Michael JECKS - The Abbot's Gibbet

Avice stifled a giggle. Her maid clucked with disapproval, but the girl could see nothing wrong with talking to a monk, especially one who was so obviously tongue-tied with adolescent yearning for her. He was endearing, she thought. Like a puppy.

“Hello,” she said.

Peter swallowed. He felt as if a large stone had materialized at the base of his throat. All he could manage was a grunt.

She began to walk, her eyes on him the whole way, and as if hauled along by a rope, he found himself trailing beside her, half unwillingly, half drunk with pride that she should want him to join her.

At home she was used to lovers who waited hopefully outside her door. That the monk might have been simply walking past with no knowledge that she lived there did not occur to her. Avice assumed, not vainly, but simply as a matter of logic, that he must have been waiting to see her, and she was determined to repay him for the compliment. She talked kindly to him, prattling about the excitement of the fair, telling him of her purchases and what she must still look for, and he drank in her words like a wine, and was drunk with admiration for her.

Avice had no idea how total was his ardor. She had grown up in Plymouth, where there were many young men, and she was used to their adoration. In the small town there were no competitors to her beauty matched with her father’s wealth. To her, it was merely a whim that she should reward his worship. She had no realization that a few words from her could cause him to reconsider his vocation, that over the space of a few short yards she would convince him that he could not renounce the world and hide from such tender beauty as she possessed. If she had understood the turmoil in his heart, she might have relented and been curt to him, as a kindness. But she could not appreciate how a young man’s desires could be lighted; still less that a monk was a man, possibly a man of even more passion than the weak, vapid youths of her home town.

Peter was fired with adoration. He would give up his cloth, leave the monastery and become an ordinary man: he would marry this woman.

For Avice it was all the more gratifying to receive his attentions because he was a monk. If even a man of God should recognize her beauty, she felt in her youthful arrogance, she must be destined for a great marriage. She couldn’t possibly wed John, he was a slob. He had no understanding of art or beauty. No, Avice must find a husband with whom she could create a dynasty. With that gratifying thought her mind turned once more to Pietro.

She was resolved to marry him. She was convinced that he and his father were rich, and that her mother could not object to the match when she saw the true value of the Venetians’ estates. For Avice it was irrelevant. Pietro appreciated her – something of which John was incapable.

They were approaching the tavern. Avice remembered the place with fondness, now that the mistake of the previous evening was cleared up. She could recall the doubt and upset while sitting there for so long, waiting and waiting for Pietro to arrive, and then realizing he wasn’t going to. It had been terrible – the worst night of her life. But his apologies had been so fulsome this morning that she had forgiven him.

She could just make out his figure standing opposite the tavern, and she smiled inwardly. Peter mistook her expression as being on his behalf, and he sighed happily. This, he thought, was the woman for him. She was so kind, so soft and gentle, she would be the perfect wife, an angel on earth. When he was ill, her cool hand would caress his brow; when he was well, she would be a staunch friend and the mother of his children.

He was reflecting happily on his fortune in finding so wonderfully beautiful a mate when he saw the Venetian. The monk was feeling a spark of irritation that the foreigner should interrupt his walk with his woman, when his muse gave a small gasp of delight, and his dreams shrivelled in the heat of his dismay: he had a competitor, a man who was not sworn to chastity. In that second Peter made the decision that would change his life.

Avice hurried forward, her steps light now as she saw her man, and her maid had to collect her skirts in her hands to keep pace. Peter halted, his belly churning.

“My lady, I am honored to meet you again,” Pietro said softly. “May I join you?”

“No, you mayn’t,” her maid declared hotly. “She doesn’t talk to every foreigner in the town, not when she doesn’t know them.”

“Don’t worry,” Avice said, her eyes fixed on her lover. “He has met my parents. Father let me walk with him this morning.”

Her maid muttered darkly, but dared not gainsay her charge. She knew perfectly well that her lady could have a will of steel when it pleased her.

Pietro glanced behind her. “Who is the little monk?” he asked patronizingly.

His tone stirred her caprice. She turned and waved. “He is an admirer of mine, no mere monk. I may marry him.”

“Marry him? A monk?” he sniggered.

His amusement stung. “Monk he may be, but he would give it all up for me.”

“Oh? And what of the noble John?”

“Him?” she said scornfully. “He revolts me. He’s a fool, a buffoon. My mother likes him because he is related to a lord, but he is nothing to me. No, I will not marry him. But a young monk? What better proof of devotion could there be, than that a man should give up his religion, his life, everything for his woman? I think he is rather noble.”

“You think so?” Pietro studied her smiling face. It had been bad enough to hear that she was betrothed to a squire, but her denial persuaded him. Yet now she asserted her passion for a feeble monk! He looked back at Peter, suddenly filled with an unreasoning hatred. No boy would come between him and Avice, he resolved. If he was prepared to renounce his calling for a woman, he was no monk, and his cloth wouldn’t protect him.

Avice saw his stare, and felt convinced that this man would fight for her if he had to. It was deliciously stirring – and pleasurable.

Abbot Champeaux bowed, smiling, as the Venetian walked from his hall, but by the time he had returned to his table his face had become thoughtful. Cammino’s idea was interesting, he acknowledged. His proposal to export the wool from the Abbey’s flocks by galley instead of slow cogs could well increase their profits. The Venetians with their fast vessels could move it over the Channel to France in half the time – if the weather was good enough – and Antonio appeared keen to form a close alliance with the Abbey, promising loans at low rates if he won this deal.

Yet Antonio da Commino was the very kind of man Champeaux had learned to distrust. The Venetian appeared to have few opinions of his own; he molded his every word to suit his prospective partner, and Champeaux had the feeling that if he was to say that all merchants and bankers should be hung and drawn, the other would wholeheartedly agree.

The Venetian had made a great play of his contacts, giving the name of the Bishop of Exeter as someone who could confirm his probity and integrity. Perhaps, Abbot Champeaux mused, Antonio had expected to be taken purely at his word; perhaps an Abbot should trust to a man’s honor – but Champeaux was too wily in matters of business. Something had struck him as false, and as he already had a man going to Exeter, he had sent a message to Stapledon to confirm Antonio’s credentials. The reply lay on his table. Stapledon’s steward apologized that the Bishop was away, and denied any knowledge of a Venetian called Cammino. The Bishop had never, to his knowledge, had any dealings with such a man. Abbot Champeaux was forced to conclude that he was the target of a trick. It made him determined not to accept the Venetian’s offer.