Angels in the Architecture (38 page)

When Father Taylor
’s message reached Hugh en route to his country house, again he turned on the road, to head this time for the Cathedral and its town. He’d met there with a rather new Father Taylor who had taken charge in his absence and remarked to his Lord Bishop that he’d felt it best to quell opinion, to which the Bishop could only have agreed.

Hugh had found the man a new comfort to him
, and together they had planned a Christian burial within the new Church walls, hoping to use the opportunity also to herald a new day of tolerance, and fear only of God. But in the days leading to the funeral, and beyond, the bravery they brought to their mutual defence and protection of the Jews of Lincoln seemed in vain. With this limited success, Hugh determined to further scold the King for the absence of his royal protection for a faithful community of subjects, and for refusing any punishment to wayward princes and lords who took the law and the King’s name in their own hands, as seemed to be their wont..

Ultimately
, though, he was perturbed that he could not balance in his mind the sure loss of Jerusalem he had seen in his dream, with the vicious backlash that eventually saw the hangings of nineteen Jews, with the loss of the boy, and then after a while longer with what he assumed as his own swan gone. Each was a tragedy for his soul: one the weight of responsibility to the world for a failure in Christendom, one his inability to curb a prejudice that he could see clearly threatening the truth and beauty he strived to keep alive albeit flimsily among the Christian faithful; the other his own sadness to lose his winged helpmeet who would no longer come to his side, alongside the violence and distortion and prejudice accompanying the passing of one of the most innocent of all, the young boy Thomas Warriner. Which of these was to be mourned the most? It was a tragic irony that his efforts to protect the Jews, through the plans he agreed with Father Taylor for the boy’s interment, became instead an opportunity to blame the Jews for the tragedy of the boy’s death. So many absurd stories surrounded the child in time that he could scarcely believe the shallow hearts and minds of his fellow Christians.

He ached to the core of his soul and his mind, and neither of these gave him any solution or any respite as they circled painfully about each other, dark and unrelenting..

It would be many weeks before he would let go these sorry occurrences from his mind and collect his strength and character to a resolution that would again support a true Christian community, with the knowledge forever that he had either misread or seen too late some indications with which he might have acted sooner.

After his impromptu dash
to Lincoln, where he had sent urgent word to the Bishop and then simply waited for his arrival, Father Taylor realised he must next return to the boy’s parents, who would not have been informed well by the Thane or his men. And he would visit again with the townsfolk and ensure their well-being.

The priest knew something had happened that changed his view of the world
, and he was glad of God’s mercy to him. His load was now a different one, to bring a balm to the suffering, and he determined he would seek the counsel of the Bishop more often.

The storm that broke though nearly
consumed Father Taylor, and it required every speck of his new-found finesse to handling every intricate stage of what then unfolded. There was no telling what had brought the death of the boy really, and the priest had as much faith in the testimony of a Thane’s man as any other thug. But in the end, there was no escaping the baying for blood, and the village and the town had sought their prey in the Jews. Out of nowhere the King, and then the Duke of Cornwall, joined the fray ostensibly to bring a swift and strong justice, but even Father Taylor knew this noble virtue eluded them as much as they cared not a jot for the boy, preferring any reason to support the further frailty of the Jews. In all, ninety-odd Jews were arrested from around about and held in the Tower of London no less. A clemency was sought by Hugh, and the priest knew that when only nineteen were hung that this had more to do with the power of the Bishop than any mercy on the part of the King.

As for the boy, the villagers’ suspicions at this own idiot child’s ways were quickly r
enounced in favour of martyrdom which had not been the Bishop’s and priest’s intentions either.

In time the hubbub wane
d, as much as did the priest’s ambition. He would soon find entry into the hearts of these ignorants, offering a new wisdom, hard-won and inspiring.

Gamel Warriner
had a great relief at the demise of his youngest son, at least following the business of his interment at the Cathedral, a somewhat overwhelming event for a peasant. He had fewer mouths to feed and no longer felt the weight of the view the world had of his awkward family. He sensed no loss in his wife, even though he knew he wasn’t always able to see these things anyway. Of course, he knew that the passing of two young boys was a loss to the world and provided a reason for people about to make note of their going, but it didn’t seep a lot further into him than that.

He expected his three sons to work their share and make their mother’s life not too hard. He cared enough that there was some kind of respect paid her, and
he knew that was odd enough among men too, but it was his way.

Alice sat with her hands inside a ferret’s guts, the slurp and suck of it engaging her skilled fingers, and her
cold-numbed feet absently brushed aside a collection of pebbles askew in the wet mud beneath her. She looked alike to any other peasant at work in the small circle of her dimmed livelihood. A man and three tattered boys squabbled behind the wall where she sat, and a yelp escaped through the open door so that she knew one had been kicked or lobbed at by another for some doing, who knows if in silliness or wrath.

The skies were darkening and heavy with rain and the potential for thunderclaps. The respite of coolness was not relished for long, as the ground turned
dark with the onset of so much wet. There was never a good weather one way or the other, and now the cold demanded more food for all men and beasts.

Alice cared less for it all and kept her prayers briefer, and her soul was not so hungry. The darkness did not encase her though; she just was
.

Ismat ad-Dīn Khātūn, known as Asimat, was a wife of kings. Her first husband, Nur ad-Din, had been king of all Syria, uniting its many domains into one great sultanate. He had died from a poisoning as he plotted the defeat of his own protégé, Saladin. Saladin was Ismat’s second husband, and he had taken her as his wife after defeating Nur ad-Din’s thirteen-year-old son and successor and uniting Egypt and Syria.

Asimat was
not Saladin’s only wife, and she would not bear him any children now, as indeed she had not for Nur ad-Din, despite the twenty-seven years she had been married to him. She was though Saladin’s favourite. She was two years older than him, and at forty-nine she was no longer young, but she knew how to please him, and she could speak with him about his battle strategies as none of his generals could, and certainly none of his other wives. Asimat had travelled with her first husband through the second Crusade, and she had proved a valuable confidante to Saladin throughout his many military successes.

The night
before, Saladin had talked again of his most fervent wish to free Jerusalem from its Christian King and to create a universal city of peace for Jews, Christians and Muslims. The Jerusalem kings had been many, with much infighting and intrigue, and had little concern for their station as rulers. The old King Baldwin had recently died, a crippled old leper, although a worthy opponent despite that on many occasions. But he’d left a five-year-old in charge of his kingdom with various notables squabbling for the regency.

Saladin
and Asimat had talked about whether the city could be ruled by all three religions, segmented into thirds. A challenge though was the proximity of some of the different Faiths’ holy sites to each other, so it would not be an easy truce. Saladin was determined though, as he talked of the beauty of Abraham’s children, Christ’s followers, and the Prophet, and his hopes that they could live together in peace.

Asimat
believed Saladin to be the greatest of leaders, with a powerful vision for the world. The nine years she had been with him were the happiest of her life, and her fervent desire was to see his wish of a unified Holy City come true. But more and more now she was afraid she would not; the pain she felt in her abdomen was so great some days that she could hardly walk or even breathe. She had kept her illness hidden from her husband so as not to distract him from his mission, and she would send a messenger to him to encourage him to take another wife on the days and evenings that she was ill. She hated to do so, but he took this action on her part as a sign of her generous spirit, and it only served to make him think more highly of her. When Saladin came to her, she would use every ounce of her loving encouragement to support his plans, persuading him to discuss in ever closer detail how he would take the City. She had heard that the English–French king, Henry, was not enamoured of his duty to fortify the Crusaders’ strength in the Holy Land, which could only serve Saladin’s interests further; but that Henry’s son, who they called the Lionhearted, was a worthy and, some said, greater opponent than his father.

Thoughts and plans of battle
excited Saladin, and in turn Asimat, and their lovemaking was as explosive as their talk once they had finished picturing each victory in stupendous detail. Asimat knew Saladin’s younger wives had firmer bodies than hers, and breasts that were full and pointed skyward, and that by comparison her own body had long since begun to soften and sag. But she knew also that it was she Saladin most wanted. Sometimes when he had had too much wine, he would indiscreetly tell her how they did not compare to her and that his liaisons with them had few of the pleasures Asimat herself offered. This pleased her and made it easier for her to tolerate their presence. She was pleased that most of them feared her.

It
was Saladin’s regard for Asimat that had led him to appoint her as patron of a new university and of many other religious and civil buildings in Damascus. Asimat knew she represented her husband with great honour and pride in such matters, and she would affect her most upright and noble bearing whenever she was in public on some engagement or other. She would give speeches in his honour, and for Syria, and she had come to be known as a woman of wisdom and courage.

And now this morning she had
kissed Saladin as he left her bed and went to meet with his generals to lay out the plans they had conceived that night. He was energised and vital after a sound sleep and his lengthy morning prayers. Asimat prayed for him. She would accompany him into battle for yet another day.

‘I’m not
well, Nigel,’ the prince moaned to his page behind his inner tent curtain. ‘This damned heat ...’

‘There is a man arrived
from Saladin, Highness,’ the servant replied in Richard’s native French. ‘The English translator says he claims he is Saladin’s physician and he is sent to offer his assistance to you. But the English has said not to trust him, Sire.’

‘It
’s that damned English I wouldn’t trust as far as I could kick!’ Although his father was the King of England, Richard had virtually never set foot in the Kingdom and spoke no English. ‘Send this gift from my noble Saladin to me. Bring the bloody English to translate, but he’s
only
to translate. He can keep his opinions to himself!’

‘As you
wish, Sire.’

‘Yes
, I damned well wish, sycophants and arse-lickers all of you. Christ,’ Richard muttered to himself as Nigel backed out of the tent.

Richard, known as
the Lionhearted, had taken up the Church’s call where his father Henry would not. Richard loved to fight; he lived for it. And he’d had no nobler opponent than Saladin. He’d heard much of the Sultan’s prowess before reaching the Eastern Mediterranean and he had determined not to underestimate him, but he had to admit now that even despite this he had not reckoned on such a masterful general as Saladin. It would take all his resources and intellect to devise a plan that would succeed in defending the Holy City.

When they had battled
, he had seen Saladin at a great distance, and he focused all his thoughts on the man’s mind, attempting to know the secrets of his soul, just as he knew – indeed, he felt – Saladin was also doing. By God, he was brilliant. Not for the first time, he wished he could send all the generals and soldiers away and meet Saladin alone in the desert for an hour. He thought they would have a fine time. What a brilliant ally the man would make!

‘Sire, here is the man
.’ Nigel returned with an older, bearded and turbaned man who bowed low to the prince lying on his sickbed before him.

‘Let him in. Let him close here,’ Richard beckoned to
the Arab to come closer.

‘His robes were checked for hidden
weapons, Sire.’