Ken Follett - World Without End

Brother Carlus performed the last rites, then led the monks in a hymn.

Godwyn did not know what to hope for. For some years he had been looking forward to the end of Priory Anthony’s rule. But in the last hour he had got a glimpse of what might replace Anthony: joint rule by Carlus and Simeon. They were Anthony’s cronies, and would be no better.

Suddenly he saw Matthew Barber at the edge of the crowd, looking over the monks’ shoulders, studying Anthony’s lower half. Godwyn was about to order him indignantly to leave the chancel, when he gave an almost imperceptible shake of the head and walked away.

Anthony opened his eyes.

Brother Joseph cried: “Praise God!”

The prior seemed to want to speak. Mother Cecilia, who was still kneeling beside him, leaned over his face to catch his words. Godwyn saw Anthony’s mouth move, and wished he could hear. After a moment, the prior fell silent.

Cecilia looked shocked. “Is that true?” she said.

They all stared. Godwyn said: “What did he say, Mother Cecilia?”

She did not answer.

Anthony’s eyes closed. A subtle change came over him. He went very still.

Godwyn bent over his body. There was no breath. He placed a hand over Anthony’s heart, and felt no beat. He grasped the wrist, feeling for a pulse: nothing.

He stood up. “Prior Anthony has left this world,” he said. “May God bless his soul and welcome him into His holy presence.”

All the monks said: “Amen.”

Godwyn thought: Now there will have to be an election.

Kingsbridge Cathedral was a place of horror. Wounded people groaned in pain and cried out for help to God, or the saints, or their mothers. Every few minutes, someone searching for a loved one would find him or her dead, and would scream with the shock of sudden grief. The living and the dead were grotesquely twisted with broken bones, covered in blood, their clothing ripped and sodden. The stone floor of the church was slippery with water, blood and riverside mud.

In the middle of the horror, a small zone of calm and efficiency was centred on the figure of Mother Cecilia. Like a small quick bird, she went from one horizontal figure to the next. She was followed by a little flock of hooded nuns, among them her long-time assistant, Sister Juliana, now respectfully known as Old Julie. As she examined each patient, she gave orders: for washing, for ointments, for bandages, for herbal medicines. In the more serious cases she would summon Mattie Wise, Matthew Barber or Brother Joseph. She always spoke quietly but clearly, her instructions simple and decisive. She left most patients soothed, and their relatives reassured and hopeful.

It reminded Caris, with dreadful vividness, of the day her mother died. There had been terror and confusion then, though only in her heart. In the same way, Mother Cecilia had seemed to know what to do. Mama had died despite Cecilia’s help, just as many of today’s wounded would die; but there had been an orderliness about the death, a sense that everything possible had been done.

Some people appealed to the Virgin and the saints when someone was sick, but that only made Caris more uncertain and frightened, for there was no way to know if the spirits would help, or even whether they had heard. Mother Cecilia was not as powerful as the saints, the ten-year-old Caris had known; but all the same her assured, practical presence had given Caris both hope and resignation, in a combination that brought peace to her soul.

Now Caris became part of Cecilia’s entourage, without really making a decision or even thinking about it. She followed the commands of the most assertive person in the vicinity, just as people had obeyed her directions at the riverside immediately after the collapse, when no one else seemed to know what to do. Cecilia’s brisk practicality was infectious, and those around her acquired some of the same cool competence. Caris found herself holding a small bowl of vinegar, while a beautiful novice nun called Mair dipped a rag in it and washed the blood from the face of Susanna Chepstow, the timber merchant’s wife.

After that it was non-stop until well after dark. Thanks to the long summer evening, all the floating bodies were retrieved from the river before nightfall – though perhaps no one would ever know how many drowned people had sunk to the bottom or drifted downstream. There was no trace of Crazy Nell, who must have been pulled under by the cart to which she was tied. Unjustly, Friar Murdo had survived, having suffered nothing worse than a twisted ankle, and had limped off to the Bell to recuperate with hot ham and strong ale.

However, the treatment of the injured continued, after nightfall, by candlelight. Some of the nuns became exhausted and had to stop; others were overwhelmed by the scale of the tragedy and fell apart, misunderstanding what they were told and becoming clumsy, so that they had to be dismissed; but Caris and a small core group carried on until there was no more to do. It must have been midnight when the last knot was tied in the last bandage, and Caris staggered across the green to her father’s house.

Papa and Petranilla sat together in the dining hall, holding hands, grieving for the death of their brother Anthony. Edmund’s eyes were wet with tears, and Petranilla was crying inconsolably. Caris kissed them both, but she could think of nothing to say. If she had sat down, she would have gone to sleep in the chair; so she climbed the stairs. She got into bed next to Gwenda, who was staying with her, as always. Gwenda was deep in an exhausted sleep, and did not stir.

Caris closed her eyes, her body weary and her heart aching with sorrow.

Her father was mourning one person among the many, but she felt the weight of them all. She thought of her friends, neighbours and acquaintances lying dead on the cold stone floor of the cathedral; and she imagined the sadness of their parents, their children, their brothers and sisters; and the sheer volume of grief overwhelmed her. She sobbed into her pillow. Without speaking, Gwenda put an arm around her and hugged her. After a few moments exhaustion overtook her, and she fell asleep.

She got up again at dawn. Leaving Gwenda still fast asleep, she returned to the cathedral and continued the work. Most of the injured were sent home. Those who still needed to be watched over – such as the still-unconscious Earl Roland – were moved into the hospital. The dead bodies were laid out in neat rows in the chancel, the eastern end of the church, to await burial.

The time flew by, with hardly a moment to rest. Then, late on Sunday afternoon, Mother Cecilia told Caris to take a break. She looked around and realized that most of the work was done. That was when she started to think of the future.

Until that moment she had felt, unconsciously, that ordinary life was over, and she was living in a new world of horror and tragedy. Now she realized that this, like everything else, would pass. The dead would be buried, the injured would heal, and somehow the town would struggle back to normal. And she remembered that, just before the bridge collapsed, there had been another tragedy, violent and devastating in its own way.

She found Merthin down by the river, with Elfric and Thomas Langley, organizing the clean-up with the help of fifty or more volunteers. Merthin’s quarrel with Elfric had clearly been set aside in the emergency. Most of the loose timber had been retrieved from the water and stacked on the bank. But much of the woodwork was still joined together, and a mass of interlocked timber floated on the surface, moving slightly on the rise and fall of the water, with the innocent tranquillity of a great beast after it has killed and eaten.