Dark Night Hidden

10

In the middle of the morning of the next day, Helewise sat at her table and studied Josse and Gervase de Gifford as they took one another’s measure. They were, she thought irreverently, like two large dogs in the market place, each suspecting the other of invasion of personal territory.

Despite the wariness, however, she sensed a similarity between the two men. Not a physical one; Josse was brown-eyed and dark, tall, broad-framed and, despite his rough-featured face, he habitually wore an expression that suggested he expected to like people rather than condemn them. Gervase de Gifford on the other hand was slim and elegant, and his green eyes had a look of detachment and slight amusement. No. The likeness between him and Josse was merely that they shared a sort of power, an indefinable something that sat on them like a garment. It was as if both had been put to the test, survived and consequently believed in themselves and their own ability to cope with whatever life might subsequently throw at them.

She became aware that de Gifford was speaking to her.

‘. . thank you for summoning me here, my lady.’

‘It is my duty,’ she said piously. ‘Besides, I promised that you should be informed of any intelligence that Sir Josse managed to glean concerning the late Father Micah.’

‘Indeed you did,’ de Gifford said blandly. ‘As Sir Josse has just been explaining, it is nothing definite, but every small pointer can be of use. Is it not so, Sir Josse?’

‘Aye.’ Josse, she noticed, was not yet ready to waste more than the basic civilities on this newcomer.

‘To recapitulate,’ de Gifford said, turning to Helewise to include her in his summation, ‘you suspect that the woman Aurelia, brought here to your care gravely injured, may have been the victim of Father Micah’s religious zeal. You think this because her wounds are similar to those with which the Father threatened another woman, the wife of this Lord of the High Weald. Yes?’

‘Yes,’ Helewise said, adding, ‘It is, as you just implied, rather vague and we really should be trying harder to discover the truth but-’

‘My lady,’ de Gifford interrupted with an apologetic smile, ‘I believe you may be accusing yourselves falsely. You have here someone who may have been flogged by Father Micah and, through Sir Josse’s good offices, you have come to hear of someone who would have been a possible future candidate for the same treatment. It may interest you to hear that I know of others.’

‘Really?’ Helewise sat up straighter in her chair. Josse, she noticed, was scowling at de Gifford in concentration.

‘Really,’ de Gifford echoed. ‘I am not certain where the boundaries of the Father’s influence were set; he was a replacement for your Father Gilbert, I am aware, and Father Gilbert made but rare visits down to us in the Medway valley. He had his own concerns up here and, besides, our souls are adequately catered for by our own Father Henry. But, whether or not Father Micah should have been carrying out his mission of salvation in our vicinity, the fact remains that he was.’ He studied Helewise for a moment, as if deciding whether he should proceed with what he was about to say. Apparently deciding that he would, he added, ‘Father Henry understands our — er, our ways. Father Micah did not. We did not welcome him and Father Henry, I believe, resented him. Neither reaction had the least effect in keeping Father Micah away.’

Helewise was not sure what he was trying to imply. ‘Your ways?’ she said. ‘Surely there is only one way for a godly man, Sir Gervase? Does not your Father Henry appreciate this?’

De Gifford gave her a charming smile. ‘Naturally so, my lady Abbess, and reminds us all of our duty at every possible opportunity. I merely meant to make the point that priests may vary in the methods that they employ to keep their flock within the fold.’

‘Hmm.’ She was not convinced. She had observed an occasional exchange of glances between de Gifford and Josse — or rather, she corrected herself, glances from de Gifford directed at Josse — as if the Sheriff were trying to recruit Josse as an ally. Two laymen together facing a woman of the Church.

Josse said, ‘Who else did the Father order to be flogged?’

‘He did not merely order,’ de Gifford corrected. ‘He made it a rule to carry out himself any sentence that he imposed. A variant, I suppose, on the good commander’s maxim: never order your troops to do something you are not also prepared to do. In answer to your question, Sir Josse, Father Micah flogged another woman, somewhat younger than Aurelia. She had been convicted of a crime by a Church court and she was to be handed over to the secular arm for punishment. However, Father Micah overruled that and said he would do it himself, which he duly did. Then he allowed her to be hauled away by a couple of guards and thrown into some filthy prison cell.’

‘What became of her?’ Helewise, to her distress, heard her own voice emerge as little more than a whisper. But she did not think there was anything that she could have done about it; de Gifford told his affecting tale simply but with quiet force, so that, for an instant, it had almost seemed that the poor beaten woman, dragged away to prison, was there in the room with them.

De Gifford was gazing at her, cool eyes briefly filled with pity. ‘She died, my lady. Her gaoler decided to compound her various agonies by raping her. In doing so, it appears she hit her head on the stone floor of her cell, and it was a hard enough blow to kill her.’

‘And what of the gaoler?’ Now her voice was shaking.

De Gifford shrugged. ‘What of him? Still a gaoler.’

‘But he assaulted his prisoner!’

‘She was to die in any case, my lady,’ de Gifford said gently. ‘They did not believe that her repentance was sincere, for they said she intended to revert to her wickedness as soon as she was able.’

Helewise was about to ask what form the woman’s wickedness had taken — another adulteress? Surely not! — when Josse interrupted.

‘I investigated the case of two men who escaped from a gaol,’ he said. ‘My own involvement began but three days ago, although I believe that the men fled some days earlier. A pilgrim family who came here for the Holy Water cure told us how someone had attacked the guard. He only appeared to have been hit once, or perhaps twice, in the face, yet he died. When one of the Abbey’s brothers and I went to look at the body, we discovered marks on his throat that suggested he had been throttled.’

‘Yes, I heard about him,’ de Gifford said.

‘And what about the men who escaped? Do you know anything of them?’ Josse, Helewise noticed, looked eager, straining towards de Gifford as if he expected answers to all his questions suddenly to materialise.

De Gifford studied him for a moment. Then he said, ‘No.’

I am almost certain, Helewise told herself, that his last statement was a lie. Josse met her eyes briefly, and she saw that he had had the same thought.

‘I asked around in the village where the gaol was,’ Josse said casually, as if it were a mere aside. ‘Nobody there knew anything of the men, either. Or they said not, anyway.’ He eyed de Gifford. ‘Which I thought strange, since I was almost certain that they did. They were afraid, you see, de Gifford. To a man — and to a woman — they scarcely waited to hear me ask my question before they began shaking their heads and denying all knowledge. One old woman started to tremble, repeating over and over again that she didn’t want any trouble and that she hadn’t seen anything, didn’t know anything, may God strike her down if she told a lie. I thought her statement was quite foolhardy, since she had undoubtedly just done exactly that. And a little child who was with her — he was a boy, no more than about five, too young to know how to keep a secret — said that he was frightened that the black man would come back and get him while he lay in his bed at night.’

De Gifford looked as if he were about to speak. Then, seeming to change his mind, shook his head slightly.

‘I’ll tell you another thing,’ Josse went on. ‘The prison guards reckoned that the men who escaped were foreign. One of their number had complained that he didn’t understand a word the prisoners said. Now it’s possible that the prisoners were well-educated men whose speech was not comprehended by the ruffians we employ in our gaols, or that the guard was singularly hard of hearing or dull of wit. But I believe it’s much more likely that the guard didn’t understand because the men cried out to him in another tongue. What d’you think, de Gifford? Do I reason rightly?’

Again, de Gifford appeared to go through the same process of deciding whether or not to confide his thoughts. But this time he made a different decision. With a gesture of squaring his shoulders, he said, ‘My lady Abbess, Sir Josse, there is a limit to what I may tell you. But you are right — I do know something about these prisoners and of the woman who died in gaol. And, indeed, of the one now lying in your infirmary. Or so I believe.’

‘You can’t have her!’ Helewise cried. ‘She is under our protection and if you try to arrest her I will have her taken into the Abbey church where she may claim sanctuary!’

De Gifford turned his clear eyes on to her. ‘My lady, you misunderstand, and I cannot blame you for that when I have perforce been so very reticent.’ He frowned. ‘On my honour, I am glad that Aurelia is here. What was done to her was vilely cruel and I would have brought her to Hawkenlye myself had I known where to find her. As it is, I shall ensure that nobody who wishes her ill shall learn from me where she is. Keep her here, help her to heal. When she is ready to go, then — but no. It is not yet time to speak of that.’

Feeling weak as the high emotion drained from her, Helewise leaned against the back of her chair.

Josse said, ‘You were saying, de Gifford, that you know the identities of the two escaped prisoners.’

‘I cannot be sure, for the tally of people we refer to here is but four — the woman who died in gaol, Aurelia and the two men who fled — whereas the group of which I heard tell numbered seven.’

Not four but five, Helewise thought. The two men, Aurelia, the poor woman who died, and Benedetto. But if de Gifford did not know about Benedetto, then she was not yet ready to tell him. Nor, from the glance he sent her, was Josse. De Gifford, it seemed, had assumed that Aurelia had been brought to Hawkenlye by some Good Samaritan who came across her on the road.

‘Four people?’ Josse now said. ‘Foreigners?’

‘Er — yes. Some from the Low Countries, some from the far south. So I believe.’

‘And why are they in England?’ Josse demanded. ‘Were they making for Hawkenlye?’

‘No, not as far as I know.’ De Gifford twisted his face in mock anguish. ‘Sir Josse, please do not push me so hard. I am telling you all that I may, and even this much is more than I should. I can reveal nothing else about the travellers and I shall not do so, no matter how much you scowl at me. What I will say is that I am aware that Father Micah was on their trail. As I have told you, he was responsible for beating and imprisoning Frieda.’

‘Frieda,’ Helewise repeated softly. ‘The woman who was raped and killed.’

‘Yes, my lady.’ De Gifford looked at her. ‘It is better, is it not, to have a name for her? So that we may remember her as a real woman and not merely a faceless, unidentifiable prisoner?’

‘It is,’ Helewise agreed. ‘We shall say a mass for her soul.’

‘I do not think-’ de Gifford began. Then, abruptly breaking off, he bowed briefly and murmured, ‘A charitable thought.’

‘Go on, now,’ Josse urged. ‘Father Micah brought about this Frieda’s downfall. What else?’

‘He was also responsible for the imprisonment of the two men, and he was beside himself in his rage when he learned that they had escaped. He went through that village with the force of an attack of the pestilence, cursing them for their evil ways, telling them that they were Satan’s own and in league with the Evil One, that they should have kept their accursed eyes open and prevented two of the devil’s minions from escaping.’

‘If the villagers were Satan’s own and the prisoners were his minions, then they were on the same side and it’s no wonder the men were allowed to escape,’ Josse observed.

‘Quite so,’ de Gifford agreed. ‘But then Father Micah was never strong on logical thought, especially when he was in a thundering rage and about God’s work.’

‘You speak of a priest,’ Helewise said coldly. ‘Whatever his faults, Father Micah did his duty to God as he saw it. His methods should not be open to the criticism of ordinary people.’

‘No?’ De Gifford’s tone was soft. ‘Well, my lady, if you will excuse me, I must disagree. The Father’s methods included burning down the houses of those he suspected of contravening the Church’s edicts, and he did not care whether the inhabitants were inside or not. He also confiscated the meagre food of the poor in order to ensure that they fasted when he ordered them to, and he had been known to beat a man so badly that the poor fellow never worked again. That man had five children.’

Helewise opened her mouth, found she had nothing to say and closed it again.

De Gifford turned to Josse. ‘You spoke just now of a little boy in the village who was terrified of the black man, Sir Josse,’ he said. ‘Did you have any idea who he meant?’

‘I wondered if some friend of the prisoners had got them out,’ Josse said, ‘and I thought that he might have been foreign, like them, perhaps from the lands of the distant south and with a black skin.’

De Gifford smiled, shaking his head. ‘Fanciful but inaccurate,’ he said. ‘The Black Man has become known to quite a lot of folk around here by now. He was feared wherever he went because he had a violent temper and he descended on the poor and the weak like a fury against which they were powerless.’

He looked from Josse to Helewise, making sure he had her full attention. Then, once more addressing Josse, he said, ‘The Black Man is what they called Father Micah.’

While the Abbess, de Gifford and Josse were preoccupied with the drama of the Sheriff ’s account, Sister Phillipa sat by herself in the small, peaceful room that housed the manuscripts. She had been steadily working through the precious documents on and off for the last three days, slipping away to her pleasant and undemanding task whenever she was not required for other duties. To begin with, Sister Bernadine had helped her, but the two women had found that checking each script off against the inventory and inspecting it for damage was a job that one person could perform quite well alone. Sister Bernadine appeared to find the task stressful; Sister Phillipa guessed that she went in constant fear of discovering that something valuable had been stolen and of the punishment she might receive for her carelessness if this were so. The younger nun had kindly offered to proceed with the inventory alone, and Sister Bernadine gratefully accepted.

‘But I must know if you find — if you find-’ She had been unable to put the cause of her distress into words.

‘If I discover that anything at all is missing or damaged, then I shall report first to you,’ Sister Phillipa promised.

To her surprise, tears had welled up in Sister Bernadine’s eyes. She had muttered something about Sister Phillipa being a good, kind girl, then hurried away.

Now, the only slight drawback to the work was that it kept Sister Phillipa from her herbal. At first she had itched to return to her painting and her lettering; they were deeply absorbing in themselves but, in addition, there was the thrill of the new knowledge of herbs and their uses that she was learning from Sister Tiphaine and Sister Euphemia. Both nuns were natural and gifted teachers and, even when very busy in their own departments, always strove diligently to make quite sure that Sister Phillipa understood exactly what they were telling her and would not make a mistake. However, regret for time lost for her herbal had gradually faded; as she had thrown herself into her careful examination of the Abbey’s precious manuscripts, she had soon realised that this task in fact provided a lucky and perfectly timed opportunity for her to study the work of some of England’s greatest artists and craftsmen.

This morning she was so happy that she hummed softly as she worked.

She found it just before the summons to Sext called her away.

She had been staring intently at a page in a glossed Bible; the page had an extract from the Book of Leviticus and the writing hand was so beautiful, so even, that it quite took Sister Phillipa’s breath away. Putting it carefully back — I have a job to do, she reminded herself, and I ought not to waste time in rapture over another’s fine penmanship — she noticed something bright lying on the base of the book chest.

It was pure chance that the small patch of colour caught her eye. Had she not had to push two scripts carefully aside to make room for the Bible pages, it would have remained hidden. She took out several scripts and placed them carefully on the floor. Now, in the much larger gap that she had made, she could see that another document had been placed on the floor of the chest. Once all the other scripts had been replaced upright on top of it, it had been totally hidden.

Now what, she wondered, removing the script, is this doing down there?

She studied it. The letters appeared to make words, but she did not know what they were. They were not in Latin nor, she thought, in Greek. Leaving aside the writing for a moment, she looked at the first page of illustrations.

She realised instantly that they were like nothing she had ever seen before. There was a wonderfully vivid, affecting little painting of a group of people with their hands held aloft and their ecstatic faces raised to the sky, out of which there shone a fiery sun with orange, yellow and gold rays. There were strange animals gambolling around the people, arranged like a sort of living frieze. Sister Phillipa did not recognise any of the beasts; she wondered if they might be symbolic, like the winged lion representing St Mark and the eagle St John, but of whom or what she did not know.

The second illustration was of a golden, bejewelled cross. But it did not look like the familiar cross that Sister Phillipa knew and loved; there was something strange about it, something unfamiliar. Getting up, she went to check on the inventory to see what this alien document might be.

There was no mention of it.

She read through the inventory again, but the strange manuscript was not on it.

In a flash of insight Sister Phillipa realised what had happened. She called to mind why she was doing this exacting task: she was meant to be checking whether or not anything was missing from the chest or the cupboard. So far — and she had almost finished — nothing was. None of the manuscripts had been taken.

Instead, one had been added.

Josse walked with de Gifford out to where Sister Martha was looking after the Sheriff ’s horse. They had stayed only a little longer with the Abbess. Josse had perceived her struggle between standing up for Father Micah because he was a man of the Church and joining in with their condemnation because he was also cruel, perverted, narrow-minded and took advantage of the weak and the powerless, and he had opted for a swift departure so as not to prolong her suffering.

‘She’s a good woman,’ Josse said when they were out of earshot of the few people out and about in the Abbey on that chilly morning. ‘She has-’

De Gifford put up a slim hand, on to which he had just put a beautifully fitting cream kid glove embroidered with reddish-brown stones that matched the braid on his tunic. ‘Please, Sir Josse, there is no need,’ he said. ‘Although I have had but two brief meetings with the Abbess Helewise and not the advantage of a long acquaintance such as yours, I feel that I have already taken some of the lady’s measure. And, indeed, I ask myself how I would behave, were I in her position. To be called on to defend the indefensible is testing to us all, even more so to a woman to whom the truth clearly matters so very much.’

‘She likes to see things as they really are,’ Josse agreed, ‘and is ever at pains to strip away the sort of concealing, self-deluding devices that most of us use to disguise unpalatable facts.’

‘And now she has to cope with the aftermath of Father Micah,’ de Gifford murmured. ‘Poor lady. I do not envy her.’

‘It is-’ Josse paused delicately. ‘I believe, de Gifford, that it is easier for us. We are laymen, after all, and we may criticise — that is, we can-’

‘We are at liberty to say that Father Micah was an insult to the cloth he wore if we feel like it,’ de Gifford finished smoothly. ‘As, indeed, we do. I do, anyway.’

‘And I,’ Josse agreed. He checked again that they were not overheard, then said in a low voice, ‘I wonder, then, since we are agreed on that, if you feel that you could be more forthcoming with me than with the Abbess. Not that I’m trying to learn secrets that you would rather not divulge.’

‘Yes, you are,’ de Gifford said easily. ‘That is exactly what you are doing, and I can’t say I blame you.’

‘Is there anything else that you can reveal to somebody who is not bound by their very profession to support that dead priest?’ Josse urged.

De Gifford studied him. ‘It is true that in part my reticence stems from my fear that the Abbess of Hawkenlye is likely to reflect the attitude exhibited by Father Micah. We speak of a delicate business, Sir Josse,’ he exclaimed as Josse made to protest, ‘concerning which neither I nor, I suspect, you, can say how the Abbess will react.’

‘Unless my silence compromises another, I will respect any confidence you make to me,’ Josse said. ‘Of that you have my word.’

De Gifford, still staring into Josse’s eyes, frowned. Then he said, ‘I believe you. And, let me say, it would be a relief to speak frankly.’ He looked around, noticed a deserted corner where the end wall of the stable block rose up above the herb garden and said, ‘Let us go over there into the small shelter provided by the wall, and I will tell you what I can.’

They walked quickly to the spot. A weak sun shone down on it and the temperature felt quite pleasantly warm. Again de Gifford checked that they were alone, then he said, ‘The party I spoke of seek a place of sanctuary. Their leader, whose name is Arnulf, is from the Low Countries and he leads a group whose nationalities are varied. One is a fellow countryman of Arnulf ’s named Alexius, and these two are the men who escaped from the prison. They have a big man with them who is from the south, from Verona I believe. I think it is possible that it was he who killed the prison guard; they say he is exceptionally strong and he is doubtless capable of throttling a man with one hand.’

‘The man who killed the guard choked him with his left hand,’ Josse said.

‘Indeed? I do not know if the man of whom I speak favours his left or his right hand.’

‘You said seven people,’ Josse prompted.

‘Yes. Originally there were four men and three women. The fourth man is one Guiscard, who is from the Midi. Toulouse, Albi, I do not know for sure. Also in the group were Frieda, who was killed by her gaoler, Aurelia whom I believe is the woman who is safe here at Hawkenlye, and one other. Her name is Utta.’

‘And where is she?’

‘I have no idea.’

Josse, taken aback by de Gifford’s willingness to talk, felt he ought to repay the confidences with one of his own. ‘The strong man is called Benedetto,’ he said. ‘It was he who brought Aurelia here.’

‘Was it?’ The bright eyes went instantly to Josse’s. ‘I imagine he is no longer here?’

‘No.’

‘And nobody knows where he is now?’

‘No.’

‘The whereabouts of five, then, are or have been known,’ de Gifford went on, more to himself than to Josse. ‘Arnulf and Alexius were imprisoned but escaped, probably helped by Benedetto. Frieda was also imprisoned but she is dead. Aurelia was flogged but presumably Benedetto got her away before, like Frieda, she was thrown into prison. Guiscard and Utta we know nothing about.’ He frowned.

De Gifford might have been frank about the party, Josse thought, but his frankness in itself revealed very little. ‘Under whose orders were they beaten and imprisoned?’ he asked. ‘Father Micah’s?’

De Gifford turned to him. ‘They were apprehended on the road north of Tonbridge and given over to the Church authority, which tried them and imposed the punishment. As I told you earlier, it is usual for those of us in the secular arm then to take over, administering whatever measures the Church feels necessary and then arranging for the criminals’ imprisonment, unless they’re to be executed. In which case the lay authorities usually do that too. But, as I said, Father Micah liked to take his involvement a little further.’

Taking all that in, Josse said, ‘I suppose someone found out what was going on in the group. I must say I find it hard to see how; they must have been very indiscreet. You’d have thought they could have kept that sort of thing hidden, wouldn’t you?’

De Gifford was looking at him curiously. ‘Well, no, not really. I mean, the whole point of their being here is surely because they want to win people over to their cause. After all, the more followers they have, the more formidable they will become.’

‘Their cause?’ Josse sounded incredulous. ‘What cause? They were punished for adultery!’

‘Adultery?’ De Gifford gave a short bark of laughter, quickly suppressed. ‘Sir Josse, what an extraordinary picture you paint, of the seven of them all fornicating with one another’s husbands and wives — none of them is married, in fact, I am almost certain of that, not in the sense that we understand marriage — and of Father Micah coming across them in the midst of their frolicking and instantly putting them under arrest!’

‘But Aurelia has a brand mark on her forehead,’ Josse persisted. ‘It looks like an A, which must mean that she was punished because of adultery!’

De Gifford was shaking his head. ‘Whoever made the mark cannot have had a steady hand,’ he said soberly. ‘It isn’t a letter A, Sir Josse. It is a letter H.’

Josse stared at him. ‘H?’

‘Yes. They’re heretics.’