The Devil's Acolyte aktm-13

by Michael Jecks

  ‘My lady, would you serve as my advocate, should I ever be accused of a crime?’ Baldwin murmured, and Cissy preened, grinning.

  Simon said, ‘Tell me, before Hamelin was killed…’

  At these words, there was a high, keening wail from the corner of the fire, and Cissy rolled her eyes. ‘Did you have to say that? I’ve only just got her to quieten down, and now you’ve started her off again.

  ‘My apologies. But can we ask some questions?’

  ‘Hamelin! Hamelin! He can’t be dead! Oh, Christ! Why him? Why us? What have we done to deserve this?’

  Cissy shook her head. ‘You want to question people, you find someone who can talk without crying. Come back later. Better still, don’t bother.’

  ‘What of you? Can we talk to you?’

  ‘Why has he died?’ Emma burst out. ‘How could someone do it to a man like him?’

  Simon was struck by the woman’s ravaged features. If he had been asked, he would have said that she was at least forty years old, and yet he was sure she was not much more than half that. It was the toll that bearing children had waged upon her, the toll of little sleep, of fear that her youngest might die, of her husband being taken from her so cruelly and without explanation.

  ‘I am sorry about your husband,’ he said with as much compassion as he could.

  Cissy tried to hold Emma back, glaring furiously at the men. ‘Won’t you leave us? This girl is in no position to–’

  ‘Cissy, give me grace! I want to help these men if they can find the murderer of my man! Why should I sit here snivelling while he who has caused my misery dances and sings, knowing he is safe? Let me put the rope about his neck if I may!’

  ‘Do you know anything of your man’s death?’

  ‘All I know, I will tell you,’ Emma declared with force. She gently removed Cissy’s arm from before her and walked to her stool, sitting and composing herself as best she might. It was terrifying to have three such men in her room, but she drew strength from Cissy, and from the memory of the sight of her man’s body.

  ‘Gentlemen, Hamelin arrived here the night before last because he wanted to make sure that our son was well and hadn’t died. The last weeks have been hard for us. Joel has been suffering because we couldn’t afford good food. Then on Friday Hamelin arrived with a purse of money which he said Wally had given him.’

  ‘I told them,’ Cissy said.

  ‘That money saved Joel’s life,’ Emma said with determination.

  ‘You say he saw you the day Wally died,’ Simon said. ‘Did he say anything about Wally’s death?’

  ‘Only that he saw the Brother Mark up there. Hamelin hated Mark for taking our money and gambling it away. It was because of Mark that he became a miner. He saw Mark with Wally that morning, arguing with him, and then Wally set off eastwards and the monk came back to Tavistock. Hamelin followed after him, and went to the tooth-puller, Ellis, to have a tooth out. Then he came back here to me.’

  ‘Do you not think he might have killed Wally to rob him?’ Baldwin asked quietly.

  ‘No! If he would have harmed anyone, it would have been that fat monk. No one else.’

  ‘What of the night before last, then?’ the Coroner asked.

  ‘He came home to see how Joel was, as I said, and while he was here, the watchman arrived and told him to go to see the Abbot in the morning – that would be yesterday. As soon as he had risen, he left me to go to the Abbey.’

  ‘This watchman – who was it?’ Simon asked.

  ‘We didn’t see him. He told us the message and said there was no need to open the door.’

  ‘Did you recognise the voice?’ Baldwin asked.

  ‘No,’ she said with a frown. ‘He didn’t sound familiar.’

  ‘Were there many routes your man could have taken to the Abbey?’ Baldwin enquired thoughtfully.

  ‘No. He would have gone along this alley, across the road, then into the next alley. That would take him straight to the place. But he didn’t get there, did he?’

  ‘I doubt it,’ Simon said. ‘He was ambushed on his way.’

  ‘By the man who gave him the message,’ Baldwin muttered.

  Joce could hear them. God! How many were there? He crouched low, his knife in his hand, listening intently, and it sounded like the whole of the King’s army had come to try to catch him. He still gripped his dagger, and held it out in front of him as he cautiously pressed his way onwards, trying to evade the men, but desperate to return down to the town where he would be safe.

  He must clean his hand. The acolyte’s blood had stained him all the way up to his wrist, and he could see specks up his arm. That was from his cut to the lad’s nose, he thought with a flash of pleasure. There was something good in having punished the bastard like that. He might live, but he’d never forget Joce Blakemoor, Joce Red-Hand.

  It was a complication he could live without, though, the thought that the lad might survive. Joce had kicked him hard: maybe he had broken his neck? A cracked rib could kill as easily as a sword-thrust, and Joce had managed at least one good stab with his dagger in the shoulder. Not enough, though, he reckoned. The boy had been fit and healthy, well-fed and strong. He could take a more severe punishment than that which Joce had handed out.

  Would Gerard’s word stand? Joce was inclined to think it would. If the boy lived to tell his tale in court, that was the end of Joce. Not that it mattered. Without the pewter, nothing mattered. He had no life in the town, no money. Nothing.

  He had no choice. Before anything else he must avoid these men looking for him. Cautiously, he made his way along a narrow gully, listening for shouts and knocking as search-parties banged among bushes and ferns to see if he was hiding. It was like a great hunt, with beaters scaring the quarry onward. With animals there would be a line of huntsmen, with dogs or bows, or perhaps men on horses eager to give chase, but here the reason was more mundane. The beaters were hoping to push him forward, up the hill, and out into the open moorland beyond. There he would be easily visible.

  That way was madness. He would need a mount to escape to the moors. Instead, he searched for a gap between beaters, and carefully made for it. The line was extended, but the gap between each man was fluid, and it took him some while to spot where he could go. There, a space between one youth and a forty-year-old peasant who looked like his head was built of moorstone.

  Joce crawled over to a thick bramble patch and scrambled through it, feeling his woollen clothing snag and pull. Thorns thrust into his hands and knees; one caught his cheek and tore at him, and more became tangled in his hair. He had to bow his head and clench his fists against the pain. He couldn’t, he daren’t make a sound. The beaters were too close.

  With a shock of horror he heard a dog. His heart stopped in his breast. Every facet of his being was concentrated on his ears and it seemed that the slavering, panting sound was deafening, smothering all other noise, even the steady whistling and banging of sticks. Then there was a clout across his back as a heavy staff crashed into the bushes above him, and he could have shrieked as a set of furze thorns were slammed into his back between his shoulders.

  There was a louder panting, and he opened his eyes to see the dull-witted eyes of a greyhound peering at him, mouth wide, tongue dangling in a friendly pant. A man bellowed, and the dog curled into a fist of solid muscle, then exploded forward, shooting off like an arrow. Joce felt as though his heart had landed in his mouth, it burst forth into such powerful thumping.

  Then the noise was past him. To his astonishment, the line had washed over him and now was carrying on up the hill. He was safe!

  He carefully crawled from his hiding place, pulled off his coat and knocked as many bramble and gorse spikes away as he could, while walking swiftly down the hill towards the town. Once there, he could fetch clothes and a horse.

  His blood was coursing through his veins with more consistency now. Yes, he would escape from this damned town. Over the moors on a horse, perhaps, or south, to the coast.
He would be free again.

  Sara had left her children with a neighbour while she went to buy bread, and she was there, outside the baker’s when she heard the raucous blast of a horn. Hurrying along the street, she came to the road where she could see the bridge, and there she saw the men bringing a body back from the hill. They trailed down to the bridge, and slowly crossed it before making their way past the Water Gate and on around the town.

  There was another blast from the horn, then a harsh bellow. ‘Havoc, murder! Help! All healthy men, collect your arms and help catch a murderer!’

  At Sara’s side a woman gasped, ‘My Christ! The poor boy!’

  Others had already stopped to stare, watching as the small group, Sir Tristram on his horse at the head, and four men carrying the stretcher of stout poles with a palliasse bound between them, made their way to the Court Gate. All could see the blood and pale features of the boy.

  ‘What have you done to the lad?’ came an angry voice from the crowd.

  Sir Tristram whirled his horse about. ‘Don’t bellow at us, man! This is none of my men’s doing. One of my Host saw this fellow being attacked, and we are up the hill now, trying to find the culprit, so any among you who are fit and healthy, grab a weapon, and go up there. We need all the help we can muster. Come on! All of you, up that hill and find this bastard before he kills someone else!’

  Coroner Roger, Simon and Baldwin were walking back from Emma’s alley when they saw the men carrying the stretcher.

  ‘We found your man, Sir Coroner,’ Sir Tristram said with heavy amusement. ‘Although I fear he won’t be of a mood to help you yet awhile. He is a little punctured just now.’

  ‘Sweet Jesu!’ Baldwin burst out, and then he whirled around to Sir Tristram. ‘Why did you do this? The boy was no threat to you!’

  ‘We did nothing. My man was riding eastwards towards the moor, thinking that the lad might have tried to escape,’ Sir Tristram said, waving the stretcher-bearers on towards the Abbey. ‘He saw a man striking this lad, kicking him and then preparing to give the fatal blow. He shouted and raised havoc, and the bastard ran away.’

  ‘Did he see who it was?’ Coroner Roger asked eagerly.

  ‘Alas, he doesn’t know the local folk,’ Sir Tristram acknowledged. ‘By the time the rest of my men responded to his call, the scoundrel was flown. He could be anywhere. Still, I have left my fellows up there to see if they can find him. It’s the best training for war, hunting a man.’

  Baldwin felt sick. He could remember how knights had spoken about hunting down his comrades from the Knights Templar after their destruction. It was repellent, this idea of treating men like so many deer or hares.

  Gerard had suffered; it would be a miracle if he lived. Baldwin had seen the thick flap of skin cut away from his cheek, the smashed and all-but cut off nose, the slashed ear that dangled from a small flap of flesh, the bloodied shoulder and flank. After so many wounds, any one of which might grow gangrenous, the lad would be fortunate indeed to live.

  ‘There they are!’ Sir Tristram exclaimed, pointing.

  Following his finger, Baldwin could see a thin line of men working their way up the hill east of them. There was no sign of their prey.

  The Coroner saw this too. ‘I shall have to organise the Watch to help them. Christ’s Ballocks! As if there wasn’t enough to do already!’

  Baldwin nodded. ‘You go, and I shall see whether I can entice a little information from that poor wreck of an acolyte.’

  Studying his coat and tunic in among the trees that stood at the side of the road, Joce was forced to accept that he’d be viewed a little oddly if he were to appear like this in town. He’d be better off leaving his coat behind.

  He could hear the horn blowing, and when he stared over the river, he saw that Sir Tristram was shouting for more men to help. It made Joce grind his teeth with impotent rage. If he could, he would charge over that bridge and hurl himself at the tarse! Who did the arrogant sodomite think he was? The new conscience of the land, the new hero? From all Joce had heard, he was nothing more than a reiver himself. There were enough of them up there on the border, as Joce knew perfectly well.

  Then he saw a saviour. There, standing near the bridge, as Sir Tristram’s men rode onwards, was Sara. She would help him: she wouldn’t be able to stop herself, he thought smugly. He stepped onto the road from his cover and walked across the bridge, his coat carelessly flung over his shoulder. Once there, he made straight for her.

  ‘Hello, Sara.’

  Her face blanched. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘My love, all is well now,’ he murmured as soothingly as he could, ‘since that blasted fool Walwynus is gone, I need have no more fear.’

  ‘Fear?’ she repeated dully. ‘You wouldn’t talk to me after the coining, and now you talk of fear?’

  ‘It was Wally. I told you afterwards, I had hoped you’d understand,’ he said sadly. ‘Wally came and threatened me, telling me to leave you alone, not to play with your emotions. I was scared.’

  ‘I…’ Sara swallowed, her face a picture of confusion. ‘But you said you beat him.’

  He laughed shortly. ‘Does any man like to admit that he’s been bested? No, my love.’

  ‘You said you wanted no more to do with me, that you’d deny your own child.’

  ‘No, never,’ Joce said firmly. He stepped forward and took her elbow, guiding her on, keeping his eye upon her the while, stepping up the lanes, away from the main roadway, away from the Abbey, and down an alley which led to the back of his house. He could enter without being seen. ‘How could I reject my own child? Impossible.’

  But confusion was already turning to anger as Sara recalled their last two meetings. She shook her arm free. ‘No! You’re not going to take me in the back here, like a slut. You swore to wed me, and that means I have the right to enter by your front door.’

  ‘Darling, please come with me just this once,’ Joce said, smiling. ‘It is a whim of mine.’

  ‘Don’t treat me like a fool!’ she threatened him. She was rubbing at her elbow where he had gripped her. ‘If you’re serious about honouring our vows, and are not going to deny me again, and if you will support Ellis as well, if he is accused, then I shall enter your house, for the sake of my children, as your wife. But I shall not go in the back door so that you can deny seeing me in the future. Ah, no!’

  ‘Stop rubbing your arm, woman. Come! I merely wish to see my horses.’

  ‘Then you can, once we’ve entered by your front door. Or is this all merely a jest to satisfy some cruel amusement of yours?’ she asked.

  ‘This is no jest, I assure you, Wife.’

  She said nothing. Her hand was at her elbow still. As he watched, she picked at the material, and pulled a face as she realised that it was covered in mud. ‘Oh, look at that. My best linen shirt, too. What have you been up to?’

  He could say nothing. Suddenly he felt as though the blood was draining from his face as she took him in, her features at first sharp and irritated, and then subtly altering, until they registered pure horror. ‘My God!’ she whispered. ‘It was you, wasn’t it? You tried to kill that boy!’

  His arm was up and at her throat in a moment while he fumbled for his knife, but he was too late to prevent the scream that burst from her. She kicked at his feet, and he stumbled, and then she had broken free. Two men appeared from his gateway, and he stared at them dully, before bolting back the way he had come.

  He made it to the bridge without anyone catching him, and then he found himself confronted by a traveller on a tired old nag. Without pausing, Joce ran to the man’s side. The nag side-stepped, rearing his head, and Joce caught the man’s foot, thrusting upwards viciously. In a moment the rider was up and over his mount, falling on the other side with an audible crunch as his shoulder struck the cobbled way. It took no time to shove one foot in the stirrup and lift himself up into the saddle. Kicking the beast’s flanks cruelly, Joce urged it into a slow canter.

  No
one else had a horse behind him, but now he was committed, whether he wanted it or not. The road south was at the other side of the river. He could attempt to ford it further downstream, but that would be hazardous. No, he was better off trying to cross over the moors.

  In any case, this was the way he should be taking, he realised. What had the lad said? That Wally, the shit, had sold the plate to some foreign bastard on the moors. That was what Gerard had said, and he’d said it in the extremity of his pain, when he was trying to save his life. Surely that was what Joce must do now, then. Find these travellers and retrieve his pewter.

  With that resolve, he whipped the reins across the flanks of the horse and forced it to go faster.

  Joce would go up by the main roadway, for none of the line of beaters would expect the murderer to be behind them. Then he would ride to the first mining camp and ask about strange-speaking foreigners and whether anyone had seen them. And if the foreign bastards refused to give his property back to him, Joce smiled coldly, he would kill them. Without compunction. He had tried to kill twice today already, with Gerard and then Sara, and he was keen to succeed the third time.

  Simon waited until Baldwin had followed the stretcher through a doorway, and then wandered down to fetch an ale. Mark was sitting as usual on his little stool in the doorway to his salting rooms.

  ‘Bailiff! Who was that?’ he called out, staring after the stretcher.

  Simon walked over to him. ‘That poor acolyte Gerard. He was caught and attacked by someone on the other side of the river. We don’t know who it was, but we’ll get him.’

  ‘It wasn’t me, Master Bailiff! I have been here all day. And an exciting one it has been too.’

  Gratefully taking a mazer filled with an excellent spiced wine, Simon leaned against the doorway. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘if you were to learn of a monk who’d been stealing from the Abbey you’d want to punish him wouldn’t you?’

  Mark eyed him curiously, then drained his cup. ‘Of course. No question.’

  ‘So what has been happening here, then?’