Sarum - Edward Rutherfurd [350]
And now the work was done, the scaffolding dismantled, retreating from the dizzying height where the cone was so thin that it was hard to imagine it sustaining even a man and a bucket. As it was withdrawn, the holes through which the supports had passed were filled with stone plugs with iron handles so that they could be opened and used again for future repairs.
Crowning the spire was the capstone – a series of stones in fact, laid in four courses and welded together with cramps of iron. And over the capstone was set the great iron cross.
The cross of Salisbury Cathedral was not only a necessary ornament. A rod from its centre passed directly through the capstone, like a root, and down to the wooden framework inside the spire, to which it was connected with a tightening mechanism. By this means the ingenious masons ensured that the interior stress of the cone could be adjusted.
One other item had been needed: and though it was not a structural feature, there was no question that it was as important to the safety of the building as anything the clever builders conceived. Inside the capstone they had reverently placed a small circular casket lined with lead which contained a little piece of cloth. It was a fragment of the Blessed Virgin’s robe.
When this was done, the capstone sealed, and the great cross tightened to the framework, almost a century after it had been begun the cathedral church of Our Lady, the Blessed Virgin Mary, at Sarum was at last complete.
It was soon after this completion, on a darkening afternoon in late December, that Edward Mason found himself in the nave of the great cathedral – and staring at the old man in disbelief.
“Impossible.”
But Osmund was obdurate, and nothing Edward could say would make him listen to reason.
For on the eve of Holy Innocents Day, also called Childermas – that is, on December 27 – in the year of Our Lord 1310, Osmund the Mason in the eightieth year of his life, had fallen into the last and greatest of all the seven deadly sins.
Worse. He seemed to have decided to destroy himself.
Childermas eve was an important day in the year: for on that day, in Sarum, a curious and delightful event took place: the festival of the boy bishop.
The nave of the great church was crowded. The ceremony was about to begin. They had come from all over Sarum to witness it. The merchant Shockleys had come; Mary Shockley, now grey-haired, had stomped in from the farm to join them. From Avonsford, Roger de Godefroi had brought his son Gilbert, and although neither John nor Cristina had chosen to come, young Walter Wilson had even deserted his eel traps in the river to slouch across the fields that afternoon to see the fun.
It was an extraordinary, and good-humoured business, begun some time in the century before. On this day, in the best tradition of topsy-turveydom, the boy choristers were allowed to take over the cathedral and the priests take second place. Not only this: the boys had elected their own boy bishop who would rule the cathedral for the festival.
Despite the completion of its lovely spire, the cathedral and its priests had not always been popular with the people of Sarum of late. There had been, first, a spirited dispute between the mayor and the bishop over the bishop’s feudal right to tax the town. The bishop had won. Then there were always the vicars’ choral – a mass of junior and penniless fellows ranging from former choirboys who rang the bells to ordained young men without benefices – who were generally a rowdy nuisance and whom the townspeople complained about. And then there had been, despite Bishop Simon of Ghent’s best efforts, a general decline in standards in the close. It was partly caused by the number of its canons who were absentee Italians, granted these rich benefices by the pope; but whatever the reason the once scholarly precincts, despite the extraordinary cathedral in their centre, were regarded with less respect than they had been