He said: “Are you sure?”

Once again she suppressed the thought of pregnancy. “I’m sure.”

She felt a moment of fear when he entered her. She tightened involuntarily, and he hesitated, feeling her body resisting him. “It’s all right,” she said. “You can push harder. You won’t hurt me.” She was wrong about that, and there was a sudden sharp pain as he thrust. She could not help crying out.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“Just wait a minute,” she said.

They lay still. He kissed her eyelids and her forehead and the tip of her nose. She stroked his face and looked into his golden-brown eyes. Then the pain was gone and the desire came back, and she began to move, rejoicing in the feeling of having the man she loved deep inside her body for the first time. She thrilled to see the intensity of his pleasure. He stared at her, a faint smile on his lips, a deep hunger in his eyes, as they moved faster.

“I can’t stop,” he said breathlessly.

“Don’t stop, don’t stop.”

She watched him intently. In a few moments he was overwhelmed by pleasure, his eyes shut tight and his mouth open and his whole body as taut as a bowstring. She felt his spasms inside her, and the jet of his ejaculation, and she thought that nothing in life had prepared her for such happiness. A moment later she herself was convulsed with ecstasy. She had had this sensation before, but not so powerfully, and she closed her eyes and gave herself up to it, pulling his body hard against her own as she shook like a tree in the wind.

When it was over they lay still for a long while. He buried his face in her neck, and she felt his panting breath on her skin. She stroked his back. His skin was damp with perspiration. Gradually her heartbeat slowed, and a deep contentment stole over her like twilight on a summer evening.

“So,” she said after a while, “that’s what all the fuss is about.”

25

The day after Godwyn was confirmed as prior of Kingsbridge, Edmund Wooler came to Merthin’s parents’ house early in the morning.

Merthin tended to forget what an important personage Edmund was, for Edmund treated him as a member of the family; but Gerald and Maud acted as if receiving an unexpected royal visitation. They were embarrassed that Edmund should see how poor their house was. There was only one room. Merthin and his parents slept on straw mattresses on the floor. There was a fireplace and a table and a small yard at the back.

Fortunately, the family had been up since sunrise, and had washed and dressed and tidied the place. All the same, when Edmund came stomping into the house with his uneven gait, Merthin’s mother dusted a stool, patted her hair, closed the back door then opened it again, and put a log on the fire. His father bowed several times, put on a surcoat and offered Edmund a cup of ale.

“No, thank you, Sir Gerald,” said Edmund, no doubt knowing that the family had none to spare. “However, I’ll take a small bowl of your pottage, Lady Maud, if I may.” Every family kept a pot of oats on the fire to which they added bones, apple cores, pea pods and other scraps, to be slow-cooked for days. Flavoured with salt and herbs, the result was a soup that never tasted the same twice. It was the cheapest food.

Pleased, Maud ladled some pottage into a bowl and put it on the table with a spoon and a plate of bread.

Merthin was still feeling the euphoria of the previous afternoon. It was like being slightly drunk. He had gone to sleep thinking of Caris’s naked body and woken up smiling. But he was suddenly reminded of his confrontation with Elfric over Griselda. A false instinct told him that Edmund was going to scream “You defiled my daughter!” and hit him across the face with a length of timber.

It was only a momentary vision, and it vanished as Edmund sat at the table. He picked up the spoon but, before he began to eat, he said to Merthin: “Now that we’ve got a prior, I want to start work on the new bridge as soon as possible.”

“Good,” said Merthin.

Edmund swallowed a spoonful and smacked his lips. “This is the best pottage I’ve ever tasted, Lady Maud.” Merthin’s mother looked pleased.

Merthin was grateful to Edmund for being charming to his parents. They felt the humiliation of their reduced status, and it was balm to the wound to have the town’s alderman eating at their table and calling them Sir Gerald and Lady Maud.

Now his father said: “I almost didn’t marry her, Edmund – did you know that?”

Merthin was sure Edmund had heard the story before, but he replied: “Good lord, no – how did that happen?”

“I saw her in church on Easter Sunday, and fell in love with her instantly. There must have been a thousand people in Kingsbridge Cathedral, and she was the most beautiful woman there.”

“Now, Gerald, no need to exaggerate,” Maud said crisply.

“Then she disappeared into the crowd, and I couldn’t find her! I didn’t know her name. I asked people who was the pretty girl with the fair hair, and they said all the girls were pretty and fair.”

Maud said: “I hurried away after the service. We were staying at the Holly Bush inn, and my mother was unwell, so I went back to take care of her.”

Gerald said: “I looked all over town, but I couldn’t find her. After Easter, everyone went home. I was living in Shiring, and she in Casterham, though I didn’t know that. I thought I’d never see her again. I imagined she might have been an angel, come to earth to make sure everyone was attending the service.”

She said: “Gerald, please.”

“But my heart was lost. I took no interest in other women. I expected to spend my life longing for the Angel of Kingsbridge. This went on for two years. Then I saw her at a tournament in Winchester.”

She said: “This complete stranger came up to me and said: ‘It’s you I after all this time! You must marry me before you disappear again.’ I thought he was mad.”

“Amazing,” said Edmund.

Merthin thought Edmund’s goodwill had been stretched far enough. “Anyway,” he said, “I’ve drawn some designs on the tracing floor in the mason’s loft at the cathedral.”

Edmund nodded. “A stone bridge wide enough for two carts?”

“As you specified – and ramped at both ends. And I’ve found a way to reduce the price by about a third.”

“That’s astonishing! How?”

“I’ll show you, as soon as you’ve finished eating.”

Edmund spooned up the last of the pottage and stood. “I’m done. Let’s go.” He turned to Gerald and inclined his head in a slight bow. “Thank you for your hospitality.”

“It’s a pleasure to have you here, alderman.”

Merthin and Edmund stepped out into a light drizzle. Instead of heading for the cathedral, Merthin led Edmund towards the river. Edmund’s lopsided stride was instantly recognizable, and every second person on the street greeted him with a friendly word or a respectful bow.

Merthin suddenly felt nervous. He had been thinking about the bridge design for months. While he worked at St Mark’s, supervising the carpenters who were constructing the new roof as the old was demolished, he mulled over the greater challenge of the bridge. Now for the first time his ideas would come under scrutiny by someone else.

As yet, Edmund had no idea how radical Merthin’s plan was.

The muddy street wound downhill through houses and workshops. The city ramparts had fallen into disrepair during two centuries of civil peace, and in some places all that remained were humps of earth that now formed parts of garden walls. At the river’s edge were industries that used large quantities of water, especially wool dyers and leather tanners.

Merthin and Edmund emerged on to the muddy foreshore between a slaughterhouse that gave off a strong smell of blood and a smithy where hammers clanged on iron. Directly in front of them, across a narrow stretch of water, was Leper Island. Edmund said: “Why are we here? The bridge is a quarter of a mile upstream.”