But Arnau was not listening to him.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked, this time seizing him by the shoulders. “Let me look at you! You’ve changed!”
“It’s been thirteen years,” Joan tried to say, but Arnau would not listen.
“How long have you been in Barcelona?”
“I came...”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
With each question, Arnau shook his brother’s shoulders.
“Are you here to stay this time? Tell me you are!”
Guillem and Mar could not help smiling. The friar saw them: “That’s enough,” he said, pushing Arnau away. “Enough. You’ll squeeze me to death.”
Arnau stood back to survey him. Only the bright, lively eyes reminded him of the Joan who had left Barcelona. Now he was almost bald, thin, and hollow-cheeked ... and the black habit hanging from his shoulders only made him look worse. Joan was two years younger than him, but he looked much older.
“Haven’t you been eating? If the money I sent wasn’t enough—”
“No,” Joan butted in, “it was more than enough. Your money served to nourish ... my spirit. Books are very expensive, Arnau.”
“You should have asked for more.”
Joan waved away the suggestion, then sat down at the table opposite Guillem and Mar.
“Aren’t you going to present me to your goddaughter? I see she’s grown a lot since your last letter.”
Arnau signaled to Mar, and she came round the table to stand in front of Joan. Abashed by the stern look in the friar’s eyes, she kept her eyes on the floor. When he had finished his examination of her, Arnau presented Guillem.
“This is Guillem,” he said. “I’ve talked a lot about him in my letters.”
“Yes.” Joan made no effort to shake him by the hand, and Guillem was forced to withdraw his own outstretched arm. “Do you fulfill your Christian obligations?” he asked coldly.
“Yes...”
“Yes, Brother Joan,” Joan corrected him.
“Brother Joan,” Guillem repeated.
“And over there is Donaha,” Arnau said quickly.
Joan nodded without so much as looking at her.
“Good,” he said, turning to Mar and indicating with his eyes that she could sit down. “You’re Ramon’s daughter, aren’t you? Your father was a good man, a hardworking Christian who feared his Lord, like all
Arnau ordered Donaha to serve their supper, then sat at the table. He realized that Guillem was still standing some way away, as though he did not dare sit down with the newcomer.
“Come and sit, Guillem,” he said. “This is your home too.”
Joan said nothing.
Nobody spoke during supper. Mar was unusually quiet, as if the presence of the friar had robbed her of all spontaneity. For his part, Joan ate frugally.
“Tell me, Joan,” Arnau said when they had finished eating, “what are you doing here? When did you come back?”
“I took advantage of the king’s return. I boarded a ship to Sardinia when I learned of his victory there, and came from the island to Barcelona.”
“Have you seen the king?”
“He would not receive me.”
Mar asked permission to leave the table. Guillem did the same. They both said good night to Brother Joan. After that, the two brothers talked until dawn; with the aid of a bottle of sweet wine, they made up for thirteen years apart.
37
TO THE RELIEF of everyone in Arnau’s family, Joan decided to move to Santa Caterina convent.
“That is the proper place for me,” he told his brother, “but I’ll come and visit you every day.”
Arnau, who had noticed how uncomfortable his goddaughter and Guillem had been during supper the previous evening, did not insist more than was strictly necessary.
“Do you know what he said to me?” he whispered to Guillem when they were getting up from their meal at midday. The Moor bent closer. “He asked what we have done to see that Mar is married.”
Without straightening up, Guillem looked across at the girl, who was helping Donaha clear the table. Find a husband for her? Why, she was only ... a woman! Guillem turned to Arnau. Neither of them had ever looked at her as they did now.
“What has become of our little girl?” Arnau whispered.
