Brother Hermitag, the Shorts

by Howard of Warwick

  ‘Oh yes. Bee, ay, arr, gee and issss. Bargis. I can write them, and read them if they’re written neat.’

  ‘A remarkable level of learning my son.’ Hermitage said genuinely, and Bargis’s chest swelled. ‘In these sorry days it is hard to find anyone of intellect, even in monasteries. And then they are treated with a sorry level of significance.’ Hermitage could confirm this from personal experience.

  ‘So this Dingle place needs a scribe does it?’

  ‘Well, I’m not exactly sure about that.’

  ‘If I may say so brother, for someone travelling alone in a testing part of the realm, you seem know very little about your direction or purpose.’

  ‘I’m afraid that is the case, I had to leave my last establishment rather quickly you see.’

  Oh this was better. Tales of this sort about monks weren’t really to his taste, but he could always trade a good one for a loaf somewhere.

  ‘Go on,’ Bargis said, hoping that this was going to be really juicy. He was already making up the sales pitch for the next village.

  ‘Oh, nothing much to tell really,’ Hermitage began, which did nothing to dampen Bargis’s hopes as the guilty always thought they’d done nothing wrong. The ruder the sin the more heartfelt the denial. The really naughty ones usually admitted all the sordid details of their grubby little acts, but would then ask their audience with wide and unbelieving eyes what they had done wrong; it was perfectly normal/natural/expected/invited/helpful after all.

  ‘There was a death you see.’

  Fantastic.

  ‘One of the monks died and I couldn’t understand how or why it had happened.’

  He had killed someone; Bargis would dine out on this for weeks.

  ‘I questioned and considered all of the facts and thought that I was coming to a conclusion. Then the abbot said that there was nothing to worry about and that perhaps I should take my skills to another place.’

  ‘What?’ asked Bargis, all agog, ‘Your skills at killing people?’

  A killer monk, this was getting better and better.

  ‘No, no,’ Hermitage was shocked and appalled, then offended and finally worried that he was being thought capable of murder. ‘I had nothing to do with the death, I was just trying to determine whether it was a murder and if so, who might have done it.’

  ‘Clever,’ said Bargis, disappointed once more that this monk had not turned out to be either a deranged killer, or some sort of ecclesiastical executioner.

  ‘That’s what the abbot said, before he asked me to leave.’ Hermitage began to wonder if the learning he valued so highly was more of a curse than a blessing. ‘None of the other monks were worried about the death, the abbot said the removal of the head had been a prank,’

  Bargis could already taste the wine.

  ‘And then another monk threw himself off a tower saying that he had done it. Although that seemed odd as well.’

  ‘Well, what a day you’ve had.’ Bargis hoped that the monk would go on. Perhaps he had a whole history of things like this happening around him.

  ‘That’s why the Abbot said I would better off at a place of higher learning, like De’Ath’s Dingle. I could put my analytical powers to good work.’

  ‘Let’s get this straight,’ Bargis said, finding it hard to believe that someone so apparently intelligent could be this stupid. ‘A monk gets his head cut off, the abbot says it’s nothing to worry about, you start getting suspicious, an odd monk jumps off a tower and the abbot suggests you should leave?’

  ‘That’s about it,’ Hermitage sighed.

  ‘Remarkable,’ said Bargis, wondering if he could find the monastery and blackmail the abbot. Churchmen were notoriously difficult to blackmail though. If they were junior, disgraceful behaviour was pretty much expected, and if they were senior they tended to make troublesome people like Bargis disappear in the middle of the night - as this abbot had obviously done once already.

  ‘So,’ Bargis offered the opinion in that high pitched tone that suggests innocence of question and absence of judgement. ‘Do you think the abbot could have had anything to do with it?’

  ‘Good Lord no,’ Hermitage responded quickly. ‘He was an abbot.’

  ‘Ah,’ thought Bargis, this monk was one of them. ‘Of course,’ he added.

  ‘So it’s your working things out that the Abbot thought you ought to take somewhere else?’

  ‘Yes, I’ve always had an enquiring mind, that’s what drew me to the world of letters in the first place.’

  Bargis also had an enquiring mind. It was usually enquiring how he could get hold of other people’s property before they got hold of him.

  There were very few occasions when he couldn’t see the value in something or other, and even fewer occasions on which this didn’t result in him helping himself to the something or other without the owner’s permission. Everything had a value, it might be large or small, it might be right now or in the future, all you needed to do was let your imagination run wild. While it was out in the wild it would sometimes spot some helpless and hapless individual who could be led down one of two paths; either Bargis had something of high value, for which they would pay dearly, or something they possessed was so worthless they would sell cheaply.

  Bargis knew very well that knowledge alone could have very high value indeed, although it seemed clear that this monk didn’t actually have any hard facts. It seemed even more obvious that he wouldn’t know what to do with a fact if it ran up his habit. He did however have understanding - analytical skills he called them - and there had to be some use for them. All Bargis needed to do was think what it might be. He let his imagination off the leash while his body sat there nodding at some drivel the monk was spouting about the nature of miracles.

  ‘I think you’d better stay by my fire tonight brother,’ he eventually interrupted as his thinking returned with a quite simply marvellous idea.

  ‘That’s extremely decent of you my son. I have nothing to offer in return I’m afraid.’

  ‘Oh, a good conversation is payment enough, and you have given me that already.’

  Hermitage didn’t think it had been much of a conversation as the fellow hadn’t even answered some direct questions about whether miracles were mediated or not.

  ‘I’ll tell you what,’ Bargis went on, ‘I’ll give you a puzzle to challenge that thinking of yours.’

  ‘A puzzle?’

  ‘Yes, one I heard in a village a way back and I haven’t been able to solve it with my poor brain. Perhaps you’ll have better luck?’

  ‘We can but try.’ Hermitage liked the idea of a puzzle, but it seemed rather out of place at this moment.

  As Bargis got his fire going and produced some bread from which he expertly flicked the mould, he told Hermitage the puzzle.

  ‘There’s a castle see.’

  ‘Where?’ Hermitage asked.

  ‘In the puzzle’

  ‘Oh right, have we started?’

  ‘Yes, this is it.’ This was going to be hard work.

  ‘There’s this castle and it’s impregnable.’

  ‘Impregnable.’

  ‘That’s right. Big wood and iron doors, drawbridge up, moat, great tall walls with battlements and guards, no obvious way in.’

  ‘Presumably people come and go?’

  ‘They do,’ said Bargis already seeing that this was a good idea. ‘Now, inside the castle a fair maid is being held prisoner.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ Hermitage wasn’t sure he liked the sound of this.

  ‘Oh it’s alright, it’s only a puzzle. It’s not a real maid.’

  ‘Ah.’ In that case Hermitage couldn’t really see the point.

  ‘And outside the castle is the maid’s sweetheart. But as it’s impregnable, and as it’s a big castle, he can’t get in. And even if he could get in, he doesn’t know where the Lord of the castle keeps his precious erm, prisoner.’

  Bargis fell silent.

  ‘And?’ Hermitage asked.

/>   ‘So how do you get in and find the treasure - ed princess?’

  ‘She’s a princess?’

  ‘Usually.’

  Hermitage thought for a moment. First he thought that if this was a puzzle he didn’t like them. It seemed to be a totally pointless exercise, leading nowhere and offering no learning. Then he thought that his companion had been kind in offering him a fire for the night and if the man wanted to play puzzles then it was the least he could do to go along with it.

  ‘Well, we need more information.’ Hermitage said.

  ‘Do we?’

  ‘Oh yes, not enough to go on here. Am I allowed to ask questions?’

  ‘Ask away.’

  ‘Presumably the drawbridge is not up at all times. How do supplies get in?’

  ‘Well it’s open at, I mean I suppose it must be down during the day but then the guards are posted on the bridge so you can’t, I mean couldn’t just walk in.’

  ‘I see. Is the sweetheart expected to rescue the princess?’

  ‘Oh absolutely. Compulsory.’

  ‘So it’s got to be in secret? No gathering an army and attacking the place?’

  ‘Secret would be best.’

  ‘Night is obviously ticklish as the drawbridge is up and, as you say, the castle is impregnable.’

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ said Bargis mentally crossing out a night raid.

  ‘Do we know if there are any other ways into the castle?’

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘Then it would have to be a daytime entrance which means that the guards on the bridge have to either not see him, or see someone who they would let in. Do the guards know the sweetheart?’

  ‘Oh yes, and they’ve thrown him out several times already.’

  ‘Oh dear.’ Despite himself Hermitage was starting to find this exercise stimulating, ‘What’s the traffic on the bridge like?’

  ‘Can be busy at times, mostly castle business coming and going but the odd cart as well.’

  ‘Is it in a very populous area?’

  ‘No, it’s pretty ugly really.’

  ‘No, populous, not popular, do many people live round there?’

  ‘Oh just the usual, sort of shanty town round the edge of the moat, usual beggars and peddlers.’

  ‘And are any of them let into the castle?’

  ‘Nah, usually thrown into the moat.’

  ‘And the carts, are they let in?’

  ‘Oh yes but they’re searched.’

  ‘My goodness, this Lord really does protect his treasure doesn’t he?’

  Bargis was suddenly hostile, ‘What treasure?’ he snapped.

  ‘The princess,’ Hermitage replied, wondering at the outburst.

  ‘Ah yes, the princess. Yes he does, very erm, jealous of the princess is the Lord.’

  ‘Well this really is a conundrum isn’t it?’ Hermitage lapsed into thought.

  ‘Ah yes, probably,’ said Bargis. He didn’t like to interrupt the train of thought with simple questions like, ‘what are you talking about?’

  ‘Tell me about the castle.’ Hermitage said.

  ‘Like I said, big, moat, walls, drawbridge, guards, all the usual.’

  ‘Is it new, or one of the old designs?’

  ‘Oh it’s pretty new, they’re still building bits of it but it’s nearly done. Only another ten years or so I think’

  ‘That’s interesting.’

  It wasn’t to Bargis, but then he was not the one doing the thinking here.

  ‘Does it have any towers?’

  ‘Towers?’ Bargis asked, what did that have to do with anything?

  ‘Yes, you know, tall, usually round although sometimes square, normally situated...’

  ‘I know what a tower is,’ Bargis interrupted with some irritation. ‘And yes it has towers.’

  ‘How many and where are they?’

  ‘They’re in the castle of course.’ Bargis was losing it.

  ‘I mean where are they situated in the castle?’

  ‘Oh I see. Well there’s the big square one in the middle of the yard.’

  ‘The keep.’

  ‘Is it?’

  ‘Yes, probably where the Lord lives and probably where he keeps the princess.’

  ‘Really?’ Bargis was impressed.

  ‘What about other towers, are there any at the edge of the castle?’

  ‘Yes, there are two, one sort of either side of the coop.’

  ‘Keep.’

  ‘Keep.’

  ‘Right, and do the castle staff live in one of those? I expect one is home for the guards and the like and the other is for stores.’

  ‘Suppose.’

  ‘Well, does the puzzle know which is which?’

  Bargis thought for a moment which seemed a bit odd to Hermitage, surely he would know if this was a game?

  ‘Erm, the guards usually go into the one on the right.’

  ‘As you face the castle?’

  ‘Yes,’ Bargis said, although he did seem to be having to think about it a bit.

  ‘And do the guards live in the castle all the time, or do they come and go and live in the village?’

  ‘Oh no, they all live in the castle, all the bloody time.’

  ‘Right,’ said Hermitage, ‘I think we have our way in.’

  Bargis could hardly contain himself ‘Really?’

  ‘Oh yes, but that’s only half the puzzle isn’t it?’

  ‘It is?’ Bargis really, really wanted the funny monk to tell him how to get into the castle but pushing it might tip the man off to his devious plan. He was though, starting to think that this man couldn’t be tipped off if he was taken at speed to the edge of a cliff in a wheelbarrow with a dangerously faulty wheel.

  ‘How to get to the princess.’

  ‘What princess?’

  ‘The princess in the puzzle.’

  ‘Eh? Oh, yes, right, the princess. Yes, got to get to the princess.’

  ‘So,’ Hermitage said, thinking as he spoke, ‘we’ve got to get into the castle and avoid the guards.’

  ‘Er, yes,’ said Bargis, somewhat annoyed that this had been the whole point of the conversation. ‘How do we do that then?’

  ‘I’m coming to that bit,’ said Hermitage, tantalisingly. ‘We enter the castle when the drawbridge is up. Once that happens, the guards will be looking outwards, they won’t be expecting anyone to be already in the castle.’

  ‘But the drawbridge only goes up at night?’ Bargis was getting lost.

  ‘Exactly.’

  Bargis mentally uncrossed-out the night raid.

  ‘Now we need to get in the keep. If it’s of a standard design we’ll probably find the princess in an upper chamber, which is going to be tricky.’

  ‘Why an upper chamber?’

  ‘Well you could hardly put a princess in a dungeon could you? It wouldn’t be seemly. No no, the lower chamber would be kept for more mundane things like the Lord’s armoury or treasury.’

  ‘Really?’ Bargis tried to fain disinterest but knew that he was failing miserably. The monk was fully engaged in the problem though, and didn’t seem to notice anything.

  ‘Again if the keep is fairly new, we may be able to utilise the same method of entry.’

  Bargis had to bite his lip to stop himself demanding what this method of entry was. Demanding with menaces was one of his favourites.

  ‘Hm,’ Hermitage hummed, ‘I think I have an answer.’

  ‘Right,’ Bargis sat forward. When driven by greed, his mental capacity was really rather high.

  ‘At night the sweetheart swims across the moat.’

  ‘What? Gets in it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Yeuch.’

  ‘Oh that’s nothing. He swims to the foot of the tower where the guards live.’

  ‘Right?’ Bargis was very doubtful about this. He’d looked at the moat many times and had once seen a rat, perfectly happy on the shoreline, die within moments of slipping into the murky brown wat
er.

  ‘Towards the bottom of the tower there will be an opening in the wall.’

  ‘Will there?’ In all his reconnoitring Bargis had never spotted anything like this.

  ‘Oh yes, it’ll be rather small and may have a hinged door or gate but they put them in all the latest designs.’

  ‘I see. And the purpose of this opening?’

  ‘Well it’s the garderobe isn’t it?’

  Bargis was stumped here, he didn’t know whether to ask what the hell a garderobe was, or whether to play the knowledgeable role, even though he was in complete ignorance. Perhaps a middle way with this man.

  ‘A garderobe brother?’ he asked with the tone of an enthusiastic innocent, a tone which had come in handy in many of his more colourful exploits.

  ‘Yes, it’s the very latest thing. Instead of all the detritus of normal living being hurled over the wall from buckets, a special room is built in which people sit and carry out their functions. Where they sit is above a hole, which drops through the castle walls and out, sometimes into a further chamber created for the purpose from where it can be removed. As this castle is new it’s bound to have a garderobe and as it has a moat that’s bound to be where it all ends up.’

  Bargis was horrified; and he’d seen and heard a lot of things in his life which would horrify all but the more seriously deranged.

  ‘And the sweetheart is expected to climb up this thing?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘But what if someone’s sitting just above, carrying out their functions?’

  ‘He’s just swum across the moat so I don’t think a bit more muck is going to make much difference.’

  Bargis had done some pretty disgusting things in his time to increase his material wealth. He’d also done some very disgusting things and a couple of extremely disgusting things, but this was going to be a whole new chapter.

  ‘And how does he get out the top? I mean someone might be sitting there?’

  ‘He’ll be able to see that won’t he?’

  Bargis thought that he probably would be able to see that, and then he tried to stop thinking about it but found that he couldn’t.

  ‘And he has to wait until the hole is available.’ Hermitage finished off with some satisfaction.

  ‘Then,’ Hermitage went on, although Bargis found it hard to get his attention back to the plan, ‘Comes the clever bit. While he was swimming across the moat the sweetheart’s accomplice….’