Ranulf felt a surge of relief that the matter was to be settled as quickly as this. But his relief ebbed away as Geoffrey Ridel rose to speak again. “Indeed we are making progress,” Ridel said smoothly. “I hope we can be equally expeditious in resolving the debts still outstanding from the king’s Toulouse campaign.”
Thomas Becket half rose in his seat, then sank back. “What debts?”
“Five hundred marks you borrowed from the King’s Grace and an additional five hundred marks you borrowed from the Jews, for which the king stood surety.”
“That money was a gift from the king, and spent in his service!”
“Have you evidence in support of that claim?” When Becket reluctantly shook his head, Ridel smiled derisively, although Henry remained impassive. After a brief deliberation, the court’s decision was rendered: that the thousand marks must be repaid. By now the king’s intent was plain to every man in the hall, and Becket had some difficulty in finding men willing to stand surety for the debt.
His face flushed with barely suppressed anger, Becket looked challengingly at Henry. “Is there anything more you require of me?” he asked, managing to invest those innocuous words with resounding echoes of contempt.
Henry’s hand closed on the arm of his chair. When he spoke, though, his voice was quite even, chillingly dispassionate. “Just one thing more. I require from you an accounting for all the proceeds of the archbishopric of Canterbury during the period between Archbishop Theobald’s death and your consecration-and an accounting for the revenues of all the vacant bishoprics and abbacies you administered during your chancellorship.”
Becket blanched and there were audible gasps. This heavy-handed display of royal power was disturbing to them all.
Ranulf was admitted into the king’s private chamber as dusk was falling. Henry looked tired but satisfied, and why not? So far all had been going his way. Becket’s protest that he’d been summoned only to answer contempt of court charges had fallen on deaf ears. He’d finally gained himself a brief reprieve by insisting that he must consult with his fellow bishops before responding to this latest demand, and the court had been temporarily adjourned. But Ranulf knew that the bloodletting would resume on Monday-unless he could convince his nephew to back off.
“Have you come to take supper with me, Uncle?”
“Yes, but first I would like a few moments with you-alone.” Henry hesitated slightly, then made a gesture of dismissal. As the other men obediently trooped out, he moved to the hearth, reached for the fire tongs, and began to stir the flames.
“Harry…” Ranulf joined the younger man at the hearth, so obviously groping for words that Henry slanted him a grimly amused look.
“Spit it out, Uncle, ere it chokes you.”
“Harry, I was troubled by what occurred in the hall this afternoon.”
“Not as troubled, I trust, as Becket.”
“In all honesty, I think every man in that hall was troubled. You were justified to charge him with contempt, but to demand a full accounting… Jesu, that might well total as much as thirty thousand marks! It could take years to sort through the records, and there are bound to be discrepancies and missing receipts and errors-”
“So?”
“So it is beginning to look as if you are aiming for nothing less than the man’s ruination!”
“I am,” Henry said, with a bluntness that took Ranulf’s breath away. “I cannot dismiss him, but I can force his resignation, and by God, I will-one way or another.”
“At what cost, Harry? Have you not thought about the damage done to the Church-and the Crown-by this feud with Becket? I understand your disappointment with his performance as archbishop. For the life of me, I cannot understand why he felt the need to make you his enemy or to take such extreme, provocative positions. Yet getting rid of him might well give you more grief than ever he could. Granted that he was a mistake, but surely he is a mistake you can live with?”
“Can Will?” Henry demanded, so bitterly that Ranulf fell silent. There was no point in arguing that Becket had not brought about Will’s death. That wound was still too raw.
Saturday morning passed in endless and increasingly acrimonious discussion. All of the bishops had gathered in Becket’s priory guest quarters and proceeded to give the archbishop advice that was distinguished only by its discord. Gilbert Foliot argued brusquely for resignation, a course of action adamantly opposed by the Bishop of Winchester, who insisted this would set an invidious precedent for future prelates and undermine canon law. Hilary of Chichester contended that compromise was clearly called for under the circumstances, and the plain-spoken Bishop of Lincoln sent shivers of alarm through the room when he blurted out that Becket’s choices had narrowed to resignation or execution. “What good will the archbishopric do him if he is dead?”
The Bishop of Winchester shook off the gloom engendered by Lincoln’s tactless remark, getting stiffly to his feet and demanding his cane. “It has been my experience,” he said dryly, “that few problems will not go away if enough money is thrown at them. I shall go to the king and see what effect two thousand marks have upon his resolve.”
Becket had been slumped in his chair, letting the arguments swirl about him. At that he raised his head sharply. “I do not have two thousand marks to give the king,” he said and Winchester patted him on the shoulder.
“Ah, but I do,” he said, and limped purposefully toward the door.
His departure brought a hiatus in the day’s heated discussions. Some of the men went off to answer nature’s call, others to find food or drink in the priory guest hall. William Fitz Stephen had been hovering inconspicuously on the sidelines. He’d been deeply shaken by the Bishop of Lincoln’s terse warning, and when he saw the young Bishop of Worcester heading for the door, he swiftly followed.
He caught up with Roger out in the priory cloisters. “My lord bishop, might I have a word with you?”
“Of course, William.” Roger gestured toward a bench in a nearby carrel. “What may I do for you?”
“You are the king’s cousin. Surely you must know his mind. My lord, how far is he prepared to go? Think you that there is any chance the archbishop’s life might be at risk?”
“No,” Roger said firmly, “I do not. The king has the Devil’s own temper, as he’d be the first to admit. But for all that, I cannot see him being deliberately cruel or unjust.”
Fitz Stephen was heartened by the certainty in Roger of Worcester’s voice and he returned to the lord archbishop’s quarters with a lighter step. There he found that Hilary of Chichester was haranguing Becket on the need to resign his position, insisting that otherwise he faced imprisonment for embezzlement. Becket paid him no heed, but another of the bishops rebuked Chichester sharply, declaring that it would be shameful for the archbishop to consider his personal safety. The afternoon dragged on, one of the longest that Fitz Stephen could remember. And then the Bishop of Winchester was back, stoop-shouldered and grim-visaged.
“Well,” he said, heaving himself into the closest chair, “he turned me down. If he does not want money, what then? Blood?”
Fitz Stephen knew that the bishop, a highly erudite man, was speaking metaphorically. Still, he flinched, and as he looked around, he saw that he was not the only one disquieted by those ominous words.
On Sunday it rained, but Monday brought flashes of sun. Henry was just finishing his breakfast when he received a message from his one-time chancellor and friend. He read it hastily, swearing under his breath, and then shouted for his uncle.
Rainald pushed reluctantly away from the table, his trencher still heaped with sausages and fried bread. “What is amiss?”