Emerging, Edie caught her first real sight of Canterbury cathedral. ‘Wow,’ she murmured, the cathedral so immense as to be downright daunting. One of those soaring Gothic structures purposefully constructed for maximum impact, everywhere she looked, there were towers and spires and statues. ‘Wow,’ she murmured again, yet to emerge from her awestruck state.
C?dmon remarked, ‘Of course, the magnificence of Canterbury is not surprising, this being the mother cathedral of 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 carving.
‘I think Thomas is a peripheral character, little more than a reference to direct us to Canterbury. For it’s this colossus of stone and glass —’ raising his arm, C?dmon motioned to the cathedral ‘— that played a pivotal role in Philippa’s daily life before she left for Godmersham. Moreover, she —’
C?dmon stopped in mid-sentence and mid-step. Wordlessly, he stared at the facade of the cathedral. Like a man transfixed.
‘What’s the matter?’ she asked, grabbing him by the upper arm.
He turned to her, a beatific smile upon his lips. ‘The clue is contained in glass. Stained glass, to be precise. One of the greatest artistic achievements of the medieval world, it was the first modern medium of mass communication.’ His smile broadened. ‘Not to mention that stained glass forms a “veil between the two worlds”.’
Edie stared at the windows in the southern facade of the cathedral.
‘Stained glass was intended as a barrier between the secular world of the city streets,’ C?dmon continued, ‘and the sacred world contained within the cathedral. Illuminated by light, the first of God’s creations, stained glass can literally come to life before one’s eyes.’
As though an affirmation from on high, a bell tolled sonorously.
‘Come, Miss Miller. Destiny beckons,’ C?dmon said portentously, ushering her towards the entrance.
Following on the tail of an American tour group, they entered the elaborately carved doors at the western end of the cathedral. Immediately they were assaulted by the twin scents of incense and flowers and the twin sounds of clicking cameras 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, is just a drop in the ocean compared to what you’re gonna see on the tour, the cathedral boasting hundreds of glass panels. Make no mistake, folks,
Along with everyone else in the group, Edie peered up.
‘Oh God,’ she groaned, stunned. ‘It’s gonna be like finding a holy needle in a sacred haystack.’
Taking her by the elbow, C?dmon led her away from the group. ‘Admittedly, we have a daunting task ahead of us.’
Edie craned her neck, taking another gander at the sixty-three glass panels of the West Window.
‘You think?’
54
Neck inclined at an awkward angle, C?dmon stared at the top of the stained-glass panel, the blaze of colour dazzling, casting what could only be described as psychedelic patterns of light onto the gloomy walls of the Gothic interior.
Some two hours into their search, they stood in the Corona, the semicircular chapel originally built to house the relics of St Thomas a 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.
Swaying slightly on his feet, the coloured light almost hypnotic, several lines of Bible verse came to mind. ‘“I will lay thy stones with fair colours, and lay their foundations with sapphires. And I will make thy windows of agates, and thy gates of —”’
Edie raised a hand, cutting him off in mid-sentence. ‘Enough already. I am totally and completely Bibled out. Trying to decipher these 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.
Although C?dmon had studied medieval iconography while at Oxford, to any modern observer the symbolism contained within the Canterbury windows was not unlike a foreign language. But this language had been well understood eight hundred years ago. Illiteracy the norm during the Middle Ages, stained glass had enabled the faithful to learn the stories of the Bible through pictures.
Ignoring the painful crick in his neck, C?dmon continued to study the panels, forcing himself to examine only those images specific to the Old Testament.
As they continued to the next group of panels, he caught sight of a leather-clad figure in the corner of his eye. The size and shape of the figure similar to those of their assailant in Oxford, he slowed his step. Almost instantly, his heartbeat escalated, goose pimples prickling his skin. He knew this feeling, had had it any number of times when he worked for MI5. Something in Denmark most definitely stank to high heaven.
Muscles tightening, he slowly turned to face the enemy.
It took only an instant to verify that the man was simply a tourist. While the robust physique was similar, the facial features were completely different.
‘Is something the matter?’ his companion asked. ‘All of a sudden, you’re looking awfully tight around the jaw.’
‘No, no, nothing is the matter,’ he assured her, taking her by the elbow and steering her towards the aisle of the cathedral choir. To one side of them, massive columns supported incised stone arches; on the other side, stained-glass windows gleamed beautifully.
‘Ah! The famed Typology Windows,’ he announced, effectively changing the subject. Knowing that the Typology Windows had been created prior to the thirteenth century, he angled his head to examine the upper panes of glass, ignoring the bolt of pain that travelled from the nape of his neck to the base of his spine.
Edie elbowed him in the ribs. ‘Explanation, please. In case you’ve forgotten, I’m a novice at this.’
‘Typology was a tool often used in the Middle Ages to confirm the legitimacy of the New Testament using stories taken from the Old,’ he explained. ‘A typical example is the tale of Jonah and the whale. According to the Old Testament, Jonah remained within the whale’s belly for three days and three nights.’
‘Prefiguring Jesus being entombed for the same length of time,’ she astutely commented.
‘Precisely. Usually the stories were paired, thus reinforcing a particular theological point through the manipulation of biblical imagery.’
‘Thought control at its very best.’
He winked at her. ‘How else does one control the masses?’
‘Hey, look, it’s Noah and the Ark!’ she exclaimed, pointing to a half-roundel. Placing a hand to her mouth, she stifled a snicker. ‘Yeah, I know, wrong ark. Although at this point I’m happy to see
