“It’s just a rendezvous,” Philip said. He turned around and took a step toward the door. Matthew was in his way. For a moment they stood still, facing one another. The four people in the room made a frozen tableau. Philip wondered if they were going to try to stop him from leaving. Then the steward stood aside.

Philip went out. He held up the skirt of his robe and hurried down the spiral stairs. When he reached the bottom he heard footsteps behind him. Matthew caught him up.

“Don’t tell anyone we’re here,” he said.

Philip saw that Matthew understood the unreality of their position. “How long will you stay here?” he asked.

“As long as we can,” the steward replied.

“And when you have to leave? What will you do then?”

“I don’t know.”

Philip nodded. “I’ll keep your secret,” he said.

“Thank you, Father.”

Philip crossed the dusty hall and stepped outside. Looking down, he saw Bishop Waleran and two others reining in their horses near his own. Waleran wore a heavy cloak trimmed with black fur, and a black fur cap. He looked up, and Philip met his pale eyes. “My lord bishop,” said Philip respectfully. He went down the wooden steps. The image of the virginal girl upstairs was still vivid in his mind, and he felt like shaking his head to get rid of her.

Waleran dismounted. He had the same two companions, Philip saw: Dean Baldwin and the man-at-arms. He nodded to them, then knelt and kissed Waleran’s hand.

Waleran accepted his homage but did not wallow in it: he withdrew his hand after a moment. It was power itself, not its trappings, that Waleran loved.

“On your own, Philip?” Waleran said.

“Yes. The priory is poor, and an escort for me is an unnecessary expense. When I was prior of St-John-in-the-Forest I never had an escort, and I’m still alive.”

Waleran shrugged. “Come with me,” he said. “I want to show you something.” He marched off across the courtyard to the nearest tower. Philip followed. Waleran entered the low doorway at the foot of the tower and climbed the staircase inside. There were bats clustered under the low ceiling, and Philip ducked his head to avoid brushing against them.

They emerged at the top of the tower and stood at the battlements, looking out over the land all around. “This is one of the smaller earldoms in the land,” Waleran said.

“Indeed.” Philip shivered. There was a cold, damp wind up here, and his cloak was not as thick as Waleran’s. He wondered what the bishop was leading up to.

“Some of this land is good, but much is forest and stony hillsides.”

“Yes.” On a clear day they might have seen many acres of forest and farmland, but now, although the early mist had gone, they could barely make out the near edge of the forest to the south, and the flat fields around the castle.

“This earldom also has a huge quarry which produces first-class limestone,” Waleran went on. “Its forests contain many acres of good timber. And its farms generate considerable wealth. If we had this earldom, Philip, we could build our cathedral.”

“If pigs had wings they could fly,” Philip said.

“Oh, thou of little faith!”

Philip stared at Waleran. “Are you serious?”

“Very.”

Philip was skeptical, but despite himself he felt a tiny spurt of hope. If only this could come true! But he said: “The king needs military support. He’ll give the earldom to someone who can lead knights into battle.”

“The king owes his crown to the Church, and his victory over Bartholomew to you and me. Knights aren’t all he needs.”

Waleran was serious, Philip saw. Was it possible? Would the king hand over the earldom of Shiring to the Church, to finance the rebuilding of Kingsbridge Cathedral? It was hardly believable, despite Waleran’s arguments. But Philip could not help thinking how marvelous it would be to have the stone, the timber and the money to pay the craftsmen, all handed to him on a plate; and he remembered that Tom Builder had said he could hire sixty masons, and finish the church in eight to ten years. The mere thought was enthralling.

“But what about the former earl?” he said.

“Bartholomew has confessed his treason. He has never denied the plot, but for some time he maintained that what he did was not treason, on the grounds that Stephen was a usurper. However, the king’s torturer has finally broken him.”

Philip shuddered and tried not to think about what they had done to Bartholomew to make that rigid man yield.

He put the thought out of his mind. “The earldom of Shiring,” he murmured to himself. It was an incredibly ambitious demand. But the idea was thrilling. He felt full of irrational optimism.

Waleran glanced up at the sky. “Let’s get moving,” he said. “The king expects us the day after tomorrow.”

William Hamleigh studied the two men of God from his hiding place behind the battlements of the next tower. He knew them both. The tall one, who looked like a blackbird with his pointed nose and his black cloak, was the new bishop of Kingsbridge. The small, energetic one with the shaved head and the bright blue eyes was Prior Philip. William wondered what they were doing here.

He had watched the monk arrive, look around as though he expected to see people here, and then go into the keep. William could not guess whether Philip had met the three people who lived in the keep-he had been inside only a few moments, and they might have hidden from him. As soon as the bishop arrived, Prior Philip had come out of the keep and the two of them had climbed the tower. Now the bishop was gesturing at the land all around the castle with a somewhat proprietorial air. William Could tell by the way they were standing and their gestures that the bishop was being ebullient and the prior skeptical. They were hatching a plot, he felt sure.

However, he had not come here to spy on them. He had come to spy on Aliena.

He did this more and more often. She preyed on his mind all the time, and he suffered involuntary daydreams in which he came across her tied up and naked in a wheat field, or cowering like a frightened puppy in a corner of his bedroom, or lost in the forest late in the evening. It got so that he had to see her in the flesh. He would ride to Earlscastle early in the morning. He left Walter, his groom, looking after the horses in the forest, and he walked across the fields to the castle. He sneaked inside and found a hiding place from which he could observe the keep and the upper compound. Sometimes he had to wait a long time to see her. His patience would be sorely tried, but the thought of going away again without even a glimpse of her was insupportable, so he always stayed. Then, when at last she did appear, his throat dried, and his heart beat faster, and the palms of his hands became damp. Often she was with her brother or the effeminate steward, but sometimes she was alone. One afternoon, in the summer, when he had waited for her since early morning, she had gone to the well, drawn some water, and taken off her clothes to wash. Just the memory of that sight inflamed him all over again. She had deep, proud breasts that moved in a teasing way when she lifted her arms to rub soap into her hair. Her nipples had puckered delightfully when she splashed cold water over herself. There was a surprisingly big bush of dark curly hair between her legs, and when she washed herself there, rubbing vigorously with a soapy hand, William had lost control and ejaculated in his clothes.

Nothing so nice had happened since, and she certainly would not wash herself in winter, but there had been lesser delights. When she was alone she would sing, or even talk to herself. William had seen her braid her hair, and dance, and chase pigeons off the ramparts like a small child. Clandestinely watching her do these little private things, William felt a sense of power over her that was quite delicious.