Epic Historial Collection (129 page)

She was fourteen years old.

When William stared at her, he had been imagining meeting her on a dark night and taking her by force in the back alleys of Winchester: marriage had not crossed his mind. However, Mother swiftly established that the father was agreeable, and the girl herself was an obedient child who would do what she was told. Having reassured William that there would be no repetition of the humiliation Aliena had inflicted on the family, Mother arranged a meeting.

William had been nervous. Last time he had done this, he had been an inexperienced youth of twenty, the son of a knight, meeting an arrogant young lady of the nobility. But now he was a battle-hardened man, thirty-seven years old, and he had been the earl of Shiring for ten years. He was foolish to be nervous about a meeting with a fourteen-year-old girl.

However, she was even more nervous. She was also desperate to please him. She talked excitably about her home and family, her horses and dogs, and her relations and friends. He sat silently, watching her face, imagining what she would look like naked.

Bishop Waleran married them in the chapel at Earlscastle, and there was a big feast that went on for the rest of the day. By custom, everyone of importance in the county had to be invited, and William would have lost face badly if he had not provided a lavish banquet. They roasted three whole oxen and dozens of sheep and pigs in the castle compound, and the guests drank the castle cellars dry of beer, cider and wine. William's mother presided over the festivities with a look of triumph on her disfigured face. Bishop Waleran found vulgar celebrations somewhat distasteful, and he left when the bride's uncle began to tell funny stories about newlyweds.

The bride and groom retired to their chamber at nightfall, leaving the guests to continue reveling. William had been at enough weddings to know the ideas that were passing through the minds of the younger guests, so he stationed Walter outside the room and barred the door to prevent interruption.

Elizabeth took off her tunic and her shoes and stood there in her linen shirt. “I don't know what to do,” she said simply. “You'll have to show me.”

This was not quite how William had imagined it. He went over to her. She lifted her face, and he kissed her soft lips. Somehow the kiss failed to generate any heat. He said: “Take off your shirt and lie on the bed.”

She pulled the undershirt over her head. She was quite plump. Her large breasts had tiny indented nipples. A light brown fuzz of hair covered the triangle between her legs. Obediently she walked to the bed and lay down on her back.

William kicked off his boots. He sat on the bed beside her and squeezed her breasts. Her skin was soft. This sweet, obliging, smiling girl was nothing like the image that had made his throat go dry, of a woman in the grip of passion, moaning and sweating beneath him, and he felt cheated.

He put his hand between her thighs and she parted her legs immediately. He pushed his finger inside her. She gasped, hurt; then quickly said: “It's all right, I don't mind.”

He wondered briefly whether he was going about this in completely the wrong way. He had a momentary vision of a different scene in which the two of them lay side by side, touching and talking and getting to know one another gradually. However, desire had at last stirred inside him when she gasped in pain, and he brushed his doubts aside and fingered her more roughly. He watched her face as she struggled to bear the pain silently.

He got on the bed and knelt between her legs. He was not fully aroused. He rubbed himself to make his organ stiffer, but it had little effect. It was her damned smile that was making him impotent, he was sure. He pushed two fingers inside her, and she gave a little cry of pain. That was better. Then the silly bitch started smiling again. He realized he would have to wipe the smile off her face. He slapped her hard. She cried out, and her lip bled. This was more like it.

He hit her again.

She started to cry.

After that it was all right.

 

The following Sunday happened to be Whitsunday, when a huge crowd would attend the cathedral. Bishop Waleran would take the service. There would be even more people than usual, because everyone was keen to look at the new transepts, which had recently been finished. Rumor said they were amazing. William would show his bride to the ordinary folk of the county at that service. He had not been to Kingsbridge since they built the wall, but Philip could not stop him from going to church.

Two days before Whitsunday, his mother died.

She was about sixty years old. It was quite sudden. She felt breathless after dinner on Friday and went to bed early. Her maid woke William a little before dawn to tell him that his mother was in distress. He got up from his bed and went stumbling into her room, rubbing his face. He found her gasping horribly for breath, unable to speak, a look of terror in her eyes.

William was frightened by her great shuddering gasps and her staring eyes. She kept looking at him, as if she expected him to do something. He was so scared he decided to leave the room, and he turned away; then he saw the maid standing at the door, and he felt ashamed of his fear. He forced himself to look at Mother again. Her face seemed to change shape continually in the inconstant light of the one candle. Her hoarse, ragged breathing got louder and louder until it seemed to fill his head. He could not understand why it had not woken the whole castle. He put his hands over his ears to shut out the noise but he could still hear it. It was as if she was shouting at him, the way she had when he was a boy, a mad furious scolding tirade, and her face looked angry too, the mouth wide, the eyes staring, the hair disarrayed. The conviction that she was demanding something grew, and he felt himself becoming younger and smaller, until he was possessed by a blind terror he had not felt since childhood, a terror that came from knowing that the only person he loved was a raging monster. It had always been like this: she would tell him to come to her, or go away, or get on his pony, or get off; and he would be slow to respond, so she would yell; and then he would be so frightened that he could not understand what she was asking him to do; and there would be a hysterical deadlock, with her screaming louder and louder and him becoming blind, deaf and dumb with terror.

But this time it was different.

This time, she died.

First her eyes closed. William began to feel calmer then. Gradually her breathing became shallower. Her face went grayish despite the boils. Even the candle seemed to burn more weakly, and the moving shadows no longer frightened William. At last her breathing just stopped.

“There,” William said, “she's all right, now, isn't she?”

The maid burst into tears.

He sat beside the bed looking at her still face. The maid fetched the priest, who said angrily: “Why didn't you call me earlier?” William hardly heard him. He stayed with her until sunrise; then the women servants asked him to leave so they could “lay her out.” William went down to the hall where the inhabitants of the castle—knights, men-at-arms, clergymen and servants—were eating a subdued breakfast. He sat at the table beside his young wife and drank some wine. One or two of the knights and the household steward spoke to him, but he did not reply. Eventually Walter came in and sat beside him. Walter had been with him for many years and he knew when to be silent.

After a while William said: “Are the horses ready?”

Walter looked surprised. “For what?”

“For the journey to Kingsbridge. It takes two days—we have to leave this morning.”

“I didn't think we would go—under the circumstances….”

For some reason this made William angry. “Did I say we wouldn't go?”

“No, lord.”

“Then we're going!”

“Yes, lord.” Walter stood up. “I'll see to it at once.”

They set off at midmorning, William and Elizabeth and the usual entourage of knights and grooms. William felt as if he was in a dream. The landscape seemed to move past him, instead of the other way around. Elizabeth rode beside him, bruised and silent. When they stopped Walter took care of everything. At each meal William ate a little bread and drank several cups of wine. In the night he dozed fitfully.

They could see the cathedral from a distance, across the green fields, as they approached Kingsbridge. The old cathedral had been a squat, broad-shouldered building with small windows like beady eyes under round-arched eyebrows. The new church looked radically different, even though it was not finished yet. It was tall and slender, and the windows seemed impossibly big. As they came closer, William saw that it dwarfed the priory buildings around it in a way that the old cathedral never had.

The road was busy with riders and pedestrians all heading for Kingsbridge: the Whitsunday service was popular, for it took place in early summer when the weather was good and the roads were dry. This year more people than usual had come, attracted by the novelty of the new building.

William and his party cantered the last mile, scattering unwary pedestrians, and clattered onto the wooden drawbridge that crossed the river. Kingsbridge was now one of the most heavily fortified towns in England. It had a stout stone wall with a castellated parapet, and here, where previously the bridge had led straight into the main street, the way was barred by a stone-built barbican with enormously heavy ironbound doors that now stood open but were undoubtedly shut tight at night. I don't suppose I'll ever be able to burn this town again, William thought vaguely.

People stared as he rode up the main street toward the priory. People always stared at William, of course: he was the earl. Today they were also interested in the young bride who rode at his left. On his right was Walter, as always.

They rode into the priory close and dismounted at the stables. William left his horse to Walter and turned to look at the church. The eastern end, the top of the cross, was at the far side of the close and hidden from view. The western end, the tail of the cross, was not yet built, but its shape was marked out on the ground with stakes and string, and some of the foundations had already been laid. Between the two was the new part, the arms of the cross, consisting of the north and south transepts, with the space between them which was called the crossing. The windows
were
as big as they had seemed. William had never seen a building like this in his life.

“It's fantastic,” Elizabeth said, breaking her submissive silence.

William wished he had left her behind.

Somewhat awestruck, he walked slowly up the nave, between the lines of stakes and string, with Elizabeth following. The first bay of the nave had been partly built, and looked as if it was supporting the huge pointed arch which formed the western entrance to the crossing. William passed under that incredible arch and found himself in the crowded crossing.

The new building looked unreal: it was too tall, too slender, too graceful and fragile to stand up. It seemed to have no walls, nothing to hold up the roof but a row of willowy piers reaching eloquently upward. Like everyone around him, William craned his neck to look up, and saw that the piers continued into the curved ceiling to meet at the crown of the vault, like the overarching branches of a stand of mature elms in the forest.

The service began. The altar had been set up at the near end of the chancel, with the monks behind it, so that the crossing and both transepts were free for the congregation, but even so the crowd overflowed into the unbuilt nave. William pushed his way to the front, as was his prerogative, and stood near the altar, with the other nobles of the county, who nodded to him and whispered among themselves.

The painted timber ceiling of the old chancel was awkwardly juxtaposed with the tall eastern arch of the crossing, and it was clear that the builder intended eventually to demolish the chancel and rebuild it to match the new work.

A moment after that thought had crossed William's mind his eye fell on the builder in question, Jack Jackson. He was a handsome devil, with his mane of red hair, and he wore a dark red tunic, embroidered at the hem and neckline, just like a nobleman. He looked rather pleased with himself, no doubt because he had built the transepts so fast and everyone was so astonished by his design. He was holding the hand of a boy of about nine years who looked just like him. William realized with a shock that that must be Aliena's child, and he felt a sharp pang of envy. A moment later he caught sight of Aliena herself. She was standing a little behind Jack and to one side, with a faint smile of pride on her face. William's heart leaped: she was as lovely as ever. Elizabeth was a poor substitute, a pallid imitation of the real, red-blooded Aliena. In her arms Aliena held a little girl about seven years old, and William recalled that she had had a second child by Jack even though they were not married.

William looked more closely at Aliena. She was not quite as lovely as ever, after all: there were lines of strain around her eyes, and behind the proud smile was a hint of sadness. After all these years she still could not marry Jack, of course, William thought with satisfaction: Bishop Waleran had kept his promise and had repeatedly blocked the annulment. That thought often gave William consolation.

It was Waleran, William now realized, who was standing at the altar, lifting the Host above his head so that the entire congregation could see it. Hundreds of people went down on their knees. The bread became Christ at that moment, a transformation that struck awe into William even though he had no idea what was involved.