“Yes, yes, I understand. I do.” The monk was bobbing his head rapidly, no trace of arrogance or dislike discernible in him now.
“Then take your skinny, piss-wet arse out of my sight. Now!”
The roar of rage galvanized the wretched monk, and he scrambled to all fours and scurried away, lurching towards the Abbey.
I turned to Will. “You know he’s running straight to Father Abbot, don’t you?”
“Aye, and I don’t care. This day has been coming for years and now it’s done with.” Suddenly he switched to Scots. “And ye ken? I dinna gi’e a damn what they dae to me. Yon was worth it. Did ye see how quick he pished hissel’, the watter rinnin’ doon his robe? I could hear the gush o’ it. He didna think we’d daur face up to him.”
“They’ll expel you, Will. Me, too.”
“No, Jamie, not you.” He reverted to Latin seamlessly. “He attacked you with a weapon, unprovoked. And that reminds me.” He stooped and gathered up the four broken pieces. “We might need this for proof. Pull up your shift.”
I struggled to do as he said, suddenly aware of the band of pain across my shoulders, and when my back was bare he pressed his thumb against the welt that was evidently visible.
“Aye,” he murmured. “That’ll bruise beautifully, too clear to be denied. Don’t lose it.” I looked at him in disbelief, amazed to see him grinning.
“How can you laugh, Will? We are deep in trouble.”
He shook his head. “No, Jamie, no. I might be, but you’re not. I told you.”
“They’ll throw you out. What will you do then? You’ll be disgraced.”
“Aye.” He barked a laugh, which astounded me. “And they’ll go hungry for fresh meat forever after.” He reached out to dig his fingers into my shoulder. “I’m finished here anyway, Jamie. Nothing more here that I want to learn. I’ve only stayed this past half year to keep you company, but nowadays you’re so lost in your books that I spend most of my time alone. So if they throw me out, and I hope they will, I’ll go back to Elderslie and be a forester. That’s all I want to do anyway.”
“A forester!” I was sure he was jesting. “You can’t be a forester, you speak Latin and French! Foresters know only trees and animals, poachers and hunters.”
“And bows, Jamie. Some of us know bows. But I might be the first monk-taught forester. Think of that. And never fear, Uncle Malcolm will welcome me because he can always use good foresters, and he’ll accept my leaving here once he knows what caused it. You, on the other hand, will stay here and take up your calling and we’ll see each other often.”
I knew he spoke the truth about being welcomed back in Elderslie, for he was right about the need for a good forester on the Wallace lands, and I knew too that the old knight would forgive him, for Will and Sir Malcolm had grown close, and the older man had scant respect for clerics. Some, he would concede if pressed, were well enough, honest in their endeavours and their calling like his own two kinsmen, but he had found too many far less suited to his taste. Parasites, he called those who used the privileges and seclusion of the clerical life to keep themselves well fed in relative comfort and free of the responsibilities that encumbered other men.
Brother James, I had long known, was one such specimen. He had never overcome the dislike he had conceived for us when he had been charged with showing us the precincts on our first day there. He had not known who we were that day, and when he discovered later that we were Wallaces, close kin to Father Peter and Brother Duncan, his resentment and dislike had festered and grown deep, although he was usually at pains to mask it. But even that masking bred more resentment.
Will and I tried several times to placate him in the months that followed that first encounter, but it was a thankless task, and we soon resigned ourselves to his dislike and avoided him as much as possible. Yet, inevitably in such a small community, there were times when our paths crossed, and those occasions were generally unpleasant. That became increasingly true as the years passed and we continued to disappoint Brother James by failing to disgrace ourselves as he expected, rising instead to positions of relative prominence within the community, myself as the youngest librarian ever and Will as supplier to the pantry.
I discovered later that our final encounter that September day had been caused by jealousy, and it was inconceivable to me that any full-grown man should be jealous of me. But I learned that James had once worked in the library and had been banished for negligence after several valuable manuscripts were damaged through his carelessness. He had also applied to study for the priesthood, but had been found deficient in several areas and was rejected. The word of my acceptance as a seminarian had been brought to me by Father Peter on the morning of the day Joseph attacked me, and clearly the unfortunate man had heard of it, as he attacked me soon afterwards.