The rose rent : the thirteenth chronicle of Brother Cadfael

Shrewsbury Abbey anticipates two events coming on 22 June in 1142: honouring the day five years earlier when Saint Winifred's reliquary was placed on its altar, and paying the rent due to the widow Judith Perle. Three years earlier, she lost both her husband and her unborn child within three weeks. She gave their home in the Foregate to the Abbey, half her patrimony, in a charter. The Abbey pays a single white rose from the garden, delivered to her in person, as rent. Brother Eluric delivers the rose. Eight days before the feast, he asks Abbot Radulfus to be released from this duty, as he is tormented by his desire for the widow Perle. The Abbot asks Niall the bronzesmith, who rents the property, to deliver the rose rent.Judith asks Niall to make a new buckle for a girdle. She has several active suitors but is not interested in remarrying, still grieving her losses. She considers taking the veil at Godric's Ford with Sister Magdalen. Sister Magdalen advises her to wait, saying their door is always open as a place of retreat.Niall, a widower, keeps his young daughter with his sister in Pulley, three miles away. He returns from an overnight visit to find that the white rose bush has been hacked at its bole. At its base lies young Eluric, dead with a knife by his side. While investigating the murder scene with the Abbot and Brother Anselm, Brother Cadfael finds a distinctive footprint and makes a wax impression. Judith arrives to pick up the repaired girdle; Cadfael tells Judith about Eluric's desire for her. The Abby has been giving one rose as rent for a wealthy widow's property. This year the rose is hacked to pieces, and the rent cannot be paid. Worse yet, a man has suffered the same fate as the rose. Brother Cadfael must weave a complex garland to figure this one out. Men in Shrewsbury desire a young widow for her beauty and her substantial dowry. Though one crisis is averted by the monks of the Benedictine abbey, a sudden brutal murder cries out for investigation and punishment Brother Cadfael investigates the disappearance of Judith Perle, owner of the Shrewsberry cottage his abbey rents for one rose per annum Judith Perle, a benefactor of the abbey, disappears, and Cadfael believes that she may be connected to the murder of a young monk