Blood of the Innocents

by Michael Jecks

  Fulk was sitting at the gate on a bench positioned so that travellers could rest their weary legs. He looked up as Berenger approached. ‘Evening, Fripper.’

  Berenger nodded and gratefully accepted the jug of ale Fulk passed him. He drank well, but not too deeply; he did not feel the need of intoxication, only a natural thirst.

  ‘The back, it is healing?’ Fulk asked.

  ‘Yes. I am much mended, my friend.’

  ‘It is good. Perhaps soon we shall leave this place.’

  ‘I am content here.’

  ‘It is good. But that only means it will be a sore temptation for companies of routiers or others.’

  ‘With God’s grace we can hope they will miss this place,’ Berenger said. ‘We can hope that the abbey will escape. What would an army do in this direction? It is far from Bordeaux.’

  ‘There is talk of the English coming this way.’

  Berenger gave a quick frown. ‘What would they come up here for?’

  ‘I don’t know. Perhaps it is Will and the company?’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  Suddenly all the ease which Berenger had felt settling on him in the last hours were gone. He took up Fulk’s jug and drank again.

  Wednesday 10 August

  Early the next morning the Infirmarer discovered Berenger lying on the floor near his bed, a pool of vomit close by his head.

  ‘Get off me!’ Berenger said, waving at him in a futile gesture of dismissal.

  ‘You need help to get up,’ the Infirmarer said calmly. ‘And you must do so as quickly as you may, or else I shall call the Abbot. If you are well enough to drink so much that you become this oafish, you are clearly well able to leave our gates and find your way to a tavern somewhere so that you can indulge your gluttonous whims to your heart’s content.’

  ‘I’m no glutton! I’m a routier! I’m guilty of things you cannot comprehend: a commander of routiers.’

  ‘Yes, however, there are none here with you. So for now, you are a drunk.’

  ‘Not drunk. I wish I was. Can’t you just leave me alone?’

  ‘I need you back in your bed. You defile the chamber. I will have to clean up all this.’

  ‘Piss on you!’

  The Infirmarer was a patient man. He often had cause to be, but there were times when his stores of goodwill to others ran a little dry, and this was one of those occasions. Berenger had drunk more than his share of wine every day, and to be in this stinking state, he must have taken an excess. He had brought nothing with him, so the only source for him was somewhere within the abbey. He grasped Berenger’s arms and hoisted him up, being careful not to harm his wounds, and placed him on his palliasse once more.

  ‘What was the cause of this?’

  Berenger blinked at him. ‘What do you mean? I drank a little, that is all.’

  ‘It is morning, Master. You have been drinking all night.’

  ‘It helps. I could not sleep.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘What does it matter? It helps.’

  ‘Is it your own acts of cruelty that keep you awake?’

  The Infirmarer watched him closely as he asked his questions. He had seen others who had been distraught by their own actions in battle, who had relived each bloody sword-cut into another’s face or body every night for their rest of their lives. It did not matter whether it was a man fighting to defend himself in the line of battle, or whether it was a man taking revenge for an insult, often it was the mere fact of surviving that led a man to question his place in the world.

  ‘Not my cruelty, no. I can hardly remember them all,’ Berenger said with a twisted grin.

  ‘Then what ails you?’

  ‘You cannot understand.’

  ‘Then it is a woman,’ the Infirmarer said.

  Berenger said nothing, but his eyes fell to studying the floor.

  ‘Who was she?’

  ‘She was my wife,’ Berenger said, and suddenly the tears began to flow. He dashed them away angrily.

  ‘What happened to her?’

  ‘The pestilence came. That’s what happened. It took her, just as it took my son. I was happy for the first time in many years, and after Calais I settled with her in the town. King Edward was generous with the houses and plots in Calais, and I took one. I married. But we knew only a year of joy, before the pestilence took her son. She was already large with our child when he died, I think that made her ill. She had the baby too early and he died, and a little while later, she died too. I think from a broken heart. And I wanted to. I really wanted to die. But I couldn’t. I didn’t.’

  ‘You cannot take your own life. No man can choose when his life will end. Only God can decide that.’

  ‘I’m not strong enough to kill myself or I would have done, many times over the years. If God had any compassion He would have taken me by now.’

  ‘So, what will you do? Continue drinking until you have dissolved your brain? Are you so determined to die?’

  ‘It is all those I’ve seen dead. They come to me at night and torment me!’

  ‘Perhaps it is your feeling of guilt that brings them to your mind?’

  Berenger gave him a look of disgust. ‘You think I am evil because I’ve been a soldier? I’ve known loss too! I lost my wife and sons, damn you!’

  ‘And they would be happy to see you like this? Self-destructive and selfish to the suffering of all others?’

  ‘My wife would understand.’

  ‘Why should she? She would not understand your behaviour any more than I can.’

  ‘She understands me, damn you! She too comes to me in my sleep.’

  ‘Perhaps. Her shade may come to try to persuade you to divert yourself from your actions.’

  ‘No,’ Berenger said. And his voice continued with a sob of self-pity. ‘I know why she comes: she comes to remind me I promised to look after her. I promised to love her and protect her!’ He covered his face in his hands. ‘I failed. I failed her when she needed me!’

  ‘Master, she would not wish to see you sad. It has been many years since her death, has it not?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter. Ten years, twenty – what do years mean?’

  ‘They mean life and death. You have life. You should make better use of it.’

  ‘I have no life. Since she died, I have nothing.’

  ‘She would be angry to hear you say that. She has gone on to join with the Heavenly Father and life eternal, and you will join her one day, if you are worthy; but continue on this path of dissolution and death, and you will not see her again,’ the Infirmarer said sharply.

  ‘I would join with her today if I could,’ Berenger said. His head hung, and his eyes filled with tears that brimmed and ran down his cheeks.

  ‘You may not, my son. You know that.’ The Infirmarer saw Saul and Fulk appear in the doorway and he waved them away impatiently. ‘That is not in your hands to decide.’

  ‘Yes. But this world is unwholesome to me. I could give it up in a moment.’

  ‘You said she comes back to remind you that you should have protected her. Do you blame yourself for her death?’

  ‘Blame myself? No, I blame all France. It was French people who brought the pestilence to Calais. It’s all because of France that she is dead. I curse the land!’

  ‘You blame the country?’

  ‘I detest this land. I despise it. If I had the power, I would destroy it all in fire and then sink it beneath the waves.’

  ‘What of the people?’

  Berenger looked up at him. The tears were still running, but his eyes were cold and unwavering as he said, ‘Without my Marguerite, I care nothing for any of them!’

  ‘No? So you put all blame and responsibility on her shoulders?’ the Infirmarer said. ‘You blame your dead wife for all? You deny your own responsibility for your situation?’

  Berenger opened his mouth, but the Infirmarer cut over him before he could speak.

  ‘You have a responsibility to live your life as s
he would like to see you. You believe she would want to know that you were nothing more than a routier and club-man who enjoyed destroying other lives for no reason? I think her memory deserves better than that. Don’t you?’

  Thursday 11 August

  The Abbot visited Berenger in the infirmary in the afternoon before Vespers and stood over him as he lay on his belly, while the Infirmarer washed his back and dressed it.

  ‘You seem to have made a remarkable recovery,’ he observed. ‘In a few more days, you’ll be perfectly healed, eh?’

  ‘I am vastly grateful to you and your good Infirmarer for all the care you have taken of me and the others,’ Berenger said. His mouth was dry again, and he longed to reach for the skin of wine he had installed under the palliasse, but it would be hard to reach it while the Infirmarer was working on his wound.

  ‘We are happy to have been of some help to you. However, I think that the time approaches when you must leave.’

  Berenger felt as though he had been bludgeoned. ‘Leave?’

  It was like falling into a deep well. His stomach lurched, his head whirled, and he had to fight the urge to spew. He knew that one day he would have to leave the abbey, but he had not thought it would be quite so soon. Of course, it made sense, but it was a daunting prospect. He and the others had many miles to cover, all the way to the coast and Guyenne, and their little band could be set upon by any local Lord or group of disaffected soldiers. With a journey of over a hundred sweltering miles to travel, it was unlikely that they would all make it. It was unlikely any would make it.

  The Infirmarer rested his hand on Berenger’s back, as if he understood Berenger’s thoughts. Berenger lifted himself onto his forearms and then elbows, grunting with the effort.

  ‘Not until you are perfectly hale and hearty, of course,’ the Abbot said. ‘But there is no place in a monastery like ours for men who are so worldly as you and your men. You are, when all is said and done, fighters. We have need of peace here in our cloister. I will not throw you from our doors, but you must prepare for the day when you will leave us.’

  ‘I do understand. And again, I am glad of the help you have been able to give us. When you wish us to go, we will.’

  The Abbot gave a quiet smile. ‘That is good. Well, I am sure that some exercise would do you good, too. If the Infirmarer will let you know when you are, in his opinion, fit enough you may take horses and ride about the area. I will let the stablemen know that you are to be helped to saddle and prepare.’

  Berenger swung his legs down to sit on the edge of his cot. It was tiring, but he was feeling the strength return to his flank and back. The Infirmarer had told him that the worst of his injuries were to the skin, rather than to the muscles. Although he had felt, so he thought, the muscles rip, the actual damage was lessened because the weapon had been clean and sharp. He lifted his arm experimentally, licking his lips. They felt very dry.

  ‘My friend, some days ago we walked in the orchard. Perhaps you would accompany me again?’ the Abbot said.

  ‘Aye, with pleasure,’ Berenger said. He pulled his shirt over his head and stood, reaching down for his wine skin.

  ‘You are thirsty?’

  Berenger heard the note of quiet discontent in his voice. He hesitated, and then left the skin where it was. ‘A little.’ He looked at the Abbot, whose eyes were narrowed as if testing Berenger. ‘I don’t need it.’

  ‘I am glad. It is a crutch for the weak, my friend. You don’t need it.’

  Berenger could have laughed aloud at that. He felt the need of it all the more after the Abbot’s words about leaving.

  It had been a long, hard journey to this, the third crucifixion, and Denisot was glad to be returning, even with an uncertain welcome from his wife. He was not so badly delayed as the last time with Fripper and his men. Perhaps she may even be glad to see him again so soon.

  A third child; a third family deprived; a third young life ended in rape, torture and horror. There were no words to describe his hatred of the man responsible. Such a man was a demon. He was like a rabid dog. Denisot would have no compunction in putting him down. Such a man was a danger to the whole community: he would find this man and kill him.

  He had heard of this one from a goatherd. The old man, Ponton, lived most of his life far from the town, walking with his animals over the hills and staying out with them for days at a time. He had heard the slaying and led Denisot and Ethor back to the place where it had happened.

  ‘There was a shouting and laughing. It was the laughing got to me,’ Ponton said, staring about him. A lanky fellow, with skin the colour of walnut, wiry and skinny, he looked as though his body had no fat in it, like a man who had fasted for a month. He could hear them down in the valley. Horses and men, the noise of their passage loud in the cool evening air. ‘Sound passes a long way at that time of evening,’ he said.

  ‘What did you see?’

  Ponton spoke slowly and deliberately, as a man will who rarely speaks to others. Every word was considered, weighed, and spoken when he was sure it held the correct meaning.

  ‘I was up at the pasture last evening. When I heard the noise, I went to the trees and peered through them. There was a force of English in the woods below me. Through the trees I saw them. They had stopped at the house of Jean Rives.’

  Denisot nodded. A peasant who farmed a few sheep and pigs, Jean was in his middle thirties, and had a daughter and wife who tended to the house, the garden, and spent most of their time making quarrels with each other as daughters and mothers will.

  ‘I saw one grab at the girl. She screamed, Jean came out with a stick to protect her, and a man ran him through with a lance. The girl screamed again as he died. Then they found her mother and raped them both. The house was set afire, and then they threw the mother inside. I could hear her die. It was piteous.’

  ‘The girl?’

  ‘They left and rode away, leaving her behind. She was on the ground. I saw her through the trees. I was going to help her, but before I could reach her, I saw a man appear. He was one of the English, I think. He pulled a board from the house, and then he struck the child across the face until she was silent. I saw him nail her hands to the board, then he took her again.’

  ‘You mean he raped her once her hands were nailed to the wood?’

  Yes. Then he hoisted her up on the plank with a rope, and tied her off, up there in the trees. He settled down and waited while she cried out for help.’

  His old eyes filled with tears and he averted his gaze. ‘I didn’t ought to have left my goats alone, but I couldn’t leave these poor souls here without telling anyone.’

  Ethor was staring about him with a look of extreme melancholy. ‘How many were they, Ponton?’

  ‘At least five. Beyond that, I don’t know.’

  ‘The man who came back and did this,’ Denisot said, pointing to the girl’s body. They had cut her down, but she was dead and cool to the touch. ‘Was he one of the first five?’

  ‘Who else could he have been?’

  ‘I just wanted to make sure,’ Denisot said. He shook his head. Jean Rives was dead, only a matter of feet from his threshold. He lay before it, an expression of pained surprise on his face. Behind him, the cottage was a blackened shell. The timbers had burned through and collapsed, and one section of wall had already fallen. Inside was the blackened figure of the mother, curled into a foetal ball. Ethor and Denisot carefully noted the damage done to the three before loading them all onto the back of the cart they had brought for this purpose.

  Ethor wrote down the details on a sheet of parchment. ‘We have to make sure that we don’t miss anything out,’ he grumbled. ‘My memory’s not as good as it was.’

  Denisot nodded. It made sense, but as they set off to return home, Ponton striding up the hill to his goats on his long legs, he felt overwhelmed. ‘What can we achieve?’

  ‘We can try to have this man found and executed,’ Ethor said.

  ‘Whoever he is, do you think w
e shall have an opportunity to do anything?’ Denisot asked. ‘Look at us, two officials who should be representing our Lords here, and yet the English can ride everywhere. We cannot even raise a force to stop them.’

  ‘Have you tried to?’

  ‘What would be the point? People are too fearful of the English. They won’t want to join us to remove them from Uzerche. Why would they? They know that if they were to leave their homes and go to help the people in the town, they would leave their own wives and children unprotected. And many would die against the English. We know the truth of them. They are ruthless and invincible. If they can kill off most of the noblemen of France in a battle, what would they do to unprotected, untrained levies from Domps? They could wipe out all the males in the town without breaking into a sweat.’

  ‘I think you do some of our neighbours a disservice.’

  ‘Which?’ Denisot enquired wryly.

  They had rounded one side of a hill as he spoke, and now he looked ahead over the trees towards their homes. Denisot felt the blood drain from his face. Suddenly he felt his legs quiver as though he might topple. ‘Ethor, what is that?’

  ‘Good God in Heaven, Denisot! I hope it’s not what I think it is!’

  The two men stopped to stare. There, ahead of them, where their town should be, was an enormous blue-black cloud. It rose high over the trees, like a thunderhead, but there was no other cloud in the sky.

  ‘It’s the Devil’s sign,’ Denisot said. He felt as though his heart had already broken in anticipation.

  The Abbot was quietly reflective as they walked. Then he took a deep breath.

  ‘Master Fripper, I have discussed you with the good Brother Infirmarer. We were both concerned for you, for the injury done to your back was as nothing to the injury you had suffered inside. You were being eaten alive by your demons. And you had many. I think you are almost healed body and soul.’