The Clerkenwell Tales by Peter Ackroyd (good short books .txt) 📕

The glow of their fires and torches was reflected in the quietly moving water of the Fleet, while the sounds of hammering and beating could still be heard. There was no curfew beyond the walls.

Duckling stayed as close to Clarice as he dared, but she had stopped. She had reached the stone cell of the bridge hermit. He thought that she was simply giving alms but, approaching the little hermitage, he could hear the nun and the anchorite talking quietly together.

“And the height of Moses?”

“Twelve foot and eight inches,” Clarice replied.

“Christ?”

“Six foot and three inches.”

“Our Lady?”

“Five foot and eight inches.”

“St. Thomas of Canterbury?”

“Seven foot save an inch.”

The hermit then helped her down some ruined steps to the bank of the river, and into a small wherry like those which crossed between Lambeth and Westminster. Duckling could hear the splash of oars, and saw the boat move slowly down the Fleet towards the dark city and the Thames. The Fleet flowed softly here, but its quietness was deceptive. It was filled with unclean things, from the dead dogs of Smithfield to the refuse of the tallow chandlers. In some places it was deep and perilous, and in others more like a mire or marsh than a river. It was known to be dangerous to children and to drunkards, who were often found floating in the filthy water or caught among the reeds.

John Duckling began to walk across the bridge, when he heard something sighing or whispering in the water. It was just below his feet, waiting to raise its hands towards him, and he turned back in horror. As he rushed past the hermit’s cell he heard a thin voice calling to him.

“Right dear brother, great worship be thy sacred order unto you. Do you have any offerings for the sake of Christ?” The cell stank of the age-old sweat that had settled into its stones.

“One nun came this way. Sister Clarice. Do you know of her?”

“No nun has come here, sir priest. There is no nun who may leave her house alone. What novice are you? Do you have hair under your hood?”

“I saw her take boat here and depart.”

“Do way! Do way! I know nothing of this!” The bridge hermit, a man no more than thirty, was wearing an unclean shirt which touched his knees; now he banged his head savagely against the wall behind him. “Do way! Do way!”

The nun’s priest retraced his steps along the Fleet towards the House of Mary; he opened the side gate and walked across the lawn to the guest-house and the cloister beyond. A candle was still gleaming within the nun’s chamber and, as he came closer, he could distinctly hear the low voice of Brank Mongorray coming from the open window. And then – but this could not be – the reply of Sister Clarice. It was her own clear, light voice. John Duckling had just watched her floating down the Fleet in the direction of the Thames. How could she still be here? Had he seen a hobgoblin of the night? Such figures were known to haunt convents and other places of God; but why had it taken the form of a nun? He heard her suddenly singing, “Oh one that is so fair and bright.” And at once the strangest memory descended upon him.

Three years before he had been the confessor to the Alder Street compter, a local prison of ancient foundation where the more serious malefactors were confined before they were hanged. He had been ordered to undertake this dangerous work as a penance by the Bishop of London, after he had been found consorting with a married woman of his parish. The prison itself comprised two connecting vaulted chambers constructed at a depth of seven feet, with an aperture in the roof as an entrance; on each side ran a stone bench for the whole length of the room, and in a platform on the earthen floor against the western wall were inserted six huge rings of iron. It was here that John Duckling, fearful of the gaol fever, had first conversed with Richard Haddon, a fishmonger who had suffocated three children. Haddon had admitted his crime at the sheriff’s court and, since he could not read and therefore not plead benefit of clergy, he was sentenced to hanging at the site of the murders on Dark Tower wharf.

On the day before his death he had told John Duckling in secreta confessione that he had seen his own mother stifle her newborn child and take its body in a basket down to the Thames. His mother, ever after that time, had beaten and whipped him; he believed that the devil had entered him when he first opened his mouth to scream. He confessed to Duckling that he had only once found contentment in all his life – when his mother sang him to tearful sleep with the song that begins, “Oh one that is so fair and bright.”

More curious still was the manner of Haddon’s departing from this life. When he was lifted out of the stone prison and tied to the hurdle which would drag him from Alder Street to Dark Tower wharf, he opened his mouth and began to sing. As he was jolted along the stone cobbles he sang out, “Oh one that is so fair and bright,” in a strong and melodious voice.

Duckling could still hear the nun singing as he crept from the guest-house and walked quickly through the cloister. It was only after he entered his lodging that he wondered if the monk, Brank Mongorray, had assumed her voice:

“Oh one that is so fair and bright

velud maris stella

Brighter than the day is light

parens et puella

I cry to thee, I sue to thee,

Lady, pray thy son for me

                  tam pia

That I may soon come to thee

                  Maria.”

Chapter Eight

The Knight’s Tale

On that same spring evening, even as John Duckling was walking through the cloister of