'The Town House' (5) - Nicholas Freeman's Tale Quiz | Literature

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. What job had Nicholas been working towards before he came to the Old Vine?

Answer: the priesthood

He was to go on to become a Cardinal, after returning to the Church after realising that he was not going to marry Maude and settle at the Old Vine. On the occasion that Maude had been lost in the Maze at Beauclaire, she had seen Nicholas' face in the Rune Stone in the centre, and he had been dressed in Cardinal's garb.

2. Which of the following did Nicholas NOT used as an argument to keep Maude at the Old Vine rather than have her go to live with the nuns?

Answer: that the food was sparse and bland at the convent

Both Nicholas and Martin (Maude's grandfather) tried to persuade Maude to stay at the Old Vine, but she was determined to go and make sacrifices in order to lessen Melusine's stay in Purgatory. The issue of the poor food was not touched on prior to her leaving, but when she came home for Christmas.

3. Although Walter could write with a fine hand (indeed, Maude envied his penmanship and asked Nicholas to teach her how to write well), he refused point blank to learn one thing which his tutor was required to teach him. What was this?

Answer: reckoning (maths)

Walter was determined not to become a woolmaster as his father was, so refused to learn how to reckon. Nicholas says how, when he left home, he was unable to do more than count on his fingers. He was a gifted lute player and, like his grandmother Magda before him, wanted to travel the country and make magic with his music.

4. Wanting to ease the hardship under which Maude was living at Clevely, Martin asked Nicholas about the possibility of giving the nuns some sheep. He suggested three dozen, or fifty, but how many sheep did Nicholas tell him the convent had before?

Answer: eight

"'It wouldn't benefit Maude in any way, sir. The sick poor might fatten. And you'd be putting the gyves on Maude tighter than ever. Once make Maude a supply line between you and Clevely and next time you see her she'll be in novice garb. I know my monks, and nuns differ from them only in ways that have no effect on greed.'"

5. How old was Maude when she first announced that she was to become a novice?

Answer: 14

She had been coming back to the Old Vine on a regular basis since going to Clevely when she was twelve, on the insistence of her grandfather, but it was on her birthday visit that she told the family that she was planning on becoming a nun. Her grandfather declared that he had never had worse value for money than the �5 a year he spent on her keep at the convent, and turned on Maude's mother to berate her for her unloving treatment of her daughter.

6. Nicholas had two mistresses during the course of this story. The second was Clemence Kentwoode (we are to meet further members of her family in the next book, 'The House at the Old Vine'), but who was the first?

Answer: Bessie

It was because Nicholas did not feel he could remain celibate that he did not take his final vows and become a priest. His mistresses were not paraded in front of the Reed family, but Martin knew about them, as was proved when Maude announced that she was to become a novice, and he threw the ring he wanted to give her at Nicholas with the instruction to give it to his leman - his mistress.

7. Still determined to make his own way with his music, Walter came to his dining hall just one month after Maude announced her intention to become a nun and told everyone that he was joining a band of travelling wastrels to walk the roads from town to city and beyond. What was his grandfather's reaction?

Answer: that he have some money sewn into his jerkin

Martin also told Walter that he must take the names of some honest men with him - "'Wait,' the old man said. 'You must have the money and the names . . . the names of honest men I know in many towns, who would help in case of trouble. I'd have done as much for her,' he added inconsequently, 'if I had known.'" We know, of course, having read the book, that he was talking about Magda, the boy's grandmother.

8. The news that Walter was dead in bad circumstances came from a man who had been in prison with him. What was striking about this man?

Answer: he was a side-show freak

"When I reached the door I realized that her use of the word 'creature' had a frightful accuracy. There are the natural deformities to which the eye becomes accustomed, the squints, hare-lips, hunch-backs, mutilations due to accident or battle. But there is another sort, inflicted by unscrupulous showmen upon infant children. They take them when their bones are soft and pliable and shape them, as a gardener shapes a tree that is to be espaliered. Then, if the unfortunate child survives - few do - they have something truly unusual, something out of nature, for a sight of which, in a dim-lighted booth, the sensations seekers will hand over their pence. This was one such, a striking example of the devilish art. His left arm had been trained to grow behind his head, so that he had two arms, one long and one short, on the same side, and his head appeared to grown from under his arm, like those of a strange people mentioned in some traveller's tale."

In the fifteenth century a black man or a transvestite would have been a novelty in Britain - the latter would probably have been burned at the stake!

9. As old Martin Reed lay dying, he called for a Priest, and dictated his Will. Nicholas was certain that the old man would prefer it if Maude did not remain at the convent, so added a further sentence or two to the bequest to his granddaughter. This said that the legacy was on condition that she did not take her final vows. Because any bequest with a condition requires a second option, he wrote that the church from which the priest was in attendance would receive the legacy instead. Which church was this?

Answer: Flaxham

Nicholas chose this course of action because he knew that men who did not read or write very well had good memories of the spoken word, and the priest would likely recall that such a condition was not included. By giving the bulk of the fortune to Flaxham church in the event that Maude became a nun, Nicholas hoped to silence Sir Andrew's protests.

10. Growing in the garden of the Old Vine was some asparagus plants, the fruit of which was eaten by the whole assembly in the dining hall at least twice a year. However, the first harvest of the plant was a smaller one, and just enough for a few plates. Because of this a special day was established at the Old Vine when the family would eat alone in the solar. What name did the family give this special day?

Answer: Sparrowgrass Day

Nicholas decided to ask Maude to marry him on the Sparrowgrass Day following her grandfather's death and her return to the Old Vine. He had bought her a very fine and expensive pendant, and started the day with a long ride out. His plans were to come to nothing, however, for as they returned to the house they were to see that a visitor had arrived - Sir Henry Rancon, who had proposed in a rough 13-year-old fashion some years before.

As Martin Reed said - 'People do what they must.'

Source: Author ArleneRimmer

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'The Town House' (5) - Nicholas Freeman's Tale Quiz

Nicholas Freeman went to the Old Vine to be a Tutor. Although he only stayed there for a short time, his position was such that he is able to tell the story of what happened when Maude returned from Beauclaire at the age of twelve.

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