Sarum - Edward Rutherfurd [293]
“And now,” he said cheerfully to Edward Shockley the next day. “Let work on our mill begin.”
1248
When exactly it was that his mentor Bartholomew turned against him Osmund the mason could never say with certainty. But he thought it was probably the day, about a year after he began his apprenticeship, that he brought a carving of a swan that he was making for Jocelin de Godefroi into the masons’ lodgings.
It was a small piece, carved of oak, which was to fit into a niche set in the big, studded door of the manor house at Avonsford; he had worked on it for several days and he was proud of it, and by the guttering candlelight, while the masons chatted, he put the finishing touches to it.
The masons liked young Osmund. He was quiet, and modest, and never pushed himself forward unless first spoken to. When one of the men noticed what he was doing, inspected the work, and then called his friends over to see what the young fellow had done, they were delighted to find that he had such a talent.
“He can carve,” they agreed. “The young fellow has the touch. We’ll teach you,” they promised him, “how to carve in stone.”
It was a moment of acceptance. From that evening, his life changed. The older masons began to speak to him freely. Robert himself, the deputy to the great Nicholas of Ely, came by where he was working to look him over again and say a few words; and often one of the older men would call him over to where one of the more intricate pieces of work was being done and show him the techniques, the mysteries, of the mason’s art.
He was discovering the broad friendship and companionship that linked, right across the whole country, the network of medieval masons.
It was not surprising that Bartholomew became cold. He was a competent, hardworking fellow, with little talent, and just enough imagination to see that the new apprentice was his superior.
He found fault with the new apprentice where he could; but it was not easy. Once or twice, when he had complained to the older masons about some supposed incompetence of the little fellow with the big round head, he had seen a look in their eyes which told him that it was their respect for him, not for Osmund, that was dwindling. Soon he stopped complaining. But he did as little as possible to help his protégé, and it was all the more galling to realise that the quiet little fellow was rapidly ceasing to need his guidance anyway.
Within another three months, he scarcely addressed Osmund at all; and by the next Michaelmas, he had even begun surreptitiously placing obstacles in the young man’s way – leaving a pile of dust mixed with lime beside the place where he was working so that it would blow into his face and irritate his eyes, or discreetly removing pieces of stone which Osmund was about to work.
At first Osmund was hardly aware of these small attacks. But gradually he began to sense a certain method in them; he also noticed that every time some mishap had occurred to him, Bartholomew would appear soon afterwards, apparently casually and by chance, to see how he was getting on. Serveral times he was aware of the young man staring at him with unconcealed malice, although he had done nothing to offend him.
Sometimes the young mason would be so frustrated by Osmund’s progress that he would unconsciously scratch the sore on his neck until it bled, and Osmund would see him going by, his long pale face working with vexation and his neck scarlet with the scratching he had given it.
But Osmund paid little attention. For with the years of his apprenticeship he had entered a period of timelessness. He had watched the passing of the seasons, of course. He had been conscious that he was growing older, stronger and filling out. But he no longer measured time in such ways as he had always done before. Now he measured time by his proficiency in his craft. That was the year I truly mastered stonecutting, he would remember; or, that was the year I learned to turn stones upon the lathe.
He loved the long, peaceful days, especially in the summer when the