Epic Historial Collection (68 page)

Philip was glad Tom saw the sense of what he had done.

Harold seemed to be reaching agreement with his men. He came back to Philip and said: “Will you pay the wages to me, and leave me to distribute the money as I think fit?”

Philip was dubious. That meant the master could take more than his share. But he said: “It's up to the master builder.”

“It's common enough,” Tom said. “If that's what your team wants, I'm willing.”

“In that case, we accept,” Harold said.

Harold and Tom shook hands. Philip said: “So everyone gets what they want. Good!”

“There's one who hasn't got what they want,” Harold said.

“Who's that?” said Philip.

“Earl Percy's wife, Regan,” Harold said lugubriously. “When she finds out what's happened here there's going to be blood all over the floor.”

II

There was no hunting today, so the young men at Earlscastle played one of William Hamleigh's favorite games, stoning the cat.

There were always plenty of cats in the castle, and one more or less made no difference. The men closed the doors and shuttered the windows of the hall of the keep, and pushed the furniture up against the wall so that the cat could not hide behind anything; then they made a pile of stones in the middle of the room. The cat, an aging mouser with gray in its fur, sensed the bloodlust in the air and sat near the door, hoping to get out.

Each man had to put a penny into the pot for each stone he threw, and the man who threw the fatal stone took the pot.

As they drew lots to determine the order of throwing, the cat became agitated, pacing up and down in front of the door.

Walter threw first. This was lucky, for although the cat was wary it did not know the nature of the game, and might be taken by surprise. With his back to the animal, Walter picked a stone from the pile and concealed it in his hand; then he turned around slowly and threw suddenly.

He missed. The stone thudded into the door and the cat jumped and ran. The others jeered.

It was unlucky to throw second, for the cat was fresh and light on its feet, whereas later it would be tired and possibly injured. A young squire was next. He watched the cat run around the room, looking for a way out, and waited until it slowed down; then he threw. It was a good shot but the cat saw it coming and dodged it. The men groaned.

It ran around the room again, faster now, getting panicky, jumping up onto the trestles and boards that were stacked against the wall, jumping back down to the floor. An older knight threw next. He feinted a throw, to see which way the cat would jump, then threw for real when it was running, aiming a little ahead of it. The others applauded his cunning, but the cat saw the stone coming and stopped suddenly, avoiding it.

In desperation the cat tried to squeeze behind an oak chest in a corner. The next thrower saw an opportunity and seized it: he threw quickly, while the cat was stationary, and struck its rump. A great cheer went up. The cat gave up trying to squeeze behind the chest and ran on around the room, but now it was limping and it moved more slowly.

It was William's turn next.

He thought he could probably kill the cat if he was careful. In order to tire it a little more he yelled at it, making it run faster for a moment; then he feinted a throw, with the same effect. If one of the others had delayed like this he would have been booed, but William was the earl's son, so they waited patiently. The cat slowed down, obviously in pain. It approached the door hopefully. William drew back his arm. Unexpectedly the cat stopped against the wall beside the door. William began to throw. Before the stone left his hand the door was flung open, and a priest in black stood there. William threw, but the cat sprang like an arrow from a bow, howling triumphantly. The priest in the doorway gave a frightened, high-pitched shriek, and clutched at the skirts of his robes. The young men burst out laughing. The cat cannoned into the priest's legs, then landed on its feet and shot out through the door. The priest stood frozen in an attitude of fright, like an old woman scared by a mouse, and the young men roared with laughter.

William recognized the priest. It was Bishop Waleran.

He laughed all the more. The fact that the womanish priest who had been frightened by a cat was also a rival of the family made it even better.

The bishop recovered his composure very quickly. He flushed red, pointed an accusing finger at William, and said in a grating voice: “You'll suffer eternal torment in the lowest depths of hell.”

William's laughter turned to terror in a flash. His mother had given him nightmares, when he was small, by telling him what the devils did to people in hell, burning them in the flames and poking their eyes out and cutting off their private parts with sharp knives, and ever since then he hated to hear talk of it. “Shut up!” he screamed at the bishop. The room fell silent. William drew his knife and walked toward Waleran. “Don't you come here preaching, you snake!” Waleran did not look frightened at all, just intrigued, as if he was interested to have discovered William's weakness; and that made William angrier still. “I'll swing for you, so help me—”

He was mad enough to knife the bishop, but he was stopped by a voice from the staircase behind him. “William! Enough!”

It was his father.

William stopped and, after a moment, sheathed his knife.

Waleran came into the hall. Another priest followed him and shut the door behind him: Dean Baldwin.

Father said: “I'm surprised to see you, Bishop.”

“Because last time we met, you induced the prior of Kingsbridge to double-cross me? Yes, I suppose you would be surprised. I'm not normally a forgiving man.” He turned his icy gaze on William again for a moment, then looked back at Father. “But I don't bear a grudge when it's against my interest. We need to talk.”

Father nodded thoughtfully. “You'd better come upstairs. You too, William.”

Bishop Waleran and Dean Baldwin climbed the stairs to the earl's quarters, and William followed. He felt let down because the cat had escaped. On the other hand, he realized that he too had had a lucky escape: if he had touched the bishop he probably would have been hanged for it. But there was something about Waleran's delicacy, his preciousness, that William hated.

They went into Father's chamber, the room where William had raped Aliena. He remembered that scene every time he was here: her lush white body, the fear on her face, the way she had screamed, the twisted expression on her little brother's face as he had been forced to look on, and then—William's masterstroke—the way he had let Walter enjoy her afterward. He wished he had kept her here, a prisoner, so that he could have her anytime he wanted.

He had thought about her obsessively ever since. He had even tried to track her down. A verderer had been caught trying to sell William's war-horse in Shiring, and had confessed, under torture, that he had stolen it from a girl answering to the description of Aliena. William had learned from the Winchester jailer that she had visited her father before he died. And his friend Mistress Kate, the owner of a brothel he frequented, had told him she had offered Aliena a place in her house. But the trail had petered out. “Don't let her prey on your mind, Willy-boy,” Kate had said sympathetically. “You want big tits and long hair? We've got it. Take Betty and Millie together, tonight, four big breasts all to yourself, why don't you?” But Betty and Millie had not been innocent, and white-skinned, and frightened half to death; and they had not pleased him. In fact, he had not achieved real satisfaction with a woman since that night with Aliena here in the earl's chamber.

He put the thought of her out of his mind. Bishop Waleran was speaking to Mother. “I suppose you know that the prior of Kingsbridge has taken possession of your quarry?”

They did not know. William was astonished, and Mother was furious. “What?” she said. “How?”

“Apparently your men-at-arms succeeded in turning away the quarrymen, but the next day when they woke up they found the quarry overrun with monks singing hymns, and they were afraid to lay hands on men of God. Prior Philip then hired your quarrymen, and now they're all working together in perfect harmony. I'm surprised the men-at-arms didn't come back to you to report.”

“Where are they, the cowards?” Mother screeched. She was red in the face. “I'll see to them—I'll make them cut off their own balls—”

“I see why they didn't come back,” Waleran said.

“Never mind the men-at-arms,” Father said. “They're just soldiers. That sly prior is the one responsible. I never imagined he could pull a trick like this. He's outwitted us, that's all.”

“Exactly,” said Waleran. “For all his air of saintly innocence, he's got the cunning of a house rat.”

William thought that Waleran, too, was like a rat, a black one with a pointed snout and sleek black hair, sitting in a corner with a crust in its paws, darting wary glances around the room as it nibbled its dinner. Why was he interested in who occupied the quarry? He was as cunning as Prior Philip: he, too, was plotting something.

Mother said: “We can't let him get away with this. The Hamleighs must not be seen to be defeated. That prior must be humiliated.”

Father was not so sure. “It's only a quarry,” he said. “And the king did—”

“It's not just the quarry, it's the family's honor,” Mother interrupted. “Never mind what the king said.”

William agreed with Mother. Philip of Kingsbridge had defied the Hamleighs, and he had to be crushed. If people were not afraid of you, you had nothing. But he did not see what the problem was. “Why don't we go in with some men and just throw the prior's quarrymen out?”

Father shook his head. “It's one thing to obstruct the king's wishes passively, as we did by working the quarry ourselves; but quite another to send armed men to expel workmen who are there by express permission of the king. I could lose the earldom for that.”

William reluctantly saw his point of view. Father was always cautious, but he was usually justified.

Bishop Waleran said: “I have a suggestion.” William had felt sure he had something up his embroidered black sleeve. “I believe this cathedral should not be built at Kingsbridge.”

William was mystified by this remark. He did not see its relevance. Nor did Father. But Mother's eyes widened, she stopped scratching her face for a moment, and she said thoughtfully: “That's an interesting idea.”

“In the old days most cathedrals were in villages such as Kingsbridge,” Waleran went on. “Many of them were moved to towns sixty or seventy years ago, during the time of the first King William. Kingsbridge is a small village in the middle of nowhere. There's nothing there but a run-down monastery that isn't rich enough to maintain a cathedral, let alone build one.”

Mother said: “And where would
you
wish it built?”

“Shiring,” said Waleran. “It's a big town—the population must be a thousand or more—and it has a market and an annual fleece fair. And it's on a main road. Shiring makes sense. And if we both campaign for it—the bishop and the earl united—we could push it through.”

Father said: “But if the cathedral were at Shiring, the Kingsbridge monks would not be able to look after it.”

“That's the
point
,” Mother said impatiently. “Without the cathedral, Kingsbridge would be nothing, the priory would sink back into obscurity, and Philip would once again be a nonentity, which is what he deserves.”

“So who would look after the new cathedral?” Father persisted.

“A new chapter of canons,” Waleran said. “Appointed by me.”

William had been as puzzled as his father, but now he began to see Waleran's thinking: in moving the cathedral to Shiring, Waleran would also take personal control of it.

“What about the money?” said Father. “Who would pay for the new cathedral, if not Kingsbridge Priory?”

“I think we'd find that most of the priory's property is dedicated to the cathedral,” Waleran said. “If the cathedral moves, the property goes with it. For example, when King Stephen divided up the old earldom of Shiring, he gave the hill farms to Kingsbridge Priory, as we know only too well; but he did that in order to help finance the new cathedral. If we told him that someone else was building the new cathedral, he would expect the priory to release those lands to the new builders. The monks would put up a fight, of course; but examination of their charters would settle the matter.”

The picture was becoming clearer to William. Not only would Waleran get control of the cathedral by this stratagem; he would also get his hands on most of the priory's wealth.

Father was thinking the same thing. “It's a grand scheme for you, Bishop, but what's in it for me?”

It was Mother who answered him. “Can't you see?” she said tetchily. “You own Shiring. Think how much prosperity would come to the town along with the cathedral. There would be hundreds of craftsmen and laborers building the church for years: they all have to live somewhere and pay you rent, and buy food and clothing at your market. Then there will be the canons who run the cathedral; and the worshipers who will come to Shiring instead of Kingsbridge at Easter and Whitsun for the big services; and the pilgrims who come to visit the shrines…. They all spend money.” Her eyes were bright with greed. William could not remember seeing her so enthusiastic for a long time. “If we handle this right, we could turn Shiring into one of the most important cities in the kingdom!”