A Mortal Bane

by Roberta Gellis

  “I do not run the errands of lackeys, even the bishop’s lackeys,” Brother Paulinus said, drawing himself up and stalking off across the cloister to enter the monks’ chapter house.

  Since that was exactly the reaction for which Bell had been hoping, he made no protest but hurried back to the gate. He was about to ring the bell lustily when Brother Godwine stepped out of the small shelter the gatekeepers used at such times as they expected to need to open the gate frequently.

  “I have spoken with Brother Paulinus,” Bell said. “Now I must question Knud, who found the body, and when I am done with him, the infirmarian.”

  “Come with me,” the porter said, leading him along the west wall of the building and into the lay brothers’ hall.

  He bade Bell wait near the entrance, looked around, nodded with satisfaction, and went toward a group of men who were working at some task Bell could not distinguish. One looked up when the porter spoke to him, seemed to make some protest, and then began to fold something into a cloth. The porter returned, told Bell his man was coming, and went out. Bell waited without impatience, well satisfied that Paulinus had no chance to talk to his servant.

  Knud was a middle-aged man, thin and wiry, with sparse brown hair, who approached with his head down, his hands concealed inside his sleeves. Midway he stopped uncertainly, and Bell gestured for him to come nearer. He resumed his approach, but with apparent reluctance.

  “Yes, my lord?” he whispered when he was near enough.

  “I have been sent by the bishop to—” Bell stopped abruptly and reached out to steady the man, who had uttered a gasp and listed to the side. “What is wrong?” he asked, feeling Knud shudder. “We do not blame you for Messer Baldassare’s death. I only want to know what you saw when you found the body, and where you and others were on the night of the murder.”

  Bright brown eyes flashed up at Bell and away, and Bell thought of a small trapped animal. Almost fearing Knud would bolt, he kept his grip on the man’s arm and drew him to a spot farther away from the group among whom he had been working.

  “The crows were cawing,” he said to start Knud off, “and Brother Paulinus sent you to see why.”

  “Brother Sacristan is responsible for the building and the grounds. He thought someone might have left offal on the porch. Sometimes sinners seek shelter there to make merry…or worse.”

  “I know that. So you went to look, and you found?”

  Knud shuddered and his eyes flickered up toward Bell again. “You know what I found. A dead man. I had nothing to do with that. I did not know him. I had never seen him before.”

  Despite the defensive words, Bell had the feeling that the lay brother was now more at ease. “Never?” he asked, seeking for what could have frightened the man so much when he first mentioned the bishop. “Not in the church attending the Compline service?”

  For a moment the man did not answer, frowning slightly and obviously thinking back. Then he shook his head slowly. “I do not think so,” he said, even more at ease and seemingly trying to answer truthfully. “But he might have been there. It was quite dark in the nave. There were some others besides the lay brothers there, visitors to the priory and a few folk from the neighborhood. He might have been among them, but I cannot remember seeing him.”

  “Very well. It is true he might never have entered the church. Now, tell me what you saw when you opened the door to the porch, exactly what you saw.”

  “Blood,” Knud said. “At first all I saw was blood—blood all over, all over the man, all over the porch. I cried out and jumped back. I do not remember what I said, but it must have been that someone was hurt, or dead, because the infirmarian came running.”

  “Was the blood red?”

  “No. It was black.” He glanced up again, not so fleetingly this time. “I suppose it could have been red, but it is the north porch. The sun does not touch there, and it was dark.”

  “But you were sure it was blood?”

  “The knife was there, in his neck.”

  “Who took it out?”

  “I do not know. The infirmarian, I suppose, or the lay brothers who are healers. I did not touch it. I did not even look at the body again.”

  “Very well. Now, after the body was carried away by the infirmarian, Brother Paulinus told you to send a messenger to the abbot. After that what did you do?”

  He expected the man to say he went back to his work or his prayers; instead, the quick glance flicked at him again before the eyes were humbly lowered.

  “I…I did not know what to do, and in the end, I did nothing because I am bound to obey the sacristan.” Knud’s voice was scarcely above a whisper and he leaned a little closer to Bell, his body tense. ‘I thought the bishop should be told, but Brother Sacristan does not trust the bishop.”

  Bound to obey the sacristan but eager to tell tales about him, Bell thought. Was that because Knud disliked his master, or because he feared the bishop and wished to curry favor by placing the blame on the sacristan—Bell had not forgotten Knud’s initial reaction when he said he was the bishop’s man—or simply because he was a sneaking little rat who liked to make trouble? However, Bell only asked mildly, “Why does Brother Paulinus not trust the bishop?”

  “He says Lord Winchester is worldly and that he prefers the secular clergy.”

  ‘That cannot be surprising, since your order is autonomous,” Bell said. “Lord Winchester must necessarily give most of his attention to the churches and parishes under his management.”

  “Brother Paulinus says that we live by harsher rules and are more pure and closer to God. Thus, the needs of our orders should come first. He told me once that the Bishop of London used to contribute a substantial sum to our priory for the maintenance of our buildings, but when London died and Winchester was appointed as administrator, he refused to continue the donation. Brother Paulinus was furious.”

  Knud hunched his shoulders and Bell saw a slight movement within the sleeves of the gown, as if he had clutched his hands tighter around his forearms. Bell could not help wondering whether Brother Paulinus had beaten his assistant because he could not take out his fury on the Bishop of Winchester. If so, Bell hardly blamed Knud for making clear that he was not at fault for failing to inform Winchester of the murder. No doubt he guessed that the bishop would not be pleased to be left in ignorance.

  “I will remember that you wished to inform the bishop about Baldassare’s death but had no instruction and no permission to do so,” Bell said. Knud raised his head a bit and allowed a small smile—of complicity?—to curve his lips; then he dropped his head again. He seemed to think he had made a favorable impression, implying they were in league together against the sacristan. Bell returned the smile and said, “Now, tell me where you were during the Compline service and who can say you were there?”

  Knud looked up fully, mouth agape. “Where I was? Why do you ask me that?”

  “I need to know where everyone was, especially at the end of Compline,” Bell said blandly.

  Once again with bent head, Knud said, “I was with the other lay brothers. We all stood together.”

  When Bell asked him to name them, he did, again growing calmer until Bell added, “And when the service was over, did you leave the church with the other lay brothers?”

  “No, of course not,” Knud said, trying to sound indifferent but with his voice gone thin and breathless again. “I went to the altar to replace the vessels used during the service in the safe box. Brother Sacristan unlocked the box and handed me each piece. When they were all replaced, he relocked the box and left. I stayed a moment longer because someone had spilled water on the floor. I wiped it up before it could run along the safe box and wet the wood.”

  “Were you alone in the church then?”

  “No. Some of the older folk who had been in the nave walk slowly. I think I went out by the monks’ door before all of them left the church.”

  “The sacristan had left before you? Do you know where he went?
And where did you go?”

  Knud shook his head, then said slowly, “He often went to walk in the cloister after services. Perhaps he went there. I went up to bed.” His voice was easy, although he did not look up to meet Bell’s eyes. “The other lay brothers will tell you. We do not have separate cells but sleep like the novices” —his voice checked suddenly and Bell saw him bite his lower lip— “in a dormitory.”

  “Was anyone missing from the dormitory?”

  “No.” The man’s eyes flicked up and away again. “My lord, is it true that the murdered man was a papal messenger carrying a bull that would have made the Bishop of Winchester a papal legate?”

  “The man was a papal messenger,” Bell replied. “We do not know what he was carrying. His pouch was missing, as was his purse. Why do you ask?”

  “His pouch was missing?” Knud’s voice drifted into silence and his eyes flicked up and away once more.

  ‘That has significance to you,” Bell said harshly. “Have you seen a pouch somewhere?”

  “No. No.”

  Knud backed away a step. Bell caught his arm. “Then why did you ask about the pouch? Are you implying that this killing was a Church affair?”

  Knud flinched. “The man was a papal messenger, so I thought….”

  For the second time, his voice faded away as if he had spoken before he realized what the end of the sentence must be. “So you thought that a churchman—but none were here except the members of this priory—had committed the crime?”

  “No. No. Of course not. Brother Paulinus said it was the whores who killed the man, that Satan had possessed them to make them desecrate the church.”

  “Satan may possess them, but I doubt for that purpose.” Bell could not help grinning. “If the devil is trolling for souls, he will catch more by leaving the whores to their usual work. Now, why was the first thought that came to your mind that one of the brethren was guilty when you heard Baldassare was a papal messenger?”

  “No, I did not. I….” Knud looked fearfully over his shoulder and then whispered, “A papal legate has authority over the monastic orders as well as over the secular clergy.”

  The swift glance touched Bell again, this time with a spark of satisfaction in it. Despite the fearful looks and the whisper, this was what Knud had wanted him to know, what he had been leading up to when he first spoke of Brother Paulinus’s distrust of the bishop. Likely Knud had known all along that Baldassare was a papal messenger—not surprising that what one knew, all knew in a small, tight community like the priory. But the idea that a man would kill to keep papal authority out of the hands of another was fantastic. Only, Brother Paulinus was a fanatic, and men did strange things when driven by what they believed was religious righteousness.

  Bell nodded acknowledgment and released Knud’s arm, but said only, “I need to speak to the infirmarian now.”

  Knud bowed slightly and gestured toward the south end of the hall, where a sturdy partition was broken by a solid door. “You will find him within.”

  With a hand on the infirmary door, Bell watched Knud walk away. Then he opened the door and stepped inside. His first impression was one of pleasure. The room was full of light from three windows, east, west, and south, open to the spring air. It was also warm from fires blazing in two hearths, which were obviously new additions as the stone was different from that of the walls. The air was redolent of spices; Bell took a deep breath and then coughed. Beneath that pleasant scent was a musk of sickness. An elderly monk with kind eyes and a worried expression hurried up to him.

  “Are you ill, my son?”

  “No, Brother,” Bell replied. “I am the bishop’s knight, and he has asked me to look into this dreadful murder. I understand that you examined the body and cared for it. Can you tell me when you think Messer Baldassare died and what killed him?”

  The infirmarian looked over his shoulder at the four occupied cots. In two, near the hearth on the west wall, a pair of very old men were sleeping. In one near the window on the south wall, a young monk was sitting propped up praying, sliding the beads of his rosary through his fingers. The last cot was on the east wall, and another young monk was tossing to and fro on it, a lay brother seated beside him on a stool. The infirmarian sighed and shook his head.

  “Come, we can walk in the cloister while I tell you what little I learned of Messer Baldassare’s death.”

  Here, Bell thought, listening to Brother Infirmarian, was no withholding and little doubt. He was glad to learn that the infirmarian’s observations tallied exactly with his own, although the monk had drawn no conclusions from the condition of the wound or the body’s stiffness. Bell put forward his ideas about the killing. The infirmarian’s eyes widened with surprise and recognition.

  “Yes, I agree. I would never have thought of it, but so clean a cut and so deep a wound must mean that the murderer took deliberate aim and meant to kill, and poor Messer Baldassare did not expect the blow or try to defend himself against it. Oh, dear! How dreadful! Why?”

  “When I know why, I may also know who,” Bell said. He thought for a moment, but could find nothing more he wanted to ask. The infirmarian, he believed, was hiding nothing and was likely unaware of any undercurrents flowing through the priory. “Thank you, Brother Infirmarian,” he said. “I am very glad to have your confirmation of my conclusions.”

  “I do not understand men who do such things,” the old monk said sadly, and then smiled. “I suppose that is why I am here and not out in the world.” Then his eyes grew shadowed. “But there is no escape from evil. It has followed us right to the door of our church, has it not? It must be fought.”

  “That is my work, Brother,” Bell said. “I hope I can root it out for you. That is the bishop’s order.”

  “A good man.” The smile was back. “Not perhaps totally patient and submissive to God’s will, but of good heart and great wisdom.”

  When the infirmarian had nodded at him and returned to his duties, Bell stood irresolute. What he wanted to do was go to the Old Priory Guesthouse, and because he recognized the strength of the desire as being unhealthy, he sought to curb it, but there really was nothing else he could think of to ask, except…yes, ask for a list of the visitors who had stayed at the priory on Wednesday night. At the gate, he communicated this need to the porter.

  “But it was the whores,” Brother Godwine protested. “I told you that Messer Baldassare did not come through the front gate. He came through the back, from the whorehouse, and Brother Sacristan says the whores followed him and killed him.”

  “So Brother Sacristan says,” Bell replied, “but as I told Brother Paulinus, I think it highly unlikely. Why should a whore take such a risk when she could poison Baldassare’s wine in the comfort and privacy of her own house and be rid of the evidence of her crime by throwing his body in the river? A knife, used so precisely, is more likely a man’s weapon. Moreover, it seems that Messer Baldassare had planned a meeting with someone that night, so it is not impossible that one of the guests came for that purpose—”

  “And committed murder? Oh, I do not believe it.”

  “Perhaps your faith will be justified,” Bell said, “but I still need to know who guested here that night.”

  “I am not sure I know all the names…I did not open the gate for every single guest—”

  “But you know Baldassare did not enter by this gate?”

  “Because Brother Patric and Brother Elwin watched the gate when I was not by. I asked them. They swore that only three mounted men came in by the gate and that only three horses were ever in the stable at any time that afternoon and night.”

  “Very good. Make sure the names of the three mounted men are included among the guests.”

  Brother Godwine shook his head. “I do not know their names, not two of them, at least. But they are all known to Brother Paulinus. They have done work for the mother house and were sent to examine what, if anything, needs to be done here. But I cannot go about finding out all the name
s right now. I will send you a list of them after Vespers.”

  “That will do. Send it superscribed with my name—Sir Bellamy of Itchen—to the bishop’s house. I will then want to question the brothers at large as to whether and when and where they saw the guests.”

  “It is almost time for evening prayers, a little supper, and then for bed.”

  The last two phrases set off an urgent desire. The sun was low in the west and Bell could just imagine a small table in Magdalene’s chamber set with a cozy supper for two, the good bed with its coverlet turned down in the background. He nodded brusquely to the porter, and as he signaled for the gate to be opened, said over his shoulder that he could ask his questions the next day, but desired to have the list this night to discover if any in the bishop’s Household knew those on it.

  Chapter Nine

  21 April 1139

  Old Priory Guesthouse

  The image of warm food, comfort, and hospitality was still vivid in Bell’s mind when he rang the bell at the gate. When there was no quick answer, he ground his teeth and rang again, louder. Doubtless she was plying her trade and did not wish to be disturbed, but that was nothing to him. He was about to peal the bell for the third time when he saw the door of the house open. Magdalene came forward slowly, but she was fully dressed, not covered in a hastily donned bedrobe.

  “Sir Bellamy!” she exclaimed as soon as she could see his face. “I did not expect you again today, but I am very glad you came. I have some interesting news for you.”

  “I am sorry to disturb you when you are busy,” he said stiffly.

  “I was only embroidering, but since Messer Baldassare’s death, I find myself reluctant to answer the bell if everyone I expect is already in the house. Come in, Sir Bellamy.”

  He followed her, speechless for a moment—he had forgotten how beautiful she was. Then he said, “Since we are to work together to solve this murder, why do you not call me Bell, to which I am more accustomed.”