Page 211 of The Evening and the Morning

“Exactly. He will have set it adrift several miles away. He’ll claim he has no idea what happened to it.” Aldred felt defeated. “With no ferry and no raft, we can’t bring the visitors across the river.”

Edgar snapped his fingers. “Mother Agatha has a boat,” he said. “It’s very small—with one person rowing and two passengers it’s crowded—but it floats.”

Aldred’s hopes rose again. “A little boat is better than nothing.”

“I’ll swim across and beg a loan. Agatha will be happy to help, especially when she finds out what Dreng and Wynstan are trying to do.”

“If you’ll start rowing the visitors over, I’ll send a monk to relieve you after an hour.”

“They’re also going to want to buy food and drink at the alehouse.”

“There’s nothing there, but we can sell them everything in the priory stores. We’ve got ale and bread and fish. We’ll manage.”

Edgar ran down the hill to the riverside and Aldred hurried to the monks’ house. It was still early: there was time to get passengers across the river and turn the monastery into a tavern.

Fortunately it was a fine day. Aldred told the monks to set up trestle tables outside and round up all the cups and bowls in the hamlet. He mustered barrels of ale from the stores and loaves of bread both fresh and stale. He sent Godleof to buy all the stock Bucca Fish had in his store. He built a fire, spitted some of the fresh fishes, and started cooking them. He was run off his feet, but he was happy.

Soon the pilgrims began to come up the hill from the river. More arrived from the opposite direction. The monks started selling. There were rumbles of discontent from people who had been looking forward to meat and strong ale, but most of them cheerfully entered into the spirit of emergency arrangements.

When Edgar was relieved, he reported that the queue for the boat was getting longer, and some people were turning around and going home rather than waiting. Aldred’s fury with Dreng surged up again, but he forced himself to be calm. “Nothing we can do about that,” he said, pouring ale into wooden cups.

An hour before midday the monks herded the pilgrims into the church. Aldred had hoped the nave would be packed shoulder to shoulder, and was prepared to repeat the service for a second congregation, but that was not necessary.

With an effort he turned his mind from managing an improvised alehouse to conducting Mass. The familiar Latin phrases soon calmed his soul. They had the same effect on the congregation, who were remarkably quiet.

At the end, Aldred told the now-familiar story of the life of Saint Adolphus, and the congregation watched the effigy rise. By now most people knew what to expect, and few were actually terrified, but it was still an impressive and marvelous sight.

Afterward, they all wanted dinner.

Several people asked about staying the night. Aldred told them they could sleep in the monks’ house. Alternatively they could take shelter in the alehouse, even though the owner was away and there would be no food or drink.

They did not like either option. A pilgrimage was a holiday, and they looked forward to convivial evenings with other pilgrims, drinking and singing and, sometimes, falling in love.

In the end, most of them set out for home.

At the end of the day Aldred sat on the ground between the church and the monks’ house, looking downstream, watching a red sun sink to meet its reflection in the water. After a few minutes Edgar joined him. They sat in silence for a while, then Edgar said: “It didn’t work, did it?”

“It worked, but not well enough. The idea is sound, but it was undermined.”

“Will you try again?”

“I don’t know. Dreng operates the ferry, and that makes it difficult. What do you think?”

“I have an idea.”

Aldred smiled. Edgar always had ideas, and they were usually good. “Tell me.”

“We wouldn’t need the ferry if we had a bridge.”

Aldred stared at him. “I never thought of that.”

“You want your church to become a pilgrim destination. Theriver is a major obstacle, especially with Dreng in charge of the ferry. A bridge would make this place easy to reach.”

It had been a day of emotional ups and downs, but now Aldred’s mood went from deeply pessimistic to wildly hopeful in the biggest switch yet. “Can it be done?” he said eagerly.

Edgar shrugged. “We have plenty of timber.”

“More than we know what to do with. But do you know how to build a bridge?”