Read Brother Cadfael 03: Monk's Hood for Free Online

said you were but four in the house."
    "He has a neck as stiff as my lord's, he's taken himself off to live with his married sister and her family, and learn a trade. He was expected back with his tail between his legs before now, my lord was counting on it, but never a sign, and I doubt if there will be."
    It sounded, Cadfael reflected ruefully, a troublous situation for the disinherited boy's mother, who must be torn two ways in this dissension. Certainly it accounted for an act of spleen which the old man was probably already regretting. He handed over the bunch of mint stems, their oval leaves still well formed and whole, for they had dried in honest summer heat, and had even a good shade of green left. "She'll need to rub it herself, but it keeps its flavour better so. If she wants more, and you let me know, I'll crumble it fine for her, but this time we'll not keep her waiting. I hope it may go some way towards sweetening him, for his own sake and hers. And yours, too," said Cadfael, and clapped him lightly on the shoulder.
    Aelfric's gaunt features were convulsed for a moment by what might almost have been a smile, but of a bitter, resigned sort. "Villeins are there to be scapegoats," he said with soft, sudden violence, and left the hut hurriedly, with only a hasty, belated murmur of thanks.
    With the approach of Christmas it was quite usual for many of the merchants of Shrewsbury, and the lords of many small manors close by, to give a guilty thought to the welfare of their souls, and their standing as devout and ostentatious Christians, and to see small ways of acquiring merit, preferably as economically as possible. The conventual fare of pulse, beans, fish, and occasional and meagre meat benefited by sudden gifts of flesh and fowl to provide treats for the monks of St Peter's. Honey-baked cakes appeared, and dried fruits, and chickens, and even, sometimes, a haunch of venison, all devoted to the pittances that turned a devotional sacrament into a rare indulgence, a holy day into a holiday.
    Some, of course, were selective in their giving, and made sure that their alms reached abbot or prior, on the assumption that his prayers might avail them more than those of the humbler brothers. There was a knight of south Shropshire who was quite unaware that Abbot Heribert had been summoned to London to be disciplined, and sent for his delectation a plump partridge, in splendid condition after a fat season. Naturally it arrived at the abbot's lodging to be greeted with pleasure by Prior Robert, who sent it down to the kitchen, to Brother Petrus, to be prepared for the midday meal in fitting style.
    Brother Petrus, who seethed with resentment against him for Abbot Heribert's sake, glowered at the beautiful bird, and seriously considered spoiling it in some way, by burning it, or drying it with over-roasting, or serving it with a sauce that would ruin its perfection. But he was a cook of pride and honour, and he could not do it. The worst he could do was prepare it in an elaborate way which he himself greatly loved, with red wine and a highly spiced, aromatic sauce, cooked long and slow, and hope that Prior Robert would not be able to stomach it.
    The prior was in high content with himself, with his present eminence, with the assured prospect of elevation to the abbacy in the near future, and with the manor of Mallilie, which he had been studying from the steward's reports, and found a surprisingly lavish gift. Gervase Bonel had surely let his spite run away with his reason, to barter such a property for the simple necessities of life, when he was already turned sixty years, and could hardly expect to enjoy his retirement very long. A few extra attentions could be accorded him at little cost. Brother Jerome, always primed with the news within and without the pale, had reported that Master Bonel was slightly under the weather, with a jaded appetite. He might appreciate the small personal compliment of a dish from the abbot's