The Prophecy of Death: (Knights Templar 25)

by Michael Jecks

  ‘He thinks I am disloyal because I was loyal to the Queen. We live in a strange land, Sir Baldwin, when a man can be thought of as a traitor to his King, just because he is known to support the King’s wife.’

  ‘Yes. Although I do not know what I may do to help you in this.’

  ‘All I ask is that you look into the matter for me.’

  ‘I must leave tomorrow with the Bishop.’

  ‘Then please do what you can tonight to convince yourself that we have not omitted to seek the killer, so that if the King asks you, you can tell him we have done our best.’

  ‘In one night? Do you know how long an inquest would usually take?’

  ‘All I ask is that you satisfy yourself I have not been remiss,’ the prior pleaded. ‘Please.’

  The crypt was a large space, filled with boxes and barrels, and strongboxes made of thick oak with steel bands, and Baldwin stood in the middle gazing about him, while Simon leaned against a wall near the doorway, watching him.

  ‘This is where the oil was kept?’ Baldwin said.

  ‘It seemed safe enough down here,’ the Prior said mournfully.

  He was staring down into a heavy, iron-bound chest. One enormous key inserted into the middle of the lid unlocked the bolts on each face of the chest, and then the chest could be opened. The Prior opened it and showed them the inside. It was part-filled with documents and leather wallets containing scrolls.

  ‘You’re sure it’s gone?’ was Baldwin’s first question.

  ‘We have emptied it three times to make quite sure.’

  ‘Would this monk normally have had the key?’ Simon asked.

  ‘No. There was no reason for Gilbert to have it,’ the prior admitted. ‘But sometimes a man may acquire such things. He had a close companion in the monastery, a man called James, who was responsible for the relics. James remembers having the key the day before. I suppose …’

  ‘Gilbert must have taken it from him at some point,’ the coroner said.

  ‘I still find it incomprehensible that a king’s man could have come and taken it from us,’ Prior Henry said. He gazed down at the open chest with near despair. ‘Why would the King order that?’

  ‘There is nothing to suggest that the King knew anything about it,’ Baldwin said hurriedly. ‘It is perfectly likely that the man who saw this supposedly blood-sodden herald was simply mistaken. He saw a tabard and assumed it must be royalty. It was dark, you say, and you think he had been drinking?’

  ‘Quite so,’ the coroner said.

  ‘There, then. It was as likely a merchant wearing a shield on his breast as a genuine herald.’

  ‘Yes. I see,’ Prior Henry said, uncertainly.

  ‘The other thing to bear in mind is that the King could have no need to steal what is rightfully his. I understand the Duke of Brabant gave it to him?’

  ‘That is what I understand,’ the Prior said.

  ‘Well, then. Clearly, it is nothing to do with the King.’

  ‘Then who?’ the coroner asked.

  Baldwin looked at him, considering. ‘The interesting feature in all this is Gilbert’s own part. Why was he there helping in the theft?’

  ‘People will assist thieves for many reasons. Perhaps he was simply evil? I suppose we could have been misled,’ the Prior attempted.

  Baldwin smiled ironically. ‘A monk? Surely not. No, there must have been a reason.’ It was good to see the Prior’s relief at his words. And yet, why not, he thought. Maybe there was another man? Perhaps Gilbert was more innocent than he gave the dead man credit for. Was it possible that another monk had gone to take the oil to this ‘herald’ and Gilbert saw him, and so was killed? Possible, certainly. But not likely. ‘Still, it is an interesting problem.’

  The Prior looked at him sideways. ‘Does it pique your interest?’

  ‘Well, naturally. It is a fascinating little conundrum.’

  ‘Then you will look into it for me?’

  Baldwin smiled. So that was why the prior was telling him this tale. ‘I wish I could, but as you know, I have to be on my way in the morning with the Bishop of Orange. We go to the King.’

  ‘Yes. And I must inform the King of the theft,’ Prior Henry said.

  He looked at Baldwin. Baldwin looked back. Then Baldwin glanced at the coroner, and a slight frown passed over his features. ‘Oh! Oh, no. No, I don’t think that this is a matter for me to—’

  ‘All I ask is that you inform him of the loss of the oil,’ Prior Henry said. ‘I shall write a note for you to take to him. What, would you ask that a special messenger be asked to do it when you are to be going to him anyway?’

  Baldwin glared at the Prior, then peered down at the chest. ‘No. You may well find the oil over the next few days. Telling the King would be a bad error, I think.’

  ‘But we do not know how to seek it! You, you are the expert, won’t you—’

  ‘Oh, show us where his body was found. Perhaps I can help there, if only a little.’

  Simon and Baldwin spent the next couple of hours studying the barn where Gilbert’s body had lain, but there was nothing there which seemed to help with an inquiry. Too many boots had already gone over this ground for there to be any hope that they might discover something new.

  ‘I didn’t expect you to be able to help,’ the coroner admitted as they walked back towards the prior’s chambers over the grass.

  ‘What do you believe happened?’ Baldwin asked.

  ‘Same as you. This Gilbert entered into some sort of agreement with another man, someone probably wearing a tabard similar to that of a king’s herald, and then when he passed over the oil, he was slain to silence him.’

  ‘Like a king’s herald, as you say,’ Baldwin agreed. ‘And yet, what purpose could a man like that have for stealing what was already the King’s?’

  ‘You tell me.’

  Baldwin eyed him. The coroner was one of those who kept his own judgement, a man who was silent much of the time, watching and assessing rather than opening his mouth. He reminded Baldwin of a Devon farmer. They were often happier to keep their peace, judging quietly rather than speaking. One had said to him once that: ‘’Tiz better to keep gurt zilence an’ be thought a fule, raither’n open yure mouth and prove ’un.’

  The coroner was a man in a similar mould. He would observe, note, and measure. And the reason was not hard to appreciate: all too many coroners had been shown to be corrupt, but so had keepers like Baldwin. He could understand the reluctance of a king’s coroner to speak in front of a keeper when the matter under consideration related to a king’s herald potentially being shown to be a murderer.

  ‘Coroner, a quiet word?’ he said.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘We are both on the side of justice, friend. Let me hypothesise for a moment. Let us suppose that your peasant was no fool and knew the King’s badge when he saw it. That could mean that a king’s herald was here, and perhaps slew Brother Gilbert. That would mean that we would have to wonder what that herald was doing. He must have had a reason to want the oil, after all.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So, either he committed this act on the King’s orders or he acted for himself, or another. It is unlikely that he would do this on the King’s behalf. Do you agree?’

  ‘Yes, on the basis of why would the King steal his own oil from the priory.’

  ‘Precisely. All he would need to do would be to speak to the prior and ask for it to be sent to him. There would be no need for a clandestine theft. So unless new evidence comes to light, that possibility can be set to one side. Which leaves either a herald acting on his own behalf or on the commands of another, or a man clad in herald’s tabard coming here and taking the oil.’

  The coroner peered at him narrowly. They had no torches, and there was no light here in the court, other than the thin light from the stars overhead. ‘Well?’

  ‘We have little more to say, I think. Why should a herald wish to steal the oil? What possible use could he put it to?
To have himself anointed with it and set himself up as King? Some fools could think that, once they were anointed with such a marvellous fluid, they automatically became God’s chosen, I suppose, but not many living in the King’s household would consider it likely.’

  ‘So someone else put him up to it?’

  ‘That is more likely.’

  Simon was frowning. ‘Who would have a motive to do that?’

  ‘It is the King’s oil. Someone who wanted to withhold it from the King, perhaps to ransom it to the King later? Or someone who wished to withhold it from the King to cause him distress? I do not know.’

  ‘But you guess?’ the coroner asked shrewdly.

  ‘There are some who would not stop from any action. Those who are so proud and convinced of their own power that they would dare anything. However, my friend, they are genuinely dangerous. Unless you have a firm resolution, I should not personally seek to delve too deeply into this matter.’

  ‘I thank you for your warning,’ the coroner said, but there was a trace of sarcasm in his tone.

  Baldwin shrugged. ‘You will act as you see fit, of course. But one thing: did anyone note the names of the King’s heralds who were here with the party before our own?’

  ‘There were two, I think, but I don’t know their names. You see a man like that, in uniform, and they are little more than the furniture in a room. Like a servant.’

  ‘True enough. Someone must, though. Could you enquire for me? The other thing is, in which direction did the man say this herald was riding?’

  ‘Away south and west. On the main Ashford road, so he could have been heading almost anywhere.’

  ‘But that would be the road that we would take, I think?’ Baldwin said. ‘It is the road that heads towards the King at Beaulieu?’

  ‘I haven’t been there, but yes, I think so. It’s the road the rest of his party took.’

  ‘So, hypothetically, it is possible that the man was indeed a king’s herald. And the King himself commands the heralds of his household.’

  ‘So you think the King ordered a man to come here, and to murder a monk in the priory where St Thomas was killed by King Henry II?’

  ‘The King has a friend who is capable of ordering a herald to do his bidding,’ Baldwin said dangerously. Before the coroner could comment, he continued, ‘Another thing, though, why should a young monk steal the key and take the oil to this herald?’

  ‘Money? Some other reward?’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘More likely that, than the King or the King’s friend ordering the robbery of his own property,’ the coroner stated flatly.

  ‘Yes. Perhaps so,’ Baldwin said, but Simon could tell that his mind was running along a different lane just now. He was looking about him in that distracted manner which Simon knew so well.

  The coroner gave them a Godspeed, and stalked across the court.

  Baldwin sighed. ‘Simon, I think that man is destined for high office – or an early grave.’

  Beaulieu Abbey

  The messengers were always with the King. Many of them had worn their uniforms with the parti-coloured blue patterns with stripes for more years than the King had been on the throne. Some had been used so widely that their shoes had been replaced more times than they could remember. Those who set off on foot would cover the same distance as those who went on horseback, for a man was more resilient than a horse, when all was said and done, but such cursores were still rather beneath a man like Joseph of Faversham.

  Pulling his coat about him again, he felt his shoulders fill the tunic. It was a magnificent uniform, if he said so himself. Buttons drew the cloth tight over his breast all the way to this throat, while more ran from the wrist to the elbow of his sleeves. It was as blue as all the other messengers’ tunics, but his was newer than any of theirs, and much smarter. He knew that because he’d deliberately bribed the man who had supplied it, paying over the odds to have the best.

  There were good reasons for it, too. A man needed to stand out when he was one of a large company. And a king’s nuncius should look good. It was all a part of his duty to the King. And since he had been honoured when the King sent him to the Pope earlier this year, there were good reasons for him to look as good as he felt.

  Not that he’d been feeling exactly perfect when he first got back. It had been a very long journey, and one fraught with dangers along the way. It was fortunate that the route was fairly well-defined, and other nuncii had told him the best places to rest and those which he should avoid. With good fortune, and a certain amount of his own natural cunning and skill, of course, he had made the journey in only a little over the time it would have taken a man vastly more experienced.

  But that was the advantage of being so much younger than the others. Most of them were close to being retired.

  ‘Faversham, where are you?’

  ‘Here, my Lord,’ he responded, hurriedly climbing to his feet. The man calling was known to him, of course. He was the King’s own bottler.

  The bottler stood in the doorway now, a serious expression on his face as he studied Joseph for a moment with pursed lips. Then he gave a brief shake of his head as though in disgust, and jerked his head towards the abbot’s hall, where the King was presently installed. ‘The King wants you. Personal message.’

  Joseph did not hesitate. A messenger was always ready to be called on at a moment’s notice. He had his little purse with the King’s insignia embossed on it hanging from his belt, and now he pushed past the bottler, full of fire and excitement to be off again.

  He only hoped it wasn’t to be another foreign trip. The food played havoc with his belly.

  Chapter Nine

  Second Tuesday following Easter11

  Christ Church Priory

  Baldwin and Simon were up early the next morning and, with relief, witnessed Cook bringing the jury to order before the coroner. The bodies were viewed, stripped naked before the jury, and then rolled over and over to show all the injuries sustained.

  Witnesses were called to describe the events of the previous day, first Cook, then other guards from the gate, then the two bishop’s men who had struck the three down, and lastly others who had seen the blows. There was little real evidence of intentional murder, Baldwin felt, once the fact of men hurling ordure at the two was noted. It was plain enough that the three had been angry to see foreigners ignoring the queue at the gate and showed their displeasure by flinging muck. The jury accepted that the men had felt threatened, and in justice to them, it was agreed that their swords had been bloodied because they had feared that they might be in danger of their lives.

  Simon was not watching the matter as closely as Baldwin. Simon’s attention was fixed on the coroner himself. The coroner was observing the two accused keenly, Simon noticed, and he was surprised enough to nudge Baldwin and point. Baldwin nodded, but then shrugged. He appeared to be saying it was nothing to do with him what the coroner thought of them.

  At last the coroner summed up the evidence as his clerk recorded the facts, and he declared that the three had been killed by a chance medley. It was better than a decision that there had been murder done, a deliberate and premeditated slaughter, for that would have meant an argument about whether the men would be allowed to continue on their journey with the Bishop, but, with the official recording of the verdict, both of the men were relieved. A killing ‘par chaude melle’, or in hot blood, with the implication of deliberation, would have prevented the two from accompanying the Bishop.

  ‘A good result for the Bishop,’ Baldwin commented as the jury began to disperse.

  ‘Where are you going?’ Simon asked.

  ‘I want a word with that gatekeeper,’ Baldwin said over his shoulder as he hurried after Cook.

  ‘You got the decision you wanted, then,’ Cook said as Baldwin approached.

  ‘I think it was just. But close. I don’t know those two men, but I can easily believe that they acted from fear, not maliciousness.’

&nb
sp; ‘Can you really?’ the gatekeeper said. He turned his back and would have walked away, but Baldwin asked him to halt for a moment. ‘Why?’

  ‘This monk killed in the priory barn. Do you know anything about it?’

  ‘Only what you say, that he was slain in a barn and left there.’

  ‘Hmm.’

  ‘That tone carries a great deal of meaning, Sir Baldwin.’

  ‘I was reflecting that the priory has solid gates, my friend. Do you suppose another monk, or perhaps a lay brother, killed the lad?’

  To his surprise, the gatekeeper grinned. ‘Do you? No. I think almost anyone would have learned where the weaknesses in the priory wall lay. There are plenty of men in the city who have seen brothers in the town after curfew. Any convent with intelligent young men will occasionally learn that young men are young men, and where there are a few lodged together, some will find the means to escape and find a tavern which will sell them wine or ale. I would bet I could find a way in within an hour, if I wished to.’

  ‘So the priory is not so secure as your gate, then?’

  ‘No. Not at all.’

  ‘Which means that the killer was already in the city – unless you think he bribed a gatekeeper to open a postern and let him in.’

  ‘No. None of the keepers would do a thing like that,’ Cook said with certainty.

  ‘I accuse no one. But if you were me, would there be any gate you would look to first, thinking a man might get through?’

  ‘There are none,’ Cook said, and he looked like a man who was now in a hurry. ‘I must be off.’

  ‘I thank you for your aid, friend Cook,’ Baldwin said.

  Cook looked at him, then over to the prior and a number of brothers who ambled along the way. ‘There is one thing,’ he said suddenly, lowering his voice and not meeting Baldwin’s eye. He ducked his head to pick up his pack and swiftly spoke in an undertone. ‘Look at the castle. There is a small postern near the castle wall. If I had to bet on a corrupt man …’

  After the inquest and his talk with Cook, Baldwin and Simon went to break their fast with biscuits and cold meats and cool ale from the priory’s stocks.