The Tolls of Death: (Knights Templar 17)

by Michael Jecks

  ‘Well?’ Serlo taunted. ‘One of my boys died because of a fire, but your whole family went up in smoke. I wonder who was responsible for that, eh?’

  Richer shook his head blindly, pulled the door open and stumbled out into the warm afternoon sun.

  ‘So, Father Adam,’ Baldwin said as he and Simon followed the priest out from the hall. ‘What do you think of this news?’

  Adam stopped and faced the two men. ‘I think it’s nonsense. How could anyone suggest such a thing! Athelina broke her heart after losing her man, and it led to those terrible events. That’s all there is to it. It’s sad, but of course she did it.’

  ‘I should have expected you to defend the members of the vill,’ Baldwin said.

  ‘I just don’t believe this fabrication you have put together.’

  ‘Did she turn down your advances?’ Simon demanded.

  The priest’s response was enough to confirm Ivo’s allegation. Adam paled and his lips flattened like apples in a press. Then he hissed, ‘How dare you suggest such a thing. I refuse to speak further.’

  ‘The other woman: Julia. What’s she doing in your household?’ Simon said, ignoring his protests.

  ‘She is my maid. She looks after me and that is all.’ And at that Adam spun around to march home. He would say nothing more to the uncouth son of an Oxford tavern whore.

  The Bailiff and the knight wouldn’t understand anyway. Such men were too rooted in the here and now to be able to comprehend the sort of thing he attempted: to do good to others as Jesus would have wanted.

  Except Jesus would have tried to look after Athelina as well, he reminded himself.

  To Father Adam’s annoyance, the two wouldn’t leave him. They walked with him, one on either side, and Baldwin studied him as they went.

  The priest was white with fury after Simon’s bluntness, and although such a rage might have meant his decencies had been offended, Baldwin shrewdly guessed that there was more to the man’s mood than pique. After all, a rural priest was as aware as any peasant of the realities of fornication, and many would make their own use of the women of a vill. He glanced at Simon and nodded. Ivo was right.

  Baldwin spoke again in a more conciliatory tone. ‘Father, we have to understand your position if we’re to learn who killed this woman.’

  ‘No one else was involved, I tell you! Scratches on her neck? It was probably the hemp that did it.’

  ‘Father!’ Baldwin called, and this time Adam stopped. There was a depth of tone that brooked no argument.

  ‘What?’ he snapped.

  Baldwin walked slowly up to Adam, a frown on his face as he approached to within a pace. Adam recoiled, but he gripped his cross and held it tight in his fist. ‘Don’t hurt me, Knight!’

  ‘I should hardly dare do so,’ Baldwin said. ‘You are a man of God and I trust you to do your best by the people here. My good friend Bishop Walter of Exeter would not be thankful to me for breaking the head of one of his priests, would he?’

  ‘Then what do you want with me?’

  ‘The truth! This maid is dead, and we believe that she was murdered. Imagine, Adam, a man throwing a cord about your neck. He’s behind you as you walk into your house, and as you fumble for a spark from your steel, the rope is over your head and you’re being throttled. Imagine being lifted by that intolerable bond, slowly dying as your breath rattles in a throat that is so constricted you can’t fill your lungs, and imagine the sense leaving your body. The little spots bursting out on your flesh, your eyes bulging, your tongue filling your whole mouth, and all the while, perhaps, you can see your children lying before you, both murdered. All you can do is try to haul that cord from your neck, but although you tear your own flesh, there is no escape from encroaching death. And then you die. Imagine all that, Adam, and tell me – dare to tell me – that you won’t help us.’

  Adam held his stare without flinching. ‘A nice story. One to scare the children perhaps, but not me. I’m a priest, damn you! You accuse me of molesting my own maid and then ask my help?’

  Simon stepped over to Baldwin’s side. ‘Tell us about her, then. Whose child does she raise if not yours?’

  ‘I will not talk to you!’ Adam blurted out angrily. ‘How could you suggest that I, a man of God, could do such a thing? I am sworn to celibacy.’

  ‘Such things are not unknown,’ Baldwin pointed out.

  ‘They may not be unknown where you come from, but for me it is entirely unknown. In God’s name, I swear I am innocent.’

  ‘Then help us! Supposing we are right, who could have wished her harm?’

  Adam held his gaze for some moments, but then he had to look away. There was a depth of intensity about this knight’s stare that made him uncomfortable. It was as though the fellow was stripping away all of the skins with which he had covered himself until only the bare soul remained, and he was still too ashamed about that to be able to talk about it. Looking down, he shook his head, but as the silence grew intolerable, he spoke quietly.

  ‘Sadly, some could have wished to harm her. The man who owned her cottage, Serlo, wanted money. Since his apprentice died last year, he’s been in financial trouble. Then there were men who desired her body, I have no doubt, and sometimes wives of such men can do murder in jealousy and anger, protecting their family by destroying the woman who threatens their stability.’

  ‘Serlo?’ Baldwin mused. ‘Why should he wish to kill her if he knew he could evict her?’

  Adam grunted. ‘Perhaps he thought he might persuade her to give herself to him so that he might have an alternative rent from her?’

  Baldwin glanced at Simon. ‘Perhaps. Yet why should he then kill her?’

  ‘Some men do not enjoy rejection.’

  ‘More likely that he would rape her. For a woman to prove rape is all but impossible normally,’ Baldwin said.

  ‘True enough – in fact, the Constable is Serlo’s brother Alex, so it would be still more difficult for a woman to win a case of rape in this vill.’

  ‘Could there be another man who loathed her for some reason?’

  ‘I do not know.’

  Baldwin eyed him. There was something Father Adam was keeping back, he felt sure. ‘Did you know this woman well yourself?’

  ‘Are you suggesting again that …’

  ‘No. I am trying to understand her, and through her, her murderer. Was she incontinent?’

  ‘No. I believe she was honourable. I never heard that she was the sort of woman to take many lovers.’

  ‘So another man could have been jealous of her affection?’

  ‘It’s possible.’

  ‘How did she afford that house?’ Simon asked. ‘If she had to rent it, did her husband leave her a lot of money?’

  ‘No,’ Adam said before thinking, and then scowled at the ground by his feet.

  ‘So how did she pay?’ Simon demanded.

  ‘Her lover paid.’

  At this moment, Sir Jules and Nicholas appeared in the doorway to the hall in the church house. Baldwin beckoned for them to join him. Sir Jules’s face, Baldwin saw, had lost its greenish hue, and now he looked simply anxious. Nicholas did not join them, but set off towards the castle as Simon continued questioning Adam.

  ‘Athelina was not made pregnant by her lover.’ Adam said. ‘She was a widow, and both boys had a legitimate father. Athelina was a good wife, and it was her misfortune that her husband died young.’

  ‘What of your maid?’

  ‘She was persuaded by a man that he would marry her, but then he left her some months after she came with child. I took her and the baby in to protect her from endless censure. At least as my maid, she would always have food and drink.’

  ‘A kind thought,’ Simon said flatly. He disliked this priest; he also disliked the reminder of his earlier thoughts at the beginning of the inquest: what would happen to his own wife, were he to die? ‘Why didn’t you do the same for the poor widow?’

  ‘I can’t take in every woman with no
man,’ Adam huffed.

  ‘No,’ Simon agreed. ‘But Athelina had at least been married, and she had two boys to protect. You could have done more good perhaps by taking her into your home.’

  ‘She had a home already. Julia came to me because she was thrown from her vill by the priest.’

  ‘Hardly the most charitable behaviour from a man of God,’ Baldwin commented.

  ‘Father John is an exemplary priest,’ Adam said hotly, ‘but he saw no reason to support another parish’s son. I took her in when I heard of her plight.’ It wasn’t the whole truth, but it was adequate for these two.

  ‘Does that mean you thought that the father might be here in your parish?’ Baldwin asked shrewdly.

  ‘Whoever the father may be, I am sure he’s confessed his sins to God,’ Adam said.

  Baldwin nodded thoughtfully. ‘Thank you. I suppose we should ask Serlo about the woman. He may know more about her and her death than he has so far confessed.’

  ‘You cannot!’ Adam burst out. ‘I expect he is in my church even now, praying for his dead son. I am going there myself, and I shall attempt to soothe his soul. I will not have you interrupting a man in his grief.’

  ‘Father,’ Baldwin said coolly, ‘we have a triple murder to investigate. We may upset some folks, but I will not stop because of other men’s feelings – including your own.’

  Adam nodded stiffly, gave Simon a withering look, and then made his way across the green of the yard to the church itself.

  Once within the safety of the nave, he kneeled and offered a quick prayer in thanks that the two had not learned the real reason for having Julia in his house; at least that secret was secure. If ever the truth came out, the rural dean would be here in no time, and on him like a ton of rock.

  ‘Oh God,’ he breathed, and suddenly he felt the weight of his personal guilt sitting upon his soul. ‘I am sorry, so sorry …’

  He should have taken in Athelina and protected her and her sons. Her death was incomprehensible, but the last thing Adam wanted was an investigation here. Tongues would wag, and the result must be his own ruin.

  Maybe Athelina had been murdered. If so, perhaps it was a result of her badgering her lover, who might have killed her in anger. Her lover … who had thrown her over for Julia. At the time Athelina had told Adam of her desperation, but he had not believed her, had brushed it aside. Anyway, he thought it was better that she should leave the vill. Otherwise, she might see her old home rented out to Julia, and that would bring untold dissension to the vill. In all conscience, Adam couldn’t allow that. So instead, he’d taken Julia in and left Athelina to her fate. And now she was dead. Her murder was his fault.

  He must rise, he must rise and seek out Muriel, the distressed mother, and Serlo too, if he was there in the church with her. Standing, Adam stared ahead to where the body lay. He could see Letitia by the side of the church hearse, and then he saw the figure of Muriel, her head once more wrapped in linen to staunch the blood that had stained the shoulder of her thin tunic, but there was no sign of the miller.

  Yes, he should go to her and offer her what consolation he could, but right now, all he wanted to do was fall on his face and beg forgiveness for his own sins. To beg forgiveness for the death of Athelina and her two lovely little boys.

  ‘I should have thought that I was to be the man leading any investigation,’ Sir Jules said with some force once the priest was out of earshot. It was hard enough to keep a grip on an inquest without these dabblers barging in.

  ‘Of course,’ Baldwin said easily. ‘But Adam was there, and a few questions occurred to me.’

  ‘They would have occurred to me as well, Sir Baldwin,’ Jules said with hauteur.

  ‘Of course they would. And you’d have asked them as quickly as us,’ Simon said. ‘Except we beat you to every one, didn’t we? Very unsporting.’

  Sir Jules looked at him contemptuously. ‘Perhaps you can’t understand, being a mere Bailiff; when you have my responsibilities, others getting under one’s feet can be a hindrance.’

  Baldwin set his jaw. ‘Sir Jules, when you hold your inquest, all the facts I have learned can come out. Perhaps until then we should unite in order to seek this murderer.’

  ‘If there is a murderer to find,’ Sir Jules said. ‘There is little enough evidence of that.’

  ‘Perhaps when you’ve stopped looking at responsibilities and instead have real experience,’ Simon said kindly, ‘you’ll realise the importance of marks like those on her neck.’

  Sir Jules’s nostrils flared with rage, but before he could say anything, Baldwin murmured in his most placatory tone, ‘We need your expertise, if we are to make sense of the matter. And your perspicacity must surely lead to the identification of the murderer. Why don’t we go to the alehouse to discuss the affair?’

  And before Simon could speak again, Baldwin kicked out and felt his toe connect with the Bailiff’s ankle.

  Julia only just had time to smooth the blanket on her palliasse before the priest arrived back at the house, pale and angry still after his questioning. As soon as he slumped in his chair he shouted at her to bring him some ale.

  ‘Father, what is it?’ she asked.

  ‘Those men are intolerable! Quite insufferable! I should complain to Nicholas – demand that he makes them treat me with respect. As though the woman could have been murdered!’

  She passed him his cup and a jug of strong ale, and as he sat staring at the embers of his fire, he didn’t see how she had been rocked by his news. ‘Athelina – murdered?’ she repeated faintly.

  ‘It’s nonsense,’ he said dismissively. ‘Complete rubbish. And they so disordered my thoughts that I was incapable of lending any form of solace to poor Muriel in the church.’

  She left him there, and went through to her own room again, sitting on the bed. Ivo’s warmth was still there, and she spread her fingers over it, feeling the little glow of satisfaction from his lovemaking gradually seep away from her, to be replaced by a sense of concern.

  If Athelina had been murdered, Julia was sure that the only man who could have done so was her lover, Gervase. Everyone knew that Athelina was desperate about money, and that she kept pestering him for help. And Julia herself had been asking him for money too, recently.

  She looked at her sleeping child, and suddenly hoped very strongly that she hadn’t upset the steward of Cardinham Castle with her demands for cash.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Richer left the tavern and walked along the roadway until he reached a tree trunk lying by the road. Here he stopped and sat down, a hand at his head, eyes closed in pain.

  Once he had been prone to these headaches, suffering at least one a month, but now he was unfortunate if he was so afflicted more than once in a year. Yet this, for all its suddenness, had attacked with more venom than any he had known in the last five years. His eyesight was affected: as he stared at the trees, their trunks at the bottom of his vision, to his left, were all moving oddly, as though he was watching them through water. Farther left, his vision ceased working altogether. He had to screw up his forehead against the pain that stretched across the back of his skull.

  It was Serlo’s words that had made it blow up like this. The bastard! He had to mention the fire.

  Richer could recall it all only too clearly. The night sky lit up like a beacon, with the sparks flying into the air, madly whirling in the roaring heat. Richer had been out at the fields helping his father with the harvest all day, but when their work was done and when the lord’s ale casks and cider barrels were opened, his father had made his way home, like other older men, leaving the field to their sons and daughters. The end of the harvest often led to a rash of births, and marriages in Maytime the next year; it was the way for natural desires to be slaked, and no one objected.

  From an early age Richer had been enslaved by Athelina’s beauty. A child’s view of marriage was different to the reality of hot, sweating bodies moving to create a new life, but Richer had alw
ays been sure that he would have her. He knew that he loved her. And that night, he almost won her.

  The evening had drawn in and the sky was purpling. As the swooping swallows and martins ceased their loud screechings and the bats began to dart as darkness deepened, Richer lay on his back on the bed of straw he had made for himself, and kissed Athelina. Their passion excited by hard work and copious quantities of cider, they were soon engaged in the pursuit of their pleasures, when they heard a scream and a cry for help.

  ‘Ignore it,’ Richer had said as distinctly as he could while his mouth was welded to Athelina’s, but she pushed him away. Forced to pause, while the blood yet boiled in his veins, Richer heard the cries calling all to join in putting out the blaze. Over his protests that they could be little aid after all the drink they had consumed, Richer found that he and Athelina were soon joining the crowd heading back towards the vill. He could still remember the ferocious face of Serlo at the rear of the group, sneering at Athelina for disappearing with Richer. ‘You should have come with me, wench. I’d have given you something to gag on!’

  ‘Leave her alone,’ Richer grated, but then his attention was drawn away as he saw the towering column of flames in front of him. It was very close to his parents’ house, he thought with dread, and he wondered which of the nearby homes it could be. Through the trees it was hard to gauge, but as they drew ever nearer, he saw that it was …

  In his mind there was a blankness, a stolid refusal to believe what his eyes told him. He preferred to think that it was the woods behind the house which were alight; his family should gather up all their belongings as soon as they could, and try to escape, he thought frantically; then he pretended that it was a fire in the small barn his father had built a few yards from the house, and that it would soon burn out; then the log store on the side. Someone should find a grapnel and tug the logs away so that their flames couldn’t hurt the thatch …

  Even now, after so many years, he could recall the horror he felt as the enormity of the disaster hit him. His father was in there, so was his mother, Avice, his brothers, his beloved sister … and the family home was an inferno. Flames thrust up through the thatch like daggers of gold and crimson; thick, greasy smoke coiled and spread high overhead like a cloud belched from Hell.