Ramon pursed his lips, ‘Do we dress for the cloister or the fight, do you think?’
The three men looked down at their chain shirts and padded jackets lying on the floor. After so long travelling and fighting wearing the full military equipment, the temptation to spend a day in the simple garb of a monk was almost too much. Finally, with regret, Balthesar shook his head. ‘Given the situation and the constant possibility that we might need to move at short notice, we had best be prepared for all eventualities.’
Sighing, the three men once more took up their armour and dressed fully, belting on their swords, but leaving their heads bare for the relief of cool air on wet hair. Finally arrayed appropriately, they emerged into the Catalan sun and crossed the courtyard to the chapter house, whose door stood open – a dark maw in the golden face of the wall.
‘You take the lead,’ Ramon said to Balthesar as they neared the door. ‘De Mont will probably expect it from the most senior brother.’
Balthesar nodded and the three of them entered the room and blinked a few times to allow their sight to adjust to the gloom. Brother Guillem stood to one side of the preceptrix’s chair, face carefully blank, while the humourless Brother Jaume stood to the other. The man in the white mantle that sat upon the chair at the centre was tall and lean with a serious, thoughtful look, pale and with hollowed cheeks. He looked bookish to Arnau, and did not immediately have the visible makings of a conspiratorial enemy. Somehow Arnau would have been more comfortable had de Mont looked wicked and sly. It took him a moment to realise what it was about the room itself that seemed odd, but finally he realised that the sword of Gombau d’Oluja, which had always hung on the wall behind his wife’s chair, was no longer there. He hoped the preceptrix had taken it and not that de Mont had removed it.
‘Ah, the knights of the household,’ de Mont said, looking the three of them up and down in turn. ‘It would appear that, along with other noble members of our esteemed order, you are to be commended for your part in a great victory. Glory belongs to God alone, of course, but his mortal instruments should always be thanked for their work in His name. I bow to your efforts and am pleased to see you return hale from the field of battle.’
Arnau felt disarmed. He’d expected vicious or aloof, or unctuous at the least. Certainly not genuine and respectful. There was still a warning, though, in the fact that both Jaume and Guillem maintained carefully neutral expressions.
‘Thank you, Brother,’ Balthesar responded with an incline of the head. ‘It has been an exhausting campaign, for all its brevity, and, while the Almohad menace remain in their domain in the south, the balance of power seems to have shifted noticeably in the wake of the fight. I doubt we will see pressure upon our borders in the coming years.’
De Mont nodded. ‘This is good. And I can only express my sadness that you must return from your travails only to find your house in tatters and being controlled as an extension of the mother house. I assure you that I work tirelessly to bring matters to a conclusion and to return Rourell to its own control.’
‘And to exonerate the preceptrix, of course,’ Arnau found himself saying, and instantly regretted the comment when both Balthesar and Ramon turned to glare at him.
De Mont seemed to take it in his stride. ‘My role is neither defender nor accuser – Brother Vallbona I presume? My place here is to investigate the matter and prove or disprove the many cases, regardless of the effects they might have beyond their conclusion. It is, I am afraid, a lengthy task, for there are many claims, but I work diligently and will see this through in due course. What the future holds for Sister d’Oluja I cannot say. Even if I prove or disprove every case, her judgement will come from loftier positions than mine.’
It was so well said and so hard to find fault with that Arnau immediately clammed up, nodding. Balthesar took a step forward. ‘Might I make a suggestion?’
‘By all means.’
‘I should report to the former preceptrix. She is the one who dispatched us upon our task, and until a new preceptor sits upon that chair, a rank that I understand you do not yet hold, she is still the most senior in all of Rourell. Moreover, it may be that I can divine information of use that you yourself cannot, not being as familiar with the preceptrix as I. However, while I visit,’ he added, not waiting for permission from de Mont, ‘it may be of further benefit to have Brothers Ramon and Arnau look over the cases. Ramon has a solid history of legal work with the Aragonese church, and Arnau hails from a Catalan noble line and may be familiar with the landowners in question.’
De Mont frowned. ‘You seem curiously well-informed concerning the case, Brothers. I had assumed you would have picked up hints of such from the absence of your former preceptrix and from unavoidable murmurs around Rourell while you settled your horses and washed and changed, yet you seem familiar with the details at an impressive level.’
‘“Oh, the depth of the riches of wisdom and knowing of God. How incomprehensible be his judgements, and his ways unsearchable”.’
‘Romans eleven. Very clever, Brother Balthesar. You dissemble like a master.’ De Mont straightened. ‘Very well, however you came about such information,’ a quick flick of the eyes at Guillem there, ‘it will save me the trouble of walking you through the case and may prove to be of use. The sisters of Rourell are currently being housed in the old mill, and you will find Sister Ermengarda among them. You have the permission of the master of Barbera, through myself, to visit her.’
Ramon smiled. ‘The master of Barbera transcends death, apparently, since I watched him fall at Las Navas.’
For the first time, a sense of irritation fell across de Mont’s face as he frowned at this. Balthesar shot him a look. ‘Apologies for my unfortunate wit,’ Ramon said loudly. ‘A side effect of my wounds no doubt.’
Balthesar turned to his friends. ‘I shall visit with the preceptrix and shall seek you out upon my return.’
Ramon and Arnau nodded and the old knight bowed to de Mont and strode from the chapter house. Left in the room with the others, Ramon stepped forth now. ‘It may be that I can add nothing of note to your investigation, but a fresh set of eyes with a legal mind may be of use. Might I be permitted to look over the documents in the case, along with the good brother here?’
De Mont chewed his cheek for a moment. ‘I am in two minds. While I recognise that you have both the skills of a lawyer and a vested interest in the matter, being as close as you are to the preceptrix and to Rourell, you can hardly be accused of being impartial, which is the very reason I was appointed from Barbera. To be an independent investigator.’
Arnau opened his mouth to point out that in his opinion the brothers of Barbera could hardly be labelled impartial in the matter of the preceptrix, but Ramon silenced him with a look before he could speak. After a pause, de Mont nodded. ‘Very well. I have had the records brought to us by the archbishop and filed in a temporary office in the belfry. Thus far I have used the place alone, partially driven by scarcity of space. All the files are carefully organised so, while I am content for you to look through them, I would appreciate them being left in precisely the state in which you find them.’ He gave the two men a hard look. ‘And while I would hope that you are both as honest as your garb demands and as above reproach as one would expect from a brother, I will remind you that I am fully aware of each and every record there, and a copy of each one is held by the archbishop.’
Ramon nodded and de Mont rose and fished a key from his pouch, proffering it to them. The older knight took the key and stepped back with a bow. ‘Thank you, Brother de Mont.’
Turning, he strode from the room, Arnau spinning without a bow of his own and following on in his friend’s wake. Outside, where the courtyard was clear, he caught up and muttered under his breath. ‘I had great trouble restraining myself in there.’
Ramon sighed. ‘I allowed myself an outburst that I should have kept barred within. De Mont is unreadable. I would not trust him as far as I could throw my own horse, yet
there is nothing in his manner that indicates he has done anything but that which he said.’
Reaching the belfry, Ramon used the key to unlock the heavy door, while Arnau tried to banish memories of the building. Since the siege when he had first arrived he had contrived to enter the belfry at most a handful of times, and even then only when he could not avoid it. Every time he laid eyes upon it, his thoughts were whisked away to that terrible siege and to the figure of Sister Joana, cut off from all help and pursued by ravaging attackers, throwing herself from that high window. He shivered at the memory as the door creaked open and the two men entered the cramped room. The stairs ran up to the next level, but de Mont had made his office space here on the ground floor. A single old table set against one wall, a chair pulled up to it, and a set of shelves which had been hastily assembled from fresh local wood stood to the side. As well as pen and ink and a stack of blank paper, files of records sat in four neat piles across the table, while others remained in ordered rows upon the shelves.
As Arnau closed the door behind them and then wandered over in the gloom to the shelves, Ramon flicked flint against steel half a dozen times, carefully keeping away from the important documents, and lit the lamp that de Mont had been using for illumination. He closed the glass door and placed it upon its shelf.
Arnau picked up the first file and examined the outside. In rather grand script it was simply labelled ‘XXXVII DE MILA’. He opened it and had to catch half a dozen papers that immediately fell out. Lifting one, he ran his eyes down the text. It occurred to him as he read that it was entirely possible that churchmen used the most indecipherable language in an effort to keep the uninformed woefully ignorant of their workings. Certainly, by the time he was halfway down the page he was hopelessly lost and had forgotten how it had started.
‘Is legalese an actual language?’ he asked Ramon. ‘I read Castilian and Aragonese, as well as Catalan, Frankish and Latin, with even passable Greek and Arabic these days, and yet this seems to me to be indecipherable rubbish that purports to be in my own Church’s tongue.’
Ramon shrugged. ‘It is more like a code than anything. Once you understand the meanings of the phrasing, it can be unpicked remarkably swiftly. It is of great importance in all legal writings to be entirely clear and to cover every potential angle from the outset. As such, it becomes unfortunately verbose, and yet necessarily so. Of more interest to me right now is our first sign that de Mont might be hiding something.’
‘Oh?’ Arnau hurried over to the table, where Ramon seemed to be looking at the plain wooden surface. ‘What is it?’
Ramon laid his head on the table, side-on, looking along the surface by the light of the lamp. ‘There are grooves of words here, almost etched into the wood. De Mont has been writing here recently, and yet the desk contains only blank writing paper. Our friendly investigator is keeping whatever he writes somewhere safe. Safer even than an office to which only he has a key.’
‘How do you know it’s him?’
The older knight straightened. ‘This is the preceptrix’s desk. I have used it on her behalf many times. She has a very light touch with a pen, and there were few marks on the timber until recent use. It would appear that de Mont has a heavy hand with a pen.’
‘Can you read anything?’
Ramon shook his head. ‘Many things have been written here on top of one another. It is impossible to make out any detail.’
‘On the other hand,’ Arnau said, ‘perhaps this is no evidence after all. Perhaps the words he has writ are now filed within these many folders?’
‘It is possible, but I suspect not. I have already looked swiftly through the top folder on each pile, at least one of which must be his latest examination, and there is no document in there of recent work in a heavy hand. Papers made here would be easy to identify, for he presses so hard he almost etches as he writes.’
Arnau huffed. ‘So somewhere in Rourell is a pile of writings by de Mont that are relevant to the cases.’
‘It would seem so.’
Arnau flicked through the files on the top shelf now, looking at the covers as he went, given that the contents were clearly going to be incomprehensible to him. ‘It would seem that the archbishop or whoever is behind this has cast his net wide. There are family names I recognise here, and many of them, but they stretch far from Rourell. There are names here from as far afield as Pamplona and Perpignan. If there was ever a chance that such a deluge of claims was an unhappy accident, this knocks it aside. Such a wide range can only be the result of painstaking research.’
Ramon flicked through one of the files. ‘This contains a letter documenting the claim, with an attached list of land references concerning the territory in question. It has been sealed with the claimant’s own seal, as well as that of the archbishop of Tarragona. A second paper contains an excerpt from the Order’s record of the donation of said lands, though the excerpt refers specifically to a stretch of land adjacent to the one in question, rather than the one itself. If this is the only appropriate reference on the Order’s records, then it cannot be used to refute the claim. This excerpt has been signed off by de Mont as well as a brother by the name of Bernaldino at Barbera, as is confirmed by the mother house’s attached seal. Other records here include affidavits of witnesses, claiming that though they have been working the land for the preceptory, they know of no legal transfer from the previous owner. Witnesses that are worth nothing, sadly, even if they seemingly back up the claim. The only record in here, in fact, that in any way goes against the claim is a single statement given by a carter that says he had been given instructions back in the spring of six years ago to amend his delivery address from that of the previous owner to the preceptory.’
Arnau smiled. ‘This must be one of Guillem’s witnesses. Surely that helps put a counter case for the preceptrix?’
Ramon shook his head. ‘Sadly, though we are given the witness’s name, he is apparently unable to recall the identity of the person or persons who agreed the change of address. It looks hopeful, but a lawyer of even passing-quality will brush the statement aside as of insufficient value to the case.’
As Arnau fumed at this, Ramon picked up another file and rifled through it, and then another. By the fourth he was working slowly through the text, trying to pick out anything of importance while the younger Templar continued to look through the names, hoping that something would leap out at him. After some time, Ramon slammed down the folder he had been checking through with an explosive expulsion of breath.
‘I don’t like it at all, but it is clear the claim in this case cannot be refuted with the paltry evidence in support of Rourell. The worst thing is that I remember this Michael of Luesia and his donation. He’s a minor landowner up towards Zaragoza. He sticks in my mind because he’d been accused of some terrible impropriety with his local church and was seeking a path to redemption. We were experiencing a high traffic of pilgrims and a good reputation at the time, and he donated us a portion of his land in return for our blessing and access to our relic for private prayer. I remember the land he gave us, but this claim is for only a small sliver of territory and even I, who dealt with him at the time, cannot say for certain whether this small strip was part of the donative. If all the cases are like this then it is going to be almost impossible to stand against any of them. And again, the section of text copied from the mother house’s records does nothing to disprove the claim. Luesia states that his original donation covered only three quarters of the area that we have been working, and that we simply moved the boundaries without his realisation. Guillem has provided no witness against this, but then Luesia’s lands are two days’ ride from here, so our poor clerk will not have had the opportunity to go there and seek them.’
‘Perhaps that is something we can do?’ Arnau asked with a touch of hope. ‘Maybe we can provide that witness.’
Ramon shook his head. ‘From what I have seen so far, every witness we can provide has been flawed, or vague, or both. We can
ride for Luesia and question everyone, but were we permitted to gamble I would wager all I own that any potentially useful witness has already been dealt with either by Luesia or by friends of our local archbishop.’
Arnau sagged. ‘Is it not even worth a try?’
‘Only if you can think of nothing more useful to do for four days. In four days this could all be over, after all.’
The younger man leaned back against the wall. ‘There are more than sixty cases there on those shelves. I don’t know how many there are on the table, but it looks like thirty or forty. We’re looking at around a hundred accusations in total. This is astounding.’
‘And if they cannot be disproved, then they rather damningly label the preceptrix a criminal who has used her position to defraud and steal and otherwise underhandedly acquire land for the preceptory. Even if with diligence and thorough investigation we can prove a few of these false, we would need to do so with the overwhelming majority of them to save her. It is an impossible task on that basis.’
Arnau sighed, ‘And if de Mont is involved as we suspect, then he will not allow us to achieve such a goal. Our enemies will press for a conclusion before we can bring any counter-case against them.’
Ramon cracked his knuckles and leaned over the table once more. ‘We should check what we can. Balthesar will come back for us at some point and there is nothing awaiting us in the preceptory in the meantime. Until he arrives we should use our time investigating however we can. I will continue to look through the files on the desk, on the assumption that at least one of these piles consists of cases that de Mont has not yet looked at. Perhaps there we might find something of more use. For your part, go through the names again and again, as often as you can until you find something that stands out.’
The Last Crusade Page 6
