London - Edward Rutherfurd [113]
Only once, five years ago, had he dared to go further. She had been looking tired and sad one day, and suddenly he had demanded: “Does he mistreat you, your husband?”
She had paused before giving a sad, wry laugh. “No. But what,” she asked, smiling, “would you do about it?”
Forgetting himself for a moment, the Dane had moved close and said fiercely: “I would take you away from him.”
To this declaration she had merely shaken her head, murmured, “I may not see you if you say such things,” and he had never made any advance again.
And so, year after year, this relationship of chaste lovers had continued. It was agreeable, she thought, knowing herself to be imperfectly loved at home, to be appreciated by an older, wiser man. And for his part, Barnikel found that this role of an ardent suitor who, perhaps, was not quite without hope brought its own particular kind of joy.
He came forward eagerly, therefore, wearing a new blue cloak, with a lightness in his step, and together they walked westwards towards the Aldwych and the old churchyard of his Viking ancestors at St Clement Danes.
How cavernous the cellars would be. As the foundations grew, the outline of the huge Tower’s interior was already clear.
Approaching the site from the riverbank, the whole of the left half of the interior was taken up by a great hall. The right side was divided in two: a long, north–south, rectangular chamber occupied the rear two-thirds of the space, leaving the front, south-eastern corner for a smaller chamber. This corner would contain the chapel.
The builder of this mighty project was Gundulf, a distinguished Norman monk and architect who had recently been brought to England and made Bishop of Rochester in nearby Kent. With him Gundulf had brought all his knowledge of the fortress-building of Continental Europe and King William had already set him to work on several projects. Indeed, the great Tower of London was itself one of a pair, its nearly identical sister being in the Essex town of Colchester.
Much as he hated the drudgery of his work, Osric could not help being fascinated by the details of the building growing around him. The base level would form the cellars, which were roughly at ground level on the river side of the building, but because of the slight slope in the ground, were almost completely underground along the back wall.
The stone was laid in layers: first Kentish ragstone, which was only rough-hewn or rubble, then a layer of flint to strengthen it, then more ragstone. Everything was bound with mortar made from various materials to hand. On a number of occasions, cartloads of ancient Roman tiles from the surrounding area had been brought to the site and he had been put to work with the men who were hammering and grinding them into powder to make the binding cement. When the tiles were used, the mortar in the wall had a reddish tinge, and one of the labourers had grimly remarked:
“See. The Tower is built with English blood.”
The pale Norman stone from Caen was for corners and dressings only. “It’s especially hard,” the foreman had told him, “and being a different colour, it makes the building look neater.”
As the cellar walls began to rise, Osric observed other things. Although one could walk from one huge room into another, there was no door in the outer wall. The cellar would only be reached, he discovered, by a single spiral staircase set in a turret in the north-eastern corner. As for windows, when he asked the foreman, the fellow had smiled and pointed to one of two narrow insets high in the western wall. “Watch those,” he said. Once the masons started work on these places, Osric had realized that each was to be an opening in the shape of a slim wedge that grew narrower towards the outside.
“There won’t be room for much of a window,” he had