The Awful Secret

by Bernard Knight

  With this unpromising start, a cacophony of recrimination and protest began, some of it contributed by de Revelle. De Wolfe began shouting back and nothing was achieved above the din for several minutes. Then Roland de Ver rapped the pommel of his dagger upon the table and, in a steely voice, called for quiet. ‘Let us all regain our tempers! I wish for no personal quarrel with you, Coroner. I realise that you have been charged with certain duties by the king and I respect your fidelity in wishing to carry out your legal functions.’

  Somewhat mollified by this sensible statement, de Wolfe advanced to the table and nodded to the leader of the group. ‘When a man is killed against the king’s peace, especially a Norman knight, it cannot be ignored.’

  ‘God will not ignore it and that is what matters,’ said de Ver piously. ‘Pope Eugenius long ago made the Templars independent of archbishops and you well know that Rome has decreed to all states in Europe that our Order is to be exempt from all national laws. Thus, you have no jurisdiction over us and cannot interfere with our activities.’ He paused, then his tone changed to accusation. ‘Not only do we deny you the right to question us, but we wish to question you. We are concerned at your apparent intimacy with Gilbert de Ridefort, especially your insinuations that he imparted certain information to you. De Wolfe, did he or did he not expound on his crazed heretical beliefs?’

  ‘He did not – and I would have scant interest if he had. I am concerned with one thing only, and that is the manner of his death and who caused it.’

  Roland de Ver patently disbelieved him and again repeated his firm intention of not answering any questions on any subject.

  The coroner scowled at the calm features of this slim soldier-monk. ‘Are you confessing that you had something to do with the death of your fellow Templar, but are refusing to let me question you about it?’ he thundered.

  ‘Watch your tongue, de Wolfe,’ yelled Brian de Falaise, but de Ver held up his hand for silence.

  ‘The last part of your question is true. You may not question us about anything. The first part is unanswerable, as we say neither yea nor nay to anything you might ask. We do not – we cannot – forbid you to investigate this death. You are welcome and have a duty so to do, as long as you do not try to ask us anything about that or, indeed, any other subject that we choose not to discuss.’

  De Wolfe shook his head in exasperation. ‘Well, do you choose to discuss Templar land-holdings in Devon? That seems an innocuous subject.’

  His brother-in-law spoke up. ‘I have already told these good knights about our expedition to the north on Monday and they have agreed to accompany us. We would welcome the support of six seasoned warriors, especially as they have a specific interest in the rightful claim of their Order to the island of Lundy.’

  There was a silence, which allowed frayed tempers to simmer down. De Wolfe could see that the will of the Templars remained intractable and, having respect generally for their organisation, he had to admit defeat in any frontal attack upon them, though he remained highly suspicious of their involvement with the death of de Ridefort. His eyes roved over their faces, including those of the grimly silent squires, and he felt that any one of them might have slain de Ridefort, if their fanatical devotion to their Order demanded it. But there seemed no way of pursuing it now, though he resolved to continue investigating by any other means he could devise.

  They took his silence for defeat and the atmosphere relaxed a little, as Roland de Ver obtained more details from the sheriff of the departure on Monday morning, and the arrangements for accommodation, food and fodder en route for Barnstaple. The coroner remained silent throughout these exchanges and stood aside as the six Templars filed out, the knights giving him a cursory nod as they left for the priory of St Nicholas.

  He was left alone with Richard de Revelle, who breathed a deep sigh of relief. ‘John, why is it that you seem to antagonise every person of authority with whom you come in contact?’ he asked wearily. ‘The Templars are the most powerful force not only in England but in the whole of Christendom – and yet, within the blinking of an eye, you manage to incense them with your accusations!’

  ‘The dead man was also a Templar, but no one seems concerned about him,’ retorted de Wolfe.

  ‘He was a renegade of some sort, so Roland de Ver informs me,’ replied the sheriff. ‘Who are we to probe the mysteries of that occult Order? Keep out of it, John, it’s none of our business.’

  De Wolfe had his own ideas on that, but knew that it was useless arguing with de Revelle. He cared only about deferring to the most powerful men in the vicinity, men who even if they could not advance him would at least not hinder him in his eternal search for preferment. ‘Why are they willing to join our expedition on Monday?’ he asked, trying a slightly different tack.

  ‘As I told you, they say that their purpose in Devon is to seek new Templar holdings – so what more natural than that three tough fighters and their hardy squires should take the chance to investigate how their long-established grant of Lundy has been frustrated for so many years?’

  De Wolfe had to admit to himself that this seemed reasonable, given the long history of defeat that the Templar claim to the island had suffered. Cynically, he thought that maybe now that their task of eliminating Gilbert de Ridefort had been successfully completed, they felt that a few days’ diversion in the service of their Order might be appropriate.

  De Wolfe pushed himself upright from the table edge and the sheriff pointedly picked up a quill and a parchment, ready to continue his work. ‘So what is to be done about this dead knight? Is he to be pushed into a hole in the cathedral grounds and forgotten?’

  De Revelle brandished the feather of his pen at the coroner. ‘I would suggest doing just that. I don’t want to know about him, now that three senior Templars have warned us off. Forget it, John. Go on to your next case – it’s safer that way.’

  With a snort of disgust at his brother-in-law’s apathy, John stalked out and went home, but he was fated this night to have no peace. Outside his front door, he found his clerk hopping from foot to foot in impatience, with a summons from the archdeacon to visit him immediately at his house in Canon’s Row.

  Uneasy, but glad of another excuse to postpone sitting in his wife’s company, the coroner beckoned Thomas to accompany him and strode along the few yards of Martin’s Lane and into its continuation along the north side of the cathedral Close. Many of the twenty-four prebendaries of the cathedral lived here, together with their vicars, secondary priests and male servants, for theoretically no woman was allowed to reside in the Close.

  John de Alençon was Archdeacon of Exeter; the other three holding that rank in the episcopal hierarchy were archdeacons of other parts of the diocese. He was John’s special friend, a staunch supporter of Richard the Lionheart, which was more than could be said for the Bishop, the Treasurer and the Precentor. A thin, ascetic Norman, he nevertheless had a dry sense of humour, but tonight it was not much in evidence when de Wolfe entered his bare study in the narrow house facing the cathedral.

  ‘I have had a visit from this abbot from Italy, John,’ he began, without any preamble. ‘As the bishop has left for Canterbury, I had to receive him in the Chapter House and listen to his orders from France and Rome.’ He sounded bitter at what must have been a traumatic meeting with such a powerful emissary.

  ‘What orders were these, John?’ asked de Wolfe mildly.

  ‘That this corpse you brought back from somewhere is not to lie before an altar in the cathedral – and that it is not to be buried in the graveyard outside.’

  The coroner stared at his friend. ‘And what is to happen to him, then? A stake through his heart, then buried at midnight at the crossroads? Good God, man, the deceased was a monk, a follower of the Rule of Benedict. He can’t be consigned to an unmarked grave like a suicide!’

  The thin priest, enveloped from neck to toe in a black robe, looked saddened but resolute. ‘Those were my orders and, after being shown a signed a
uthority from the Vatican, I had no option but to obey.’

  Thanks to Thomas’s spying, John knew that this letter existed and was genuine. ‘But why? A few hours ago you allowed him to rest in the North Tower.’

  ‘That was before this Cosimo came to inform me of certain matters, John.’

  ‘What matters would they be?’

  John de Alençon shook his head sadly, the tight grey curls at the sides of his head lifting. ‘I cannot tell you that. He forbade it. Suffice it to say that, given the damage that this Gilbert might have done, I am not surprised that he came to a dreadful end. It is a wonder that he was not cloven in two by a lightning flash from heaven.’

  There was a moan from behind, and looking round, the coroner saw that his clerk was crossing himself in an almost frenzied way. ‘And you can tell me nothing more, old friend?’ he asked softly.

  ‘Not even you, John. Like the confessional, some things are inviolate, and the command of a messenger from the Holy Father is one of them, much as we may dislike its content.’

  ‘So what is to happen to Gilbert’s body? Are you going to eject it from the house of the God he served all his life?’

  The archdeacon’s blue eyes were stern. ‘I am not sure that latterly the man was much concerned with serving his God. But it is late and I am conveniently going to claim that nothing can now be done until morning.’

  ‘And what then?’

  ‘There is a small burial ground behind the church of St Bartholomew. I have prevailed upon the parish priest to have this body interred there in the morning, with the minimum of ceremony. The ground is consecrated and no doubt Abbot Cosimo will not be pleased, but I am willing to endure his displeasure in order to place this Templar in hallowed ground, even if the devil had entered his soul in his last days.’

  De Wolfe realised that his friend had gone out on a limb, probably as much to please him as for the repose of de Ridefort’s soul.

  ‘I dare not officiate, but the priest of St Bartholomew’s, William Weston, will put him in the ground with some appropriate words. I failed to tell him the whole story – indeed, I could not after the direct orders of Cosimo – so he will not be aware of the extent of the problem.’

  With that, de Wolfe had to be satisfied, and late in the evening, he took himself home to meet Matilda’s red-rimmed eyes.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  In which Crowner John attends a funeral

  Putting Gilbert de Ridefort to rest next morning was a quick and almost furtive exercise. Soon after dawn, two grave-diggers carried the shrouded body on a bier from the cathedral to St Bartholomew’s, a church in Bretayne, which had a burial ground against the north-west stretch of the town wall. Just after the ninth-hour bell, a few people straggled through the cold rain to stand briefly around the newly dug grave-pit.

  Uncoffined, but wrapped securely in his clothing, with a linen shroud stitched over the top, the former Knight Templar was lowered into the hole by the two labourers, whilst the gaunt parish priest, himself shrouded against the rain by a long leather cape, mumbled some unintelligible version of the Mass for the Dead. The spectators – for, with the exception of Matilda, one could hardly call them mourners – stood well back from the muddy pit, as if to distance themselves from the deceased. Apart from John de Wolfe and his wife, they consisted of the three Templar knights, with their impassive squires standing in the background, Gwyn, Thomas de Peyne – and Abbot Cosimo of Modena, also with his two grim retainers lurking behind him. A couple of heads were visible over the stone wall that divided the churchyard from a narrow lane, curious at such goings-on early on a Saturday morning.

  John had the strong impression that all those inside the graveyard had come solely to confirm that this dangerous and heretical renegade actually was buried in the earth and had not resurrected himself in a puff of sulphurous smoke.

  There was an almost palpable air of relief when the grave-diggers began shovelling sticky mud down on to the body, and within minutes of the congregation coming into the churchyard, the grave was filled in and they began silently dispersing.

  De Wolfe was surprised at the presence of the ‘opposition’, as he thought of them. All were suspects in his eyes, the only problem being that, with nine potential murderers, it was impossible to hazard a guess as to the real culprit or culprits: the way that Gilbert had died meant that either a single assailant or several might have killed him.

  The coroner’s original plan had been frustrated by the denial of burial in the cathedral: he had hoped to attempt the ‘ordeal of the bier’ while the body was lying there. He had brought it back from Stoke partly because he had hoped by some subterfuge to get the Templars and the abbot to view the corpse before it was buried to see if de Ridefort’s injuries might bleed again in the proximity of the killer. He was not sure in his own mind whether there was any truth in this mystical procedure, but it was approved by the Church and he had heard tales in the past that when suspects had been made to touch the bier, the corpse had bled. Now the three Templars ignored him, though Roland de Ver managed a moderately courteous nod in the direction of Matilda, before hurrying out of the small graveyard.

  De Wolfe was more interested in Abbot Cosimo, on whom he had never laid eyes until now. As Thomas had described, he was a short, slight man of middle age, with a strange facial profile, his forehead coming down in an absolutely straight line with his prominent nose. His hair was black and his complexion sallow, with a marked Mediterranean look about it. His small black eyes and thin lips over projecting teeth, gave him a rodent-like appearance. As the outspoken but perceptive Gwyn said later, he was the sort of creature you wanted to tread on when it crossed your path.

  As he passed to go to the gate, the abbot looked right through de Wolfe as if he didn’t exist, making no acknowledgement of him whatsoever. His two sour-faced acolytes closed ranks behind him, and the trio vanished rapidly into the rain, following the Templars. The abbot’s henchmen, who de Wolfe learned later were men-at-arms from the Temple in London, were heavily built men in sombre tunics and mantles, who seemed rarely to speak and certainly never smiled. He never discovered their names and they seemed to view anyone who approached Cosimo with suspicion, fingering their swords or daggers as if they expected an assassination attempt at any moment. As John came through the gate and stared after them, he saw that Cosimo had caught up with the knights and was talking animatedly to them.

  Matilda curtly expressed a wish to go to St Olave’s and, in such an unsavoury neighbourhood as Bretayne, demanded her husband’s company as escort, though the church was only a few hundred yards distant. The lanes were lined with hovels of board and cob, mostly roofed with turf or thatch, much of it tattered and disintegrating. Many of the dwellings were little better than ramshackle huts, tilted and leaning against each other. The narrow alleys were barely the span of two arms and the ground ran with sewage, rubbish and mud, amongst which dogs, cats, rats, fowls and a few pigs vied for space with urchins and toddlers, all seemingly oblivious of the filth and the rain.

  With Gwyn and Thomas trudging behind, de Wolfe chaperoned his wife to her favourite place of worship and then, with some relief, suggested to the others that they adjourn to the Bush for discussion and refreshment.

  As they crossed Fore Street, Gwyn looked several times over his shoulder, before stopping dead and staring back. ‘Who’s this following us?’

  De Wolfe swung round and experienced a momentary déjà vu sensation, harking back to de Ridefort’s early antics. A man in a wide-brimmed pilgrim’s felt hat was behind him, enveloped in a soaking cloak of nondescript dun colour. De Wolfe recognised the hat as having been on one of the heads looking over the graveyard wall a few minutes earlier. ‘What is it, fellow? Do you want me?’ he challenged.

  The man, tall and powerfully built, came up close to him and Gwyn stepped forward, his hand going to his dagger. The coroner had made a few enemies and, like Cosimo’s men, the Cornishman was ever on his guard. But his caution was unnecessary,
if the fellow’s first words were true.

  ‘Sir John, I am Bernardus de Blanchefort. I think you may have been expecting me.’

  With his cloak steaming over the wattle screen near John’s favourite table, the new arrival sat before a trencher of salt bacon and onions, a quart of ale by his elbow. Whether or not the man was still a Templar, he was allowed to eat the meat of four-legged animals, unlike the usual monk: the philosophy of the warrior-monks was that a fighting man needed to keep up his strength, which was also why the Order forbade its members to fast. Certainly, this warrior was eating Nesta’s viands with a gusto that suggested he had had little food that day. The coroner and his assistants sat around the table, each with a more modest meal than the famished newcomer. Nesta and Edwin hovered nearby, the nosy old pot-man concealing his avid curiosity less successfully than his mistress as they fussed with supplies of food and drink.

  ‘I arrived here from Weymouth yesterday, after a terrible passage a sennight ago from Caen,’ explained de Blanchefort, between mouthfuls. ‘I stayed last night in some fleapit tavern not far from here, whose landlord was a mean fat bastard who overcharged me.’

  ‘Willem the Fleming, at the Saracen!’ said Nesta indignantly, from where she stood at the end of the table. ‘He gives our inns in Exeter a bad name, the way he runs that hovel.’

  Bernardus had already been told by the coroner of the demise of his Templar friend. He said that he had gone to the funeral at St Bartholomew’s not because he knew the deceased was Gilbert de Ridefort but because he was seeking John de Wolfe to make himself known. He had been told by someone at the castle gate that the coroner was at the burial ground, but when he saw the Templars there and Abbot Cosimo, he had been shocked and kept clear of de Wolfe until the others had dispersed. ‘At first, I had no idea who the dead person might have been, but the sight of those wolves from the New Temple and Paris soon made it clear that it could only have been de Ridefort who had died.’