“Oh, yes-the writing room will pay for itself many times over.”

They left the building and walked through the cloisters. It was the study hour. Most of the monks were reading. A few were meditating, an activity that was suspiciously similar to dozing, as Francis remarked skeptically. In the northwest corner were twenty schoolboys reciting Latin verbs. Philip stopped and pointed. “See the little boy at the end of the bench?”

Francis said: “Writing on a slate, with his tongue sticking out?”

“That’s the baby you found in the forest.”

“But he’s so big!”

“Five and a half years old, and precocious.’

Francis shook his head in wonderment. “Time goes by so fast. How is he?”

“He’s spoiled by the monks, but he’ll survive. You and I did.”

“Who are the other pupils?”

“Either novice monks, or the sons of merchants and local gentry learning to write and figure.”

They left the cloisters and passed on to the building site. The eastern limb of the new cathedral was now more than half built. The great double row of mighty columns was forty feet high, and all the arches in between had been completed. Above the arcade, the tribune gallery was taking shape. Either side of the arcade, the lower walls of the aisle had been built, with their out-jutting buttresses. As they walked around, Philip saw that the masons were constructing the half-arches that would connect the tops of those buttresses with the top of the tribune gallery, allowing the buttresses to take the weight of the roof.

Francis was almost awestruck. “You’ve done all this, Philip,” he said. “The writing room, the school, the new church, even all these new houses in the town-it’s all come about because you made it happen.”

Philip was touched. No one had ever said that to him. If asked, he would say that God had blessed his efforts. But in his heart of hearts he knew that what Francis said was true: this thriving, busy town was his creation. Recognition gave him a warm glow, especially coming as it did from his sophisticated, cynical younger brother.

Tom Builder saw them and came over. “You’ve made marvelous progress,” Philip said to him.

“Yes, but look at that.” Tom pointed to the northeast corner of the priory close, where stone from the quarry was stockpiled. There were normally hundreds of stones stacked in rows, but now there were only about twenty-five scattered on the ground. “Unfortunately, our marvelous progress means we’ve used up our stock of stone.”

Philip’s elation evaporated. Everything he had achieved here was at risk, because of Maud’s harsh ruling.

They walked along the north side of the site, where the most skilled masons were working at their benches, carving the stones into shape with hammers and chisels. Philip stopped behind one craftsman and studied his work. It was a capital, the large, jutting-out stone that always stood on top of a column. Using a light hammer and a small chisel, the mason was carving a pattern of leaves on the capital. The leaves were deeply undercut and the work was delicate. To Philip’s surprise, he saw that the craftsman was young Jack, Tom’s stepson. “I thought Jack was still a learner,” he said.

“He is.” Tom moved on, and when they were out of earshot he said: “The boy is remarkable. There are men here who have been carving stone since before he was born, and none of them can match his work.” He gave a slightly embarrassed laugh. “And he isn’t even my own son!”

Tom’s real son, Alfred, was a master mason and had his own gang of apprentices and laborers, but Philip knew that Alfred and his gang did not do the delicate work. Philip wondered how Tom felt about that in his heart.

Tom’s mind had returned to the problem of paying for the market license. “Surely the market will bring in a lot of money,” he said.

“Yes, but not enough. It should raise about fifty pounds a year at the start.”

Tom nodded gloomily. “That will just about pay for the stone.”

“We could manage if I didn’t have to pay Maud a hundred pounds.”

“What about the wool?”

The wool that was piling up in Philip’s barns would be sold at the Shiring Fleece Fair in a few weeks’ time, and would fetch about a hundred pounds. “That’s what I’m going to use to pay Maud. But then I’ll have nothing left for the craftsmen’s wages for the next twelve months.”

“Can’t you borrow?”

“I already have. The Jews won’t lend me any more. I asked, while I was in Winchester. They won’t lend you money if they don’t think you can pay it back.”

“What about Aliena?”

Philip was startled. He had never thought of borrowing from her. She had even more wool in her barns. After the fleece fair she might have two hundred pounds. “But she needs the money to make her living. And Christians can’t charge interest. If she lent her money to me she would have nothing to trade with. Although…” Even as he spoke, he was turning over a new idea. He remembered that Aliena had wanted to buy his entire wool production for the year. Perhaps they could work something out… “I think I’ll talk to her anyway,” he said. “Is she at home at the moment?”

“I think so-I saw her this morning.”

“Come, Francis-you’re about to meet a remarkable young woman.” They left Tom and hurried out of the close into the town. Aliena had two houses side by side up against the west wall of the priory. She lived in one and used the other as a barn. She was very wealthy. There had to be a way she could help the priory pay Maud’s extortionate fee for the market license. A vague idea was taking shape in Philip’s mind.

Aliena was in the barn, supervising the unloading of an ox cart stacked high with sacks of wool. She wore a brocade pelisse, like the one the Empress Maud had worn, and her hair was done up in a white linen coif. She looked authoritative, as always, and the two men unloading the cart obeyed her instructions without question. Everyone respected her, although-strangely-she had no close friends. She greeted Philip warmly. “When we heard about the battle of Lincoln we were afraid you might have been killed!” she said. There was real concern in her eyes, and Philip was moved to think that people had been worried about him. He introduced her to Francis.

“Did you get justice at Winchester?” Aliena asked.

“Not exactly,” Philip replied. “The Empress Maud granted us a market but denied us the quarry. The one more or less compensates for the other. But she charged me a hundred pounds for the market license.”

Aliena was shocked. “That’s terrible! Did you tell her the income from the market goes to the cathedral building?”

“Oh, yes.”

“But where will you find a hundred pounds?”

“I thought you might be able to help.”

“Me?” Aliena was taken aback.

“In a few weeks’ time, after you’ve sold your wool to the Flemish, you’ll have two hundred pounds or more.”

Aliena looked troubled. “And I’d give it to you, gladly, but I need it to buy more wool next year.”

“Remember you wanted to buy my wool?”

“Yes, but it’s too late now. I wanted to buy it early in the season. Besides, you can sell it yourself soon.”

“I was thinking,” Philip said. “Could I sell you next year’s wool?”

She frowned. “But you haven’t got it.”

“Could I sell it to you before I’ve got it?”

“I don’t see how.”

“Simple. You give me the money now. I give you the wool next year.”

Aliena clearly did not know how to take this proposal: it was unlike any known way of doing business. It was new to Philip, too: he had just made it up.

Aliena spoke slowly and thoughtfully. “I would have to offer you a slightly lower price than you could get by waiting. Moreover, the price of wool might go up between now and next summer-it has every year I’ve been in the business.”

“So I lose a little and you gain a little,” Philip said. “But I’ll be able to carry on building for another year.”