Belladonna At Belstone Part 15

Simon motioned for her to continue.

"I know little about it. When Agnes first came here, she soon befriended Katerine, but more recently they have hardly spoken."

"How did Agnes get on with Moll?"

"I think most of the women here found Moll difficult. Someone who wishes to be a saint can be tedious company, especially when she considers it her duty to report any misbehaviour. Not the best way to make friends."

"Who else could have wanted to see Moll and Katerine dead?"

"Although the nuns and novices here often confide in me, I a.s.sure you none of them have admitted to murder," Joan said. She s.h.i.+vered. "And now I think it is time I returned to the boredom of watching a fire. Alas! Although I find sitting in front of the flames dull, I still crave the heat."

"One last question, please. Did Denise like Moll and Katerine?" Joan hesitated. "Denise? What on earth makes you ask that?" she said lightly, but as she walked through the door to the infirmary, Simon saw her throw him a look over her shoulder.

Jeanne had a quick eye, and while Edgar organised the servants to see to the bishop's men, she sat him in Baldwin's own chair before the fire and served him herself, darting little glances over his embroidered robes, the heavy rings on his fingers, the weighty belt with all the enamelled metalwork, the expensive Spanish boots of such soft, supple leather and the velvet hat which must surely have come from an exotic source. It was plain to her eye that the man who had left Exeter as a well-known but honourable cleric had enhanced himself by his position as the country's Treasurer.

It wasn't only the metalwork on his fingers and hanging around his neck, it was his overall form. Bishop Stapledon, the last time Jeanne had seen him, had been quite slim in his build, but now he had grown portly. His second chin had been superseded by a third, and his belt appeared to be finding the task of encircling his girth a sore trial, from the way that it cut into his belly.

But his smile was the same. Bishop Stapledon, Jeanne knew, had already created the new Stapledon Hall at Oxford, and had founded twelve scholars.h.i.+ps for students of grammar in Exeter, as well as granting many licences for clergy to live outside their parishes so that they could go to Oxford and improve their learning. He took his bishopric seriously, always trying to improve the men whose task it was to help the souls of the paris.h.i.+oners on their journey to heaven.

"My Lady, you look very well," he sighed as he leaned back in his chair, pot of warmed wine grasped in his hand. "Marriage must suit you."

"It would be pleasant indeed, had I more opportunity to enjoy my husband's company," she said lightly.

Stapledon laughed. "There are many who think that."

"And many who will shortly think it," she agreed sombrely.

"You are thinking of the conflict to come?"

"What else occupies the minds of most people now, my Lord?"

Stapledon idly ran his finger around the rim of his pot. When he looked up to meet her gaze, his face was serious, his brow wrinkled with concern. "It would be troubling indeed if it should come to war. The country doesn't need the King to fight with the barons."

"Yet it appears that the King's friends are forced to go to war," Jeanne said carefully. She liked the bishop and enjoyed his company, but he was Treasurer to the King, and she had heard that he had won the job from the support of the Despensers. It would be best that she didn't let him know that her own loyalties were with the Welsh March barons who were showing a united front against the Despensers. Such information could be useful to Baldwin's enemies; and one never knew when a friend like Stapledon could become a dangerous ally, or an enemy himself. It was best to be circ.u.mspect.

He spoke quietly. "The country doesn't need to rip itself apart. G.o.d knows, we have more than enough enemies over the water keen to see us destroy ourselves. And those Scottish b.a.s.t.a.r.ds are always at our back with their long knivesa* He stared into the fire, his face drawn and serious - more so than Jeanne had ever seen before.

She poured wine. "While you are here, let us forget your great position in the country, and talk only of local matters. You great prelates, you often forget that the most important matters are not those which are dealt with by the King's Parliament, but those which are handled by the burgesses of Crediton, or the tinners of Devon, in their little taverns. That is where the really interesting debates occur, and the issues of great moment are discussed."

Stapledon smiled, a little sadly, she thought. "Yes. Matters here are a great deal more entertaining. I look forward to spending more time at Exeter - I am on my way there now."

"Truly?" Jeanne asked. "Can you take time away from your work with the King?"

"With the King? My dear Lady, I have resigned my post. I am no more a national figure, the hated tax-collector of England. I despise the situation we are now in, with threats of war rattling shutters up and down the land, and I am simply the Bishop of Exeter once more. d.a.m.n all politicians, say I!"

After Morrow Ma.s.s, Simon went with the canons through the church and out to the cloister. Here the canons left him to go to their chapterhouse, the little chamber where they would discuss matters relating to the church and its work. At the other side of the church Simon knew that the prioress was holding her own chapter with all her nuns, and at this moment, alone, without the advice of his friend, without even his servant, Simon suddenly felt abandoned.

He was a bailiff, and as such had hunted down gangs, escaped murderers and felons, and yet now, here in this cloister, he was more aware of his solitude than ever before. It was as if his life before was cut off from him; all the normal props and supports upon which he depended had been removed: his wife, his daughter, his servant and, of course, his friend.

It was strange how attached he had become to the tall, dark-featured, austere knight. Simon was a country fellow, a cheery, rumbustious man, enthusiastic about his sports and drinks, but cautious of new acquaintances until he had grown to know them very well. The methodical, cool-mannered Baldwin was not the sort of fellow to whom Simon would normally have warmed, yet he had become his closest friend. Perhaps it was simply that both were propelled into their respective positions with little warning, Simon to be a bailiff, Baldwin to his post as Keeper of the King's Peace, and they each had need of a friend.

Certainly they had always managed to work very well together. Baldwin's learning was extensive because of his time with the Templars. Conversely, Simon's knowledge sprang less from learning and more from his background as a steward, which was enhanced by his shrewdness in dealing with people. Simon could normally see in a man's eye whether he was lying or not. That skill had helped to catapult him to his present position under the Warden of the Stannaries, where he regularly had to test men who tried to get away without paying tax on the tin they had mined, or who tried to persuade him that they had taken over a concession when there was none.

Finding himself at the entrance to the guestroom, Simon climbed the stairs to it, crossing the room and sitting glumly on his bed. It was only this morning, he reminded himself, that he and the other two had gone to attend the services in the middle of the night. Only this morning in the dark, Hugh and Baldwin, Bertrand and he had walked through the cloisters to the church. It had been absolutely freezing. He had been miserable - not so miserable as Hugh, Simon remembered, but then Hugh was always dreadful when he hadn't had enough sleep. He'd hardly said a word during the morning. Only that stuff abouta Simon's eyes narrowed as Hugh's earnest expression came to his mind. The servant had told him about the prost.i.tute in the frater. After all the excitement of the morning, Simon had completely forgotten about it. He wondered how to proceed but then reproved himself. Baldwin would not have sat about wondering what to do, he would have tried to form an idea as to what had happened, and then test his theory. And if he had no theory to test, he would have gone questioning anyone who might have information until he could form one.

Rising, the bailiff walked from the room with a renewed sense of purpose.

The frater was empty bar Jonathan, who sat before the fire, a large pot of wine in his hand. For a moment, Simon stood just inside the doorway, gazing about him, wondering about the doorkeeper and what he actually did for the convent.

In his experience, most doorkeepers and masters of priories were older fellows, men who could not be tempted by the young women within the precinct, men who had seen much of the world and who had chosen to retire from it into the sphere of ecclesiastical life. Their duties were simple: to protect the nuns from the unwanted attentions of people from the outside world. In return they had an easy life, mostly spent sitting in a warm gatehouse, granting visitors the necessary hospitality and avoiding unwanted interruptions to the daily round of services and work.

Simon reminded himself of the working of the convent as he went to the seated man. Jonathan would also be responsible for the receipt of accounts from the reeves and bailiffs, for storing all the goods produced within the priory's demesne, for maintaining all contact with the secular world outside the gates.

And yet he sat here, ignoring his responsibilities at the gate, and similarly not attending the services or the chapter meeting.

Jonathan heard him and shot a look over his shoulder, spilling a little of his wine. Seeing who it was, he returned to his solitary study of the fire.

"Is the gate unmanned?" Simon asked as he approached.

"There's a lay brother there. He doesn't need my help."

Surprised at the dead tone of his voice, Simon hesitated.

It was Jonathan who looked up and nodded towards an empty bench. "If you wish for ale or wine you'll have to fetch it yourself." He watched as Simon walked out to the b.u.t.tery.

Sighing, Jonathan set his pot on the ground and put his hands over his eyes. He knew he was behaving ridiculously, but couldn't stop himself. He had always been petulant, and this morning, when he had realised that his feelings for Paul weren't reciprocated, he had come in here to think and drink until he had forgotten his misery. Later he would go to the church and try to soothe his soul and cleanse his spirit with prayer. After two pints of wine, the bitterness of his frustration had worn away.

There was nothing new about this sense of desperation. He had suffered from it often enough, especially when he was younger. Somehow the desires began to fade a little as he grew older, but that simply meant that there was a poignancy to each fresh encounter. He loved, but knew that his love could never be requited. It was his unending doom - a living h.e.l.l in which he was forced to deny his own emotions.

The whole world appeared to abhor his kind of l.u.s.t. His father certainly did, which was why Jonathan had been condemned to a life of prayer and service to G.o.d, in order that he could atone for the sin of his perverted attraction, and incidentally remain far away from his family where he could never again embarra.s.s them.

Yet now he had heard that he was not alone. It wasn't just he who found the male body infinitely more attractive than the female; rumours abounded that the King himself, Edward II, had taken the younger Hugh Despenser to be his lover, just as he had previously taken Piers Gaveston until that man's execution by the King's enemies. And that was why Jonathan now needed to sit alone before the fire, ignoring the summons to the chapterhouse, refusing to attend the church services; he knew his life was irrelevant. If he had been born to wealth, like the King, maybe he could have enjoyed the love he craved, but G.o.d had seen fit to deny him that solace; to punish him with this fixation. If he was King he could flout the law - but he wasn't King.

He gazed sombrely at the bailiff who came and sat at his side. "How is your companion?" he asked.

"Sir Baldwin is resting, I thank you. He was fortunate. If he had been standing even a short distance to one sidea* Simon held up his hands helplessly. "He was lucky."

"Some luck," Jonathan said. He drained his pot and set it at his side, fixing Simon with a steady eye. "So did you come here to comment on an ageing doorkeeper's laziness, or to chat about your friend's near-death? Or perhaps there was some more pressing reason for your walking in here?"

"I wanted to ask, era* Simon met Jonathan's gaze, and suddenly his resolve faded.

"Whether I was on top of the church and pushed the girl at your friend?"

"She was murdered before she got up there."

The canon gaped, but then blinked and gave Simon a curious look, his head set to one side like an intrigued terrier. "You're not so foolish as you can appear, my friend. Let me a.s.sist you to another pint of wine. My pot is empty."

"Here, have some of this," Simon said, pouring from his own jug.

Jonathan sat back and held his feet to the fire, wiggling his toes. "I had no idea the poor little thing was murdered. She was killed and tossed over the wall like a rock hurled at a besieging army? That's disgusting."

"Whoever it was also threw a tile at Baldwin intending to kill him. I want to know where people were when all this happened."

"It was between Prime and Terce, wasn't it? You'll have your work cut out to discover where everyone was at that time. The canons should all sit and read in the cloister, but that only happens in the really well-regulated priories, and I am sure you will have observed that this onea* he waved a hand airily and belched 'a this one is hardly on that sort of level. No, here everyone gets on and sees to themselves. Some come and chat here in the frater; others go to the cloisters, it's true, while some walk in the gardens, thinking."

"Where were you?"

"Me?" Jonathan asked sadly. "I was alone in the orchard, waiting for a friend to meet me, but I fear he didn't come."

Simon saw his mood, but he had no time to worry himself about the reason's behind it. "Did you see anyone there?"

"I did see the smith, Elias. He was hanging around by the wall to the nunnery, but I saw no one else."

"There was a girl here last night. A wh.o.r.e servicing the canons - is that right?"

"Yes. So what? Even canons have desires, you know."

"Buta chast.i.ty?"

"G.o.d's bones! What of it? Do you think all those who live in cloisters are capable of meeting each and every strict demand of the Orders we serve? I doubt whether G.o.d could be so cruel."

"Does the prioress know?"

Jonathan took a deep breath. "My dear fellow, there is next to nothing ever happens in this place without her knowledge. She is the spider, sitting in the middle of her web, with strands reaching into every nook and crevice of the priory, and when a canon sneezes or coughs, she knows. Did she know that a girl was here yesterday, you ask? Well, I answer, yes. She not only knew, she probably spoke to the girl."

"That's hard to believe."

"Bailiff, I retract my suggestion that you are not so foolish as you look. Have you not heard of the prioress's sin? The girl is Rose - Lady Elizabeth's daughter."

Chapter Seventeen.

The hardest part for Jeanne was admitting that she had no idea why the suffragan had demanded that Simon and Baldwin should go to Belstone. As far as Bishop Stapledon was concerned, it was ridiculous that two secular men should be sent to a convent for nuns, and strange indeed that the reason for their mission should be concealed. With Jeanne's permission, he had sent one of her grooms to Crediton on a fast horse, with a request that Peter Clifford should tell him the cause.

Now he paced up and down, the reply gripped tightly in his hand, chewing at his lip and scowling. Walter Stapledon was no fool, and he could easily understand the urgent desire of Bertrand to squash any rumours - especially in a case like this, where the treasurer of the priory had alleged that the murderer wasa He stopped that line of thought. Lady Elizabeth was well-known to him. There was no possibility of her being guilty of this crime. Surely not. Stapledon's frown deepened; there was that story in 1300, before Stapledon became bishop, that she had given herself to a mana but Stapledon shook his head with decision. That a woman could lapse was not evidence that she could murder. The two crimes were utterly different. Lady Elizabeth was too urbane and refined for murder. No, it must be someone else, and Stapledon could only hope that she had not taken umbrage at Bertrand's less than subtle manners. Stapledon pursed his lips. There was little likelihood that she would have suffered Bertrand gladly. Stapledon knew both reasonably well and the thought of Bertrand standing before her pointing an accusing finger and declaring her to be a murderer - the bishop winced at the thought.

The only thing that mattered was keeping news of this away from the general public. If it should become common knowledge, the nunnery could be closed, and that was a horrible prospect.

Very well, Stapledon thought to himself with resignation. I shall have to go and make sure that any ruffled feathers are soon smoothed.

Yet when he announced his intention, Jeanne was aghast. "Look at the weather! You can't go out in this - think what it could be like in an hour or so! And getting to Belstone is not so straightforward as riding to Crediton. It's much farther - you couldn't get there before nightfall even if it was summer."

Going to the door, Stapledon was forced to agree. The snow was light, simply a thin scattering of tiny flakes so far, and the road was not hidden; the air was too warm and the snow melted as soon as it landed, forming a thin, muddy sludge, but Stapledon knew only too well how different the weather could be on Dartmoor, for he was a Devons.h.i.+re man, born and bred. He gauged distances in his mind and decided. "You're right. We'd not make it to Belstone today; we shall need to travel as far as possible, though. We should be able to reach Bow before nightfall, and it would be a short enough journey from there. Yes, that would be all right," he said.

He turned to the b.u.t.tery and ordered his men to prepare to continue. When he returned to the hall, Jeanne saw his mood had not improved.

"My Lord, please sit and finish your wine," she said gently.

Stapledon thanked her and sat down in Baldwin's chair, but he glanced through Peter Clifford's message once more and then muttered what Jeanne thought must be a curse. "Bertrand!" he exclaimed, and struck the arm of the chair.

As Jeanne watched in horror, the arm fell to the floor. Stapledon forgot his anger and stared at it, but even as he realised what was happening, he felt the rocking, heard the ominous creak. His eyes met Jeanne's as there was a loud report, and then the seat collapsed.

Simon Puttock sat gaping after the doorkeeper long after the man had left the room. When a lad, Simon had been taught by the canons at Crediton. It had been drummed into him that the Church had a sacred duty to save souls; for them to achieve their duty, all clerics were men of integrity, led by their most responsible and honourable representative. It had been rammed into him while he was a boy, and he had never quite lost the conviction that those who wore religious robes were somehow different from others.

It was hardly incredible that a nun should be guilty of giving birth to a child - Simon was no fool, and news of such incidents were all too common, if regrettable - but that the prioress of a convent should do so had never occurred to Simon. It disgusted him, as if she had openly offered herself to all the men of the village.

Simon took a deep gulp of his wine and then grinned to himself. What was more astonis.h.i.+ng was his reaction, he realised, leaning back in his seat. The woman was hardly young, and yet she presumably had only been a prioress for a few years, since her lapse - if the story of her lapse were true. When she had been younger, she had taken a lover, perhaps only the once, and had fallen pregnant. To fail was human; surely since then she must have proved herself to be devout, and that was why she had been elected to lead her community.

Although whether they would do so again was a different matter, he thought, remembering the holes in the roofs of the main buildings and the freezing wind that whistled around the dorter.

He stood. The girl was not here. He would go and try to speak to the prioress. If Jonathan was right and the Lady Elizabeth had spoken to the girl, she herself might have heard something.

About to seek her, he hesitated, remembering Bertrand. He'd last seen the visitor hurrying towards the stables. Bertrand was supposed to be sorting out the trouble here; it was Simon's duty to tell him about Rose. Simon was torn. He didn't want to give Bertrand another excuse to proceed against the prioress, but at the same time didn't feel he had the right to warn Lady Elizabeth.

Simon fretted but his duty was clear; he walked out to find the suffragan.

Baldwin groaned as the pain shot through his skull like a red-hot bolt from a crossbow. He half-expected to smell the singed hair and cooked flesh, and cried out as he tried to move his head again, but his mouth was oddly quiescent, as though it had been bound with velvet cords.

He tried to sit up, but his arms wouldn't obey and it was only with an effort that he could force his eyelids open.

The room was red, warm, safe. He stared directly ahead of him, feeling the ma.s.sive weight of his body; it felt so gross, he was sure the bed upon which he lay couldn't support him. He felt as if he was slowly falling through the mattress, and the panic rose in his breast: he would suffocate! The bedclothes would rise up on either side and swallow him, smothering him in their warm embrace.

Even as he reached this conclusion, he forced down his fear with logic: the mattress was solid. He couldn't fall through, it was impossible. His fear was the result of the drugs. Pillows and mattresses couldn't engulf men. He forced himself to breathe slowly, concentrating on the flames of the fire.

A fresh blow of pain battered at his head, and he heard a low moan issue from his lips, as though it came from another person. He was not part of his body; he was near it, but somehow dislocated, a most curious sensation. However, before he could consider his state further, a shadow approached.

Immediately he was convinced that now, while he was incapable of defending himself, he would be attacked. For some reason he was sure that a hand would soon appear above him, from the head of the bed, drifting forward slowly, fingers outspread, before falling to cover his mouth and nose, extinguis.h.i.+ng his life.

The feeling disappeared. He saw that the figure approaching was a woman in a nun's habit. Such a person could be no threat. Dimly, he recognised Constance's anxious but comforting eyes, and he wanted to smile back, but his mouth wouldn't obey.

Elias had not joined his brethren for the service. He had sat in the small yard, waiting desperately for Constance so that they could talk; he had to explain why their escape was so essential, but she didn't appear. Instead, as the singing in the church faded, he had lifted his eyes to meet the stern gaze of the prioress.

"It won't do, young man. You cannot have her. She is already married to Christ."

Elias fell back as if struck. Lady Elizabeth walked forward until she was at the metal screen, and Elias couldn't meet the look in her serious face.

"Nothing to say? Well, Elias, you have misbehaved with her, but now she has partially come to her senses. She is pregnant -you knew that? Ah well, of course you did," she added almost to herself. "That was why you wanted to take her away from here, wasn't it? So that you could look to both mother and child somewhere. And how would you have done that?"

"I can smith - I could earn enough for us in any town or village."

"And which town or village would allow you, a wandering stranger dragging two useless mouths behind you, to stay long enough to demonstrate your skills? Don't be a fool! You would wander the streets, declaring your love for your wife, for such you would call her, and move from one small town to another, seeking work ever more desperately. And your child would die, of course: how could a baby live in the cold and damp for days without a roof overhead? Constance would have to give birth beneath a hedge, and she would be weak and fractious. You would love her and your offspring at first, but after days or weeks you would grow to hate them both; your child you would detest as a muling, squalling brat, a blob of vomit and excrement; Constance you would grow to loathe, for as you struggled to keep you and she alive, she would always demand more, saying that your baby needed warmer clothes, or a better shelter, or any one of a thousand things a mother wishes for her child."