The Awful Secret

Chapter Twelve In which Crowner John witnesses an arrest

John de Wolfe spent a quiet couple of hours in his small, bleak room at the top of the gatehouse. Even the damp cold of the unheated chamber was preferable to the frigid company of his wife. He used the time to practise his reading of Latin, running a finger slowly along the lines of Thomas’s perfect penmanship and forming the words silently with his lips.

The text was on the rolls that his clerk had written for current cases, pale cream parchment stitched together in long lengths, which would be presented to the king’s justices when they eventually came to Exeter for the next Eyre of Assize. They were long overdue, but rumour had it that they were in Dorchester and might perambulate as far as Devon in the next month or two to hear any civil disputes and serious cases of crime that de Wolfe had managed to wrest from the sheriff’s Shire Court.

John’s ability to read the rolls was improving weekly, and now he stumbled through a recent case of rape to refresh his memory. The woman, a young widow, claimed to have been waylaid in the backyard of her own house in Goldsmith Street. She had been allegedly beaten and ravished, and had produced a bloodstained rag, the almost obligatory evidence required to substantiate such a charge. Certainly when examined by de Wolfe, she had had bruised cheeks and arms, a black eye and a couple of loose teeth. There was no doubt about the assailant, a local carter who had been living with her for some months. The bailiff to the burgesses and one of his constables were called by the woman and her sister, who had raised the hue and cry, though in fact the man needed no chasing, as he was sitting in the house drinking ale when the bailiff arrived. On the accusation of the two women, the carter was arrested on the spot and dragged away to the gaol in the tower of the South Gate. If de Wolfe had not been notified by the bailiff, the carter would then have been hauled off to the sheriff’s fortnightly court and would most likely have been hanged, even though he loudly insisted that all he had done was give the widow a thrashing because she had stolen some money from his pouch when he was sleeping. As for the coupling, he claimed that that had been at least a daily event and had been enthusiastically received!

Against the equally loud protestations of Richard de Revelle, John insisted that such a serious charge as rape be referred to the king’s court, so he examined the woman himself, chaperoned by the old hag who did service as the midwife in that part of the town. There seemed little evidence of actual rape, but the coroner knew that in a previously married woman that by no means excluded forceful ravishment, even though the injuries to this one’s face were more in accord with a common assault. He decided to record all the facts and leave it to the king’s judges to decide who was telling the truth. As it was a hanging offence, de Wolfe could not attach the man with a heavy bail payment and he had to stay in prison until the Eyre of Assize, much to the annoyance of the burgesses and sheriff who had to pay a ha’penny a day for his keep. It was common for the prisoner in such cases to escape, usually by bribing the gaolers, but the only future for him then was either to run for the forest and become an outlaw or to seek sanctuary in a church and then abjure the realm.

De Wolfe pushed the roll aside, having strained his eyes and his brain enough for one day. He pulled his mantle more closely around him as he saw the rain sheeting down outside the window slit and thought about this latest complication, Bernardus de Blanchefort. He heartily wished him a thousand leagues away for he was no concern of a coroner as long as he stayed alive. Due to Gilbert de Ridefort’s tenuous claim to friendship, both he and this Bernardus had been thrust upon him and he seemed to be burdened with their safety, which he had spectacularly failed to ensure in the case of de Ridefort. ‘To hell with him! Let him give his damned sermon!’ muttered the coroner to himself, huddled in his bare attic. ‘If he wants to commit suicide, so be it. Those Templars or the Italian rat will put paid to him if he utters more than two words in front of the cathedral tomorrow.’

His dismissal of de Blanchefort was short-lived, however. Just as he was thinking of walking down to the Bush for an early-evening drink, there was a familiar uneven tapping of feet on the stairs and Thomas appeared through the hessian curtain. He looked worried and agitated. ‘Crowner, you must come down to the cathedral at once to see the archdeacon. He has sent me to fetch you.’

‘What’s the urgency, Thomas?’

‘As you told me to, I put word about concerning this sermon tomorrow.’ He crossed himself at the thought of it. ‘I told several vicars, a few secondaries and one canon while I was walking about the Close and later having my dinner at the house where I lodge. Within the hour, there was a buzz of interest in it and several more priests and monks came to ask me about the time and place, some of them already angry. Then, not long ago, two canons appeared and almost blamed me for encouraging heresy, though I told them I was only passing on gossip I had heard.’

‘Get on with it, man! What about the archdeacon?’

‘John of Alençon sent his own vicar-choral to me just now, with a demand that he speak to you urgently about this affair. He wants to see you in the Chapter House straight away.’

‘How did he know that I was connected with this?’

‘Your involvement with the dead Templar led him to assume that you were behind this new man.’

‘I’m not behind anything!’ snapped de Wolfe irascibly. ‘I wish I’d never heard of either of the damned fellows. But I suppose I must come down with you. What about Gwyn?’

‘He has been around the alehouses with the gossip – no hardship for him, I’m sure!’ the little man added wryly. ‘And I saw him just now, talking to some of the men-at-arms downstairs in the guardroom, so he’s probably telling them as well.’

The result of Gwyn’s publicity was even more rapid than that of Thomas’s. By the time John and his clerk had reached the gateway to Rougemont, Sergeant Gabriel was hurrying towards them from the direction of the keep. ‘The sheriff wants to see you, Crowner. Something about a new Templar giving a sermon tomorrow. He seemed in a high temper about it. Wants you to go to his chamber right away.’

De Wolfe sighed a great sigh. ‘Can’t be done, Gabriel. I have to see the archdeacon urgently at the Chapter House. Tell the sheriff that if he wants to talk about it he had better join us at the cathedral without delay.’

Determined not to be at the beck and call of Richard de Revelle, de Wolfe waved the sergeant away and, with Thomas clip-clopping behind, he strode away down towards the high street and the Close.

He found John de Alençon waiting impatiently in the Chapter House. This was a square wooden structure outside the South Tower in which the daily chapter meetings of the canons and lesser clergy were held. It had bare benches around three sides and a lectern on the other, where a chapter of the gospels was read at each session, giving the assembly its name. A wooden ladder in the corner led to the cathedral library above. The archdeacon’s spare frame was pacing up and down, his cassock sweeping the floor in his agitation. Sharp grey eyes looked out worriedly from his thin face, accentuating his ascetic appearance. ‘John, what am I hearing about tomorrow? Is there no end to this?’

De Wolfe sank on to a front bench and turned up his hands in exasperated supplication. ‘It is not of my doing. Another ex-Templar has appeared, this time intent on delivering some religious truth. I have no control over him, so what do you expect me to do?’

De Alençon slumped on to the wooden seat alongside the coroner. ‘I wish the bishop was here. This should be the responsibility of someone with a higher authority. I have been visited by Cosimo and the Templar knights, who told me of their concern that serious heresy is afoot.’

The outer door banged and in marched Richard de Revelle, green cloak flowing in the wind and an expression of outrage on his narrow face. ‘You’re treading on thin ice, John,’ he began, without any preamble. ‘I have heard that some foolishness is to be to be perpetrated here tomorrow and it seems that you are linked to it in some way.’

De Wolfe jumped to his feet. ‘For God’s sake, it’s none of my doing! Some religious fanatic appears in the city and immediately everyone thinks he is my protégé.’

‘This cannot be allowed to continue!’ shouted the sheriff. ‘I’ll have three senior Templars on my back like a ton of quarrystone. When they hear of this, they will demand that he be arrested.’

‘Do you know who we are talking about?’ grated de Wolfe. ‘You want him arrested and yet you don’t even know his name.’

‘So who is he?’ demanded de Revelle.

‘He’s another Templar – or perhaps former Templar would be more accurate. No doubt he has already been ejected from the Order,’ observed de Wolfe.

The archdeacon, who disliked the sheriff as much as de Wolfe did, could not resist putting a brake on his autocratic manner. ‘Forgive me, de Revelle, but I have to point out that not only do you have no jurisdiction in the cathedral precinct, except upon the roads, but that I fail to see how you can arrest anyone for threatening to give a religious address, sacrilegious or otherwise. Both those matters are strictly within the authority of the Church and its Consistory Courts.’

Richard de Revelle tried to bluster his way around this. ‘Possibly true, Archdeacon, but if the outrage at heretical preaching leads to a public disturbance or even a riot, which could spread beyond the Close, then it most certainly is a breach of the king’s peace and falls within my remit.’

The two Johns couldn’t resist exchanging cynical smiles at this, coming from a recognised supporter of the prince’s treason.

‘I am very glad to hear you upholding your sovereign Richard’s peace, Sheriff, and I will bear it in mind,’ said the priest sweetly.

‘Are you going to do nothing to prevent this obscenity, then?’ fumed de Revelle.

‘There is no way that we can allow anyone to preach publicly from our own cathedral steps,’ said the Archdeacon decisively, ‘especially when it is rumoured that he is fostering some heresy, presumably that of the Cathars, as he is said to come from that part of France.’

Once again the Chapter House door creaked open and this time a whole crowd of men jostled inside. The three Knights Templar ushered in Cosimo of Modena and their five retainers came in after them to stand ranged around the back of the room.

‘Gossip travels fast in this city,’ observed John de Alençon mildly, looking at the group of damp souls who stood dripping water on to the flagged floor, for the rain had begun again in earnest outside.

The small Italian priest moved to the centre of the floor, in front of the much taller archdeacon. He began speaking in a high pitched whine. ‘It has come to my notice that we have yet more sacrilege amongst us! It is my duty to know of such dangerous men, especially from France, and I tell you, this Bernardus de Blanchefort may present a serious threat to our Mother Church. He must be taken and sent home to be taught the error of his ways.’

‘What are these errors, Brother Abbot?’ asked the archdeacon gravely.

Cosimo looked evasively from him to the coroner and back again. ‘It is the usual foul nonsense, the perverted beliefs of those in the Albi region of the Languedoc. They are so evilly fanciful that, though they make no impression on educated men such as we, if preached openly to the public some of the weaker-minded may be influenced.’

‘He must not be allowed to open his mouth,’ roared Brian de Falaise, from a few feet away. His bull neck and rugged cheeks were almost purple with anger and de Wolfe suspected that if he hadn’t left his broadsword at home to visit a church the blade would be whistling through the air at this point.

‘Where is this accursed fellow, anyway?’ demanded Richard de Revelle. ‘Has anyone seen him? How did we hear that he was in Exeter and intended on this madness tomorrow?’ He glared at his brother-in-law, as if suspecting that he was behind this new problem.

John decided that part of the truth was better than a complete denial. ‘He accosted me in the street today, after the burial of his fellow Templar.’

‘They are no Templars!’ snarled Brian de Falaise. ‘They would have been ejected from our Order with ignominy had they been found before they fled from us.’

‘So you were searching for these men, then, and not just looking for land to purchase?’ observed de Wolfe, with a hard edge to his voice.

Roland de Ver slid smoothly into the exchange. ‘We are seeking new estates, indeed we are. But on our journeying we were also told to look out for our two wayward brothers, who were thought to be in this part of England.’ He looked reprovingly at de Falaise, who glowered back. De Ver continued, ‘My friend here is not quite correct in his harsh judgement of them. If we had come across them in our travels, we were to persuade them to return with us so that the error of their ways could be explained to them, and every effort made to bring them back into the paths of righteousness.’

At this, Godfrey Capra and Brian de Falaise looked at each other as if this was the first they had heard of it, but they wisely held their peace.

The archdeacon came back into the discussion, privately most concerned – as was his friend the coroner – about Gilbert de Ridefort’s bloody end. ‘Abbot Cosimo, I am not at all clear about your mission in Devon. Did you come because of these two Templars?’

The Italian’s strange profile slowly turned up to the taller priest. ‘I regret that I cannot discuss such matters, Archdeacon. As you know, I am a papal nuncio and as such have complete authority to conduct myself in any way that seems beneficial to the Holy See. But I can tell you that I am charged with the rooting out of heresy, wherever it may be found.’

After being told to mind his own business, John de Alençon stared stonily at de Revelle. ‘What is to be done about this, Sheriff? Though I have pointed out to you that the precinct is outwith your jurisdiction, I take your point about not wanting a riot. Already, several of my priests and some monks have protested to me about the rumours concerning tomorrow.’

Richard threw back his cloak over one shoulder in a dramatic gesture. ‘I will arrest the man the moment he shows his face. I will soon find some suitable charge.’

In spite of an icy glare from Roland de Ver, Brian de Falaise cut across de Revelle in a loud voice. ‘Let us take him! We need no legalistic excuse, he is a renegade member of our Order and as such is subject to our discipline. As our leader says, we need to remove him to the New Temple so that he can be readjusted.’

De Wolfe wondered if ‘readjustment’ included tearing de Blanchefort’s arms from their sockets on the rack, but the priest from Modena was now entering the verbal fray.

‘What matters is that this troublemaker must not be allowed to open his mouth in public,’ he hissed. ‘In five minutes before an audience of dull-witted but impressionable folk, he might begin something that could do incalculable damage to the Holy Church. I don’t care if the sheriff hangs him or the Templars drag him back to London, as long as he is not allowed to remain at liberty where at any time he might begin to spread this heresy.’ With a face that momentarily reminded de Wolfe of a snake, he threw a poisonous look at the coroner. ‘I hold you responsible in part for all this trouble. You seem very bound up with these two men – I trust you yourself have no leanings towards their perverted ideas.’

He looked over his shoulder to where his two glowering retainers stood menacingly near the door. ‘I intend to have a presence in the cathedral Close tomorrow, as a safety measure in case you others fail in your duties.’ With that, he pulled up the pointed hood of his black habit, glided towards his men and vanished with them into the night.

Now the Templars, the archdeacon and the sheriff all turned to the coroner. ‘So where is he, John?’ snapped de Revelle. ‘You seem to know most about him. In fact, we have only your word for it that he actually exists!’

‘De Blanchefort exists all right, as did de Ridefort,’ growled Brian de Falaise. ‘I saw them both in Outremer – they were strange then. De Ridefort had strangeness in the blood, for his damned uncle proved that!’

John de Alençon held his hands as if in prayer. ‘Do you know where he is now, John?’

‘I have no idea where he is,’ said the coroner, almost truthfully. ‘I presume he is still in the city, as the gates are now locked, though he may have left since this afternoon, when I last saw him.’

De Wolfe satisfied his conscience with the evasion that he did not know exactly – to a few hundred paces – where Bernardus was at that moment, for as soon as he had known that he was going to the Chapter House for an inevitable grilling about the fugitive, he had seized Gwyn in the castle guardroom and sent him down to the Saracen to get the Templar out and hide him somewhere until the morning.

One of the brown-cloaked Templar sergeants moved forward and whispered to Roland de Ver. The knight nodded and pulled thoughtfully at his right ear. ‘It is pointless trying to find this de Blanchefort tonight. I have never met him, but both my brothers here know him slightly by sight, and in the morning can patrol the streets around the cathedral to seek some sign of him.’

De Ver pulled his white mantle with the bold red cross more closely around him in preparation for leaving. ‘Whatever happens, this man must not be allowed to climb the cathedral steps, let alone open his mouth to say even as much as “Good morning”,’ he declared. Turning on his heel he stalked from the bleak chamber, followed by the sheriff, then his fellow Knights of Christ and their sergeants.

The two Johns were left alone, apart from the rather overawed Thomas lurking near the lectern. ‘You have a talent for becoming involved in desperate situations, John,’ said the archdeacon, with a twinkle in his eye even at this serious moment. ‘A few months ago it was the murder of that silversmith, then it was the business of Prince John. Now you bring international heretics into our city and cathedral! What will it be next?’

De Wolfe gave his friend one of his rare grins. ‘I’ll think of something, John, never fear!’