Odo's Hanging

by Peter Benson

  I sat up.

  He pointed at Rainald. ‘You and me, alone.’

  He led me along the alley to a low part of the wall, hoisted me on to his shoulders, and I stood up to look down, across the precincts to the workshops.

  I was on top of the wall.

  Turold whispered, ‘I will open the gate. Meet me there.’

  I jumped down and stood in the yard. I was still with Martha, but I could not feel her, I do not think I knew what I was doing, only that I had to do what Turold asked. I could prove myself, I was working for his art’s sake, I am his boy.

  The nunnery slept. I crept across the precinct yard, using the walls as cover half the way, then counting to five before I slipped into the moonlight and ran to the corner of the linen store. I stood there for a moment and listened to my breathing, then I listened for other sounds. There were none. The walls kept out sounds of the town and sounds from the country beyond. I scratched my elbow, the sound echoed across the yard and into the towers of the abbey church. I looked over my shoulder, there was no one there. I looked in my heart and I looked in my soul; it was as quiet in these places as the precincts and my voice.

  I followed the workshop walls slowly, feeling my way, smelling the stones, until I came to the door. It was not locked. I knew I had locked it. I was the last to leave the workshop in the evening, and that was one of my jobs: leave the key on a shelf above the little window. I felt the shelf, there was nothing there. The key was in the lock. I pushed the door, it swung back, I stepped into the workshop.

  In the night it smelt of cold. Turold’s sketches were as we had left them, and though I knew them well, they were changed by the moonlight as it cut through gaps in the shutters. Here the men appeared to actually mount their horses, and there they galloped into battle. Here, arrows flew between sheets, and I heard men scream. I took the first sheet, laid it carefully on the next, then moved slowly along the trestles. The night was solid.

  I felt someone watching, someone had eyes on me. They had watched me come from the wall, across the yard, past the linen store and around the workshop. My footsteps had been heard, and my head seen as it bent to watch the horsemen move.

  The horsemen moved. I gathered another sheet to the pile, then another, they all rustled together, and I came to the end of the first trestle. I was standing with a window in front of me. I had never seen it shuttered, it looked smaller, I turned around at the moment I heard a noise from a far corner of the workshop.

  It was not a whisper and it was not a sigh, it was more as a creak, but not of a door. I dropped the sketches, the sound of them falling filled the shop. I bent down, pulled them across the floor towards me and whistled, softly.

  The note hung but there was no answer. I heard a click, I folded the sheets together, stood up again, laid them on the trestle and took a deep breath. I was hot, I was cold, Turold’s face came to my mind, and the sound of his voice in my ear.

  ‘Be quick,’ he said, ‘and don’t forget any.’

  I looked at a sheet. It was the sketch of Harold saving William’s men from the quicksands of the Couesnon; below, in the borders, eels swim.

  Eel. I am tasting eel, and I pick up the next sheet, and the next. I had reached the end of the second trestle when I heard the creak again, this time closer, and just after it, the sound of rustling cloth. It was a faint noise, like a whispered word you do not quite hear, but it is there, in front of you.

  The wind in the shutters, the wind through the branches of the trees in the precinct yard. Apples and pears.

  My hands sweat, I was praying I would not smudge the sketches.

  I could smell honey. The nuns keep bees. I thought about my pigeons. I would not have time to collect them, Turold will never let me take them, I will open their box so that they can fly, I will never see Martha again. Did I suck honey from her skin, or was it a dream? My mind is going like this as I pick the sketches up. I am holding so much cunning, I am doing something for him, I am proving that I am worth his time. I will do exactly what he wants, my pigeons will live. As I cross to a trestle that runs along the top of the workshop, I am full of pride.

  ‘I will advise against the thought and kill the deed.’ There is the breeze again, cooling the night and sending the leaves on the trees shivering again, and now there is another sound in the workshop, a whimper, as though someone is weeping on top of me. I froze, the weeping stopped, I turned to look over my shoulder and heard my name.

  ‘Robert?’

  It came as the breeze, disturbing the air as still water is disturbed, layering it with cold ripples that lay about me and tugged at my shirt. A sudden heat burst into my chest, then it dropped to my feet, a heat like cold that froze me, I could not tell.

  ‘Robert?’

  Hell.

  Bishop Odo.

  Rich food.

  Martha’s ankles.

  I looked at the sketches. A Norman knight leant from his horse and struck an English footman with his sword. The horse was reined in, archers filled the border and their arrows had pierced the Englishman’s shield. I heard his cry and the bellow of the horse as the reins cut, I saw spears and I saw the sword split the Englishman’s head. Blood on the ground and blood in the air. I looked up as a cloaked figure slowly rose up in the workshop, six feet from where I stood, its head cowled and bowed, the arms folded in front, its legs slightly apart.

  Devils.

  Harold.

  William.

  My knees screamed at me, my mouth filled with salt, my head said, ‘Run’, Turold’s words stopped me, I was fixed where I stood, the sheets of sketches felt no weight at all. To my right, there were twenty more sketches to collect. I could see the battle rage beyond me, Harold’s death, William’s coronation and the workshop door, half open. I moved to fetch the next sheet when the figure tipped its head back and the thin needly face appeared, and the eyes struck at me and collapsed my will. Ermenburga’s mouth was open, her tongue flicked at me and she said, ‘Robert. What are you doing?’

  I shook my head.

  I was thinking I might piss.

  She stretched her hand out, it appeared from beneath her habit and I thought it had no skin. I thought it was all bones, it was white as snow and my mind was saying, ‘Move back do not let her touch you it is devil’s fingers’ but she did, and held my shoulder. Her face drew closer, I saw tears on her cheeks and she whispered, ‘I’m sorry. I forgot.’

  I licked my lips.

  ‘Don’t be afraid,’ she said.

  No.

  ‘If you are doing this for your master because he was insulted by Bishop Odo,’ she said, ‘then I support you.’

  I nodded.

  ‘You are?’

  I nodded again.

  She smiled now, I had never seen her smile. She had no teeth, her lips curled over her gums and I felt a blast of her breath. It came from her lungs and spread over my face, it smelt of cabbage, she said, ‘Anything you do to impede the Bishop you do with my blessing.’

  I narrowed my eyes and creased my brow.

  ‘He is a beast.’

  I looked at Turold’s sketches. They lived in my hands.

  Bishop Odo.

  Harold.

  Guy.

  Her face was close enough to kiss. Behind it, I could see pain, and I saw Odo bearing down on her. He was three times her weight. He would burst her, and I am thinking what do I do?

  She said, ‘You plan to leave?’

  I nodded.

  ‘Tonight?’

  I nodded.

  ‘And your master knows the consequences? He knows what the Bishop will do to him?’

  I shrugged.

  She took her hand from my shoulder and rubbed her forehead.

  Here, at the siege of Dinan, Conan delivers the keys of the city to William. The keys hang from Conan’s lance, William’s lance almost touches them. The tips of their lances.

  ‘You need a guide,’ she said. ‘You will go in circles without one.’

  I
shrugged at her.

  She touched me again. ‘I will fetch one. You collect the rest of the work; you are meeting Turold at the alley gate?’

  I nodded.

  ‘We will meet you there.’ Her face was clean, like linen. Her nose, mouth and eyes were stitched on, and her ears.

  I stared at her.

  ‘What are you waiting for?’ she said. ‘Collect the rest.’ She pointed to the sketches. ‘Your master is waiting.’

  My master is waiting.

  ‘Finish here and go to him. Do not let him leave before we have come.’

  Hold him.

  Ermenburga’s voice was loaded, all the words she said were nuts on a string, and I am picking them. ‘Go,’ she said, and I did. I rustled the sheets in my hands, and then I picked up the rest, all in a line along the trestles, as he had told me. I am praying for a voice, I am praying for success and when I have every sheet in my hand I am rolling them. Turold has a hide to cover them, I must get to the alley gate. I looked up, and I was about to nod at Ermenburga, but she had gone. She was quiet and she was thin, she was the stick-faced queen of Nunnaminster with the rustling sleeves and the boned hand, but she was born with Christ in her heart, and Christ lay all about her face.

  I handed the roll to Turold. He said, ‘This is all of them?’

  I nodded.

  ‘You are sure?’

  I nodded.

  ‘Then we leave.’

  I grabbed his sleeve as he turned away, and shook my head. Spit flew from my mouth, and hit him in the eye.

  ‘Let go!’ he hissed.

  I am shaking my head and pulling him, and as he tried to walk, my feet are dragged along. We are going to wake people and I tugged at him, I heard threads rip in his shirt, and he turned to hit me.

  Please God. I am here. I must be able to speak. I must speak. Please give me the gift you gave everyone else. I have never met another like me. I am the only dumb boy in the world. I am tugging a strong man, all I have to do is tell him, a voice must be a lonely man’s only friend. Is my voice living a life without me, lost as I am? Is it in a tree?

  ‘Let go!’

  I have two hands on him, and now he is going to hit me. His hand is raised, then as if in answer, the alley door opened and Ermenburga came from the precincts with a small nun.

  Turold spun towards them, and I thought he would hit them but I jumped in front of him. I put my hands up, Ermenburga said, ‘Quiet.’

  ‘Abbess?’

  Ermenburga said, ‘Master Turold…’

  ‘Do not,’ he said, ‘try to prevent us.’

  She is going to laugh. ‘No…’

  ‘Abbess?’

  ‘You should value your boy,’ she said.

  Yes.

  Turold laughed. He was going to say something about me, but Ermenburga stopped him.

  ‘This is sister Mildred.’ Mildred bowed at us. She was a tiny nun, my size. Her face was small and old, her eyes were large. ‘As I told Robert, you will go nowhere without a guide. She knows the way with her eyes closed. She…’

  Turold held the roll of sketches under his arm. ‘You will not prevent us leaving?’

  ‘I am helping you.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘No time,’ she said, and she pushed Mildred towards us and then disappeared through the gate, the gate closed and we froze.

  No time.

  Locked gate.

  Night.

  Damp.

  The night was a black ribbon above us, the wall that bounded the alley wept with damp, the voices stopped, started again and then moved away. Turold looked at us, shook his head, Mildred pushed between us and said, ‘We must go now.’ I heard a door close beyond the nunnery wall.

  ‘We have packs to fetch,’ said Turold.

  ‘Hurry,’ said Mildred. Her voice sounded like a crow’s. ‘I will wait at Southgate.’ In the dark I could see her mouth.

  ‘We will be there,’ said Turold, and as he pulled me away, she disappeared ahead, around a bend in the alley, and all we could hear was her soft steps in the dirt.

  We crept into the lodging, and as I tucked Martha’s linen into my pack, Rainald stirred in his sleep, opened his eyes, saw us in the moonlight, closed them and opened them again. He sat up and said, ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Leaving,’ said Turold.

  ‘Leaving?’ Rainald rubbed his face. ‘Why?’

  ‘Odo.’

  Rainald shook his head. ‘Bishop Odo,’ he said. ‘And where are you going?’

  ‘Home.’

  Rainald laughed. ‘Are you mad? You’ll be in more trouble at home than here. That’s if you get that far. You cannot run from the Bishop.’

  ‘I’m not running,’ said Turold.

  ‘That is exactly what you are doing. Because of this afternoon’s disagreement?’

  ‘It was more than a disagreement. I will not have text in my work.’

  ‘I heard.’

  ‘You should have been there. You could have supported me. You are meant to intercede…’

  ‘What is there to support?’

  ‘You agree with Odo?’

  ‘I agree with neither of you.’

  ‘Of course.’ Turold slapped his forehead. ‘When have you ever taken sides?’

  ‘I am on the Lord’s side.’

  ‘Why did I think you would say that?’

  ‘Why tell me that I should have been with you? If I am so predictable, why do you bother with me at all?’

  ‘Rainald.’ Turold sat down, opposite the monk. ‘If I am mad, why do you bother with me?’

  ‘We were forced together a long time ago.’

  ‘That is true…’

  ‘It is too late for either of us. We will haunt each other to the grave.’

  ‘Will we?’

  ‘But we are friends too.’ Rainald leant towards Turold. ‘And that is why I must tell you to stay. If you leave, you are walking into more trouble than you have ever known. Bishop Odo’s anger will descend upon you like rain.’

  ‘I will take my chance.’

  ‘You and the boy?’

  I nodded.

  ‘The boy is my only true friend,’ said Turold.

  I took a deep breath and pushed out my chest.

  ‘You know that is not true,’ said Rainald.

  ‘Maybe not, maybe.’

  The monk stood now and walked to the window. The forest was deep and dark. ‘You will be lost within an hour,’ he said.

  ‘Ermenburga has provided a guide.’

  ‘Ermenburga has what?’

  ‘You heard.’

  ‘She’s with you?’

  ‘She has her own reasons for despising Odo.’

  ‘Has she?’

  ‘The boy knows them.’

  Rainald looked at me. I nodded.

  ‘I thought you would know them.’

  Rainald shook his head. ‘I do not,’ he said, and in the moonlight, I saw his face become long and grey, as if he had grown twenty years. ‘No doubt I will hear.’

  ‘I’m sure.’

  The two men stared into each other’s eyes. Rainald said, ‘Even if you get to the coast, you will never get across the sea.’

  ‘We’ll take our chances.’

  ‘Chance?’

  ‘It’s one faith…’

  ‘And even if you did, if you reached home, his men would be waiting.’

  ‘My faith,’ said Turold, ‘is in my art. I must take risks for what I believe in.’

  ‘But to take such a risk because of a few words of text…’

  Turold turned away and tied his pack. ‘You want me to roll over at Odo’s request? If I am to achieve nothing else, I will have proved the strength of my convictions.’

  ‘Your convictions? You are selfish and mad, and a fool. A child.’ The monk shook his head. ‘Why does art choose children for its instruments?’

  Turold stood up and glared at his friend. He knew there was truth in this, he looked like a big child. They had not spoken
with raised voices, but I had never seen either angrier. There was a terrible air in the lodging. I did not know where to stand so I waited. Then, when he was ready, Turold went first, into the alley and towards Southgate. I felt Rainald’s hand on my shoulder, and when I looked at him, he was crying. I broke away and followed my master, past Martha’s, like a dog.

  ‌6

  The forest was cold and dark, and stretched from coast to coast. I followed Mildred and Turold followed me. We trusted her, we did not question when she chose a path we would have missed, away from the main track. This climbed a hill, dipped down the other side, we avoided a village in the valley, crossed a river by a bridge and took a path that ran along the bank.

  We walked quickly to keep up. When we dropped behind, she called for us to keep up. ‘If you are in a hurry,’ she said, ‘why are you falling back?’

  ‘We are with you,’ said Turold.

  The trees thickened the dark, they blocked out the sky, the only light came when the moon peeped from behind clouds and shone along ridges on the path. The ground was dry, we left no tracks, we disturbed no animals. Our footsteps echoed into the branches. I kicked a stick, it flicked against Turold’s heel and flew into undergrowth. ‘Ssh!’ said Mildred. She stopped and we stood behind her. She stared through the trees towards a clearing that opened beyond us. ‘Wait,’ she said. ‘Soldiers camp here.’ She pointed to the right. ‘I will go around this way and meet you back here.’

  Turold did not argue.

  I was there.

  Mildred was a quiet woman, and though her silence was loaded with confidence, I thought, Is she guiding us for another reason? Whose soldiers is she protecting us from, or whose soldiers is she leading us towards? Had Ermenburga told her to make sure we were dead before the coast? Gangs of English haunted the forest, anxious to lay weapons on any Norman. I looked at Turold and I am praying for a voice. He was staring at patterns the branches of the trees made against the sky. His mind was occupied by the scene of night falling over the battlefield.

  William camped amongst the dead and dying, the single apple tree is there, in the sketches. Turold had drawn its branches large and its twigs were fingers. It was the best tree in the work, it was the tree of death and here, as some of William’s men amuse themselves by hacking the limbs and heads from the half-dead, and re-assembling the bodies so men with huge torsos have small legs and massive arms, and arms stick where the legs should be and legs poke from necks, and men have two heads or five heads, one in its proper place, four more at the empty limb sockets; it is a nightmare, and this is just the beginning. Suddenly, Turold turned to me and said, ‘I am worried.’