Epic Historial Collection (173 page)

“The cracks.”

“I don't see any.”

“The timbers on either side of the central pier are splitting. You can see where Elfric has reinforced them with iron braces.”

Now that he pointed them out, Caris could see the flat metal strips nailed across the cracks. “You look worried,” she said to him.

“I don't know why the timbers cracked in the first place.”

“Does it matter?”

“Of course it does.”

He was not very talkative this morning. She was about to ask him why, when he said: “Here comes your father.”

She looked along the street. The two brothers made an odd pair. Tall Anthony fastidiously held up the skirts of his monkish robe and stepped gingerly around the puddles, wearing an expression of distaste on his pale indoor face. Edmund, more vigorous despite being the elder, had a red face and a long, untidy gray beard, and he walked carelessly, dragging his withered leg through the mud, speaking argumentatively and gesturing extravagantly with both arms. When Caris saw her father at a distance, the way a stranger might see him, she always felt a surge of love.

The dispute was in full swing when they got to the bridge, and they continued without pause. “Look at that queue!” Edmund shouted. “Hundreds of people
not
trading at the fair because they haven't got there yet! And you can be sure half of them will meet a buyer or seller while waiting, and conduct their business right then and there, then go home without even entering the city!”

“That's forestalling, and it's against the law,” said Anthony.

“You could go and tell them that, if you could get across the bridge, but you can't, because it's too narrow! Listen, Anthony. If the Italians pull out, the Fleece Fair will never be the same again. Your prosperity and mine are based on the fair—we must not just let it go!”

“We can't force Buonaventura to do business here.”

“But we can make our fair more attractive than Shiring's. We need to announce a big, symbolic project, right now, this week, something to convince them all that the Fleece Fair isn't finished. We have to tell them we're going to tear down this old bridge and build a new one, twice as wide.” Without warning, he turned to Merthin. “How long would it take, young lad?”

Merthin looked startled, but he answered. “Finding the trees would be the hard part. You need very long timbers, well seasoned. Then the piers have to be driven into the river bed—that's tricky, because you're working in running water. After that it's just carpentry. You could finish it by Christmas.”

Anthony said: “There's no certainty the Caroli family will change its plans if we build a new bridge.”

“They will,” Edmund said forcefully. “I guarantee it.”

“Anyway, I can't afford to build a bridge. I don't have the money.”

“You can't afford
not
to build a bridge,” Edmund shouted. “You'll ruin yourself as well as the town.”

“It's out of the question. I don't even know where I'm going to get the money for the repairs in the south aisle.”

“So what will you do?”

“Trust in God.”

“Those who trust in God and sow a seed may reap a harvest. But you're not sowing the seed.”

Anthony got irritated. “I know this is difficult for you to understand, Edmund, but Kingsbridge Priory is not a commercial enterprise. We're here to worship God, not to make money.”

“You won't worship God for long if you've nothing to eat.”

“God will provide.”

Edmund's red face flushed with anger, turning an purplish color. “When you were a boy, our father's business fed you and clothed you and paid for your education. Since you've been a monk, the citizens of this town and the peasants of the surrounding countryside have kept you alive by paying you rents, tithes, charges for market stalls, bridge tolls, and a dozen other different fees. All your life you've lived like a flea on the backs of hardworking people. And now you have the nerve to tell us that God provides.”

“That's perilously close to blasphemy.”

“Don't forget that I've known you since you were born, Anthony. You always had a talent for avoiding work.” Edmund's voice, so often raised in a shout, now dropped—a sign, Caris knew, that he was really furious. “When it was time to empty out the privy, you went off to bed, so that you would be rested for school the next day. Father's gift to God, you always had the best of everything, and never lifted your hand to earn it. Strengthening food, the warmest bedroom, the best clothes—I was the only boy who wore his younger brother's cast-off outfits!”

“And you never let me forget it.”

Caris had been waiting for the opportunity to halt the flow, and now she took it. “There ought to be a way around this.”

They both looked at her, surprised to be interrupted.

She went on: “For example, couldn't the townspeople build a bridge?”

“Don't be ridiculous,” said Anthony. “The town belongs to the priory. A servant doesn't furnish his master's house.”

“But if your permission was sought, you would have no reason to refuse it.”

Anthony did not immediately contradict that, which was encouraging; but Edmund was shaking his head. “I don't think I could persuade them to put up the money,” he said. “It would be in their interests, long term, of course; but people are very reluctant to think in the long term when being asked to part with their money.”

“Ha!” said Anthony. “Yet you expect me to think long term.”

“You deal with eternal life, don't you?” Edmund shot back. “You of all people ought to be able to see beyond the end of next week. Besides, you get a penny toll from everyone who crosses the bridge. You'd get your money back
and
you'd benefit from the improvement in business.”

Caris said: “But Uncle Anthony is a spiritual leader, and he feels it's not his role.”

“But he owns the town!” Papa protested. “He's the only one who can do it!” Then he gave her an inquiring look, realizing that she would not have contradicted him without a reason. “What are you thinking?”

“Suppose the townspeople built a bridge, and were repaid out of the penny tolls?”

Edmund opened his mouth to express an objection, but could not think of one.

Caris looked at Anthony.

Anthony said: “When the priory was new, its only income came from that bridge. I can't give it away.”

“But think what you would gain, if the Fleece Fair and the weekly market began to return to their former size: not just the bridge tolls, but stallholders' fees, the percentage you take of all transactions at the fair, and gifts to the cathedral, too!”

Edmund added: “And the profits on your own sales: wool, grain, hides, books, statues of the saints—”

Anthony said: “You planned this, didn't you?” He pointed an accusing finger at his older brother. “You told your daughter what to say, and the lad. He would never think up a scheme like this, and she's just a woman. It has your mark on it. This is all a plot to cheat me of my bridge tolls. Well, it's failed. Praise God, I'm not that stupid!” He turned away and splashed off through the mud.

Edmund said: “I don't know how my father ever sired someone with so little sense.” And he, too, stomped off.

Caris turned to Merthin. “Well,” she said, “what did you think of all that?”

“I don't know.” He looked away, avoiding her eye. “I'd better get back to work.” He went without kissing her.

“Well!” she said when he was out of earshot. “What on earth has got into him?”

8

T
he earl of Shiring came to Kingsbridge on the Tuesday of Fleece Fair week. He brought with him both his sons, various other family members, and an entourage of knights and squires. The bridge was cleared by his advance men, and no one was permitted to cross for an hour before his arrival, lest he should suffer the indignity of being made to wait alongside the common people. His followers wore his red-and-black livery, and they all splashed into town with banners flying, their horses' hooves spattering the citizens with rainwater and mud. Earl Roland had prospered in the last ten years—under Queen Isabella and, later, her son Edward III—and he wanted the world to know it, as rich and powerful men generally did.

In his company was Ralph, son of Sir Gerald and brother of Merthin. At the same time as Merthin had been apprenticed to Elfric's father, Ralph had become a squire in the household of Earl Roland, and he had been happy ever since. He had been well fed and clothed, he had learned to ride and fight, and he had spent most of his time hunting and playing sports and games. In six and a half years no one had asked him to read or write a word. As he rode behind the earl through the huddled stalls of the Fleece Fair, watched by faces both envious and fearful, he pitied the merchants and tradesmen grubbing for pennies in the mud.

The earl dismounted at the prior's house, on the north side of the cathedral. His younger son, Richard, did the same. Richard was bishop of Kingsbridge and the cathedral was, theoretically, his church. However, the bishop's palace was in the county town of Shiring, two days' journey away. This suited the bishop, whose duties were political as much as religious; and it suited the monks, who preferred not to be too closely supervised.

Richard was only twenty-eight, but his father was a close ally of the king, and that counted for more than seniority.

The rest of the entourage rode to the south end of the cathedral close. The earl's elder son, William, lord of Caster, told the squires to stable the horses while half a dozen knights settled in to the hospital. Ralph moved quickly to help William's wife, Lady Philippa, get down from her horse. She was a tall, attractive woman with long legs and deep breasts, and Ralph nurtured a hopeless love for her.

When the horses were settled, Ralph went to visit his mother and father. They lived rent-free in a small house in the southwest quarter of the town, by the river, in a neighborhood made malodorous by the work of leather tanners. As he approached the house, Ralph felt himself shriveling with shame inside his red-and-black uniform. He was grateful that Lady Philippa could not see the indignity of his parents' situation.

He had not seen them for a year, and they seemed older. There was a lot of gray in his mother's hair, and his father was losing his eyesight. They gave him cider made by the monks and wild strawberries Mother had gathered in the woods. Father admired his livery. “Has the earl made you a knight yet?” he asked eagerly.

It was the ambition of every squire to become a knight, but Ralph felt it more keenly than most. His father had never got over the humiliation, ten years ago, of being degraded to the position of pensioner of the priory. An arrow had pierced Ralph's heart that day. The pain would not be eased until he had restored the family honor. But not all squires became knights. Nevertheless, Father always talked as if it were only a matter of time for Ralph.

“Not yet,” Ralph said. “But we're likely to go to war with France before long, and that will be my chance.” He spoke lightly, not wishing to show how badly he yearned for the chance to distinguish himself in battle.

Mother was disgusted. “Why do kings always want war?”

Father laughed. “It's what men were made for.”

“No, it's not,” she said sharply. “When I gave birth to Ralph in pain and suffering, I didn't intend that he should live to have his head cut off by a Frenchman's sword or his heart pierced by a bolt from a crossbow.”

Father flapped a hand at her in a dismissive gesture and said to Ralph: “What makes you say there will be war?”

“King Philip of France has confiscated Gascony.”

“Ah. We can't have that.”

English kings had ruled the western French province of Gascony for generations. They had given trade privileges to the merchants of Bordeaux and Bayonne, who did more business with London than with Paris. Still, there was always trouble.

Ralph said: “King Edward has sent ambassadors to Flanders to form alliances.”

“Allies may want money.”

“That's why Earl Roland has come to Kingsbridge. The king wants a loan from the wool merchants.”

“How much?”

“The talk is of two hundred thousands pounds, nationwide, as an advance against the wool tax.”

Mother said bleakly: “The king should take care not to tax the wool merchants to death.”

Father said: “The merchants have plenty of money—just look at their fine clothes.” There was bitterness in his tone, and Ralph observed that he had on a worn linen undershirt and old shoes. “Anyway, they want us to stop the French navy interfering with their trade.” Over the last year, French ships had raided towns on the south coast of England, sacking the ports and setting fire to ships in the harbors.