Have you ever wondered about what life was like before bridges arrived. Septimus recalled how his father related rolling up his monks habit to allow him to ford the river each day as he carried building stone back to the abbey. The abbeys younger monks often ended up being spirited away when local wenches took a fancy to them. Even Septimus’s father was carried off by a raven haired girl.

Now Septimus had been spared such embarrassment, for the abbot had arranged for stepping stones to be laid allowing the monks to cross the river Aire. Habits no longer had to be hitched up around shoulders. However no one told the abbot about the farm girls watching the bathing pool. Now the abbot had organised for clapper bridges to be constructed, allowing safe passage where monks once had to hitch up their woollen habit.
As Septimus returned to copying the abbeys bible, he noted how the abbot kept looking at him. Rather too much like Septimus looked at the farm wenches. Septimus decided that it was time to abandon being a monk. A girl with ivy in her hair had caught his eye.