The Abbot's Agreement: 7 (The Chronicles of Hugh De Singleton, Surgeon)

by Mel Starr

  Arthur did not appreciate this unannounced intrusion, and leaped to his feet, scowling, with his right hand on the hilt of his dagger. I was immediately upon my feet also, but when the two men halted but a step inside the chamber door ’twas not my appearance which halted their advance.

  Before I could ask the meaning of their abrupt arrival the first of the fellows spoke. “Prior Philip wishes to speak to you. You are to come with us.”

  “Where?” I asked.

  “His chamber. He awaits you.”

  “Tell the prior that I have much to discuss with him, but would prefer to entertain him here, in the guest chamber. I have no other pressing business, so will await his visit this morning. Your chauces and cotehardies are mud-spattered. Did you accompany Prior Philip to Lincoln?”

  “Aye. But you are to come with us.” The lay brother also rested a hand upon the hilt of his dagger. I did not wish for conflict with these fellows, but I thought it likely that if I appeared before the prior our conversation would be brief and both Arthur and I would leave his chamber securely bound. And this time Brother Gerleys might find it more difficult to free us. I decided to give the men a cause for alarm.

  “Tell the prior that I have prepared a letter” – this was not completely a lie, for I had composed a message in my mind – “to send to Bishop Bokyngham regarding a heretical brotherhood which has contaminated this abbey, and wish to discuss the business with him as a matter of great urgency. I have discovered that monks, and some lay brothers also, have succumbed to this heresy, and, unless they repent, are in danger of the scaffold.”

  I said these last words with a solemn visage, frowning into the eyes of first one man, then the other.

  “It will be best if Prior Philip appears alone. The heresy is widespread. Who can know which of the brothers may be infected?”

  “We’ll find ’em,” Arthur added. “An’ when we do they’ll ’ave more to fear than this dagger.” And as he spoke he drew his blade from its sheath.

  I do not know which was most effective, my words or Arthur’s dagger. One or the other caused the lay brothers to back through the door, then turn on their heels and flee across the kitchen garden toward the refectory.

  The Eynsham Abbey guest house is not grand, as it would be in greater monasteries. There were no separate accommodations for those of great estate but for a partition which divided the chamber. Early in our stay at the abbey I had opened the door to see what lay beyond the divider. Night had come when I did this, so I saw little of the unlit space. Now I went again to the partition door, and opened it, and peered into this unused area.

  Furnishings there were of higher quality, the beds equipped with thicker mattresses. It was clear that when some baron wished lodging at Eynsham Abbey, he and his lady would be housed in this more elegant chamber while his retainers slept where Arthur and I resided.

  The rear of this better half of the guest house abutted the dormitory. No door was there, which was good. We could not be overwhelmed by men coming for us from two directions. If the prior decided to force a way into the guest house, there was but one door through which men could enter, and to do this they must pass Arthur. No easy task when only one man at a time could occupy the doorway.

  The word “brotherhood,” when I used it, seemed to concentrate the minds of the lay brothers whom Prior Philip had sent for me. I thought they might use it when reporting to the prior, and was sure that if they did, he would deny his dignity enough to appear at the guest house to learn what I knew and if the knowledge could be used against him.

  The prior did not come to the guest house alone, as I had asked, but when Brother Guibert attempted to enter with him I denied him. I thought that Prior Philip might then depart also, but he waved a hand toward the infirmarer, indicating that he should go, and walked to the center of the chamber. He wore yet the long, mud-spattered black cloak which had warmed him upon his journey. I motioned to Arthur to shut the guest house door, and as he did so the prior turned and, with hands upon his hips, gazed imperiously at me.

  I believe the prior was accustomed to intimidating others by looking down upon them, as he is taller than most. He could not do so with me, as I am also tall. I looked him in the eye, but he did not look away.

  Neither of us had spoken. I waited for Prior Philip to begin the conversation. This he hesitated to do, but when the silence became onerous he finally spoke.

  “How is it you defy me? I am lord of this abbey. You refused to attend me.”

  “You are temporarily lord of Eynsham Abbey, I think. Abbot Thurstan told me of what was in the letter you took to Bishop Bokyngham.”

  “Bah. Doddering old fool. I told the bishop his accusation was baseless.”

  “There are other matters. If your only concern was that of Abbot Thurstan’s accusation that you shoved him down the presbytery stairs, you would not have come here as I asked. But when your lay brothers spoke the word ‘brotherhood’ you decided to have conversation with me, to learn what it may be that I have discovered whilst you were upon the road. You would not be here in the guest house if you were not uneasy, I think.”

  “Bah.” (This seemed one of the prior’s favorite expressions.) “I care little for what you may have learned in my absence.”

  “Even who has done murder?”

  I watched the prior intently as I said this, to see if he would react to my claim (untrue, but he would not know that) that I knew who had slain John Whytyng.

  “You have discovered who has slayed the novice?” he asked.

  There was no indication that such knowledge on my part gave the prior any anxiety. Of course, I thought, an adept of the Brotherhood of the Free Spirit would be experienced in lying and therefore skilled at it. If forced to leave the abbey, perhaps he might take up the law.

  “Who is the killer?” he asked.

  “We must first discuss another matter,” I said. “I have discovered heresy within Eynsham Abbey.”

  “You have discovered?” the prior said incredulously. “How does a heretic discover his own heresy? The archdeacon has reported all to Bishop Bokyngham.”

  “Not all, I think. The man who reported my words to Abbot Thurstan is himself a heretic. Will the bishop believe the testimony of such a man?”

  “Who is this heretic?”

  “The infirmarer, Brother Guibert.”

  “What evidence have you for such a charge?”

  I thought I detected just the beginning of concern in the prior’s words.

  “The testimony of others who shared the heresy, but have repented their error, and of some who were invited to join the heresy but refused.”

  “So you will condemn a man as a heretic upon the word of other heretics?”

  “The word of those who are heretics no longer.”

  “What heresy has supposedly infected this house? Tell me, that I may root it out. ’Tis a prior’s duty, in the absence of his abbot, to do so.”

  “The brothers will soon choose a new abbot. He will deal with apostasy.”

  “I surely will.”

  “The brothers know the contents of the letter Abbot Thurstan sent with you to Bishop Bokyngham. Some may believe the accusation against you false, but those are few. Brother Gerleys will be the next abbot of this house, and unless Bishop Bokyngham has some other candidate in mind he will approve him. Either way, you will not be abbot of Eynsham Abbey.”

  Prior Philip’s marred countenance reddened as I spoke. “So you claim,” he growled.

  “You asked of the heresy I have found. There are in Eynsham Abbey members of the Brotherhood of the Free Spirit.”

  “The Free Spirit? That heresy died away a century past,” the prior said. “And ’twas never great here in England. Who has told you this nonsense?”

  “I told you, those who now repent their foolishness and sin. In every such company of heretics there is an adept, a leader, whose commands the others must obey.”

  “Who is this man?”

  “Yo
u, as you well know.”

  “I have served as monk and prior for many years with no blemish upon my reputation. Do you expect that you, a mere bailiff, will be believed if you make this charge known?”

  “You do not deny it, then?”

  “Nay. To what purpose? I am proud of my enlightenment and the hidden secrets I have brought to others.”

  “You do not fear the hangman?”

  “Nay. Who would believe you, did you accuse me?”

  “I told you, there are others: Brother Adam, and Brother Herbert. Brother Henry…”

  “Brother Henry? Was the novice made a brother in my absence?” The prior’s face reddened again.

  “Aye. You thought he would succumb to your demand, as did Brother Adam and Brother Herbert, but he would not, as Martin Glover and John Whytyng would not. Martin Glover left Eynsham Abbey and joined another monastery. But when you required John Whytyng to join the heresy he refused, and you learned then, in the night beside the fishpond, that he intended to forsake a vocation and leave the monastery. You would then have no hold over him. If he told of your heresy there was danger that he might be believed, so you silenced him with a dagger in the back.”

  Prior Philip’s mouth dropped open as I made the accusation. I thought this to be evidence of his guilt. The bishop’s court would not accept an open mouth as evidence, but I thought I could find other proofs. Brother Eustace had seen the prior go out in the night to follow the novice, and no other saw the lad alive after.

  “You believe I murdered the novice?”

  “You were there with him in the night. There are witnesses.”

  “Who says so?”

  “Brother Eustace has told me that you followed John from the church after he let himself from the abbey with his key. And there is another who hid near the pond and overheard the novice refuse your demand. You saw no other course to save yourself. A novice might not send a heretic prior to the scaffold upon his witness alone, but you knew that John’s testimony would cause others, especially Abbot Thurstan, to watch you more closely to see if some part of his accusation might be true.”

  “I did not slay him,” the prior said. His attitude had deflated like a sheep’s bladder kicked too hard.

  “If not you, who did? You admit that you were there. ’Tis why you urged Abbot Thurstan to discharge me… you feared I might learn of your felony.”

  “I did not slay him,” he said again. “I know not who did.”

  “Why should I believe you?”

  “’Tis the truth,” he shrugged.

  “There is no truth for an adept of the Brotherhood of the Free Spirit. That which is false is as acceptable, nay more acceptable, than truth.”

  The prior did not respond. Nothing he said could be believed. But he finally spoke.

  “I left the novice beside the fishpond,” he said. “If he left the abbey he could do me little harm. I had no need to slay him. He said that he planned to tell Brother Gerleys of his choice, then depart. He would not speak to Abbot Thurstan, he said.”

  “Why should I believe this?”

  “Because as I returned to the north porch of the church I saw the man who must have slain the novice.”

  “Who was it?”

  “’Twas dark, and had he not moved I would not have seen him. But I was all in black, so he did not see me and hide himself. Don’t know who it was, and paid the man no attention.”

  “It did not trouble you that he was about after curfew without a light?”

  “That’s a beadle’s worry, not mine.”

  “Next day, when John Whytyng was discovered missing, why did you not speak?”

  “Foolish question. How could I know these things without implicating myself in his disappearance? I thought he had changed his mind. Decided not to tell Brother Gerleys he was leaving the abbey, and chose to depart in the night. He’d no possessions in the novices’ chamber to reclaim. I was pleased that he was away. When you found him dead I congratulated myself that I had held my tongue.”

  “When I found the novice dead, why did you not then speak of the man you saw in the night?”

  “And say what? That I had followed John to the fishpond in the night? Abbot Thurstan might have assumed that we had planned to meet there. I had no desire to be sent to Scotland or Norway.”

  “You may yet go to some such place. ’Twill be better than the alternative.”

  “You think a bishop will turn a prior over to the sheriff for punishment?”

  “I do not know the mind of Bishop Bokyngham, but the archdeacon seemed eager to root out heresy.”

  “’Tis a prior’s word against a bailiff’s.”

  “A bailiff, four monks, one not of this house, and several lay brothers.”

  “Lay brothers? But they were with me on the road to Lincoln.”

  “Aye, they were. But when pressed ’tis my belief they will abjure your heresy rather than face a noose. Do you trust that they will remain loyal to the Brotherhood of the Free Spirit, even to death?”

  The prior hesitated, and I saw in the pause an admission that he could not be sure of his followers. And even if they remained loyal to the Brotherhood, ’twould be no betrayal of the order to lie, for that was the conceit upon which the organization had been founded. Would they betray him, the prior must have thought, to save themselves? Of course. He faced the ruin of his plan, and he knew it.

  “I did not slay John Whytyng,” he said again.

  “You follow a heresy which admires falsehood,” I said. “Why should I, or any man, believe you?”

  The prior had no answer, caught in a web of his own devising. But foolish as it seemed at the time, I believed him. His fur coat did not match the tuft in my pouch, he had evidently roused no man in the night to help him draw John Whytyng’s corpse from the pond and carry it away, and he spoke true: he had small motive, for he would surely be believed over a novice if John had accused him of heresy.

  “We will go to the north porch. Show me where you stood when you saw the man the night John Whytyng was slain.”

  Prior Philip was not eager to do this, or cooperate with a mere bailiff in any way. He would not have, I think, if he could have discovered some way of escaping the hold, tenuous as it was, which I had over him. I motioned to the guest house door. He walked through it and Arthur and I followed. He said not one word, nor looked behind to see if we came after.

  The prior did not lead us through the west range or the cloister to the church, but circled around the kitchen and the abbot’s lodging, past the west front of the church, and stopped when he reached its north porch. Only then did he speak.

  “I stood here, with my hand upon the latch, when movement in the street caught my eye. The moon was near to full, and the night nearly cloudless.”

  “Where was the man when you first saw him?”

  “Just there,” the prior said, and pointed toward Simon atte Pond’s barn.

  “Which way did he travel?”

  “Don’t know. He passed behind those bushes yonder by the road, and I saw no more of him. He did not make for the abbey so I paid him no heed.”

  If this shadowy fellow, skulking about in the night, was the felon I sought, he had already slain the novice when Prior Philip saw him, for if the prior was to be believed, he was seen walking from the abbey fishpond, not toward it. Such would agree with Maude atte Pond’s assertion that John Whytyng was slain but a few moments after his conversation ended. That conversation, ’twas now clear, was with Prior Philip.

  Had this fellow seen the prior leave the church and followed? Why would he do so? What interest could some curfew-violator have in a monk’s nocturnal business? If not the prior, had the man followed John Whytyng? If so, how could he know that the novice would leave the abbey and be waiting to follow him? Or was this shadowy presence mere coincidence?

  There was no sun to warm this day, but even had there been, the north porch would have been in shadow, and cold. Again I wished for my fur coat, and shivered
.

  “Did the fellow walk slowly, or did he seem in a hurry?” I asked.

  “He was hurried,” the prior replied. “He knew his path, even in moonlight, and was quick to follow it and vanish beyond yon bushes.”

  The foliage toward which the prior pointed was bare of leaves, but the thicket of intertwined stems was dense enough that even in daylight a man walking behind the hedge might not be seen. And if he continued on that course he would pass from the road to the forecourt of Sir Richard Cyne’s manor house.

  “Come with me,” I said, and walked toward the road and the place where the prior had seen a man leave Simon atte Pond’s toft. I did not look behind to see if Prior Philip followed. Arthur would see that he did. The prior’s presence behind me would help guarantee truthful answers at the house I intended to visit.

  A few paces along the road and we came to Sir Richard’s manor house. I waited ’till we had passed beyond the bushes which fringed the road, then turned my head quickly toward the house, so that if any man peered from an upper window, my glance would be too quick for him to hide himself from view.

  A man did. Sir Thomas looked down upon us. Did the knight ever do anything but stare from that window? When he saw my eyes upon him he disappeared.

  A few more strides and we came to the path which led to the reeve’s house. I turned toward the door, and heard Prior Philip and Arthur follow. The prior had not spoken as we passed the manor house. Whether or not he followed my gaze and saw Sir Thomas at his window I know not.

  But when I approached the reeve’s door he spoke. “Why do we come here?” he asked. “And what has this place to do with a man seen in the night? You believe I saw Simon atte Pond, and that he did murder?”

  “Nay. Wait, and listen.”

  I rapped my knuckles upon the sturdy door, and a few moments later the old washerwoman who had entered the abbey with Maude appeared, drying her hands upon an apron.

  The woman had visited the abbey many times and recognized the prior. Her hands flew to her face and she stepped back in surprise.