MONK’S HOODEllis Peters

Table of Contents

Chapter One

On this particular morning at the beginning of December, in the year 1138,Brother Cadfael came to chapter in tranquillity of mind, prepared to betolerant even towards the dull, pedestrian reading of Brother Francis, andlong-winded legal haverings of Brother Benedict the sacristan. Men werevariable, fallible, and to be humoured. And the year, so stormy in its earliermonths, convulsed with siege and slaughter and disruptions, bade fair to end incalm and comparative plenty. The tide of civil war between King Stephen and thepartisans of the Empress Maud had receded into the south-western borders,leaving Shrewsbury to recover cautiously from having backed the weaker side andpaid a bloody price for it. And for all the hindrances to good husbandry, aftera splendid summer the harvest had been successfully gathered in, the barns werefull, the mills were busy, sheep and cattle thrived on pastures still green andlush, and the weather continued surprisingly mild, with only a hint of frost inthe early mornings. No one was wilting with cold yet, no one yet was goinghungry. It could not last much longer, but every day counted as blessing.

And in his own small kingdom the crop had been rich and varied, the eaves ofhis workshop in the garden were hung everywhere with linen bags of dried herbs,his jars of wine sat in plump, complacent rows, the shelves were thronging with bottles and pots of specifics for all the ills of winter, fromsnuffling colds to seized-up joints and sore and wheezing chests. It was abetter world than it had looked in the spring, and an ending that improves onits beginning is always good news.