World Without End

Most ingenious was the system Merthin had devised for moving the raft from one bank to the other. A long rope ran from the south end of the raft across the river, around a post, back across the river, around a drum and back to the raft, where it was attached again at the north end. The drum was co

“It’s quite simple,” Merthin said when she marvelled at it – and it was, when she looked closely. The lever simply lifted one large cog wheel up out of the chain and moved into its place two smaller wheels, the effect being to reverse the direction in which the drum turned. All the same, no one in Kingsbridge had seen anything like it.

During the course of the morning, half the town came to look at Merthin’s amazing new machine. Caris was bursting with pride in him. Elfric stood by, explaining the mechanism to anyone who asked, taking the credit for Merthin’s work.

Caris wondered where Elfric got the nerve. He had destroyed Merthin’s door – an act of violence that would have scandalized the town, had it not been overtaken by the greater tragedy of the bridge collapse. He had beaten Merthin with a stick, and Merthin still had the bruise on his face. And he had colluded in a deception intended to make Merthin marry Griselda and raise another man’s child. Merthin had continued to work with him, feeling that the emergency outweighed their quarrel. But Caris did not know how Elfric could continue to hold his head up.

The ferry was brilliant – but inadequate.

Edmund pointed this out. On the far side of the river, carts and traders were queuing all along the road through the suburbs as far as the eye could see.

“It would go faster with two oxen,” Merthin said.

“Twice as fast?”

“Not quite, no. I could build another ferry.”

“There’s already a second one,” Edmund said, pointing. He was right: Ian Boatman was rowing foot passengers across. Ian could not take carts, he refused livestock and he charged two pence. Normally he had trouble scraping a living: he took a monk across to Leper Island twice a day and found little other business. But today he, too, had a queue.

Merthin said: “Well, you’re right. In the end, a ferry is not a bridge.”

“This is a catastrophe,” Edmund said. “Buonaventura’s news was bad enough. But this – this could kill the town.”

“Then you must have a new bridge.”

“It’s not me, it’s the priory. The prior is dead, and there’s no telling how long they will take to elect a new one. We’ll just have to pressure the acting prior to make a decision. I’ll go and see Carlus now. Come with me, Caris.”

They walked up the street and entered the priory. Most visitors had to go to the hospital and tell one of the servants that they wanted to speak to a monk; but Edmund was too important a personage, and too proud, to beg the favour of an audience in that way. The prior was lord of Kingsbridge, but Edmund was alderman of the guild, leader of the merchants who made the town what it was, and he treated the prior as a partner in the governance of the town. Besides, for the last thirteen years the prior had been his younger brother. So he went straight to the prior’s house on the north side of the cathedral.

It was a timber-framed house like Edmund’s, with a hall and a parlour on the ground floor and two bedrooms upstairs. There was no kitchen, for the prior’s meals were prepared in the monastery kitchen. Many bishops and priors lived in palaces – and the bishop of Kingsbridge had a fine place in Shiring – but the prior of Kingsbridge lived modestly. However, the chairs were comfortable, the wall was hung with tapestries of Bible scenes, and there was a big fireplace to keep the house cosy in winter.

Caris and Edmund arrived mid-morning, the time when younger monks were supposed to labour, and their elders to read. Edmund and Caris found Blind Carlus in the hall of the prior’s house, deep in conversation with Simeon, the treasurer. “We must talk about the new bridge,” Edmund said immediately.

“Very well, Edmund,” Carlus said, recognizing him by his voice. The welcome was not warm, Caris noted, and she wondered if they had come at a bad time.

Edmund was just as sensitive as she to atmosphere, but he always blustered through. Now he took a chair and said: “When do you think you’ll hold the election for the new prior?”

“You can sit down too, Caris,” said Carlus. She had no idea how he knew she was there. “No date has been set for the election,” he went on. “Earl Roland has the right to nominate a candidate, but he has not yet recovered consciousness.”

“We can’t wait,” Edmund said. Caris thought he was being too abrupt, but this was his way, so she said nothing. “We have to start work on the new bridge right away,” her father continued. “Timber’s no good, we have to build in stone. It’s going to take three years – four, if we delay.”

“A stone bridge?”

“It’s essential. I’ve been talking to Elfric and Merthin. Another wooden bridge would fall down like the old.”

“But the cost!”

“About two hundred and fifty pounds, depending on the design. That’s Elfric’s calculation.”

Brother Simeon said: “A new wooden bridge would cost fifty pounds, and Prior Anthony rejected that a week ago because of the price.”

“And look at the result! A hundred people dead, many more injured, livestock and carts lost, the prior dead and the earl at death’s door.”

Carlus said stiffly: “I hope you don’t mean to blame all that on the late Prior Anthony.”

“We can’t pretend his decision worked out well.”

“God has punished us for sin.”

Edmund sighed. Caris felt frustrated. Whenever they were in the wrong, monks would bring God into the argument. Edmund said: “It is hard for us mere men to know God’s intentions. But one thing we do know is that, without a bridge, this town will die. We’re already losing out to Shiring. Unless we build a new stone bridge as fast as we possibly can, Kingsbridge will soon become a small village.”

“That may be God’s plan for us.”

Edmund began to show his exasperation. “Is it possible that God is so displeased with you monks? For, believe me, if the Fleece Fair and the Kingsbridge market die, there will not be a priory here with twenty-five monks and forty nuns and fifty employees, and a hospital and a choir and a school. There may not be a cathedral, either. The bishop of Kingsbridge has always lived in Shiring – what if the prosperous merchants there offer to build him a splendid new cathedral in their own town, out of the profits from their ever-growing market? No Kingsbridge market, no town, no cathedral, no priory – is that what you want?”

Carlus looked dismayed. Clearly it had not occurred to him that the long-term consequences of the bridge collapse could actually affect the status of the priory.

But Simeon said: “If the priory can’t afford to build a wooden bridge, there’s certainly no prospect of a stone one.”

“But you must!”

“Will the masons work free?”

“Certainly not. They have to feed their families. But we’ve already explained how the townspeople could raise the money and lend it to the priory against the security of the bridge tolls.”

“And take away our income from the bridge!” Simeon said indignantly. “You’re back to that swindle, are you?”

Caris put in: “You’ve got no bridge tolls at all, now.”

“On the contrary, we’re collecting fares on the ferry.”

“You found the money to pay Elfric for that.”

“A lot less than a bridge – and even so it emptied our coffers.”

“The fares will never amount to much – the ferry is too slow.”