by Paul Doherty
The Preacher was in charge. Parson Osbert bleated about compassion and the rights of the prisoner but the peasants’ blood was up: they were determined to try this hermit for his life.
Christina did not come down that morning but stayed in bed. Matthias heard the uproar as the men dragged the hermit into the nave of the church. He slipped out of the house and joined the women and children of the village as they thronged the church, eagerly awaiting the trial. A jury was empanelled, twelve good men and true symbolising the apostles who followed Christ. There was, however, nothing Christlike about the Preacher. Parson Osbert could only stand flailing his hands, bemoaning the violence of his parishioners. The Preacher acted as both judge and prosecutor. The jury sat on the benches facing each other across the nave. The prisoner was bound to a pillar whilst the Preacher dominated the proceedings from the pulpit. Walter Mapp the scrivener had a small table brought from the sacristy as he would act as clerk. He pompously laid out the parchment, ink horns, quills, pumice stone and the keen little knife which would keep his pen sharp.
The Preacher clapped his hands three times.
‘Vox populi, vox Dei!’ he intoned. ‘The voice of the people is the voice of God!’ He pointed to a vivid scene painted on the church wall: Christ in Judgment at the parousia, the last day, dividing the people into sheep and goats. ‘Christ is our witness,’ the Preacher began. ‘We are here in the nave of the church to try this man for the crimes of witchcraft, devilish practices and murder. What say ye?’
A roar like the howl of some great beast filled the church. Men, women and children stamped their feet and held their hands out, a sign they always used in the manor court when petitioning for justice.
‘What is your name?’ the Preacher demanded.
‘What is yours?’ the hermit coolly replied, bringing back his head.
The Preacher looked nonplussed. ‘My name is not your business!’
‘Then neither is mine yours!’ the hermit retorted.
The Preacher, his face flushed with anger, looked down at the scrivener. ‘Take careful note of what the prisoner says.’
‘I am glad you will,’ the hermit replied, ‘for the record will condemn you, your own words and actions.’
The Preacher drew himself up. He was disconcerted by the cool mockery in the hermit’s voice.
‘What do you mean?’ The Preacher could have bitten his tongue out.
‘By what authority do you try me?’ the hermit demanded. ‘You are not a member of this village. You are not a tenant of the manor. You hold no warrant either from the Crown or the Church. So, by what authority do you try me? By what right do you hold this court? What warrant gives you the role of judge and prosecutor?’
A murmur of approval greeted the hermit’s words. The villagers peered anxiously at each other, then at the Preacher. They accepted the power of the prisoner’s words. The villagers had a reverential awe of the written word, the sealed warrant, the rites and ancient customs. More importantly, what would Baron Sanguis say when he returned? Manor lords were very jealous about their rights.
The Preacher in the pulpit was also concerned. Unless he reasserted his authority, these proceedings would end like some mummers’ farce. He dug into his wallet and drew out a scroll of parchment, dark and greasy with age. He unrolled this, holding it up so the villagers could see the indentations down the side and especially the great purple blob of wax at the bottom, an official seal.
The villagers sighed with relief.
‘What is that?’ the hermit mocked.
‘The warrant of Holy Mother Church!’ the Preacher snapped. ‘Permission from the great Order of the Hospital to preach God’s words, extirpate heresy and bring wrongdoers to justice.’
‘It has no authority here,’ the hermit declared.
‘Hasn’t it?’ the Preacher replied silkily.
He came down the steps of the pulpit. He now realised standing there was a mistake. Too aloof, too distant from the people he wished to manage. The Preacher handed his warrant to the scrivener, who studied it carefully and nodded wisely.
‘It has the authority of Holy Mother Church,’ the scrivener lied.
‘Then why am I bound?’ The hermit seemed determined to fight the Preacher every step of the way.
The Preacher nodded and gestured at Simon the reeve. He must not allow the prisoner too much sympathy. The cords were cut. The hermit, rubbing his wrists and flexing his arms, walked into the centre of the nave. Matthias, who had managed to worm his way to the front of the crowd, squatted open-mouthed. The hermit caught his eye, smiled faintly and winked.
‘I accuse you,’ the Preacher decided to waste no more time, ‘of the murder of Edith, daughter of Fulcher the blacksmith!’
‘What proof do you have?’
‘So, you don’t deny it?’
The Preacher now walked up and down, more intent on the parishioners than the prisoner.
‘You have accused me of a crime,’ the hermit retorted. ‘And I ask you for the proof. If I see the proof then I will reply.’
The Preacher decided to shift his ground, to move on to other cases, only to receive the same incisive reply. Matthias stared at his father but Parson Osbert, his face haggard, shoulders drooping, had lost all control over the proceedings. He sat on the steps of the small Lady Chapel, eyes down, refusing to lift his head. For the first time ever, Matthias felt ashamed, scornful of his father’s cowardice before this stranger. Now and again the Preacher would look to the priest for assistance but there was none.
The Preacher, fingers to his lips, walked up and down, silent for a while: this was not going the way he wanted it. The hermit, instead of protesting his innocence, kept bringing his questions back to matters of legal principle, evidence, witnesses. The Preacher realised that, indeed, the hermit knew more of the law then he did. What, therefore, had Prior Sir Raymond Grandison advised? He paused in his pacing.
‘You ask about rights and evidence,’ he snapped. ‘Are you a true son of Holy Mother Church?’
‘It is up to you,’ the hermit replied, ‘to produce evidence that I am not.’
‘Recite the Creed!’ the Preacher snapped.
The hermit turned to face the villagers.
‘Credo in Unum Deum, Patrem omnipotentem, factorem caeli et terrae.’
The Preacher made a cutting movement with his hand. That was a mistake, he realised. The hermit had launched into the Nicene Creed, which was always intoned in Latin every Sunday by their priest: the Church’s eternal hymn of belief to the Trinity, to the Incarnate God and to the Church.
‘You don’t pray,’ the Preacher taunted.
‘How do you know that?’ the hermit replied.
‘You consort with lewd women.’
‘I didn’t know there were any in Sutton Courteny,’ came the quick reply, causing a ripple of mirth amongst the villagers. ‘This is Sutton Courteny,’ the hermit continued smoothly, ‘not St Paul’s churchyard.’
The Preacher stopped his pacing. He tried to hide his confusion. He glanced quickly at the hermit. His opponent’s eyes mocked him: I know you, his gaze said, your secret sins, your weakness for soft flesh, for the pleasures of the bed.
The Preacher swallowed hard and glanced quickly at the jurors. He did not like what he saw: not one of them would meet his eye. Two or three of them were shuffling their feet. The Preacher went to the mouth of the sanctuary screen and stared at the crucifix, then at the red lamp glowing beneath the pyx which contained the Blessed Sacrament. The Preacher recalled the words of Sir Raymond. He cursed his own impetuosity as he watched the flickering red lamp.
‘Do you go to church, hermit?’ he asked, not turning round.
‘I live in one,’ the prisoner replied, causing a fresh outbreak of laughter.
‘Do you attend Mass?’ the Preacher continued. ‘Do you take the Sacrament?’
Without even looking round, the Preacher knew he had hit his mark. For the first time the hermit was silent.
&nbs
p; ‘Well? Well?’ The Preacher walked back, arms folded. ‘A hermit who lives in a church, who constantly asks for evidence for this and evidence for that. Do you take the body and blood of Christ?’
The hermit was staring at the floor.
‘Well, do you?’
‘I am unworthy.’
‘In the eyes of God we all are,’ the Preacher replied tersely. ‘But the Church encourages the faithful to eat the sacred species. Why don’t you?’
‘I have answered that question. I will say no more.’
The Preacher stared at the villagers, walking slowly towards them, arms raised.
‘Belief in the Eucharist,’ he declared, ‘is the heart of our faith. Moreover, the prisoner talks about law. It is an ancient custom that a man can prove his innocence by partaking of the Body and Blood of Our Lord. In the time of King Edward the Confessor, the traitorous Earl Godwin, being offered the host, choked and died. I now appeal,’ his voice rose, ‘to Heaven!’
And, swinging on his heel, the Preacher strode into the sanctuary. He ignored the protests of Parson Osbert and the murmur from the villagers. He took down the pyx, placed it on the altar and genuflected. He opened it, took out the host and walked purposefully towards the prisoner.
‘Ecce Corpus Christi!’ he intoned.
The prisoner turned his head away.
‘Behold the Body of Christ!’ the Preacher repeated. He turned to John the bailiff. ‘Take some men, seize him, open his mouth!’
‘You cannot do this,’ the hermit protested. ‘It is against God’s law to force the host upon any man!’
‘He speaks the truth.’ Parson Osbert got to his feet, his hands hanging by his side. He had been rubbing his eyes until they were red-rimmed. ‘Enough is enough,’ he whispered to the Preacher. ‘If he will not partake, he shall not partake, that is the law of the Church. If you press him further it will be a blasphemous sacrilege.’
The Preacher glared down the church. The victory was his. He returned the host to the pyx and walked back into the nave. He stopped before the jurors.
‘How do you find him?’
‘Guilty.’
‘And you?’
‘Guilty.’
The other ten replied the same.
‘And how do you find him?’ he appealed to the congregation.
‘Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!’
The chant rose, echoing round the church. The Preacher clapped his hands.
‘And what sentence?’
‘Death by fire!’
The response came loud and clear, men stamping their feet as they repeated the words, relishing the sombre threat of their verdict.
Matthias felt cold, stricken to the heart. He could not believe what was happening. The Preacher, his lips curled in a sneer, turned towards the hermit.
‘Do you have anything to say?’
‘Yes.’ The hermit’s face was pale but he held himself upright, head erect. He walked towards the villagers. ‘You have condemned me without evidence. Let me remind you — yes, I came here eight years ago. And, since my first arrival to this moment, has not Sutton Courteny been spared? No soldiers, pillaging or burning? Your crops have been rich and plentiful? Your cattle grown fat?’
The villagers stared back.
‘Fulcher the blacksmith, are not your profits so great that you are planning to build a better house? And look to provide a good marriage dowry for your remaining daughters? Simon the reeve, do you not have plans to purchase more meadow land? Even Baron Sanguis is thinking of allowing you to be a partner in the profits from his sheep. John the bailiff, Fulke the tanner, Watkin the tiler, have not your businesses prospered? Joscelyn, your beer and ale is now sold as far afield as Stroud and Gloucester, is it not?’
The villagers heard him out. One or two of them were nodding, others stared narrow-eyed. They could not understand how the hermit knew so much about their affairs yet he spoke the truth. In the last eight years Sutton Courteny had prospered and become the envy of its neighbours. No war, no famine, no pestilence.
‘And you?’ The hermit spun on his heel and pointed to the scrivener. Matthias caught a look of venom in his friend’s eyes. ‘Are not your storerooms full of good hides? Do you not have a lucrative trade with the scriptorium at Tewkesbury Abbey?’
The hermit walked closer. The scrivener, quill raised, was fearful at how this man’s eyes seemed to search his very soul.
‘Plenty of money,’ the hermit declared in a loud whisper. ‘The joys of the tavern, the bodies of lithe young women thrashing beneath you.’ He wiped the spittle from the corner of his mouth. ‘But even that does not satisfy you!’
‘You have proved your own witchcraft,’ the Preacher intervened, fearful of the hold this man might have over the villagers.
‘No, sir. You have proved it!’
The Preacher refused to answer but shouted at the villagers, ‘Is there anyone here who will speak for him?’
A deathly silence.
‘I ask you now, before God, is there any man, woman or child who will speak for the prisoner?’
‘I will!’
The words were out of Matthias’ mouth before he could stop them. He was on his feet, walking forward. His father, wringing his hands, just shook his head. Matthias didn’t care. He didn’t like the Preacher. He felt sorry for the hermit — like when he and the other children gathered here in the church to study their hornbooks, would go out into the cemetery and play a game: ‘Who will play with him?’ ‘Or who will play with her?’ Matthias always felt sorry for the boy or girl left alone. It was no different now. He walked over and looked up at the hermit. His friend gazed back, the tears rolling down his cheeks.
‘Oh, Creatura bona atque parva!’ he whispered. ‘Brave little man!’
‘You are a child,’ the Preacher declared.
‘He was kind,’ Matthias replied. ‘He could hold doves and knows the names of flowers. He showed me young fox cubs, he caught a rabbit and roasted it.’
Matthias blushed at the laughter from the villagers.
‘It’s true! It’s true!’ he cried.
He stamped his foot and the Preacher, mimicking him, stamped his. The villagers burst into laughter. Matthias, face burning red, fled the church, across the cemetery and into his house. He ran up the stairs and burst into his mother’s room. She was lying on the small four-poster bed, face buried in the bolsters. He ran up, tugging at her hand.
‘Mother, they are going to take him out and burn him!’
Christina lifted her sleep-laden face from the bolsters. Matthias could see she had been crying.
‘It’s finished,’ she whispered. ‘There’s nothing you can do. May God help us all!’
She let his hand drop and fell back on the bolsters, staring at the blue and gold tester over the bed.
‘Did your father speak?’
‘Some.’ Matthias bit back the insults he felt. ‘It made no difference.’
He walked slowly out of the chamber, closing the door silently behind him, and went down the rickety stairs. He sat for a while poking the cold ash in the fireplace with a stick. From the cemetery came the shouts and cries of the villagers. The door opened and his father came down the passageway. Matthias did not look up. He sat jabbing at the ash, wishing it were the Preacher’s face.
‘They’ve put him in the death house,’ Parson Osbert said. ‘The Preacher and others are guarding him. They. .’ Parson Osbert licked his dry lips. ‘He says sentence must be carried out by dusk. Fulcher and the rest, they are piling brushwood around the bear-baiting post. You know,’ he continued in a matter-of-fact voice, ‘it’s near the gallows. Matthias?’
The boy kept jabbing at the ash. His father came and knelt beside him.
‘Matthias, why did you speak?’
His son turned to him. Parson Osbert had grown old that morning: cheeks sagging, eyes constantly blinking.
‘I don’t know,’ Matthias replied.
‘He wants to see us,’ his father continu
ed. ‘He made that last request: to see me, you and Christina before he died.’
‘I thought he would.’
Parson Osbert whirled round. Christina stood in the doorway, a woollen coverlet round her shoulders.
‘I thought he would,’ she repeated.
‘Christina, are you well?’
The parson went across and pressed his wife’s hands: they were lifeless and cold like those of a corpse. Her face had an unhealthy pallor. Her hair, usually so lustrous, now hung lank and untidy.
‘You don’t have to see him,’ Parson Osbert said.
‘He’s going to die, isn’t he? We’ll take him some wine, some bread.’ She went like a dreamwalker back up the stairs.
Parson Osbert went across to the small podium where the church missal was put. He opened this, pretending to study the gospel from the Mass of the day. He felt sick, anxious about the Preacher’s actions. Matters had proceeded far too fast. On his return, Baron Sanguis would not be pleased.
Christina came back. She’d put a dress over her linen shift, tied her hair back and covered it with a veil, wooden sandals on her feet. She took a small jug of wine from the buttery, some manchet loaves and, without saying a word, walked out of the house. Parson Osbert and Matthias hurried after her. The scene in the cemetery was like that of an armed camp. Women and children sat on the grass or on fallen headstones sharing out the food they had brought. Their menfolk strutted up and down, boldly showing off their rusty swords, daggers and spears and bent shields. A group of young men, under the direction of the Preacher, stood on guard outside the stone death house. As they approached, the Preacher held his hand up but Parson Osbert had regained his courage.