Brother Hermitag, the Shorts Read online

  ‘My thinking?’ Hermitage protested. Weakly.

  They tiptoed across a dark courtyard, scuffing into piles of things which Hermitage didn’t like think about. At least they were down there on the floor, and as long as none of them moved he should be alright.

  Across the yard to the right was another entrance, and the leader did his leading thing and took Hermitage through it. Just as they entered, the moon emerged from behind a cloud and gave a rather unhealthy illumination to a very unhealthy scene. The yard behind them was, as Hermitage had suspected, liberally covered with straw. The problem was that the straw looked like it had been spread on the yard several years ago and was now congealing itself together in clumps. It looked like it was gathering for some sort of assault on the main building.

  Hermitage shivered as he moved indoors. Inside, the hall was a complete contrast and Hermitage thought it very likely that the Lord spent all his time in here and seldom visited the outside. The room was sparse but neat. A long refectory table was surrounded by equally spaced and identical chairs. Facing its longest side, away from the door, the embers of the main fire jittered and twitched in the inglenook. Several doors led from various walls to places unknown. The room was clean, ordered and well maintained. It seemed impossible that anyone who lived here could even have the faintest idea what conditions were like outside. Perhaps they had come through the back door and the Lord only ever used the front.

  ‘Right, look around,’ the leader hissed and set off to the right on a perambulation of the room, looking at the tapestries that hung on the wall. Hermitage moved to the left doing likewise and noted the quality of the first piece he came upon. It was a large work in the traditional style showing a variety of scenes in one image. In the bottom left a number of ladies were embroidering while sitting in a garden, in the opposite corner a group of men on horseback were hunting a boar, and across the top were a series of vignettes, probably from the life of the Lord of the estate.

  First, he was a child being borne by his father in armour, then he was a youth killing his first deer, and then he was a man surveying his demesne in a very Lordly manner. It only occurred to Hermitage now that he didn’t know what the tapestry he was looking for was like.

  He thought about calling over to ask the leader, but then thought that shouting out while trying to steal things in the night was probably best avoided. It was dark so that he couldn’t actually see the man any more, and in any case it seemed clear that this first work was not the sort of thing a weaver would leave as a sample. He would carry on until he found something which seemed perhaps out of place and then confer.

  The next work was again a fairly standard piece, a maiden was cowering by a tree while a knight on horseback was skewering a Unicorn through the eye. Normal romantic stuff, and again a bit too large to be a sample.

  Hermitage had covered one wall of the room by now and turned to the side of the fire, which was still giving out some warmth and would probably be visited by a serf any minute to make sure it didn’t die in the night. Hermitage shivered as he thought that discovery might mean he would die in the night.

  There was a tapestry by the side of the fire here, and it was a small one so perhaps this might be it and they could make their escape. Hermitage had to peer hard in the dying light of the fire to see what it was, and felt further disappointment as it became clear it was a simple patterned device of the family crest. At least he assumed it was the family crest, but in any case it didn’t seem to be the sort of thing villagers would want to borrow.

  Right next to the fire place, probably in the place of most importance as it would be in anyone’s line of sight, was another small work which once more Hermitage had difficulty making out. Even as the representation became clear to him he couldn’t quite see what it was, or what was going on. There was a preponderance of pink hues about it and some shapes in the foreground that seemed intertwined somehow. Just at that moment a piece of wood, buried in the fire, sprang to flame and bathed the area in a swaying glow.

  ‘Oh my,’ said Hermitage as the image before him became clear.

  He had spoken loudly enough for the leader to hear and he came over.

  ‘Ah yes,’ he said with some relief, ‘that’s the one.’

  ‘But,’ said Hermitage.

  ‘Remarkable isn’t it?’ the leader commented and dug Hermitage in the ribs.

  ‘Is that a woman?’ Hermitage asked pointing at the tapestry and tipping his head over to one side slightly.

  ‘I hope so,’ said the leader chortling slightly.

  ‘But isn’t she..?’ Hermitage couldn’t finish the question.

  ‘She certainly is.’ The leader was grinning again now and Hermitage found it almost as distasteful as the picture.

  ‘And is that a..?’

  ‘Yes it is.’

  ‘And is it doing what I think it’s doing?’

  ‘I bet you never expected to see that.’

  Never mind expected to see it? Hermitage had never, even in the darkest depths of his murkiest and most sinful thoughts even begun to imagine anything remotely approaching the activity that was portrayed in front of him.

  ‘And that man?’ Hermitage pointed a wavering finger at the shapes which were now beginning to swim before his eyes.

  ‘Yes,’ the leader, ‘A fine specimen eh? And that’s something even I wouldn’t have thought of. And you see the two nymphs in the background?’

  Hermitage certainly could see them, he could see a lot more of them than he knew was necessary. He was equally certain that nymphs simply didn’t do that sort of thing. He was fairly sure that no one did that sort of thing.

  ‘I don’t know where this weaver gets his ideas. Famous for them, he is. You can see why it was important to get the thing back.’

  Hermitage could see many things now, both as a new arena of life was opened up before him, and as a portrayal of activities which he didn’t even have names for was spread out before his eyes.

  He knew that he was a bit of an innocent, but he understood the ways of the world, even if he didn’t want to take part in any of them. These weren’t ways of the world he knew, these were ways of a world that had been closed to him before, and which he already wished had remained so. Would he ever be the same again? Would he ever be able to have a sensible conversation with a married couple without picturing the sorts of things they got up to? Would he ever be able to look the dog in the eye again?

  With a leer on his face that was quite appropriate to the tapestry, the leader reached up and removed it from the wall. He rolled the small work up and stuffed it into his jerkin. Next to his flesh. Which gave Hermitage a new image to conjure with.

  …

  Having made their escape from the woefully guarded hall, the leader was full of good spirit, giggling and slapping Hermitage’s back as they returned to the village.

  ‘Will the Lord and the Seneschal take its removal well?’ Hermitage asked not feeling in remotely good spirits.

  ‘Oh, absolutely not,’ the leader confirmed, ‘but of course they can’t say anything can they? They leant the thing to us, then stole it back. Now it’s back where they’ve got to say it’s been all the time.’

  ‘Erm,’ this level of deception and double dealing was something entirely new to Hermitage and it spun his mind.

  …

  ‘Oh,’ Mrs Leader’s voice screeched out of the darkness at them, ‘got the filthy thing back then?’

  As they came into the village and saw her clearly, she gave them both the sort of look that could dry fish.

  ‘And you a monk,’ she said despairingly which Hermitage took to heart.

  ‘Oh shut up,’ the leader said happily, ‘just keep the thing safe until the weaver comes for it.’ The leader paused and plunged into the depths of thought which was not an area he was familiar with.

  ‘In fact,’ he said slowly, ‘I’ve got a better idea.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ Mrs Leader was fully prepared to be not impressed at all
with what came next.

  ‘Yeah, we wait till morning and then go back up to the hall and give it back to them.’

  ‘But,’ Hermitage’s powers of thought were far more profound than most, but the depths he plunged were clean and clear and sparkling. This murk he was paddling around in now obscured all his rational processes.

  ‘Brilliant,’ said the leader, ‘that’ll show that pig of a Seneschal who’s got the upper hand.’

  Mrs Leader huffed.

  Hermitage saw two options before him. The first was to try and work his way through all of this. This had many advantages. It would be a learning opportunity for him, it would enable him to better understand the ways of the ordinary folk, it would open up his thinking to more routine and mundane matters than he usually attended to, and it would give him the chance to consider the manipulations and twists of scheming, sinful people at first hand.

  ‘I’d better be off then,’ he said, as he came quickly down on the side of the second option; get away from this place as quickly as possible.

  ‘It’s the middle of the night?’ Mr Leader exclaimed.

  ‘Then I shall have the route to myself. I think I have done quite enough in the short time I’ve been here, and I feel a calling elsewhere.’

  The leader shrugged, he had his tapestry back and was going to be able to put one over on the hall, he didn’t care what else went on.

  ‘Please yourself,’ he said.

  As Hermitage gathered his meagre things together and bade farewell, making his lonely way out into the darkness, he was subject to conflicting emotions. On the one hand he was terrified that there would be fierce animals or people close at hand intent on doing him harm, on the other, he felt the most overwhelming sense of relief that he was out of the place. He did not want to be around when the tapestry was handed back, partly because it was bound to be a frightful scene and he hated that sort of thing, but mostly because he didn’t want to see that tapestry in the daylight.

  Further, he did not want to be in the position of having to explain to the Lord or the Seneschal what a monk was doing in the village, and what his part in all of this had been.

  Primarily though the desire to walk away from the village as soon as possible was prompted by the fact that the very last thing he wanted to happen, preferably ever in his whole lifetime, bearing in mind the ghastly image he had seen and the ideas it had put unbidden into his head, was to bump into the weaver of the thing. He wouldn’t know where to look.

  The end of Hermitage and the Dog

  Manuscript: MS/BH/HoW/003 Folio 7

  Hermitage and the Robber

  Preface.

  This manuscript is remarkably helpful. The discussion it contains firmly places Brother Hermitage on the road to the monastery at De’Ath’s Dingle. He even mentions the place in his discourse.

  We are also fortunate to have the thoughts of someone as they deal with Hermitage, the outsider’s view as it were. This view only serves to confirm many of the conclusions already drawn about the monk, but supporting evidence is always welcome.

  The material here also goes some way to explaining Hermitage’s engagement with the mystery, The Garderobe of Death. His knowledge of such devices is clearly already established.

  It is quite possible though, that my allocation of manuscripts to dates is awry. There is a strong argument to suggest that MS 002 Folio 7 comes after 003. In the tale here, Brother Hermitage is hopeful that his interlocutor may know the location of the grim monastery at De’Ath’s Dingle, and so it may only be a few hours or days even, since Hermitage left the coast.

  To my own mind I am content to leave them as they are. MS 002, Hermitage and the Dog, has no indication of date and so could well have been immediately after the events of 001 Hermitage and the Headless. By the time of 003 - this tale - Hermitage appears quite desperate to locate the place, and may have been wandering the countryside for days or weeks looking for it. We know from the tale of The Heretics of De’Ath that his sense of direction appears to be missing.

  Of course Professor Bunley does not agree. He insists that his Department for The History of the Investigative Monk, at the University of Mid-West Nuneaton is much better equipped to deal with the sort of thing. I say department, but that is stretching the facts somewhat. As I understand it, the “department” consists of Bunley himself and a part time post-graduate who was expelled from the Tudor period for defacing one of the Wives of Henry VIII.

  This “agent” fellow arrived just as Bunley was expostulating, and criticised him roundly for the very widest variety of failings, many of which might have been thought, but need not be brought up.

  Bunley retorted that he had doubts about the authenticity of the manuscripts the agent kept turning up with, (I must confess I have had my own doubts on this score), and virtually accused the man of fabrication. Coming from a historian, even one of Bunley’s modest repute, this is quite an accusation, and the agent retorted in kind.

  Professor August Bunley is not a small man, while the “agent” is a wiry fellow, endlessly fidgeting and unable to sit still for a moment. When the two of them crashed into my lectern and spilled my favourite Walnut ink - a charming brown hue which hangs very well on the quill - I had to call a halt.

  After some considerable effort I managed to usher them from the scriptorium, but could hear that their dispute continued for some time in the garden below my window. The professor would have weight on his side but the agent is lithe and would be able to get away quite smartly if necessary.

  I imagine they will both return to let me know the outcome in due course. Unless of course I lock the door and pretend to be out.

  Howard,

  Warwick,

  Thursday.

  Hermitage and The Robber

  ‘So,’ the gruff voice did gruff extremely well, and the spice of menace that garnished it did nothing for Hermitage’s peace of mind.

  ‘A monk eh?’ it asked and Hermitage wondered why. Wasn’t it obvious that he was a monk from the way he dressed?

  ‘That’s right.’ Hermitage debatedwhether the figure before him was simple, or just knew nothing about monks. He didn’t feel that this was the moment to ask somehow.

  ‘What you doing here monk?’ This wasn’t a threat, there was distinct disappointment in the voice, as if Hermitage had stumbled into some place where monks shouldn’t tread. A place where there was perhaps some sin and wrong doing which had been getting along quite nicely before a monk turned up.

  There was some truth in this. The man’s name was Bargis, and he was disappointed that this was a monk. The source of the disappointment was that monks were notoriously poor. This one looked worse than most meaning that he was almost certainly not going to have anything worth stealing.

  Bargis had noted the weight and shape of the monk’s pack as he had put it down, and had used years of experience to quickly value it at next to nothing. Not precisely nothing, and of course a decent habit could fetch a reasonable price. The trouble was this monk didn’t even have a decent habit. Bargis had rapidly concluded that if there was anything of worth about this wandering monk, then the wandering monk could keep it. The gain would not be worth the pain of delving into this man’s belongings. Even Bargis, with his famously low standards drew the line somewhere.

  ‘I am on my way to the monastery at De’Ath’s Dingle my son,’ Hermitage replied, it only occurring to him now that this unkempt fellow might know where that was.

  ‘Lucky you came upon me at this time of night then.’

  ‘Is it?’ Luck hadn’t been Hermitage’s travelling companion for some time now, and he failed to see how this rather frightening looking fellow, in this place, was a harbinger of good fortune.

  ‘Oh yes, dangerous country this.’

  Hermitage looked around quickly, expecting to see a bear or something.

  ‘Robber country.’

  ‘Is it?’ Hermitage looked around again, this time for a robber. He didn’t spot one.

&
nbsp; ‘You’d be lucky to make it through after dark. There’s people round here would drop you for your sandals.’

  ‘Really?’ Hermitage puzzled over why a robber would lift him up in the first place. Probably to get at the sandals.

  ‘Oh yes, I doubt you’d make it through the forest to the Nottingham Road. Where is this Dingle place anyway?’

  Oh well, that was that line of enquiry terminated.

  ‘I have to confess that I don’t actually have the detailed location. I was rather hoping that the name would be familiar to you?’

  ‘Never heard of it. It’s round here somewhere though is it?’

  ‘A very good question. I wasn’t given much information, just that I was needed there.’

  ‘Monks!’ Bargis spat on the ground. ‘You weren’t told where it was that you had to go, just that you had to go there?’

  ‘Erm.’ Now that it was said in this way, Hermitage did think that his abbot had been less than responsible in his dispatching of Hermitage.

  ‘So why are you needed? Are you an apothecary or something?’ Bargis thought that this might compensate for the lack of profit from this encounter. The monk could take a look at his bunions which had been killing him for weeks, and at that lump that had appeared in his groin.

  ‘Oh no,’ Hermitage replied, flattered by the assumption. ‘I’m a scribe.’

  ‘Woah,’ Bargis was impressed. ‘Can you read and everything?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Hermitage, ‘I’m not just a copyist.’

  ‘I know my letters,’ Bargis said. He prided himself on his great learning. Well, relatively great.

  Hermitage was ashamed of himself as he found this very hard to believe looking at the condition of the man.

  In reality, of all the men of the woods, Bargis was recognised as one of the foremost intellectuals.

  ‘Really?’ Hermitage tried to sound impressed.