Hugh Corbett 13 - Corpse Candle

by Paul Doherty

  Corbett breathed in deeply. No, it was not like that. True, he had never met Abbot Stephen. Prior Cuthbert and his community were strangers. This was the first time he had visited St Martin’s-in-the-Marsh. Nevertheless, Corbett felt as if he was now part of the abbey and it part of him. He recalled the answer he had given Ranulf.

  ‘I am not now in the Schools of Oxford,’ he’d replied. ‘The analogy is not suitable, appropriate or logical. My great fear, Ranulf, and that of the Lady Maeve, is that one of these days, in the middle of some bloody intrigue, I’ll receive my death blow. No, Ranulf, we are not scholars or masters of logic. More like knights in a tournament – yet this is not some friendly joust on a May Day field. Oh, we are armed with sword and shield but our eyes are blindfolded. We stand in a chamber full of shadows and, before we can escape, we must trap and kill the sons and daughters of Cain.’

  Corbett smiled now at the dramatic way he had spoken but it was true. St Martin’s-in-the-Marsh was a darkened chamber. God knows what assassins it housed? Corbett opened his eyes and stared down the transept. Even a place like this, the House of God and Gate of Heaven, was no sanctuary against the flying arrow or the sudden, vicious thrust of knife or sword. Corbett listened carefully; but heard nothing, except the wind battering at a loose door above the squeak and scurry of mice. He sighed, got to his feet and went out into the grounds.

  Corbett continued his search through herb gardens and courtyards, down porticoes, across small cloister garths, around the infirmary and refectory. He passed the Chapter House, its doors closed, its windows full of light. Corbett heard the murmur of voices. All the time he kept a hand on his dagger, listening for any untoward sound. The abbey lay silent. The sky was grey and lowering. The wind, sharp and bitter, carried small flurries of snow. Corbett wondered if tomorrow all would be carpeted in white. It would make things difficult for the murderer, he reflected, but also for us. At last Corbett was satisfied. He had, in his own mind, a plan of the abbey. He also realised what a powerful and wealthy place it was. He could understand why Prior Cuthbert was so eager to build a new guesthouse. He walked down towards the curtain wall and paused at the Judas gate just as the bell tolled, the sign that the Chapter meeting was over. Corbett opened the gate and went through. Bloody Meadow stretched out like a great circle, oak trees on either side curving down to Falcon’s Brook. A mist was seeping in and, through the trees, Corbett glimpsed the labourers in the fields: he heard the wheels of a cart, the crack of a whip and the harsh braying of oxen as they heaved at the plough. Corbett drew his dagger and knelt down. The frozen grass was hard. He cut deep, picked up the small sod and crumbled the ice-hard soil between his fingers.

  ‘Still the farmer’s son,’ Corbett murmured to himself. He recognised how rich the earth was. In summer the grass would be green, long and lush. It was good meadow land or, if put to the plough, the crops would sprout thick and high. No wonder Abbot Stephen had been reluctant to build on it. Corbett brushed the soil from his fingers and got to his feet. In the centre of the meadow the tumulus rose like a great finger beckoning him forwards. Corbett walked across and inspected it carefully. Abbot Stephen was correct: the tumulus or funeral barrow was man-made and had been carefully laid out in proper proportions. He patted its surface and tried to climb it but the grass was thick with frost and slippery so he contented himself with walking around. The light was fading. At last he found what the sub-prior had seen: just at eye level, someone had cut into the tumulus. Corbett removed the loose earth. The hole beneath was about six inches across. Corbett looked round for the loosened soil but realised that whoever had dug must have gathered it up and taken it away. He felt inside: the man-made burrow was long. Corbett withdrew his hand.

  ‘Of course!’ he whispered. Whoever had done this had come out late in the evening and hacked away a piece which could later be used to conceal his handiwork. The intruder had burrowed down and used a long pole or spear shaft to probe, to discover what lay deep within. A coffin – a sarcophagus? Corbett placed the sod back in its place. Had it been Prior Cuthbert, he wondered? Abbot Stephen? Or even Master Taverner, who must have been attracted by the mystery of this place?

  Corbett wiped his hands on the wet grass, dried them on his cloak and walked on. The great oak trees stood in a line from the abbey walls down to Falcon Brook, so symmetrical Corbett wondered if they had been planted deliberately? Squat, round trunks with powerful black branches reaching up to the greying sky. Corbett stared back at the tumulus. With the abbey wall at one end, the oaks on either side resembled the pillars of a church whilst the tumulus in the centre looked like a place of worship. He walked into the shadow of the oaks. Corbett could hear faint sounds from the abbey, as well as the trundling of carts and the shouts of the labourers as they finished their work in the far fields. The abbey bell began to toll again. Corbett recalled how Prior Cuthbert had ordered special prayers to be said for both Taverner and the sub-prior now stiffening under their corpse sheets in the death house.

  The undergrowth between the oaks was thick in places. Corbett had to watch his step. He paused at the great burn mark which scorched the grass and brambles. Corbett crouched down and prodded at it with his dagger: black, flakey ash about six inches broad, the scorch mark stretched for at least two yards. Poachers, Corbett wondered? Mystified, he got to his feet and continued. He left the oaks and walked to the edge of Falcon Brook. It was really nothing more than a rivulet about a yard across. On the far bank was a line of straggling bushes and gorse. The brook was sluggish and against each bank a thick green slime had formed. Corbett carefully scrambled down and measured its depth with his boots: no more than a foot. The brook was probably man-made, its water diverted from the swamp or the fens; certainly not used by the Harcourts or the abbey either as a source of fresh water or fish for the kitchens. Corbett pulled himself out and froze. Further along the bank, on a hummock of grass beneath a willow, sat one of the monks, cowl pulled forward, head down, hands up the sleeves of his robe. He was so deep in thought he hadn’t heard Corbett approach. He sat like a statue. Corbett drew his dagger, walked softly forward and coughed. The figure didn’t stir. Corbett felt a prickle of fear along his back.

  ‘Pax vobiscum, Brother!’ he called out and sighed with relief as the figure started and turned, one hand going up to push back the cowl. Corbett recognised Brother Dunstan the treasurer. The monk leapt to his feet, hands flailing. Corbett could see he had been crying.

  ‘Brother Dunstan, this is a cold and lonely place to meditate and pray!’

  The monk, feet slipping on the wet grass, made his way forward.

  ‘I thought you were at the chapter meeting! Brother, what is the matter?’

  Brother Dunstan’s eyes were swollen from crying. The man raised a hand to brush away the tears from his cheek, displaying a row of fingernails bitten to the quick.

  ‘We are going to die, aren’t we, clerk?’

  Corbett stared round the monk and noticed the small wine-skin lying on the grass.

  ‘Brother Dunstan, we are all going to die: that doesn’t mean we must camp out in the cemetery and wait for it to happen.’

  ‘I didn’t attend the chapter meeting,’ Brother Dunstan slurred. ‘What’s the use, Sir Hugh? I brought some wine here and decided to think.’

  ‘Is there any left?’

  The monk grinned and stepped back. He picked up the wineskin and tossed it over. Corbett lifted the wineskin. He drank and handed it back.

  ‘Remember the good book: a little wine gladdens the heart but too much dulls the soul. Brother Dunstan, you sat there like a man the world has forgotten.’

  ‘I am worried, I truly am.’ Brother Dunastan grasped the wineskin as if it was a precious relic. ‘The news of these deaths will soon spread. Pilgrims won’t come. Merchants will be reluctant to stay. Moreover, when the King hears . . .’

  ‘It will pass,’ Corbett reassured him. ‘You are frightened about the abbey’s revenues?’

  Brother Dunstan nodde
d quickly.

  You’re lying, Corbett thought: this abbey is rich and powerful enough to withstand a year-long siege.

  ‘What are you truly worried about, Brother?’

  The monk looked away. ‘Sin!’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘Sin!’ Brother Dunstan repeated. ‘It’s true what the proverb says, isn’t it, clerk? Your sins will find you out.’

  ‘What sins?’

  ‘Abbot Stephen was a good father. He was strict yet gentle and kind.’ Brother Dunstan glanced back towards the massed buildings of St Martin’s. ‘He knew our sins but was compassionate.’

  ‘Did you confess to him?’ Corbett asked.

  Brother Dunstan nodded. ‘He shrived me and gave me good counsel.’ The monk’s watery eyes came up. ‘He was a good priest, clerk. I have never met his like before. Now we shall be punished for our sins.’

  ‘First, what do you mean, his like?’ Corbett stepped closer.

  ‘It was almost,’ Brother Dunstan bit his lip, ‘almost as if he believed there was no sin.’ He glimpsed Corbett’s puzzlement. ‘You’d have to listen to him to know what I mean.’

  ‘And yet he was an exorcist?’ Corbett demanded. ‘He believed in Satan and all his power.’

  ‘I know, I know, it’s a conundrum.’

  ‘Did Abbot Stephen have a father confessor?’

  ‘Yes, yes, he did.’ Brother Dunstan’s fingers went to his lips. ‘He told me once that sometimes he confessed to a priest he met on his journeys but there was also someone in the abbey. Ah yes, Brother Luke! He used to be the infirmarian here, and is now almost a hundred years old! Brother Luke says he can remember King John when he progressed through Norfolk. Old Luke! A sharp mind in an ageing body!’

  Corbett promised himself that he would seek this old one out.

  ‘It’s beginning to snow,’ Brother Dunstan declared.

  White, soft flakes were lazily floating down. The sky was now low, a dark grey.

  ‘It will be a cold night,’ Brother Dunstan whispered.

  Corbett looked back towards the soaring towers, spires and gables of St Martin’s-in-the-Marsh. Strange, he mused, how a place can change. When he’d first approached the gatehouse, the abbey had seemed welcoming, a pleasant refuge from the wilderness which surrounded it. Now it looked sinister, forbidding, even threatening.

  ‘I am cold,’ Brother Dunstan murmured, stamping his feet. ‘Sir Hugh, are you walking back?’

  Corbett agreed. They crossed the field; the snowfall was now heavy.

  ‘What did you mean,’ Corbett asked, ‘about Abbot Stephen almost believing there was no sin? You called it a conundrum.’

  Brother Dunstan pulled up his cowl. Corbett wondered if it was as much to hide his face as for protection against the biting wind.

  ‘This is only a thought, Sir Hugh.’ The treasurer measured his words. ‘Philosophers argue about the existence of God. Sometimes I had the impression that Abbot Stephen had gone the other way, that it was almost easier for him to discover the spiritual life through the world of demons, though I wouldn’t dare say that to our community.’

  ‘So, Abbot Stephen saw the rite of exorcism as a journey into the darkness?’

  ‘Why not?’ Brother Dunstan laughed abruptly. ‘We live in a sea of evil, Sir Hugh: murder, rape, theft, lawlessness.’ He sighed. ‘You very rarely meet an Angel of Light.’

  Corbett was about to continue the discussion when the Judas gate was abruptly thrown open and Brother Perditus appeared waving his hands.

  ‘Sir Hugh, you’d best come!’

  ‘Oh no!’ Brother Dunstan murmured. ‘Not another death!’

  ‘What is it?’ Corbett shouted.

  Perditus just gestured at him to hurry. Corbett quickened his stride. The lay brother stood agitated.

  ‘I bear a message from Brother Aelfric. You must come, he wishes to show you something.’

  He led them back through the Judas gate and across the abbey grounds. Aelfric was at the back of the infirmary where a stout shed had been built against the wall. Corbett entered the Death House. Inside it was warm: braziers glowed in the darkness; the hooded candles gleamed and oil lamps threw shifting pools of light. The Death House contained five or six long tables. Hamo and Taverner’s corpses occupied two, and heavy canvas sheeting covered them both.

  ‘I came back from the chapter meeting,’ Aelfric explained taking a candle, ‘and I noticed the door to the Death House was off the latch. Sir Hugh, look at this!’

  He pulled back the sheets covering Hamo and Taverner and lowered the candle to reveal a hideous ‘V’ mark branded into the forehead of each corpse.

  ‘God and his angels!’ Corbett exclaimed. ‘The assassin has a malevolence all his own. He has come back to claim the corpses – brand them as his own!’

  ‘How could it be done?’ Perditus whispered.

  Corbett pointed to the brazier. ‘It would only take a few seconds. The branding iron would be heated, and then the forehead marked.’ He turned to a bucket of water just near the door. ‘The iron was probably cooled in that. The courtyard outside is quiet, so the assassin would hear if anyone was around.’

  ‘True,’ Aelfric agreed. ‘And very few people come here. It’s not till the bodies are formally laid out that the community gathers to pay its respects.’

  Corbett pulled the sheets back over the bodies. He turned to find Aelfric, Dunstan and Perditus standing in the doorway. The dancing light made them look sinister, secretive.

  ‘I have had enough of the dead,’ Corbett murmured, brushing past them. ‘Brother Aelfric, there’s little I can do here, at least for the moment.’

  Corbett went out. Night was falling and the snow was coating the ground with a white dust. The abbey was busy with monks hurrying about finishing their tasks. Smoke billowed out from the kitchens as well as the fragrant odours of cooking meat and baking pies. Corbett pulled up his hood and walked back to the guesthouse. Once he was back in his own chamber he secured the door, drawing across the bolt. He lit the candles and oil lamps. An extra brazier had been wheeled in. Corbett took a pair of bellows and fired the coals until they glowed hot and red. The chamber had a small mantel hearth but Corbett decided not to light the wood. He went across and checked the wine cups, jug and the platter of dried fruit, bread and cheese. He could detect nothing wrong with them. He eased off his boots and lay down on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. He could make no sense of what was happening. Thoughts and images jumbled in his mind. He idly wondered how Ranulf and Chanson were doing.

  ‘A killer prowls here,’ Corbett whispered to himself, ‘who enjoys what he does. He’s turned this abbey on its head – no longer a place of sanctuary and prayer but of fear and sudden death.’

  But was it that in the first place? The more he learnt about Abbot Stephen, the more curious Corbett became. On the one hand a devout, learned monk; on the other, Abbot Stephen was a man full of uncertainty, even regret and remorse. Corbett’s eyes grew heavy. He drifted into sleep but was rudely awoken by a loud rapping at the door. He rolled off the bed, and picked up his sword belt which he had thrown onto the floor.

  ‘Who is it?’ he called.

  ‘Archdeacon Adrian. Sir Hugh, I need to speak to you.’

  Corbett withdrew the bolts and the Archdeacon stamped into the room. Without a by-your-leave, he took off his cloak, wet with melting snow, went across and warmed his hands over the brazier.

  ‘Corbett, it’s snowing.’

  ‘I can see that.’

  ‘I need to travel back to London. I want to be away from St Martin’s-in-the-Marsh.’

  ‘Why?’ Corbett demanded.

  ‘Business, my court in London awaits. I see no point in delay.’

  ‘Oh, I see every point.’

  Corbett sat on the bed. The Archdeacon turned. Are you frightened, Corbett wondered? Angry, or playing a game? The Archdeacon’s lip curled.

  ‘I need not take orders from you, Corbett!’

 
; ‘Oh yes you must!’ Corbett waved at the panniers stacked in the corner. ‘I carry the King’s commission!’

  ‘I am an ecclesiastic, a clerk in Holy Orders!’

  ‘I wouldn’t care if you were the Angel Gabriel. For all I know, Archdeacon Adrian, you could be the assassin.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ The Archdeacon went across, picked up a chair, turned it round and slumped down on it. ‘I’m no more guilty than you, Corbett. Indeed,’ he spluttered, ‘how do we know you’re not the assassin?’

  ‘I wasn’t here when the Abbot died.’

  Corbett pulled the war belt across his lap and played with the dagger, pushing it in and out of its scabbard.

  ‘But you were here, Master Wallasby!’

  ‘Abbot Stephen was my friend, a colleague. You know the reason for my visit.’

  ‘You’re lying!’ Corbett pointed the dagger at his univited guest. ‘You weren’t Abbot Stephen’s friend, you were his rival, his opponent. Perhaps you resented his fame, and that’s why you devised this stratagem?’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Master Taverner, Carrefour, or whatever he’s called, whose corpse lies stiffening in the Death House. You know he’s been branded?’

  The Archdeacon swallowed hard and glanced at the door as if he regretted coming here.

  ‘If you hadn’t come, Master Wallasby, I would have sent for you. Now, let me see. You are an opponent of Abbot Stephen’s philosophy. You are a pragmatist, a lawyer. You don’t believe in elves and goblins, wood sprites or that the Powers of Hell can possess a man. You engaged Abbot Stephen in open debate. However, he proved to be a resourceful opponent with considerable evidence to justify what he did. Now, Archdeacon, you mentioned your court in London? In your role as a Judge of the Church you must have met the cunning man Carrefour, whom we now know as Taverner.’ Corbett paused. ‘You did know him, didn’t you? Master Wallasby, I don’t want to put you on oath. However, I am sure, if I searched the records of your court, I’d find reference to Taverner, that father of lies, being a constant visitor at your court.’