walls and pedestrians alike
by every passing horseman. Like sin, such filth was the common situation of humanity, but Roger had never before encountered
either in so sensible a concentration.
It was better as they approached the Hall, which stood directly along the Thames; for though the river itself sublimed into
the air the miasma of the grandest Cloaca Maxima of them all, here at least the air could distinctly be felt to be in motion.
Nevertheless, by the time he and Adam were left alone in their separate cells in the palace, Roger was more than ready for
the spring bath with which he had already planned to conclude the long trip.
What he had expected to follow upon their arrival he could not have said, but in fact, there was nothing of any moment. They
had reached the. Hall early in the afternoon, and Roger spent the rest of daylight prowling his cell. Occasionally, a distant
sennet announced the arrival of one of the barons and his suite; on each such occasion, Roger halted his pacing and looked
out his one window, but for the most part there was nothing to see but fog; when, once or twice, the fog lifted slightly,
nothing but the river. The day, a dim and depressing one even at high noon, died early,obviously of suffocation. A man came with a lit rush and touched it to two tapers beside Roger’s low wooden bed –even inside
the cell the air was so moist that both flames showed haloes only five paces away – and then there was another long wait.
Part of this he was able to fill as a matter of course with the prayers appropriate for the hours; but he was able to go no
further with the book on old age without writing materials, and perhaps could have accomplished as little with them, for he
discovered that away from his references he could not call a single quotation to mind with surety – either something had abruptly
gone wrong with his memory or (the self suggested with its usual exacerbating abruptness) his memory had never had the true
scholar’s infinite retentiveness for the letter of the text. The simple attempt to choose the least unattractive of these
two new appearances made him feel slightly motion-sick, like a child taken trotting for the
first time;
and as the hours lengthened, the giddiness seeped down into his knees and began to transform itself implacably into panic.
Someone knocked. After his first start, Roger jerked open the door with a great surge of relief travelling through his muscles.
Anything that would serve to take him out of this prison-yard circling had to be welcome.
It was Adam. ‘Eheu,’ he said, twitching his long nose.
‘Stercor stercoraris!
I was about to ask thee if thou’d supped, but that could no man in this chamber-pot. Ho, Roger, ware the candles—’
Roger missed the candles, but he did not miss the bed, though he tried. He gasped and glared at Adam.
‘God pardon me, and do thou, too,’ Adam said, instantly repentant. ‘Here, let’s sponge thee off and get fresh linen –hold
off, thou’rt but making it more hopeless – and then we’ll have thee changed to higher quarters. Stay’st thou here and thou’lt
suffocate; look how blue yonder candles burn; ‘tis like the vault of a sewer.’
He helped Roger to strip, steadying him, and bathed him again.
‘Full many a rogue’s died from taking such a refuge,’ hesaid, wrapping the still-damp surplice over the warm dry shift he had removed from his own back. ‘There’s a foulness collects
over still sewage that kills even rats. I myself have seen spectral fires burning over cesspool-heads, in the midst of nights;
demons, belike, come to breathe what’s closest on earth to their air in hell.’
‘How can a demon leave hell by first intention? Roger asked, staring with fascination at the nearest candle-flame. It was
undeniably mantled with blue, but not the blue of incipient guttering-out; the flame itself was as tall as ever.
‘Ah, Roger, as to that, no
by every passing horseman. Like sin, such filth was the common situation of humanity, but Roger had never before encountered
either in so sensible a concentration.
It was better as they approached the Hall, which stood directly along the Thames; for though the river itself sublimed into
the air the miasma of the grandest Cloaca Maxima of them all, here at least the air could distinctly be felt to be in motion.
Nevertheless, by the time he and Adam were left alone in their separate cells in the palace, Roger was more than ready for
the spring bath with which he had already planned to conclude the long trip.
What he had expected to follow upon their arrival he could not have said, but in fact, there was nothing of any moment. They
had reached the. Hall early in the afternoon, and Roger spent the rest of daylight prowling his cell. Occasionally, a distant
sennet announced the arrival of one of the barons and his suite; on each such occasion, Roger halted his pacing and looked
out his one window, but for the most part there was nothing to see but fog; when, once or twice, the fog lifted slightly,
nothing but the river. The day, a dim and depressing one even at high noon, died early,obviously of suffocation. A man came with a lit rush and touched it to two tapers beside Roger’s low wooden bed –even inside
the cell the air was so moist that both flames showed haloes only five paces away – and then there was another long wait.
Part of this he was able to fill as a matter of course with the prayers appropriate for the hours; but he was able to go no
further with the book on old age without writing materials, and perhaps could have accomplished as little with them, for he
discovered that away from his references he could not call a single quotation to mind with surety – either something had abruptly
gone wrong with his memory or (the self suggested with its usual exacerbating abruptness) his memory had never had the true
scholar’s infinite retentiveness for the letter of the text. The simple attempt to choose the least unattractive of these
two new appearances made him feel slightly motion-sick, like a child taken trotting for the
first time;
and as the hours lengthened, the giddiness seeped down into his knees and began to transform itself implacably into panic.
Someone knocked. After his first start, Roger jerked open the door with a great surge of relief travelling through his muscles.
Anything that would serve to take him out of this prison-yard circling had to be welcome.
It was Adam. ‘Eheu,’ he said, twitching his long nose.
‘Stercor stercoraris!
I was about to ask thee if thou’d supped, but that could no man in this chamber-pot. Ho, Roger, ware the candles—’
Roger missed the candles, but he did not miss the bed, though he tried. He gasped and glared at Adam.
‘God pardon me, and do thou, too,’ Adam said, instantly repentant. ‘Here, let’s sponge thee off and get fresh linen –hold
off, thou’rt but making it more hopeless – and then we’ll have thee changed to higher quarters. Stay’st thou here and thou’lt
suffocate; look how blue yonder candles burn; ‘tis like the vault of a sewer.’
He helped Roger to strip, steadying him, and bathed him again.
‘Full many a rogue’s died from taking such a refuge,’ hesaid, wrapping the still-damp surplice over the warm dry shift he had removed from his own back. ‘There’s a foulness collects
over still sewage that kills even rats. I myself have seen spectral fires burning over cesspool-heads, in the midst of nights;
demons, belike, come to breathe what’s closest on earth to their air in hell.’
‘How can a demon leave hell by first intention? Roger asked, staring with fascination at the nearest candle-flame. It was
undeniably mantled with blue, but not the blue of incipient guttering-out; the flame itself was as tall as ever.
‘Ah, Roger, as to that, no
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