The Lost Book of the Grail

by Charlie Lovett

  “What happened to it?”

  “It was stolen,” said Arthur. “A couple of years ago. It had been borrowed by a family member who was ill and while she was in hospital someone stole it from her house.”

  “And you figured Jesse Johnson . . .”

  “When I heard he was looking for the Grail, the thought did cross my mind.”

  “Did they ever find it?”

  “It was returned last summer by what the police called an anonymous intermediary.”

  “Thank goodness,” said Bethany. “But listen, you’ve got to believe that I am not here looking for the Grail; I’m just here to digitize manuscripts. And if I did find the Grail . . . if we found the Grail, the last person I’d tell about it would be Jesse Johnson. You do believe me, don’t you?”

  “It’s rather strange,” said Arthur, “what I do and don’t believe. I’m surrounded by a five-hundred-year-old monument to God, and I don’t believe in Him, but I believe in a cup that most people think is a myth or a legend. And I’m sitting here with someone who was a total stranger less than a month ago and with whom I was furious quite recently, but I believe her. I trust her. I trust you.”

  “Thank you, Arthur,” said Bethany. “That means a lot to me. And do you know what else would mean a lot to me?”

  “What?”

  “Getting out of here before that candle burns out. So where is that memorial you need to transcribe?”

  —

  When they returned to the library, Arthur told Bethany all about his search for the Grail—how he had discovered the lions on the tower and the yew tree in the cloister. He shared his suspicion that the lost Book of Ewolda was somehow connected to the Grail. He showed her the marginalia in the medieval service book that spoke of a great treasure of Barchester and the note in the Stansby Morte d’Arthur about Barchester being the perfect place for that book.

  “I should have noticed that,” said Bethany, “but I was only on chapter twenty-six.”

  “What’s your favorite part?” said Arthur. “I mean apart from the Grail.”

  “Merlin,” said Bethany. “I love his mysticism. He always felt very Old Testament to me, but like somebody from the Old Testament you’d actually want to sit down and talk to. They’re not all that way. I think I liked that he could be wise and kind and frightening all at once. My dad is a little like that, but he lacks the . . . I don’t know, the mystery. My dad is an open book and Merlin was anything but. And of course I love the idea that he transcended time. This idea that he might still be asleep in a cave somewhere—it’s very Christian in a way, but in a weird way that my dad would call heresy. Did you ever read C. S. Lewis’s space trilogy? He brings Merlin back in the third book.”

  “I’ve read just about everything by Lewis,” said Arthur. “He was a nonbeliever who became a believer. I wanted to see if I thought I might follow in his path. A lot of my college friends scoffed at the space trilogy—I mean it is a bit muddled. But I liked parts of it, and I loved that Merlin was part of the story.”

  “Who was your favorite?”

  “My favorite C. S. Lewis character?”

  “No, silly, your favorite in the Arthur stories.”

  “I suppose it should be one of the ones who achieved the Grail. . . .”

  “So, Percival, Bors, or Galahad?” said Bethany.

  “It’s none of them,” said Arthur. “Oddly enough, my favorite was always Lancelot. I could never really relate to purity—the near perfection of the knights who saw the Grail. But Lancelot was anything but pure; Lancelot had faults but he was still a great knight. That seemed a lot more achievable to me.”

  “So you wanted to be a knight?”

  “Not as such,” said Arthur, “but I wanted to see that people with weaknesses could still have success. I think it was part of my whole struggle with belief. I went to a Church of England school and that’s when I started to love church without believing in God. As a child I thought that meant something was wrong with me—so I related to Lancelot. He defied the biggest rule in chivalry but he was still Arthur’s best friend and most talented knight.”

  “Until the bit where his affair with Queen Guinevere brings the whole kingdom crashing down.”

  “Well, there is that. But I still liked him.” They sat in silence for a moment, until they heard the sound of a bird in the cloister. Arthur wondered if it was a nightingale or a lark.

  “Listen, as long as we’re telling secrets,” he said, “there’s one more thing you need to know. I’m not sure if it has anything to do with the Grail or the Book of Ewolda, and I might never have even found out if it hadn’t been for you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “One of the names in the list of rectors of St. Cuthbert’s—the one that came right after Henry Albert Naylor—was my grandfather.”

  “The same grandfather who told you to go Grail hunting but keep it a secret?”

  “The same one. And eventually he was rector of Plumstead Episcopi, too.”

  “The same posts that Naylor held. Arthur, your grandfather must be a part of this story, somehow.”

  “It could just be a coincidence.”

  “There are no coincidences,” said Bethany.

  “That’s what he always said,” said Arthur.

  VIII

  THE HIGH ALTAR

  In ancient religions the first altars were tombs; they later developed into places of sacrifice. At Barchester, the high altar is both. It serves as a tomb just once a year, when, after the Maundy Thursday service, the Communion elements, signifying the body and blood of Christ, are “entombed” in a chamber in the side of the altar as Christ’s death and burial are commemorated. From this “Easter sepulchre” the elements are retrieved when Christ’s Resurrection is proclaimed at the Great Vigil of Easter. As a place of sacrifice, the altar serves at least once a week, as the sacrificial service of the Eucharist is performed here.

  1285, Priory of St. Ewolda

  Walter de Bingham knelt at the high altar of the monastic church of the Priory of St. Ewolda, just outside Barchester. The morning sun streamed through the east window, dappling his face with blues and greens. Around him, the massive columns and heavy curved vaults of the church rose toward heaven—though not as far toward heaven as the nearby Barchester Cathedral. The Norman architecture of the priory church was, in fact, a bit out of fashion. The thick walls, rounded arches, and small windows meant the church was often dark and cold. Walter had heard one monk say, after the fifth service of the day, that the place felt more like hell than heaven, but that young man had soon left the priory for a posting at one of the new cathedrals, with their soaring pointed arches, vast windows, and ribbed vaulting. But Walter liked St. Ewolda’s, old-fashioned though it might be. He liked dimness and damp and mystery, and every morning after Terce, when the other brothers had left the church and returned to their work or their studies or their private devotions in their cells, he took a few minutes to pray, and he always prayed to that saint whom he saw as his own private protector—St. Ewolda.

  The brothers knew that the monastery had been founded by a saint named Ewolda; but they knew her in name only. Walter alone knew the details of her life, for Walter was, and had been for nearly thirty years, the keeper of the Book of Ewolda. When this responsibility had first been passed to him he had been a young monk, freshly arrived from Cluny to a foundation that was both ancient and new. St. Ewolda had founded the monastery hundreds of years ago, early in the first great age of English monasticism. Unlike so many of its contemporary foundations, it had survived through the centuries—probably, thought Walter, because St. Ewolda’s always managed to have barely enough wealth to feed its monks but never enough to invite sacking, whether by Vikings or by someone else. After the Norman invasion, the monastery had been refounded on a new site, and twenty years later became a Cluniac house—part of the new order
of monasticism based in Cluny. But Walter thought of the priory as a Saxon foundation with a Saxon patron.

  Often, following his prayers to this patron, Walter would sit in the small chapel of St. Martin—a chapel that would not hold more than two or three—and read from the book of St. Ewolda. He remembered well the day that one of the oldest monks, Brother Simon, had called Walter into his cell.

  “There is a secret with which I must entrust you,” Simon had said. “And you must be the bearer of this secret for the next generation.”

  “I am at your service, Brother,” said Walter. “What is this secret?”

  “You will know in time,” said Simon, “but first you must learn a strange and unfamiliar language.”

  Walter had come to Simon’s cell every day for an hour after Terce and had proved a quick study. Within a few months, he could read the Saxon language, and Simon showed him, for the first time, the Book of Ewolda.

  “The book was copied from an ancient manuscript in the last days before the coming of the Normans,” said Simon, “so that Ewolda’s story might be kept alive.” Walter read to Simon from the book every day, translating each sentence as he read. Simon gently corrected him when his translation was not perfect. And thus Walter learned the full story of Ewolda, founder of the priory.

  “But why should this story be a secret?” asked Walter one day after Simon had closed the book and placed it in its hiding place under his bed.

  “When the priory joined the order of Cluny,” said Simon, “the new prior allowed us to keep the name of St. Ewolda and to celebrate her feast day. But he felt that any further allegiance to a Saxon founder was allegiance that ought properly to be paid to Cluny or to our Lady. So knowledge of Ewolda was forced underground, and the book was hidden by a monk named Harold, who had once been the abbot of the original St. Ewolda’s Monastery. He decreed that the book should always have a single protector, so that the story of St. Ewolda might be kept alive. But Harold was also the custodian of another secret—a deeper, more holy secret—that the keeper of Ewolda’s book must protect.”

  “And what is this secret?” asked Walter, leaning forward, trembling with wonder.

  “You have mastered the language,” said Simon, “so only you among the monks of the priory will be able to read Ewolda’s book, and only you will be able to read this.” From within his robes, Simon pulled out a single sheet of parchment, twice folded. “Take it with you. Read it only in the privacy of your cell. Guard it with the greatest care, and choose your successor wisely, for none but the Guardian must ever know.”

  That night, by the light of a single taper, Walter read the document. The words had faded in places, but some Guardian, perhaps Simon, had traced the originals with fresh ink, so the text was legible. Yet the secret it revealed was nearly incomprehensible. How could such a secret have remained hidden at Barchester for so many centuries? When he went to see Simon in his cell the next morning, eager to discuss this monumental intelligence, the old monk was gone. Walter never saw Simon again. The message had been clear—there is only ever one Guardian. And Walter knew what he had to guard.

  Now Walter read again from the story of St. Ewolda’s life. As priceless treasures go, the Book of Ewolda was unassuming. It was small enough to slip into a pouch that Walter had sewn inside his robe. The vellum covers were worn at the edges and scratched. They were blotched with smears and smudges, spots that could be wine or ink or blood. The interior boasted no illuminations or decorative capitals. The pages themselves often lacked a corner or a bit of fore edge. Walter was proud to think, though, that the book was in no worse condition than when he had taken over the guardianship thirty years ago. The same could not be said, however, for the document that Walter also kept in his pocket. He had folded and unfolded the parchment so many times—even though he had committed the text to memory decades ago—that the words on the folds were illegible. He knew old age was stalking him and that the time was near when he must appoint a new Guardian. That brother must be able to read the words that had so amazed Walter all those years ago.

  It seemed foolish to Walter that the document should be separate from the book. A single parchment could so easily be lost or destroyed, but a book, even an ancient and tattered book, was a thing of value. A book was easier to protect. He turned to the last pages of the volume. Because of the small format, the original sheets of parchment had been folded twice to create the pages—eight pages from each sheet. But the text of Ewolda’s history extended across only five of the last eight pages. In any other book, this valuable space would have been filled with prayers or Scripture verses or illuminations, but in Ewolda’s book, the pages remained blank. There was just enough room on those three pages, thought Walter, to copy the text of the document—to bring together into a single volume all the great secrets of St. Ewolda’s.

  Walter felt he was well suited to copy the document. After all, he had worked as a scribe for more then twenty years. He had copied some of the most important books at St. Ewolda’s—including the breviary from which many of the services were taken. The old breviary book had been used for centuries and was so worn it was in danger of becoming illegible. Walter had copied the prayers and services with great care, adding musical notations to some of the psalms and canticles to assist the monks with their chanting. He had even copied a small bit of marginalia that only he understood—for only he could read the language in which it was written. “Here I remember the great treasure of Barsyt,” Walter had written, keeping the words in the Saxon tongue that was foreign to his fellow monks. After such a task as creating the breviary, copying out a document of a few paragraphs would be a simple matter.

  And so Walter became the last Guardian to copy the Saxon text of the document. He worked slowly over the next several days to fill the empty pages with his careful script, knowing he must finish his work by midnight on the twelfth of October—the feast day of St. Ewolda. He completed the task early that morning, and after Compline, when the rest of the priory had retired, Walter returned to the high altar. He spoke a long prayer to Ewolda and placed the document in a pottery basin he had borrowed from the kitchen earlier in the day. He held his candle to the edge of the parchment, then watched as the flame licked the document and smoked curled into the darkness.

  When the monks assembled at midnight for Matins, only Walter noticed the faint smell of smoke in the air, not knowing that he wasn’t the first monk in St. Ewolda’s history to perform this peculiar rite.

  May 8, 2016

  FEAST OF DAME JULIAN OF NORWICH

  By Saturday afternoon, Arthur had a rough draft of the entire guidebook. In the end, writing ten thousand words wasn’t that difficult, especially with Bethany keeping him on course. Whenever he tried to dive into some digression, she would repeat, “Just tell the story, Arthur.” He found this ironic, since Bethany herself was the master of the conversational digression, but he nonetheless appreciated her guidance. Arthur knew just about all there was to know about Barchester Cathedral—or all that one could know given the surviving sources. Condensing that knowledge into a story had only required the one thing he never had during his solitary years of research—a listener. Of course he had told David and Oscar and Gwyn about various discoveries he had made in his studies of the cathedral’s history, but he hadn’t tried to tell the entire story of the cathedral as just that—a story.

  Now, as the sound of the choir rehearsing the psalm one last time before the main Sunday morning service drifted up from below, Arthur sat at his usual table. Gone were the piles of notes and stacks of books with slips of paper marking relevant passages. Gone was his fountain pen and his ream of fresh writing paper. In front of him lay a neat stack of computer-printed pages and a red felt-tip pen—a gift from Bethany.

  They had worked through Friday night, and just before Evensong on Saturday Bethany had pushed “print” on her computer. Arthur had agreed not to look at the manuscript until he got a
good night’s sleep. Even standing up he had almost dozed off during the Magnificat, an early-seventeenth-century setting by Thomas Weelkes that had soothed him to the edge of sleep until Bethany dug an elbow into his side and brought him back just in time for the Gloria Patri. After the service, he had gone home and slept. It was the first time he had missed Compline in months.

  On Sunday, he had attended Morning Prayer at seven and had been tempted to head to the library and begin proofreading right away, but he wasn’t used to missing a night’s sleep, and even after almost twelve hours of slumber, he felt caffeine was required. He had sat and chatted with David over a mug of coffee at the bookshop—mostly listening to the story of how David had failed to seduce a poet who had given a reading at the university the night before. It was exactly the sort of mindless narrative Arthur needed to ease back into reality.

  Now, as the bells called the worshippers of Barchester to Sunday morning Eucharist, Arthur sat comfortably in the peace of the library. He picked up Bethany’s printout, leaned back in his chair, and began to read.

  The early history of Barchester Cathedral is shrouded in mystery, but we do know there was a religious foundation dedicated to St. Ewolda on this site from at least the early eighth century, making it one of the oldest Christian monasteries in southern Britain. Of the founder, St. Ewolda, little is known.

  It wasn’t exactly the opening he had hoped for, but it wasn’t bad. He was just finishing the first page without any cause to reach for the red pen, when he heard feet on the stairs and the slightly breathless voice of Oscar.

  “Ah, Arthur, I thought I might find you here. I was on my way to services and I thought I’d drop off those keys you wanted.”

  “What keys?” said Arthur.