Page 201 of The Evening and the Morning

“Abbot Osmund is dead.”

Aldred crossed himself and said: “May his soul rest in peace.”

“Hildred has been made abbot.”

“That was quick.”

“Bishop Wynstan insisted on an immediate election, which he oversaw.”

Wynstan had made sure that his preferred candidate won, and had then ratified the monks’ decision. In theory, both the archbishop and the king had a say in the appointment, but it would be difficult now for them to overturn Wynstan’s fait accompli.

Aldred said: “How do you know all this?”

“Archdeacon Degbert brought the news to the priory. I think he was hoping to tell you himself. Especially the part about the money.”

Aldred had a bad feeling. “Go on.”

“Hildred has canceled the abbey’s subsidy to our priory. From now on we must manage on whatever sums we can raise for ourselves, or close down.”

That was a blow. Aldred was suddenly grateful for Deorman’s three pounds. It meant the priory was not in danger of immediate closure.

He said to Godleof: “Get yourself something to eat. We should leave as soon as possible.”

They sat on the ground beside the oak tree that gave the house its name. While Godleof ate bread and cheese and drank a pot of ale, Aldred brooded. There were advantages to the new arrangement, he told himself. The priory would now be independent, in practice: the abbot could no longer control it by threatening to cut off funds—that was an arrow that could be shot only once. Aldred would now ask the archbishop of Canterbury for a charter that would make the priory’s independence official.

However, Deorman’s gift would not last forever, and Aldred’s search for some means of financial security was now urgent. What could he do?

Most monasteries depended on the accumulation of wealth from numerous donations. Some had large flocks of sheep, some drew rents from villages and towns, some owned fisheries and quarries. For three years Aldred had worked tirelessly to attract such gifts, and his success had been no more than modest.

His mind strayed to Winchester and Saint Swithin, who had beenbishop there in the ninth century. Swithin had worked a miracle on the bridge over the Itchen River. Taking pity on a poor woman who had dropped her basket of eggs, he had made the smashed eggs whole again. His tomb in the cathedral was a popular destination for pilgrims. Sick people experienced miraculous cures there. The pilgrims donated money to the cathedral. They also bought souvenirs, lodged in alehouses owned by the monks, and generally brought prosperity to the town. The monks spent the profits enlarging the church so that it could accommodate more pilgrims, who brought more money.

Many churches possessed holy relics: the whited bones of a saint, a splintered piece of the True Cross, a worn square of ancient cloth miraculously imprinted with the face of Christ. Provided the monks managed their affairs shrewdly—making sure pilgrims were welcomed, placing the sacred objects in an impressive shrine, publicizing miracles—the relics would attract pilgrims who would bring prosperity to the town and to the monastery.

Unfortunately, Dreng’s Ferry had no relics.

Such things could be bought, but Aldred did not have enough money. Would anyone give him something so valuable? He thought of Glastonbury Abbey.

He had been a novice at Glastonbury, and knew that the abbey had such a large collection of relics that the sacrist, Brother Theodric, did not know what to do with them all.

He began to feel excited.

The abbey had the grave of Saint Patrick, patron saint of Ireland, and twenty-two complete skeletons of other saints. The abbot would not give Aldred a priceless complete skeleton, but the abbey also owned numerous odd bones and scraps of clothing, one of thebloodstained arrows that had killed Saint Sebastian, and a sealed jug of wine from the wedding at Cana. Would Aldred’s old friends take pity on him? He had left Glastonbury in disgrace, of course, but that had been a long time ago. Monks generally sided with monks against bishops, and no one liked Wynstan: there was a chance, Aldred decided with mounting optimism.

Anyway, he had no better ideas.

Godleof finished his meal and took his wooden tankard back into the alehouse. Coming out, he said: “So, are we heading back to Dreng’s Ferry?”

“Change of plan,” said Aldred. “I’ll accompany you part of the way—then I’m going to Glastonbury.”

He was not prepared for the intense wave of nostalgia that overwhelmed him when he came in sight of the place where he had spent his adolescence.

He crested a low hill and looked down on a flat, swampy plain, green with spring foliage interlaced with pools and runnels that glinted in the sun. To the north a canal five yards wide came arrow straight along the gently sloping hillside and ended in a wharf at a marketplace bright with bales of red cloth and truckles of yellow cheese and stacks of green cabbages.

Edgar had questioned Aldred closely about this canal, severely taxing Aldred’s memory, before beginning construction of the canal at Outhenham.

Beyond the village stood two buildings of pale gray stone, a church and a monastery. A dozen or more timber structures were clustered around: animal shelters, storehouses, kitchens, and servants’ quarters.Aldred could even see the herb garden where he had been caught kissing Leofric, bringing down on himself a cloud of shame that had never lifted.

As he rode closer, he remembered Leofric, whom he had not seen for twenty years. He pictured a boy, tall and skinny, pink-faced with a few blond hairs on his upper lip, full of adolescent energy. But Leo must have changed. Aldred himself was different: slower and more dignified in his movements, solemn in his demeanor, with the dark shadow of a beard even when he had just shaved.