C. Palov - Ark of Fire

“All that remains of St. George’s Church,” he remarked, “the tower having somehow weathered the travails of time and history.”

“Although it looks like most of the town fared pretty well.” She gestured to the neat line of half-timbered structures that fronted the narrow street. “I feel like I’m walking through a medieval living history museum.”

“Indeed the inns, taverns, and shops are little changed from the days of Chaucer, all still vying for the traveler’s coin.”

Like Oxford, the town was dressed in its Christmas finery, fairy lights merrily twinkling behind storefront windows. But Canterbury had about it a magical air that the staid Oxford had lacked. Probably on account of its fairy-tale appearance.

As they walked along Mercery Lane, the pavement teemed with tourists, the modern-day pilgrims undeterred by the chilly weather. With each footstep, Edie was very much aware that she walked in another woman’s footsteps—none other than Philippa of Canterbury. Like most medieval women, Philippa’s life story had been written at birth. A man’s life in the fourteenth century was recorded on vellum, enabling changes to be made. But a woman’s life was struck in stone. Unchangeable.

As they neared the city center, the thorny spires of the cathedral began to fill more and more of the skyline. To Edie’s surprise, she began to experience a sense of agitated excitement. Caedmon evidently felt it too, taking her by the hand as they approached a massive three-story gatehouse. Bedecked with tiers of medieval shields and a contingent of stone angels, the Savior stood front and center, welcoming saint and sinner alike.

Caedmon led her through the arched portal. “Christ Church Gate . . . the physical divide between the secular and the sacred.”

Emerging from the portal, Edie caught her first glimpse of Canterbury Cathedral.

“Wow,” she murmured, the cathedral so immense as to be downright daunting—one of those perpendicular Gothic structures purposefully constructed for maximum impact. Everywhere she looked, there were towers and spires and statues.

“Wow,” she again murmured, having yet to emerge from her dumbstruck state.

“We approach as did the medieval pilgrims, awed and bedazzled,” Caedmon remarked. “Of course, the magnificence of Canterbury is not surprising, this being the mother cathedral for the Church of England.”

“More like the mother ship,” Edie muttered, still overwhelmed by the sheer size of the place. “This is gonna take days. Particularly since we don’t even know what we’re looking for.”

“But we know that whatever it is, it’s located inside the cathedral. And I suspect the clue has something to do with the Ark of the Covenant.”

“But the clue could be anything. A piece of sculpture, a painting, a bas-relief. Anything. It could even have something to do with Thomas à Becket,” she added. “After all, he is the ‘blessed martyr,’ right?”

“I believe that Thomas is merely a peripheral character, little more than a reference point to direct us to Canterbury. For it’s this colossus of stone and glass”—raising his arm, Caedmon motioned to the cathedral—“that played a pivotal role in Philippa’s daily life before she left for Godmersham. Moreover, she—”

Caedmon abruptly stopped, in midsentence and midstep. Wordlessly, he stared at the exterior façade of the cathedral. Like a man transfixed.

“What’s the matter?” she asked, grabbing him by the upper arm.

“The clue is embedded in neither sculpture nor painting nor bas-relief.” He turned to her, a beatific smile upon his lips. “It is embedded in glass. Stained glass, to be precise. Arguably one of the greatest artistic achievements of the medieval world, it was the first modern medium of direct communication; complex ideas could be transmitted in a pictorial format.” His smile broadened. “Not to mention that stained glass acts a ‘veil between the two worlds.’”

Edie stared at the dark panes of glass that fronted the southern façade of the cathedral.

“Stained glass was intended as a barrier between the secular world existent in the city streets,” Caedmon continued, “and the sacred world contained within the cathedral. Illuminated by light, the first of God’s creations, stained glass can come to life before one’s very eyes.”

As though an affirmation from on high, a church bell sonorously tolled.

“Come, Miss Miller. Destiny beckons,” Caedmon remarked, ushering her toward the main entrance.

Following on the tailcoats of an American tour group, they entered the elaborately carved doors at the western end of the church. Immediately they were assaulted by the twin scents of incense and flowers and the twin sounds of clicking camera flashes and a Midwestern twang.

“Above you, in what is known as the West Window, you will see a brilliant example of medieval stained glass,” the American tour guide expounded, in what was obviously a canned speech. “The sixty-three glass panels, which depict various saints, prophets, and kings, are just a drop in the bucket to what you’re gonna see on the tour; the cathedral boasts hundreds of glass panels. Make no mistake, folks, this is one of the cultural treasures of Europe.”

Along with everyone else in the group, Edie peered upward.

“Oh, God.” She groaned, stunned. “It’s gonna be like finding a holy needle in a sacred haystack.”

Placing a hand to her elbow, Caedmon led her away from the tour group. “Admittedly, we have a daunting task ahead of us.”

Edie craned her neck, taking another gander at the sixty-three glass panels on the West Window.

“You think?”

CHAPTER 54

His neck inclined at an awkward angle, Caedmon stared at the top register of the stained glass panel, the blaze of color near dazzling, casting what could only be described as psychedelic patterns of light onto the cavernous gloom of the gothic interior.

Les belles-verrières, he silently mused. Certainly more beautiful glass than one man and one woman could reasonably absorb in a single day. But mindful of the fact that MacFarlane might have correctly deciphered the quatrains, he and Edie forged onward.

Some two hours into the search, they now stood in the Corona, a semicircular chapel originally built to house the relics of St. Thomas à Becket. Despite the fact that they had methodically examined dozens of stained glass panels created before the mid-fourteenth century, thus far they’d seen no images or references to the Ark of the Covenant.

As he swayed slightly on his feet, the colorful windows having a hypnotic effect, several lines of Bible verse came to mind. “‘I will lay thy stones with fair colors, and lay their foundations with sapphires. And I will make thy windows of agates, and thy gates of—’”

Edie raised a hand, preempting him in midsentence. “Enough already. I am totally and completely Bibled out. Trying to decipher these stained glass windows is an awful lot like learning a foreign language. Except we don’t have the Berlitz tapes. And you spouting verses from the Good Book does not help matters.”

“Understood,” he contritely replied.

Though Caedmon was at an advantage, having studied medieval iconography while at Oxford, the symbolism and didactic meaning contained within the Canterbury windows was, to the modern observer, not unlike a foreign language. Although it was a language well known eight hundred years ago. Illiteracy was the norm during the Middle Ages, so stained glass enabled the faithful to learn the stories of the Bible in an easily accessible format, thus making medieval stained glass a picture book for the masses.