Deeds of Darkness

by Mel Starr

  Still, it’s not all penance. The abbey’s ale was fresh and its pottage of peas and beans flavored with ample portions of pork. I suspect a Cistercian monastery might not have been so liberal. Such monks, forbidden to partake of flesh themselves, are not disposed to allow their guests such pleasures as are Benedictines. Which is why, I suppose, Cistercians look upon their Benedictine predecessors as a feeble remnant of what they once were.

  I had finished my pottage and was considering a bed when the hosteller entered, announcing that Abbot Gerleys, informed of my arrival, wished for me to visit his lodging. I was eager to do so. If he or some other of the abbey had discovered the felons who so vexed the shire, the guilty men might be the same who had slain Hubert Shillside, and a part of my obligation would be met.

  Not so. No felons had been apprehended between Eynsham and Oxford, and, indeed, hamsoken had been done again but three days past on an abbey manor, whilst husband, wife, and children were at work in a field. I was pleased to see that Abbot Gerleys seemed well, free of the ague and its debilitating influence. I asked of his health, and he proclaimed his recovery from the fever.

  “So – what brings you this way again?” the abbot asked. “It’s always good to see you, but I don’t flatter myself you’re that enamored of us. Have you some new clue regarding the murder of your man from Bampton?”

  “Nay. I know nothing more of that felony than when we last met, and am unlikely to learn more of the rogues unless they commit more crimes and in doing so leave behind some clue.”

  “Such men may become careless in their wickedness,” the abbot said. “Success brings imprudence. But if you do not seek felons, why are you again upon the road?”

  I explained to Abbot Gerleys that I sought more than murderers. I told him of my father-in-law’s loss, and my fruitless search for stolen set books. The abbot seemed thoughtful as I completed the tale.

  “RHETORIC was one of the stolen books, you say?”

  “Aye, and the only one identifiable.”

  “Oh? How so?”

  I explained that some previous owner had carelessly spilled ale upon some pages, thereby reducing the value of the book.

  Abbot Gerleys’ brow furrowed at this report. He turned to the monk who attended him and told the lad to seek a Brother Matthew. The youth hurried away, and the abbot turned to me to explain.

  “Shortly before Easter a ragged scholar appeared at our gate. He sought lodging and a meal. He could no longer afford his studies, he said, and so was leaving Oxford to return home – near Bristol, I believe he said. He carried his possessions in a sack slung over his shoulder, and a small sack it was. He possessed but one book, which he told Brother Matthew was of no further use to him, as his days as a student must end. The lad asked if the abbey would purchase this book, as the weight of it would hinder his journey and the coins he might acquire for it would speed him upon his way.”

  “The book was RHETORIC?”

  “Aye. We already have a copy, but such a work is valuable enough that an extra is useful.”

  “Was the book stained?”

  “I’ve not seen it, but Brother Matthew said we paid only sixteen shillings for it, which is a bargain for sure. I felt guilty we did not offer the poor scholar more, and that he was so reduced that he accepted the sum with considerable eagerness.”

  “If he was genuinely a poor scholar,” I said. “What do you remember of him? Was his apparel worn and tattered?”

  “Aye. ’Twould not warm him upon his journey, threadbare as it was.”

  “He stayed in your guest house one night, and then was away?”

  “Just so. Brother Watkin sent him on his way with two loaves fresh from the oven.”

  “Was the lad scrawny and ill-fed?” I asked.

  “Odd you should ask. He seemed fleshy enough. Didn’t appear to have lived on bread and water for many terms.”

  A figure darkened the abbot’s door as he spoke. “Ah, here is Brother Matthew, who keeps the key to our book cupboard.”

  The newcomer bowed and Abbot Gerleys addressed him.

  “A fortnight before Easter we purchased a copy of Aristotle’s RHETORIC.”

  “Aye, from a poor scholar.”

  “What was the book’s condition? Had it been ill-used?”

  “Seemed of some age, but I’d not say ’twas damaged.”

  “No pages stained?”

  “Not as I remember, but I didn’t turn over every leaf.”

  “Is it in the book cupboard?”

  “Nay. Brother Walter has it.”

  “Fetch it, please.”

  Brother Matthew seemed surprised by the request, but monks carry out their abbot’s orders without question. He turned without a word and disappeared toward the monks’ dormitory.

  “You believe the abbey may have acquired one of my father-in-law’s stolen books?”

  “I hope ’tis not so, but I would not have this abbey profit from another man’s loss.”

  “My father-in-law said several lads were involved in the thefts. Mayhap they divided the spoils. Odd, though, that he said nothing about the thieves being meanly clothed, as the youth who sold you RHETORIC was. Perhaps ’twas too dark to notice. He said the thefts occurred as he was about to shutter the shop for the night.”

  “Aye,” the abbot agreed. “And when a man is being robbed his mind may be so unsettled that he will not recall the details of the incident.”

  We fell into a companionable silence, each turning over his own thoughts regarding the abbey’s recent purchase. A few moments later I heard footsteps in the passage beyond the abbot’s chamber and Brother Matthew appeared, carrying a book.

  Night was near, and the abbot’s lodging growing dark. Abbot Gerleys took the book from the librarian, laid it carefully upon his table, then lit four candles and a cresset so we could inspect the pages with more light than his windows could supply.

  We found the stained pages nearly halfway through the book. Some scholar had indeed been careless, for the ale, if such it was which produced the blemish, had discolored four leaves of parchment and made the ink of one page dissolve to the extent that the letters swam and lost clarity, although the leaf was yet readable.

  “I never noticed that,” Brother Matthew said as Abbot Gerleys examined the stained pages. “No wonder the fellow was willing to part with the book for such a price.”

  “You believe this is your father-in-law’s stolen book?” Abbot Gerleys asked.

  “I cannot be sure,” I admitted. “But ’twould be an astonishing coincidence if two different men had spilled ale upon two different copies of RHETORIC.”

  “It would indeed,” the abbot agreed. “So tomorrow, when you return to Bampton, you must take the volume with you. If your father-in-law recognizes the work as one taken from him, he must keep it or sell it, as he wishes. If ’tis not his stolen book, you may return it when next you pass this way – which is likely to be soon, as the number of felons seems to be multiplying and you seem to be in pursuit of them all.”

  “I and my father-in-law are in your debt,” I said. “Not all abbeys would endure such a loss.

  “What else can you tell me of the youth who sold this book?” I asked Brother Matthew. “You have already said he did not seem to be starved and he wore threadbare clothing. Was it a gown such as scholars wear?”

  “Aye,” Brother Matthew affirmed.

  “What of his shoes? Or did he go bare of foot, as a poor man might now that the days are warmer?”

  “He wasn’t barefoot. I didn’t really pay attention to his shoes, but I’m sure he wore a pair.”

  “What of his face and features?”

  The librarian shrugged, nonplussed. “I can bring to mind nothing very memorable about him. He had brown hair.”

  “Long and shaggy,” I asked, “as if he’d not visited a bar
ber for many weeks?”

  “Nay, not long. And he was newly shaved.”

  “He was old enough to shave his whiskers?” I said.

  “He was. The stubble upon his chin was two or three days grown. Odd that he’d been shaved and barbered but a few days before he had to plead such poverty he must sell us his only book.”

  “Pride can be expensive,” Abbot Gerleys said. “Some men will spend their last farthing to maintain appearance.”

  “If appearance was his care, he should’ve purchased a newer gown,” Brother Matthew said wryly. “Few would notice his trimmed hair or shaven cheeks with that shabby gown before them.”

  “Brown hair, you said,” I persisted. “Brown eyes also?”

  “Aye, think so. It’s been six weeks.”

  “Anything memorable at all about the lad’s countenance? Warts? Moles – that sort of thing?” I asked.

  “Nay, he was too young for warts. But now I think on it, the scholar had a mole upon his left temple, betwixt eyebrow and ear.”

  “If the lad passes this way again, seeking lodging, we will ask him where he came by the book,” Abbot Gerleys interjected. “And if his answer is not credible we will hold him and send for you.”

  I left the abbot’s chamber with that understanding between us and RHETORIC under my arm. Neither Arthur nor Uctred could read, but nothing would do when they heard my tale but to inspect the stained pages.

  “Waste of good ale,” Uctred declared as he peered at the leaves.

  “Just as well it wasn’t wine,” was Arthur’s opinion, “else them pages’d be purpled an’ worse than they are.” Arthur is a man who can see the good in even a bad situation.

  He is also able to dismiss all care and worry when his head is upon a pillow and so falls readily to sleep, snoring vigorously to announce to others his somnolent condition. This seemed not to trouble Uctred, who soon joined him in a rasping chorus.

  Perhaps I am becoming accustomed to Arthur’s noisy nocturnal resonance. I lay abed considering how a book could pass from Caxton’s shop, through the hands of thieves, to a poor scholar and thence to Eynsham Abbey. The obvious conclusion was that the poor scholar was one of the thieves who had robbed my father-in-law. Moments after this thought I awoke to the morning sun illuminating the guest chamber’s single window.

  After a loaf and a pint of the abbey’s ale we continued our homeward journey through Stanton Harcourt. I had two questions for the Harcourts, father and son. For the father I wished to know of progress in discovering who had slain Henry. Of the son I would ask if he knew of, whilst he had been a student at Oxford, any poor scholar who had a mole upon his left temple, and who had quit the university and his studies some six weeks past.

  The answer to both questions was “no.”

  “I don’t know many from other halls and colleges,” Edmund said. “But as for Queen’s I remember nobody with such a blemish on his face.”

  Edmund had been a student of Queen’s Hall, Sir Thomas explained, and this did not surprise me. Queen’s regards as its duty the training of priests and such as will take holy orders. Its fellows are lads like Edmund, younger sons who will not inherit, so must seek another living, although most, like those at Balliol, hail from the north, Lancashire and Yorkshire.

  Sir Thomas was in the middle of telling me he had dismissed his portly bailiff for the fellow’s incompetence in discovering who had slain his heir, when a thought came to me. “The wisp of green wool I plucked from the tree – does Oswald yet have it?” I asked him.

  “I suppose so. I’ve given the fellow ’til Whitsuntide to leave his house. He’s not departed yet to seek new employment. You want the strands?”

  “The threads will be of use if ever a suspected murderer is found who wears a green cotehardie.”

  “Match the wisp with the rogue’s clothing, eh? Well, the bailiff’s house is just there, beyond the church and across the road. Come with me and we’ll fetch the bit of wool; you can keep it safe until it may be needed.”

  Sir Thomas, Edmund, and I left Arthur and Uctred with the beasts at the manor house and walked the short way to the bailiff’s residence. Oswald came to the door only after Sir Thomas had pounded vigorously upon it for some time. I believe the man had been yet abed.

  “Here is Master Hugh,” Sir Thomas said. Oswald nodded sleepily at me. “He will have that wisp of green wool he found and left with you.”

  “He’s found a match?” the bailiff asked. I saw his eyes widen and the somnolent expression disappear from his face. Perhaps this change in the man was brought about because he thought I had succeeded at finding the men who had slain Henry whilst he had not. So I thought.

  “Nay, but I have confidence he will do so before you ever would. Fetch the wool.”

  Oswald glanced from Sir Thomas to Edmund to me, shrugged, and turned from his door to enter the dim recesses of his house. Sir Thomas followed close behind, then Edmund, and I entered the house last. Modesty would not permit me to precede Sir Thomas or his son. This was wise, as well as mannerly, although I did not realize it would be at the time.

  Oswald went to a small chest set upon a sideboard, opened it, and rummaged about within it. He seemed perplexed, lifted the chest, and walked with it to the open door where the morning sun illuminated the opening. As he passed Edmund he stumbled and fell headlong into the rushes covering his floor. Edmund, being nearest, sprang to assist the fellow to his feet, which task, due to the bailiff’s girth, took some effort. The lad took Oswald’s hand and elbow so as to raise him to his feet, then bent to retrieve the fallen chest. And its contents.

  Two silver spoons had fallen from the chest, and a pouch of coins. There were also several buckles and a small dagger. And there was a badge of St. Thomas, indicating that Oswald had gone on pilgrimage to Canterbury to worship at the saint’s shrine.

  Oswald was sufficiently padded that the tumble harmed little but his pride. He took the chest from Edmund and continued to the open door and sunlight. At the doorway Oswald pawed through the chest again, then eventually lifted his eyes to Sir Thomas and spoke.

  “It ain’t ’ere.”

  “What? The green wisp of wool I entrusted to you is missing?”

  “Aye. It was ’ere in this chest last time I looked.”

  “When was that?”

  “Two days past. I remember because I saw a gentleman an’ his grooms ride past an’ one of the grooms wore a cotehardie of green. I went to me chest to fetch the fragment an’ see was the fellow’s garb the same.”

  “And was it?” Sir Thomas barked.

  “Nay. Forest green ’is cotehardie was. Not like the scrap I ’ad.”

  As he spoke I saw Oswald lift the chest to Sir Thomas, as if inviting him to inspect its contents for a scrap of yellow-tinted green wool.

  “Two days past you say the wool fragment was there, and it’s now gone?” Sir Thomas said.

  “Aye.”

  “And you’ve not opened the chest since the green-garbed man rode past?”

  “Nay.”

  “Perhaps,” I said, “the wool fell from the chest when you dropped it just now.”

  At this thought my three companions turned as one to gaze at the disordered rushes where Oswald had fallen.

  Edmund stood closest to the place, and so was first to drop to his knees and paw through the rushes for the missing bit of wool. I joined him, whilst Sir Thomas and the bailiff stood aside so as not to block the light from the open door. We found no wool, green or otherwise.

  Oswald yet held the small chest before him, as if offering the box as evidence of his guileless state. That the green woolen filaments were not in the chest was clear. Where the threads might now be was another mystery to add to the conundrums already vexing my life. And I’d thought I had enough.

  Did Oswald destroy the wool in anger at Sir Thomas for removing
him from his position? Or was the bailiff simply careless? Or did Oswald intentionally spirit the wool away? But if so, why?

  “Whitsuntide, remember. You must be away by then,” Sir Thomas said, through gritted teeth, as we abandoned the search.

  Oswald bowed unctuously and promised that he would be.

  “There will be another to have your place and this house the Monday after,” Sir Thomas said.

  Oswald bowed again, then turned and replaced the chest upon the sideboard. I put the matter from me. I had enough to puzzle me already. I needed no new riddles to bewilder me this day. I determined to put green woolen wisps out of my mind.

  It is easy to resolve a thing, less easy to carry it out. The more I was determined not to think on green wool and what it might have to do with felonies, the more difficult I found it to put the missing fragment from my mind. So as Arthur, Uctred, and I traveled on from Stanton Harcourt to Bampton I thought of little else but the absent wisp of green wool.

  Chapter 12

  Caxton knew his stolen book the moment he laid eyes upon it and saw the stained pages. “What will you do with it?” I asked. “Bampton has no scholars eager to buy it.”

  “I suppose you could return to Oxford with it and sell it to some other stationer or bookseller,” he replied. “But I’d realize small profit from it. You should keep it, as payment for my board here at Galen House.”

  I had read and studied Aristotle when at Balliol College, but had always rented the books I used. I had never thought to own a copy of RHETORIC, much as I might admire the philosopher. I was perhaps overeager to accept the offer.

  Kate set to work preparing our dinner of stockfish in balloc broth whilst Caxton and I played with Bessie and John. I tossed Bessie into the air, a sport she dearly loves, until the little lass cackled with delight. My father-in-law had crafted a doll for Bessie from scraps of linen and wool and a bit of a broken beech tree branch come down beyond Bushey Row in a storm. Next, he said, he would make a cradle for the doll.