Hermitage, Wat and Some Nuns

by Howard of Warwick

  ‘No,’ said Hendig, sounding reluctant, ‘I’ve come to rescue you.’

  ‘Really?’ Cwen asked, sounding suspicious.

  Balor pushed Hendig in the back. ‘Balor says I’ve got to.’ He hung his head. ‘He says you’re trying your best. And in any event you can’t have killed Gilder because you weren’t here.’

  ‘At least someone gets that,’ Hermitage observed.

  ‘And he was my father,’ Balor added. ‘If anyone’s going to say who killed him, it’ll be me.’

  ‘And if I don’t help you,’ Hendig gave a little shudder, ‘he says he’ll never give me a job and I shall have to be a real smith’s apprentice.’

  ‘What do we do when we’re out though?’ Cwen asked. ‘If the town moot is getting ready for an execution, we’ll just have to clear off.’

  ‘Run away, you mean?’ Wat asked, disparagingly.

  ‘Yes,’ said Cwen, quite clearly.

  ‘Alright,’ said Wat, accepting it readily.

  ‘But what about the killer?’ said Hermitage.

  ‘Killers,’ Wat corrected.

  ‘Killers?’

  ‘Yes. The moot, old Oswine, Mildburgh, the abbot. The ones who want to kill us and are preparing to get on with it?’

  ‘Ah,’ said Hermitage, seeing the problem.

  ‘You said it was most likely Eggar,’ said Balor, from the door.

  ‘Still is,’ said Wat, ‘but the whole town isn’t getting ready to execute him.’

  ‘But if we went to this treasury and found that some things were missing, you’d be able to say it was Eggar and he’s escaped. Then they wouldn’t execute you.’

  ‘I think Mildburgh would still like to.’

  ‘That’s only because you’ve upset her,’ Hermitage pointed out.

  Wat frowned.

  ‘We could stop by the treasury while we’re running away,’ Hermitage suggested.

  ‘And if there is no robbery we carry on over the river and be gone,' said Wat. ‘We head for Derby, tell William all about Shrewsbury and let him do his worst.’

  ‘That hardly seems fair, considering we know what William’s worst is.’

  ‘Hermitage, these people are trying kill us!’

  ‘They’re just misguided.’

  ‘I don’t think being misguided will make the death any less permanent.’

  ‘Ahem,’ Cwen coughed politely. ‘Of course we can stay here and debate this fine point. In the cell under the hall of the people who want us executed. Personally I’d like to leave before they come down here and TRY TO KILL US.’ She shouted these last words with her fists clenched.

  ‘Alright, alright,’ said Wat gesturing to the door as if escorting her to a dance, ‘after you.’

  Caput XVI

  The Gong House

  They followed Hendig away from the moot hall and back towards the river at a fast pace.

  For some reason Hermitage, Wat and Cwen were crouching as they ran, perhaps imagining that crouching people running away from a lock-up were less likely to be noticed.

  As several people actually stopped to point at the crouching people as they ran along, they soon gave this up and tried to walk as normally as possible. This was still rather stiff and much faster than usual but no one stopped them.

  They turned back towards Balor’s house and the bridge they had crossed to arrive in Shrewsbury in the first place.

  ‘Isn’t this the wrong way?’ Hermitage hissed in a very loud hiss which could be heard by everyone.

  ‘Eh?’ Hendig asked.

  ‘We’re going back the way we came.’

  ‘This is where the treasure house is,’ Hendig explained. ‘I thought you wanted to go there first.’

  ‘Well, yes,’ said Hermitage. For some reason he’d imagined the place would be on the other side of the town, by the gate leading into England, the gate pointing roughly in the direction of Derby. Another thought occurred to him about this arrangement.

  ‘If your gong house is this side of town,’ he spoke slowly as he thought it through.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘And the river runs that way,’ he pointed south which was the direction of the river at this point in its loop around the town.

  ‘Hm?’

  ‘Doesn’t all the, erm, gong stuff just float around the town and gather at the other bridge?’

  Hendig looked at him. ‘You’re not the first to spot that,’ he accepted.

  ‘Bit of a flaw, I’d have thought, if you want to send it to Worcester and all.’

  ‘That is true,’ said Hendig, ‘but some say the original gong house was here before the second bridge anyway.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘Others say Gilder put it there on purpose. One more nasty thing to do just because he could.’ Hendig shrugged as if this was perfectly reasonable behaviour.

  ‘Never mind which side of the river the muck is thrown,’ Cwen said in a hiss of her own, which was much quieter but much, much more intense. ‘If we’re going to get to this place we have to go through the gate.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Hendig confirmed.

  ‘The gate with all the guards on it?’

  Hendig’s realisation was plain for all to see. ‘Ah,’ he said.

  ‘The same guards who carted us off to the lock up and would probably carry us to the executioner?’

  ‘Not exactly the same ones,’ said Hendig. ‘The town does have several.’

  ‘How nice,’ said Cwen, clearly not meaning it at all. ‘Whoever they are, I imagine they’ve heard about us being locked up for Gilder’s murder.’

  ‘Oh, undoubtedly.’ Hendig smiled at the efficient messaging systems of the Shrewsbury guard regime.

  ‘In which case?’ Cwen asked the question.

  ‘We wait till they’re not looking,’ Hendig suggested.

  ‘Do they spend a lot of their time not looking then? These guards of yours?’ Wat enquired.

  ‘It would explain why the place keeps having to persuade invaders to leave instead of fighting them off,’ said Cwen, ‘if the people being paid to look out aren’t actually looking at all.’

  ‘Why don’t we go out the other gate?’ Balor put his hand up to get their attention. ‘Then we could walk round the outside.’

  Cwen gave him the sort of look that could scathe the skin off a swordfish.[

  A fish with a pointed beak, used to sink ships.] ‘And the other gate doesn’t have guards?’

  ‘Oh,’ said Balor, seeing the problem, ‘yes, it does, rather.’

  ‘We could go in disguise,’ Hendig suggested with some enthusiasm.

  ‘Really?’ The contempt was gathering in pools at Wat’s feet.

  ‘Yes,’ Hendig nodded, ‘I went to May feast disguised once. No one knew who I was.’

  ‘What did you go as?’ Hermitage had to ask.

  ‘A monk,’ said Hendig slowly, seeing yet another problem.

  ‘What if we give them some money?’ Wat suggested.

  ‘Money?’

  ‘Yes, you know, coin? Most guards I know will do what you want if you give them money.’

  ‘Wat, really,’ Hermitage chastised.

  ‘But I’m usually trying to get into places, not out.’

  The five of them loitered in Balor’s doorway from where they had a clear view of the gate and the guards who occasionally wandered in and out of view. There only seemed to be two or three but they carried long poles with which they could hit people from quite a distance.

  ‘Is there a way through the walls?’ Hermitage asked. ‘A secret door or anything?’

  ‘This isn’t a story, Hermitage,’ Cwen pointed out wearily. ‘Walls don’t have secret passages in them.’

  They all gazed in different directions, seeing if inspiration would appear from the buildings around them.

  ‘Him,’ said Wat, pointing towards the gate.

  They looked over as one of the guards paced slowly across the entrance to the town, moving out of the way as a cart trundled in from
the bridge.

  This man had his long pole in his right hand, but he also had a large, dirty-looking piece of cloth bound around his head across what was clearly a wound of some sort. He also had a very black eye and paused every now and then to put a hand to his head. He did this very gingerly and made a moaning noise as he did it.

  ‘The guard who’s very keen on the works of Wat the weaver,’ Cwen noted.

  Hermitage squinted and saw that it was indeed the guard who had first greeted them on their arrival.

  ‘I’m sure he could be persuaded to let us pass,’ said Wat. He stepped out from the shelter of Balor’s house and headed for the gate. As he did so he waved the others to keep their distance in case they disturbed his negotiations.

  When he arrived at the guard the man turned in surprise and started to lower his pole. Wat held his hands out in a calming gesture while the others stopped in their progress and stood back.

  Hermitage could not hear what was being said but it was clear that the conversation was not easy. The guard gestured in the direction of the moot hall, clearly aware that that was where Wat should be.

  Wat in turn made placatory moves and even nudged the guard with his elbow in a rather conspiratorial manner.

  The silent discussion appeared to relax a little and the blatant hostility slowly softened as Wat began to describe something in detail.

  Hermitage had never in his life imagined that one of Wat’s disgraceful and explicitly sinful tapestries could be rendered without any wool. The shapes Wat was drawing in the air were positively alarming. He was clearly describing the most disgusting things and used a number of gestures which encapsulated them completely.

  The guard started to add his own interpretations, which, if it was possible, seemed even more crude.

  Wat even added some body movements which Hermitage absolutely thought were unnecessary, if not positively sinful in their own right.

  Cwen giggled as she clearly recognised the very tapestry Wat was describing.

  Hermitage gave her a harsh scowl, which achieved nothing at all.

  Eventually, Wat and the guard were clapping one another on the back and exchanging even more revolting gestures, some of them accompanied by noises.

  Wat now urgently waved them all to join him and they scurried across the short space.

  ‘Go on then,’ the guard said with an odd look, nodding towards the gate. ‘But you come back straight away mind.’

  Wat mumbled something incoherent.

  ‘And I get first sight of the tapestry,’ the guard added.

  Wat shooed and hurried them all through the gate and onto the bridge.

  ‘It’s this way,’ Hendig gestured them to the left, along the side of the town walls.

  Hermitage touched Wat on the shoulder. ‘What tapestry?’ he asked, with a very accusatory tone.

  Wat smiled. ‘I just said I wanted to see the gong house so I could put it in a new tapestry I was working on.’

  ‘Oh, Wat,’ said Hermitage. He paused for a moment. ‘You’re not, are you?’

  ‘No, of course not,’ said Wat. ‘Who’d want a tapestry with a gong house in it for goodness sake?’

  Hermitage was relieved at that. Then he thought again. ‘You mean you lied?’

  ‘That’s it,’ said Wat. ‘I did not tell the guard that we had escaped from the lock up where we were held for the murder of Gilder, or that we wanted to see his secret treasure house to check if anything was missing. Do you think I should go back and let him know?’

  Hermitage couldn’t think of what to say.

  ‘I also failed to tell him that we are planning to run away and not come back at all.’

  Wat clapped Hermitage on the shoulder with another grin. ‘But as you didn’t hear any of it Hermitage, you don’t have to worry.’

  Well, that really was ridiculous, telling Hermitage not to worry.

  ‘Down here,’ Hendig called as he led the way towards the river bank itself. It was steep sided in most spots but emerging from tall reeds and stepping out on stilts into the stream was what must be the gong house.

  Hermitage did not need to see it to know what it was. The smell seemed to have a direct link to memories he had dearly hoped had died a natural death. His earlier investigation into a death in a garderobe had been bad enough but that device only serviced one castle.[

  If this sort of thing appeals to you, you might like to dip into The Garderobe of Death. Available from all good bookshops and carefully selected plumbers.] This place was for an entire town.

  He was surprised that the wooden shell of the place had not collapsed under the assault. He could see why the people would want this facility outside of the town gate. He also perfectly understood what an excellent site it was to hide Gilder’s treasure.

  ‘We, er, we have to go through it?’ he asked, timidly.

  ‘Absolutely,’ said Hendig, who didn’t seem concerned in the slightest by the sort of odour, which, being able to lay claim to being the god of awful smells, was probably entitled to its own mythological name.

  ‘No point giving the treasury its own door to the outside.’

  Hermitage thought that battering a new one would be preferable to walking through the gong house.

  ‘Lead on,’ said Wat, brightly.

  Hermitage hesitated. ‘It’s not, erm, working, is it?’

  ‘Nah,’ Hendig snorted. ‘We keep the town clean but we’re not obsessed about it. Once a week is plenty.’

  He led the way down to a rude wooden door which looked like it was ashamed of itself. Pushing this open he beckoned them to follow into the dark interior.

  As his eyes got used to the gloom, Hermitage saw that the place was not living up to his worst fears, which were very unpleasant fears indeed. It was a simple open space, long and narrow, with one half of the floor open to the river flowing underneath. Piled against the back walls was a collection of leather buckets and various shovels, scoops and scrapers. Thankfully it looked like they’d all been rinsed in the river since their last use. Not that this prevented their purpose being as clear as a punch in the nose.

  They continued on towards the far wall where Hendig knelt and fiddled around on the floor. He lifted a loose plank and lay down, which Hermitage thought was a very rash move in this place, to stretch his arm out and grab something underneath. Finding what he wanted he pulled, and a further door in the wall in front of them sprang open.

  Wat looked at Cwen and winked. ‘A secret passage,’ he said.

  The darkness inside the room beyond seemed absolute. Hermitage could see that only thin slats of light dropped into the space from gaps in the roof and they did nothing to illuminate anything.

  Hendig stepped confidently through the door and emerged with a simple clay oil lamp in his hand. Laying the lamp on the floor he pulled flint from a pocket and struck several times before the wick took.

  ‘Come on then,’ he said cheerfully.

  Hermitage could see no reason for cheer. He was in a gong house about to enter a dark cave of a room following a man with a flickering oil lamp which somehow made the light worse, rather than better.

  Hendig stepped into the room, shouted in alarm and immediately sprang back again.

  ‘What?’ Hermitage barely contained a shriek.

  ‘Has it gone?’ Wat demanded.

  ‘No,’ said Hendig and pointed to the doorway.

  Out of the darkness a figure emerged slowly and mysteriously. Hermitage had no idea who it was, but anyone who sat in the dark in a gong house was a worry.

  Balor stepped forward and squinted. ‘Eggar,’ he asked, ‘is that you?’

  The man who emerged from the dark room was tall and gaunt and grey. Mind you, being in this place with no light would be enough to gaunt anyone.

  ‘Master Balor,’ the old man acknowledged. ‘It is all here sir. I have been guarding it for you.’

  Hermitage blanched for a moment but then recalled that he was referring to Gilder’s treasure and not the fa
mily collection of gong which had been kept in its own special store.

  ‘Good God man,’ said Balor, ‘how long have you been here?’

  ‘Since that day,’ Eggar said, propping himself up against the wall. He waved to Hendig, who scurried into the back room and emerged with a simple stool. Eggar sat himself down and looked at them all.

  ‘These people are helping find out who killed my father,’ Balor explained.

  ‘I am Brother Hermitage,’ Hermitage introduced himself, ‘and this is Cwen and Wat.’

  ‘We thought you’d killed him,’ said Cwen, which Hermitage thought was incredibly rude and hardly the way to start a conversation with a stranger.

  ‘Many’s the time it should have been,’ Eggar nodded to himself, ‘but I never found the courage.’

  One more to add to the list of people who wanted Gilder dead.

  ‘But you were there at the time,’ said Wat, more gently than Cwen’s accusation.

  ‘Unfortunately not,’ said Eggar. ‘The master had sent me down here to collect, erm, something. When I got back I found him. As dead as dead could be. And I checked, believe me. I wouldn’t trust that old man to even die honestly. Begging your pardon, master Balor.’ Eggar nodded to his new master.

  ‘So you ran off?’ Cwen asked.

  ‘My immediate thought was robbery. I thought that the killer must know about the treasure and would be coming here to take it. I couldn’t allow that. It’s master Balor’s now.’

  Balor was looking very puzzled.

  ‘I had to protect it for you,’ the old man explained. ‘And there was nothing I could do for Gilder. Not that I’d want to.’

  ‘Why?’ said Balor.

  ‘He was horrible,’ said Eggar.

  ‘We know that.’ Balor hurried on, ‘I mean why would you protect the treasure for me?’

  ‘It’s your birth right,’ Eggar said, sombrely.

  ‘But you were always as horrible to me as he was,’ Balor protested.

  ‘I had to be, master,’ Eggar hung his head. ‘I had to keep you out of that place. I promised your mother. We couldn’t have you brought up by him. You might have ended up the same.’ He said the word “him” as if it was the sort of material they wouldn’t even let in the gong house.