Philip knew he was innocent of fornication, and it followed logically that he could not be guilty of nepotism, for a man cannot favor his sons if he has none. Nevertheless he searched his heart to see whether he had done wrong in promoting Jonathan. Just as impure thoughts were a kind of shadow of a graver sin, perhaps favoritism toward a loved orphan was the shadow of nepotism. Monks were supposed to forgo the consolations of family life, yet Jonathan had been like a son to Philip. Philip had made Jonathan cellarer at a young age, and had now promoted him to sub-prior. Did I do that for my own pride and pleasure? he asked himself.
Well, yes, he thought.
He had taken enormous satisfaction from teaching Jonathan, watching him grow, and seeing him learn how to manage priory affairs. But even if these things had not given Philip such intense pleasure, Jonathan would still have been the ablest young administrator in the priory. He was intelligent, devout, imaginative and conscientious. Brought up in the monastery, he knew no other life, and he never hankered after freedom. Philip himself had been raised in an abbey. We monastery orphans make the best monks, he thought.
He put a book into a satchel: Luke’s Gospel, so wise. He had treated Jonathan like a son, but he had not committed any sins worth taking before an ecclesiastical court. The charge was absurd.
Unfortunately, the mere accusation would be damaging. It diminished his moral authority. There would be people who would remember the charge and forget the verdict. Next time Philip stood up and said: “The commandment forbids a man to covet his neighbor’s wife,” some of the congregation would be thinkingBut you had your fun when you were young.
Jonathan burst in, breathing hard. Philip frowned. The sub-prior ought not to burst into rooms panting. Philip was about to launch into a homily on the dignity of monastic officers, when Jonathan said: “Archdeacon Peter is here already!”
“All right, all right,” Philip soothed. “I’ve just about finished, anyway.” He handed Jonathan the satchel. “Take this to the dormitory, and don’t rush everywhere: a monastery is a place of peace and quiet.”
Jonathan accepted the satchel and the rebuke, but he said: “I don’t like the look of the archdeacon.”
“I’m sure he’ll be a just judge, and that’s all we want,” Philip said.
The door opened again, and the archdeacon came in. He was a tall, rangy man of about Philip’s age, with thinning gray hair and a rather superior look on his face. He seemed vaguely familiar.
Philip offered a handshake, saying: “I’m Prior Philip.”
“I know you,” the archdeacon said sourly. “Don’t you remember me?”
The gravelly voice did it. Philip’s heart sank. This was his oldest enemy. “Archdeacon Peter,” he said grimly. “Peter of Wareham.”
“He was a troublemaker,” Philip explained to Jonathan a few minutes later, when they had left the archdeacon to make himself comfortable in the prior’s house. “He would complain that we didn’t work hard enough, or we ate too well, or the services were too short. He said I was indulgent. He wanted to be prior himself, I’m sure. He would have been a disaster, of course. I made him almoner, so that he had to spend half his time away. I did it just to get rid of him. It was best for the priory and best for him, but I’m sure he still hates me for it, even after thirty-five years.” He sighed. “I heard, when you and I visited St-John-in-the-Forest after the great famine, that Peter had gone to Canterbury. And now he’s going to sit in judgment on me.”
They were in the cloisters. The weather was mild and the sun was warm. Fifty boys in three different classes were learning to read and write in the north walk, and the subdued murmur of their lessons floated across the quadrangle. Philip remembered when the school had consisted of five boys and a senile novice-master. He thought of all he had done here: the building of the cathedral; the transformation of the impoverished, run-down priory into a wealthy, busy, influential institution; the enlargement of the town of Kingsbridge. In the church, more than a hundred monks were singing mass. From where he sat he could see the astonishingly beautiful stained-glass windows in the clerestory. At his back, off the east walk, was a stone-built library containing hundreds of books on theology, astronomy, ethics, mathematics, indeed, every branch of knowledge. In the outside world the priory’s lands, managed with enlightened self-interest by monastic officers, fed not just the monks but hundreds of farm workers. Was all that to be taken from him by a lie? Would the prosperous and God-fearing priory be handed over to someone else, a pawn of Bishop Waleran’s such as the slimy Archdeacon Baldwin, or a self-righteous fool such as Peter of Wareham, to be run down to penury and depravity as quickly as Philip had built it up? Would the vast flocks of sheep shrink to a handful of scrawny ewes, the farms return to weed-grown inefficiency, the library become dusty with disuse, the beautiful cathedral sink into damp and disrepair? God helped me to achieve so much, he thought; I can’t believe he intended it to come to nothing.
Jonathan said: “All the same, Archdeacon Peter can’t possibly find you guilty.”
“I think he will,” Philip said heavily.
“In all conscience, how can he?”
“I think he’s been nursing a grievance against me all his life, and this is his chance to prove that I was the sinner and he was the righteous man all along. Somehow Waleran found out about that and made sure Peter was appointed to judge this case.”
“But there’s no proof!”
“He doesn’t need proof. He’ll hear the accusation, and the defense; then he’ll pray for guidance, and he’ll announce his verdict.”
“God may guide him aright.”
“Peter won’t listen to God. He’s never been a listener.”
“What will happen?”
“I’ll be deposed,” Philip said grimly. “They may let me continue here as an ordinary monk, to do penance for my sin, but it’s not likely. More probably they will expel me from the order, to prevent my having any further influence here.”
“What would happen then?”
“There would have to be an election, of course. Unfortunately, royal politics enter into the picture now. King Henry is in dispute with the archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Becket, and Archbishop Thomas is in exile in France. Half his archdeacons are with him. The other half, the ones who stayed behind, have sided with the king against their archbishop. Peter obviously belongs to that crowd. Bishop Waleran has also taken the king’s side. Waleran will recommend his choice of prior, backed by the Canterbury archdeacons and the king. It will be hard for the monks here to oppose him.”
“Who do you think it might be?”
“Waleran has someone in mind, rest assured. It could be Archdeacon Baldwin. It might even be Peter of Wareham.”
“Wemustdo something to prevent this!” Jonathan said.
