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Read Online [William Falconer 06] - Falconer and the Ritual of Death by Ian Morson - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Ian Morson
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Simon?’
‘No, prior. I thought first of you.’
‘Good. Now, do not reveal your concerns to anyone. And I will overlook the simple matter of your.., er... difficulties with the words of the Mass.’
‘Yes, Prior Thomas.’ Simon breathed a sigh of relief. His living was safe thanks to what he had seen, and his judicious choice of confessor.
Nine
30 August, 1271
The morning did not begin well for Falconer. He had slept badly, his mind churning over the discovery of the body of the man buried in the walls of the house in Little Jewry Lane. Something was very amiss with what he had seen, but he could not recollect what it was that nibbled at the corners of his mind. A megrim then started to burgeon, causing his head to pound and making thinking an impossibility. He had lain awake stating out of the window of his solar as the moon became gradually obscured by scudding clouds. Lately, he had experienced regular headaches, and once as a result had completely forgotten his train of thought in the midst of a lecture. The subject - Aristotle’s Prior Analytics - was as familiar to him as his own palm, and he had intoned the tenets a thousand times.
‘First then take a universal negative with the terms A and B. If no B is A, neither can any A be B. For if some As - we will call them C - were B, it would not be true that.., not true that...’
Suddenly, the sequence that he had rattled off to hundreds of students refused to emerge from his brain. And a sudden shaft of a headache arrowed through his left eye. He had covered the moment by brusquely harassing one of the more recalcitrant of his students.
‘Finish the premise, Tom Youlden.’
At least he had remembered the boy’s name, if not the principle he had been instilling into unwilling brains for years.
The boy had trembled, but had fumbled his way through that which had completely escaped his domine. The thought that he might be losing his memory petrified Falconer.
It had been the early morning before he had drifted into a disturbed slumber. And now, the sound of heavy rain awoke him. If it had not, he might have slept on fitfully past the time be should have been attending to his lessons in the schools along from St Mary’s Church. He sat up, and groaned as his befuddled brain reeled. Outside his window, the sky was pewter grey, and the day barely lighter than the night that had preceded it. The rain steepled down inexorably, and Falconer knew that many students would avoid his morning lectures rather than sit cold, wet and shivering in the chilly warren of rooms that made up the university schools. He thought of Dame Elia Bassett’s memorial to her dead husband. Perhaps a collegium where clerks lived and studied together in one place was not such a bad idea after all. At least they would not have to brave the persistent rains that regularly swept along the Thames valley.
He pulled on his plain black gown, not bothering to change his undershirt. It felt cold and clammy, and he shivered.
Poking his head out of the door of his solar, he saw that one of the students who lodged at Aristotle’s Hall had carried out his duties, and left a wooden bowl outside. It contained water drawn from the cistern that stood in the narrow rear yard. It was his principle to wash every day, and set an example to the students under his charge. As well as the five shillings a year for each student he taught, he derived a few pence weekly from each of the clerks sharing the Hall. It was a living far from the riches he had imagined as a young man following the merchants’ routes across the countries of Europe, selling his services as a mercenary soldier, but it suited him. He lifted the bowl, and bore it carefully over to the table in the centre of his room, only slopping the contents once on the rush-strewn floor. He paused, held his breath and dunked his head in the water. It was freezing, and took his breath away. He gasped, and raked his wet fingers through his grizzled
‘No, prior. I thought first of you.’
‘Good. Now, do not reveal your concerns to anyone. And I will overlook the simple matter of your.., er... difficulties with the words of the Mass.’
‘Yes, Prior Thomas.’ Simon breathed a sigh of relief. His living was safe thanks to what he had seen, and his judicious choice of confessor.
Nine
30 August, 1271
The morning did not begin well for Falconer. He had slept badly, his mind churning over the discovery of the body of the man buried in the walls of the house in Little Jewry Lane. Something was very amiss with what he had seen, but he could not recollect what it was that nibbled at the corners of his mind. A megrim then started to burgeon, causing his head to pound and making thinking an impossibility. He had lain awake stating out of the window of his solar as the moon became gradually obscured by scudding clouds. Lately, he had experienced regular headaches, and once as a result had completely forgotten his train of thought in the midst of a lecture. The subject - Aristotle’s Prior Analytics - was as familiar to him as his own palm, and he had intoned the tenets a thousand times.
‘First then take a universal negative with the terms A and B. If no B is A, neither can any A be B. For if some As - we will call them C - were B, it would not be true that.., not true that...’
Suddenly, the sequence that he had rattled off to hundreds of students refused to emerge from his brain. And a sudden shaft of a headache arrowed through his left eye. He had covered the moment by brusquely harassing one of the more recalcitrant of his students.
‘Finish the premise, Tom Youlden.’
At least he had remembered the boy’s name, if not the principle he had been instilling into unwilling brains for years.
The boy had trembled, but had fumbled his way through that which had completely escaped his domine. The thought that he might be losing his memory petrified Falconer.
It had been the early morning before he had drifted into a disturbed slumber. And now, the sound of heavy rain awoke him. If it had not, he might have slept on fitfully past the time be should have been attending to his lessons in the schools along from St Mary’s Church. He sat up, and groaned as his befuddled brain reeled. Outside his window, the sky was pewter grey, and the day barely lighter than the night that had preceded it. The rain steepled down inexorably, and Falconer knew that many students would avoid his morning lectures rather than sit cold, wet and shivering in the chilly warren of rooms that made up the university schools. He thought of Dame Elia Bassett’s memorial to her dead husband. Perhaps a collegium where clerks lived and studied together in one place was not such a bad idea after all. At least they would not have to brave the persistent rains that regularly swept along the Thames valley.
He pulled on his plain black gown, not bothering to change his undershirt. It felt cold and clammy, and he shivered.
Poking his head out of the door of his solar, he saw that one of the students who lodged at Aristotle’s Hall had carried out his duties, and left a wooden bowl outside. It contained water drawn from the cistern that stood in the narrow rear yard. It was his principle to wash every day, and set an example to the students under his charge. As well as the five shillings a year for each student he taught, he derived a few pence weekly from each of the clerks sharing the Hall. It was a living far from the riches he had imagined as a young man following the merchants’ routes across the countries of Europe, selling his services as a mercenary soldier, but it suited him. He lifted the bowl, and bore it carefully over to the table in the centre of his room, only slopping the contents once on the rush-strewn floor. He paused, held his breath and dunked his head in the water. It was freezing, and took his breath away. He gasped, and raked his wet fingers through his grizzled
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