The Butcher of Avignon (Hildegard of Meaux medieval crime series Book 6)

by Cassandra Clark

  While he was doing that Hildegard turned to Hubert. ‘You can confirm that Cardinal Grizac was in lauds at the palace with you?’

  ‘I can vouch for it.’

  ‘Me too,’ added Gregory. ‘And Fondi, Bellefort and Montjoie. I can promise you, domina, they all left together, groaning about the weather and how lucky Brother Egbert and I were to be staying behind in the palace guest quarters. Montjoie was livid.’

  Egbert returning and catching the end of the conversation, tilted the contents of the flagon into their cups. ‘There’s one of Montjoie’s pages over there.’

  They all looked across the refectory to where he pointed.

  Hubert rose to his feet and went over.

  After a few minutes he returned. ‘What you said about Montjoie reminded me of something. According to his page they accidentally tipped him out when they were on the bridge and got the full brunt of one of his tirades.’

  ‘His rages are quite unbridled,’ murmured Gregory.

  ‘Was that the argument on the bridge?’

  ‘Could be.’

  ‘Believe me,’ observed Egbert. ‘Once he gets going you can hear him berate those poor servants of his from one end of Avignon to the other.’

  ‘But the argument happened just before the lauds bell,’ Hildegard pointed out.

  ‘How reliable is that old priest?’

  ‘Sleeping fitfully, waking in the night? Who can ever tell what the time is?’ Egbert asked.

  **

  After leaving the Tinel and the men with their fresh flagon, Hildegard went down to the main courtyard. The guards were used to seeing her come and go by now and scarcely raised their heads.

  Down by the river the flood was receding, leaving a rim of brown sludge above the waterline. Lower down the slope on his small hillock the ferryman had got his boat back. It lay upside down in the mud.

  As she approached she saw other things lying around. A broken pitcher. A few rags of some sort. A stool with one leg missing.

  She hurried up to the door and peered inside.

  The shutters were half open, swinging on their hinges with a desolate, repetitive sound. In the drizzle of light she noticed more broken pots scattered on the earth floor. No fire brightened the hearth, instead there was a pile of ashes where the logs had been allowed to burn away.

  She heard a groan and stepped through the door without knocking. The ferryman was lying stretched out in his chair with his hands to his head.

  ‘What’s happened?’ She went right up to him and he flinched when he realised he was not alone.

  ‘It’s only me,’ she reassured. ‘Are you ill?’

  ‘That black devil,’ he ground out. When he removed his hands from his head she saw that he had been beaten about the face. Both eyes were half-closed. His lips were puffed. His nose bleeding.

  ‘Who did this?’

  ‘If I knew I wouldn’t be lying here I’d be using a paddle on him.’ He gave another groan. ‘He was lying in wait for me behind the door. What have I done? I don’t get it. Was he thieving? If so he got precious little and what he got he smashed.’

  ‘Have you run up against somebody recently?’ she asked, caution in her voice as she wondered if it had anything to do with the help he had given the miners.

  ‘Telling me to keep my mouth shut,’ he groaned. ‘It’s a warning, he said. Me, I said, what have I got to blab about?’

  ‘Let me bathe your wounds. At least we have plenty of fresh water.’

  She went over to the rain barrel outside the door, dipped a piece of clean cloth in it and returned, opening her scrip as she did so. ‘We’ll soon have you fixed up,’ she said.

  There was dread in her heart. It was surely not the guild of pages who had behaved so barbarically, was it? Who else would want him to keep his mouth shut?

  **

  ‘At least your nose isn’t broken as far as I can tell. How does it feel?’

  ‘Like a bloody great throbbing horn.’

  ‘Yes, it looks a bit like one at present but if you keep on using the arnica the swelling will go down. Soon you’ll soon be as handsome as ever - and breaking women’s hearts all over again, the angels save us.’

  ‘The angels must have brought you here, domina.’ His eyelids flickered at the smarting of his wounds as she dabbed at them and he growled, ‘It was the devil brought him.’

  ‘There now.’ She wrung out the cloth and put it back into her scrip to wash and dry later. ‘And you saw no-one?’

  ‘I’d been out to my boat. I was only outside there. No, I tell a lie - ’

  Not the first, she thought.

  ‘I’d been down to the bridge to have a look among the wreckage.’

  ‘You mean where the duc’s esquire was found?’

  ‘No, closer in. A tree came down in the night and blocked the nearest arch. I found a few bits and pieces nobody wants and piled them on the bank. Then I thought I’d better have a look at my boat where they dragged her up this morning after finishing with her.’

  ‘The pope’s men, you mean?’

  ‘Them.’ He sniffed. ‘I was going to clean her up a bit. The devil what attacked me must have sneaked in while I was fetching stuff from the river.’

  ‘More debris brought down stream you say?’

  ‘A load of it.’

  ‘Shall I see it if I walk along there?’

  ‘Nothing worth seeing now.’

  ‘This tree?’

  ‘I’ll get some help to shift it later. We can bring it ashore. Winter logs.’

  ‘And your attacker got inside your cottage while you were doing this? He had a nerve. Was he looking for something?’ She was clutching at straws.

  ‘I can’t think what. Anything of value I carry on me - well, I’m being indiscreet now but I suppose I can tell you that, you’re not likely to rob me at knife point, are you!’

  He chuckled, then winced as it disturbed the wounds to his face. ‘He was lying in wait for me behind the door,’ he continued ‘First I knew of it was when I felt a crack on my head. I hear him snarl a warning about keeping my mouth shut. I said, what do I know? But I must have blacked out, I don’t remember anything after that. The fire was out when I came round. Then I got up, sat here and then you’re coming in, to my aid and succour, bless you.’

  Hildegard looked carefully around the cottage, on the floor, everywhere, but there was nothing to say who had been here. The floor was scuffed with mud. Impossible to read the prints. At least nothing pointed to the pages.

  There must be only one other person who wanted the ferryman to keep his mouth shut and he had nothing to do with the miners. It was Taillefer’s murderer. He must think the ferryman had seen something.

  Before leaving she asked, ‘That night when the duc’s esquire was murdered, you said you heard angry voices. Are you sure they came from the bridge?’

  ‘As sure as anything’s sure.’

  That was just what the priest of St Nicolas told her too. And Hubert had now confirmed it. The argument. The bell. Lauds. And Montjoie was in lauds because all three Cistercians had seen him. Or had said they had seen him. But the priest might have rung the bell at any time after the voices from the bridge woke him up.

  She went back up to the bridge, was nodded onto it by the sentry, walked along as far as the chapel. The priest was inside. This time he was busy swabbing the floor.

  ‘Please don’t take this amiss, but is it possible you rang the bell for lauds later than usual?’

  His milky pale eyes peered myopically into her face. ‘Such a wild night,’ he murmured. ‘I was awake on and off.’

  ‘You heard voices,’ she prompted, ‘and then you took it to be time for lauds. Could you have been mistaken?’

  ‘No man is infallible, domina.’

  **

  Sir John Fitzjohn was standing inside the gatehouse when she walked back up to the palace. It seemed an age since she had seen him raging and ranting over the absconding miners.

  Sin
ce returning from his manhunt he had kept a low profile. Presumably he had been waiting for instructions from Woodstock about what to do about the proposed barter. He would have to hand something of value to the pope but now his miners had vanished without trace, what did he have?

  He was back, however, as visible as ever, his pennant on its long pole held by his standard bearer, his breast plate gleaming with the result of Edmund’s hard work, his fine horse, held by its gilded leather halter, prancing and displaying the high polish on its hooves.

  Fitzjohn had chosen to copy the practise of his lord Woodstock and hang the severed tail of an animal on his standard but unlike Woodstock he had not chosen a fox’s red brush but something diplomatically smaller, a rat maybe, tail dangling like a piece of string.

  His retinue milled around him. They were apparently waiting for orders.

  Edmund emerged from inside the couriers’ office. He strode over, bent his knee to make a flourish then handed his lord a letter. Fitzjohn snatched it without thanks and tore it open.

  He scanned it. Evidently the man could read.

  Before asking for her own mail if any, Hildegard watched from inside the doorway.

  The news he read evidently pleased him. He held the letter aloft. ‘Good news from England, men! The Lord Chief Justiciar is dead!’

  A dutiful but weak cheer arose.

  Fitzjohn relished the moment. He declaimed aloud from the letter in his hand while Hildegard listened in rising horror:

  Justice Tresillian, impeached for treason, was caught disguised as a pilgrim in Westminster- the fool didn’t even have the common sense to run for it - whence he was dragged to the Tower, with his wife and daughters weeping- with such a sotwit for a father who can blame them? - where he was bound hand and foot to a hurdle and dragged through the streets of the City- and listen to this - and when he came to his Calvary and refused to say a word against King Richard or admit his treason he said, “I am not able to die” and they found a magic symbol on a string round his neck and ripped it off and so hanged him, naked, then cut his throat to make sure he was dead.’

  Fitzjohn glanced round with satisfaction. ‘And thus ends Sir Robert Tresillian.’ He did not cross himself but instead drew his sword and pointing it at the sky bellowed, ‘And so lives my lord Thomas of Woodstock!’

  A shocked silence followed.

  One by one his men began to attend to their belongings, tying and untying a strap here, inspecting a buckle there, anything but look at their companions. Fitzjohn’s lips tightened at this lack of enthusiasm. With a curse of impatience he turned to his trumpeter. ‘A blast or two. Rouse the dullards.’

  While the horn shrilled Hildegard, stunned and appalled by Fitzjohn’s announcement, turned inside the office and, in a dazed voice asked for any mail.

  Too stunned to realise that the clerk was handing over a small missive she stared unseeingly at the wall behind him. The Chief Justiciar, condemned in absentia, then returning only to be caught and executed?

  The king’s enemies crept ever closer to the king himself.

  In a blur she nodded her thanks to the clerk and walked outside again to see Fitzjohn and his retinue mounted already and heading for the gate. A horse brushed by her and she saw it was Edmund.

  ‘We’re going hunting, domina. Pray for our quarry.’ Then, white-faced, he rode on after his lord.

  **

  Tresillian had not been popular in several opposing quarters. First, with the people. During the great revolt, the hurling time of the peasants’ uprising, he had ordered a bloody aftermath, even forcing the fourteen year old king to accompany him to several mass hangings - the most repulsive being nineteen men in Essex hanged together on one specially built gibbet.

  Later, to everyone’s astonishment, aware of King Richard’s sympathy for the rebels, he had become one of his most vociferous supporters. Was it conscience or expedience that brought a change? Whatever it was, next he earned the hatred of the King’s Council, Woodstock, Gaunt, and their ally the earl of Arundel among the leaders, for his support for the king.

  Now, through some chicanery, he had been attainted for treason along with the rest of Richard’s close advisors. Mayor Brembre had been executed despite his strong defence before parliament. The others, including de la Pole and Archbishop Neville, had so far escaped.

  Who would be next to be hunted down?

  She was astonished at Tresilian’s folly in returning to Westminster, to the very heart of the fire that was consuming the royal court.

  **

  The wind at the top of the tower whined and blustered, strong enough to pitch her over the battlements. She staggered as it tossed her garments into disarray and whipped at her cloak. Gripping it tightly she edged across the roof to a more sheltered spot behind a buttress.

  Before taking out the letter from her scrip she looked down onto the house tops far below, onto the winding alleys, the canal, the squares, the belfries rising above the clusters of red roofs and the market place with its windswept stalls.

  Along the lane that ran round the outside of the palace walls she could see the small figures of Fitzjohn and his men trotting their horses in a tight, colourful bunch. She saw them come to a stop at the west gate where evidently they were waiting to be allowed out through the city walls.

  Open land stretched flat and water-logged to the west where the arable fields began with a track leading back towards the river.

  Then she took out the battered and travel-stained message, slit open the seal, and began to read.

  **

  It was in cipher. Not that anyone else would have known.

  A letter from her superior, the lady Prioress of Swyne, it appeared to be a query about some woollen leggings and whether she had managed to purchase any locally to bring back for her sister nuns, and there was news about the priory bees and the poor outlook for honey later that year because the cold weather was withering the blossom on the branch. They had never had such rains, it said.

  The general tone may have suggested a code to the suspicious, enough to make the censor believe he understood the secret message that was being sent, a commonplace grouse about the political situation at home, about which mere nuns could do nothing but grumble.

  Underneath that was another message, using the cipher that had been agreed while still in England. She took out her missal. The message took a few minutes to work out as she had to commit it to memory as she worked, leaving nothing written down. Soon she had it. News, now somewhat out of date, about the doings of the King’s Council and the secret plans of their victims to counter the accusations.

  Then something made her look twice and flatten out the vellum and the scrawl of water-stained ink marks on it.

  Do not trust him under any circumstances. I know him well. He is… The following word was almost obliterated but it looked like deadly.

  She stared. Whom should she not trust?

  The wind snatched at the paper she was holding, forcing her to bring it close under her hood to reread it. She could nowhere find a name. It made no sense. Mangled by the courier over the long miles from England, it looked as if a page or two was missing. It cannot be, she exclaimed aloud.

  Had the censer got to it first? To make any sense of it he would have to know the cipher and she was sure it could not be broken by anyone who did not have the key.

  ‘A curse on him!’ she shouted in sudden rage. Her voice flew away on the wind. ‘Curse you! Curse the courier! Curse the censor! Curse all the saints! Who does she mean?’

  It was pointless to give way to anger. After her outburst she became calm, glanced towards the door, checked her knife, reassured herself that everything was as it should be then placed the letter in her scrip and closed her eyes to focus on what she must do next.

  **

  The warning would refer to someone she had mentioned in her letter to the Prioress. Of course she had mentioned Hubert in passing, her surprise at finding him here, in Clement’s pocket as it were.
She had mentioned Athanasius. And had she mentioned Grizac? She was sure she had. Anyone else? Pope Clement of course. Each had their own cipher which she had communicated to the prioress.

  I know him well.

  The Prioress knew Hubert well but had no need to inform Hildegard of the fact. She must know Athanasius. He had admitted it himself. Did she know Grizac? He had been in York for some time and they could easily have met. And Clement? It was unlikely that she knew him personally, and anyway, it was general knowledge that he was treacherous, nobody needed to be told.

  Hildegard did not trust any of them anyway.

  Common sense told her that the prioress was probably trying to warn her against loose talk, an incautious word that might betray her allegiance and cause her to be summoned in front of the council of heretics. She could guard against that easily enough.

  Do not trust him.

  She didn’t.

  She wouldn’t.

  She wouldn’t trust any of them.

  The prioress must mean Grizac.

  **

  Before she returned to the lower floor she went over to the crenellated parapet and gazed down again with her thoughts still teasing out the different strands of the problem that presented itself.

  The river was as swollen as ever, still swamping the mead on both banks and hurling debris along from further upstream to gather under the arches nearest the bank where the current was slowest and sluicing as fast as ever under the chapel with its guiding light.

  Her gaze sharpened.

  John Fitzjohn’s small troop of cavalry had not gone out into the countryside to hunt as expected but were now down on the river bank outside the ferryman’s cottage. They were almost too far away to be seen but she narrowed her eyes to try to make out what was going on.

  Evidently someone had kicked in the door because it hung aslant as if on one hinge. Of the ferryman himself there was no sign. After what happened earlier he must be cowering inside with his knife at the ready.

  Heart suddenly in her mouth she leaned against the parapet out of the wind to watch.

  Fitzjohn was waving an arm as if giving instructions. The men scattered and one or two splashed through the water to take something into the cottage. They came out again. Others seemed to be searching along the waterline for something. One of them dragged a few broken branches to the door but Fitzjohn waved him back. His horse was kicking up water and champing at the bit.