Hermitage, Wat and Some Nuns

by Howard of Warwick

  The room gasped. Apart from Cwen, who giggled.

  ‘Wat the weaver?’ Mildburgh confirmed in a calm but very firm voice.

  ‘Yes,’ Wat snapped back, angry at this treatment.

  The nun looked him in the eye. ‘You’re disgusting,’ she said.

  Caput VI

  How Many Nuns Does it Take?

  ‘Monk.’

  Hermitage heard the word behind him as they stepped from the frosty atmosphere of the moot hall. He didn’t know whether it was an observation, an expression of surprise, or just some children pointing and laughing as normal.

  He turned and saw a shape in the shadow of the building, quite a large shape. A large shape roughly dressed, with a wimple on its head. Oh dear.

  He raised eyebrows at Wat and Cwen who had heard the call as well. They looked rooted to the spot with no intention of going anywhere near one of these nuns.

  Hermitage took a deep breath and stepped over.

  ‘Ah,’ he said, recognising his summoner with a shiver, ‘Abbess Mildburgh.’

  ‘I am no abbess,’ Mildburgh replied.

  It didn’t take much to confuse Hermitage, and this wasn’t much. As a result he was very confused. She was going to a lot of trouble to look like a nun if she wasn’t one. Perhaps he had been right at the gate and this was a woman pretending to be a nun. Why would anyone do that?

  He would demand an explanation. He looked at Mildburgh. Second thoughts, she’d probably explain in her own time.

  ‘I am a mere sister,’ Mildburgh did explain.

  Well, that was clear then. Or rather, it wasn’t. She hadn’t bothered correcting the moot when they called her abbess. And her little flock followed her as if she was one. She seemed to take to the role of abbess quite naturally. If it looked like an abbess and talked like an abbess…, Hermitage didn’t bother completing the thought.

  ‘I see,’ said Hermitage, not seeing at all but wanting to get back to Wat and Cwen quite urgently.

  ‘The convent at Wenlock was destroyed by the Danes,’ Mildburgh went on. This was clearly some sort of litany, doubtless a routine explanation for the confusion about whether she was a nun or a sister or an abbess or whatever. ‘Only when the convent is restored will I become the abbess, God willing. Until then I am only a sister. Just one of many.’

  Hermitage’s immediate worry was how many?

  ‘How, erm,’ Hermitage floundered for the word, ‘interesting,’ he said.

  Mildburgh stared at him. It had obviously been the wrong word.

  She held Hermitage with her gaze and spoke very slowly and deliberately. ‘And we know who you are,’ she said. ‘I wasn’t going to say in front of the moot, but you are known to us.’ She left it at that. But that was quite enough.

  Hermitage quaked. This alarming nun knew who he was. This was terrible. What was he going to do? Wait a minute. He’d just told Mildburgh who he was, of course she knew.

  ‘Indeed sister,’ he acknowledged.

  ‘And we obviously know who your weaving friend is,’ Mildburgh added with a grimace.

  Hermitage could easily imagine that this woman was quite capable of slapping total strangers, but Wat’s name and reputation travelled widely. She’d have good reason to assault him. All he could do was nod.

  ‘Walk with me,’ Mildburgh instructed, taking Hermitage by the elbow.

  He shrank from the grasp but it was strong and firm. He gave Wat and Cwen a pleading look but Wat just winked and gave him a little wave.

  The abbess/sister/nun led him around the corner of the moot hall, away from the entrance and out of sight of Wat and Cwen. Hermitage hoped they would come quickly if he screamed for help.

  Mildburgh strolled slowly on but at least let go of Hermitage. He accompanied her of his own volition, thinking that turning and running would be ridiculous, even if it was his instinct.

  ‘The death of Gilder,’ Mildburgh said after several steps, during which Hermitage had started to wonder why she’d asked him for a walk.

  ‘Absolutely,’ said Hermitage, even though it made no sense.

  ‘What do you mean, absolutely?’ Mildburgh asked, halting her progress. She looked at Hermitage with a rather worried expression.

  ‘I, er, that is to say,’ Hermitage struggled to explain that he often said the first word that was in his head. Even if it was left over from some completely different conversation. ‘Absolutely, you want to talk about the death of Gilder,’ he said, trying to sound confident.

  Mildburgh frowned now, as if trying to make up her mind about him. She appeared to think carefully about what she said next. ‘Our sisters in the south have sent word.’

  Hermitage just nodded at this. He couldn’t trust himself to say anything. Whatever he came up with was bound to be wrong, particularly as he had not the first idea what on earth this woman was talking about. It did alarm him that there were more of them.

  ‘They send news,’ Mildburgh said, slowly and knowingly.

  ‘I see,’ said Hermitage. He thought it sounded knowing. It certainly did when he said it in his head.

  ‘About the new King,’ Mildburgh said, significantly, ‘you see?’

  Hermitage was so far behind he’d lost sight of this conversation long ago.

  ‘Yes?’ he asked, cautiously.

  ‘And the various arrangements King William is putting in place.’

  ‘Arrangements.’ Hermitage thought that just repeating what she said might lead to some progress.

  ‘I must say,’ Mildburgh commented, ‘you play a very clever game, master monk.’

  Hermitage tried to look as if that was exactly what he was doing. Perhaps if he just said nothing for long enough, the nun would explain what he was doing here and what he was supposed to say.

  ‘The King’s arrangements for this sort of thing,’ Mildburgh said.

  The arrangements for walking round a moot hall with a nun? Why would King William worry about things like that? Hermitage knew he could be a very capricious monarch but he surely had more important issues to consider.

  Harrying the north had been William’s preoccupation the last time they met. And Shrewsbury wasn’t even in the north. No. This was getting him nowhere.

  ‘So it can be no coincidence, you being here at this time.’

  ‘No, indeed,’ Hermitage confirmed. Exactly what he had just confirmed was a complete mystery. The nun seemed content though, which was his main concern.

  ‘I see I shall have to be frank,’ Mildburgh said, still frowning at Hermitage. It looked as if she couldn’t quite work out how much she should say - of whatever it was she was saying.

  Hermitage would be grateful if she said anything that made any sense at all.

  ‘The death of Gilder is a great trouble to us,’ Mildburgh plunged in.

  ‘As is proper,’ Hermitage replied. It seemed like something to say.

  ‘Quite, quite,’ said Mildburgh, hurriedly, looking worried that Hermitage knew more than he was saying.

  Hermitage knew nothing. Absolutely nothing.

  ‘Our plans for the convent, you know.’

  Hermitage nodded, silently. ‘Oh, very well,’ Mildburgh burst out, ‘you force it from me.’

  Hermitage had done no such thing.

  ‘Gilder was to fund the restoration of the convent.’ Mildburgh, the strong, powerful nun was actually wringing her hands, her eyes darting backwards and forwards to Hermitage, as if anxious about what he might do.

  She was anxious about what he might do? He put a bit of safe distance between himself and this alarming woman.

  ‘And now that he is dead,’ Mildburgh went on, ‘that may be in jeopardy.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Hermitage, ‘I can see that.’ At last there was something he could see. He still had not the first clue what any of this had to do with him.

  Mildburgh went on, talking more to herself and the walls of the moot hall than to Hermitage. ‘If he left arrangements in place, all well and good. But he was a difficult man.�
��

  Hermitage tried nodding again. This had no perceptible effect, so he did it again.

  ‘If there were no arrangements then it will fall to the son, Balor.’

  Hermitage’s nodding was starting to make him giddy.

  ‘But,’ said Mildburgh, stopping in her tracks and turning to Hermitage.

  He stopped as well, as it only seemed polite.

  ‘But if you and the moot want it, what’s the word?’

  Hermitage did not know what they had been talking about for the last five minutes. He’d only just got the idea that it had something to do with Gilder’s legacy. How on earth he was supposed to know what this it was called was beyond him. And what did he have to do with the moot? He’d only just met them. He was starting to think he should put Shrewsbury on the list of places he had visited. As soon as he found a way to stop visiting it now.

  He tried raising his eyebrows at Mildburgh.

  ‘Ah, you press me too hard,’ she exclaimed.

  He took another step back.

  Mildburgh mumbled to herself, ‘What was the word the sisters used?’

  She gazed at Hermitage as if the answer was written on his face.

  He gazed back with nothing even written in his head.

  ‘Investigated,’ Mildburgh announced in triumph.

  Now Hermitage felt his blood chill.

  ‘That’s it. Investigation. The sisters close to court reported that a monk had been appointed the King’s own investigator. Of course we had no idea what that meant,’ Mildburgh excused her ignorance. ‘The only word we had was that this monk looked into murder and the like and brought wrong-doers to justice. It was clearly a master stroke by William, designed to bring fear and obedience to the conquered population. To quell rebellion and any thought of resistance.’

  Hermitage wondered if Mildburgh was talking about the same investigator. Perhaps William had another one?

  ‘We were warned to look out for the monk who travelled with a weaver and a girl. Well. When I saw you at the gate I wondered. Then, when Hild told me of Gilder, it started to make sense.’

  Hermitage was glad that one of them was having that experience.

  ‘And you announcing murder.’ Mildburgh shook her head. ‘I truly fear that the convent will never happen at all.’

  Ah. Now Hermitage thought he had got it. That probably meant he hadn’t, but it gave him something to go on.

  ‘Surely the death of Gilder has nothing to do with the convent?’ he said, with as much confidence as he could manage.

  ‘Of course not,’ Mildburgh snapped, her familiar self resurfacing. ‘But there are those who would not wish to see Gilder’s wealth used in this manner.’

  ‘And they would kill for it?’ Hermitage had come across killers who had done the deed for a bizarre collection of reasons but stopping a convent would be a bit extreme, even for them.

  ‘Who knows what evil lurks in the heart of men.’

  Or women, thought Hermitage in a rare absence of charity.

  ‘What do you suggest?’ he asked, not really sure if she was suggesting anything.

  Mildburgh looked at him carefully. Which he really didn’t like.

  ‘The death of Gilder need not be investigated,’ she said, quietly. She even looked around to make sure no one had heard her.

  At least Wat and Cwen would be happy with that proposal.

  She went on before he could speak. He hadn’t been going to speak anyway. ‘You have seen that the town is content that the man is dead.’

  He nodded.

  ‘And have gathered that he was of questionable virtue, if not actually evil.’

  She’d have to talk to Wat about that.

  ‘So there is little to be gained from this investigation of yours. In fact it might damage the prospects for the convent, a holy house.’

  ‘Apart from bringing a murderer to justice,’ Hermitage pointed out.

  ‘Oh, a murderer,’ Mildburgh dismissed the suggestion, ‘you don’t even know if he was murdered.’

  ‘That would be part of the investigation.’ Hermitage found himself defending the idea. Something about this nun telling him not to look into things made him even more sure it needed doing. It was unlike him to go against a direct instruction from anyone, let alone a fearsome nun.

  ‘Hardly a challenging task, if the man has had his head knocked about,’ Mildburgh was now disparaging.

  ‘If he has, then we know there is a killer in your midst,’ Hermitage pointed out, although he was pretty confident Mildburgh would be better at dealing with that than he was.

  ‘And this is the sort of thing the King has you investigate is it?’ Mildburgh asked, with a slightly sneering tone.

  ‘Unfortunately, yes,’ Hermitage acknowledged.

  ‘Do the moot want this done?’

  ‘Erm, no, not really,’ Hermitage admitted. ‘They seem quite happy that Gilder is dead.’

  ‘Just so. They are happy. I say there is no need for investigation. Yet you persist.’

  Hermitage tried a reluctant shrug, as if it was out of his hands.

  ‘I imagine,’ said Mildburgh, with a look in her eyes that somehow combined concern with moderate threat, ‘that killers don’t like being investigated.’

  Hermitage couldn’t think what she meant.

  ‘Dangerous job, being an investigator, I expect. Good chance of you climbing to the top of the murderer’s list.’

  ‘Sister?’ Hermitage asked, lost once more.

  ‘Best way not to be discovered as a killer,’ she leaned slightly closer, ‘kill the investigator.’

  Hermitage hadn’t thought of that.

  Caput VII

  To The Body

  ‘Well, you are disgusting,’ Cwen was saying when Hermitage re-joined them outside the moot hall.

  ‘There’s no call for nuns to go slapping people,’ Wat protested.

  ‘You did say you thought you recognised her,’ Cwen pointed out. ‘Perhaps she knows you?’

  ‘What’s the world coming to if nuns are slapping people?’ Wat went on, turning to Hermitage, ‘Do you know any nuns who slap people?’ He stopped when he saw Hermitage’s face. ‘Are you alright? How was your chat with the no-nonsense nun?’

  Hermitage didn’t really know where to begin. ‘Erm, it seems she would rather we didn’t investigate the murder,’ he said, simply.

  ‘We’re with her there, then,’ Cwen noted.

  ‘But she knows I’m the King’s Investigator,’ he said.

  ‘What? How?’ Wat was surprised by this.

  ‘Apparently there are more of them, down south.’

  ‘Investigators?’

  ‘Nuns. And they talk to one another and send messages and share news.’

  ‘Disgraceful.’

  ‘She said that if Gilder is found to have been murdered they might not get the money for their convent.’ He didn’t like to say that he thought he’d just been threatened by a nun.

  ‘Don’t know what that’s got to do with it,’ said Cwen, ‘dead is dead, after all.’

  They were interrupted by the Ealdorman who emerged from the moot hall grinning widely.

  ‘That got rid of the old trout,’ he said, and slapped Wat on the back. Now that he was in a much happier frame of mind, the Ealdorman looked like quite a jolly fellow. A large grey beard framed a comfortable smile and laughing eyes peered out. The man obviously lived well, his large stomach filled most of the space in front of him and he was well dressed, very well dressed. The flush in his round cheeks said that he had been celebrating along with the rest of the town, although his had more depth to it.

  ‘What had I done?’ Wat protested.

  ‘Made some pretty revolting tapestries I expect.’ The Ealdorman was still smiling.

  ‘What’s that to do with her?’

  ‘Perhaps your reputation goes before you? Or maybe she saw one. Did you ever do one of some nuns?’

  ‘Well,’ Wat looked away, ‘yes. But they aren’t suppos
ed to be looked at by nuns. The old works tend not to be bought for religious establishments. Religious figures, yes. The buildings, no.’

  ‘Wat, really,’ Hermitage sighed. Thinking about Wat’s disgraceful tapestries was most effective at taking his mind off Mildburgh.

  ‘Well,’ said the Ealdorman, ‘nuns are always easily offended, believe me. They don’t have to actually see or know what you’re doing to tell you not to do it.’

  Hermitage could appreciate that.

  The Ealdorman turned to face him. ‘But you,’ he said in a very brusque tone.

  ‘Me?’ Hermitage asked. What was the problem now? He hadn’t slapped anyone.

  ‘What did you have to mention murder for? In front of abbess Misery herself.’

  ‘Misery?’ Hermitage enquired, he was sure the woman was called Mildburgh.

  ‘She’s going to go on and on about it now. Won’t give us a moment’s rest.’

  Hermitage knew that from personal experience. He gathered his thoughts. All his well-reasoned and rounded arguments before the moot that the death should be investigated had come to nothing, yet one angry nun and suddenly they’re interested?

  ‘But if there was murder?’ he suggested. Surely their eternal souls would trouble them more than a nun?

  ‘It would have gone quietly on its way if the abbess had not known about it.’

  No, Hermitage couldn’t follow this at all. Didn’t they know that Mildburgh didn’t want an investigation either?

  ‘Would she still get her money?’ Cwen asked. ‘Sounded like she’s expecting a new nunnery at Gilder’s expense. Presumably now he’s dead that’s a bit more complicated.’

  ‘Absolutely,’ the Ealdorman confirmed, ‘and we’ve only got her word Gilder was going to help out anyway. Doesn’t sound like him at all.’

  ‘Whether he was murdered or not wouldn’t make any difference then,’ Cwen shrugged.

  ‘Not necessarily,’ Hermitage put in, suddenly putting some thoughts together. Thoughts that he was most grateful had kept their distance when he was talking to Mildburgh.

  They all turned to him, which made him most uncomfortable.