The Malice of Unnatural Death

Chapter Forty-Three

Exeter Cathedral

Baldwin and Simon had a leisurely walk to the cathedral after their breakfast. Already the grounds before the great church had startedto fill with city folk ready to join the Sabbath celebrations.

Practically every day of the year had its own saint to revere, and Baldwin knew that keeping abreast of which was due forhonour on any day was a task that exercised some of the finest minds in Christendom. At the cathedral there was a good manwho was paid a gallon of wine to call out all the different relics that were held there on the Monday after Ascension eachyear. It was a task that demanded a degree of perseverance on the part of the annueller concerned, calling out the piece of Mary’s pillow, the splinter of the True Cross, the oil of St Catherine and all the other bits and pieces that made up thegreat treasury owned by the cathedral. The number of relics made Exeter a place of pilgrimage for people from all over thewest country.

All too soon Baldwin saw the first of the black-robed canons appearing in his doorway as the bells began to ring, and thenall the houses in Canon’s Row disgorged their occupants. Entire households stood in the road, with the processions being decided by rank and authority: canon first, then vicars, annuellers, novices, servants, all clad in theirrobes ready for the service. They stepped over the open sewer that ran between their houses and the cemetery, and began tocross the grassy plain. A hog and two horses moved out of their way as the men passed around the new building work, avoidingthe great stones lying all about, and making their way to the southern entrance. Only when all the choir had already entereddid the rest of the congregation follow.

Inside it was serene, an odd silence compared with the anticipated noise of a working building site. None of the workmen wasallowed to continue on the day of rest.

Baldwin and the others made their way to the northern side of the cathedral, where there was the altar dedicated to St Catherine,and stood about while the incense wafted and the singing of the choristers rose to the heavens.

Bowing his head beneath his hood, Baldwin listened to the service in the choir. The music was marvellous, as always. Althoughhe had travelled widely and knew the forms of celebrations in the more modern and contemporary churches of France, Galiciaand Portugal, he still felt most at home here in English churches, with their more restrained, simple services. In other countriesthere was too much extravagance, he felt. The plainer customs in English services were more suitable.

As always, the people standing all around were hooded and hatted respectfully. When the bishop came to raise the host up onhigh for all to see, they would bare their heads. There was a group of women near him, under the watchful gaze of a chaperon,while beyond them an older couple were sitting on folding chairs with leather seats and reading a book of hours together. The sole irritant to him was the woman behind him, who would keep up a relentless prayer for a son who had disappeared some years ago, which spoiled his concentration.

And then he saw the man: Robinet.

He was over at the southern wall with the watchman, Ivo. Baldwin recognised him immediately, and was angry to see the manhere, flaunting his freedom in a church of God. It was shameful.

‘Look, Simon,’ he breathed. Simon followed his pointing finger and Baldwin saw his neck stiffen.

‘Where’s Sir Richard?’

Ivo had tagged along reluctantly, but he wasn’t sure he understood what his companion was on about. There was some story aboutthe man they’d tried to find yesterday actually being an assassin who was going to try to kill the bishop, which caught hisattention, naturally enough. Where there was a job to be done saving a bishop’s life, there was also a good fee to be earnedas reward. He was sure of that.

But apparently the killer wouldn’t have to be nearby. Would not be getting up close with a knife or anything. No, he wouldbe a little distance away — but near enough to see the bishop.

‘What, he going to use a bow in the cathedral?’

‘Not a bow, no. But something quite as deadly.’

‘As deadly as a bow?’ Ivo said doubtfully, squinting up at him.

He didn’t answer. The necromancer had to be here somewhere. Not in with the congregation, not if he was going to strike rightnow … and he had to strike now. It was the only thing that made sense, attacking during this special celebration.

There!

It was a fleeting glimpse of blackness up at the top of the wall, where the new construction joined the older section of thebuilding. A flash of black clerical cloth, nothing more, and it was that very movement that told him he was right. Any otherman would have stood still and watched the service. Only a man seeking concealment would disappear like that.

‘He’s there.’

Baldwin saw Robinet start to move towards the rear of the church, his eyes fixed skywards, and he turned to stare up, wonderingwhat the retired king’s man had seen.

‘Simon!’

‘I see him!’

The two pushed through the laity towards the back, but even as they moved they heard the door open and the steady trampingof the coroner’s feet, the petrified girl bound at his side, his hand on her arm to stop her bolting. Immediately attentionwas diverted, and people craned their necks to see what was happening, some few, who were better informed, telling othersthat this was the mad girl who’d killed that servant over near the West Gate.

‘Come on, Simon,’ Baldwin muttered as he shoved people from his path. Then, at the rear, he found a clearing, and he hurriedover it. At the back of the church there was a ladder set up, and he came to it just as the girl was dragged to the altar. Baldwin cast a look over his shoulder, then began to climb. Reluctantly: he hated heights.

It was fortunate that the ladder was only propped up against a lower section of the wall. While it looked high enough to Baldwin,and set his heart racing, there was a dread emptiness in his stomach as he looked overhead and saw how much higher the walls climbed.

‘Come on, then!’ Simon said enthusiastically as he reached Baldwin.

‘Yes. Yes.’ Baldwin gathered his thoughts and his courage and took a deep breath before gritting his teeth and making hisway along the wall to another ladder. This one took them up to another level, and now Baldwin did not dare to look down. Thesound of singing and prayer came to him, but only dimly, because there was an unpleasant rushing sound in his ears. He hearda wailing cry, and it distracted him long enough to make him glance in its direction. There, before the altar, he saw Jenkneeling while the bishop set his hands upon her head, the coroner nearby, his head bowed, but his eyes fixed on the child.

Turning away quickly, swallowing, Baldwin continued. There ahead he could see the king’s man, and now he searched about forany sign of their quarry.

Up here, the walls were a mass of confusing blocks of stone. There was a great scaffold erected, with good poplar boughs lashedtogether, but the uneven nature of the building work made it difficult to see. The man could be anywhere along here, onlya matter of feet away, and Baldwin would not spot him.

But then he did. He saw a sandalled foot between two lumps of rock. John of Nottingham was the other side of them, sittingin a vantage point where no one could see him, but from where he could see all that was going on below.

Baldwin signalled to Simon, and began to creep nearer.

It was perfect up here. John of Nottingham smiled to himself as he drew out the figure and gazed at it, wiping the brow smooth with a rough thumb. Down below, there was a sudden hiss and rush as all the congregation bowed their heads and pulledoff hats or drew back their hoods, and the bishop lifted his hands high overhead with the host, praying.

John took the small antler pin from his purse and waited a moment, then set it at the figure’s temple. He peered down again,and slowly pushed it into the waxen head.

At first he would have said that nothing appeared to happen. The bishop continued his prayer loudly, unfalteringly, and withdetermination, but then, as John pushed the pin all the way in, and felt the point at the far side of the skull, he was surethat he saw the bishop stumble over a few words. The host was set down on the table, and the bishop shook his head. Yes! Itwas working.

The efficacy was proved. He took out the pin, and held it over the figure’s heart. Uttering a prayer of his own for the successof his effort, he was about to push it in when there was a scrape of rubble behind him. It urged him on, and the pin had justbegun to penetrate the breast when a bright blue steel blade appeared in front of him. It flicked, and the pin was jerkedfrom his hand, to whirl over and over, away from him, down to the floor.

‘No-o-o!’

‘Keep still, man, or you’ll be joining it,’ Baldwin said. ‘Come round here, and don’t be foolish.’

John was staring down in dismay. There was nothing on him. Nothing at all — not even a little knife to stab at the thing inhis hands. Yet he must … he took the figure in his hands, and slammed it down on the edge of the wall in front of him. The head was dented badly. He did it again, and the head snapped off, falling to bounce on the floor of the cathedral.

‘There!’

Ivo was behind Robinet when they both heard the voices behind them. Robinet stared, and then his brow cleared as he saw how hehad walked past John without seeing him. He started off in a hurry, and almost knocked Ivo down as he hurtled along the wallto where John knelt, smiling up at Baldwin.

‘Well done, Sir Baldwin. Where are the other dolls, though?’

Baldwin reached round the stone and gripped John’s tunic. Pulling hard, he half pulled, half lifted the older man back tothe more solid base of the cathedral wall. ‘Where are they, John? You are John of Nottingham?’

‘Yes. I am John, but I see no reason to help you. The others will be destroyed in time. You cannot stop me and my friends.’

‘Why?’

‘Why do you think! Because of the injustice daily perpetrated by those miserable bastards. The king was a supposititious child. You only have to look at his unnatural activities to see that! Look at his lovers. Forsaking his own wife he consorts withhedgers and ditchers, dancers and play-actors! And then he gives up the riches of this sovereign realm to his advisers the Despensers, and richly rewards the thieves. And asks your Bishop Stapledon to spy on the queen. Did you know that?’

‘Enough! Come on, you’re coming down with us. You have many questions to answer,’ Baldwin said.

‘Oh, yes.’ John stared at him, a thin, gaunt man with a face like a skull. Baldwin could feel the strength of the man’s intelligenceas he met that firm gaze. It was almost as though John was trying to work upon Baldwin silently, by the power of his thoughts. It was alarming to see how he strained,as though by the mere exercise of will he could force Baldwin to change his mind and release him. A vein throbbed in his temple,and he brought his head down slightly, as though to add to the intensity of his stare.

It made Baldwin smile to see it. ‘You may as well relax your overworked features, John. I do not succumb to witchcraft.’

They reached the ladder in short order, and Simon, knowing how Baldwin felt about heights, volunteered to climb down it first. He went, and when he was almost at the bottom, Baldwin and Ivo pushed the sorcerer towards it, Baldwin sheathing his swordready for his own descent.

Suddenly John spun round, his fist catching Ivo full in the face. The watchman fell back, and would have toppled over theedge but for the attention of Robinet, who caught him and whirled him round, using his weight to pull him back towards thesafety of the wall. Baldwin saw it, and his hand was on his sword-handle, but before he could reach it he felt something whipround his neck. It was a fine cord or thong, and on one end was fixed a small lead weight, so that it encircled his throat. Immediately John grabbed the second end and started to pull tight, strangling Baldwin.

If he had done that from behind, Baldwin would have been fearful for his life, but as it was, he took hold of John’s handsand forced the older man to loosen his grip. Crossing John’s wrists, he lifted them until the cord was over his head. ‘It’stoo late for that.’

John responded by dropping the thong and grabbing at Baldwin’s belt. The old man was astonishingly powerful for one so frail and thin, and he wrestled Baldwin towards the edge of the wall.

‘Baldwin!’ he heard Simon shout, but he had his mind on other things. He threw himself bodily backwards to the wall, striking his headon a stone, and suddenly he felt a great lassitude overwhelming him. There was a roaring in his ears, and his head was swollen,so he thought, to double or more its usual size. He was aware of being dragged a little, and then he realised that John hadthrown himself over the edge of the wall, and his weight was pulling Baldwin towards the abyss.

‘No!’ he roared, scrabbling with his feet for any purchase, but they were already over the edge. There was nothing for themto grip. His hands were scratched as he tried to cling to the bare rocks, but the new dressing was so precise that he couldgain no hold. Inexorably he felt himself sliding towards the edge and certain death on the floor below.

And then he saw Robinet at his side. Robinet drew Baldwin’s sword and hacked down. There was a short scream, and Baldwin glanceddown to see the bloody stump of John’s left forearm waving, blood flicking in an obscene fountain. Still clinging to Baldwin’sbelt with his right hand, John stared up, and saw Robinet. ‘Tell Matthew I shall see him with you in hell!’

The sword flashed down again. There was a spurt of blood that sprayed up and over Baldwin’s face, then a hideous, damp sound.