The Chapel of Bones: (Knights Templar 18) (25 page)

‘I do remember, Husband,’ she said tartly.

‘Yes, well – I decided I’d tell the King and the court about it. I mentioned it to William because I was scared of him even then and didn’t want him angry about my words, and he said it was a good plan. He thought he ought to do something like it himself, because he was irritated about his woman. She was clinging too hard to him and he wanted his freedom. But he had no money to leave Exeter. Well, I told him I could go on the morrow because I had a bag of coin I’d collected over the years. Then, the day the King came, I went to the court only to see William standing up and telling of the gate being open. And after the King had left, I looked for my purse, and it had gone. The bastard robbed me of my idea, my money, and my future!’

Maud stared at him long and steadily.

He hurriedly appended, ‘Except I should be glad, for if he hadn’t stolen them, I might not have met you, dearest …’

As soon as he had left Paul, Baldwin went to speak to Janekyn Beyvyn.

He found the porter to be a tall, rather morose-looking man. His face spoke of mistrust and scepticism – all no doubt useful qualities in a man set to guard a gate to such an important place as the Cathedral Close, but not ones to inspire confidence in his kindness or generosity.

‘Master Porter, I should like to ask you about the body of Henry Potell, discovered in the chapel. It is my job to find out who was responsible.’

‘I don’t know.’

‘But you were the man called by the First Finder, weren’t you?’

‘Paul asked me.’

‘And you went to view the corpse with him?’

‘He asked me. I went.’

Baldwin pursed his lips. This was like drawing water through a stone. ‘Master Porter, may I tell you something? When I spoke just now to Paul, he spoke of a light that was in the chapel when he first found the body. When he returned with you, that light was gone. Did you see a light of any kind in there?’

Janekyn considered. ‘No.’

‘So there are two things to note. Paul had left you at the gate, clearing up. You are a most dutiful porter. You were here again when he hurried to fetch you. That means you are not only dutiful, it means you weren’t in the chapel when Paul arrived there, and you didn’t snuff a candle when he hurried off. In short, I do not suspect you. However, I do wish to know what you saw, because you, Master,’ he paused and studied the man, ‘you are older, wiser, and less likely to harbour superstitious nonsense about a darkened chapel late in the evening when all is quiet.’

Janekyn gave a shrug, then hawked and spat onto the ground near the wall. ‘Would you like some wine?’

Baldwin’s spirit quailed at the thought of drinking rot-gut with this man, but he forced a bright smile to his face and said, ‘I should very much enjoy some wine.’

He followed the porter into the small lodge. Here Janekyn twisted the cork from a gallon pot and sniffed it with evident pleasure while Baldwin glanced around him.

It seemed that Janekyn had occupied this room for some years. There were little signs of his life. A palliasse which had seen much better days was rolled and tied with a thong in one corner. Above it hung a couple of thick blankets from a wooden peg. Where the bed would be unrolled, there was a stool and low brazier, which threw out a wonderful heat. There were two
pots – one enormous one with three legs set in its base, which had plainly been well used over the years, to judge from the uniform blackness of its exterior. A second beside it was large enough for only perhaps a pint of food, and Baldwin assumed that the frugal porter would often cook his own pottage here. There was a table, two small benches, and a cupboard with one door which housed the porter’s few belongings. Inside Baldwin could see many little pots and some reeds.

The walls were limewashed, but over time the wash had been almost entirely covered with pictures, mostly religious, but also others: portraits of jugglers in multi-coloured hosen and jacks; gaily dressed people walking among the tents and stalls of a great market at fairtime; bulls being baited by dogs; a man on horseback hawking … all these and many more were executed in a spare but precise style that rendered them utterly lifelike to Baldwin’s eye. ‘These are magnificent. Who painted them?’

‘Me,’ the porter said with a sharp look at him as though doubting the honesty of his words.

‘They are truly excellent,’ Baldwin said, entirely serious.

The porter gazed about him as though seeing the pictures for the first time. Then, ‘
I
like them.’

He set the jug down, took two mazers from a niche in the wall and poured the wine, passing the first cup to Baldwin, who took it with trepidation. For some years he had avoided strong wines. It was the effect of the training which he had endured in the Templars. He had learned that for him to fight with the strength and dedication owed to God, he should not partake of wines which tasted as though their primary constituent was vinegar. While learning his duties on Cyprus and after, he had come to appreciate that the worse the quality of the wine, the more severe the quality of the headache the
following day. And he knew that porters were among the least well-regarded members of a religious institution. How else could they be viewed, when their whole life involved sitting on a stool and watching people walk past?

Taking a reluctant sip, he could
feel
the taste. It exploded on his tongue, a glorious, rounded, sweet wine. It was better than his own best quality. ‘That is …’ He looked at the porter. ‘You are a man of surprises.’

‘Just because I’m a porter doesn’t mean I don’t like good wine. I have an arrangement with the vintner. When I fetch my wine, he gives me good quality.’

‘I see,’ Baldwin grinned. He wondered what the porter offered in return. Perhaps an easy route into or out of the Cathedral’s Close, if the vintner wanted to visit a young female companion, or was it simply that the porter knew something about the man? There were so many possibilities. Maybe the vintner had been blackmailed by someone else, for example, and had killed the saddler to stop news of his misdeeds escaping? Anything was possible – but speculation was no aid to a man trying to find the truth, Baldwin told himself.

‘So tell me, what was your perception when you saw the body? I assume you wouldn’t think that Paul could be the murderer?’

‘Him? He’d crap himself if he was told to kill a rabbit,’ Janekyn said contemptuously. ‘No, I reckon the man who killed Henry was probably older.’

‘Why?’

‘When I got in there, the body was lying in front of the door, legs first, head away. Looking at him, I thought he’d just walked in and been killed from behind. That means someone who was sure of his attack. There was only one wound I saw, too. No practice stabs first. How I see it is, the saddler was with
someone he knew and trusted, he walked into the chapel first, and soon as he was inside, the other man shoved his knife in his back. One push, into the heart, and that was that.’

Baldwin gave a shrug. ‘Did you smell anything in there? A candle recently snuffed?’

Janekyn gave a sour grin. ‘All I smelled was blood. I wasn’t going to go and search for more. No, I sent Paul to fetch the Dean while I waited there with the body. That was that.’

‘What of earlier? Did you see anyone in the Close who was acting or looking suspicious?’

Janekyn frowned. ‘There was only the physician, Ralph. He was wandering about the place when Henry came in, and he asked for his money for treating the German. Henry just told him he’d bring it later, and hurried on. Ralph didn’t look happy to be brushed off.’

‘Was there anyone else?’

‘Not that I saw, no. And Ralph didn’t kill him – not just then, anyway. The two parted, and Ralph came back towards the gate. I was called by a man walking in just then and didn’t see him actually leave, but he probably did. He doesn’t live too far from here.’

‘But he could have turned back and gone to lie in wait for Henry,’ Baldwin commented.

‘Aye. And he could have sprouted wings and flown to the chapel’s roof,’ Janekyn grunted. ‘But it’s best not to guess when it’s a man’s neck you’re wagering.’

Although Baldwin questioned him on other aspects of the case, he could bring no further light to the affair. The porter had seen no one else talking to Henry that day, nor did he see where Ralph had gone, and there was no one suspicious who entered the Close. Baldwin left him as the light faded and
stood outside the lodge, gazing at the labourers packing their tools amid the mess and chaos of the building site.

He scarcely noticed the man who hurried into the Close like one fleeing from the Devil himself.

Thomas hardly knew where to go or what to do. After he’d been accused by Dan, he’d run away from that hovel, up to an alehouse he spied from the top of the alleyway, but as soon as he reached the door, he turned and started running towards the East Gate, desperate to be as far as possible from Sara.

Ah, God! He’d never be able to forget the expression of horror on her face. There was nothing he could say in his defence. Nothing at all. It was true. He
had
killed her husband through his negligence; that meant he had killed her son and reduced her to abject poverty. It was all his fault. If his death could ease her mind, he’d kill himself, just to avenge the dreadful crime his slipshod work had caused. At least that way she might find some peace, and so might he, too. Since returning here, he had known little enough.

Standing in the Close, he felt his legs beginning to move towards the stark walls of the Cathedral. There was a ladder propped against the scaffolding, and he walked to it like a man in a dream. The last few workers were clearing up, most of them had already gone, and few noticed as Thomas stumbled over the ground, his face pale and preoccupied. Suddenly, he tripped over a loose rock and fell heavily onto a large shard of stone. The splinter was as sharp as a fragment of glass, and it tore a great rent in his hosen and sliced through his shin like a knife, but he didn’t heed it. He righted himself and continued on his way.

At the bottom of the ladder, he stared upwards into the darkening sky. Turning, he saw the evening star gleaming, but
then it was erased by a cloud, and as though this was the signal, he put his hand on the ladder and lifted his foot to climb.

‘It’s a little late for that.’

Thomas heard the voice and instantly his blood froze. His head was suddenly an awful weight, and he had to rest it upon the ladder’s rung between his hands.

‘Nicholas,’ he breathed, but his voice was a moan.

Baldwin awoke feeling entirely unrested. There was a lethargy about him that was unusual for him. An old campaigner, he was used to taking his sleep wherever there was a dry place to rest his head, and normally he would be fully asleep in moments, but not now. Just now he felt as though his life was fraying, and he was distracted.

He had hoped that coming here to investigate a murder would allow him to forget his problems at home, but it had proved to be impossible. He had betrayed his wife, and that act of disloyalty must inevitably alter their relationship; perhaps even break it.

In his mind he saw Jeanne’s face again when he had allowed his anger to show after her light comment about the peasant girl. There was such a depth of pain and hurt in her eyes, he wasn’t sure how he could ever retrieve the situation. But retrieve it he must.

The room he had here at the Talbot Inn was large for a city inn. He always tried to rent this room when he needs must travel to Exeter, because he had a dislike, based upon too many years of sleeping in dorters with snoring companions, of sharing a room with other travellers. That was one thing that he would never miss about the life of a warrior monk!

Here he had a good-sized bed with a palliasse that was large enough to accommodate five men in a normal inn, but Baldwin
had never yet been asked to share it. The master of this house had been a merchant until his profits from his excellent ale-brewing showed him that his talents were being wasted in providing ale only for his own household. He stuck up his bush over the door, and now his ale accounted for half of his business. A wealthy man, he was perfectly happy to accommodate Baldwin’s need for solitude. In return, Baldwin paid rather more than the room would normally be worth.

Today he awoke early, and with a slight headache from a disturbed night’s sleep. He was tempted to roll over and close his eyes again, but instead he lay back and stared at the cracked ceiling, trying to make sense of his feelings for Jeanne. Then, in despair, he pushed her from his mind and considered instead the murder.

This was one of those killings in which it was quite likely that no one would ever be brought to justice. There were cases of that nature – and although Baldwin knew that his own methods of detection were more successful than those of other men, still there were many murderers who committed their crimes and were never caught by him. Some men were too clever, others fiendishly lucky; most murderers were caught because they made mistakes or were too stupid to conceal their crimes. Baldwin had once found a man who denied the murder, but had cleaned his knife of blood by wiping the blade on his own jack. It was still fresh when Baldwin caught him, and although he claimed that he had killed a dog, he could not recall where, nor where he had put the body.

In a matter like this, though, there had to be a motive for Henry Potell’s death. If he could discover that, he would be much further on in the enquiry. It was possible, of course, that the widow would be able to help in this, but all too often
Baldwin knew that the wife was the last person to discover certain secrets. He put the sharp mental picture of his own wife to the back of his mind again as Jeanne leaped into the forefront of his thoughts; no, in matters of business many men would not tell their women all that had happened in a day. It was one of those basic differences between men and women: the men would prefer to leave their work and relax; women by contrast sought to discuss every aspect of their day in the minutest detail before they could think of relaxing. Or maybe that
was
their way of relaxing – Baldwin didn’t know …