The Midnight Man

The Physician’s Tale
Part One

Brother Anselm, Carmelite friar and principal exorcist to the Archbishop of Canterbury, closed his eyes and breathed out slowly. He and his clerk, the novice Stephen of Winchester, were now alone. The doors to St Michael’s, Candlewick in Dowgate Ward, London were closed and guarded by Parson Smollat and members of his parish council. All flambeaux, candles, cressets and tapers had been extinguished. They were alone in the darkness and already ‘the presence’, as Brother Anselm described it, was making itself felt. The usual mustiness had faded. The warmth of the spring day, still to be enjoyed in the gloomy cemetery beyond the corpse door, now disappeared. A horrid cold swept the nave of that ancient church, bringing with it the stinking stench of corruption, the horrid perfume of hell. The attack had already begun. Memories whirled through Anselm’s mind like black fat flies. He thought about what he had witnessed in Norwich. The lady who’d fled with her lover monk: her brothers had caught up and killed both her and her priestly paramour. They’d castrated the monk then drowned both in a sack weighed down with rocks. Their souls had refused to move on into the light and judgement. They had clustered in that derelict watermill, sheltering like bats twittering in a cave, the horror and bloody terror of their deaths darting out like tongues of hellish flames to disturb and harm the living.

‘Brother Anselm,’ Stephen whispered, ‘it’s cold, and I’m frightened.’

Anselm started, freeing himself from the devilish distraction. ‘Surely we shall see the Lord’s goodness in the land of the living,’ he intoned reassuringly. ‘Take heart and hold firm. Hope in the Lord.’

Stephen threaded his Ave beads, fingers slippery with sweat. He tried to recite the Pater Noster but could not speak the words. ‘Qui est in coelis — who art in heaven.’ He stared into the gathering blackness. Anselm had warned him about this sticking cold, the unpleasant thoughts. More terrors would soon press in. Stephen’s mouth and throat turned dry. He jumped as something brushed his face, soft yet menacing, like a fluttering hawk wing. He must remain vigilant, prayerful and remember everything so as to faithfully record it. He drew himself up on the stool next to the shriving chair in which Anselm sat. He was about to cross himself when his shoulder was poked. He whirled around, alarmed by the hissing whispers. Something crawled over his sandalled feet, cold and slithering — a viper, here? The novice moved his feet. Anselm did likewise. He gripped Stephen’s arm and pressed reassuringly. ‘Phantasms!’ he murmured. ‘Ignore them. More will come.’

As if in answer a dog howled, a flesh-tingling sound. Stephen was not sure whether the hound was in the church or beyond the corpse door. A black shape moved furtively between the drum-like pillars of the nave.

‘Magister,’ Stephen whispered, ‘this is supposed to be a holy place, not the domain of demons.’

‘So it is,’ Anselm whispered back, ‘but, as scripture proves, Satan even appeared to the Holy One himself. What I am certain of is. .’ Anselm broke off as candles in the chantry chapel immediately to his right flared into life, lit by some unseen hand. Stephen followed his master’s gaze and shivered. The candles on their spigots were burning briskly, shoots of flames leaping up to illuminate the vivid wall painting just beneath the darkened window. The fresco recorded a vision of hell where the damned hung by their tongues from trees of fire. Others smouldered in furnaces, heaped with burning coals, roasted on spits or plunged head first into cauldrons of bubbling black oil. All around these gathered hordes of demons, serpents and monstrous beasts. Black dogs, armed with swords, stood guard over other damned souls being led to a gibbet which stretched over a plunging abyss. The candles were abruptly extinguished and the flames smothered. The whispering began again as a crowd of ghosts hustled close.

‘Earth swallowed Abel’s blood; it thirsts for more.’ The voice was low and mocking.

‘Aye,’ Anselm replied sharply, ‘and all those hallowed by receiving Christ’s body before the great resurrection condemn you.’

The voice screamed and faded away. Anselm rose to his feet, Stephen likewise.

‘In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.’ Anselm began the rite of exorcism. He had assured Stephen, before being locked in this darkened church, that ‘the scriptures say this type of demonic activity can only be driven out by prayer and fasting.’

They had certainly fasted. Stephen’s empty stomach grumbled in protest. He forced himself to join in the prayers, even as the ghastly voices began to mimic what was said. The verses drifted back, distant echoes. Lights appeared, floating like those strange marsh fires above the fens of Ely. Were they, Stephen wondered, goblins, fairies, fireflies or the souls of the damned? Anselm was now chanting a psalm. The lights disappeared; the stench remained as if from some open sewer. A cold, as freezing as the north wind sweeping across the snowbound fields of Lincolnshire, chilled their bodies. Anselm had stopped his reciting. He just stood in the centre of the nave, hands hanging by his side.

‘Magister, Magister?’

Anselm turned and grabbed Stephen’s shoulder in a hard squeeze. ‘I saw one once, Stephen — a knight. The cross-bolt bow had knit his gorget to his throat. Another had smashed into his nose. Others were being slaughtered, some eviscerated; they trod on their own entrails and vomited their own teeth. Some stood gazing speechlessly at where their arms should have been. Yet when I turn away, I see the pestilential horde, bodies covered with buboes, white and round like shining shillings. These turn into burning candles in their flesh; they erupt like the seeds of black peas, broken fragments of brittle sea coal, dark black berries. .’

‘Magister, Magister?’ Stephen freed himself from his master’s grip. He seized Anselm’s freezing cold hands, even as he was aware of sinister shades gathering like bats, their silent wings wafting putrid air towards them. ‘Magister?’ Stephen could not see Anselm’s face through the gloom but he felt his master’s hands grow warm. Anselm gave a great sigh, turned and promptly fainted into Stephen’s arms. The novice, sweat-soaked, lowered his body down to the cold paving stones. Stephen knelt by his master, aware of the darksmen, as Anselm called them, the night-walkers pressing in. Anselm stirred, groaned and struggled to sit. ‘Don’t be alarmed,’ he whispered. ‘Let us see. .’

Anselm staggered to his feet and walked down the nave. He was calling out questions, pausing and listening to replies. The darkness thinned. The ancient mustiness of the church returned. No longer was it cold. No voices echoed. No lights flared. No darting shadows or flitting shapes. They had all faded, trailing away. Anselm stood in the centre of the nave, hands clasped, staring up at the elaborately carved rood screen. He stepped forward as if to go up into the sanctuary but paused and looked over his shoulder. ‘Stephen,’ Anselm murmured, ‘it’s over. Unlock the doors.’

A short while later Anselm, Stephen and others assembled in the great solar of Sir William Higden’s stately mansion which overlooked St Michael’s, Candlewick. Anselm had washed his hands and face. He’d drank a full loving cup of water and eaten a platter of diced meat, beef garnished with a spicy vegetable sauce. Stephen had also eaten and drunk, perhaps more wine than he should have done. The excitement of the evening had diminished. The novice stared around the opulent chamber, such a contrast to the stark simplicity of the cells at the House of the Carmelites, the White Friars. The solar was luxuriously furnished. Oaken panelling gleamed against the walls; above this the delicately plastered walls were decorated with gorgeous cloths, embroideries and tapestries. The tiled floor was carpeted with dark turkey cloths while the full glory of the solar was illuminated by an array of fiery candles and flaring cressets. Stephen felt the strong arms of his leather-backed chair and stared at the other items of polished furniture: the dressers, tables and shelves displaying a magnificent array of silver and gold cups, mazers, platters and dishes. Stephen glanced at Anselm. The exorcist slouched in his chair at the top of the table picking at strips of dried fruit, his bony face creased with tiredness. Anselm, Stephen reflected, looked what he was, a priest used to the tangled warfare between the visible and the invisible. Anselm had a streak of gentleness carefully hidden behind his hard-featured face, hooded eyes, aquiline nose and bloodless, thin lips. He was clean-shaven, his black-silver hair closely cut to reveal the tonsure as well as proclaim the austerity of this former knight who’d once fought and killed under the snarling, gold leopards of England.

The others grouped around the table were subdued. Parson Smollat, neat and fussy, his rosy cheeks now full-red from the claret he’d generously supped, his piggy eyes ever darting, his clean little face screwed up in concentration as he listened to the conversations swirling about him. Simon the sexton was no different. A smug little man with a streak of vanity betrayed by the way he let his scrawny, silver-grey hair tumble down to his shoulders. Curate Amalric was different. A scion of a noble Somerset family, or so he often proclaimed, Amalric disdained what he dismissed as ‘courtly fancy’ and dressed simply in a long black robe, heavily stained with food, wine and other unmentionables. Amalric, head and face completely shaved, was bony and angular — so much so that the curate reminded Stephen of a skeleton.

‘You want more claret?’

Stephen glanced down at the other end of the table where their host, Sir William Higden, sat enthroned, holding up the wine jug, gazing expectantly around at his guests. A plump city merchant knighted by the King, dressed in a beautiful quilted jerkin of dark murrey, Sir William was trying to remain cheerful despite what was happening in his parish church of which he was the lord, holding its advowson, the right to appoint the parson and other clerics. Sir William’s podgy face under its mop of thinning reddish hair gleamed with oil.

‘More wine, sirs, surely?’

Sir William’s question was politely refused. Amalric gazed longingly into the far corner where the flame of the hour candle was slowly sinking to the next ring — compline time.

‘Are you sure?’ Sir William’s face was now drained of all good humour: his small black eyes hard as pebbles, no longer wrinkled in a smile. The merchant knight put the wine jug down. He played with the medallion on the chain around his neck then started to slip on and off the rings decorating his podgy fingers. A strange man, Stephen reflected, Sir William had fought strenuously for King Edward in France before amassing a fortune in the wool trade. He had raised loans for the King who’d rewarded him with a knighthood and a secure place in the Commons where, of course, Sir William could defend the Crown’s rights. A warrior turned merchant, Sir William’s stately mansion overlooked the sprawling cemetery of St Michael’s, Candlewick. He was a lord who took a keen interest in his local church and all things parochial. He now used the wine jug to bang on the table and still the desultory conversation. He was about to speak but paused at a knock on the door. This swung open immediately and Sir Miles Beauchamp, Chief Clerk in the Chancery of the Secret Seal, swept into the room. Beauchamp arrogantly surveyed them all as he undid the clasps of his heavy, dark blue cloak; he swung this off, tossing it over an old chair just within the doorway.

‘Gentlemen, kind sirs, good evening.’ Beauchamp undid his war belt carefully, folding it around the two blood-red scabbards carrying sword and dagger. He placed this carefully on the cloak and pulled down the quilted jerkin so its high collar showed off the snow-white cambric shirt beneath, the tight-fitting waist and padded shoulders emphasizing Beauchamp’s slim figure. The royal clerk walked the length of the table, studying each of them carefully. Dressed in black, the silver spurs on his high-heeled boots clinking at every step, Beauchamp carried himself as if his person was sacred and his very presence of crucial importance. Just past his thirtieth summer, Beauchamp was a clerk greatly favoured by the old King. He looked and dressed like a fop with his be-ringed fingers, tight-fitting hose and languid ways, almost womanish with his handsome features, blond hair coifed and pricked like any court lady. Beauchamp could be dismissed as one of those decadent minions whom the preachers thundered against with cutting references to the secret sin of Sodom.

Brother Anselm, however, after he and Stephen had met Beauchamp earlier in the evening, had warned the young novice: ‘Cacullus non facit monachum — the cowl does not make the monk. Sir Miles is not what he appears. In truth, he is a ferocious warrior much trusted by the Crown and a true ladies’ man. Indeed,’ Anselm smiled, a rare occurrence which transformed his face, ‘he reminds me of myself before.’ The smile then faded. ‘He reminds me, that’s all,’ and he had refused to elaborate further.

Sir Miles stopped at the end of the table, lazy blue eyes studying both Carmelites. Stephen noticed the slight cast in the clerk’s right eye, which enhanced rather than retracted from Beauchamp’s good looks. He smiled faintly at both, nodded and sauntered back to slide easily into the chair to the right of Sir William.

The merchant spread his hands. ‘Welcome, Sir Miles. I am sorry you could not be with us for the exorcism, which-’

‘I am not finished,’ Anselm abruptly interrupted. ‘I must leave. I have to because I want to, not because I am being forced to. Stephen and I,’ Anselm glanced at his companion, ‘must go back.’

The exorcist rose so swiftly he took the rest by surprise. Amalric the curate threw his hands up in horror. Simon the sexton flapped his arms like a spring sparrow caught in a net.

‘You cannot.’ Sir William half-rose but then sat down as Sir Miles gently pressed the back of his hand.

‘I have eaten and I have prayed,’ Anselm replied. ‘God will give me the strength.’ He leaned down, snatched up the leather satchel resting against the leg of the table and thrust it into Stephen’s hand.

Sir William made to object again but Beauchamp rose languidly to his feet. ‘The priest desires to go. If our exorcist wishes to run one more tilt in this demonic tournament so be it, I shall join him.’

Anselm half-raised his hand, as if to protest.

‘I shall go,’ Beauchamp declared, ‘or no one goes.’

They left the solar, going across the spacious entrance hall with its monumental fireplace surmounted by a giant hood, its pure stone studded with diamonds to defend against poison and magical incantation as well as gleaming topaz, a sure protection against sudden death. Just in case neither of these worked, above the fireplace hung the Cross of San Damiano, much beloved by Saint Francis, while triptychs on either side displayed in brilliant colours dramatic scenes from the life of St Christopher. The rest of the walls were hidden by painted cloths brought to life by the darting light of candle and taper; the windows were glazed while Persian carpets and woven mats covered the paved floor. A servant standing by the main door handed them their cloaks. Outside the April night had turned dark and cold. One of Higden’s retainers, a large, thick-set man holding a torch, led them across the rich gardens Stephen had glimpsed earlier, out through a small postern door and across to the huge, brooding lychgate of St Michael’s. They entered the broad, rambling cemetery. In daylight hours it stretched quiet and still, a mass of wooden crosses and weather-beaten stones, a wild garden with shady yew trees planted to fend off wandering cattle. Here and there clumps of flowers, violets, lavender, peonies and lilies planted years ago by some enterprising parson or his woman. Now night cloaked everything in darkness. For Stephen this ancient burial place, God’s acre or not, seemed a domain of brooding menace dominated by the sheer stone mass of the old Norman church. Some of its glazed windows caught the light; others, covered by stretched oiled pig’s bladders, simply gazed sightlessly out into the darkness.

‘Look!’ The retainer pointed to the top of the soaring tower. ‘No light! The beacon fire has been extinguished.’

‘But I relit it,’ Simon the sexton declared hoarsely. ‘The beacon was firmly packed, and there’s been no rain.’

‘I am tired of this.’ The retainer turned and came back.

Sir William stepped forward to urge him on but Anselm placed a restraining hand on the merchant’s arm.

‘You are tired of what, my friend?’ Anselm asked. He took the torch and raised it high. ‘What’s your name?’

Stephen stared at the man, his burly, unshaven face all pocked and marked, furry eyebrows either side of a fat drinker’s nose, with the jutting lips and protuberant jaw of a mastiff.

‘Bardolph.’ The man’s voice was grating. ‘My name is Bardolph, Brother. I serve the parish as a gravedigger and corpse-mover. My wife and I also own a small alehouse nearby. We used to sell ale here in the churchyard after Mass on Sundays and holy days. Now, because of this, there are no fees for digging, no fees for corpse-moving and no fees for ale stoups.’

‘I had no choice.’ Parson Smollat stepped forward. ‘The eerie happenings here, God save us.’ He breathed out noisily. ‘Sir William wants that, don’t you, Sir William?’

‘I certainly do. The cemetery will be closed until these matters are settled.’

‘This is our parish church.’ Bardolph wouldn’t give way.

‘Enough!’ Sir William declared. ‘Bardolph, this can be discussed elsewhere.’

‘God will resolve all these problems,’ Anselm offered.

‘Then I hope He does so soon.’ Bardolph grasped the torch and stomped off up the path.

They were about to follow when a loud banging echoed from the church. Anselm ordered everyone to go on. They did, following the pool of light thrown by the fluttering torch up to the narrow corpse door. The path turned and twisted between the stark, fading memorials of the dead. Briar, bramble and bush snaked out to catch the ankle or snare the cloak. The ominous banging continued. Simon explained how it might be the door leading down to the crypt, the charnel house where the gleaming white bones and skulls of the long dead were stored. Bardolph, holding the torch, began to tremble, the flame shaking and juddering. Stephen could even hear the man’s teeth chattering. Beauchamp seized the torch and dismissed Bardolph back to the house.

‘We are in the realm of the rat and rot,’ Beauchamp turned, face all smiling, ‘of corruption and decay. If you have the words, you can even summon up each soul buried here and ask them if they’re damned or not.’

‘Walk on,’ Anselm insisted. ‘The dead gather here but so do a horde of angry, hostile spirits.’

‘Or,’ Beauchamp, still trying to make light of it, lifted the torch and stood blocking the narrow path, ‘I remember the story of a man who, every time he passed a cemetery, recited the De Profundis for the departed. One night, as he did so, he was attacked by robbers but was saved by the dead who rose up, each holding the tool they’d used in their lifetime to defend him vigorously.’

‘Not here,’ Anselm whispered hoarsely. ‘This is not the place for your mockery. I am an exorcist — ghosts gather here. I can hear their faint chatter. Listen!’

‘Nothing!’ Beauchamp retorted.

‘Exactly,’ Anselm replied. ‘Can you hear anything? Where’s the snouting fox, the furtive rat, the floating, ghost-winged owl?’

Beauchamp stared around, lowering the torch. ‘True, true,’ he conceded. ‘There’s nothing but silence.’

‘And the dead.’ Stephen spoke before he could stop himself. The novice pushed his hands up the sleeve of his gown. He knew he could see and hear things others, like Beauchamp, could not. In spite of Beauchamp’s mockery, this was happening. Strange lights had appeared. Sparks of flame leaped up only to sink into the blackness, followed by chattering, whispered conversation where one word could not be distinguished from the next. Across the cemetery shapes and shadows moved, darting shifts between the headstones. A hideous scream rang out.

Beauchamp cursed, fumbling with the torch. ‘Now I hear,’ he declared. ‘Let us. .’

Anselm didn’t wait but, clutching his leather satchel in one hand, the other on Stephen’s shoulder, stepped round the royal clerk and marched swiftly through the darkness. Simon hurried behind, jangling his keys. They reached the narrow door with its rusty iron studs. Simon unlocked and pushed back the creaking door. Anselm, Beauchamp and Stephen entered. The royal clerk lit one of the sconce torches just inside. Immediately a cold wind swept by them; the torch flickered and died. Higden and the rest hastily retreated.

‘You should also go,’ Anselm warned Beauchamp. The clerk just shrugged. Anselm walked into the church and pulled across a bench into the centre of the nave. He sat down with Stephen on his right. Once again the exorcist began the ritual. ‘Oh, God, come to our aid. .’

Stephen and Beauchamp murmured the responses. The novice began to tremble. Anselm grasped his hand and squeezed it. Beauchamp was at a loss, aware of the cold, the rank stench, though he could not see the faces which swarmed out of the gloom, white and drawn, eyes black holes of fire, hair like trailing wisps of mist.

‘You see them, Stephen?’

‘Aye, Magister.’

‘What?’ Beauchamp whispered.

Anselm ignored him as he concentrated on the gathering malevolence. The dire memories those terrors of the night summoned up swept in to distract his mind and chill his soul. Anselm was back as a soldier in that French city the English had stormed, its streets full of wild animals feeding on human flesh. Drunken ribauds, armed to the teeth, looting and raping as they moved like a horde of demons through the fallen town. Old women dragging out corpses from houses filled with fire and smoke. Packs of rats, bellies full, snouts stained with a bloody froth. Corpses stacked like firewood in the middle of squares. The black smoke of funeral pyres winding everywhere. The screams and yells of souls in their last extremity. The gallows breaking under the weight of cadavers while corpses crammed the wells and polluted the streams. Anselm forgot the rite and began to mouth the memories which plagued him.

‘Magister!’

Anselm heeded the cry. He began to recite the Credo as he stared at the haunting, nightmare faces massing close. Beside him, Stephen could take no more. He fell to his knees, head bowed, hands clenched in prayer. Beauchamp, cloak tight about him, drew his sword and half-raised it. Anselm pressed on the clerk’s arm until he lowered the blade.

‘By the grace of God,’ he whispered at the wraiths which surged all around him. ‘By the grace of God, in the name of that same God, by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, who are you? Why are you here? Why do you haunt this place? In the Lord’s name, tell me, here in the House of God and at the very gate of heaven.’ Anselm closed his eyes and prayed. Neither he nor Stephen knew if the phantasms spoke or whether their own souls echoed the desperate pleas for forgiveness, for justice.

‘Against whom?’ Anselm begged. ‘Take comfort. I shall light tapers and sing Masses for the repose of your souls. Tell me, who are you? Why are you here?’

‘Thrust out!’ a voice hissed close to Stephen. ‘Thrust out, our souls winkled out of their shells; now we swim amongst the dark ones.’

‘Except for me!’ A man’s voice, mocking and strident, called out. ‘Taken, plucked from my rightful place but then. .’ The voice faded like the rest.

Stephen strained to hear but it was like listening to the murmured conversation of a crowd passing beneath a window. He caught some words and phrases, some in English, others in French or a patois he couldn’t understand. Stephen opened his eyes. ‘They’re going,’ he murmured. He felt the press around him ease. The cold faded. The stench seeped away, turning back to the general mustiness of that old church. Stephen sat back on the bench. Beauchamp began to softly whistle the tune of a song.

‘What happened. .?’ A clatter and clash stilled the clerk’s question. Beauchamp jumped to his feet as around the church kneeling rods, stools, benches and other furniture were violently overturned.

‘They are leaving,’ Anselm explained. ‘They vent their temper at not being believed or not being helped. They are withdrawing for a while but I think they’ll return.’

‘But why are they here?’ Beauchamp insisted.

‘In a little while. .’ Anselm sighed. ‘Sir Miles, that will have to wait. For the time being, we are finished here. .’

Sir William Higden gathered all his guests into his dining parlour, a fine pink-washed room with a gleaming oaken table. A mantled hearth, the carved face of a dragon in its centre, warmed the chamber, while on the walls either side of it hung tapestries celebrating David’s victory over Goliath. Green, supple rushes, tossed with herbs and sharp garden spices, covered the floor and sweetened the air as they were crushed underfoot. A partition to the petty kitchen had been removed. A cook, assisted by two sleepy-eyed servitors, prepared bowls of diced chicken smothered in mushrooms, cream and garlic sauce. Sir William had broached his finest cask of wine sent from Bordeaux four years earlier. Goblets were filled, except for Anselm’s — he never drank. The exorcist had once confided to Stephen that if he started to drink the delicious juice of the grape he’d never stop.

When the food had been served and blessed, the kitchen shutters replaced, the fire built up and the doors closed over, Beauchamp raised his goblet in toast towards Anselm, who replied by lifting his beaker of water.

‘Well,’ the royal clerk dabbed his lips with a napkin, ‘Brother Anselm, I have business with you. However,’ he shrugged, ‘that can wait. Why did you go back to the church?’

‘I had to,’ Anselm retorted. ‘An important principle. An exorcist never lets himself be driven out, though God only knows the truth behind all this.’

‘I began it,’ Parson Smollat put his horn spoon down, ‘or rather, I noticed it first, both me and my good friend, Simon.’

The sexton nodded in agreement.

‘Tell them all,’ Sir William urged, ‘from the beginning.’

‘I was provided with the benefice here,’ Parson Smollat began, ‘two years ago by the grace and favour of Sir William, who has the right of advowson to Saint Michael’s, Candlewick.’

‘As well as other parish officials,’ Simon, his spotty face flushed with claret, quickly added.

‘Saint Michael’s is an ancient church,’ the parson continued, ‘built during the time of William the Norman. You can see that from its nave — the thick, clumsy pillars have none of the beauty of Westminster or La Chapelle. The great tower is built on the side and has been strengthened and extended by successive generations. To the north-east of the church lie the sacristy and store rooms, and there is a cellar and a crypt which serve as our charnel house. The cemetery itself is sprawling, the soil very coarse, difficult to cultivate. The dead have been buried there for at least three hundred years. During the day, despite my protestations, the people used to flock there to trade. Well,’ Smollat’s fat face creased in embarrassment, ‘it depends on what they were trading. Prostitutes, tinkers and hawkers. During summertime the cemetery is the trysting place of lovers of either sex or both. At night, well, sorcerers, wizards, warlocks and practitioners of the dark arts creep in to sacrifice black cockerels and offer their blood to the full moon.’ The parson’s voice grew weary. ‘I did my best. The parish is, or was, a busy, thriving community — baptisms, shrivings, weddings, funerals, ale-tastings. We observe the liturgical feasts, especially Michaelmas, the solemnity of the great Archangel. We have a fine statue to him.’ The parson paused as the door opened. A woman came in, round as a dumpling with cherry-red cheeks, a smiling mouth and eyes bright as a sparrow. She was garbed in a blue dress with a silver cord around her plump waist. A thick white veil covered her black hair, streaked with slivers of silver, and over her arm she carried a heavy cloak.

‘My housekeeper, Isolda,’ Parson Smollat explained. The woman bobbed a curtsey to the assembled guests. ‘She came with me tonight,’ the parson continued. ‘Isolda, what do you want?’

‘Shall I stay, Parson Smollat, or do you want me to go?’

‘It’s best if you left.’

‘Ask one of my men to act as Lucifer,’ Sir William joked, ‘light-bearer.’ He answered the woman’s puzzled look. ‘One of them will see you safely across to the priest’s house.’

Isolda again bobbed a curtsey. Stephen noticed the smiling glance she threw Parson Smollat as she made her farewells to the rest of the guests.

‘God be with you,’ Anselm called out.

‘And you too, Brother.’ Isolda gazed hard at the exorcist then left.

‘Very good, very good,’ Beauchamp softly declared once the door closed behind Isolda, ‘but why are we really here?’

Stephen glanced at the parson. A good man, he thought, but weak and reluctant to grasp the tangled root of the evil festering here. Despite the warmth, the wine, the sturdy furniture and brightly painted wall cloths, the evil, the bleak despair, the heinous malice Stephen had experienced in that church had followed them here. It lurked watching in the shadows, away from the light. Some malevolent ghost or hell-born creature was dragging itself through the murk across that great barrier between the visible and invisible. The exorcist was also alert; he fingered his Ave beads, the other hand touching the small wooden tau cross on a cord around his neck. Stephen recalled one of Anselm’s sayings: ‘Thistles of the souls bring forth sin and despair. Satan and his demons can only feast on what we offer them’. What was at stake here? Stephen broke from his reverie as Parson Smollat pointed to the red cross with trefoiled ends painted on a shield which hung on the wall above the mantled hearth. Next to it a second shield displayed the Agnus Dei, a white lamb with a nimbus of gold showing three red rays. The lamb held a scarlet cross against a field of deep azure and a banner which had a silver staff with a gilt crown on top.

‘For all our weaknesses and stupid sins,’ Parson Smollat confessed, ‘I thought we were a godly community shielded against evil, protected by the Lord and his great henchman, Archangel Michael.’ Parson Smollat took a deep breath. ‘All that changed last year around the Feast of All Souls. You know,’ he swallowed hard, ‘that the eve of All Saints, thirty-first of October, Saint Walpurgis, is one of the most solemn black feasts of the sorcerers and other practitioners of the dark arts. I was absent that evening, when our cemetery was invaded by a warlock well-served by the knights of hell, the one who calls himself “The Midnight Man”.’

‘I’ve heard of him,’ Anselm broke in. ‘One day I would like to meet him.’

‘One day you shall!’ Beauchamp retorted. ‘You can shrive him just before he’s burnt as a warlock at Smithfield.’

Anselm turned in his chair and stared at the subtle clerk. ‘God,’ he whispered, ‘has ordained all our ends. Pray God we are not consumed by his fire in the second death.’

Beauchamp’s smile faded. He looked sharply at Anselm, then indicated that Parson Smollat should continue.

‘As I said,’ Anselm would not be outfaced, ‘I would like to meet the Midnight Man — he claims to be constantly attended by a spirit dressed in a flesh-coloured tunic under a dark robe. I wonder,’ he mused, ‘why warlocks and sorcerers place such great emphasis on petty demons like that?’

‘I do not know any of this, nor does anyone here.’ Parson Smollat sniffed. ‘Nor do I know what went wrong, what horrid sights and hideous manifestations made their presence felt. Murderous chants, snatches and war cries were heard amongst the howling of a pack of wild dogs which invaded the cemetery and drove off a herd of pigs, snouting around the dead. Apparitions were glimpsed, ghouls and night-stalkers. Menacing shadows with strange lights were also seen.’ Parson Smollat crossed himself. ‘All I know is that sooty souls, their evil minds fastened in wicked sins, came into our cemetery and sang their own devilish vespers. They opened the very doors of hell. According to rumour and, it is only rumour, the Midnight Man and all his devilish crew were so terrified at what they’d provoked, they fled.’ The parson mopped his fleshy face with a napkin. ‘I should have been content with that. The rogues and villains fled but, no sooner had the Feast of All Souls come and gone, than the hauntings began.’

‘At first they were minor matters.’ The sexton took up the story while the parson wetted his throat. ‘Tombstones were tumbled. Crosses were knocked over, then those who crept into the cemetery after dark, the night-lovers, stopped coming, eager to avoid the place.’

‘Why?’ Beauchamp asked.

‘They talked of prowlers, sinister shapes and threatening shades snaking around the tombs. Cries and strident screams were heard. Strange lights and tongues of flames licking the darkness.’

‘The same also appeared in the church,’ Parson Smollat intervened.

‘Frightful.’ Curate Almaric spoke up, clawing at his hair. ‘I heard similar tales when I was a boy at my father’s manor. .’

‘Well, yes,’ Parson Smollat glared at his curate, ‘but we’re talking about our church where tables and benches were overthrown. Triptychs pulled down from the walls. Cruets and thuribles smashed in the sacristy. A tun of wine was shattered.’ Parson Smollat paused to gulp more claret.

‘Even at Mass,’ Sir William Higden declared mournfully, ‘I was there. Candle spigots dashed to the ground. The pyx chain sent swinging. Foul smells, horrid sounds.’

‘All the same, I thought ghosts and demons could not haunt a hallowed place?’ Beauchamp asked.

‘Not true.’ Anselm tapped the table. ‘Christ was taunted by demons. Read the scriptures: devils thronged around him, even if it was to beg for mercy. Evil can open up the gates of hell. Demons swarm up, drawn by feelings of hate, resentment, malevolence, wickedness and malicious evil. Like soldiers laying siege they seek paths into our souls, drawbridges across the great void which separates us from them.’

‘Like an enemy horde attacking a castle?’ Beauchamp asked.

‘Precisely. The demon lords, the restless spirits, pound on our doors and clatter like the wind against the shutters of our souls. Some castles can be taken by direct assault, others by siege or attack from afar with catapults, mangonels and the siege towers of hell. Sometimes the attack is very violent; the soul can be devastated by fire and sword as deadly as any kingdom being put to the torch. For most of us, thank God,’ Anselm crossed himself, ‘it’s just a quiet, desperate struggle.’ He paused. ‘No one is safe; holy men and women suffer the most vicious assaults. Look at Saint Anthony of the Desert, Benedict or the great Francis of Assisi.’

‘But why here? Why now?’ Almaric protested.

‘I don’t know. I am trying to discover why. Isn’t that the reason you asked for me?’

‘True, true.’ Parson Smollat’s fingers went to his mouth. He acted like a frightened child, staring down at Anselm. ‘I thought that tonight. .’

‘What did happen?’ Beauchamp had dropped his world-weary airs: he was harsh, accusatory. ‘Did you fail, exorcist?’

Stephen glanced expectantly at Anselm. He, too, was deeply curious about what he had seen and heard. Why had old memories come floating back? Why had his master, the man he reverenced as the magister, appeared so lost? The rest of the company were also attentive, waiting for the exorcist’s reply.

‘I did not fail,’ Anselm declared, ‘but neither did I succeed. However, I am not a cozener, a cheat. I do not draw pentangles and circles. True, I would like to meet the Midnight Man and discover his tricks but,’ Anselm drew himself up, his voice forceful and carrying as it was when he delivered a homily to a crowd in Cheapside, or harangued a group of fops in their brocaded fineries, their palfreys, saddled and harnessed, glittering with gold and silver, ‘what I do is not some sleight of hand. Let me assure you: we are not only dealing with ghosts and relics of the past, but something very evil.’ Anselm breathed in deeply. ‘Let me explain — what is a ghost? We have the Lord’s own words that ghosts do exist. When he walked on the water his disciples thought he was a ghost. After his resurrection Christ had to assure them that he could eat and drink and was no phantasm.’ Anselm paused, listening to the gathering sounds of the night. ‘No one,’ he continued softly, ‘knows what truly happens to a soul after death.’ He joined his hands together. ‘Perhaps it’s like a child being born. There is confusion, chaos. Perhaps the immediate aftermath of death can be like someone caught at a lonely crossroads not knowing why they are there, where they are going or even who they are. Awareness in the soul after death dawns, I am sure, slowly, according to the way we have lived. Most souls take their chosen path; some, God alone knows why, do not — they linger. They believe they have unfinished business so delay by possessing a house, a church — even another soul. They press for their business to be completed.’ He paused. Anslem now had their full attention. ‘I believe that is what’s happening here but,’ he held up a warning hand and his voice thrilled, ‘even more, these spirits are in the grip of some malignancy which has fastened tight about them. It blocks their path — why? I do not know. I suspect the practices of the Midnight Man did not help. He invoked something which now prowls your cemetery and church like a ravenous wolf.’

‘Why don’t these souls tell you?’ Beauchamp asked.

‘They cannot,’ Anselm retorted. ‘Only God’s grace conveys knowledge of what is truly beyond the veil. Think of us as looking through the bars of a prison door. We can see the captives within. We can watch their torment. They may even know we watch. We sympathize with them but they cannot truly explain why they are there, who they are or what they are doing. We are witnessing souls twisting in pain and torment. The noises, the lights, the horrid stench, the rank odours are simply manifestations.’

Anselm stared hard at a painted cloth on the far wall celebrating the legend of the Lady of the Lake. He sat as if fascinated by the snow-white hand breaking free from the dark green water bathed in a setting sun to grasp the great jewel-encrusted sword Excalibur.

‘And?’ Beauchamp asked gently.

‘Something else is also there — retainers of the apostate angel, hell’s dark robber.’

‘What are you saying?’ Sir William insisted.

‘The Midnight Man, in his foolish blundering, drew in the rankest lords of the air. However,’ Anselm’s voice grew sharper, ‘some great evil,’ he pointed in the direction of the church, ‘has definitely occurred there. No,’ he hushed their protests, ‘let me assure you of that. I have great experience, God forgive me, of hauntings, ghosts and exorcisms. I tell you all, such spiritual manifestations have their suppurating roots firmly in human wickedness. Let me explain. Once,’ Anselm paused, his head down. ‘Once,’ he repeated, ‘I was summoned to an old manor house. I shall not give you the name but it stood in the Romney marshes, a forbidding, gloomy place built of stone, wood and plaster. It was much decayed, a desolate habitation abandoned after the great pestilence. The nearby village was also an abode of ghosts.’ Anselm shrugged. ‘No life, no work. Once a thriving community, the angel of devastation had swept through as it had so many places. A sheer nothingness brooded over it. No crops, cattle or sheep. The trackways around it lay abandoned as traders and tinkers saw little profit in going there. Now, the King, freshly returned from France, wished to reward one of his young knights. He granted him that manor and all the land attached to it. This young paladin received his chancery writ to take up possession.’ Anselm waved a hand. ‘He also married a young noblewoman. Both knight and lady moved into their new home.’

‘Romney?’ Beauchamp abruptly asked. ‘Why, Sir Thomas de-’

‘Please,’ Anselm interjected, ‘I beg you — such matters are best kept secret. I promised.’

Beauchamp pulled a face, shrugged then sat back cradling his goblet, watching Anselm intently.

‘The knight and his beloved bride occupied this manor on Romney marsh. Retainers and servants were hired, ditches dug, fields cleared, the house and outbuildings were repaired.’ Anselm sipped at his beaker of water. ‘Few of the retainers stayed. The house was declared accursed. Like you, Sir William, the knight appealed for help. .’

‘Not really,’ Beauchamp interrupted.

‘Sir William, you do want our help, yes?’

The merchant knight murmured his agreement.

‘But there was more,’ the royal clerk insisted. ‘The King’s Justices of Oyer and Terminer have just completed their circuit through the London wards. They received many petitions that the hauntings at Saint Michael’s be investigated. Similar pleas were sent to the Archbishop of Canterbury and the King’s council.’

‘I encouraged these,’ Higden declared. ‘Didn’t I, Smollat?’ He turned to the parson, who nodded vigorously even as he stifled a yawn.

‘The same,’ Anselm continued, ‘occurred with this hapless knight. I was asked to visit the manor and exorcize whatever lurked there.’ He stretched out and grabbed Stephen by the arm. ‘This was before my young friend here joined me.’

Stephen smiled at the word ‘friend’.

‘When I arrived at Romney,’ Anselm continued, ‘the manor house was gloomy, a place bereft of joy. I walked its chambers, store rooms and galleries, its cellars and outhouses. The very walls exuded a deep sadness, a horrid despair. Ghosts truly gathered there. It was one of those arid places where demons loved to lurk, well away from the light. I celebrated Mass in its small chapel and felt a malevolent presence just beyond the door, a rank horde of venomous spirits mouthing their own foul curses as they controlled who or whatever was also there. I searched that manor, and the more I did the deeper the darkness grew. A heavy pall of misery stifled my own spirit — never more so than in a narrow chamber, a dusty room with peeling plaster and dirty boards. Cobwebs cloaked every corner and niche; its lancet window was divided by a thick, rusting iron bar. I grasped this and stared out into the weed-filled kitchen yard. As I did I heard a voice.’ Anselm shook his head. ‘Let me explain. When I say I hear a voice, or see anything supernal, as God is my witness, I am never certain if it’s within or without me.’

‘And this voice?’ Almaric asked.

‘A woman’s voice.’

‘And she said?’

‘“Help me, for the love of God, help me! Let me be free. Let me move into the light. Break the chains which bind me to him.” I asked her who she was and what she meant.’

‘And?’ Almaric asked.

‘The door behind me opened and shut with a crash. I heard a scream, something brushed my face — the ice-cold fingers of some ghostly hand — then it was gone. I stayed and searched that manor. The more I did, the more I returned to that morbid chamber at the back of the house and the long, gloomy paved passageway leading down to the kitchen and buttery.’

‘Did you attempt an exorcism, as you did here?’ Sir William asked.

‘I attempted, and I failed. I could hear a woman’s voice but some hell-lurker, a darkness-dweller, always intervened. I blessed and sanctified. I also prayed that the Lord would send me an angel of light.’ Anselm gave a rare smile. ‘Angels come in many forms and guises. Near the manor stood a hermitage, an ancient, small dovecote hidden in a dense clump of trees. The land around it was so marshy and treacherous, the hermitage could only be approached carefully. I tried to speak to the old man who lived there, locked in his fasting and prayers. I failed but one morning he came to see me, a true ancient with his white hair and beard. He asked to be shriven. I cannot reveal what he told me except that afterwards he agreed to help me lift the paving stones of the passageway stretching from the kitchen to that godforsaken prison chamber.’

‘Why?’ Beauchamp asked.

‘Let me explain without breaking the seal of confession,’ Anselm retorted. He glanced quickly at Stephen. ‘I certainly could have used your help there. I, the manor lord, his henchman and even his lady helped. The henchman had to retreat, as did the knight’s wife.’

‘Why? Why?’ Almaric sat like a rabbit petrified by a stoat.

‘Evil swept that gallery like the winds of hell. Full of hideous terrors, rank smells, fearful faces, curses and obscenities. Sometimes it turned hot as if a blast of wind blew from the seething deserts of Outremer, only to turn so cold we could scarcely grasp the picks and poles we used.’ Anselm lifted the Ave beads wrapped around his left hand. ‘I prayed and sprinkled holy water. I insisted that the candles in front of the cross on the table set up in the passageway stay alight. At last we found it — a pit beneath the paving stones containing the skeleton of a woman. We could tell that from the remnants of her robe and sandals. She lay in an oiled sheet drenched in pine juice with no cross, pyx holder or Ave beads; instead, between her legs, laid the severed head of a man.’ Anselm stilled their gasps and exclamations. ‘The head and face had been preserved though these were shrunken and ghastly. Severed cleanly at the neck, the head had been soaked in brine and tarred like those of traitors polled on London Bridge. I blessed these gruesome remnants. I thanked the hermit. I could now question him outside the seal of the sacrament, and he confessed the most macabre tale. Years earlier, before the great pestilence, the manor lord who lived there married a local woman of outstanding beauty. He loved her to obsession but, during the King’s early wars against the Scots, this knight was called away by the commissioners of array. He obeyed the writ, fought valiantly along the Scottish march then returned to his manor. .’

‘To find she had been unfaithful?’ Beauchamp asked swiftly.

‘Yes, she had fallen in love with the steward of the manor, a man she’d known since childhood. Other servants betrayed her secret trysts. Her husband caught her. He had the steward decapitated, his severed head pickled and preserved.’

‘And his wife?’

‘She was condemned to a living hell. She was confined to that ghastly cell, walled up like a recluse. Every night her husband and chosen servants entered her cell and prepared the table for supper. Three chairs: one for him, one for her and a third for her dead lover. Every evening the food would be served, brought from the kitchen, along with the severed head which would be placed opposite her. The manor lord insisted that she eat and drink with him. Never once would he utter a word to her or answer any of her pleas, except to point to the ghastly remnants of her former lover.’

‘Surely,’ Stephen asked, horrified by the story, ‘the other servants would object?’

‘No.’ Anselm tapped the table. ‘The knight was both feared and loved, well-respected by the King; and his wife had been found playing the two-backed beast while he had been honouring his oath to the Crown. She had betrayed him and been caught red-handed. God forgive them but no mercy or compassion was shown to her.’ Anselm drank from his beaker. ‘By then the vengeance was making itself felt throughout the kingdom. The great pestilence had emerged in Dorset. All the terrors of the underworld emerged. The village and manor on Romney Marsh was devastated by the Angel of Death. Entire families fled. Apparently, according to the hermit, only the manor lord, his wretched wife and a few servants remained. Nevertheless, the torture continued until one day she managed to get a length of rope. She hanged herself and her husband buried her in that passageway; the final insult was her dead lover’s severed head being placed between her legs. The husband was later swept away by the plague. The manor house and village were deserted.’

‘Except for the ghosts?’

‘Aye, Sir William, evil ghosts, supported by their kind as well as those two unfortunates who had loved unwisely.’

‘And what did you do?’ the sexton asked.

Anselm sat listening to the cries of some night bird in the gardens beyond, a lonely sound answered by the creaking of this stately, three-storey mansion.

‘I arranged a Christian burial for the remains in consecrated ground. The new lord of the manor and his lady vowed to go on pilgrimage to Our Lady of Walsingham as well as Saint Swithun’s Well. I offered Mass in reparation as well as a requiem for the dead. I blessed that house, hallowed the chamber and,’ Anselm lifted his hands, ‘as God be my witness, peace returned.’

‘And you think the same has happened here?’ Sir William demanded.

‘Yes, I do. The secret rites of the Midnight Man disturbed something, opened the door to spiritual forces, venomous and vindictive, but they must have a nestling place here. Something wicked and hideously evil has been committed in and around that church.’

Parson Smollat gulped his wine and stared askance at Sir William.

‘I was granted the advowson of this church three years ago after my wife died,’ Sir William declared. ‘I could not abide to continue to live in my house in Cheapside where my wife had lingered with a wasting disease. I moved here. A year later I was pleased to appoint Parson Thomas Smollat as the parson but,’ his voice faltered, ‘well, that’s all I know.’ He almost gasped before continuing: ‘I cannot tell you what the cause of all this is.’

‘I have studied the recent history of the church,’ Parson Smollat offered. ‘Certainly there have been murders in the cemetery, drunkards with flashing knives, while during the great plague a huge burial pit was dug in the cemetery. .’

‘It cannot be any of these,’ Anselm observed.

‘But what you’re claiming,’ Beauchamp declared, ‘is that all the hauntings and ghostly manifestations at Saint Michael’s are rooted in human activity? Some bubbling iniquity, some unresolved sin?’

‘Yes,’ Anselm got to his feet, ‘that is what I am claiming. A mortal sin, an act which has killed God’s life in souls. I did not succeed tonight because I could not find the root.’ He beckoned at Stephen. ‘Now, Sir William, I believe we have lodgings here?’

‘Magister,’ Beauchamp also got to his feet, ‘as I said, I have other business with you. Messages from the council but,’ he smiled, ‘you have worked long and hard. I shall have words with you tomorrow, if not here then at White Friars.’

Anselm shrugged, picked up his pannier and moved to the door.

‘Tell me,’ Sir William called out, ‘did you learn anything tonight during your exorcism?’

‘No,’ Anselm retorted. ‘Young women, perhaps, who died in great distress except for one voice, a man’s, strong, rather mocking, loudly complaining at being dragged away though what that means I cannot say. Now, Sir William, if you could show us to our chambers. .’