Falconer's Trial

by Ian Morson

  ‘Then we must follow this up. Can you get to speak to the sergeant? In the meantime, I will try and talk again to Segrim, or his half-brother. Perhaps the Templar has been spotted lurking around Botley. He must still be intent on killing Sir Humphrey if his plan is to suppress any knowledge of the conspiracy.’

  Bullock shook the young man’s hand firmly, pleased that he was taken heed of. He was so used to Falconer tossing his ideas aside, that it was heartening to be taken seriously by a scholar for once. Even if it was only young and impressionable Thomas Symon.

  The flagstone rocked under Saphira’s feet as she crossed the kitchen, and Rebekkah cried out a warning.

  ‘Take care, mistress. I nearly tripped over that on Friday. Nearly measured my whole length across the floor.’

  Saphira recalled how the magical appearance of Samson from under the slab resulted in her salvation yesterday. She was not surprised it was not seated properly now. But her maidservant had just said it had been loose the day before Saphira’s rescue. She stood and rocked backwards and forwards on the secret trapdoor thoughtfully. Rebekkah continued to prattle on as she finished preparing dinner on the newly repaired table. Harold Pennyverthing had done a good job, and had shamefacedly promised to come back the following day and finish the work on her front door. For now the bolt and frame were fixed temporarily. Saphira tipped the slab once more with her foot.

  ‘It’s very odd, Rebekkah, but I don’t recall this flagstone rocking before. How long has it been like this?’

  ‘Oh, a good few days, mistress.’ She laughed. ‘If it wasn’t a foolish idea, I would blame those rats for it. They started eating your food from the larder about the same time.’

  Saphira smiled and tapped her foot on the flagstone.

  ‘When you have served my dinner, Rebekkah, you can go home. I won’t need you any more today.’

  Rebekkah smiled broadly. Mistress Le Veske was a most generous employer. And she was hoping to meet her boyfriend in the afternoon without her parents knowing. She prepared and served the repast with great alacrity. Saphira, for her part, was glad for her maid’s speed. She had an idea concerning the access to the tunnel and what might lie within. After the dishes had been cleared away, and Rebekkah had slammed the front door behind her, Saphira poked around the kitchen until she found a sturdy iron trivet with a long handle. It was perfect for inserting in the inconspicuous slot at one end of the flagstone. She levered the stone up and pushed it to one side. Cool air rushed up into the kitchen from the underground tunnels and cellars below. She lifted her skirts and slowly descended the steps which she had almost slid down on the previous occasion. She held a candle in her hand to light the area below. The flame guttered a few times as draughts from other parts of the tunnel blew through. Once more, she admired the neat ashlar stonework of the walls and curved arches. She retraced her steps from the previous occasion as far as she remembered them, until she came to the intersection of tunnels. She knew that, if she turned right, she would come out where she had before, in Samson’s cellar. So turning left should bring her out higher up Fish Street, under Rabbi Jacob’s house. She recalled that Samson had told her there was a mikveh under his house. And if she was right in her supposition, she would find what she was looking for near running water. She turned to her left.

  Bullock took the right fork just outside Oxford and rode towards Temple Cowley again. He was not sure what he would be asking Gilles Bergier, but he knew he couldn’t expect the sergeant to admit to murder. Or betray his master, Odo de Reppes. He would have to rely on that sense of comradeship that permeated the squires and sergeants in the lower ranks. And the Templar knights’ feeling of superiority that sometimes set them apart from the rank and file. It was Saturday and the Rule decreed that on that day the knights benefited from three meals of vegetables, where the squires and sergeants got one alone. It had always annoyed him as a sergeant, and he was sure the mood persisted even now. So, instead of announcing himself to the commander – Laurence de Bernere – this time Bullock just aimed his old nag towards the dormitory where the sergeants bunked. It was late afternoon and their masters would have dined, and would now be in the Temple to hear the divine offices. The sergeants would be making the most of the time off, and shooting the breeze with each other.

  He was in luck. Wandering round behind the dormitory, he found a bunch of sergeants rolling the dice on the dusty ground. Gilles Bergier was one of them. He squatted down awkwardly, his stiff old legs protesting at the abuse. A couple of the sergeants gave him a sidelong glance, but then went back to their gambling. Bullock observed for a while, and noted that Bergier was on a roll and winning the small coins that were being wagered. The knights may have taken a vow of poverty but their sergeants surely hadn’t. Eventually, Bergier scooped up his winnings and, amidst protests from those who he had taken money from, rose and walked away. Bullock followed him down to the fish ponds that helped support the commandery. Bergier stopped and stood looking over the flat and murky waters.

  ‘You wanted to talk to me.’

  Bullock realized any subterfuge he had planned was pointless.

  ‘Yes. It’s concerning Odo de Reppes. I have heard stories about his journey to Outremer, and extraordinary events that seem to dog his heels.’

  ‘And you are wondering if they are true. Well, you know the words of the Rule as well as I do. “Do not accuse or malign the people of God.”’

  Bullock realized that word had got around he was an old soldier, and former sergeant of the Order of Poor Knights. Well, he could quote the ancient Rule laid down by their founder, Hugues de Payens, too.

  ‘It also says, “Remove the wicked from among you.”’

  ‘Hmmm. I still cannot help you. You see, I have only been appointed his sergeant since he came through France. A matter of a few weeks ago.’

  Bullock felt disappointed. Perhaps this man could not help him nail down the truth of the conspiracy tale after all. Though it was still possible that he had acted for de Reppes in the murder of Robert Bodin. He had to try and winkle the truth out.

  ‘Then you were with him in Berkhamsted when Richard of Germany died.’

  Bergier turned and stared hard at him. He looked as though he was assessing the old man who stood before him. Whether he could trust him, and whether he was someone who could keep a secret. Bullock held his right hand behind his back and crossed his fingers. The sergeant took a deep breath and continued.

  ‘Yes. The old man. He was suffering from the half-dead disease. His face all pulled down at one side, and dribbling from the side of his mouth. If that had been me, I would have wanted to die. He was hanging on to a life not worth living, so maybe it was a mercy he died when Odo was there.’

  Bergier’s slow and deliberate delivery told Bullock all he needed to know about what had happened in Berkhamsted. But it did not help him with either Ann’s or Bodin’s death. He risked another question, as the man had been as cooperative as he could be so far.

  ‘And Odo, has he got any reason to be in Oxford? Has he asked you to aid him with anything in the town?’

  Bergier’s eyes narrowed.

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘A matter concerning a local knight of Botley, and his wife who is now dead.’

  ‘Botley?’ The sergeant looked puzzled. ‘No, if that is what you are seeking to sort out, you have the wrong man. Odo de Reppes is here on family business in Oxford, and that is all I can say. We went nowhere near Botley.’

  Bergier turned and walked back to his comrades, leaving Bullock as puzzled as before.

  TWENTY

  The cool air led Saphira to the ritual bath. At the northern end of the tunnel under Jewry stood a vaulted chamber with a flight of stone steps leading down into a cistern. Cool, clear water filled the cistern to halfway up the steps. Her candlelight reflected off the smooth surface of the water as off a mirror. She paused and listened, but could hear nothing save the steady drip of water somewhere. She turned, and heard a faint scrab
bling sound. Perhaps it was just rats, and she was wrong. But she didn’t think so. In the compacted earth at her feet she saw something odd. Bending down she picked up a small stone, which might have otherwise gone unnoticed. But this one had a hole carved in it where a cord might be threaded, and a Hebrew letter painted on its surface. She called out in a hushed tone, which echoed back to her.

  ‘Covele, where are you?’

  Silence. She tossed the talisman in the air and caught it.

  ‘Boy, I know you and your father are there.’

  The scrabbling began again, and Covele appeared from round one of the pillars at the end of the chamber, his boy shielded protectively by one arm. They stood a little way off from her, cautiously assessing her.

  ‘What do you want? We are doing no harm.’

  ‘None, I am sure. Except for robbing my food store.’

  ‘Would you begrudge your own kind sustenance?’

  ‘Not at all. If you had asked for it. But you sneaked up out of the earth and took it like… rats.’

  Covele sneered at the insult and stood his ground. It was the boy who eventually broke the deadlock. He walked up to Saphira and spoke.

  ‘Will you feed us, please? I am hungry and tired of hiding down here.’

  In the kitchen, as the boy was tucking into the remains of the fish cooked by Rebekkah for her, Saphira began to question Covele. At first he sat defiantly straight with his brown robe pulled around him, a satchel full of talismans and amulets at his feet. He refused the food offered by Saphira and evaded her questions. But then the boy pushed a piece of bread towards him which was soaked in fish oil. He gave his son a fleeting smile and took the offering.

  ‘You ask me why I followed the university master to that manor house. It was to find a way of exacting revenge on him. And you. Last year you drove me from this very town. And me a fellow Jew.’

  Saphira knew that she and Falconer had only questioned Covele because he had been responsible for carrying out a forbidden ritual. If he had fled, it was of his own free will.

  ‘We were only asking questions, as I am now. If you were innocent, there was no need to run away.’

  Covele snorted with laughter, some crumbs of bread spewing from his mouth.

  ‘Innocent? You are a Jew, too. You know what it’s like. Where does presumption of innocence come into it?’ He hooked a stained thumb at the lad, whose eyelids were beginning to droop despite the tension in the room. ‘I had to flee with my boy for our safety. So then I set myself up as a talisman seller, and in the guise of a German Jew I thought I was safe to come back to this place. When I saw you staring at me in the street, though, I knew you had recognized me. We went back to where we were camped in the cemetery, and began to pack once again. Then I had second thoughts and stayed around, not wishing to be pushed out again. Later, I saw that man of yours and followed him. I thought I could maybe learn something about him that I could use against him. And I did.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  He wasn’t looking at Saphira by now, but staring into the embers of the fire. She, for her part, was blushing at his revelation, even though she knew how things had stood between William and Ann Segrim. Covele continued, his hands clasped tight together as though he were squeezing the life out of Falconer.

  ‘I gave her an amulet in reward for the information she gave me. And that was as far as I got.’

  The amulet, no doubt, that Saphira had later seen in Ann Segrim’s solar, which had set off her suspicions of Covele in the first place. It appears he had never even got as far as Ann herself. Margery had probably put it in her mistress’s room hoping to cure her.

  ‘But the arsenic you bought from the spicer?’

  ‘Arsenic? What’s that got to do with revenging myself on this man? I bought it to mix with milk to kill the flies in our tent. The weather is hot and the flies are prodigious in numbers. But then I heard tales of murder and mayhem being bandied around town, and found a better place to stay. Those tunnels are cool and safe. I told the boy to take the arsenic back and see if the spicer would return our money. But he chased him off. Ask him.’

  She looked at the boy, who was now asleep. She was sure he was the beggar-boy she had seen on the doorstep of Bodin’s shop that day. Covele’s story was plausible. The talisman seller leaned back in the chair and yawned.

  ‘Now my revenge will have to wait.’

  Saphira didn’t tell him that Falconer was already in a worse fix than merely having rumours of adultery being spread about him. She left the pair to sleep in her kitchen and retired to her solar, aware she had not spoken to Falconer all day.

  Thomas had also spent the whole day without speaking a word with Falconer. Which was unfortunate as William had some precise opinions about the Templar conspiracy and its impact on the death of Ann Segrim. But Thomas was still determined to uncover the threads of Odo de Reppes’s misdeeds from his end, whilst Bullock tried to talk to his sergeant. In the end, he had no need to go to Botley, for in the afternoon he encountered Margery in La Boucherie – the end of High Street where all the butchers traded. He saw her coming out of a shop and called her name. The maidservant cast a wary eye over towards him and for a moment looked as though she was going to flee. Then, when she saw who it was had called, she sighed, and waited for him to cross the street.

  ‘What do you want now?’

  Thomas ignored her sullen demeanour and smiled sweetly.

  ‘I was just wondering how your master was. I was planning to go over to Botley and ask him about…’ He realized Margery would know nothing of the high politics of Sir Humphrey’s situation, being a lowly servant. ‘. . . the state of his health.’

  Margery took a defiant stance in the middle of the street as people flowed by them on both sides.

  ‘The master is still very unwell, as you might expect. He has not set foot outside the house for days. In fact, he has told us to tell anyone who calls that he is not at home. That he never came back from the Holy Lands.’ She put on a cute face, which was at odds with her sour look and dark hairs on her upper lip. ‘So, there is no point in coming to Botley. The master is not at home. Now, if you will excuse me, sir, I must buy a potion from Bodin the spicer.’

  Thomas realized that no one at Botley could know of the spicer’s murder, that had taken place only that morning. He warned Margery of the situation.

  ‘You will not be able to carry out your task, I fear. Robert Bodin was murdered this morning.’

  Margery went very pale and swayed a little. Thomas reached out an arm in case she collapsed, but she recovered her composure quickly.

  ‘Who did it, sir?’

  ‘That we don’t know yet. But we shall find out, and it might throw light on your mistress’s death too.’ He paused, a thought jumping into his head. ‘Constable Bullock told me that when you gave evidence at the Black Congregation, you said you had gone to Bodin for a medicine for your mistress.’

  Margery’s jaw clenched tight and she cast her eyes down to the dusty ground. Thomas wasn’t sure if it was because of him reminding her of the scare she had got bearing witness in front of the Black Congregation, or for some other reason. He decided not to pass over the errant idea, however. Here was a tenuous link between the spicer and various people at Botley, after all.

  ‘What did you fetch, Margery?’

  Margery ground the toe of her shoe in the dust.

  ‘It didn’t matter. The mistress never took it anyway.’

  ‘What didn’t matter, girl?’

  ‘I was supposed to get the mistress a preparation of feverfew for her sweats. But when I told Master Alexander where I was going, he said not to bother. The mistress was not all that ill. He said go to the spicer and get something harmless that tasted bitter but would do nothing. So I did. And I gave it to the master when I got back.’

  ‘You gave it to Alexander Eddington?’

  ‘Yes, but he could not have passed it on. The Oxford master k
illed her before she could take it, didn’t he? Either that or she got some murrain from that nunnery she went to almost every day.’ She shuddered. ‘Dangerous places, those nunneries.’

  William Falconer was frustrated by a lack of knowledge. He didn’t think he would ever think that, but being locked away in a cell had kept him from knowledge. The accumulation of knowledge about Ann’s murder. Why had no one come to him today, and kept him informed about what had developed? Where was Saphira? He was bursting with questions to ask. But then, he supposed he only had himself to blame. Ann’s death had overwhelmed him, and for a few days he could not even think clearly. Then, when they told him that the chancellor was to try him, he had been scared. Not for himself, but for Saphira, whom he would have incriminated if he had said anything. It had been her potion he was bringing to Ann, and no would believe a Jew was an innocent. Especially one who, it seemed, was now known to have replaced Ann in his affections. Even though he knew the real situation, Ralph Cornish had twisted it to suit the chancellor’s view of the facts. And where did he learn about his relationship with Saphira anyway? Falconer was sure he had been very careful, for Saphira’s sake if not his own.

  In fact, he had kept silent about so many matters that it was no surprise now that he was not being consulted. But Saphira had told him last night about some of the threads of truths that had been uncovered. He had spent a sleepless night thinking about them, rearranging the facts and events as he knew them. He had seen a flaw in one set of facts, and needed to find out more before he could tell Bullock what needed doing. It was all to do with the timing of Humphrey Segrim’s arrival in Oxford, and the presumption that the Templar could have murdered Ann to silence her.

  He had spent quiet hours in the night recalling what he knew about the sequence of events. Finally, he had convinced himself he was right. Whenever Segrim had arrived in Oxford – and apparently he had closeted himself in the Golden Ball Inn for quite a while – Ann had not encountered him or spoken to him until after she had fallen ill. He was sure of this because, when he had visited her on her sickbed, she had made no mention of Humphrey’s return. If Bullock thought the Templar had killed her because he feared Humphrey could have told her his secret, he was wrong. There might have been other reasons, but that is what he needed to talk to Bullock about. And he had a bee buzzing in his bonnet about Godstow nunnery. That is what Ann had spoken to him about before Alexander Eddington had thrown him out of Botley Manor. And Falconer had some important information for Bullock or Saphira to follow up in connection with that. He didn’t know where it might lead, but it needed investigation. And time was running short. Tomorrow was Sunday, and he didn’t think the Black Congregation would convene until Monday. So there was a whole day to set matters in train. If someone would only visit his cell.