There was even a time when, to show his prowess as a performer, he agreed to take the part of Herod in the pageant plays. But what was the good of all this posturing? The point is that Alison loved another. No. Not the carpenter. Of course she could not love her husband. She loved the clerk and lodger, Nicholas. Absolon might as well go whistle in the wind. She treated him as a joke. She turned him into her pet monkey, and laughed at his screechings. The proverb is quite right. The one who is closest comes first. Out of sight is out of mind. Lively Nicholas was there in the house with her, while poor distraught Absolon was on the other side of town. You might say that Nicholas stood in his light. So good luck to you, young scholar, even though Absolon will wail ‘Alas!’
It happened that one Saturday the carpenter had gone back to Osney Abbey. Alison and Nicholas took advantage of his absence and conferred together. This was their plan. Nicholas would come up with a ruse to beguile the jealous old sod; if everything went well, then she would nestle in his arms all night. That was what both of them wanted. So without more ado Nicholas left her, and took up on a platter enough meat and drink to sustain him in his chamber for a day or two. If the carpenter asked after him, she was to say that she did not know where he was. That she had not seen him. That she had not heard from him. That she even wondered if he was ill – the maid had called for him, but there had been no answer from him.
So all that Saturday there was silence. Nicholas lay very quietly in his chamber, eating and drinking and doing anything else he fancied. I could not say what. This lasted until Sunday evening. The old carpenter was by now in a state of some alarm, and wondered if his lodger had taken ill. Could it be the white death? ‘I am afraid,’ he said, ‘by the bones of all the saints. Something is wrong with Nicholas. God forbid that he should have died suddenly! This wicked world is uncertain enough. I saw today a corpse borne to church, who last Monday I saw at work.’ Then he turned to his servant-boy, Robin. ‘Go upstairs,’ he said, ‘and shout for him at his door. Knock on it with a stone, if you wish. Find out what’s going on. Then come and tell me.’
So the boy eagerly ran up the stairs, and came to a halt outside Nicholas’s chamber. Then he knocked on the door like a madman and shouted out, very loudly, ‘Hey! Where are you, master Nicholas? How can you sleep all day? It isn’t right!’ He might as well have saved his breath. There was no response. But he knew there was a hole in the skirting board, which the cat used as a passage. So he got down on his knees and peered through this hole. What do you think he saw? There was Nicholas sitting upright in his bed, with his mouth open, motionless, gaping at the ceiling. He might have been struck by the new moon.
So Robin rushed downstairs, in a state of great excitement, and relayed the strange news to the carpenter. The old man blessed himself and said, ‘By the patron saint of Oxford, Frydeswyde, no man knows what will happen next! Our young friend has been affected by all this astronomy business. He has fallen into a fit. Or he may have gone mad. I knew this would happen all along. No man should try to seek out God’s secrets! Blessed are the ignorant who know only how to say their prayers! It happened to another scholar, you know. Did you hear about him? He was walking in the fields one night, gazing up at the stars to find the future, when he fell into a clay pit. He didn’t see that, did he? And yet I do feel sorry for young Nicholas. If I get the chance, and pray God I do, I will scold him for all his studying. Get me a long staff, Robin, and I will lever it under his door while you tear it off its hinges. That will get his attention.’
So they climbed upstairs, and stood outside Nicholas’s room. Robin was a strong boy, and managed to get the door off without much difficulty. It fell down on the floor with a clatter. Yet Nicholas did not move a muscle. He was completely motionless, his mouth open, staring into space. The carpenter thought that he might be paralysed by despair, and shook him violently by the shoulders. Then he shouted at him, ‘Nicholas! Look at me! Wake up! Think of the passion of Christ!’ He made the sign of the cross over him. ‘Look!’ he said. ‘I am expelling the elves and wicked fairies that torment you.’ He went to the four corners of the chamber and muttered the night spell. Then he crossed the threshold and recited the same charm:
‘Jesus Christ and Benedict,
Keep us from heaven’s interdict,
Against the spirits of the night
Protect us from the evil blight.’
Now at this moment Nicholas began to stir. He sighed very deeply. He groaned. He began to talk to himself. ‘Alas,’ he said. ‘Is it true? Is the world about to end?’
‘What are you saying?’ The carpenter was alarmed. ‘Put your trust in God. We, who work in the world, have faith.’
‘Get me a drink,’ Nicholas replied. ‘And then I will tell you something in confidence. It is an affair that concerns both of us. And I will tell nobody else about it.’
So the carpenter went downstairs and came back with a flagon of strong ale. They both drank deeply and then, with a finger to his lips, Nicholas shut the door and sat down with the carpenter on the bed. ‘John,’ he said, ‘my dear friend and landlord, you must promise me that you will never reveal what I am about to tell you. What I have to say has been sent to me from above…’ He raised his eyes to the ceiling. ‘If you disclose it you will be damned for ever. If you betray my confidence, you will be lost. You will be condemned to madness.’
‘Christ and His holy blood forbid it should come to that,’ the poor fool replied. ‘Although I say it myself, I don’t have a big mouth. I am not about to gab to man or wife. Or child. You have my word on that.’
‘Very good, John.’ Nicholas sat closer to him, and put his mouth to the carpenter’s ear. ‘This is it. I am not going to lie to you. I have been studying my books very carefully. You might say that I have drunk deep of their wisdom. And I have been observing the moon. This is what I have discovered. Next Monday, about nine o’clock at night, there is going to be torrential rain. It will be wild, incessant and prolonged. It will be more powerful than the Flood. In less than an hour the whole world will be drowned. All human life will be destroyed.’
‘Oh God!’ exclaimed the carpenter. ‘What about Alison? What about my wife? Will she be drowned, too?’ He was prostrate with sorrow. He looked as if he were about to faint. ‘Is there no solution? No escape?’
‘Why, yes there is. God is above us. You must follow my instructions to the letter. Don’t start planning and scheming on your own. That won’t work. The saying of Solomon is still true – follow good advice, and you will not be sorry. And I promise you this. Without having to build an ark, I will save the three of us. Do you remember what happened to Noah, when God warned him that the earth was about to be drowned?’
‘Yes. Many years ago.’
‘When you heard it or when it happened?’
‘When I heard it.’
‘So you must also have heard of the trouble of Noah and his family, trying to get his wife to go on board the ark. He would have given up all the animals, from aardvark to zebra, to dispatch her on a ship of her own. So now what are we going to do? Speed is necessary. This is no time for making speeches. We cannot wait. What you have to do is this. You have to find us three tubs or troughs – you know, the kind in which you knead dough or brew beer – but they have to be large enough to accommodate each one of us. And obviously they have to be able to float. Once you have them, put enough food in each of them for a day. There will be no need for any more. The waters will go down, as swiftly as they came up, at nine o’clock the next morning.’