The Devil's Acolyte (2002) (39 page)

Although she was content where they lived now as well, he reminded himself, and it might not be easy to persuade her to move home once more. Still, when she saw it was necessary, she would no
doubt agree.

Then his buoyant attitude underwent a change. He felt a cold emptiness in his belly at the thought of having to admit to his failure. It was no use telling himself that such things happened,
that his position in life was owed entirely to the whim of the Abbot, that he had no more control over the direction of his life than a chicken in a yard: it was his duty to provide for his wife
and family. Without achieving a stable, financially sound future for them all, his life was a failure. He knew that Meg would support him, of course, but that didn’t help. There would be hurt
in her eyes when he told her that without his money as Bailiff, they would have to leave their home at Lydford, that they must be more frugal in future. That he might not be able to afford the
dowry he had intended for their daughter.

Baldwin had climbed into the bath, and he lay back with his eyes closed while all this passed through Simon’s mind. There was silence in the room as the barber thumbed back Simon’s
skin and brought the shining blade of his razor down around Simon’s cheek, along the line of his jaw, then under his chin and down to his neck. When he had relathered Simon’s face and
repeated his operations, Baldwin spoke.

‘Simon, are you all right? You look anxious.’

Baldwin’s gentle voice broke in on his thoughts. He opened an eye as Ellis held the blade away. ‘Just tired, I think.’

‘Good. I am glad.’ Baldwin nodded, but he couldn’t help telling himself that his friend had appeared to be tired ever since he had arrived in Tavistock with the Coroner.
‘What do you think about the mystery of the dead miner?’

‘Someone met him and killed him. There appears to be nothing else to learn.’

‘Simon, please, forgive me for asking, but are you quite well?’

‘Why shouldn’t I be?’

Baldwin gazed at him with exasperation. ‘Because you look away from me when I talk to you as though the sight of me pains you, you snap at me or don’t respond at all, you walk away
from me as soon as we arrive anywhere, you go and question people as though trying to exclude me from your enquiries, and you sit drumming your fingers there as though you are waiting to have a
tooth pulled!’

His last words made Simon give a dry smile. They reminded him of his own feelings about Baldwin.

Seeing that Ellis had finished Simon’s shave, Baldwin motioned the barber to leave the room. Nothing loath, Ellis left by the door and returned to the brewery. ‘Please, Simon, my
friend, you would tell me if I had offended you?’

‘Of course. I would trust you with anything. Would you trust me the same?’

‘Me?’ Baldwin said with surprise.

‘You went to the Abbot and told me nothing about the meeting. Is it that you don’t trust me any more?’

Baldwin gave a low grunt. ‘Now I believe I understand. The Abbot asked me to keep this from you.’

‘Why should he do that?’ Simon asked sarcastically. He thought he knew the answer.

‘The Abbot didn’t want to spread the tale about the town. You have heard of Milbrosa?’

‘It’s an old story. The maids of Tavistock use it to scare their children,’ Simon said scathingly.

‘Some say that there are too many similarities between that tale and the things which are happening here now.’

Simon squinted at him. Baldwin was staring contemplatively at the doorway. The room opened westwards, and the sun was already quite low, shining directly in and lighting Baldwin with a warm,
orange glow. It made him look tired, emphasising the deep lines of pain and anguish that Simon had all but forgotten, and reminding him that this man had suffered more in his life than he would be
able to appreciate. Baldwin had not told Simon everything about his time as a Templar, but Simon knew enough about the way that the Order had been destroyed to know that almost all its members had
been tortured and then slaughtered on the pyres. Baldwin had escaped because he had been travelling on the day that the arrests were made, but evading the physical punishments seemed only to have
created feelings of guilt in him.

Simon asked tentatively, ‘There is nothing to tie the two stories, is there? Only the fact that Wally was found dead on the moors. In the tale of Milbrosa, the monks hid even that proof of
their crime. The Abbot’s wine has been taken – but that may only be a thoughtless prank. How can the two be connected?’

‘The Abbot asked that I should keep this secret even from you,’ Baldwin said. ‘But I cannot maintain my silence. I cannot think of an explanation, not without your
help.’

Simon listened with astonishment as Baldwin spoke about Gerard and his sudden disappearance.

‘So just as in the tale of Milbrosa, the Abbot’s wine was drunk and plate was stolen,’ he muttered. ‘And now the supposed perpetrator has been carried away? Was the Abbot
sure that this boy Gerard was actually guilty? Perhaps someone else took the wine and things.’

‘The Abbot seemed quite convinced,’ Baldwin said. ‘Another Brother had suspected him.’

‘Did the Abbot say why the lad was suspected?’

‘Not that I recall, no.’

‘Then we should find out,’ Simon said firmly. ‘But before that, I had better reciprocate.’ He related all he had learned, although he refused to tell Baldwin who it was
who told him about the club. He had promised Hal he would keep that silent, and he would not break his oath.

Baldwin was drying himself and pulling on fresh clothes, and Simon wiped his face and did the same, shouting for Ellis. When the barber put his head around the door, he passed him some
coins.

Just as Ellis was about to leave the room, Baldwin held up a hand to stop him. ‘I am glad to have an opportunity to speak to you,’ he said quietly. ‘Barber, I have heard that
you detested Wally because he had got your sister with child. Is that right?’

Ellis gave the knight a sickly grin. He had been expecting to be questioned ever since the two men appeared, and the anticipation had been terrible. When they had told him to leave them, he had
thought he was safe, but they had only been lulling him.

‘It was, but I was wrong,’ he said in a choked voice.

‘Oh? Who was this mystery lover of hers, then?’

Ellis’s face hardened a moment, his jaw clenching and unclenching. ‘Master, I have got myself into trouble once by saying who I thought was her man. I won’t say any more, since
Sara herself asked me to keep her shame secret.’

Baldwin nodded. ‘Back to Wally, then. At the time of his death, you still believed he was your sister’s lover?’

‘Yes. Look, I went up there on Friday morning to give him a warning, but I left him alive. He was in a state, because he had been drinking and whoring all night and he could hardly
concentrate, his head was so bad, but he was alive. I just shouted at him to leave my sister alone, that was all.’ Ellis hung his head.

‘Did he deny an affair?’

‘Yes. But then I expected him to. Look – I didn’t lay a finger on him, all right?’

Baldwin eyed his razors and knives. ‘I rather think you’d have picked a more simple means of despatch, had you intended murder,’ he admitted.

‘Did you see anyone else up there?’ Simon asked.

‘Two monks. One was Mark, that
salsarius
. The other one, I don’t know.’

‘Could it have been Peter?’ Baldwin asked.

‘Might have been,’ Ellis agreed after a contemplative pause. ‘Don’t know, really.’

‘Where was this Mark?’

‘He was walking towards the middle of the moor. It was only a fleeting glimpse, but you don’t forget a man like him. He’s so big. You could practically see the glow from his
red face!’

‘Did you see him again?’ Simon asked.

‘When I got back, yes. A little while before I pulled Hamelin’s tooth. Mark came back down from the moor alone, and I saw him hurrying off to the Abbey. He was there later when I
went to shave some of the Brothers.’

‘So he was up on the moors while Wally was alive,’ Simon said. ‘And came back
after
you, when you had left Wally in good health?’

‘Yes.’

There was a sudden commotion outside, and Simon and Baldwin ceased their questioning. With Ellis trailing in their wake, they went outside to the court, to investigate.

Simon arrived there first, rubbing a hand over his smoothed cheeks and enjoying the sensation. At the Abbey entrance he saw a horse with the well-wrapped body of Wally thrown over its broad
back. Some monks and lay brothers had wandered over to view this arrival, although several of them had retreated from the odour emanating from the blankets. A pair of stolid peasants cut the body
free from the packhorse and allowed Wally to slump to the ground like a sack of grain, but the knife must have slashed the rope binding the blankets, for they opened and Wally’s bloated,
discoloured face was exposed. Worse, the horse was startled by his load falling, and set to bucking and struggling, making everyone in the yard bolt, all but Ned, who walked over grimly and took
charge.

It was just as Ned grabbed the horse’s reins and hauled his head down, gripping it with a finger in each nostril and a fist in its mane and swearing viciously into its ear, that Sir
Tristram appeared in the entrance to the stable, looking about him to find the cause of the disturbance. Seeing the body, he peered at it a moment, and was about to walk away, when Simon saw him
hesitate, turn, and stare at it more closely.

Simon was about to go to him, when a rotund fellow with an apron tied about his waist with a string came into the court. ‘Is there a Coroner here?’ he asked.

‘Who wants him?’ Baldwin called sharply.

‘I am Nob Bakere, and I’ve been sent by Brother Peter of this Abbey to ask for the Coroner. Hamelin Tinner’s dead.’

Baldwin immediately sent to find Coroner Roger, but Simon stood a moment. Sir Tristram had reached the body and now he stood over Wally, staring down with an expression of contempt twisting his
features.

‘What is it, Sir Tristram?’ Simon asked, walking to his side. ‘Do you know this man?’

Sir Tristram looked up but barely acknowledged the Bailiff. ‘This man? Oh yes, I know
him
!’

‘Where have you met him?’ Simon asked with surprise.

‘He was a Scotch raider up in the March. I fought with him once, but failed to kill him. He was taken in by . . .’ His voice didn’t alter, but Simon saw that his eyes focused
more firmly on him. ‘. . . by the man who lives here as Brother Peter, the Almoner. This man was one of those who attacked Brother Peter, and raped and murdered his woman. What’s he
doing here?’

‘His name was Walwynus. He was the miner found dead up on the moors,’ Baldwin said. ‘Are you sure you recognise him?’ he added doubtfully. ‘His face is badly
beaten.’

‘He was a Scotch raider, I tell you. A reiver. I would recognise him in the midst of the fires of hell – where his soul is burning even now,’ Sir Tristram said, and spat into
Wally’s contorted face.

While they waited for the Coroner to arrive, Simon told Baldwin what Sir Tristram had said about Wally’s real identity. When Sir Roger de Gidleigh arrived, still wiping
his cheeks to rid them of pastry crumbs, Simon and Baldwin hastened with him and the flustered-looking Nob to the alley where Hamelin lay.

Nob was not only hot and bothered, he was also plagued by doubts. In the past he would never have considered divulging information to an official, not unless there was some money involved, but
now he was reconsidering.

It was this sudden death of Hamelin. First Wally had found some money from somewhere, and then he’d given it to Hamelin and died. Now Hamelin was dead too. It was too much of a
coincidence. As they reached the mouth of the alleyway, he stopped to face Coroner Roger.

‘Sir, I don’t know if this is important, but I feel I should tell you . . .’

The Coroner was panting a little, and rather than unnecessarily expend more breath, he motioned with his finger for Nob to continue.

‘Sir, my wife knows this dead man’s wife well, and she told my woman the other day that Hamelin had been given a purse of gold by the miner who’s died.’

‘You mean Wally?’ Simon asked. ‘Wally gave him money? Why?’

‘Ah, that I don’t know, but I do know that Hamelin said Wally had bought a loan from him – a debt owed by a monk. The monk wasn’t in Holy Orders when he borrowed the
money, but when he lost it all, he joined the monastery, so Hamelin couldn’t get his cash back. That’s why the poor soul was working out on the moors. He was desperate to make a bit of
money.’

‘But the debt would be worthless,’ Baldwin said. ‘Why would this Walwynus give good money for a debt he couldn’t recover?’

‘Must have been mad,’ Coroner Roger said, moving into the alley.

‘And shortly afterwards Wally dies,’ Simon mused. ‘It’s almost as though the money was evil and Wally wanted to get rid of it. But why should he?’

‘Know that and we’ll know the full story,’ Baldwin said as he set off after the Coroner.

Peter was standing at the body’s side. With him were the nearest neighbours, all called to have their names noted so that they could be amerced for this infringement of the King’s
Peace. None looked happy, but that was no surprise. In Simon’s experience, people rarely liked having to part with their money.

While the Coroner took charge of the men gathered, Simon addressed Peter. ‘I have just been talking to Sir Tristram. He says he knew you in the north – that you were attacked by
Walwynus when you got that wound. Is that true?’

Peter tilted his chin defiantly. ‘Yes. Sir Tristram was a marauder, as I told you. He raided from the English side to the Scottish, while Wally came down the other way.’

‘Was it Wally himself who gave you that wound?’ Baldwin said.

‘No, one of his companions. But the pain was the same. He rode me down when I was with a friend. They killed my friend outright, and then his companion attacked me. Then some of them went
to my home and raped and murdered my girl.’