Servant of Death

by Sarah Hawkswood

  He was not paying attention to the cowled pair while he thought. Ecclesiastical business was usually far too parochial and small-minded to be of interest, but something in Brother Remigius’s tone jarred. Having just been speaking with him, Master Elias could easily detect the new chill and dislike in his voice, and, surprisingly, a heavy overtone of fear. He stared at the sub-prior, frowning, and then suddenly realised that the lord bishop’s clerk was watching him. He coloured, and, for an instant, the ghost of a smile flickered over the clerk’s face. Brother Remigius looked distinctly uncomfortable. Master Elias was about to withdraw when the clerk addressed him.

  ‘You have travelled a way west from your usual haunts, Master Mason. I last recall you in Oxford, at St Frideswide’s.’

  Eudo the Clerk had as good a memory for faces and voices as the master mason’s, if not better. It had taken barely a moment to drag his image from the filing system of memory, and as he spoke, Eudo was contemplating what use could be made of the man. He recalled the master mason as a Maudist, but quietly so, and Eudo wondered if he had come into Worcestershire with the aim of discovering information in an area where the supporters of king and empress overlapped. It would be prudent to discover if the big man was as sharp as a chisel or as dull as a mallet.

  Master Elias was wary. ‘I came where the work was, Brother, and it is not so far from Oxford. As well work here as further north.’

  Eudo inclined his head, with a suggestion of graciousness. ‘Indeed, the north can be as … difficult … in terms of strife between the king and the countess.’

  Master Elias blinked in surprise. The Empress Maud, now married to Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of Anjou, still used her more exalted title and was not known as ‘countess’. The only people who gave her the title were a few of those covertly seeking her elevation to the throne of England as ‘Lady of the English’. He had heard it used as a signal among her supporters, but the lord Bishop of Winchester supported the king again, so what was his clerk up to?

  ‘I would be interested to see the work you have undertaken here,’ continued the clerk. ‘Perhaps I might visit your workshop at some convenient time. We must arrange it.’ He nodded a dismissal, and Master Elias, who would normally have bristled at such treatment, meekly withdrew, his mind whirling. Brother Eudo turned to the sub-prior. ‘Now, Brother Remigius, we have, I think, much to discuss. Perhaps the cool of the cloister would be more pleasant.’

  The sub-prior gave him a look that implied he would find standing in a snake pit infinitely more ‘pleasant’ than further conversation with Eudo the Clerk, but went with him nonetheless.

  In the cool of the abbot’s parlour, Abbot William of Pershore was conducting negotiations with two women, although one seemed merely there as silent support.

  ‘It was not thought too great a thing to ask, Father Abbot, that a small relic of the blessed saint should return to the sorority in which her own sister lived.’

  The speaker was a Benedictine nun, reverent in word, but with her own obvious authority. Her voice was low and controlled, as controlled as every other aspect of her, from her immaculate tidiness to her straight back as she sat, and the precise folding of her hands beneath her scapular.

  Abbot William considered carefully. The Benedictine nuns of Romsey were offering both coin and a fine manuscript, copied and embellished by one of the finest illustrators of the Winchester school, in exchange for the bone of a finger of St Eadburga, who lay within the gilded reliquary in her chapel in the abbey church. That they were prepared to offer much for so little was proof of their eagerness to claim a part of the saint.

  ‘I am perplexed, Sister, as to why Romsey makes this request when the blessed Eadburga has lain here so long. And why not approach the Nunnaminster, St Mary’s, her own house in Winchester. Would not your Sisters in Christ part with a small bone? They retain several and must be glad of funds after the Great Burning.’ He sounded cautious. ‘Besides, Romsey has two saints of its own.’

  ‘Indeed yes, Father Abbot. St Merewenna, and her successor as our Mother Superior, St Aelfleda, lie secure and venerated within our walls. We have been blessed by having two saints to exemplify the life we should lead, but only now has a benefactor enabled us to consider bringing a small part of the sainted Eadburga to our community, and Abbess Matilda has sent us to make the request.’ The nun’s voice showed no trace that she feared being rebuffed, nor yet arrogance.

  Abbot William wavered. ‘You claim earlier poverty, but yours is a house where royalty have sent daughters in the past, and surely not without bringing wealth with them?’

  Sister Edeva permitted herself the smallest of wry smiles. ‘Kings are wont to think the honour of housing their womenfolk generous in itself, and what has come to Romsey has been put to practical use upon the fabric of the abbey and in help for those about us.’

  The Abbot of Pershore leant forward at his table, letting his chin rest against his steepled fingers. He was silent for some time. The younger nun’s eyes darted between her sister and Abbot William nervously, but Sister Edeva kept her gaze fixed at a point somewhere on the wall behind the abbot’s head. Eventually he spoke.

  ‘I am minded to accede to the request of Abbess Matilda, but this matter must go before our chapter, as it concerns all in this house.’ He was also mindful of the amount it was costing to repair the north transept. ‘I will bring it to the attention of the brothers at Chapter tomorrow morning, and will give you a final answer thereafter. In the meantime I would welcome your presence at my table tonight. I appear to have many important guests and am set,’ he sighed as if it was a burden, ‘to entertain.’

  He rose, and smiled his dismissal. The sisters made obeisance and retired, well content that their mission was proceeding well. They trod with becoming lack of haste and eyes slightly lowered, but both wore the hint of a smile. Their undertaking was important to their community, and though failure would have been accepted with outward calm, success would be greeted with delight. Sister Ursula had scarcely taken final vows and was too junior a member of the sorority to gain advancement from that success. She was content to have enjoyed a foray into the daunting but exciting secular world she had left but a few years before. Sister Edeva had withdrawn from the world over twenty years previously, and had rarely left the abbey enclave, certainly not for as long as this. She held the responsible position of sacrist, in charge of the abbey church fabric and the items within it. Her securing of a relic of St Eadburga would be remembered in years to come, when the sisters had need to select a new mother superior, and Sister Edeva knew she would be able to fulfil that role, if called upon.

  She had not been concerned about leaving the confines of the abbey at Romsey, but she had not been prepared for how strange she would find the world without. The first day’s journey had left her ears ringing and her head aching from the volume of activity about her, and the succeeding days had not proved any easier. For all the poverty and dirt that did not exist within the enclave of Romsey, there was a colourful vibrancy to the outside world that she had forgotten. Children laughed and played in the dusty streets and roadways; even the sound of argument in the marketplaces breathed life. When people, even lay people, entered the confines of the conventual world, their tones and actions were muted and respectful. Had she entombed herself all those years ago, not just to show the strength of her love for one lost to her, but to avoid the need to continue real life? Had she been afraid, deep down, that the day would come when she would look upon another man as she had looked upon him? Were such questions themselves proof of her faithlessness? For her peace of mind it would be good to go home as soon as possible.

  As they crossed from the abbot’s lodging to the guest hall, a brother passed by, and would have been ignored had he not spoken. Sister Ursula frowned, disconcerted by his action, for the brethren did not engage in unnecessary speech with women, even with pious women who had withdrawn from the world as they had. Sister Edeva slowly raised her eyes from contemplation of hi
s sandals, and the smile was wiped from her face in an instant. The younger sister heard her draw in her breath with a distinct hiss.

  ‘I give you good day, Sisters.’ He smiled broadly. ‘I hope your long journey has been crowned with success.’ No reply was forthcoming, so he continued. ‘It is strange that we, who hale from Hampshire, should find ourselves, at the same time, in this distant House of God.’ He paused and shook his head. His tone was one of surprised delight. ‘Who should have thought it, indeed.’

  Sister Ursula had the peculiar feeling that the remark was addressed solely to Sister Edeva, but the older nun remained stony-faced and silent, and walked on as though nothing had been said. The brother turned away, and Sister Ursula was sure that she heard him laugh.

  A birdlike lady, clearly aristocratic, who had halted to exchange a word with the almoner, half-turned at the laugh, revulsion and horror vying on her pale face. Her thin hands, which had been clasped modestly, were wrung in anguish, the knuckles showing white.

  Mistress Weaver was returning from making purchases in the town, and was walking towards the guest hall. She had studiously ignored the habited figure with as much froideur as the sacrist of Romsey, but she took heed of the pale lady’s distress, and hurried to her. The almoner stood by, somewhat at a loss, and beyond him a large, grizzled individual with the expression of a leashed mastiff, stiffened in readiness to lunge forward should his lady falter.

  ‘You know him, my lady?’ Mistress Weaver had little doubt, and it was more an assertion than a question. Her own eyes narrowed and she pursed her lips.

  Lady Courtney nodded dumbly, and made no demur when the Winchester widow took her by the arm, and guided her towards the guest hall. The ‘mastiff’, watchful, followed at a respectful distance.

  ‘I have my own knowledge of that snake, the lord Bishop of Winchester’s clerk, and none of it is good,’ Margery Weaver whispered, but with anger ripe in the tone.

  Lady Courtney, who was regaining her calm, would have normally dissociated herself from such as Mistress Weaver, but this gave her pause. ‘He is evil.’ She too whispered, as if he could hear her words from the distance of the cloister.

  The two women had reached the doorway of the guest hall, and would have entered but for Miles FitzHugh barring their path. He stood aside politely, though it was clear that he deferred only to the lady Courtney, but both women ignored him as they passed by, and he frowned.

  ‘Not only is Brother Eudo a man who would seek to threaten honest folk with wicked lies, but,’ Mistress Weaver’s voice had risen with the bitterness in her tone, though she now dropped it confidingly, ‘it is widely rumoured in Winchester that Eudo was deep in the lord bishop’s confidence when he changed sides two years past and deserted his brother the king. The lord bishop was keen enough then to seek approval of the Empress Maud while she held the upper hand, and that conniving …’ Mistress Weaver bit her lip lest she use a term unsuitable for a refined dame’s ear and the religious surroundings. ‘Well, anyway, he was the chief go-between. It’s not for the likes of me to say how Henri de Blois should conduct himself, but suffice it to say that any member of the guild who reneged on a business deal as the leaders of Church and State do, would be cast out. That Eudo does not even hide behind the excuse of politics. He loves his work of intrigue so well he could not cross a street in a straight line.’

  Lady Courtney was all attention, and Margery Weaver could not resist a dramatic pause before her final announcement. ‘He is even said by some to be dealing with all sides now, the dirty spy.’

  Emma Courtney’s slightly protuberant eyes bulged further, and she made no complaint as the weaver’s widow led her companionably into an inner chamber. Each was keen to know the tale that might be forthcoming from the other, and the social divide between them was temporarily bridged by a shared loathing. Lady Courtney’s silent guardian stood impassively at the door.

  Miles FitzHugh remained very still, the frown of offence at the ladies’ slight deepened by what he had overheard. He was a young man who wore his emotions upon his sleeve, and who regarded double dealing with a distaste that his liege lord had found naive and vaguely amusing until voiced in his presence. In changeable times, options were there to be kept open, and Robert de Beaumont, Earl of Leicester, was assuredly nobody’s fool. Spies had their uses, and he had no objection to dealing with them. FitzHugh was young enough to hold to ideals that older and more powerful men could not afford. The squire had fallen foul of his lord for daring to express his distaste for treating with men of the opposite faction. That the man in question was the earl’s own twin, Waleran de Meulan, Earl of Worcester, compounded the offence. After several weeks of demeaning tasks and being in his lord’s bad books, Miles had taken swift advantage of his father’s ill health to withdraw to his family’s estates and hope that Robert de Beaumont’s ire would fade. Life in the bosom of his family would be slow, and his mother would fuss like a hen with one chick over her surviving son, but he would lie low as long as possible.

  Being the heir appealed to his sense of self-importance, but he was not so shallow as to think it worth the loss of his elder brother. Gilbert FitzHugh had been killed fighting for the king at Lincoln. Miles had always looked up to Gilbert, who had the natural assurance and easy manner that Miles sought in vain to acquire. Thinking about him, Miles wondered if de Grismont had come across him before the battle. Waleran de Grismont was certainly a man worthy of respect; there was one who had fought bravely and paid a heavy price, yet looked in no way discouraged by the experience. He had a reputation with women, but FitzHugh saw much in that to admire. His own conquests had been confined to impressionable rustics and serving wenches who feared to say him nay. He only wished he had one tenth of de Grismont’s charm.

  FitzHugh indulged in a pleasant daydream about future success with the opposite sex, but then his thoughts returned to what Mistress Weaver had said. So the Bishop of Winchester’s clerk was a spy, was he? A man who listened at windows and spied at keyholes; one who set times for secret assignations with other dubious individuals? Well, Robert de Beaumont might see the use of such, but he believed it behoved a gentleman of honour to strike a blow against dissemblers and traitors.

  Master Elias was addressed twice by one of his journeymen before making a reply to the man’s question. He was trying desperately to work out whether Henri de Blois’s clerk was hoping to find out some intelligence that he could take back to his master, a piece of the puzzle that was the politics of England during such times, or whether he was, beneath it all, a genuine Maudist supporter, who either had something important to impart or sought information. The stonemason was not inclined to trust the clerk, but was not sure that he dare ignore him. He eventually answered with only half his mind on the dressing of the stone, and with his eye focused on the enclave below. The journeyman shrugged and went to double-check his query with one of the older masons.

  As a windhover scans the ground for signs of field mice in the grasses, Master Elias watched and waited. He saw Waleran de Grismont giving orders to one of his servants, and the bell of memory jangled in his head. This was how he had seen the man before, from above, and in close conversation. Something about that meeting had aroused his interest … his interest. Suddenly the master mason remembered why he had registered the meeting. He smiled, and for once it was nearly as knowing a smile as Eudo the Clerk’s.

  The lord of Defford disappeared within the guest hall, and his servant headed for the stables. A tirewoman nearly bumped into him as she emerged, looking comically furtive, probably, thought Master Elias, from some illicit assignation with a groom in the warm dimness of an empty stall. She was too far away for him to be able to discern whether she had tell-tale hay stalks clinging to her skirt. His smile this time was one of gentle amusement. A monk also appeared from the stables, cowl raised to protect his tonsure from the sun, though he paid the penalty of the added heat. He was carrying what had to be, from his lopsided stance, a heavy bucket. The lay bro
thers were never idle. Laborare est orare was the motto of the Benedictines: ‘To work is to pray’. Master Elias thought, not for the first time, that the prayers of the unlettered and lowly lay brothers therefore exceeded those of their more erudite brethren, the choir monks.

  The woman headed for the gate to the abbot’s garden and soon passed from his sight. A short while later a lady emerged from the same gateway, head down, a rose bloom held delicately to her nostrils. As she crossed the yard she was intercepted by Eudo the Clerk, who must have been at the west end of the abbey church, where Master Elias could not see him. The wispy fair hair edging his narrow skull and the manner of walking were distinctive. Master Elias sighed and made his way swiftly down to ground level. Here was the opportunity to arrange a meeting, before the bell called the brothers to Vespers.

  He did not see, therefore, the agitation of the lady accosted by Eudo, neither the clasping of her hands in supplication, nor the flailing of those same hands in angry impotence. If she spoke, he did not hear her, and by the time he turned the corner of the west end, Eudo was standing alone.

  Hearing the sound of purposeful footsteps, Eudo the Clerk turned to face Master Elias, though his face showed no recognition. He did not wait for him to draw close, but walked towards him while diverting to one side to pass him by.

  ‘Workshop, sometime after supper’, said the clerk, softly but unhurriedly, without so much as glancing at the master mason, and walked on. It was as much as the latter could do not to turn and gaze after him, both stunned by his composure and incensed by the sheer audacity of his cool assumption that he had but to command and he would be obeyed. Master Elias was certainly not used to such treatment. He coloured hotly and made a low, ursine growling noise in his throat. He would very much like to cuff that far-from-humble brother round the ear, as he would one of his lads. The violent thought brought him relief as he returned to the north transept, and it was a marginally less bad tempered master mason who climbed back to the level of the workmen.