The Saltergate Psalter

by Chris Nickson

  ‘I know old Tom,’ de Harville said finally. He beckoned the bailiff close and whispered something in his ear. The man left the room. ‘If he confirms you visited him, you’ll be able to go.’

  ‘I was there,’ Christian said, the relief plain on his face.

  A heavy, brooding silence filled the hall. The only sound was the occasional scratching of Brother Robert’s quill. Finally the bailiff returned, bending to speak quietly to the coroner.

  ‘You can go,’ de Harville said finally. As Christian stood, he added, ‘I’ll probably want to talk to you again. Next time come quietly, for your own sake.’

  ‘Yes, Master,’ the man agreed and hurried out of the room, glaring fire at John as he left.

  ‘Well, Carpenter, is he guilty? Was I wrong to let him go?’

  ‘Wrong?’ he asked in surprise. ‘I don’t know. There was no proof to keep him. I think he was telling the truth – some of the time, anyway.’

  De Harville cocked his head.

  ‘And the rest of it?’

  ‘I don’t know. He could have killed, that’s certain. He had the opportunity.’

  ‘What do you think, monk?’

  ‘I agree with John.’ Robert said after some thought. ‘We have nothing against him. But I can’t say he’s innocent. Not yet. There’s something I don’t trust about him.’

  ‘Don’t trust?’ The coroner raised an eyebrows. ‘You’re always one to see the best in people.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Master.’ He lowered his head.

  ‘Better an honest answer than piety.’ He laughed. ‘It makes a change for you, monk.’

  • • •

  He walked home slowly, lost in thought. Not about Christian; those answers might never come unless they had luck.

  His mind was filled with the attempt on his life. If Walter hadn’t come along he’d be dead; there was no doubt of that. The man knew his trade, and was clever enough to flee once the odds turned against him.

  Was it just someone seeing an opportunity or was there more behind it? How would he even know?

  Yet why would anyone consider him so much of a threat? He’d discovered nothing damning, no evidence to convict. Everything was like a tangle of threads that he was slowly trying to unravel.

  As soon as he walked into the house he knew Walter had told his sister the news. The place was hushed, no sound of children playing. Katherine stood at the entrance to the buttery. Her hair was carefully tucked under the veil, an apron covering the plain brown dress. She had her arms crossed over her breasts.

  ‘You know,’ he said and she nodded sadly.

  ‘I …’ he began and found he had no idea how to continue.

  ‘Why?’ Katherine asked.

  ‘I don’t know.’ He lowered the satchel of tools to the floor and sighed. ‘I can’t make head nor tail of it.’ He opened his arms but she didn’t move. ‘I can’t even tell if it’s connected to everything else. It might have been an outlaw.’

  ‘And perhaps it wasn’t. Is all this worth your life?’ Her eyes were intent on his.

  ‘No,’ he answered without hesitation. Who killed who, what happened to the psalter, ought to be nothing to him. All that should matter was right in front of him. He’d plighted his troth to her, given her his hand and his heart. His future.

  ‘You really don’t know the reason?’

  ‘No.’ He sat on the bench, shaking his head. ‘I don’t.’

  ‘John, you have to stop.’

  ‘There’s nowhere to go with it all, anyway. Nothing else I can do.’

  ‘Promise me,’ she told him.

  ‘I swear it,’ he said, and meant the words. His business with the coroner, with Timothy and the psalter, was done. He patted his bag. ‘Tomorrow I’m back out to Newbold as if nothing had happened.’

  ‘And if they still come looking for you?’ Her expression had softened, he thought. That was something.

  He tried to smile. ‘I’ll run.’

  Katherine came to sit across the table, her hands reaching out to take his. ‘What if de Harville comes back and wants more from you?’ She spoke the name with anger.

  ‘I’ll refuse.’

  ‘Will you?’ It came out of her mouth like an accusation and he knew he deserved it.

  ‘I will. I can make the same money doing what I love and I know I’ll be home safe every night. With my wife.’

  ‘The coroner will insist.’

  ‘Let him,’ John said. ‘I don’t owe him any service. I can stand my ground.’

  ‘I pray you do,’ Katherine said softly, but with little hope.

  • • •

  The days passed. He returned to the barn, taking Walter with him for the heavy work that needed two men. Two weeks and he was done, proud of what he’d built. All that remained was the thatching of the roof, and that was a skill beyond him.

  The farmer paid him and he moved on to the next jobs. Small work that lasted two or three days, then on to another and another.

  May ripened into June, the scent of wildflowers heady in the air when he walked outside Chesterfield. The stalks of wheat waved in the fields. The lambs flourished and the cattle grew fat on the grass.

  It was as perfect a season as he could remember. When he held Katherine he believed he could feel her body thickening, almost day by day. Sometimes she placed his hand there and he could feel the baby moving and kicking inside her.

  That was the miracle, he decided. Each time it took his breath away and brought a silent prayer for mother and child.

  He almost forgot about Timothy and the other dead men. They slipped to the back of his mind, their faces only appearing if he walked back to the empty house at the top of Saltergate or saw the coroner from a distance.

  De Harville hadn’t sent for him. They’d exchanged little more than a nod in church of a Sunday or in the marketplace.

  He slipped back into a familiar life and it fitted him well. For the first week he stayed wary, walking around with a hand on the hilt of his knife in case the killer returned. But there was nothing and he began to lower his guard.

  His labours kept him busy. He felt content in his life, happy in his own skin, using the talent God have given him. Each day he returned home tired but satisfied. Walter had wondered when they’d look further into the deaths, but even he had stopped asking.

  It was a small life. Yet he didn’t want anything more. He had everything a man could desire.

  • • •

  The evening was long, warm enough to sit outside as the darkness gathered. He’d made a simple bench for Katherine, where they could enjoy the weather and the way the silence slowly grew around them. She had a rough shawl gathered around her shoulders. Her cheeks had grown plumper, rosy in the fading light.

  His mouth was open, ready to say something, when he heard the hammering on the door. Worry flashed in her eyes. It was late for a caller. No good news ever arrived at this hour.

  He heard Katherine behind him as he strode through the house and unlocked the door. One of the bailiffs stood there, looking apologetic.

  ‘I’m sorry, Master,’ he said, ‘but the coroner sent me to fetch you.’

  ‘Why?’ John asked.

  ‘I don’t know, Master. He just sent me to tell you.’

  He was silent for a few moments, composing the words.

  ‘Please tell him that I’m flattered,’ John began, ‘but that I’m done with the business of death.’

  ‘Yes, Master,’ the bailiff replied. ‘He won’t be happy,’ he added after a pause.

  ‘I’m a free man,’ he said kindly. ‘I’m not beholden to anyone.’

  ‘Yes, Master.’ With a short bow, the man left.

  The peace of the evening had been shattered. If there’d been a death he’d hear about it in the morning, along with the rest of the town. That was enough for him.

  ‘Do you think he’ll let it go?’ Katherine asked.

  ‘I hope so.’ He put an arm around her. ‘Come on, let’s go to bed.�
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  But he’d barely settled when a fist was pounding on the door once more. If he didn’t answer it, the neighbours would wake.

  That was what the coroner wanted, of course.

  He stepped into his hose and boots, glancing back at Katherine. In the moonlight her eyes looked fearful.

  John drew back the bolts and turned the key. The coroner himself was there, face set.

  ‘I sent a man for you.’ He took a pace into the house.

  ‘I’m done with all that. I told him.’

  ‘He gave me your message.’

  John smiled. ‘Then I don’t know what more to tell you.’

  ‘People don’t turn me down.’ It sounded like a threat. ‘You’ve done it twice. First when I offered you the manor and now this.’

  ‘I have my business to look after.’ He heard feet on the stairs and turned to see Katherine. She’d put on the simple brown dress, the veil roughly gathered over her hair.

  ‘I need you for my business,’ de Harville told him.

  ‘Your business almost killed him twice,’ Katherine said. ‘Had you forgotten that?’

  ‘The dam speaks.’ The coroner’s mouth twitched with amusement. ‘Come now and we’ll forget all this happened.’

  ‘No,’ John said.

  De Harville sighed. ‘What do you want?’ he asked.

  ‘We’d like you to leave us alone,’ Katherine told him. She put her hand on John’s arm. ‘You’re a father. How do you think your child would feel if you were dead?’

  He acknowledged the statement with a nod of his head. ‘What would you have me do, Mistress? Beg?’

  ‘I’d rather you left,’ she said.

  ‘Carpenter, I need you.’ He sounded sober, his tone serious. ‘I’ve got nowhere since you left.’

  ‘There was nowhere to go, the way things stood.’

  ‘Maybe,’ the coroner agreed.

  ‘Why send for me in the middle of the night? What’s so urgent?’

  ‘Someone came and said they’d seen the two men who work for the Bishop of Lincoln again. They’re here.’

  ‘You can question them,’ John said. ‘You’re good at that.’

  ‘You do something more that that.’ The coroner hesitated. ‘You can see into their souls and judge whether they’re lying or not. I don’t have that gift.’

  John shook his head. ‘You’re praising me too highly. I can’t do that.’

  ‘Don’t forget I’ve seen you do it.’ He smiled. ‘I just want you there when I talk to them. Ask your own questions if you like, then tell me what you think.’ He looked at Katherine. ‘Nothing more than that, Mistress. I swear.’

  John watched her face. She blinked and gave the merest hint of a nod.

  ‘I’ll be there in the morning,’ he told de Harville.

  ‘Thank you.’ But the man said it to her, not him.

  The door closed and locked, Katherine turned to him. ‘Just talk,’ she warned. ‘Nothing more.’

  ‘I promise,’ he said, smiling. Most men would never let their wives dictate what they could and couldn’t do. They’d say it went against the natural order. But their marriage was for love, not property or influence. He’d learnt a hard lesson, he didn’t need to learn it again. ‘We need our sleep,’ he said, taking her hand and climbing the stairs.

  • • •

  It seemed strange to walk past the church and not hear the workmen. Without the sound of hammer and saw, the shouting up to the roof and the tower, the air was empty. Even the ale barrel had vanished from under the tree. Soon enough the grass in the churchyard would grow again and every memory of the workmen would fade.

  The weekday market was busy, the goodwives up early, haggling over prices with beaten-down sellers. Men passed on the way to their labours, bareheaded in the balmy dawn.

  John saw a face he knew here and there, then spotted Will Durrant. The young man was guiding him through the crowd.

  ‘Good morning, Master.’

  The blind man cocked his head, trying to place the voice. ‘The carpenter,’ he said, a grin of recognition growing on his face. ‘Have you found your man yet?’

  ‘No. I’ve been busy with other things.’

  ‘Working with your hands. I can smell the sawdust on you.’

  ‘Yes,’ he admitted with a smile. ‘You’re well, I hope, Master?’

  ‘Fair to middling.’ He looked healthy, with just an old man’s usual frailties and his blindness. ‘But I hear the coroner has asked for your services again.’

  He knew he shouldn’t have been surprised. The town was small enough for gossip to fly on the wind. In a matter of moments it could be everywhere. But it still took him aback, to hear it said as if it was the most ordinary thing in the world.

  ‘For today, maybe,’ he allowed.

  ‘Best not keep him waiting, John the Carpenter,’ Durrant said. ‘He has a temper. Not as bad as his father, mind, but still bad enough. I wish you peace of the day.’

  ‘To you as well, Master,’ he said as the young man led Durrant away.

  • • •

  Two chairs sat on one side of the table in de Harville’s hall. A thickset man with a hook nose and a disdainful expression sat in one of them, a lanky fellow with greying hair and a long, lugubrious face next to him. They were plainly dressed, but the wool and linen of their clothes was expensive, well-cut and sewn. They wore their elegance lightly, boots of Spanish leather on their feet and velvet caps set on their heads.

  ‘Your names, please, Masters,’ the coroner asked. He was seated across from them, Brother Robert at his side, ready to make notes.

  ‘I’m Richard d’Angers,’ the heavier man replied in flowing French. ‘This is Arthur of Warwick.’

  ‘I’d prefer this in English,’ the coroner said lightly. ‘I assume that’s no problem for you?’

  ‘Of course not,’ Arthur answered with a haughty nod. ‘But we prefer French. An educated tongue.’

  ‘And in Chesterfield we usually speak English.’ He raised his gaze a little to look at John, standing in a corner behind the two strangers, his arms folded. ‘I believe you work for the Bishop of Lincoln, Masters.’

  ‘Who told you that?’ D’Angers asked with amusement.

  ‘Is it true?’

  ‘We’ve helped the Bishop on a couple of matters,’ Arthur acknowledged. ‘But we don’t work for him.’ He spoke the word with disdain.

  ‘Are you here on his behalf now?’

  The pair glanced at each other. ‘We are,’ d’Angers answered reluctantly, then held up a hand before the coroner could ask his next question. The sunlight sparkled on a jewelled ring. ‘But we’re not at liberty to tell you why.’

  ‘It’s not your first visit here, I believe.’

  ‘Oh?’ D’Angers looked down his nose.

  ‘You visited a man called Julian,’ John said. Neither of the men turned to look at him.

  ‘What evidence do you have for this?’ Arthur said, staring at the coroner and the monk.

  ‘You were seen,’ John continued. ‘What business did you have with him?’

  ‘Does this man work for you?’ Arthur asked de Harville.

  ‘He works with me. Why do you ask?’

  ‘He’s a nobody. A nothing.’

  ‘I’d value it if you treated his questions as if I’d asked them,’ the coroner said.

  ‘Very well.’ D’Angers sighed. ‘Yes, we visited him once. What of it?’

  ‘What took you to his house?’ John continued.

  ‘We’d been told he’d be a good agent here for us. The Bishop is looking for fleeces to buy and sell on abroad.’

  It seemed reasonable enough, he thought. Julian knew Christian, a man with fleeces to sell.

  ‘And how did you find Julian?’

  ‘He was a venal, grasping man,’ Arthur told him. ‘No more than you’d expect from a butcher.’

  ‘Did you do business?’

  ‘We did not,’ he replied emphatically.

 
‘How was he when you left?’ John wondered.

  ‘Disappointed,’ d’Angers said with a heavy chuckle. ‘Why, what does he say?’

  ‘Nothing, Masters. He can’t. He’s dead.’

  That made them turn, heads craning to see his face.

  ‘When did this happen?’

  ‘Shortly after you left.’ He let the suggestion hang in the air.

  ‘D’Angers stood, hand moving towards the hilt of his sword. ‘Are you saying we killed him?’

  ‘Sit down,’ the coroner ordered. ‘No one is accusing you of anything. You’re easily upset, Master. You don’t have anything to hide, do you?’

  ‘I won’t have someone like that insult my honour.’

  ‘I didn’t,’ John said. ‘I told you he was killed after you left. Do you know why anyone would want to kill Julian?’

  ‘I would imagine there are many who would want to do that.’ D’Angers smiled. ‘Why? No reason beyond his manner. He believed he could behave beyond his station.’

  ‘How?’ the coroner asked, leaning back in his chair.

  ‘No deference or politeness,’ Arthur said. ‘He seemed to believe we were equals.’

  They were hiding something. He felt certain of that. They held themselves too still, John thought, and reasoned out their words too well before they spoke. Every sentence was calculated, and there was more than honour behind it all.

  But if they’d bought or taken the psalter when they met Julian, why were they back in Chesterfield now? Revisiting the scene of a crime seemed to be a dangerous business. He felt the rasp of stubble as he ran a hand over his chin.

  ‘Masters,’ John said, ‘it would be a great help if you could tell us your business here.’

  ‘We can’t tell you.’ D’Angers bristled. ‘Didn’t you hear what I said earlier?’

  ‘It would be useful.’ The coroner gave a lazy smile. ‘And we’ll keep your confidence, I promise that.’

  ‘No.’ Arthur stood first, sword banging against his hose, then d’Angers. ‘I think we’ve answered all your questions. I bid you God’s peace.’

  As the door closed behind them, de Harville raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Haughty fellows, aren’t they? What did you think, Brother?’