Then he and Reginald fetch a pail or two of Wear and warm them by the fire. I've worn my clothes so long they cleave to me and fall apart as I am stripped. They scrub me clean as if to lay me in my tomb. They free my hair of knots and comb the cobwebs out. Perkin says they find mouse droppings in it and a spider's nest. They trim my beard. They pare my nails. They sprinkle me with rosewater like a bride and deck me out in garments fresh. I let them set aside my iron vest so I can move more easily, but when they try to place a pair of sandals on my feet, I balk. For fifty years or more I've gone unshod. I won't change now.
They load me on a cart made soft with straw, and Perkin sits astride the mule. Reginald tramps along beside to catch me should the jouncing jounce me off. Snow falls. The sky is grey. The air is damp and chill. On such a day as this, I think, our Savior first saw light while, all about the manger, beasts knelt down to worship him.
When we enter Durham's gate, folk gather in the streets to see me pass. Some ask my blessing, and I raise a hand so milky clean I hardly know it's mine to sign them with the cross. Some snatch at bits of straw as charms against the evil eye. A fat man tries to cut a snippet from my cloak. I catch him in the belly with my heel. Bells ring. Dogs bark. A child makes water in the street. Women lean from windows waving flags.
A blind man in a bonnet, led by friends, begs me to touch his eyes that he may see. I place my thumbs on them. His lids go flitter flutter, but I mark no greater change in him. He gropes to find his friends again. They catch him when he stumbles on a stone. Some bring me gifts. A pot of honey. A kerchief worked in silk. A basket with a guinea fowl that struggles free and flaps off cackling through the air. They shove and stomp to touch my clothes. I close my eyes and pray.
Dear Father, see how these thy children hunger here. They starve for want of what they cannot name. Their poor lost souls are famished. Their foolish hands reach out. Oh grant them richer fare than one old sack of bones whose wits begin to turn. Feed them with something more than Godric here, for Godric's no less starved for thee than they. Have mercy, Lord. Amen.
Flanked by monks, the Bishop waits on the cathedral steps, his mitre white with snow. Reginald and Perkin help me up to him, and when I kneel to kiss his ring, it takes all three to hoist me back upon my feet. Hugh Pudsey's barely old enough to sprout a beard, and yet a bishop and a mighty lord as well.
“It's I should kneel to you,” he says.
I say, “Pray don't, my lord, or we'll spend Christmas bobbing up and down like turnips at the boil.”
The monks have brought a chair with poles to carry me. I haven't been inside since Bishop Flambard's time. The aisles are vaulted now. The nave is done. Thick Norman columns stout enough to hold the welkin up support the high, dim vaulting of the roof. The columns have been carved around with deep cut lines like garlands, serpents, crooked vines, each different from the rest. Behind the altar there's a shrine to shelter Cuthbert's bones they carted here, with many stoppings over many years along the way, from Lindisfarne.
Even the flames of many candles can't light up this awesome dark, nor all the gathered throng of priests and monks and lords and common folk fill up this emptiness. The hooded monks chant psalms as we wend slowly down, but all their voices raised at once are but the rustle of the wind through trees, the call of owls, in this vast wood of stone. The towns the Conqueror razed when he came harrying the north, the crops he burned, the beasts he felled, the Saxon folk he slew, all haunt these Norman Shadows. The silence is the sum of all their voices stilled. As long as these stones stand and this great roof keeps out the rain, Durham's cathedral will be dark with death.
They set my chair down near the altar. Reginald rejoins his fellow monks and takes a choir stall. Perkin stands by me. He whispers in my ear, “If YOU grow weary, tug my sleeve. I'll cart you to a tavern on my back, and there we'll raise a cup to Christ”
I set my finger to my lips and scowl, but I am glad he's there. His face is all aglow with candelight. His eyes are young and Christmas bright. The Christmas mass begins.
“Lux fulgebit hodie!” they sing. “The Lord is born to us! Wonderful shall be his name, and God, the Prince of Peace, the Father of the world to come!” And even as their monkish voices dip and soar like doves, I see with my heart“s eye the steaming dung of beasts, their cloudy breath, the cloddish shepherds at the door. I see the holy mother gazing down, and there among them, in the straw, the freshborn king.
An easy thing it is to love a babe. A babe asks nothing, never chides. A babe is fair to see. A babe is hope for better things to come. All this and more. But babes grow into men at last. That's where it turns a bitter brew. “He hath no form or comeliness,” Isaiah says. “No beauty that we should desire him. A man of sorrows we despise.” Christ minds us to be good, to feed his sheep, take up our cross and follow him with Hell's hot fires if we fail. All this and more our Savior bids when he becomes a man, and to a man we say him nay. Thus when the Bishop tenders me with his own hands Christ's flesh and blood, I slobber them with tears.
“Bear up, old man,” says Perkin in my ear.
But there“s more here than can be borne. The gorgeous robes of priests. The altar all aflame. The clouds of incense rich and sharp. And in the midst old Godric, keeping Christmas, blubbers like a child.
When mass is done, I ask to see Saint Cuthbert's shrine.
“Fifty years ago when Ranulf Flambard brought him here,” Hugh Pudsey says, “they opened up the chest. It was a miracle. Instead of bones and dust inside, they found a body uncorrupt. The joints were flexible, the flesh so succulent it only wanted breath to live again without a soul. Though he'd been dead five hundred years, his very funeral weeds were still so new it was as if death had not even dared to pluck him by the coat.”
The Bishop looks for me to marvel at this wondrous thing, but the miracle of flesh unspoiled by death looks small beside the miracle of that pure soul unspoiled by life who came to me with Glythwin in his arms on Fame.
On the way home, I see another grave that moves me more. This grave is Burcwen's.
There is no stone to mark it, but a nun who'd been her friend shows us the way. It lies within the convent wall. A holly tree grows near. I stand with Reginald and Perkin, one on each side, to prop me up. My fine clean clothes aren't half as warm as rags. My old bones rattle. There are snowflakes in the air.
“She lived and died a maiden chaste,” says Reginald. “And now through all eternity she'll sing with other virgins at the throne of grace.”
“Poor heart,” I say, “if that's the case, she's doomed to die a second death of weariness. She never cared for virgins worth a fig. Besides, she never held a tune.”
“How did she come to die? ” asks Reginald so he can write it in his book.
“She died of that which slays us all,” I say. “They call it life. Be off! Leave me to speak with her a while.”
They both withdraw a pace or two and turn their backs. Outside the wall, I hear the harness of the mule. A grey squirrel flicks his tail at me, then flees.
I say, “Well, Burcwen, it's been many years. You'd never know me now. Yet I have not forgotten you nor ever shall. How often I think back upon that night you came. The years have sieved the darkness and the shame so much away that most of what is left is light. Have you and William met in Paradise, and has he pardoned us? Have angels taught him to be still at last Give him my love if he'll take such a gift from me. And you I send a holy kiss. How old I've grown! I sometimes think that I'm already dead and only dream I live. If God is good, it won't be long. Oh pray for me that often prays for you. Know peace at last, my dear.”
“You'll catch your death,” says Perkin. Then they take and cart me home to where, as things turn out, my death comes close to catching me. It happens thus.
Unseen by us, four Scottish brigands trail us through the wood. When we reach home and fall asleep, they fall on us and tie us fast with rope. Perkin's mouth and Reginald's they stuff with straw against their crying out.
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“We know that you've got treasure here,” the leader says. “If you won't show us where it's hid, we'll beat you till you tell.”
The weariness and terror of my flesh have struck me dumb. I can't get out a word. I lie there like a heap of rags. They curse at me. They pound me with their fists. They kick me sore. At last I swoon.
When I come to, it's daylight. They have gone. My cup and bowl lie broken on the floor. Before they left, they pissed the fire out. They've slit my heifer's throat for spite. Perkin soothes my wounds with flax. Reginald kneels by me and weeps. My speech comes haltingly.
“Did they but know,” I say, “the only treasure old men have lies buried deep in graves.” Perkin says, “You're tough, old man. You'll live another hundred year for sure.”
I say, “Though I deserve it, God would never be so cruel.”
So Christmas comes and Christmas goes, and the world the holy child is born to rests, as ever, full of dark so deep that all the Norman bishops in the land with all their candles aren't enough to drive it back an inch.
How Godric kept Saint Giles's door and went to school.
“HOW old were you when Elric died?” asks Reginald.
“Buck, buck, begawk,” I cackle. I flap my arms like wings. “If years were eggs, by then I'd laid some forty odd.”
Reginald shuts his eyes to work his sum. He counts out on his fingers. “So Henry the First was king,” he says. How pleased he is to know.
“Cockadoodledoo!” I crow. “The wisest thing that old cock ever did was clap Ralph Flambard in the Tower. I've heard it from his own lips how he got away. He made his jailers drunk, then took a rope his friends had sent him in a cask of wine and swung down from his window like a mitred ape. They say his mother was a one eyed witch.”
“But Henry lived to pardon him and give him Durham back,” says Reginald.
I say, “Thus apes are always kind to apes.”
Monk Reginald heaves a sigh. “Bishop Flambard, Father, was ever kind to you,” he chides. It gives him cramps when folk speak ill of kings and bishops, so I speak more.
“It's as I say,” say I. “All apes are brothers. They scratch each other with their tails.”
“Didn't Flambard give you leave to make your cell at Finchale here ” he says.
Finchale is the name by which these woods of Wear are known. It rhymes with wrinkle, which is just. Had I a coin for every wrinkle that I've minted here, I'd be as rich as I am rucked.
“It's true,” I say. “Finchale's part of the rich lands he owned as shepherd of the poor. He and his tonsured monks had godly sport here riding after stag and boar. He'd brain them with his bishop's crook, they say, and strangle with his stole.”
“Yet of the goodness of his heart, he gave this place to you,” says Reginald.
I say, “Perhaps he sought to make amends for how he dealt with me at Bishop's Lynn.” Reginald knits his brow. He sucks his quill. “Bishop Flambard. . .? Bishop's Lynn. . .?” He blushes like a backward lad in school.
“You dunce! You monk!” I cry. “Is your life of Godric then so dull and dry you've dozed through it yourself ” He hangs his head.
I say, “In Bishop's Lynn it was this selfsame Ranulf Flambard, Ralph the Torch, that fired me forth when I was peddling martyr's blood. He burned so hot for William Rufus then, he feared my trade might cost the king some rewish geese that laid him golden eggs.”
“Pardon, Father,” Reginald says. “I do remember now.”
Then all at once I rue what I have said. “My tongue has been my only blade so long, it's over sharp,” I say. “Pay me no mind. Ask on.”
He smiles so gratefully I see that by my churlishness, then asking pardon afterward, I've only made him love me more, alas.
“When Elric died, the Lord led you to Flambard next and thence to Wear ” he said.
I say, “Not right at once. The Lord was in no haste. He let me daily on the way.”
Reginald dips his quill. He says, “Good Father, where was that?”
“Good son,” I say, “I went to school.”
He thinks I jest. The truth is it's the first time since he came that I've been grave.
From Wulsingham, where Elric made his cairn, I wandered north to the parish of Saint Giles, and who should be the priest there but a kinsman of Tom Ball! He even looked like Ball a bit. He had no eye like Ball's that skewed off on a starboard tack, but he was just as fat and slow and damp with sweat. He even knew the manor of my lord. His name was Littlefair. His wife, whose name was Joan, was deaf, and he so used to shouting in her ear he near to deafened all the world as well. His mildest words would set cups jigging on the shelf.
“Friend Godric!” he said. “In memory of my cousin Ball, stay here with us! Saint Giles could use a man like you to ring his bells and keep his door! You'll dwell beneath our roof! Why not? My Joan will feed you for your pains!” He clapped me on the back, his cheeks so flushed with kindliness I had no choice but answer yes.
Littlefair was great of heart. My tasks were many, but he used me well. I'd sit within Saint Giles's porch to mark who entered and who left. I kept a watch for thieves who lusted for Saint Giles's plate. When poor folk came for alms, I'd go fetch Littlefair, who like as not roared counsels in their ear but gave them pence as well. Or I'd get Joan, who read their hunger on their lips and gave them bread.
I saw to it the stoup was filled for christening. Many's the wedding that I swept the door, and when folk breathed their last, I tolled their knell. For this it was Great Bess I rang. She was as big around as Littlefair himself and six times louder. What a voice! She filled the neighboring air with slow paced notes so stately, deep, and clear the dead marched with a prouder step to Paradise. Yet at great feasts, with Digory and Little Will to chime her to a fit, she sang for joy.
It also fell to me to tend the lads who sang at mass lest, left alone, they'd tear Saint Giles to bits. They chirped and fought like sparrows in a trap. They'd steal up with their candles from behind and drop hot tallow on bald pates. At Pentecost they brought a cage of mice. They set them free. The women shrieked and held their skirts. One whiskered villain ran off with a morsel of the Host and scuttled up a drain. They puffed their cheeks with air and mocked at Littlefair behind his back or cupped their ears like loan and hooted out, “How's that again!” I caught them once at unclean acts behind the crypt. And yet it was like angels when they sang!
Their high pitched voices rose as pure and cool as stone. If sound were something you could see, you'd say they filled Saint Giles with shafts of silver light. And sure it was, it filled your eyes with silver tears to hear them sing the psalms.
Although I thrashed them many times, they seemed to like me well enough. At least they liked the tales I told of sailing on the Saint Esprit with Mouse. Their eyes grew wide to hear how we had broken through the Turkish fleet at Jaffa with a royal king aboard. I told them about Falkes de Granvill too. I made no mention how he cropped the poor or cruelly used his Saxon wife or hanged that wretch for stealing eggs. Instead, I merely spoke of all the wealth and castles that he owned, his stables and his mews, and in the greenwood how he glittered hunting stag. Of Elric too i told them but without his fiends, and how I went to Rome but nothing of the beggars or the stench. How seemly is a life when told to children thus, with all the grief and ugliness snipped out. I suppose it's how monk Reginald will tell of mine.
They knew I was unlettered, and a boy named Gilbert with a freckled face took pity on my shame. “Master Godric,” he said, “why don't you come and learn with us? At Saint Mary le Bow in Durham, the monks keep school. Perhaps they'll teach you too. Why don't you ask?” I said I would.
Littlefair put in a word for me as well. He told them we were cousins. He said I was a man who'd seen the world and sought my betterment. He said I'd lived with Elric, for they knew his fame, and was given much to fasting and to prayer. He told them too I'd help keep order when the lads went mad. They said they'd ask the bishop then, and thus, though we'd as
yet not seen each other with our eyes, my path and Flambard's crossed again. I went to school.
I learned my letters from a cross where they were written underneath a shield of horn. I learned to scratch my name in wax. Each day the monks would ask us, “Who are you before me here?” and we'd chant back, “Nos pueri.” We are boys. And what a boy I was with grizzled hair and beard to match, my face all rough from years at sea, and yet the dullest of the lot. But Gilbert helped me. I worked hard. Day after day we'd chant the psalms in Latin till I knew them all, together with the great Te Deum, Nunc Dimittis, and the Creed.
I learned the Pater Noster too, but kneeling by my cot at night, I always prayed it in our own rude tongue. Father in Heaven, holy one, come be our king that we may do thy will below as they above. As often as I said it too, I thought of Aedlward and prayed by now he'd climbed his ladder to the topmost rung so both my fathers might dwell side by side in Paradise.
One day in summer Bishop Flambard came, as was his wont from time to time, to see the school. Saint Mary le Bow was all agog. The floor was freshly swept and scrubbed, the holy vessels shined. Littlefair and Joan tramped from Saint Giles a mile or so away. Saint Mary's priest went clucking everywhere lest something go awry. The monks lined up the dozen lads they taught, and I stood off a bit apart for fear the sight of one old bull among so many calves might make folk laugh.
Then Flambard entered, taller by a head at least than any there. His hair was flaming red. He reeked of wine. To my astonishment I was the one he came to first. He took my hand in his. He said, “I started low like you and ended high. I doff my cap to any man who seeks the same.”
Then I knelt down and kissed the ring of him who back in William Redhead's time was the mightiest man in England save the king, and feared and hated still. When Flambard was Lord Chancellor, they say, all justice slept and money ruled the land. Perhaps it did. I only know that with a hand beneath my chin, he raised me up and smiled.
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