How Many Monks?

By Howard of Warwick

5* Hilarious
5* Like Cadfael meets Clouseau
5* Another hysterical masterpiece.
Very good indeed, brilliant. BBC

Not content with being King William's investigator of murder, and he is not content with that at all, Brother Hermitage is now having his trouble delivered. The floods of Derby wash up something very specific and there is only one monk for the job.

But who would do that to an abbot? And where did he come from? Not only will Hermitage have to discover a killer, he'll also have to find a monastery where there is none.

Perhaps some detestable monks will be able to throw light on the situation.
Could the Norman obsession with record-keeping turn out to be useful?

At least this murder is only a short walk away, and Hermitage, Wat and Cwen traipse through a soggy countryside to discover more about monks and monasteries than the weavers ever wanted to know.

The 30th - yes 30th Chronicle of Brother Hermitage continues the theme of a medieval detective monk who really shouldn’t be.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Howard of Warwick
• Release date: Oct 5, 2023
• ISBN: 9781913383602

Howard of Warwick

Howard of Warwick is but a humble chronicler with the blind luck to stumble upon the Hermitage manuscripts; tales of Brother Hermitage, a truly medieval detective, whose exploits largely illustrate what can be achieved by mistake.Now an international best-seller with nearly a quarter of a million sales and a host of Number 1s, it only goes to show.Howard's work has been heard, seen and read, most of it accompanied by laughter and some of it by money. His peers have even seen fit to recognise his unworthy efforts with a prize for making up stories.The Chronicles of Brother Hermitage begin with The Heretics of De'Ath, closely followed by The Garderobe of Death and The Tapestry of Death.Howard then paused to consider the Battle of Hastings as it might have happened - but almost certainly didn't - and produced The Domesday Book (No, Not That One). More reinterpretations hit the world with The Magna Carta (Or Is It?)Brother Hermitage still randomly drifted through a second set of mysteries with Hermitage, Wat and Some Murder or Other: Hermitage, Wat and some Druids and Hermitage, Wat and Some Nuns.Just when you think this can't possibly go on: The Case of the Clerical Cadaver turned up followed by The Case of the Curious Corpse and now The Case of The Cantankerous Carcass.Now there are thirty of the things in various cubby holes all over the world.All the titles are also available as major books, with paper and everything. Try your local bookstore or www.thefunnybookcompany.com

Book preview

How Many Monks?

The innumerable

Chronicles of Brother Hermitage

by

Howard of Warwick

From the Scriptorium of

The Funny Book Company

The Funny Book Company

Published by The Funny Book Company

Crown House 27 Old Gloucester Street

London WC1N 3AX

www.funnybookcompany.com

Copyright © 2023 Howard Matthews

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, copied, or distributed by any means whatsoever without the express permission of the copyright owner. The author’s moral rights have been asserted.

Cover design by Double Dagger.

ISBN 978-1-913383-60-2

Also by Howard of Warwick.

The First Chronicles of Brother Hermitage

The Heretics of De'Ath

The Garderobe of Death

The Tapestry of Death

Continuing Chronicles of Brother Hermitage

Hermitage, Wat and Some Murder or Other

Hermitage, Wat and Some Druids

Hermitage, Wat and Some Nuns

Yet More Chronicles of Brother Hermitage

The Case of the Clerical Cadaver

The Case of the Curious Corpse

The Case of the Cantankerous Carcass

Interminable Chronicles of Brother Hermitage

A Murder for Mistress Cwen

A Murder for Master Wat

A Murder for Brother Hermitage

The Umpteenth Chronicles of Brother Hermitage

The Bayeux Embroidery

The Chester Chasuble

The Hermes Parchment

The Superfluous Chronicles of Brother Hermitage

The 1066 from Normandy

The 1066 to Hastings

The 1066 via Derby

The Unnecessary Chronicles of Brother Hermitage

The King’s Investigator

The King’s Investigator Part II

The Meandering Chronicles of Brother Hermitage

A Mayhem of Murderous Monks

A Murder of Convenience

Murder Most Murderous

The Perpetual Chronicles of Brother Hermitage

The Investigator’s Apprentice.

The Investigator’s Wedding

The Investigator’s Kingdom

The Boundless Chronicles of Brother Hermitage

Return to the Dingle

Murder Can Be Murder

Murder ‘Midst Merriment

Brother Hermitage Diversions

Brother Hermitage in Shorts (Free!)

Brother Hermitage’s Christmas Gift

Audio

Brother Hermitage’s Christmas Gift

Hermitage and the Hostelry

Howard of Warwick’s Middle Ages crisis: History-ish.

The Domesday Book (No, Not That One.)

The Domesday Book (Still Not That One.)

The Magna Carta (Or Is It?)

Explore the whole sorry business and join the mailing list at

Howardofwarwick.com

Another funny book from The Funny Book Company

Greedy by Ainsworth Pennington

How Many Monks?

Caput I: The Rain It Raineth

Caput II: Bodies Piling Up

Caput III: Spot The Knife

Caput IV: Look In the Book

Caput V: Lakeside Walk

Caput VI: Gisolm Of Old

Caput VII: Detestable Monks

Caput VIII: Abbots Of Repute

Caput IX: In The Trees

Caput X: The Truth?

Caput XI: Spot The Monastery

Caput XII: Deep Waters

Caput XIII: How To Handle A Monk

Caput XIV: Questions Remain

Caput XV: The Normans, Who Else?

Caput XVI: Another Outing

Caput XVII: Nottingham Calls

Caput XVIII: Name That Noble

Caput XIX: All Getting Nasty

Caput XX: Is There No Rest?

Caput XXI: Normans On A Hill

Caput XXII: Is Henry At Home?

Caput XXIII: Scheming Schemer

Caput XXIV: To Horse

Caput XXV: Falling Apart

Epilogue

Caput I: The Rain It Raineth

‘The rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater. Isaiah fifty-five, chapter ten.’

‘That’s very helpful, Hermitage.’ Cwen didn’t sound as if she had found it at all helpful. ‘Finding a bucket to go under that leak over there would be a little more useful at the moment.’

Brother Hermitage looked at where she was pointing and saw that there was another stream of water pouring in through the roof. This one was in a corner and was doing little harm, as far as he could see.

‘I think we may have used up all the buckets,’ he said as he stood in the middle of the weavers’ workshop, looking like a monk who was searching for a bucket.

‘Well, go and get a pot from Mrs Grod, then.’

Hermitage couldn’t avoid the grimace at that suggestion.

‘It’s all right, she’s not here,’ Wat shouted from the other side of the room.

‘Not here?’ It was hard to imagine a day without Mrs Grod cooking the apprentices’ food. Well, there was heat and there were ingredients of a sort, the cooking had to be assumed.

She had been here for the first days of the rain and Hermitage hadn’t noticed that she’d stopped coming, about which he felt quite guilty.

‘I imagine she’s trying to stop the water getting into her own house.’ Wat said, the implication being clear that Hermitage should be doing the same.

He left for the kitchen.

This rain had started as a gentle shower, which everyone had said was most welcome as the crops needed it. The mood in the workshop and in the town had been content and even relieved.

That had been a week ago. The gentle rain had stopped being so gentle after a day or two and came down so hard it bounced from the land as if trying to get back up into the clouds.

It was around then that everyone discovered where the holes in their roofs were. And the tapestry workshop of Wat the Weaver had not been exempt.

Despite it being one of the best-made buildings of Derby, and, as Wat frequently pointed out, despite him having spent a small fortune on what was supposed to be the very latest thing in thatch, the rain came in.

Hermitage had suggested that this level of rain was unusual, but nobody said, Oh, that's all right, then.

Wat, Cwen and the apprentices had done their best to protect the works.

Looms were dragged across the floor to spots where the roof wasn’t yet leaking. Mainly this had been achieved by Gunnlaug on his own. Being the largest apprentice, probably of any craft in England, he had only required assistance with those laden with nearly complete tapestries, which made them considerably heavier than normal.

Hartle, the old weaving master, had directed the apprentices on how to remove tapestries from the loom without losing all the work that had been done.

He said it would take considerable time and effort to get back to where they had left off, but that was better than throwing it all away and starting again.

All the buckets of the workshop had been located and apprentices allocated to regular emptying. Being a tapestry workshop, the place wasn’t well-equipped with buckets in the first place, and they soon ran out.

And all that had been before the thunder started.

From horizon to horizon, the sky even looked black in the middle of the day. Not that anyone went out in this to look from horizon to horizon, but a quick peer out of a window was sufficient.

As the lightning flashed and the thunder rolled, sometimes close, sometimes far away, but never-ending, the more superstitious started to suggest that this unending torrent foretold the day of reckoning and that their doom was upon them.

Fortunately, the more superstitious was only Egland, the young apprentice, who saw his doom arriving on most days, and so no one else took much notice. Even Hermitage, well-versed in the portents of the day of reckoning, knew that this was only rain.

But there was an awful lot of it.

He had no idea what the people of the town were thinking and doing, as it was impossible to get there. If Wat’s workshop was the best place to be, he dreaded to think what the worst would be like.

Only the church would be in any way secure from this onslaught. Its solid roof even had gutters to direct water away and onto anyone standing below.

The homes and workplaces of normal folk could not afford such advanced features.

And the river did not bear thinking about.

The Derwent was fickle at the best of times, but its floods were usually limited to the same areas, and people simply avoided them at this sort of time.

The volume of water now coming from the skies might be more than the river could cope with.

The great River Trent would be more of a problem, if not a disaster. It flooded great swathes of the country on a regular basis, heaven knew what was happening downstream now.

After the rivers joined, perhaps the village of Turmudestun had been washed away completely.

And there was no sign of the rain stopping.

It was getting to the point where people would simply have to go out in it. Wat’s workshop was well-stocked, but even there, food and drink would run out eventually.

Egland had suggested gathering some of the rain in a barrel and drinking that. Naturally, he had been roundly mocked for such an idea. Everyone knew that drinking water made you ill, that was what ale was for. And water that came from the sky must be even more disgusting.

A cautious look out from the front door had shown that most of the road into Derby was now a sea of mud. The workshop may be on a slight rise, so could be safe from flooding itself, but the road into town might have disappeared completely.

And, as Wat pointed out, even if they could get there, what would they find? He was confident that the tavern would not be open and operating as normal.

That place was renowned for its poor condition. Far from Mistress Angel telling her husband, Ern, which parts of the tavern required maintenance, she was probably drawing up plans for him to build a new one.

In times of crisis, people usually gathered at the church, seeking succour and welcome. They wouldn’t get either from the priest of Derby, but they might be able to force their way in to get some shelter, at least.

Bending his mind to his task, Hermitage scoured about for something that could contain water.

Mrs Grod’s great cauldron was still hanging above the spot where the fire would be, but that had long since gone out from lack of attention. The floor around it was a soggy mess as the roof leaked here as well, so getting a blaze going was unlikely.

The cauldron looked far too heavy for Hermitage to manage on his own, but he could go and get help.

As a check, he peered over its edge to confirm that it was empty.

It wasn’t empty.

Hermitage clamped a hand over his mouth to stop his stomach from adding its contents to those of the cauldron. He had to imagine that the cooking having been left, the ingredients had started to decay. However, he didn't think that the sight before his eyes could be accounted for by only a week of decay.

His reeling head and stomach recovering some balance, he determined that he would get some help to tip the contents of the cauldron out into the cleansing rain so that it would be washed away.

He felt shame at the idea of washing it away towards the town, but it had to go. Worryingly, he was confident that if it was left, Mrs Grod would simply return, relight the fire and start where she had left off.

Wat really was going to have to do something about this. It was no wonder a lot of the apprentices looked pale and ill most of the time. He was sure that they would work better if they were decently fed. Decent food cost money though, so it would be a hard argument.

Leaving the horror behind him, and resisting the urge to cover it with something, as one would do for the dead, Hermitage returned to the main workshop.

‘If someone could help,’ he called. ‘We can bring Mrs Grod’s cauldron in. That would hold a good quantity of water.’

None of the apprentices moved, and young Egland even twitched noticeably at the mention of the cauldron.

‘And I think it would benefit from being emptied,’ Hermitage added. ‘And cleaned.’

There was a quite profound silence at this.

‘If you clean Mrs Grod’s cauldron,’ Gunnlaug spoke up. ‘You can tell her.’

‘Of course,’ Hermitage said confidently. It was easy to be confident about this when Mrs Grod wasn’t actually there.

‘Please yourself.’ Gunnlaug shrugged and gestured that Hermitage could lead the way. Everyone knew the way to the cooking area, but this expedition was being made Hermitage’s responsibility alone.

The cauldron was not huge, and Hermitage imagined that Gunnlaug would be able to manage it alone, but he could not leave the poor boy to this task. He was a gentle soul, and exposure to the contents of the cook pot should be shared.

‘I, erm, wouldn’t look, if I were you,’ Hermitage suggested as they arrived in the kitchen.

‘You don’t have to eat the stuff,’ Gunnlaug pointed out.

Hermitage always felt somewhat guilty as he, Wat and Cwen ate from Ern’s tavern deliveries, leaving the apprentices to Mrs Grod’s ministrations. Now he felt positively ashamed.

‘And if we’re going to tip it out, we’re going to see it, aren’t we?’

Hermitage had to accept that this was true, and now the detail of the process was named, he worried that the contents wouldn’t want to be tipped out. What if they resisted? Someone would have to go in with a tool of some sort. He could not make a young apprentice do that. He just hoped that Wat would be able to locate a very long tool.

‘Where are we going to put it all, anyway?’ Gunnlaug asked. ‘The privy?’

‘I’m not sure we’d be able to carry it as far as the privy. I had thought out onto the road and let the rain wash it away.’

‘Not very nice for anyone using the road,’ Gunnlaug pointed out.

‘Well, no, But in these conditions I think the road will be clear.’

‘And it might wash into the river,’ Gunnlaug added as if doing something so foul to a river needed careful thought.

'No worse than the washings from Cnut the tanner, I'd have thought.'

Gunnlaug shrugged. ‘At least his waste goes to Nottingham. This stuff could wash up in Derby and we’ll never hear the end of it.’

‘The cauldron is not that large,’ Hermitage said. ‘And the rainfall is mighty. It will soon be gone.’

‘If you say so.’ It was clear that if anyone asked about this afterwards, the response would be that Hermitage had said so.

‘Grab the other side, then,’ Gunnlaug instructed. ‘It won’t be that heavy, but it’s awkward.’

Hermitage took the side opposite Gunnlaug and they both laid hands on the iron handle that spanned the cauldron and took its weight on the hook above.

‘If it was that heavy,’ Gunnlaug observed, ‘it would have pulled the roof down.’

On the count of three, they both took the weight and lifted the cauldron from its hook.

There was a groan from the timber above as if it expressed its gratitude for relief from this awful burden.

‘Careful now,’ Gunnlaug warned. ‘We don’t want to get any of this on our shoes.’

Hermitage knew that was true, as he was only wearing sandals.

The weight of the cauldron was a strain, but not too great, and the two of them took careful steps across the wet floor towards the front door.

‘We should have asked someone to come and open the door for us,’ Hermitage said.

‘I can take the weight for a moment,’ Gunnlaug replied.

As they reached the door, Gunnlaug shifted his grasp to the middle of the cauldron handle and nodded that Hermitage could now let go.

He did so quickly and lifted the latch on the door, opening it wide.

The rain outside was so heavy that it formed a curtain across the opening, through which virtually nothing could be seen.

Gunnlaug gave an amused snort. ‘At least the rain doesn’t know what’s coming. We can think of it as our revenge.’

Hermitage knew that they were going to get completely soaked as soon as they went out, but there was nothing for it. And once outside, they would need to go a few steps farther out to reach the road. He really didn’t want to deposit the cauldron’s contents by their own front door.

Another count of three, and they were out and down the path as quickly as they could manage.

‘It would have been drier to stay inside and stand under a leak,’ Gunnlaug observed.

‘This will do,’ Hermitage shouted above the rain as he felt the path come to an end, rather than saw it.

They placed the cauldron down on the ground and quickly tipped it over.

Nothing happened.

‘It doesn’t want to leave.’ Gunnlaug stepped back, lined himself up and gave the bottom of the cauldron a hearty kick.

It took two more similar attacks before there was a noise that Hermitage could only describe as a groan, and the contents of the cauldron reluctantly headed for the outside world.

It did so as a single piece, and they looked on in part wonder, part horror as a cauldron-shaped lump of indescribable colour sat on the road, and seemed to be looking at them with profound disappointment.

‘Let’s get back in,’ Gunnlaug said, even his strong and confident voice trembling. ‘It might need another week of rain to wash that lot away.’

Hermitage nodded his agreement and turned to get back in. He didn’t have a spare habit, so was going to have to find somewhere to dry off. Perhaps they could try to relight the fire, now that the cauldron was out of the way.

‘What have you done?’ a loud voice wailed at them from the road.

It had never occurred to Hermitage to think there would be anyone on the road in this weather, let alone standing right there as they emptied the cauldron.

‘Who is there?’ Hermitage called.

‘It’s me, the town headman. What have you done to the road?’ The question was more of demand now.

‘Storm damage,’ Gunnlaug explained.

‘Storm damage?’ The headman did not sound convinced. ‘What the devil did the storm damage to produce that?’ Disgust was now obvious.

‘Mrs Grod’s cauldron,’ Gunnlaug explained.

There was a brief pause. ‘Oh, right.’

'I do apologise,' Hermitage said. 'We didn't know you were there. It is an awful day to be out. Are you checking on the townsfolk?' He thought this would be just the sort of thing a headman should do. Which made him uncharitably wonder why this headman was doing it.

‘Of course not,’ the headman confirmed. ‘I had to come and get you.’

‘Get us?’ Hermitage asked.

‘Can we go in?’ the headman enquired with a weary tone that said he should have been asked this immediately.

‘Of course, of course.’ Hermitage turned back to the workshop door, into which Gunnlaug had already disappeared, the cauldron carried easily in one hand.

Once inside, he tried to shake the worst of the water from him like some dog, but it had little effect. His habit had absorbed so much that it was weighing him down.

The headman bustled in behind him and shook the water from a fine leather cloak that covered him from neck to ankle. A wide hat on his head provided further protection and Hermitage thought that the man might actually be quite dry underneath. He was probably the only one in Derby.

'Why have you come to get us?' Hermitage asked. 'In this weather, it must be something of great import.' He shamefully thought that to get the headman out of doors in this weather, his house must have blown down.

‘Not you as in all of you,’ the headman said. ‘You as in you. Brother Hermitage. We need your help.’

‘Oh my,’ Hermitage said, wondering why he would be wanted.

He knew why he was usually wanted. As the King’s Investigator of murder, it tended to be murder. But that couldn’t be the case now. Not in these conditions. He didn’t know why murders would stop for bad weather, but it simply didn’t seem realistic. In any case, the headman would have said there had been a murder as his first words. That sort of thing generally being considered important.

‘It’s the flood.’

‘The flood? What has happened? Don’t say someone has been drowned by the flood? Is the priest not available?’ He suspected that the priest of Derby wouldn’t be available for anything that required going out in the rain.

‘This one is for you,’ the headman said. He took a breath and explained. ‘The river has flooded its banks.’

‘I am not surprised.’

‘And it’s obviously bad upstream as well. We’re getting all sorts of rubbish coming down the river and a lot has jammed against the bridge. We’re worried that it won’t take the strain and could collapse at any moment.’

‘Oh, no. But how can I help?’

‘It’s the latest lot that came down and stuck.’

‘Which was?’

‘The wreckage of a monastery.’

Hermitage had to stop and think about that for several moments. Monasteries were large places made up of several buildings. In many instances, they were constructed of stone. They couldn't simply wash away and get caught in a bridge.

And monasteries were only like any other building, at the end of the day, there was little peculiar to identify a monastery.

‘How could you possibly know that it was the wreckage of a monastery?’ Hermitage asked.

The headman sighed as if it was a bother being asked all these questions. ‘Because it had a dead monk in it.’