Free The Potter's Field by Ellis Peters

equally pertinent questions. Why all the way to Ramsey? Why not here in Shrewsbury?
    â€œHugh Beringar shall know from me, without delay,” said the abbot reassuringly, “all that you can tell me. You say de Mandeville has seized Ramsey. When did this happen? And how?”
    Sulien moistened his lips and put together, sensibly and calmly enough, the picture he had carried in his mind for seven days.
    â€œIt was the ninth day back from today. We knew, as all that countryside knew, that the earl had returned to lands which formerly were his own, and gathered together those who had served him in the past and all those living wild, or at odds with law, willing to serve him now in his exile. But we did not know where his forces were, and had no warning of any intent towards us. You know that Ramsey is almost an island, with only one causeway dryshod into it? It is why it was first favoured as a place of retirement from the world.”
    â€œAnd undoubtedly the reason why the earl coveted it,” said Radulfus grimly. “Yes, that we knew.”
    â€œBut what need had we ever had to guard that causeway? And how could we, being brothers, guard it in arms even if we had known? They came in thousands,” said Sulien, clearly considering what he said of numbers, and meaning his words, “crossed and took possession. They drove us out into the court and out from the gate, seizing everything we had but our habits. Some part of our enclave they fired. Some of us who showed defiance, though without violence, they beat or killed. Some who lingered in the neighbourhood though outside the island, they shot at with arrows. They have turned our house into a den of bandits and torturers, and filled it with weapons and armed men, and from that stronghold they go forth to rob and pillage and slay. No one for miles around has the means to till his fields or keep anything of value in his house. This is how it happened, Father, and I saw it happen.”
    â€œAnd your abbot?” asked Radulfus.
    â€œAbbot Walter is a valiant man indeed, Father. The next day he went alone into their camp and laid about him with a brand out of their fire, burning some of their tents. He has pronounced excommunication against them all, and the marvel is they did not kill him, but only mocked him and let him go unharmed. De Mandeville has seized all those of the abbey’s manors that lie near at hand, and given them to his fellows to garrison, but some that lie further afield he has left unmolested, and Abbot Walter has taken most of the brothers to refuge there. I left him safe when I broke through as far as Peterborough. That town is not yet threatened.”
    â€œHow came it that he did not take you also with him?” the abbot questioned. “That he would send out word to any of the king’s liegemen I well understand, but why to this shire in particular?”
    â€œI have told it everywhere as I came, Father. But my abbot sent me here to you for my own sake, for I have a trouble of my own. I had taken it to him, in duty bound,” said Sulien, with hesitant voice and lowered gaze, “and since this disruption fell upon us before it could be resolved, he sent me here to submit myself and my burden to you, and take from you counsel or penance or absolution, whatever you may judge my due.”
    Then that is between us two,” said the abbot briskly, “and can wait. Tell me whatever more you can concerning the scope of this terror in the Fens. We knew of Cambridge, but if the man now has a safe base in Ramsey, what places besides may be in peril?”
    â€œHe is but newly installed,” said Sulien, “and the villages nearby have been the first to suffer. There is no cottage too mean but they will wring some tribute out of the tenant, or take life or limb if he has nothing besides. But I do know that Abbot Walter feared for Ely, being so rich a prize, and in country the earl knows so well. He will stay