City of Fiends

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Marsilles’ House

It was pitch dark outside now, and without a moon-curser in sight, Baldwin stumbled as they made their way to the Marsilles’ home. Simon had to catch his arm.

Simon was still feeling embarrassed about his reaction to the body in the alley. He had thought he had grown accustomed to such sights, but the first glimpse of her face had sent his belly reeling, and the ales he had drunk in the Cock Inn had fought for release.

The entrance to the little house where the Marsilles lived was further up Combe Street, past the alley in which Alice had been discovered, and up the next. Along this squalid little way they went, until they came to a dog-leg, and it was just past this that Simon realised they had been walking along one of the walls of the Marsilles’ place.

‘God’s cods,’ he muttered as he looked at it. ‘I wouldn’t keep my cattle in a shed like that.’

It was no more than a lean-to, built against the side of a more substantial building, and as Simon looked at it, he could see holes where the rotten planks of wood had decayed. There were patches of cob where someone had tried to fill in the worst of the holes in a vain attempt to stave off the elements. The roof of shingles was black and he suspected that it held many gaps between.

In the dog-leg, the alley formed a natural courtyard, and as well as the Marsilles’ door, he saw two more in the adjacent wall as the door opened and Edgar let them inside.

William Marsille was sitting on a table, holding a cool, damp towel to his head, wincing, while his brother stood next to him, glowering at Edgar. Hugh stood behind him at the wall, wearing his customary frown.

Simon walked in and glanced about him with interest.

The chamber was small. There was scarcely enough space in it for a few men to stand; it was perhaps fifteen feet by six or seven, no more. The fire was a small heap of embers in a hearth, and the chestnut shingles must have been adequate to allow the smoke to leach out, because there was no chimney, nor even a louvre. To one side of the fire was a table, with three chairs about it, all good quality and entirely out of place with this chamber. There was a good iron-strapped chest, too, such as a merchant would use for his money, and a sideboard took up much of the outer wall. It must have formed a partial barrier to the cold, he thought. A ladder rose to the eaves, in which a series of loose boards had been laid, and up there Simon could see the palliasse on which the entire family slept. It was a miserable hovel, yet with furniture that would not have looked out of place in the Guild Hall, he thought.

‘How is your head?’ Baldwin asked.

His voice drew Simon back to the present, and he studied the boys. The older one, Philip, was a nervy youth who, in Simon’s opinion, needed a damn good thrashing to wake up his ideas. William, on the other hand, even with his injury, was clearly a more mature individual, for all that he looked two years younger at about sixteen.

‘I’m still alive. But if I keel over in a year and a day, I trust you will bring your servant to trial on my behalf,’ he sneered weakly.

‘You were about to attack a man. We could not allow that, no matter what the provocation.’

‘I had intense provocation. He killed my mother.’

‘Who did?’ Baldwin asked.

‘Henry Paffard.’

‘Did you see him?’ Sir Richard demanded. He had walked to the table and now sat, forearms resting on the tabletop.

‘If I’d seen him, I’d have killed him,’ William said. Wolf had wandered to his side, and now sat, looking up at him hopefully. He put a hand on the dog’s head and stroked him.

‘So it is only supposition?’ Baldwin said. ‘But he had already told you that you would have to leave this place?’

William looked up and about him with a wry grimace. ‘Hardly a great threat, would you say? Yes, he sent his bottler, and said that he would see us all thrown into the street because of a tiny squabble between Emma de Coyntes and Mother.’

‘What was your mother doing in the alley?’ Sir Richard asked.

‘Seeing Henry. She said that she knew something,’ William told him. ‘She said that it was to do with Gregory, and that Henry wouldn’t want it bruited about.’

‘What was it?’ Sir Richard demanded.

‘I don’t know,’ William said. ‘She didn’t tell us.’

At his side, Philip’s head drooped. He was still deeply in shock, from the expression on his face, and Simon wondered how he himself would have responded, had he seen his own mother slain and mutilated in an alley. Not well, he concluded.

‘So, could your mother have witnessed Alice being slain, do you think?’ Baldwin asked. He was thinking of the tall priest again, wondering whether Laurence could have been there. It would have explained Juliana’s reticence to talk about Alice’s death, if the perpetrator was a priest.

‘No. She would have said if she had . . . But she had been out when Alice was killed, so Henry might have thought she saw him do it,’ William said.

‘Or Gregory, if your story is correct,’ Baldwin pointed out.

‘Or, she saw nothing,’ Sir Richard summarised. ‘I think you are lucky you didn’t get close to the merchant, boy. You could have injured him, and ended on the gallows tree. You have nothing to prove he killed your mother or his maid. There is no witness, no evidence, nothing.’

‘Someone must know what she knew,’ Philip said. ‘Another maid, or a woman around here. They all gossip among themselves.’

Simon nodded and cast a look at Baldwin. The latter was watching Philip closely with that intensity Simon recognised so well.

‘We can ask and find out,’ William said. ‘I will speak to all the women and see what they know.’

‘You will leave them well alone,’ Sir Richard growled in response. ‘You almost landed yourself in very deep water tonight. Your mother is dead. You must concentrate on arranging her funeral and inquest, rather than trying to bring more mischief on yourself and your family.’

‘Sir Richard is quite right,’ Baldwin said, more gently to the two bereaved youths. ‘You should avoid anything to do with the Paffard family. If Henry Paffard is hurt or injured in the next weeks, everybody will assume it was one of you. There is nothing you can do to escape the fact that all in this street know your feelings about Henry and his son. It is a shame your mother did not confide in you. Could it have been Gregory’s affection for the maid, do you think?’

Philip suddenly looked up, his eyes narrowed. ‘Gregory?’

‘We were told that he was a wastrel and had an affection for the maid.’

‘Not him. It was his father. That man thinks he can use any woman in his house,’ Philip muttered.

‘My brother was in love with Alice,’ William explained. ‘He offered her his hand, but she told him she was happier with her rich merchant. With Henry.’

Baldwin gave a grunt of understanding. ‘I see.’

‘We won’t be here long anyway, if they have their way,’ William added.

He looked as though he had come to the end of his self-control and was about to burst into tears, Simon thought. He had an instinctive sympathy for the fellow. Glancing at Baldwin, he said, ‘We will not allow that in the immediate future.’

‘How can you stop him?’ William demanded hoarsely. ‘This is his house, and the only things we own are these pieces of furniture we managed to salvage. That bastard can have us thrown out tonight, if he wants.’

‘If he wishes to make the Cathedral angry, he can try. We are here because we have been asked to come by the Precentor, and if Henry Paffard tries to evict you, he will incur my wrath also. I will personally visit him and have him change his mind,’ Baldwin said firmly. ‘If the worst comes to the worst, I will ask the Precentor to threaten excommunication.’

‘You don’t have the authority to promise that,’ Philip said ungraciously. ‘You are a knight. A secular knight doesn’t have the power to demand things like that of the Church.’

‘Once I was a monk, and I travelled to the Kingdom of Jerusalem before you were born,’ Baldwin growled. ‘I was a fighting pilgrim in the Holy Land, and I have more authority in this than you can know. And besides,’ he added, drawing his sword and setting it on the table where the peacock-blue metal gleamed wickedly in the candle-light, ‘I can back up promises with steel, when necessary.’

Farm near Clyst St George

Ulric felt as though there were no more tears left in him as he dropped from his pony at the little farm.

A man’s body was being dragged from the doorway by two laughing fellows, over to a pile of corpses. Sir Charles was still on his horse, directing the men with the wagon and carts. They must all be secured for the night behind the main farmhouse.

They had come down from the hill among the trees late in the evening, when many of the folk were in their houses eating their food. Quiet, domestic people, with only two older men and some youngsters sitting at table with their women, but a dog had set up a warning bark, and as Sir Charles’ men poured into the yard area, men had appeared in doorways only to be cut down.

This was another of those places with little actual value. No gold, no silver. Only a little food. Nothing else.

‘Ulric, fetch me something to drink,’ Sir Charles called.

Nodding, Ulric dropped from his horse and made his way into a low doorway.

It was an old long-house. On the left he could hear cattle moving gently in their chamber, while to the right was the family’s living space. Here he found a small barrel of cider, and he had lifted the little cask to his shoulder, when he felt a hand on his arm. A man was behind him, and pulled him around, a blade resting on the side of his neck.

‘I have been watching you, boy.’

It was the archer with the scar, the shorter one. Ulric had seen him earlier with a knife, laughing uproariously as he cut the throat of a little boy.

The archer pushed the knife slightly and Ulric felt his flesh move with the blade’s point. ‘I don’t trust you. Remember that. You aren’t one of us. If I see Sir Charles hurt, I will kill you instantly.’

There was a sudden pain at his neck, and Ulric gave a cry and staggered back.

‘Oh, did the poor scanthing boy get cut?’ the archer jeered. ‘You’d best take the drink to your master, hadn’t you? Wouldn’t want him to go thirsty.’

Paffards’ House

Father Paul remained sitting on his stool near the fire when the Keeper of the King’s Peace and his companions left the hall. There was not a sound but for the crackling and spitting of the fire. All the men were engaged in their own thoughts. Father Paul saw Gregory staring at his father every so often, while for his part, Henry spent his time staring at the far wall as though seeing a picture on the pristine limewash that would answer all his life’s problems for him.

For the priest, there was nothing else he could think of, other than the moments before Gregory had announced that his brother was missing: the appearance of Henry Paffard – almost, as it seemed – at the moment that the Hue and Cry was sounding out in the street.

He stood, feeling dizzy. It might have been his wound from Sunday night, but he wasn’t certain. He then made his way to the door without so much as a benediction. He was floating, a mere wisp of a soul.

As he passed the wall on which Henry’s cloak was hanging, he could not help but touch it. The colour, the thickness, the feel: he was sure this was the same cloak worn by the man who had attacked and threatened him. At the corner, he saw the same little mark, the tear in the fabric that he had noticed while being beaten.

Outside, the air was cool and calming. He stood, swaying slightly. If he moved, he might fall.

Voices came from an alley. Not scary voices, just men talking, and he closed his eyes for a moment. He had to go and see. Lurching slightly, he crossed the road to where an orange glow showed that a lantern or two were illuminating something. There were more voices . . . and then he found himself outside the group of Watchmen and locals talking quietly. He was compelled to step closer and closer – until he saw the nightmare vision of his dead parishioner.

There was a rushing in his ears, and he didn’t hear the men who called to him as he hurtled up to the open space of the street, and then, blessed relief, he could stop and take deep breaths, the cold air flooding his lungs and bringing clarity to his thoughts.

‘Father, are you all right?’ He recognised Sir Baldwin’s voice, but could not answer.

There was a sparkling series of lights in his vision, and a blackness low and left, as though someone had removed all vision from that part of his eye, and then he felt his legs give way.

Sir Richard bellowed: ‘ho, there! Grab him, Simon! Yes, take his arm.’

‘What has happened to you, Father?’ Simon asked.

‘Not now, Simon. Let’s get him to the Palace Gate – ach, no. Curfew has passed. Then to his church. Come, Father, you will be well enough after a short time.’

He was aware of hands at his armpits, strong hands that supported him as he floated along the street down to the South Gate, and in at Holy Trinity. Those same helpful hands assisted him inside his room and deposited him on his bed.

‘Do you feel sick?’ Baldwin was asking. ‘Concentrate, Father. Don’t go to sleep. Keep awake. Talk to me!’

‘Water, please,’ he croaked. His throat was parched once more.

‘Here,’ Sir Richard boomed, bending and holding out a cup.

He took it gratefully and drank quickly, slurping and spilling much of it down his breast.

‘Easy, Father,’ Sir Richard said, taking it away again. ‘Sip, man, don’t drown!’

Father Paul leaned back on the bed and closed his eyes. But no matter how hard he screwed them shut, he could still see the figure of Henry Paffard walking into the hall just after the sound of the horns and shouting outside. And he saw too the terrible ruin that had been Juliana.

‘Father?’ Baldwin said. ‘What was it? What happened to you?’

The priest stared at the knight with wild eyes that seemed to see through Baldwin to a horror beyond.

‘It was the devil. Tonight I have seen the devil himself. I must be in hell.’