a magistrate for Lisbon and was sending another courier to announce it.”

Don Martinho shook his head doubtfully. “King Sancho would not send a courier to announce a magistrate. He would come himself.”

“His Majesty has been placed under interdict again, Don Martinho. Roberto claims he will not leave Coimbra because the churches are closed wherever he goes, and the people become angry.”

“What caused this interdict?”

“He interfered with a legacy to the Cathedral in Oporto. The Bishop protested, and King Sancho ordered his magistrate in Oporto to expel the Bishop and occupy the residence.”

Dona Tereza looked up suddenly at the tall knight commander. “Even a king’s magistrate need not obey that order, Thomas,” she exclaimed.

Sir Thomas hesitated for a moment. “It is difficult for a king’s magistrate not to obey, Dona Tereza.”

Dona Tereza turned quickly toward her husband as though to appeal to him, but Don Martinho raised his hand that he understood. “There is no danger of that in Lisbon, Trese. King Sancho has no interest in lands so near the country of the Saracens.”

Fernando sat quietly at his place, turning his eyes as the others spoke but restraining his own impulses. His dark face flushed when Sir Thomas described the “braggart, Roberto, who talks so much,” but the others did not notice. He rose readily from his bench, when Dona Tereza stood...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• part1
• Part 2
• Part 3
• Back Cover