The Bishop's Brood

by Simon Beaufort

  South of the cathedral was the abbey. Geoffrey saw the community would be a large one, and already boasted a chapter house, a dorter where the monks slept, a frater where they ate, and kitchens. There was also an elegant house with a tiled roof that Geoffrey imagined was where the prior lived. Finally, there was the city itself. The main town clustered around a market square, and its houses were large and well built. Between castle and cathedral were untidy hovels that Roger said would soon be demolished because they posed a fire hazard, while the last part was an ancient community known as the Elvet, located on the opposite side of the river.

  ‘There are bigger and better cathedrals than that in the Holy Land,’ said Ulfrith disparagingly. ‘This is all right, but the Holy Land is … well, it is holy.’

  Geoffrey wondered how the lad had gained his rosy impressions of Palestine. It was not from any Crusader, who would be more likely to list the Holy Land’s less appealing aspects – heat, flies, and inconvenient intestinal diseases. Geoffrey had tried to correct his unrealistic vision, but Ulfrith had declined to believe him. He had also infected the other soldiers with his enthusiasm, and even the unsavoury Littel brothers now talked about Jerusalem in reverently hushed tones. Geoffrey only hoped he would not have a mutiny on his hands when they eventually set eyes on the proverbial land of milk and honey.

  ‘This is the best cathedral on Earth,’ declared Roger, peeved. ‘When it is finished, it will be a great fortress, with towers for lookouts, arrow slits for archers, and a thick door to keep out the Scots.’

  ‘Will there be room in this church for religion?’ asked Geoffrey wryly. ‘Or will its function be purely military?’

  ‘Well, there is the Chapel of the Nine Altars, I suppose,’ said Roger, after a moment of serious thought. ‘The religious stuff can take place there – and there will be a lot of it. The Benedictines have an abbey here and pilgrims will come, of course.’

  ‘Why?’ asked Ulfrith. ‘They would do better going to the Holy Land.’

  ‘Because we have lots of saints,’ said Roger huffily, not pleased to have the importance of his home city questioned by the likes of Ulfrith. ‘There is Cuthbert, the greatest of them all, and his friends Aidan and Oswald. And we shall soon have Aaron’s Rod.’

  He cast Geoffrey a defiant glance. Geoffrey sighed, but declined to become embroiled in another debate about the thing.

  ‘Do these saints already belong to Durham?’ asked Sergeant Helbye thoughtfully. ‘If not, there might be a fight for them, and we could offer our services to the side we think will win.’

  ‘They are all ours,’ said Roger loftily. ‘Do you not know the story of the cow and the bones?’

  ‘Enlighten us,’ said Geoffrey warily, not sure they could believe anything Roger told them about history, coloured as it would be by prejudice and ignorance, but curious nonetheless.

  ‘When Cuthbert died, he was brought to Durham by a cow,’ said Roger authoritatively. ‘The cow told Cuthbert’s friends where to put his body – which was still as fresh as a daisy, even after a thousand years – and instructed them to build a church over it, to keep it nice.’

  Geoffrey turned away so Roger would not see him smile. The story of St Cuthbert was one he had read many times. When the monks on the remote island of Lindisfarne were threatened by Viking raids, they removed the body of their founder from its grave to take to a safer place. All were astonished to find the body undecayed after 200 years. It was declared a miracle, and Cuthbert was canonized. The monks spent years wandering with the body, until they followed a girl with a dun cow to a place called Dunholm. The cow stumbled, and the monks interpreted it as a sign that they were to settle. They founded a church and St Cuthbert’s relics had rested in it ever since.

  ‘I see,’ said Ulfrith, accepting Roger’s version of the story without demur. ‘And where do Cuthbert’s friends St Aidan and St Oswald come into all this?’

  ‘Cuthbert has Oswald’s arm in his coffin,’ said Roger, unwilling to admit he did not know and fabricating instead. ‘They were friends in life and when Oswald died, Cuthbert could not bear to be separated, so usually kept a bit of him somewhere close by, to talk to.’

  ‘Oswald and Cuthbert could not have been friends,’ said Geoffrey, reluctant to see the gullible Ulfrith fed such patently false information. ‘Oswald died when Cuthbert was a child—’

  Roger interrupted with a wave of his hand. ‘Details! The point is that my father is going to take the bones of all these saints from that wooden church you can see next to the cathedral, and put them in his glorious new one. And since they are England’s best-loved relics, pilgrims will flock to see them. Durham will be rich beyond its wildest dreams.’

  ‘That is why Flambard is willing to pay for the cathedral with his own funds,’ Geoffrey explained to Ulfrith. ‘He expects returns on his investment.’

  ‘He is a bishop,’ said Roger, offended. ‘Why should he not build a cathedral? Durham is one of the most powerful sees in the country, and so its bishop should have an impressive church.’

  It was not only a cathedral Flambard was raising, Geoffrey noted. In the shadow of the chancel, other structures were springing up, and scaffolding rose around sections of a curtain wall that would eventually surround the whole peninsula. Flambard would be lord of a community comprising castle, abbey, cathedral, and fortified town.

  ‘Right,’ Geoffrey said, turning to mount his warhorse. ‘I suggest we deliver this map to Prior Turgot and head south. This jaunt has delayed our return to the Holy Land by weeks. It is all right for you, Roger – your overlord is in a Turkish prison – but mine is not, and he expects me back.’

  ‘Then you should not have spent so much time trying to work out which one of your family murdered your father,’ said Roger unsympathetically, referring to an incident that had kept Geoffrey in England the previous autumn. ‘I would not have taken so long to discover the truth.’

  ‘Would you not,’ said Geoffrey, thinking that if someone murdered Flambard, Roger would have, quite literally, thousands of suspects to interrogate. The widespread jubilation that would doubtless accompany news of the unpopular bishop’s demise would make the crime – if it could be considered as such – even more difficult to solve.

  ‘We will stay with my sister,’ said Roger, when they eventually reached the flat-bottomed ferry that would carry them across the river. ‘She will enjoy our company.’

  ‘We will not be here long,’ Geoffrey warned. ‘Remember what we agreed: as soon as the map is delivered, we leave.’

  ‘I know, I know,’ said Roger impatiently. He gestured with a brawny arm at the city, causing the boat to rock precariously, so Geoffrey had to clutch at the ferryman to avoid being tipped into the water. ‘But just look at all this, lad. It is God’s own land!’

  ‘Perhaps you should stay, if you feel so strongly about it,’ said Geoffrey. ‘You never did tell me why you joined the Crusade. I had no choice – Tancred wanted to go and I was in his service – but you volunteered.’

  Roger sighed. ‘Just because I admire a chest of gold does not mean to say that I want to live in one. There is plenty for me in the Holy Land yet. There are cities to be looted, and the infidel still infest some of our most sacred places.’

  Once across the river, Geoffrey followed Roger up a steep, rocky path to a formidable stone-built gateway called Owengate. He detected movement through the arrow slits, and knew archers were on duty, ready to fire at anyone who posed a threat. Above them, a covered platform had been constructed to allow defenders to drop missiles on to the heads of anyone attempting to force entry. Geoffrey would not have enjoyed the prospect of storming such a well-defended site.

  ‘I am Sir Roger of Durham,’ proclaimed Roger importantly – unable to claim Flambard as a family name because of his illegitimacy – to the guard inside Owengate who demanded to know his business. ‘I have returned from fighting God’s holy war, and have come to pay my respects to my sister, Eleanor of Durham. Let me in.’


  ‘She is known as Eleanor Stanstede now,’ said the guard cockily.

  Roger appeared to be startled, although whether by the news that his sister had married in his absence or by the guard’s insolence, Geoffrey could not tell. He tensed, ready to grab Roger if he took offence at being so rudely questioned and tried to take the gatehouse single-handed. Geoffrey had not ridden days through snow, rain, and howling winds so Roger could be shot without even being allowed inside.

  ‘How am I supposed to know what my sister has been doing?’ demanded Roger. ‘I have just told you I have been fighting – unlike you, who have doubtless been skulking here with your cronies, like the black-hearted coward you are.’

  Geoffrey’s hand went to the hilt of his sword when the gate was thrown open, and a man strode out. His wariness turned to confusion when the man grinned from ear to ear, and Roger’s scowl disappeared like a puff of smoke in the wind.

  ‘Simon, you scoundrel!’ Roger bellowed, enveloping the guard in a powerful hug. Simon was not a small person, but even so, Roger’s enthusiastic welcome made him wince.

  ‘You villain!’ cried Simon in return. ‘I never expected to see you again.’

  ‘It will take more than a few Saracens to keep me away,’ declared Roger pompously.

  ‘Well, I am delighted to see you,’ said Simon. ‘Although I do not imagine others will feel the same. If you know what is good for you, tread carefully for a while. Some people have long memories.’

  ‘I care nothing for them,’ said Roger disdainfully. ‘And all that is in the past now, anyway.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ asked Geoffrey suspiciously. ‘Did you leave Durham under some kind of cloud? Is this man suggesting you might not be welcome here?’

  ‘No!’ said Roger indignantly. He remembered his manners. ‘This is Sir Geoffrey Mappestone, who comes from near Wales. He is a true friend and a great warrior.’ He pulled Simon close to him, adding a whisper Geoffrey would have been deaf not to hear. ‘I must warn you that he reads.’

  ‘We let the monks do that around here,’ said Simon, eyeing Geoffrey uneasily. ‘There are more than enough of them for that sort of thing.’

  ‘My father has expanded Durham’s monastery recently,’ explained Roger to Geoffrey. ‘He wants it to be massive, and rival places like Peterborough, Winchester, and Ely.’

  ‘Then he should watch himself,’ said Simon. ‘It is unwise to let reading men grow too powerful. Who knows what they might do with their inkwells and their scrolls and their pens?’

  He shot Geoffrey a look that was not entirely friendly. Geoffrey smiled at him, noting the uncanny resemblance between him and Roger. Both had the same deep-set eyes that Geoffrey had noticed in Flambard, and they had broad shoulders and were heavily built. He wondered whether the entire city was populated by the fruits of Flambard’s amorous adventures with seamstresses and maidservants.

  ‘Simon Mainard here took his mother’s name,’ said Roger to Geoffrey. ‘He usually tells people he is our father’s nephew, although we are actually half-brothers.’

  ‘It does not do for a bishop to have too many offspring,’ said Simon with a knowing grin. ‘And I am informed that a bishop’s “nephews” fare much better than those who confess to being his sons.’

  Geoffrey thought it was probably safer for Flambard’s offspring to keep their parentage completely to themselves. Admitting kinship with the devious bishop would not make them popular, and might even be dangerous.

  ‘Never mind that,’ said Roger, draping a thick arm around his half-brother’s shoulders. ‘What is this about our Eleanor? She has married, you say?’

  ‘To Haymo Stanstede. Remember him? He is the town’s spice merchant. Very wealthy. She did well for herself.’

  Roger gazed at him uncertainly. ‘Surely you mean Guy Stanstede? Haymo is old enough to be Methuselah’s grandfather.’

  Simon agreed. ‘But Guy died of a bloody flux last year, and Haymo found himself without an heir. He put about the news that he was available as a husband, with a view to begetting a son. Eleanor decided to accept the challenge, and they were married last summer, although she expected him to be dead within a few months, thus leaving her his fortune. But Haymo is thriving. In fact, he is more vibrant now than he was as a widower. He must be nearing seventy and married life suits him.’

  Roger shuddered. ‘Poor lass, having to endure that coming at her night after night. But I am here now, and will keep her talking late into the night, long after Haymo Stanstede will need to rest his ancient limbs. He will not seduce my sister while I am around.’

  ‘As her spouse, it is his prerogative to seduce her when he likes,’ Simon pointed out. ‘And you should ask her what she wants before you interfere. You know what she can be like.’

  ‘She will welcome rescue,’ declared Roger in a voice that indicated the matter was already settled.

  ‘Where do you plan to stay? With me? I can lodge my pig with a neighbour, and the sty is really quite pleasant once it has been mucked out.’

  ‘No,’ said Roger rudely. ‘I am a Jerosolimitanus and I do not sleep in pigsties.’ He drew himself up to his full height, although the impression of status and wealth he aimed to project was marred by his filthy clothes and the straw that still clung to his surcoat from their bed in a hayloft the previous night. Simon did not notice, and even seemed awed by Roger’s untruthful claims.

  ‘Will you stay with the prior?’ he asked doubtfully, apparently selecting the most auspicious lodgings he could think of. ‘I do not think he will like that very much.’

  ‘Of course not!’ said Roger in disdain. ‘We will stay with Eleanor. She always did keep a cosy house, and it will be even better now, if she lives in Stanstede’s mansion.’

  ‘He still owns the place just off the market square,’ said Simon with a wink. ‘But you cannot take this lot with you. Ellie is very particular about who she lets into her private quarters.’

  He was looking at Geoffrey’s soldiers. Geoffrey understood exactly why he should voice reservations about their imposing themselves on the hospitality of a wealthy lady. They were travel-stained and scruffy, and sported an eccentric array of garments that were a compromise between the armour Geoffrey insisted they wear in case they were attacked, and the additional clothes they had donned to ward off the icy northern winds. They all looked rough and disreputable.

  ‘Can they be lodged in the castle?’ he asked. The other option was a tavern, but he did not want the Littel brothers in a place where they could drink themselves into a state of belligerence, then cause trouble in the town. At least the castle would probably impose some sort of curfew on its guests.

  Simon nodded. ‘Best place for them. And you can leave that here, too, if you like.’ He pointed at Geoffrey’s dog, which was sniffing the air in eager anticipation of unwary chickens to kill. ‘It seems savage, and will not be welcome in a city where livestock roams free.’

  ‘Believe me, Simon, you do not want responsibility for that thing,’ said Roger, regarding the dog with dislike. ‘Let Geoffrey keep it. He can no better control it than anyone else, but at least he has the funds to compensate people for their losses.’ He smiled at Geoffrey. ‘But before we make Ellie’s day by telling her she has guests, I want you to see something.’

  ‘The prior’s house?’ suggested Geoffrey hopefully. ‘It would be good to deliver that map now.’

  ‘Later,’ said Roger.

  ‘Where?’ asked Geoffrey reluctantly. He was tired, dirty, and in no mood to traipse around a city on some tour devised by Roger that would probably include seedy taverns and perhaps even a brothel.

  Roger looked proud. ‘I want you to see our relics – and the shrine my father is building for Aaron’s Rod. Then you will believe me when I say it is coming to Durham.’

  Roger was not easily dissuaded from a course of action once he had decided upon it, and Geoffrey found he had no choice but to follow him and Simon along a path of yellow mud that led to the cathedral. Onc
e he was close, and could see in detail the elegant windows and the intricate decoration on the façade, his irritation evaporated. He gazed at the mighty edifice for some time, before Roger tugged on his sleeve to lead him inside.

  Like many stone churches built by Normans, the interior of Durham cathedral was icy cold. The narrow windows admitted little light, so it was shadowy, too. The walls were vibrant with paintings, some intricate geometrical designs of red and yellow, others depicting fabulous animals from the Bible. Roger hurried Geoffrey through it and out the other side, to where an old wooden church looked decrepit and dirty next to the expanding cathedral. He opened a door that creaked on worn leather hinges and marched down the aisle to the altar, sword clanking against his boots and his footsteps slapping on the flagstones. Geoffrey and Simon followed.

  ‘This will be demolished soon,’ Roger announced, his voice loud in the silence. ‘The Saxons built it when Cuthbert first came to Durham, and his bones have rested here for ages.’

  The altar was made of wood, lovingly carved with scenes from Cuthbert’s life by some long-dead craftsman. Behind it were a series of alcoves, each filled with a box, although one was ominously vacant. Roger pointed to it.

  ‘That is where Aaron’s Rod will rest – assuming, of course, that it will not go directly to the cathedral. Now, that big coffin you can see in the middle is Cuthbert’s. Above him are Ceolwulf, Edbert, and Aidan, while that long casket to the left contains one of Oswald’s arms; the other is in with Cuthbert, of course.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Geoffrey wryly. ‘However, I understood it was Oswald’s head that was in Cuthbert’s coffin, not his arm.’

  ‘You know nothing about this,’ said Roger dismissively. ‘Oswald’s head is …’ He faltered.

  ‘Yes?’ asked Geoffrey.

  ‘Elsewhere,’ Roger concluded mysteriously. ‘It is not here.’

  ‘I see,’ said Geoffrey, assuming that Roger did not know. ‘What about Balthere? I thought his relics were in Durham.’