World Without End

by Ken Follett

  "Anyway, it's not possible to build vaulting without formwork."

  "Yes, it is," Merthin said. "There's a method--"

  "That's enough," Elfric said. "You're here to learn, not teach."

  Godwyn put in: "Just a minute, Elfric. If the boy is right, it could save the priory a lot of money." He looked at Merthin. "What were you going to say?"

  Merthin was half wishing he had not raised this subject. There would be hell to pay later. But he was committed now. If he backed off, they would think he did not know what he was talking about. "It's described in a book in the monastery library, and it's very simple," he said. "As each stone is laid, a rope is draped over it. One end of the rope is tied to the wall, the other weighted with a lump of wood. The rope forms a right angle over the edge of the stone, and keeps it from slipping off its bed of mortar and falling to the ground."

  There was a moment of silence as they all concentrated, trying to visualize the arrangements. Then Thomas nodded. "It could work," he said.

  Elfric looked furious.

  Godwyn was intrigued. "What book is this?"

  "It's called Timothy's Book," Merthin told him.

  "I know of it, but I've never studied it. Obviously I should." Godwyn addressed the others. "Have we seen enough?"

  Elfric and Thomas nodded. As the four men left the roof space, Elfric muttered to Merthin: "Do you realize you've just talked yourself out of several weeks' work? You won't do that when you're your own master, I'll bet."

  Merthin had not thought of that. Elfric was right: by proving that formwork was unnecessary, he had also done himself out of a job. But there was something badly wrong with Elfric's way of thinking. It was unfair to allow someone to spend money unnecessarily, just to keep yourself in work. Merthin did not want to live by cheating people.

  They went down the spiral staircase into the chancel. Elfric said to Godwyn: "I'll come to you tomorrow with a price for the work."

  "Good."

  Elfric turned to Merthin. "You stay here and count the stones in an aisle vault. Bring me the answer at home."

  "Yes."

  Elfric and Godwyn left, but Thomas lingered. "I got you into trouble," he said.

  "You were trying to boost me."

  The monk shrugged and made a what-can-you-do gesture with his right arm. His left arm had been amputated at the elbow ten years ago, after infection set in to the wound he received in the fight Merthin had witnessed.

  Merthin hardly ever thought about that strange scene in the forest--he had become used to Thomas in a monk's robe--but he recalled it now: the men-at-arms, the children hiding in the bush, the bow and arrow, the buried letter. Thomas was always kind to him, and he guessed it was because of what happened that day. "I've never told anyone about that letter," he said quietly.

  "I know," Thomas replied. "If you had, you'd be dead."

  Most large towns were run by a guild merchant, an organization of the leading citizens. Under the guild merchant were numerous craft guilds, each dedicated to a particular trade: masons, carpenters, leather tanners, weavers, tailors. Then there were the parish guilds, small groups centered on local churches, formed to raise money for priestly robes and sacred ornaments, and for the support of widows and orphans.

  Cathedral towns were different. Kingsbridge, like St. Albans and Bury St. Edmunds, was ruled by the monastery, which owned almost all the land in and around the town. The priors had always refused permission for a guild merchant. However, the most important craftsmen and traders belonged to the parish guild of St. Adolphus. No doubt this had started out, in the distant past, as a pious group that raised money for the cathedral, but it was now the most important organization in town. It made rules for the conduct of business, and elected an alderman and six wardens to enforce them. In the guildhall were kept the measures that standardized the weight of a woolsack, the width of a bolt of cloth, and the volume of a bushel for all Kingsbridge trade. Nevertheless, the merchants could not hold courts and dispense justice the way they did in borough towns--the Kingsbridge prior retained those powers for himself.

  On the afternoon of Whitsunday, the parish guild gave a banquet at the guildhall for the most important visiting buyers. Edmund Wooler was the alderman, and Caris went with him to be hostess, so Merthin had to amuse himself without her.

  Fortunately, Elfric and Alice were also at the banquet, so he could sit in the kitchen, listening to the rain and thinking. The weather was not cold, but there was a small fire for cooking, and its red glow was cheerful.

  He could hear Elfric's daughter, Griselda, moving about upstairs. It was a fine house, although smaller than Edmund's. There was just a hall and a kitchen downstairs. The staircase led to an open landing, where Griselda slept, and a closed bedroom for the master and his wife. Merthin slept in the kitchen.

  There had been a time, three or four years ago, when Merthin had been tormented at night by fantasies of climbing the stairs and slipping under the blankets next to Griselda's warm, plump body. But she considered herself superior to him, treating him like a servant, and she had never given him the least encouragement.

  Sitting on a bench, Merthin looked into the fire and visualized the wooden scaffolding he would build for the masons who would reconstruct the collapsed vaulting in the cathedral. Wood was expensive, and long tree trunks were rare--the owners of woodland usually yielded to the temptation of selling the timber before it was fully mature. So builders tried to minimize the amount of scaffolding. Rather than build it up from floor level, they saved timber by suspending it from the existing walls.

  While he was thinking, Griselda came into the kitchen and took a cup of ale from the barrel. "Would you like some?" she said. Merthin accepted, amazed by her courtesy. She surprised him again by sitting on a stool opposite him to drink.

  Griselda's paramour, Thurstan, had disappeared three weeks ago. No doubt she now felt lonely, which would be why she wanted Merthin's company. The drink warmed his stomach and relaxed him. Searching for something to say, he asked: "What happened to Thurstan?"

  She tossed her head like a frisky mare. "I told him I didn't want to marry him."

  "Why not?"

  "He's too young for me."

  That did not sound right to Merthin. Thurstan was seventeen, Griselda twenty, but Griselda was not notably mature. More likely, he thought, Thurstan was too low-class. He had arrived in Kingsbridge from nowhere a couple of years ago and had worked as an unskilled laborer for several of the town's craftsmen. He had probably got bored, with Griselda or with Kingsbridge, and simply moved on.

  "Where did he go?"

  "I don't know, and I don't care. I should marry someone my own age, someone with a sense of responsibility--perhaps a man who could take over my father's enterprise one day."

  It occurred to Merthin that she might mean him. Surely not, he thought; she's always looked down on me. Then she got up from her stool and came and sat on the bench beside him.

  "My father is spiteful to you," she said. "I've always thought that."

  Merthin was astonished. "Well, it's taken you long enough to say so--I've been living here six and a half years."

  "It's hard for me to go against my family."

  "Why is he so vile to me, anyway?"

  "Because you think you know better than him, and you can't hide it."

  "Maybe I do know better."

  "See what I mean?"

  He laughed. It was the first time she had ever made him laugh.

  She shifted closer on the bench, so that her thigh in the woolen dress was pressed against his. He was in his worn linen shirt, which came to mid-thigh, with the undershorts that all men wore, but he could feel the warmth of her body through their clothes. What had brought this on? He looked incredulously at her. She had glossy dark hair and brown eyes. Her face was attractive in a fleshy way. She had a nice mouth for kissing.

  She said: "I like being indoors in a rainstorm. It feels cozy."

  He felt himself becoming aroused,
and looked away from her. What would Caris think, he asked himself, if she walked in here now? He tried to quell his desire, but that only made it worse.

  He looked back at Griselda. Her lips were moist and slightly parted. She leaned toward him. He kissed her. Immediately, she thrust her tongue into his mouth. It was a sudden, shocking intimacy that he found thrilling, and he responded in the same way. This was not like kissing Caris--

  That thought arrested him. He tore himself away from Griselda and stood up.

  She said: "What's the matter?"

  He did not want to tell her the truth, so he said: "You never seemed to like me."

  She looked annoyed. "I've told you, I had to side with my father."

  "You've changed very suddenly."

  She stood up and moved toward him. He stepped away until his back was to the wall. She took his hand and pressed it to her bosom. Her breasts were round and heavy, and he could not resist the temptation to feel them. She said: "Have you ever done it--the real thing--with a girl?"

  He found he could not speak, but he nodded.

  "Have you thought about doing it with me?"

  "Yes," he managed.

  "You can do it to me now, if you like, while they're out. We can go upstairs and lie on my bed."

  "No."

  She pressed her body to his. "Kissing you has made me go all hot and slippery inside."

  He pushed her away. The shove was rougher than he intended, and she fell backward, landing on her well-cushioned bottom. "Leave me alone," he said.

  He was not sure he meant it, but she took him at his word. "Go to hell, then," she swore. She got to her feet and stomped upstairs.

  He stayed where he was, panting. Now that he had rejected her, he regretted it.

  Apprentices were not very attractive to young women, who did not want to be forced to wait years before marrying. All the same, Merthin had courted several Kingsbridge girls. One, Kate Brown, had been sufficiently fond of him to let him go all the way, one warm summer afternoon a year ago, in her father's orchard. Then her father had died suddenly, and her mother had taken the family to live in Portsmouth. It was the only time Merthin had lain with a woman. Was he mad to turn down Griselda's offer?

  He told himself he had had a lucky escape. Griselda was a mean-spirited girl who did not really like him. He should be proud of having resisted temptation. He had not followed his instinct like a dumb beast; he had made a decision, like a man.

  Then Griselda started to cry.

  Her weeping was not loud, but all the same he could hear everything. He went to the back door. Like every house in town, Elfric's had a long, narrow strip of land at the back with a privy and a rubbish dump. Most householders kept chickens and a pig, and grew vegetables and fruits, but Elfric's yard was used to store stacks of lumber and stones, coils of rope, buckets and barrows and ladders. Merthin stared at the rain falling on the yard, but Griselda's sobbing still reached his ears.

  He decided to leave the house, and got as far as the front door, but then he could not think where to go. At Caris's house there was only Petranilla, who would not welcome him. He thought of going to his parents, but they were the last people he wanted to see when he was in this state. He could have talked to his brother, but Ralph was not due to arrive in Kingsbridge until later in the week. Besides, he realized, he could not leave the house without a coat--not because of the rain, he did not mind getting wet, but because of the bulge in front of his clothing that would not subside.

  He tried to think of Caris. She would be sipping wine, he thought, and eating roast beef and wheat bread. He asked himself what she was wearing. Her best dress was a soft pinkish red with a square-cut neckline that showed off the pale skin of her slender neck. But Griselda's crying kept intruding on his thoughts. He wanted to comfort her, to tell her he was sorry to make her feel spurned, and explain to her that she was an attractive person but they were not right for one another.

  He sat down, then stood up again. It was hard to listen to a woman in distress. He could not think about scaffolding while that sound filled the house. Can't stay, can't leave, can't sit still.

  He went upstairs.

  She was lying facedown on the straw-filled palliasse that was her bed. Her dress was rucked up around her chubby thighs. The skin on the back of her legs was very white and looked soft.

  "I'm sorry," he said.

  "Go away."

  "Don't cry."

  "I hate you."

  He knelt down and patted her back. "I can't sit in the kitchen and listen to you crying."

  She rolled over and looked at him, her face wet with tears. "I'm ugly and fat, and you hate me."

  "I don't hate you." He wiped her wet cheeks with the back of his hand.

  She took his wrist and drew him to her. "Don't you? Truly?"

  "No. But..."

  She put her hand behind his head, pulled him down, and kissed him. He groaned, more aroused than ever. He lay beside her on the mattress. I will leave her in a moment, he told himself. I'll just comfort her a little more, then I'll get up and go down the stairs.

  She took his hand and pushed it up her skirt, placing it between her legs. He felt the wiry hair, the soft skin beneath, and the moist divide, and he knew he was lost. He stroked her roughly, his finger slipping inside. He felt as if he would burst. "I can't stop," he said.

  "Quickly," she said, panting. She pulled up his shirt and pushed down his drawers, and he rolled onto her.

  He felt himself losing control as she guided him inside her. The remorse hit him before it was over. "Oh, no," he said. The explosion began with his first thrust, and in an instant it was finished. He slumped on top of her, his eyes closed. "Oh, God," he said. "I wish I was dead."

  7

  Buonaventura Caroli made his shocking announcement at breakfast on Monday, the day after the big banquet at the guildhall.

  Caris felt a little unwell as she took her seat at the oak table in the dining hall of her father's house. She had a headache and a touch of nausea. She ate a small dish of warm bread-and-milk to settle her stomach. Recalling that she had enjoyed the wine at the banquet, she wondered whether she had drunk too much of it. Was this the morning-after feeling that men and boys joked about when they boasted how much strong drink they could take?

  Father and Buonaventura were eating cold mutton, and Aunt Petranilla was telling a story. "When I was fifteen, I was betrothed to a nephew of the earl of Shiring," she said. "It was considered a good match: his father was a knight of the middling sort, and mine a wealthy wool merchant. Then the earl and his only son both died in Scotland, at the battle of Loudon Hill. My fiance, Roland, became the earl--and broke off the engagement. He is still the earl today. If I had married Roland before the battle, I would now be the countess of Shiring." She dipped toast in her ale.

  "Perhaps it was not the will of God," said Buonaventura. He threw a bone to Scrap, who pounced on it as if she had not seen food for a week. Then he said to Papa: "My friend, there is something I should tell you before we begin the day's business."

  Caris felt, from his tone of voice, that he had bad news; and her father must have had the same intuition, for he said: "This sounds ominous."

  "Our trade has been shrinking for the last few years," Buonaventura went on. "Each year my family sells a little less cloth, each year we buy a little less wool from England."

  "Business is always like that," said Edmund. "It goes up, it goes down, no one knows why."

  "But now your king has interfered."

  It was true. Edward III had seen the money being made in wool and had decided that more of it must go to the crown. He had introduced a new tax of one pound per woolsack. A sack was standardized at 364 pounds weight and sold for about four pounds in money; so the extra tax was a quarter of the value of the wool, a huge slice.

  Buonaventura went on: "What is worse, he has made it difficult to export wool from England. I have had to pay large bribes."

  "The ban on exports will be
lifted shortly," Edmund said. "The merchants of the Wool Company in London are negotiating with royal officials--"

  "I hope you are right," Buonaventura said. "But, with things as they are, my family feels I no longer need to visit two separate wool fairs in this part of the country."

  "Quite right!" said Edmund. "Come here, and forget about the Shiring fair."

  The town of Shiring was two days' travel from Kingsbridge. It was about the same size, and while it did not have a cathedral or a priory, it boasted the sheriff's castle and the county court. It held a rival wool fair once a year.

  "I'm afraid I can't find the range of wool here. You see, the Kingsbridge Fleece Fair seems to be declining. More and more sellers go to Shiring. Their fair offers a greater variety of types and qualities."

  Caris was dismayed. This could be disastrous for her father. She put in: "Why would sellers prefer Shiring?"

  Buonaventura shrugged. "The guild merchant there has made the fair attractive. There's no long queue to enter the city gate; the dealers can hire tents and booths; there's a wool exchange building where everyone can do business when it rains like this..."

  "We could do all that," she said.

  Her father snorted. "If only."

  "Why not, Papa?"

  "Shiring is an independent borough, with a royal charter. The merchant guild there has the power to organize things for the benefit of the wool merchants. Kingsbridge belongs to the priory--"

  Petranilla put in: "For the glory of God."

  "No doubt," Edmund said. "But our parish guild can't do anything without the priory's approval--and priors are cautious and conservative people, my brother being no exception. The upshot is that most improvement plans get rejected."

  Buonaventura went on: "Because of my family's long association with you, Edmund, and your father before you, we have continued to come to Kingsbridge; but in hard times we can't afford to be sentimental."

  "Then let me ask you a small favor, for the sake of that long association," Edmund said. "Don't make a final decision yet. Keep an open mind."

  That was clever, Caris thought. She was struck--as she often was--by how shrewd her father could be in a negotiation. He did not argue that Buonaventura should reverse his decision, for that would just make him dig his heels in. The Italian was much more likely to agree not to make the decision final. That committed him to nothing, but left the door open.