Belladonna at Belstone (9781471126345)

by Jecks, Michael

  Bishop Stapledon looked at the main gate to St Mary’s, Belstone with a significant seriousness in his expression. It didn’t go unnoticed by Jonathan when he pulled the little side door open and gaped at the cavalcade before him.

  ‘Open the gate in the name of your bishop,’ ordered Stapledon’s ecclesiastical staff-bearer, his crosier, who sat before his master near the gate, his trumpet resting on his thigh.

  Jonathan swivelled slowly to stare. ‘Which?’ he squeaked.

  Stapledon kicked his horse forward until its head was pushing Jonathan backwards. ‘This one, Canon. I am your bishop. Now open that damned gate!’

  As he spurred his mount, Stapledon took in the state of the precinct, squinting shortsightedly. His eyes had been failing him regularly for some time now, and he felt the need for his spectacles, but even without them the sight was not one to please the eye.

  For Bishop Stapledon, a man used to residing with the King in the best abbeys and halls, it was shocking to see a place so derelict. The entire area appeared so rundown as to be ready for demolition. Still worse was the attitude of the workers. Those who should have been in the fields stood gaping at the sight of his entourage; those who should have been indoors seeing to the horses, working in the dairy, or producing the ale upon which the whole priory depended, thronged the lane to the stables.

  Stapledon clenched his jaw and carefully lifted himself from his saddle, his eyes squeezed tight shut, standing in the stirrups with a small shiver of exquisite pain, holding his breath. Then, giving a little sigh of pure relief, he opened his eyes and permitted himself a faint smile as he leaned forward and swung his leg over the horse’s rump to dismount.

  It was something that he had tried to think of as a minor cross to bear in this vale of adversity, but most of all he thought of it as a damned irritating affliction. Piles! he thought to himself as he stood a moment, feeling for a second’s sheer bliss, the lack of the agony that was so like a dagger thrust between his buttocks.

  ‘Bishop!’

  Stapledon turned and smiled gently as Simon bent to kiss his ring. ‘Ah, Bailiff Puttock. Good of you to come and welcome me.’

  ‘I had no idea you were to be visiting, my Lord.’

  ‘Neither had I until a short while ago. Sir Baldwin’s wife sends him her love . . . but where is he?’

  ‘I fear Sir Baldwin is in the infirmary. He was struck by a falling slate.’

  ‘Good God!’ Stapledon surveyed the buildings about him. ‘The Lady Elizabeth has a great deal to explain.’

  ‘It wasn’t her fault,’ Simon muttered, and explained about the three deaths while he led the bishop through to the canons’ cloister. Stapledon’s expression hardly altered as Simon told him of the catalogue of disasters since their arrival here with Bertrand. He only showed emotion when Simon mentioned the stabbing of Agnes.

  ‘She is also dead?’

  ‘I am afraid so, Bishop.’

  ‘Dear God!’ Stapledon shook his head, standing still for a full minute. He remembered Agnes: a cheerful young girl. That was at least seven years ago now, when he had last seen Sir Rodney. He could picture her in his mind’s eye, a young slip of a thing, fragile as a flower, pretty with her tip-tilted nose and freckles, and with an engaging smile. She had captured Sir Rodney’s heart too.

  It was difficult to believe that the young woman was dead. Stapledon knew that her death could have an impact on the future of the convent, that Sir Rodney might change his mind and bestow his money and church on a different institution, but that was unimportant to Stapledon. The Bishop had plenty of money himself; he could make good any financial losses from Agnes’s death, but he could do nothing to bring her back from the dead. He murmured softly, ‘Godspeed, Agnes. Go with God.’

  But a moment later the bishop shook off his mood. ‘Right, Bailiff. However Sir Rodney feels about this girl’s death, we have work to do. Take me to see the Lady Elizabeth. And tell me what else has happened here. How has that fool Bishop Bertrand been behaving himself ?’

  Simon filled him in on the letter from Margherita, but also mentioned the missing money and pressed the key into the bishop’s hand.

  Stapledon looked at it, his lip twisted. ‘She took the money to make the place appear in the worst possible light, solely in order to justify her own claim to the leadership; at the same time as harming the reputation of the prioress. Such corruption! Somehow it feels worse to be confronted with deceit and betrayal here in a convent, although I should be used to it after the dishonest and thieving politicians who surround the King. Bastards! Crosier, come with me and the bailiff. The rest of you, see to the horses.’

  And with these words he swept forward, the episcopal staff-bearer and Simon trotting along in his wake.

  Hugh watched as Constance and Godfrey washed the stump of Cecily’s arm, wiping the blood away. Blood still seeped from the arm even with the tight tourniquet. Godfrey stood with a worried expression, and then reached for the large iron which sat in a charcoal brazier. Taking a deep breath, he grabbed its handle and thrust it on the stump. There was a hissing; steam rose. The slight figure of the lay sister leaped upwards, her whole body curving like a drawn bow in her agony, before slumping into unconsciousness. Godfrey closed his eyes, shuddered, and dropped the iron back in the brazier, while Constance resolutely swallowed before painting her poultice onto the ruined flesh.

  Like most countrymen Hugh had witnessed enough suffering in his time to loathe seeing any creature in pain, but he had also seen many people die because of gangrene. Although he hated to see Cecily in such agony, he recognised and mentally saluted the kindness of Godfrey and Constance. If anything, it was those two who were the most affected in the room.

  ‘An excellent job, I should say,’ Hugh heard Baldwin say.

  The knight had been unable to sleep through the hideous shrieks that the girl gave until she had been anaesthetised with a strong mixture of dwale in a pot of wine. While they waited for her to succumb to the stupefactives, Godfrey held up a glass jar of the girl’s urine to the light, trying to convince himself that he was doing the best for her.

  ‘Thank you, Sir Baldwin, but . . .’ Godfrey held out his hands in a gesture of distress. ‘Whether she will recover after such an experience is anybody’s guess.’

  ‘You were swift to put her to the knife and saw, and swift to seal the raw flesh. Now all we can do is hope that she has enough faith. You have done your best.’

  Godfrey gratefully took the pot that Constance proffered and walked to Baldwin’s side, letting himself slide to the floor, his back to the wall. ‘There are many who would look at such a wound and refuse to operate.’

  ‘Especially clerks in major orders.’

  ‘Balls to that! I can’t accept it’s wrong to do what I know to be right for the sick, no matter what the Pope may say.’

  Baldwin rose to his elbow, and Hugh could see he was intrigued. ‘You were a trained surgeon, I seem to remember Bertrand saying. Weren’t you at university with him?’

  ‘For a while, yes. I learned my craft before meeting him. We were both called to the cloth late in life. I learned my skills, such as they are, in the old King’s wars. I was with a set of London men. While we were in France I met a foreigner, and he showed me how to remove a limb. I know it can save lives when the gangrene has set in.’

  ‘So you were a fighter?’

  ‘Till I learned that peace was better than war,’ he agreed and knocked back his wine. Constance refilled it from her jug.

  Seeing her sway, Hugh rose and took the jug from her, setting it at Godfrey’s side, and helped the nun to sit on a chest. On the floor, leaking blood, was Cecily’s arm, and Constance shivered at the sight, turning from it. Hugh brought her a cup of wine, then shrugged and poured another for himself, shoving the putrefying limb away under the bed. Joan walked in a few minutes later, a pot in her hand, which she set on Costance’s table, but then she caught sight of the arm. Tutting to herself, she picked it up, wrapped it
carelessly in a large scrap of linen from the table, and took it out.

  Baldwin saw her burden as she passed. Blood was staining the end of the cloth and the sight made him shoot a glance at Cecily. She was as pale as the bleached linen she lay upon, a fine sheen of sweat dampening her brow and features. Every few minutes a shiver would rack her frame. Fleetingly Baldwin wondered what would happen to the arm. If it had been that of a peasant, it might have been thrown to the pigs – or in a town, tossed into the street, which came to the same thing in the end. He preferred not to think about it.

  He faced Godfrey again, speaking gently. ‘I have seen the Moorish doctors at work, and Byzantines, and I congratulate your efforts.’

  ‘How could I leave her looking like that?’ Godfrey muttered, then hurled his cup from him. It struck the wall, shattering and splashing red wine over the plaster. ‘She’s the same age as my daughter.’

  Baldwin saw Hugh leap into view in the doorway, his hand on his knife. Waving him away, Baldwin peered at Godfrey. ‘Your daughter?’

  ‘It was many years ago. I don’t think we realised that what we did would become a lifetime’s commitment. But it has. Lady Elizabeth was already three-and-thirty years old, and I was five-and-thirty. Gracious heaven, how long ago it feels now!’

  He wore a look of bemusement, as if there was truly little that could upset him now. Baldwin was sure that mostly this was a sign of his tiredness after the operation – the amputation had taken all of his nervous energy – but there seemed something else at the back of it. He maintained a steady silence, waiting for Godfrey to fill the emptiness.

  ‘In those days, I suppose she was less certain of her vocation. She and I used to meet when I went to help the infirmarer. I found her kind, sweet, and gentle. I thought so then, and I still do now. She truly believes in what she does.

  ‘Our Rose was a beautiful child. We should never have kept her, we should have sent her away to a wetnurse and ensured that she was given a Christian upbringing in another convent, but neither of us could face sending her away like a pet for which we had no further use. So we kept her here, although we didn’t tell her who her parents were.’

  ‘No, it took an especially vindictive woman to do that,’ said Baldwin, recalling what Simon had told him of Rose’s words.

  ‘Margherita,’ Godfrey agreed. ‘The bitch has ice in her veins, I swear. Rose went bad from that moment. She wouldn’t listen to her mother, wouldn’t treat any of her duties seriously, simply ran riot. She thought that if her prioress could fail in her oaths, why should she even bother to try? I saw her sometimes, when I came here to help with the sick, and used to feel my heart break within me to see how she was tearing herself and her mother apart. And then she ran away – but not, thank God, too far away, and she still kept coming to see me. Jesus save me, but she offered herself to me once, in gratitude for listening to her, and when I refused, she wept on her knees at my feet, saying that at least I was honourable, and if only she could have copied my example instead of being a jade like her mother. Oh, God! Her words tore at me, showing me how I had sinned – and my penance was the worst of all, not even being able to confess to her that I was her father, for fear that she would turn against me as she had her mother, that she would run away, this time to become a whore in Exeter or London, somewhere where I couldn’t help or protect her.’

  Baldwin averted his gaze while the cleric sniffed and wiped his eyes on his sleeve. ‘I think, Godfrey, you are lucky to have been able to know your daughter while she grew.’

  Godfrey looked up and met Baldwin’s eyes sadly.

  ‘If only she could have known me!’

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Hugh returned to his seat, but when he saw that Constance’s pot was empty, he poured another measure for her.

  She accepted his ministrations with gratitude. The operation had been hideous, and Constance was not convinced of its efficacity. Merely removing the limb without seeing to the inner body’s humoural balance seemed wrong to her, and after seeing the bloody object lying on the floor, the shards of bone mingled with the sliced flesh, Constance could understand why people looked upon surgeons as no more than butchers.

  ‘Drink it up and have some more,’ Hugh suggested.

  Constance shook her head weakly. She had the services to attend, the daily round of work to get on with, she couldn’t just sit here and drink the day away. Looking up at Hugh she saw the kindness in his eyes.

  It was so like Elias’s expression when they had first met, she thought, and with that, to Hugh’s consternation, she began to sob.

  Simon and the Bishop arrived at the door to the nuns’ cloister. Here Jonathan smiled nervously and proposed that they should wait while he went to warn his prioress, so that she could welcome Stapledon in a proper manner.

  ‘You can go and tell her, yes,’ Stapledon stated coldly, ‘but I shall be two paces behind you.’

  ‘My Lord, wouldn’t you prefer that . . .’ Jonathan began, but Stapledon waved him aside.

  ‘You have the choice, Canon, of being there before me or after me, but do not again presume to try to alter my mind. Open this door!’

  Shaking, Jonathan inserted his key and Stapledon sailed through, Jonathan skittering after him.

  Simon, grinning, watched the bishop cross the nave of the church and stand at the door to the nuns’ cloister, tapping his foot until Jonathan realised that the bishop was waiting for him. Darting forward, muttering his apologies, Jonathan tugged the door wide. Stapledon and his staff-bearer instantly passed through, and Simon went after them, while Jonathan leaned against the opened door like a man who has seen a demon.

  ‘My Lord Bishop! It is an honour, and what a relief to see you once more at our humble convent.’

  As the Lady Elizabeth crouched before him, kissing his ring, Stapledon peered shortsightedly around the garth, sketching a cross over her head. ‘Take me to your chapterhouse, Lady Elizabeth. We need to speak.’

  Simon was about to follow, but he knew that the chapterhouse was one place he would not be welcome. It was the hall where any important matters for the community would be discussed, and such things were best hidden from laymen. Instead he set off for the dorter, thinking to see his friend, but as he approached the door, he recalled the screams which had issued from the infirmary. The idea of seeing Cecily’s mangled body was not appealing, and unconsciously Simon bent his steps towards the frater.

  Denise sat inside, alone apart from her regular companion, the jug of wine. She raised her pot to him, but then returned to her grim contemplation of the far wall. ‘Right there,’ she said. ‘That’s where I saw Agnes’s shadow, there on that wall; just like Margherita’s before.’

  ‘Was anyone with her?’ Simon asked.

  ‘No, she was all alone. And then there was that scream!’ Her eyes closed in apparent revulsion at the memory.

  ‘Where were you when Elias ran through here?’

  She put a hand to her mouth as she burped. ‘In the buttery. Getting more wine.’

  He himself wished to go to the buttery for an ale; turning on his heel, he went outside into the yard. Something made him cross the yard to the room where Agnes’s body had been found. It already felt like days ago.

  The room was open. A sow was snuffling at the thick gouts of clotted blood on the straw of the floor where Agnes had lain. Simon angrily kicked the big animal out. It was incredible that so many deaths could have occurred one after the other. In a town like Crediton there would not have been so many in so short a space. And now Cecily would likely die as well.

  Simon turned to go back to the buttery, when his eye caught a glimpse of something. Crouching, he picked at a thread lying on the ground. It was snapped, but Simon could see that each end was securely tied, one to a hinge, the other to a protruding nail in the doorframe, both a little over a foot above the threshold. At just the height to trip someone, he realised.

  Deep in thought he made his way back to the frater and fetched a cup a
nd jug of ale. He was alone now – Denise had gone. Thank God, he thought fervently. The last thing he wanted was her chatter.

  Pouring, he drank deeply, staring across at the wall opposite, where Denise had seen Margherita when Moll died – and Agnes last night.

  At first Simon thought it odd that Denise hadn’t seen Agnes being followed. Surely the same light which had illuminated the novice’s form should likewise have lit up her attacker? Then he shrugged. Agnes’s attacker was already in the room and had stabbed her without Denise seeing. The tripwire showed that: surely the killer had been hiding in the room, and when his victim tripped the killer stabbed.

  Could it have been Luke? Elias confirmed that he had taken the alley along the church’s wall towards the garden. From there he would have circled around the claustral buildings and come to the yard. He could have stabbed Agnes and withdrawn, but if he had, he would have been able to get to the church before the alarm was raised, and finding the communicating door closed, would have gone elsewhere to hide, surely?

  Luke said it was his own cry that had alerted the nunnery, and Simon was inclined to believe him.

  What about Margherita? It was easy to suspect her. Except she had denied the murders on the Bible.

  Elias was a possibility: what if he had lied? Couldn’t he have gone through and stabbed Agnes, then returned later? If he had, it meant he must have set the tripwire when he was last in the convent, and there was nothing to suggest he had been earlier, nor that he knew about the chamber. Who did?

  Thoughtfully Simon went back to the yard. The alleyway beckoned, and he walked out along it. At the far side it gave out to a new yard, next to which was the herb garden beneath the infirmary’s window, where Elias had said he would throw pebbles to waken Constance. Simon studied the ground, seeking the knife which had been used to murder Agnes, but could see no sign of it; if the killer had been here, the easiest means of concealing it was the wall – anyone could have thrown it over into the farmyard beyond. Simon retraced his steps and stood once more outside the room in which Agnes had died.