Surely he had seen a light in that window, Brother Baeda thought as he hurried up the stone stairs to the library. Even though the light had now vanished, he felt obliged to make sure nothing untoward had occurred. He would not have bothered to check, but two nights ago some young novices had slipped in and poured ink on one of Brother Jerome’s parchments.
“The brother is such a querulous fellow and so sensitive about his talent with color and design,” he muttered. No doubt of that. Jerome did rank his own work more highly than was warranted, his efforts falling far from noteworthy quality, but that did not excuse the lads for what they had done. Just because the monk had unfairly accused them of impure thoughts, after they joked about his drawing of Eve entwined with the snake in Eden, was no reason for them to damage any work done for a holy purpose.
An irreverent chuckle escaped the brother’s lips, and he immediately prayed to be forgiven. The snake’s tail was most unfortunately placed as he remembered it, and he should have said something to Jerome at the time. Knowing that the monk would roar in fury at the very suggestion of creative incompetence had stopped him, however, so perhaps he ought to have taken some blame for what had happened the other night.
The boys had been quite properly reprimanded for the damage and assigned the penance of scrubbing the stones in the warming room, but might that have been mitigated if he had come to their defense? Now he wondered if they had resented the duty and returned to tweak Jerome’s rather pointed nose one more time.
He swung open the library door. His eyes were accustomed to the dark, and he saw no boyish shadows in the room.
Quickly, he walked over to where Jerome worked. All tools had been put away and no undone manuscript left out. Apparently, the monk had not yet started anything after the novices had ruined what he had been toiling over for days. He raised a hand to his mouth, suppressing another laugh. That tail!
Some movement or shifting shadow caught the corner of his eye and he turned toward it. Must have been his imagination, he thought. If the boys had returned, surely they would have betrayed themselves by now with the uncontrollable laughter of mischievous youth.
“Come forth!” he ordered nonetheless, hoping his voice expressed admonition mixed with just the right amount of forgiveness.
Nothing.
“It will be better for you if you come now. No damage has been done and thus no sin committed!”
Nothing.
The hairs on the back of his neck rose. Could the ghost of Queen Elfrida have entered the room? Nonsense, he thought. He had only felt a chill draught from the open door. Spring may have come, but didn’t that night air still nip at aged spines?
He shook off the feeling and glanced around the area near Jerome’s work place. Something was different, he realized, and then he gasped.
The Amesbury Psalter was lying on the floor.
Surely he had not left this precious work out! He rushed to pick it up, praying that no damage had been done, begging God’s forgiveness for being so forgetful, so careless.
As the monk bent to retrieve the Psalter, he heard a sound and raised his head.
He screamed only once.