A Dark Night Hidden (7 page)

Within an hour, the pilgrims had been fed, given hot drinks and were seated on the shelter’s benches before a cheerful fire. There were two sick among them: the smaller child and the old woman. The child had a persistent cough, and Saul had already gone to fetch Sister Euphemia and ask for some of Sister Tiphaine’s white horehound cough mixture. The old woman’s trouble was less straightforward; she was complaining of a dragging feeling in her belly and Brother Firmin, who was overheard muttering about ‘women’s troubles’, had announced it to be clearly a matter for the infirmarer.

In the meantime, the monks had taken the little family into the shrine for prayers and Brother Firmin had given them all a draught of the healing waters. By bedtime, all five were in much better spirits and already hopeful of recovery.

Sister Euphemia came down to see the old woman the next day. Josse had no idea what transpired during the consultation; the infirmarer had very firmly and pointedly closed the door of the newly rebuilt shelter and said that she wished for privacy. Whatever she did must have been effective; the old woman emerged with a smile on her face and a lightness of step that certainly had not been there when she arrived.

The family, once freed of their anxieties, proved to be entertaining guests. They had not come far; their village was no more than a short morning’s walk away. They brought news of violent happenings: a few days ago, a sheriff ’s officer guarding the gaol just outside the village had been attacked and killed. The two prisoners who had been in his custody, a man and a youth, had disappeared. Nobody seemed to mourn the sheriff ’s officer, who, according to the younger woman, had been a ‘right bastard, vicious and a bully an’ all’. When Brother Firmin timidly asked if there was anything to fear from the escaped prisoners, the man of the party scratched his head, furrowed his brow in thought for a moment and finally said, ‘Dunno.’

There was considerable fascinated speculation. Josse, listening, occasionally smiled to himself at some of the wilder conjectures. The talk was harmless, though, and understandable; the monks lived an isolated and monotonous life down in the Vale and exciting events reported from the outside world always generated a lot of gossip.

Among the chatter he suddenly heard his own name mentioned. Alert, he listened in to the conversation.

‘ . . . want to get Sir Josse here to investigate,’ Brother Erse was saying to the man and the old woman.

‘Eh? Sir what? Ain’t he a monk?’

‘No, indeed he is not. He’s only dressed that way because he’s been helping us to rebuild the shelter,’ Erse explained in an all too audible whisper. Then, looking up and noticing that Josse was listening, he reddened faintly and said, ‘They say there’s a bit of a mystery, Sir Josse. The dead man was hit in the face, seemingly, only it wasn’t such a blow as should have killed him. I was saying, you’re a bit of an expert on such things and maybe you’d . . . ?’ Apparently overcome by the daring nature of his proposal, Erse dropped his chin and shook his head in confusion. ‘But there, I dare say you’ve more important things to do with your time,’ he muttered.

Forestalling the old woman’s remark – she began to protest that it
was
important, at least to the people of her village – Josse said, ‘I will be happy to come, if that is what you wish?’ He raised his eyebrows at the man.

‘Well,’ he replied slowly. ‘Well, I don’t know as if I should—’

‘Never mind if you should!’ his wife protested. ‘There’s a matter needs resolving and here’s someone willing and, it appears, able to do just that.’ Josse could not but admire her summing-up of the matter. ‘Why not take advantage of him, that’s what I say! If you’re truly willing, sir knight?’

‘Aye,’ he replied, grinning at her. She smiled back, and her pretty mouth was only slightly marred by a missing tooth. ‘I am. When you depart from here for home, I will accompany you.’

Josse went to see the Abbess in the morning. The family was planning to set out as soon as they had eaten and he wanted to be mounted and ready so as not to delay them.

He told her what he intended to do and she nodded. ‘You do not need my permission, Sir Josse,’ she reminded him gently.

‘No, I know I don’t. But I wanted you to be aware that the shelter is finished; I am not deserting one task in order to take up another that is more to my liking.’

‘The thought had not entered my head.’ She paused, then said, ‘Sir Josse, is any more known of this family or of the officer who died other than these sparse facts that you present to me?’

‘No, my lady.’ He waited for her to enlarge and, soon, she did so.

‘I am thinking that there may be grounds for suspicion.’

‘Oh? How so?’

She hesitated, then said, ‘Probably I see danger where none exists. But we speak of a death; for all that the officer seems only to have suffered a minor blow, yet it has killed him. I fear . . .’ She did not say what she feared. Instead: ‘Will you take Brother Augustus with you, Sir Josse? Simply so that you will have someone young, fit and capable to watch out for you?’

He would have liked to say no. To add that he could take care of himself and did not need a guardian. But the Abbess’s words, he had to admit, echoed his own vague uneasiness; there was something strange about this matter. And who but a fool ventured alone into a mystery when he was offered a reliable companion?

‘Thank you, my lady, for your consideration and your sense,’ he said. ‘Aye, I’ll take young Augustus, if he’s willing to come.’

‘He will be,’ the Abbess murmured. Then, in a louder voice, ‘Tell him to take the old cob. The animal could do with some exercise; Sister Martha says he’s getting far too fat and lazy.’

The sun came out to see the travellers on their way. As before, the man led the donkey with his wife and younger child – now almost free of his cough – riding on the animal’s back. The older boy walked beside his mother. The older woman had been pushed and pulled astride the Abbey’s cob, and Augustus walked at the stirrup. Chortling, she said she’d never had such a fine ride in all her life.

Josse rode at the rear. He had offered the older child a seat in front of him up on Horace’s back, but the child, apparently frightened, had violently shaken his head. It was understandable; Horace was restless and kept rolling his eyes and pulling at the bit, a sight quite alarming enough to scare a child into keeping his distance. Josse guessed that Sister Martha had been spoiling the horse; she usually did when he was in her care. When they were clear of the frozen pond and the track widened out, Josse took Horace out in front and kicked him into a canter, riding him hard for a mile or so before reining in and trotting back to meet the rest of the party. Having got the playfulness out of him, Josse settled down for a quiet morning’s ride.

He and Augustus saw the family safely back to their little dwelling and asked for directions to the building that housed the gaol. Then, bidding them farewell, they rode on.

The presence of a mule and a couple of horses indicated that the representatives of law and order were still inside the gaol building. Tethering their own mounts and going inside, Josse and Augustus heard raised voices. Two men were arguing, another plaintively interrupting.

Josse called out. ‘Hallo there!’ The dissenting voices abruptly ceased. Then, from some hidden place at the end of a passage, there came the sound of footsteps.

‘I’m coming!’ a man’s voice panted. ‘These cursed steps will be the death of me!’ And into view came a short and very fat man in a leather tunic over saggy, soiled hose. ‘Yes?’

Josse introduced Augustus and himself, saying where they were from and how they came to be there. ‘I was informed,’ he went on regally, ‘that there was a dead man and some mystery as to how he met his death. I have some experience in these things and have come to offer my services.’

The fat man seemed to be amazed that anyone should bother. ‘He weren’t a well-liked fellow,’ he said, face creasing in puzzlement. ‘Reckon there ain’t no more mystery than that one of his prisoners thumped him in the face and the pair of ’em – him and the other one – legged it.’ He grinned.

‘They were locked up?’ Josse asked.

‘Aye, course they were. This here’s a
gaol
.’ The faint sarcasm was evident.

‘And the sheriff ’s officer would have entered the cell to take in food?’

‘Nah, not him! There’s a trap door in the wall, see, and he opens the flap, shoves the food in then locks it up again.’

‘I see. Then how, do you imagine, did the prisoner manage to achieve the blow to the guard’s face?’

‘Oh. Er. Hm.’ The fat man lifted the front of his jerkin and began an enthusiastic scratching of his crotch. ‘Hm.’

‘I should like to see the body.’ Josse stood over the fat man, trying to awe him into obedience.

‘Oh. Suppose you can if you want. Come with me.’

The fat man led the way along the passage and down a short flight of steep stone steps. Below, three small cells opened off a corridor. The doors to all three were open and the foul stench from within each cell made Josse want to retch.

The fat man went ahead of him into the end cell. ‘Here.’ He pointed. ‘Here he is. Tab, Seth, out of the way.’ He kicked at the two men crouching by the body and they leapt aside. The presence of a hurdle beside them on the wet and soiled floor suggested they had been about to put the dead man on to it and bear him away.

Josse looked down at the guard. He lay on his back and, as Josse had been told, had clearly suffered a fist in the face. The top lip was split and the nose squashed. Quite a sizeable fist, Josse thought, or else the assailant hit him more than once.

But he had to agree that the blow did not at first glance look as if it had been fatal. Perhaps the man had fallen and cracked his skull on the hard stone floor. Lifting the head, Josse felt all over it for the presence of a wound. There was nothing.

But something had killed him.

Leaving aside the vague and unlikely possibility that the man had been sick and just happened to die at the very moment that he was punched and two prisoners broke out of his gaol, Josse proceeded to examine the rest of the body.

There was not a mark on it.

He sat back on his heels, thinking.

Then, spotting something, he said, ‘Augustus?’

‘Here,’ came the lad’s instant reply.

‘Gus, can you get me a light?’

‘Aye.’ Augustus ran off, along the passage and up the stairs, quickly coming back again bearing a flaming torch. Good lad, that one, Josse thought. Keeps his eyes open. He must have noticed the torch when we were in the room upstairs.

By the light of the flame, Josse leaned forward and studied the dead man’s throat. Yes. He had been right.

‘Gus?’

In an instant the boy was crouching beside him. ‘Sir Josse?’

‘Look.’ Josse pointed. To the left of the throat, up under the ear, where there was a faint, dark bruise. And to the right, in the same place, where there were four more.

He heard Augustus’s sudden sharp gasp. And the boy said, ‘Someone throttled him.’

‘Aye,’ Josse agreed. ‘Gus, let’s have your hand . . .’

Comprehending instantly, Augustus put his hand around the dead man’s neck. His thumb and fingers, even at full stretch, came nowhere near the bruises. Josse then did the same. Although his hands were larger than Augustus’s, he could not have made the marks either.

‘He was a big man, this killer,’ Augustus breathed into Josse’s ear. ‘Uncommon big.’

‘Aye,’ Josse muttered back. ‘And there’s something else, Augustus.’ He waited, almost believing that he could hear the lad’s quick, intelligent brain at work.

Suddenly Augustus gave a sharp exclamation and swapped his hands over. Now his thumb was over the single bruise and his fingers a few inches short of the group of marks.

‘Aye,’ Josse whispered. ‘When I asked you to stretch out your hand, instinctively you put out the right, because you’re right-handed. But, as you have just realised, the killer used his left hand. Unless some circumstance prevented him from using his dominant hand – it was injured, or perhaps bound – then I think we can say we’re looking for a left-hander.’

Augustus whistled softly. ‘Aye,’ he added, his awe-filled eyes meeting Josse’s, ‘and a bloody great big one.’

While Josse was away, Helewise received another visit from Father Micah. The priest informed her that he was dissatisfied with standards within the Abbey and Helewise, controlling with some difficulty her instinctive, outraged reaction, asked him meekly to elaborate.

‘We will take a turn around the Abbey’s various departments,’ he said grandly. ‘I shall point out those areas which are of most concern.’ Rebellion seething under her quiet demeanour, Helewise fell into step beside him.

Within quite a short time, she had a good idea of what it was that formed the foundation of his complaint. In the small room behind the refectory where the cook nuns spent most of their working hours monotonously preparing large amounts of virtually the same few foods, Father Micah objected to the little songs some of the sisters sung and the occasional laughter-inducing pleasantry that helped to pass the long hours. In the infirmary anteroom, he objected to a weary young sister sitting down to roll bandages. The pain in her legs, which were swollen because she had spent much of the night on her feet caring for a very sick patient, should be, in Father Micah’s opinion, offered to God in penance for her sins. She must henceforth stand to do her work.

Out in the chilly cloister, the priest stood for some time over Sister Phillipa, seated at her desk and engaged in illuminating a capital letter A. The work was beautiful, Helewise thought, but Father Micah complained that over-use of blue and gold smacked of luxury, not seemly in an order vowed to poverty. About to tell him that the Queen herself had bestowed the wherewithal for the purchase of those very pigments, Helewise changed her mind. She would not explain herself to this man.