Chapter Two #2
Instead, she hit back. ‘Have you seen the new Inspector yet? He’ll be wanting to look at your figures, I’m sure.’
Oswyn frowned, distracted by news he wasn’t aware of. He had been on the mainland today and come back later than these visitors, that much was clear. She glanced at his cloak, fully splashed with tide mud and again supressed a grin.
‘Where’s he from?’
‘Durham, I think. He was talking about the new Bishop.’
‘Ah, Bishop Foxe, of course.’ He was back on firmer ground now, about to tell Linnet how he’d met him, given him good advice, been his best friend for many years, something like that. He’d go back to baiting her later.
As he drew a breath, he was distracted by a movement behind her.
‘Child! Are you hiding in here? Be gone with you!’ Oswyn shooed Isabelle away like a pest, and Linnet took her chance to escape.
The young novices were running around, fetching candles, wine, good bedding for the visiting Father.
Despite her fears about Oswyn, Linnet enjoyed the sense of urgency.
The monks were far fewer in numbers than they had been when she was a child visiting.
She thought there had been about thirty then, double what it was now.
This priory felt like it had been forgotten by Durham and the rest of the country.
Even the Christmas celebrations had felt muted.
She’d ignored them, going only to the church services she saw Ann going to, hiding in the Scriptorium the rest of the time, trying not to garner any attention, working hard on the prayer book.
Ann was marching out through the gate to the nearby field, carrying a torch and the cakes, with a gaggle of the young island girls around her giggling with excitement.
Her face was a mixture of grim satisfaction and lines of disappointment.
They would chant ‘St Agnes is a friend to me, I give this gift to help me see, who my helpmeet shall be’ as they threw seed over their shoulders.
Someone, the liveliest and loudest, probably Molly the innkeeper’s daughter, would squeal that she’d seen a wraith, and they would all run off in a frenzy of excitement.
Linnet wondered what Ann had seen in the grain when she was young, surely not the sot she was married to now, who she largely ignored, and who had only managed to give her one living child.
She saw Tom standing in the courtyard. She had been going to ask him about mending her cloak even before Isabelle suggested it.
He smiled at her, then shook his head as he saw her cloak.
‘Linnet, what do you do with your clothes? For a scribe who spends her time inside, how do you get those holes and tears?’
Linnet shrugged; she had no idea either.
Sometimes she’d sit down to illustrate a page, and hours later, hands frozen, she’d look down and her clothes would be sporting new marks and rips as if the animals she’d drawn had been playing with her.
She was a grown woman with the clothes of a ragged child.
Tom lowered his voice. ‘Isabelle told me the Inspector is here.’
Visitors were good for gaming so Tom would be hoping for some sport with the Inspector’s retinue, although Linnet didn’t think the novice monk looked likely and he seemed to be the only person who had come with him.
The monks would be staying away from the inn for now too.
Tom’s blue eyes were bright with dicing fever regardless.
He made a good living as a fisherman, but his time on the water didn’t compare to the chance to win and win again, and he would lose as if his money was swimming away from him.
He’d not been like that when he was young, she wondered if his mother’s death had started his fondness for the dice.
‘Can you mend my cloak then?’
He muttered a bit about how she was only friendly when she wanted something from him, but they both knew that wasn’t true. They would talk most evenings – sitting by the sea or in the tavern.
She left him the cloak. If she’d been cold before, she was slowly freezing to her bones now.
She wondered if the Prior and the Inspector were still talking or if they’d gone to sleep.
If they had, the Prior’s parlour might have the end of a fire she could warm herself by.
The Chapter House was brightly lit and warm but she couldn’t risk going in there, of course.
She listened, just outside, but there was only a low crackling.
Cautiously she slipped inside. No men, a glowing fire, and some peace and warmth at last. She spun slowly in front of the steady heat, like a chicken on a spit, but just as she was feeling some warmth returning to her, she heard voices coming.
She froze. She had no business being here.
Looking around, she crouched down behind the big chest. Stupid.
Why had she risked her place here for a moment by the fire?
And now, hiding like a disobedient child.
This was just what Oswyn would want. He’d never fully accepted why the Prior had let her stay, and she could feel his eyes on her at all times, looking for a mistake to cut her loose.
The Prior, the Inspector and the novice came in, talking louder than before and with more cordiality. Father Nicholas had been well fed, but the Prior had obviously taken care that the food wasn’t too rich.
‘I’ve asked Brother Oswyn to join us. He was busy today but he should be along soon.’
‘I’ll only need to see his accounts, if he has them ready?’
The sharp tone was still there in the Inspector’s voice, only slightly softened by the spiced wine he was sipping. Linnet could smell the nutmeg and the sour heat underneath it, the wine in the Priory was not of the best quality.
‘He’s very conscientious, Father, they’ll be in good order.’
‘And what monies do you have coming in? I know the farms to the north have been harried by the Scots and are being tardy with their rent.’
‘Yes, we have had some requests for more time which we are assessing. Fenham Farm has paid this year but not its arrears. We are also producing prayer books and the like for some local gentry.’
‘Do you have a scriptorium here? Which of your monks are scribes and which limners?’
Linnet kept listening but there was silence for a minute, only the fire crackling and the chairs creaking a little as the monks settled themselves after their meal.
Prior Richard seemed happy; he was paying her a pittance but it was all hers.
Would the Inspector think her presence here unholy?
She wondered what Oswyn might say to him, something that might make him insist she left?
She was already holding her breath, folded into as small a space as she could manage, hands gripping the rough wooden edge of the chest next to her.
‘We have – a woman,’ the Prior faltered a little.
Again, a moment’s silence.
‘A woman? Well, Bishop Foxe is not against the idea of cheap labour when you can find it.’ But he didn’t sound pleased.
She could hear the novice shifting his feet but he didn’t speak up.
The Prior breathed an audible sigh of relief as he continued.
‘She is the grown daughter of John-the-Lies – have you met him? No? He’s one of the Obituary Roll-Bearers.
He’s known to carry inks and extra parchment with him, always got a good story to tell, although who knows how true they are.
He knows all the history of the holy houses and is quick-witted.
As she travelled with him, his daughter picked up her skills.
Anyway, she came here to wait for him. She can scribe, make inks and illuminate, we can use her skill. ’
He was confident now, back on his favourite subject.
‘There’s some leftover parchment from when they tried to have a scriptorium here before.
One of the farmers is saving his male calves for me, and the tanner can make more parchment, not the highest quality but good enough for purpose.
We could produce more if we had more learned monks.
We have some books here too, so don’t need to wait for the quires for copying. ’
Borrowing quires was troublesome for some religious houses, Linnet knew. They got the best books to copy if they had the ear of the bishops. She’d seen no sign that the Prior was well connected. Perhaps he could use this time with the Inspector to become favoured by Bishop Foxe.
‘What about this woman, why did she not become a nun if she is skilled in scribing?’
Linnet struggled not to snort. That had never been her wish, although when she and Guy were in disguise, she’d dressed as one. If danger threatened again, a nunnery might be a good place to hide. Lost in thoughts of herself as a nun, she missed the rest of what they were saying.
Oswyn came in and the Prior introduced him. From where Linnet was hiding, she could only hear the men, not see them. Father Nicholas was coughing now, with Oswyn banging him helpfully on the back. Perhaps the wine had gone down the wrong way.
Once they were settled, the talk turned back to the accounts.
‘Of course, you must come and see my books tomorrow, Father Nicholas, and you—’
‘I’m Brother Cassian.’ That must be the novice. A rough local voice, from a man well into his middle years.
The Inspector grunted in assent.
‘My door is always open to you, knock for me.’ Oswyn’s voice had its customary and oily charm. Again the Inspector didn’t answer.
The Prior took him out towards his lodgings, telling Oswyn to show Brother Cassian to the dormitory, and Linnet could finally make her escape, out into the inner courtyard and across it to her room above the larders.