The Chapel of Bones: (Knights Templar 18)

by Michael Jecks

Simon smiled. ‘That’s a lie, friend. You were seen talking to the man last night.’

  ‘Perhaps the man who told you that was a liar,’ Thomas said sharply.

  ‘Your accent sounds just like an Exonian’s,’ Simon commented.

  ‘I’ve been here a while looking to the rebuilding. Maybe I’ve picked up a little of the local way of talking.’

  ‘Have you heard of the murder of the Chaunter?’ Baldwin tried.

  ‘Yes. It was after that the Bishop asked permission to be able to build his wall about the place, I think.’

  ‘That’s right. Because an armed band of assassins came here and slaughtered the Chaunter. We’ve heard that not many escaped that attack.’

  ‘What? What’s it got to do with me?’

  ‘Be calm, friend,’ Baldwin said, showing his teeth in a smile that held little humour. ‘It is merely the oddness of this chain of coincidences: we’ve heard that the friar was one of those who was attacked with the Chaunter. He had been there that night and won his scars from those who would have tried to kill his master. He was brave and honourable. And there were others there that night. There was a man called Henry, a saddler. He lies dead now in the Charnel Chapel.’

  ‘What of it?’

  ‘How long have you been here working on the Cathedral?’ Simon asked suddenly.

  ‘Almost a year, I suppose,’ Thomas said with a sidelong glance at the Master Mason.

  Baldwin shot Robert a look and caught the brief pause, then the slight nod, as though he was considering and calculating before agreeing. ‘Good. And these murders began a short while ago. Perhaps you would like to tell us where you were before that?’

  ‘I have been all over the country. Immediately before coming here, I worked on the walls in London, I’ve been to the castle at Conwy, and I’ve helped with many churches.’

  ‘Where were you born?’ Simon asked.

  ‘At Axminster.’

  Baldwin knew the town slightly. Set in flatlands on the Devon and Dorset borders, not very many miles from the sea, it was a pleasant small market town. He had seen the place when he had visited Forde Abbey some years before. ‘Was that where you learned your trade?’

  ‘No. I left my home when I was not yet seventeen and went to Dorchester to learn this. There was a church being built there. I helped.’

  ‘When was that?’

  ‘I am six and fifty years old now, so it would have been forty years ago.’

  Simon and Baldwin exchanged a look. Baldwin knew it was possible. Sometimes men were driven to leave their home cities in order to seek a better life. About forty years ago there had been the Welsh wars, and in the aftermath, men were taken from all over the country to go and build the King’s new castles there; thousands of them. It was a massive undertaking, and it denuded the rest of the country of skilled masons. Many men who left their homes were snapped up by desperate town-dwellers who needed walls mended, new parish churches built, or even simply a new privy added to a hall. When Baldwin was a lad, he could remember his father complaining bitterly about the lack of workmen.

  ‘It seems curious that there should be two murders in the Close just recently,’ Baldwin said at last. ‘Especially when both are associated with the murder so many years ago.’

  ‘Why should it have anything to do with me?’ Thomas asked.

  ‘Because you bear the same name as one man who was there,’ Baldwin said. ‘A man called Thomas was involved in killing the Chaunter.’

  ‘Then I would be foolish indeed to come here without changing my name, wouldn’t I?’ Thomas said, but without bluster. He sighed. ‘Do you mean to arrest me? I’ve done nothing.’ Except kill poor Saul, of course – and that by accident, he thought.

  ‘It puzzles me that a man should say he saw you talking to the friar last night when you say you didn’t.’

  ‘Look – I was upset last night and went straight to my bed.’

  ‘Why upset?’

  ‘That’s a matter for me. A woman,’ Thomas said, glancing at the Master Mason in explanation and a search for sympathy.

  Robert rolled his eyes. ‘Wine and women will be the end of many a good building. Now, masters both, have you finished interrogating my man here? He has a lot of work to be getting on with.’

  The Dean was in his hall alone when the two men went up and knocked upon his door.

  ‘Ah, Bailiff, Sir Baldwin. Will you – ah – please come in and be seated? I shall ask for some bread and meat for you.’

  In fact, when the door opened a short while later, there was more than the sparse repast indicated by his words. Three servants entered with trays held high. There were meats, cheese, wine and a thick, steaming pottage. ‘I – ah – often feel the need for warmer foods at this time of year,’ Dean Alfred explained. ‘So, please, do you have any theories as yet?’

  Baldwin spoke, looking to Simon for support as he described their visits to the widow and to Joel. ‘So I think that there is a connection between the present two deaths and the murder of the Chaunter,’ he concluded. ‘Do you remember that night?’

  ‘The night of Chaunter Walter’s assassination? My heavens – um – no. It was many years before I came here. I only arrived when Bishop Stapledon was installed. Not because I was an especial ally of his, it just happened that way. Hmm. I’ll have to see if there is someone who can help you with that. The Treasurer may have been here then. Someone must have been. Plainly it would have to be an older vicar or canon – a man who was then a – er – novice or chorister. I shall ask for you, Sir Baldwin.’

  ‘It is certainly interesting that there were these different fellows who were all companions at the time,’ Baldwin said.

  ‘And a strange coincidence that the man who left was called Thomas,’ Simon added.

  ‘True, although the man’s comment that he would have to be a merry fool not to have changed his name before returning was compelling enough,’ Baldwin pointed out.

  ‘Perhaps,’ Simon said. ‘Although …’

  ‘What?’ asked the Dean.

  ‘It just occurred to me: if he had worked in other cities as a mason, he might have assumed that coming here, he’d meet men he’d worked with before. Changing his name might have seemed dangerous. Thomas is also, of course, a very common name. The chance of finding someone who recalled and cared about events so many years ago, was a risk worth taking.’

  ‘A good point. Masons often go from one site to another expecting to meet someone from a past job,’ the Dean commented. ‘I – ah – know this myself. There was a need to find a new mason after poor Saul died recently, and one of the men suggested a fellow with whom he had worked before. Recommendation often works to recruit new men.’

  ‘How did he die?’ Simon asked. ‘Was it an illness or an accident?’

  ‘An accident,’ the Dean said. ‘The poor fellow happened to be walking along beneath the scaffolding when a stone fell and crushed him. In actual fact,’ he added pensively, ‘it was Thomas who was responsible for the stone slipping free.’

  ‘Him again?’ Baldwin said, his interest aroused. ‘I should like to see where this happened.’

  ‘I shall ask my Clerk of the Works, Matthew, to show you, if you like.’ The Dean tilted his head, looking like a sparrow eyeing a suspect morsel of food. ‘That – ah – doesn’t mean Thomas is guilty, of course. These things do happen.’

  ‘Yes, they do,’ Simon agreed sharply, but there was a light in Baldwin’s eye which Simon hadn’t seen since he arrived in Exeter.

  ‘What do you – ah – wish to do next, then?’

  ‘We should speak to this curious corrodian, William,’ Baldwin declared, sitting back with his mazer of wine resting on the top of his belly. ‘And then perhaps, we should question this foreign gentleman as well – this Udo.’

  ‘Udo Germeyne?’ the Dean asked.

  ‘You know of him?’

  ‘By reputation. There are some who make their money solely by regrating and forestalling – that is, by buying
all the stores in the morning and then reselling them later when they have a monopoly, or catching peasants on their way to market and buying in their produce before they reach the city, again in order that they control all prices. It is a violation of the city’s laws, of course, but all the Freemen tend to do it to a greater or lesser extent, so the fines are – um – derisory. They are not enough, in my view, to prevent a man continuing.’

  ‘So Udo is not a popular man with everybody?’ Baldwin said.

  ‘I do not think he is particularly unpopular,’ the Dean responded. ‘However, I find such behaviour often indicates the character of the man. If he is prepared to be so mercenary in his business dealings, using money to create more money like a usurer, what else would he not be capable of?’

  To Baldwin’s mind, usurers were more evil than those who merely regrated and forestalled in a well-regulated market like Exeter’s. ‘I hope you don’t think him capable of murder just because of his market trading?’

  ‘Certainly his part in all this seems odd,’ Simon mused. ‘And the speed with which the two women sought to protect him was curious.’

  ‘Let’s go and speak to him first, then,’ Baldwin said, rising. He drained his cup. ‘Thank you, Dean, for our lunch. We shall see you again as soon as we have something to report. In the meantime – could you arrange for the mason Thomas to be watched? I should not wish him to suddenly disappear.’

  ‘You think he could be the guilty man?’

  Baldwin considered, staring through the Dean’s little window out at the Cathedral Close. ‘I do not know, but the coincidence of his name, the fact that he’s about and Matthew says he reminds him of a man who left here years ago … It is better to keep him by than lose him.’

  ‘Do you wish Matthew to show you to the place where Saul died now?’

  ‘It will wait,’ Baldwin said. ‘If you could ask him to show me later, I would be grateful.’

  They left the Dean’s room and walked out into the Cathedral’s grounds. Crossing the Close, Simon at first felt how chill it was compared with the warmth of the Dean’s hall, but then there was a rift in the clouds overhead, and suddenly the area was flooded with warmth.

  ‘It makes the whole city look more pleasant, doesn’t it?’ he commented idly.

  Baldwin wasn’t concentrating. ‘Sorry?’

  ‘I said …’

  There was a rattling of hooves on the cobbles, and Simon looked up in time to see a knight wrapped in a thick black woollen cloak over a bright red tunic and green hose ride in through the Fissand Gate. The two stopped and eyed the man as he rode along towards them, and then, just as he was about to trot on past he stopped and threw back his hood. His gleaming bald pate had a fringe of golden curls now faded with the years, which looked like a baby’s fluff on a middle-aged man’s head. His mouth moved into a smile, and as it did so, Simon could almost hear Baldwin’s hackles rise.

  ‘Sir Baldwin. How pleasant to see you,’ the man exclaimed. ‘And Bailiff Puttock, too. I am delighted to see you both here.’

  ‘Godspeed,’ Baldwin said, less than entirely heartily. ‘I am glad to see you, too, Sir Peregrine.’

  Simon grinned to hear his friend lie. Baldwin had always cordially disliked Sir Peregrine de Barnstaple.

  ‘I suspect we are here for the same reasons, but I shall have to speak to you later, if you do not mind, Sir Baldwin,’ Sir Peregrine declared. ‘I am weary, yet I still have business to attend to with the Dean and Chapter. Will you excuse me? Where can I contact you?’

  When they had told the knight where they were staying, he lifted his eyebrows in apparent surprise, and then smiled sympathetically, as though their inn was far below his own standard before riding off towards the Dean’s stables.

  ‘What is he doing here?’ Simon wondered.

  ‘Sadly I am sure we shall soon find out,’ said Baldwin. ‘Come, let’s get away from here while we can!’

  Thomas was packing his meagre belongings and tools and preparing to escape. He had been very close to being uncovered when the two men had questioned him, and as soon as they left, he went to find the Master Mason, who was frowning at a plan sketched in charcoal on a sheet of vellum.

  ‘Sir, do you think you could use me on your other sites?’

  ‘No. If you want work, you can stay here.’

  ‘But Master, I can’t stay here, not now.’

  Robert stopped his fiddling with the sketch and took a deep breath. At last he met Thomas’s eye. ‘If you’ve done something here, lad, that’s your lookout. I tell you this: I didn’t believe a word of your shite about some woman, right? And I didn’t believe your tale of being born someplace else neither. No. You came from here, didn’t you? And I reckon you’re hiding something. No problem with that when you keep your nose out of things, but when it leads to the work being held up, that I do mind. And when men start to die, I mind that too, just in case I get to be the next one. Right? So as far as I’m concerned, you can stay here if you want, Tom, but you aren’t coming with me anywhere else. Sorry, but that’s the way it is.’

  As he spoke, Robert’s face was oddly devoid of compassion, as though he was talking to a man who was already condemned.

  Perhaps, Thomas thought, he already was.

  When he saw the knight approaching, John Coppe didn’t bother to hold out his bowl. Sir Baldwin didn’t ever give him alms. Still, there was a chance that he’d be more lucky with the strange knight’s friend who was Bailiff, so he smiled, ducking his head as Sir Baldwin approached. Then John remembered that some little while ago, Sir Baldwin had been in the city with his woman, and she had been very generous. Perhaps she’d taught her old man something.

  ‘Sir Knight, spare alms for a poor old sailor? Your wife was generous to me.’

  Baldwin stopped and stared at him. ‘Yes, I remember you,’ he said as he fumbled in his purse. ‘I haven’t much …’

  ‘That’s enough, Sir Baldwin. Every bit is a help to me,’ Coppe said with a lopsided grin. ‘When you have as little as me, anything’s useful.’

  ‘Are you always here?’ Simon asked.

  ‘Costs me three shillings a year to take this spot, and I don’t grudge it. I make enough.’

  Simon nodded. The places at Tavistock were cheaper, but then the town was smaller and the chances of a beggar making as much money as Coppe could earn in a year were that bit more remote. He dug into his own purse and pulled out the first coin that came to hand, but then he held it up.

  Coppe lifted his eyebrows. ‘A penny? What are you after, Master?’

  ‘Just news. You’ll have heard about the friar killed out there in the Close? They found his body this morning. Did you see anything?’

  ‘I saw him come into the Close yesterday, aye. It was late afternoon, and I remember because Janekyn was here, and as soon as the friar appeared, Jan slipped off so he didn’t have to talk to the man.’

  ‘Why was that?’ Simon said.

  ‘Jan was always a loyal Exeter man,’ Coppe said dismissively, then threw a hasty look over his shoulder in case Janekyn was about. ‘That friar, Nicholas, was guilty, in his mind, because he tried to protect the Chaunter against the men John of Exeter had hired to remove him. Daft, I know, but Jan feels strongly about that kind of thing.’

  ‘You know him well?’ Simon asked.

  ‘Yes – and before you ask: he’s no killer! Anyway, he was here when the friar went in and he stayed here. I was with him, so if you want to have him hanged, you’ll have to hang me too. And that wouldn’t be easy, lords, because you’d have to carry me to the rope on account of me not having the legs to walk there!’

  Simon chuckled along with him, but didn’t respond when Coppe held out his bowl expectantly. Instead he flicked the coin contemplatively. ‘What about the other man, the dead saddler? Did you see him the day before they found his body?’

  ‘He was often about here. You know, men like him, they’ll come in here to do a bit of business before Mass, won’t they? Actually, he
was here with that man Udo, and they had a real shouting-match in the Close there. The foreigner threatened to kill him, in so many words.’

  ‘Why was that?’ Baldwin asked sharply. ‘We hadn’t heard this before.’

  ‘Something to do with the saddler’s daughter. Henry was saying something about the German not being allowed to marry her, I think.’

  ‘Aha!’ Simon said.

  ‘What then? Was there a fight?’ Baldwin frowned.

  ‘No. A vicar ran up and stopped them before they could do that,’ Coppe said regretfully. ‘Could have been fun, otherwise.’

  Simon flicked the coin again, and it rattled in his bowl. ‘Keep your eyes open, and let us know if you see anything else.’

  ‘My pleasure. Sounds to me like easy money,’ Coppe grinned.

  Baldwin looked at him, and then turned slowly. From here he could see the lean figure of Sir Peregrine crossing the Close with a vicar and the Annuellar behind him. He glanced at Baldwin without slowing his pace, and then made straight for the Charnel Chapel, disappearing behind the southern wall.

  He had the look of a man who was involved in a busy and less than appealing task. Baldwin had not asked who the new Coroner of Exeter might be, and now he wondered with sinking heart whether this knight could be the replacement for the late Sir Roger de Gidleigh.

  Glancing down at the beggar, who was happily fiddling with his coin, Baldwin shook his head. ‘Be careful that this isn’t the same as the easy money you were paid as a sailor, Coppe, on that last journey that cost you your livelihood and your leg.’

  ‘Hardly likely!’

  Baldwin nodded, but he found his eyes drawn back once more to that chapel. He felt a sick apprehension, and the worst of it was, he had no idea why.

  Chapter Seventeen

  William walked about the cloister at St Nicholas’s Priory with his staff always in his hand, peering into the darkest places in the long corridors, while his ears strained for the hiss and clatter of a fine-pointed arrow striking the stones. When you stood in line waiting for the clash of arms, the first you would know would be the noise of the arrows whistling and soughing through the air, but something only a warrior knew was that when the thing was aimed at you, you usually wouldn’t hear it until it hit. He knew that, all right. Jesus! He should do – he’d stood against the sodding things often enough.