by Non Bramley
I have never been worried by nakedness – we are all variations on the same theme – but it threw him into confusion. He apologised and fumbled the door latch. I pulled on a long shift that still only came to my knees. He was deeply embarrassed by his body’s involuntary reaction to what he had seen. Poor David. Poor murderous, inadequate Peter. What a trick to play – to make the driving impulse of every man and woman the thing it was so hard for most to get.
It had been months since I’d had a man, so I called him back.
Afterwards he talked about his life - about his great love and knowledge of animals, about feeding wild birds and taming an orphaned fox cub with months of patience and kindness. It was a noisy creature and someone who’d had one too many disturbed nights’ sleep killed it. He’d never found out who.
He left the next morning after a night that had proved more honest than most and with nothing promised but kindness. I like imperfect things. Still, it was a mistake.
—One of the joys of being an old woman is watching the young make mistakes. It’s the best antidote for your own regret.
It had rained all though the night and showed no sign of letting up. I found Johanna sheltering in the stables doorway.
‘That’s lucky,’ she said. ‘I was just on my way to find you. We have another problem. We had to shut the gates so early this year we’re a good month further into our food stores than we would usually be, and they’re not going to last.’
‘We’ll just have to tighten our belts,’ I said, crossing to Meg and stroking her silky neck. She was thin, but so were we all.
‘Even then, it’s going to be a close call. Pray for an early spring. The food situation has other implications. What do I do with him?’ She gestured down to the cells and our prisoner. ‘Should I keep him locked up indefinitely to starve to death with the rest of us? I can’t let him go. If he confesses what would your Prior’s orders be, in a case like this I mean?’
‘If he admits to murder he’ll have to be killed. I’ll do it kindly but you’ll need to order it.’
‘Sweet Jesu,’ she said softly. ‘We won’t be able to feed the horses much longer either, Jude. I’m sorry.’
‘If it comes to that I’ll let her go, let her take her chances. We can eat the rest but I can’t eat Meg.’
‘You place more value on the life of your horse than the life of the man below us? She could feed us all for weeks. I’d rather keep him locked up as long as I can before—’
‘She has a life too and it’s a blameless one. I’ll follow your orders in everything but this. You might as well know that now.’
Johanna looked affronted but there was nothing she could do. Hers was a life of difficult compromises.
I went down to the cells alone. Brother Francis was asleep on a stool outside Peter’s door. It was deathly cold and Francis was bundled in furs and blankets. I was surprised to see that so was Peter. Francis had made sure the prisoner wouldn’t freeze to death.
‘That was a kind gesture,’ I said.
‘It’s Peter,’ he said simply.
It was a grim little cell, left over from the first medieval days and used now as a cold store. Peter was huddled in the corner on a rusty bed frame.
It proved to be an odd meeting. Peter, after a night to think his situation over, denied everything, claiming it was he who had discovered David uncovering Eva Cohen; that it was David all along and he was innocent. That was an uncomfortable thought. It was now Peter’s word against David’s. As far as I was aware there were no other witnesses. Peter had spoken when we’d come upon them in the mortuary, but he hadn’t actually admitted anything.
A sick realisation dawned. I might well have to put David down here too until I could fathom the truth.
Leaving the cells and climbing back up into slightly less frigid air I went to find Johanna. She was, of course, in the library.
When I told her of Peter’s accusations the legs went from under her and she sat down hard.
‘Were you with David when he discovered Peter? Was anybody?’ I said.
She shook her head. ‘I can’t believe it’s true. Not David. He’s such a kind soul.’
‘But he was here, wasn’t he, when the girls went missing?’
‘He’s been with us for ten years. I’ve never heard a single complaint about him. He never seemed interested in women.’
Was that a trace of regret?
‘God help me, I’ve no choice. I’ll have to keep him under lock and key until I can get to the marrow of this. I’d rather not keep either man in the cells – a sharp frost and it’ll kill them. I need two rooms, separate from each other, that I can secure. Can you think of anywhere?’
Johanna took me to the palace. Up in the eaves were what had once been the servants’ quarters, separated into male and female levels and each room with small windows and stout doors. Later that morning I found Brother Francis and asked him to scavenge heavy bolts. We fitted them to the doors of three rooms that looked secure. I only needed two, but had a feeling a third might be necessary before this case was closed.
These simple tasks took most of the day – hunger makes you slow. Peter I quietly moved to his new lodgings. He was still accusing David with every breath and terrified that he was on the way to his execution. He seemed bewildered by his new confinement.
Then, reluctantly, I went to find David.
I didn’t have to look far. The choir were in the abbey church, filling the place with a psalm of unearthly beauty. I took a seat near the north door and waited. It was an intriguing lesson in how four voices blend to a whole.
The music ended, and four figures appeared in little spheres of candlelight. I nodded at Patricia and Robin, and called David to me, moving up the long wooden bench to make room for him. He thought I’d sought him out in affection, and his smile glowed like the candle.
When we were alone, I turned to face him, and his smile wavered and dropped at my grim expression.
‘You don’t need to say it,’ he said. ‘I know it didn’t mean anything other than a kindness.’
‘You’re talking to the Reeve now, David,’ I said. ‘Not Jude.’
‘Thank God. I thought that face meant you hated me.’
‘Peter has denied uncovering Eva Cohen. He’s adamant that it was he who discovered you.’
‘What?’ he said, puzzled.
‘Peter Piss Pot claims that you were in the mortuary desecrating the body of Eva Cohen two nights ago, and that he came in and caught you. He says we have the wrong man, that it’s you who should be locked up, not him.’
David stood up, catching the corner of his habit and ripping it. ‘He can’t! He can’t say that! You don’t believe him, Jude?’
‘Reeve,’ I corrected him. ‘It’s my job to investigate every accusation. You’ve been accused of desecrating a corpse, and by inference of at least two murders. You’ll be kept in confinement while I look into this claim.’
‘I’m not going to be locked up! What will people think?’
‘I notice you haven’t denied it,’ I said.
He looked at me then in pure contempt. ‘I didn’t think I’d need to.’
‘That’s still not an answer.’
He walked quickly away from me and I followed him to the shrine tomb of Saint Credan. David put his hand on the cold stone.
‘I swear on the holy bones of Saint Credan and by my immortal soul that I did not desecrate the corpse of Eva Cohen, that I have never desecrated any corpse or given any woman need to be afraid of me. I swear before God that I have murdered no one. I swear that every word I have said is true. There,’ he said, removing his hand. ‘Is that enough for you?’
It wasn’t, and in the end I was forced to haul him bodily across the Close and up the stairs of the palace. The contact triggered uncomfortable memories of the previous night.
As I closed his cell door he shouted, ‘There’s no love in you, no trust!’
I had to agree with him.
The
re were enough witnesses of David’s ignominious incarceration for it to be common knowledge within the hour. Aware of how rumours grow and proliferate, the following morning I presented myself at Terce. This was now the first service of the day as it was still too dark and dangerous in the mornings to celebrate Matins. I had been far too busy to attend many services, and was glad to see that every member of the community was there. I needed to speak to them all.
At the end of the quiet Mass, made quieter by the loss of David’s voice I stood and answered every question. My treatment of David had set off a wave of anger amongst his brethren and sistren and many called for him to be released at once.
I refused, of course.
‘Do you think it likely Peter will confess now?’ Prior Johanna said.
‘Would you? Peter has muddied the waters with his accusation. The point is, he could be telling the truth.’
Will Mercer sneered. ‘It’s Piss Pot who’s the murderer. We all know it. Why aren’t you up there making him admit it? Give him a taste of your fist!’
‘That’s a last resort Will. If I beat him he’ll say anything to make it stop. This is a long process. I have to ask him the same set of questions again and again and look for any change in his story.’
‘That’s pointless. He’ll wriggle out of it. Why are we feeding this bastard when we’re all close to starving? Give me five minutes with him, Reeve. If he hurt Anne I’ll have it out of him if you’re too squeamish.’
‘No. If you touch him, or if any soul here releases David, I’ll lock that man or woman up too. Give me two weeks. I’ll gather the evidence and testimonies of both men and present them to Prior Johanna.’
‘And after that?’ Johanna said.
‘This is an odd case. On the presentation of my evidence, you must decide which of the accused is guilty of desecrating Eva Cohen’s corpse. The man convicted of that terrible but lesser crime must then be weighed in the balance for the ultimate crime of murder. Make your decision, Prior, and pass down punishment.’
Johanna sat down next to Will and put her hand on his arm. ‘I am the head of our community but I won’t decide a man’s fate. It will be up to us all.’
‘Then in three weeks’ time you must hold a court here. Who will speak for the accused man? Remember, it could be David or Peter.’
‘I’ll do it,’ Patricia said quietly, and I watched Will turn his head to stare at her in disgust.
I thanked her and said, ‘If the verdict of the court is guilty, that man will die.’
Chapter Twelve
It was probably the simplest set of interrogations I have ever had to undertake, but also the most frustrating. Both men swore they had come upon the other. Both men denied any knowledge of Magdela and Rebecca. None knew of Anne’s fate or had any idea as to the whereabouts of Artemisia Cohen. I repeated the same questions every day, again and again.
David cried eventually and, God help me, I was repulsed by him.
In the end, it was the simplest of slips that gave the guilty man away.
It came to me as I was standing in the mortuary, which had been locked since the incident by my own hand.
Peter Piss Pot’s job was to collect the community’s slop buckets and pour the contents into a large barrel that he pulled behind him on a small wheeled handcart. The mortuary bucket had to be collected every day when a corpse was in residence. It stood under a convenient hole in the tabletop used as a mortuary slab which allowed the natural liquids that ran from the body to be cleanly collected.
The bucket had been emptied, and was still standing next to Peter’s reeking cart. If Peter had discovered David lifting the old woman’s skirts, and tussled with him until our arrival as he claimed, he would not have had time to do his job.
Through all this, eventually drowning out fear and anger and revenge, hunger gnawed at us all.
When I presented the facts to Johanna, leaning against the wall in my weakness, she nodded, and said: ‘Tell Patricia she has as two weeks to gather herself. She can see Peter as much as she wishes. And let David go, for God’s sake.’
My job is often a thankless one.
My last task was to unbolt the door of David’s cell. For the first time since my arrival I had nothing to keep me occupied. My part in this was now over.
Christmas was as merry as we could make it after months of scant food and iron cold. On Christmas Eve, after an evensong of prayerful beauty, Robin and I baked a bean hard over the fire and dropped it into the communal stew pot.
On Christmas day, Anice found it in her bowl and was declared the Lord of Misrule. From now until Twelfth Night she could upend the usual running of the house, and Johanna gladly made way for her to sit in the Prior’s place.
Her first request was for myself, Johanna and Will to sing to the company. We were dreadful but at least it raised the spirits.
I pocketed the thin slice of rough bread that sometimes came with our meals. A bite of it would keep me upright during the long day when my strange affliction threatened to take sense and feeling from me. My thinking limped along when I was used to it racing. The world seemed very strange, the borders between our world and that of the saints and angels as thin as the skin of a bubble.
The new year arrived and the weather warmed a little. It snowed, brittle flakes that built up into drifts overnight. I spent my days reading in the library and caring for Meg, who was as hungry as the rest of us.
We’d lived for so long sealed in that when I heard a hammering at the south gate on the morning of the Feast of the Epiphany it took me a while to recognise the sound.
Walking wearily up the tower steps that overlooked the gates I saw the top of a familiar blonde head. Against all sense and reason, Philip Carpenter had arrived at Banfield.
I didn’t know if I was overjoyed or exhausted.
He stood grinning at me over the heads of a little crowd that had gathered around him. He glowed.
‘How the hell are you here?’ I said. ‘You’re the luckiest bastard that ever lived!’
‘I thought I’d risk it. Glad I did?’
‘Mother of God,’ I said weakly.
‘Pleased to see me?’
‘You should be dead. There’s wolves everywhere. How did you do it?’
‘It took me months to get here. Travelled on foot, only on the brightest days, sometimes only an hour a day.’
‘That’s just not possible,’ I said.
He grinned at me. ‘You ran away and I followed.’
‘You’re a fool,’ I said, but couldn’t hide my smile. ‘We’ve no food and we’re in the middle of terrible times here. We may have just caught a killer.’
‘I knew you would, kiddleybean,’ he said, and I saw David’s eyes widen.
‘You need to ask Prior Johanna’s permission to stay. Not mine.’
Philip crossed to Johanna. He was vivid with life, the only living creature in a community of wraiths.
‘My name’s Philip Carpenter, Prior. May I stay?’
Johanna looked bemused, but agreed.
My lover had travelled two hundred miles on a dangerous road to find me. Do you find that romantic?
He joined us in Vicars Hall for our meagre sole meal of the day, and his arrival enlivened what had become a grim affair. He listened intently to the story of our terrible discovery of Magdela and Rebecca; shook his head at Lollis’s death, trying to place his hand on mine; and asked intrigued questions about David’s coming upon Peter Piss Pot in the mortuary.
‘You’ve caught your man!’ he said to the rapt company. ‘Nothing escapes Jude.’
He annoyed the hell out of me. It was invigorating. Despite everything, that spell, that call of flesh to flesh brought its own warmth.
Johanna put Philip in the room next to mine and I invited him into my bed. My desire for this man had always made me compromise. His heavy-limbed golden body had its old familiar effect, and I was in need of his ability to make me gasp with pleasure, although my heart raced alarmingly
afterwards.
I left him asleep on the following morning, tangled in the bed clothes. I never rose from our bed without an odd mixture of satisfaction and regret. Is it always this way for women I wonder? Sex is a transaction of power. Do we barter our pride for passion?
For the next few days Philip followed me everywhere. Despite myself, I was impressed by his journey through wolf-infested winter lands, but frustrated by the lack of detail he would give me. He acted as if the whole thing had been a summer stroll. Phillip was a charming but boastful man and this new diffident and unforthcoming character was puzzling. I wondered if I’d been wrong about him. Perhaps there was more to him than easy lies and desire. I relaxed into his presence and let myself be charmed. Surely I deserved a little love and peace. The old Philip would have lost interest as soon as I dropped my guard; this new man seemed to revel in my strangeness. I believed that it might be possible for me to love and trust at last. I was too tired to fight it.
‘You’re looking thin, my love,’ he said, and shared with me the last remnants of his provisions for the road, just hard bread and cheese. I felt guilty gorging when the others were subsisting on one bowl of vegetable stew a day but my hunger was visceral. In a little while I felt alive again. The sex pulled me into my body and out of my mind.
Patricia was as good as her word, spending much of her time in Peter’s cell, a brave thing to do as he was suspected of grisly murder. The day before the date set for the trial, she sought me out.
I was in my room with Philip and had to dress quickly and open the door to her hammering. Philip threw a blanket lazily over his nakedness, proud of his body, arrogant in his virility.
To save Patricia’s blushes I stepped out to the hallway. She started speaking before I closed the door behind me.
‘Reeve, I’d not told Peter until today of the trial; I didn’t want to frighten him. He’s just told me the strangest story. He says he knows who killed Rebecca and Magdela, but he says it was a dead man. Can you come?’
