The Owl Killers

servant martha

mARK MY WORDS, there’s trouble afoot,” Gate Martha muttered, casting a baleful glance in the direction of the guest hall.

“But didn’t they give you any indication as to why they have come?” I asked, as I followed her across the courtyard.

“You’ll have to ask them yourself. They refused to tell me.” She stomped off back to her gate, evidently much aggrieved by that.

I watched her retreating form for a moment, trying to prepare myself for my unexpected guests. All I had managed to wrest out of Gate Martha was that a man and woman, announcing themselves as the uncle and mother of the anchorite Andrew, had arrived and asked if I could spare a few minutes to see them. I knew it must be a serious matter. I could hardly imagine that Andrew had merely sent them to convey her greetings, and as soon as I entered the guest hall I could tell that Gate Martha had been right to predict trouble.

A woman was poised rigidly on the edge of the chair, her eyes darting about anxiously and her fingers plucking at the yellow wimple which framed her lined face. A grey-haired man, who looked enough like her for me to conclude he was her brother, paced restlessly up and down the narrow chamber. It was a hot day and his face was beaded with perspiration, but he was too agitated to sit. From the dust on their clothes and their weary expressions it was evident they had travelled some way to see me, and I urged them not to speak until they had taken some refreshments. The woman seemed grateful. She shook her head at the platter of cold mutton and cheese, but took a little wine, clasping the goblet tightly in both hands as if she feared it would slip through her fingers.

It was only when I turned to offer meat and wine to Andrew’s uncle that I realised there was someone else in the room. A man in a coarse grey friar’s habit, with a knotted white girdle at his waist, stood motionless in the shadows. I recognised him as Franciscan from the simplicity and colour of his robe. His hands were clasped in front of him, hidden in his sleeves; his head was bowed as if he was praying.

Andrew’s uncle wiped his fingers and turned to me with a grave expression as if he could no longer delay the bad news. “We have come here on a matter of some delicacy…” he began. “We have received a message from Bishop Salmon of Norwich. The Bishop has asked us to remove Andrew from the anchorite cell without delay.”

I gaped at him. “Surely you have misunderstood the messenger? Or perhaps he muddled the words? St. Andrew’s Church would fight from here to Rome to keep her in that cell. She brings so much wealth to that parish. Many pilgrims come to the church just to see her and they all pay good money for candles, food, ale, and lodgings, not to mention the emblems and relics. Half the traders in the parish depend on the pilgrims she brings in to make a living. They cannot mean you to take her away.”

Andrew’s mother and uncle exchanged uneasy glances.

“Andrew lives in constant prayer now,” her uncle explained cautiously. “She does not even pause in her meditation to bless the pilgrims. She does not move or speak. She does not… She refuses all food. She says that she requires no nourishment except the body of our Lord, which she receives daily.”

Her mother broke in eagerly, “But she grows so plump and fat on this holy food, anyone can see it is our blessed Lord Himself who feeds her.”

“Have some questioned it then?” I asked.

Again the two of them exchanged anxious glances, before Andrew’s mother rose and, turning her face away, stared dejectedly out the window, leaving her brother to answer.

“There are always some who doubt the veracity of any saint. But they say… though I have not witnessed it myself, you understand… that sometimes when she prays she swells up to twice her normal stature, filling the whole cell. Is this not a mark of one overflowing with the spirit?”

“Some might enquire whose spirit,” I suggested gently.

“Could she take the Host daily and with such joy if that spirit were not from our Lord?” the Franciscan said softly from the shadows.

His voice made me jump. I’d forgotten he was even in the room.

I inclined my head. “Argumentum ad absurdum,” I replied, humbly acknowledging the foolishness of my remark.

But logical though the Franciscan’s argument was, I could see how it might look to others. It would take only one jealous priest in a neighbouring parish, who felt he had lost trade because of her, to whisper the Devil in the Bishop’s ear and Andrew’s piety would be seen to take on a very different complexion.

I glanced round the room expecting one of them to add more, but no one spoke.

“So… why have you come to me?” I asked finally.

Andrew’s uncle gave a small sigh of relief as if he had been willing me to raise the subject that courtesy did not permit him to broach.

“My niece needs care, much care, but she refuses to come home. She insists she must stay at the church and that is impossible. No other church will take her; we have tried… But we thought that she might be persuaded to come here, since you and she are of the same mind. Servant Martha, will you give her shelter here?”

There was such weariness in his eyes that I knew he must have spent many hours arguing with Andrew or pleading her case with others. On the pretext of pouring more wine, I moved away from his beseeching gaze.

Andrew here? It was out of the question. Our very purpose, our whole way of life, was the exact opposite of hers. How could we give shelter to an anchorite, a woman who demanded to be shut away from the world, who made such a public pronouncement of her great piety when we strove to keep ours private? What did he imagine we would do with her here? If she was so absorbed in her own meditations to the point of not even speaking, how could she possibly live the life of a beguine? Did they think we would build a cell for her on the side of the chapel and wall her up in it? It was against everything we stood for to have a woman in our midst attending to nothing except her own soul, contributing nothing, expecting to be waited upon and fed by others.

Yet the Church, whom she had served so faithfully, had abandoned her. How could they treat her so, when they had been the ones to encourage her in her life of piety? That priest, her confessor, who had tried to make us all believe he was so concerned about her welfare, where was he to defend her now?

I stared at the lime-washed wall of the room, dazzling in the burning sun, seeing not the whiteness of that wall, but the shadow of a single word carved above the gateway in Bruges-Sauvegarde-the place of refuge. Whatever Andrew was, we had a duty to provide such a place for her. We could not close our gates against her.

Three pairs of eyes watched me anxiously

I forced a smile. “If Andrew has no other place to go, she will be welcomed here.”