The Pillars of the Earth - Ken Follett [235]
Philip was shocked. His heart beat faster and the hand holding the letter trembled. It was a fiendishly clever move by Waleran, and Philip had not anticipated it, had not imagined anything like it.
It was his own lack of foresight that shook him. He knew how treacherous Waleran was. The bishop had tried to double-cross him, a year ago, over the Shiring earldom. And he would never forget how angry Waleran had been when Philip had outwitted him. He could picture Waleran’s face, suffused with rage, as he said I swear by all that’s holy, you’ll never build your church. But as time went by the menace of that oath had faded, and Philip’s guard had slipped. Now here was a brutal reminder that Waleran had a long memory.
“Bishop Waleran says you have no money, and in fifteen months you have built nothing,” the prior of Canterbury wrote. “He says that Bishop Henry will see for himself that the cathedral will never get built if it is left to Kingsbridge Priory to build it. He argues that the time to make the move is now, before any real progress is made.”
Waleran was too cunning to get caught in an outright lie, so he was purveying a gross exaggeration. Philip had in fact achieved a great deal. He had cleared the ruins, approved the plans, laid out the new east end, made a start on the foundations, and begun felling trees and quarrying stone. But he did not have much to show a visitor. And he had overcome terrific obstacles to achieve this much—reforming the priory’s finances, winning a major grant of lands from the king, and defeating Earl Percy over the quarry. It was not fair!
With the letter from Canterbury in his hand, he went to his window and looked out over the building site. Spring rains had turned it into a sea of mud. Two young monks with their hoods pulled over their heads were carrying timber up from the riverside. Tom Builder had made a contraption with a rope and a pulley for lifting barrels of earth out of the foundation hole, and he was operating the winding wheel while his son Alfred, down in the hole, filled the barrels with wet mud. They looked as though they could work at that pace forever and never make any difference. Anyone but a professional would see this scene and conclude that no cathedral would be built here this side of the Day of Judgment.
Philip left the window and returned to his writing desk. What could be done? For a moment he was tempted to do nothing. Let Bishop Henry come and look, and make his own decision, he thought. If the cathedral is to be built at Shiring, so be it. Let Bishop Waleran take control of it and use it for his own ends; let it bring prosperity to the town of Shiring and the evil Hamleigh dynasty. God’s will be done.
He knew that would not do, of course. Having faith in God did not mean sitting back and doing nothing. It meant believing that you would find success if you did your best honestly and energetically. Philip’s holy duty was to do all he could to prevent the cathedral from falling into the hands of cynical and immoral people who would exploit it for their own aggrandizement. That meant showing Bishop Henry that his building program was well under way and Kingsbridge had the energy and determination to finish it.
Was it true? The fact was that Philip was going to find it mortally difficult to build a cathedral here. Already he had almost been forced to abandon the project just because the earl refused him access to the quarry. But he knew he would succeed, in the end, because God would help him. However, his own conviction would not be enough to persuade Bishop Henry.
He decided he would do his best to make the site look more impressive, for what it was worth. He would set all the monks to work for the ten days remaining before Whitsun. Perhaps they could get part of the foundation hole dug to its full depth, so that Tom and Alfred could begin laying the