Hugh Corbett 13 - Corpse Candle

by Paul Doherty

  Lady Margaret closed her eyes.

  ‘I . . . I think . . .’

  ‘You suspect what happened,’ Corbett finished the sentence for her.

  She glanced at him sharply, opened her mouth to reply but paused at a sound from outside.

  ‘How did you get to know, Corbett? When I heard of your arrival I thought it would take you years even to suspect the truth.’

  ‘Heloise Argenteuil . . .’

  ‘That silly, little secret!’ she interrupted. ‘A fairy tale, a jest.’

  ‘It was obvious that Sir Stephen loved someone.’ Corbett remarked. ‘Once I knew Heloise Argenteuil was a fiction I began to wonder why. I suspected that your enmity was not as real as it appeared. And, as for you, Salyiem . . .’

  ‘I didn’t betray my master.’

  ‘Not deliberately,’ Corbett agreed. ‘I always wondered why the Abbot should open his heart to you, but, of course, he was accustomed to do so. And then there was his Remembrance Book – why should Abbot Stephen pray for a woman who never existed? I finally realised that Heloise Argenteuil was what he called you, wasn’t it?’ Corbett placed his hand over Lady Margaret’s.

  ‘Will I be arrested?’ Lady Margaret asked.

  Corbett shook his head. ‘It may be a sin to love unwisely but it’s not a crime.’

  ‘I was present at my husband’s death.’

  ‘But you did not will it. If the truth be known, I doubt Daubigny wanted him killed either. It just happened and the poisoned flower took root. Now, decades later, it comes to full flower.’

  Corbett got to his feet, he felt slightly stiff, tense.

  ‘But you will arrest someone?’

  ‘Oh yes, my lady. I must ask you and your servant Salyiem to remain here at Harcourt. He is not to return to St Martin’s until tomorrow.’

  Corbett bowed and, followed by Chanson and Ranulf, left the hall. Their horses were brought round. Corbett swiftly mounted, bracing himself against the cold breeze which seemed to have strengthened.

  ‘Heloise Argenteuil!’ Ranulf exclaimed. ‘So much from so little?’

  Corbett gathered the reins. ‘So much for so little, Ranulf, but that’s the way of the human heart, isn’t it? We’ll travel swiftly back to St Martin’s. I will go direct to the Abbot’s chamber. Once there I will tell you whom to gather.’

  ‘Will it be dangerous?’ Chanson asked.

  ‘Oh yes.’ Corbett dug his spurs in. ‘We are dealing with a heart full of hate!’

  Corbett sat in the Abbot’s lodgings. He’d arrived back and walked around St Martin’s, measuring out distances. He felt as if the abbey had closed in around him. Gargoyle faces contrasted with the holy demeanour of saints depicted in the stained glass windows. The statues in their carved niches staring stonily down at him. The hollow creak of his boots echoed along pavement and passageways. He opened his eyes and mind to impressions of the abbey: the dark, musty cellars and cavernous chambers; the different smells of the abbey, beeswax and ink, vellum and manuscripts; the coldness of the death house; the sweet warmth of the kitchens. Now he was ready for the final confrontation. There was a knock on the door and Prior Cuthbert came in. He still looked frozen, whilst mud heavily caked his robe and sandals.

  ‘Sir Hugh, I would like to speak to you alone.’

  ‘What is it?’

  Prior Cuthbert shuffled his feet in embarrassment.

  ‘We opened the funeral barrow.’

  ‘And?’ Corbett asked.

  ‘We found a coffin, many centuries old. The wood was rotting but of good quality. Inside lay a skeleton, a person of rank.’

  ‘So, you found your saintly Sigbert?’

  ‘No, from the fabric and the ornaments we could tell the coffin must have contained the corpse of a woman.’

  The Prior looked sheepishly at Corbett, who threw his head back and bellowed with laughter.

  ‘You are sure?’ he asked.

  ‘As sure as I am of standing here. The skeleton was whole and undecayed. It is miraculous! It even had tufts of blonde hair still on the skull. It bore a sword mark here.’ The Prior touched his left shoulder, just below his neck.

  ‘And who do you think it was?’ Corbett asked, drying his eyes on the back of his hand.

  ‘We consulted the manuscripts. It may have been Sigbert’s eldest daughter Bertholda, a Frankish princess. She, too, ruled the small kingdom which once existed here. The heathens may have martyred her because of her faith.’

  Corbett leaned back in the chair and studied this shrewd Prior.

  ‘So, you have your relic?’

  ‘Yes, Sir Hugh, we have our relic. It’s being preserved in the death house.’

  Corbett clapped his hands. ‘You mean until this matter is over. Ranulf!’ he shouted at his henchman who had been guarding the door. ‘Bring the rest up! Father Prior, we have business!’

  One by one they entered the chamber: the members of the Concilium, Dunstan, Aelfric and Richard; Archdeacon Wallasby and finally Perditus. They sat on the stools Ranulf had prepared. Chanson guarded the door whilst Ranulf came and sat beside Corbett. Sir Hugh took out his commission, displaying the royal seal, and laid it on the desk. To show he was one of the King’s Justices, his sword was placed beside it.

  ‘I am the King’s Commissioner in these parts,’ Corbett began. ‘For all intents and purposes this is a court, busy on the matters of the Crown. First, I wish to comment on the death of Abbot Stephen and the hideous murders perpetrated in this abbey. So, Abbot Stephen’s death,’ Corbett pulled himself up and stared round. ‘To all intents and purposes you are all guilty.’ He made a cutting movement with his hand to quell their protests. ‘In many ways,’ he continued, ‘Abbot Stephen was an eccentric man. A priest searching for a reason for both his faith and his vocation. I shall not explain, not yet, why Sir Stephen Daubigny became a monk but he had his secrets, including the violent death of his old friend Sir Reginald Harcourt whose pathetic remains were found in that funeral barrow.’ Corbett paused. ‘Daubigny was responsible for his death.’

  ‘No!’ Aelfric protested. ‘It cannot be!’

  ‘Yes, it is true and I can prove it. He killed Harcourt, not maliciously but in a violent quarrel over a woman they both loved. Daubigny hid his sin behind pretence but atoned for it by a life of reparation. Daubigny, however, didn’t believe in God, His angels or the power of the Church. He constantly searched for proof. He became an avid scholar, a peritus, a theologian skilled in the study of demonology. By pursuing Satan,’ Corbett added, ‘Abbot Stephen thought he might find God. I suppose his life as an Abbot provided some peace until his ambitious Concilium started to make demands about the funeral barrow.’

  ‘So, he wasn’t protecting sacred remains?’ Prior Cuthbert interrupted. ‘But his own secret sin?’

  ‘Of course. Now,’ Corbett continued, trying to hide his gaze from the man he knew to be the assassin, ‘the Concilium waged their own private secret war against their Abbot.’

  ‘We did not!’ Brother Dunstan exclaimed.

  ‘You did!’ Corbett banged his fist on the table. ‘Not openly! The Rule of St Benedict is quite clear about the obedience of a community to its Abbot. You all went your different ways until Archdeacon Wallasby entered these hallowed precincts to wreak his own mischief. He wanted to humiliate Abbot Stephen, to prove that he wasn’t an exorcist. He was helped, was he not, by some of you? But as he plotted, treachery curled back like a viper and struck its handlers. Taverner, the cunning man, was much impressed by your Father Abbot; at first involved in Wallasby’s malicious scheming, Taverner later refused any part in the mummery and mischief you’d planned.’

  ‘What is this?’ Prior Cuthbert exclaimed.

  He stared round at his companions but the expressions on Aelfric’s and Wallasby’s faces showed him Corbett was telling the truth.

  ‘Oh, Father Prior, don’t be so sanctimonious,’ Corbett declared, ‘you must have heard whispers about what was plotted?’

  ‘Yes,
yes, he did,’ Aelfric interrupted. ‘Oh come, come, Brother,’ the infirmarian jibed. ‘You knew Wallasby and I met. Surely you suspected Taverner wasn’t what he claimed to be?’

  ‘You did worse than that, didn’t you, Father Prior?’ Corbett tapped his fingers on the pommel of his sword. ‘You went hunting by yourself. One night you saw your Father Abbot embrace and kiss a shadowy figure, dressed like a monk, out in Bloody Meadow. You accused him of unnatural vice, hinted that exposure might bring disgrace, threatened that if you did not have your way regarding the building of the guesthouse . . .’

  Corbett paused at the protests and exclamations which broke out. Prior Cuthbert sat, head down, like a convicted prisoner ready to be led off to Newgate and the executioner’s cart. Aelfric sneered whilst Richard and Dunstan looked horrified.

  ‘How could you!’ the Almoner shouted. ‘How could you!’

  ‘It’s a lie,’ the treasurer declared leaning forward, red-faced. ‘Sir Hugh, that’s a lie!’

  ‘No, Prior Cuthbert had half the truth. He saw Father Abbot kiss and embrace a member of his community but he didn’t know the reason why. I’ll come to that in a while. Anyway, Father Abbot felt trapped. He knew a gulf had opened up between himself and his brothers. The issue of Bloody Meadow was a dagger pointed at his heart, an invitation to all the demons from his past to return. He could never give way, so the tension between him and you only intensified. If he did surrender, his secret sin would be exposed. A man of shaky faith, Abbot Stephen retreated into himself, believing his past had returned to haunt him. On the day that Abbot Stephen died, something in his soul snapped, shattered.’ Corbett paused. ‘On that same evening Abbot Stephen came up to this chamber. He locked and barred the windows and doors and he began to brood. He could see no way out of his predicament. The night wore on. He drank some wine and glanced through the window.’ Corbett half turned and pointed. ‘He saw the reflection of the candles in the glass. In the Abbot’s fevered, distraught imagination he believed he was seeing his own Corpse Candles beckoning him to death: that’s why he wrote down the quotation from St Paul, about seeing things through a glass, darkly and about the Corpse Candles, those mysterious lights seen on the marshes beyond the abbey, beckoning him to death. The Scriptures provided little comfort for him. Instead Abbot Stephen reflected on the ancient Romans, their culture, the civilisation he so deeply loved. He recalled Seneca, the famous Roman philosopher, who wrote: “Anyone can take away a man’s life, but no one his death”. Abbot Stephen brooded on those words, sinking deeper and deeper into a morass of despair and depression, what the theologians called the sin against the Holy Ghost.’

  Corbett stared at the Prior. The awful realisation had dawned on Cuthbert. He sat like a man facing death, mouth opening and closing as if he wished to speak but couldn’t find the words to express himself.

  ‘Oh Domine Jesu, Miserere Nobis!’ the Prior whispered. ‘Sir Hugh, are you saying Abbot Stephen committed suicide?’

  The chamber fell deathly silent. Corbett stared at each of them.

  ‘Abbot Stephen,’ Corbett chose his words carefully, ‘was a man driven to the brink and finally tipped over. He could see no way out except the Roman way, the fate of Seneca.’ Corbett pointed at the coffer. ‘He took out his dagger, sat in his chair, positioned it carefully and thrust it deep into his chest. It would have taken only a matter of seconds, a terrible searing pain, before he lost consciousness, which is why no clamour was heard, no cry, no disturbance. Abbot Stephen’s soul slipped silently into endless night.’

  Prior Cuthbert sat with his face in his hands, shoulders shaking.

  ‘You can weep,’ Brother Aelfric shouted, ‘but his blood is on your hands!’

  ‘His blood is on all your hands!’

  Everyone turned to Perditus. He had moved his stool as if he wished to study each of their faces.

  ‘You are all murdering bastards! This is not a monastery, it’s the place of the Red Slayer!’ He lapsed into German, ‘Der Rode Schlächter. You call yourselves the sons of Benedict? No, you are the sons of Cain!’

  They all stared at this lay brother who sat erect, his face contorted with hatred and rage.

  ‘How dare you!’ Brother Aelfric shouted.

  ‘Oh be quiet!’ Perditus showed his teeth, like the snarl of an attacking dog. ‘You with your drooling eyes and ever-wet nose! You are worse than animal shit!’

  Corbett watched intently. Perditus wasn’t angry with him. All the while Corbett had been speaking, Perditus had sat with a slight smile on his face, head imperceptibly nodding in agreement at his words. Now the truth was out and he couldn’t contain himself. Corbett glanced at Ranulf, to see that his henchman had quietly withdrawn his dagger and had it balanced in his lap.

  Corbett banged the pommel of his sword on the desk. Perditus paused in his diatribe, not so much because of Corbett but more because he could no longer vent his rage but sat like a man who had run a long, demanding race, gasping and gulping for air.

  ‘Abbot Stephen’s death,’ Corbett remarked quietly, ‘was a hideous sin and the consequence of a heinous threat. It marked the beginning of the real horrors. Isn’t that right, Perditus? How much did Abbot Stephen tell you?’

  The lay brother’s face was ashen except for the red spots of anger high in his cheeks. He shook his head.

  ‘You can speak both English and German,’ Corbett continued matter of factly. ‘I noticed that when I took you back to your chamber after the alleged attack upon you. One of the manuscripts you were reading was in German. I don’t know the tongue but I recognised the cursive script. Where did you get it from, the library?’

  Perditus smiled coldly.

  ‘You were raised to speak German and English fluently. You no more come from Bristol than I do. If I made careful search there, I am sure no one would recall you.’

  ‘What is this?’ Wallasby demanded, stamping with his boot.

  ‘You!’ Perditus turned on him. ‘Will . . . shut . . . up! Because . . . you!’ Perditus jabbed his finger at the frightened Archdeacon, ‘were also on my list. You should thank God, Wallasby, that this clerk kept you from leaving St Martin’s. You were special to me, and if you had left, I would have followed.’

  Ranulf was about to interrupt but Corbett gestured him to stay silent.

  ‘Scaribrick and his wolf’s-heads may not have captured you,’ Perditus taunted, ‘but I would have done.’

  The Archdeacon gulped and looked at Corbett for protection. The clerk stared back.

  ‘I planned to take you on your horse. I was going to put a rope around your neck, half hang you from a branch and use you as an archer’s butt, to improve my aim and my skill.’

  ‘Were you an archer?’ Corbett interrupted. ‘A bowman?’

  ‘I was more than that,’ Perditus, now distracted, turned back.

  ‘Yes, I am sure you were,’ Corbett agreed. ‘Let me see, a professional mercenary, hired by the nobility and powerful merchants of Germany? You and Abbot Stephen discussed Vegetius treatise, The Art of War, so you must have been a professional soldier once?’

  ‘I was a Ritter, a knight,’ Perditus declared. ‘My real name is Franz Chaudenvelt. I led my own company,’ he added proudly. He sat, head back as if reminiscing with friends in a tavern, eyes bright with pride. ‘I commanded mounted men, hobelars and bowmen.’ Perditus faced him squarely.

  Corbett wondered whether his look was admiration at Corbett’s discovery or pride in his own bloody deeds.

  ‘I made mistakes, didn’t I?’ Perditus confessed. ‘I knew I shouldn’t have left that book on the floor. And, of course . . .’

  ‘Yes,’ Corbett interrupted, eager to take over the conversation. ‘You talked of phalanxes, describing how the abbey could be defended. Of course, the irony was, you were talking about defending it against yourself!’

  ‘He is the assassin? He killed them all?’ Prior Cuthbert exclaimed, shaking his head as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

 
‘Of course he is,’ Corbett agreed. ‘Perditus saw himself as God’s justice, his vengeance on the men who had driven Abbot Stephen to his death.’

  ‘He told me, you know,’ Perditus almost shouted, ‘he told me how the dogs were snapping at his ankles, always demanding . . . Abbot Stephen didn’t fear any of you.’ His voice turned to a snarl.

  ‘Did he tell you what the funeral barrow contained?’ Corbett asked. ‘No, he wouldn’t, would he?’

  Perditus shook his head. ‘He simply said it must not be disturbed. He made mysterious references to that funeral barrow being the hub of his life: he never explained what he meant.’ He smiled at Corbett. ‘You are a clever clerk. Abbot Stephen was always drawing that diagram of the wheel. When I climbed up the funeral barrow I realised what it had meant. No wonder he admired that mosaic in the cellars. But they,’ his voice rose as he pointed at the monks, ‘are the true assasins. Abbot Stephen was driven distracted by their pleas, their hints, their threats. Oh yes, Prior,’ Perditus jibed. ‘He told me how you had seen us out in Bloody Meadow; about your blackmail and your nasty threats. If I’d had my way I’d have cut your scrawny throat, but Abbot Stephen would have no violence.’

  ‘You were Abbot Stephen’s lover?’ Brother Dunstan spoke up.

  ‘Shut up, you fat, lecherous slob! What do you know about love except between the thighs of some tavern wench! Tell them, Corbett. You seem to know everything! ’

  ‘Abbot Stephen loved Perditus,’ Corbett replied quietly. ‘But it was not an unnatural vice but the most natural love: Perditus was his son.’

  In any other circumstances the looks on the monks’ faces would have provoked Corbett to laughter.

  ‘Son?’ Brother Aelfric exclaimed. ‘How could a priest have a son?’

  ‘Don’t be stupid! Priests’ bastards litter one end of Christendom to another,’ Perditus snarled.

  ‘Abbot Stephen,’ Corbett explained, ‘did not father his child when he was a monk but when he was a member of Edward’s court, a knight banneret. Perditus?’