Bernard Knight - The Manor of Death

'Does he want to confess to being a pirate, too?' demanded John.

'It may well be a confession, but not of the sort you mean, Crowner,' replied the clerk. 'He says he wishes to speak to you and the sheriff, but wants to do so in the sanctity of his own church.'

De Wolfe frowned at this play-acting. 'Can't he just come out with it here?'

Thomas shook his head. 'I think you should indulge him, sir. It might be important.'

The coroner stepped across to where the sheriff was talking to Ralph Morin and Gwyn and told him what his clerk had said. De Furnellis shrugged and agreed to humour the two priests, as there seemed nothing to lose by it.

The constable said that he would go with Gwyn and see if there was any sign of the missing carters. As the tavern was directly opposite the church, they all walked down the village street, leaving the indignant prisoners held in the bailiff's house guarded by half a dozen soldiers.

John, Henry and the two priests turned into the churchyard alongside a double-stone stile, which was used for resting coffins upon before burial. The church of St Michael was a fairly new structure, built about fifty years earlier. It was a substantial building with a nave and chancel, having a squat tower and a striking arched doorway carved in zigzag patterns. The subdued parish priest led the way into the cool nave, which was set with columns on either side. Here, Henry of Cumba spoke for the first time.

'We should all pray to the Almighty for mercy and forgiveness — especially me!' To suit his words, he dropped prone on the floor at the entrance to the chancel, arms spread out as in a crucifixion, and began muttering in Latin into the flagstoned step.

Thomas also fell to his knees and with hands clasped towards the altar began declaiming aloud in Latin. The two law officers bobbed their heads, dropped to one knee and crossed themselves as a token to their faith and waited for the two black-robed figures to climb to their feet.

As with all churches; there were no seats on the packed-earth floor of the nave, but the parish priest led them to the stone ledge that ran around the church, used by the aged and infirm who 'went to the wall' when necessary. They sat in a row and waited to hear what Henry of Cumba had to say.

'I have prayed to God for guidance and His consent — or at least to avoid His wrath,' began the priest.

He fell silent, and Thomas had to prompt him. 'Tell us about Seaton, Henry.'

'When I heard that my fellow priest across the river had felt obliged to tell something of what that poor lad Simon had confessed, I went to see this brother in God. We spoke long and earnestly about the sanctity of the confessional, when the substance concerns the very lives of our flock.'

'Have you learnt something here about the crimes that have been perpetrated?' grated the sheriff, somewhat insensitively given the obvious temerity and reluctance of his namesake to speak, but Henry appeared not to hear de Furnellis's words.

'We tried to separate that which is given in formal confessional for the seeking of absolution for sins and purification of the soul — from what might be said to a parish priest as a personal friend and counsellor. We came to the conclusion that it was difficult and sometimes impossible.'

Thomas took it upon himself to try to interpret this philosophical dilemma. 'You are unsure what you may tell others of what you learn from your parishioners, is that it?'

Henry nodded. 'We also decided that the division between the two was not a fixed point but moved according to the seriousness of the matter concerned. A confession about lewd thoughts or pilfering apples was not in the same class as murder or putting lives at risk.'

De Wolfe was becoming impatient with this priestly long-windedness. 'So what is it that you feel able to tell us, Father Henry — if anything?'

The sheriff chipped in again. 'Remember, many lives have been lost, and if it were not for our subterfuge this week another full ship's crew would have been slaughtered!'

The parish priest looked doleful and chastened. 'I realise that — I have heard today that that evil shipmaster is now known to have strangled the unfortunate lad whose body I found. It was that and the knowledge that the same man intended the deaths of those shipmen this week that has decided me to speak.'

Thank God for that, thought John, and he meant it literally. 'Tell us what you know! It may save more lives. Do you know who killed the Keeper of the Peace and the pedlar?'

Henry looked at his fellow priest, Thomas de Peyne, and the little man nodded reassuringly for him to continue.

'This was not heard in this church as a confession, so I feel free to repeat it, even though I suppose it was meant as a confidential whisper. One of the villagers, admittedly a little free with his tongue from drink, told me that he had heard someone boasting in the tavern across there that they had 'seen off' a drunken pedlar who was poking his nose into business that did not concern him.'

The sheriff roused himself and leant across, his bloodhound features only inches from the priest's. 'Ha! And who was that someone?'

The other Henry hesitated, then took the plunge. 'It was one of the carters who take goods inland somewhere. That's their wagon in the barn.'

The sheriff and coroner exchanged a look of triumph. Though the chain of confession was tortuous, they were getting somewhere at last.

'And what else do you know, father?' asked John encouragingly. 'Tell us anything that you feel is not sacred to your confessional. It may save more lives.'

'No more confessions, but now that I have started I can tell you that with my own eyes and ears I know that the portreeve and that man from Exeter have been up to no good in respect of the goods that pass through this harbour. And I suspect that that surly wretch from the priory is mixed up with them, too.'

'What have you seen, brother?' asked Thomas, trying keep up the momentum now that the old priest's tongue had been loosened.

'Elias sometimes seems to forget that I can read as well as himself. I have been in that chamber where they scribe all their records many times — in fact, I slid back in there deliberately not long ago when no one was there.'

'You checked the records, you mean?' asked John. 'But we have done that endlessly and have no means of telling whether they are true or false.'

Henry tapped the side of his nose. Now that he had committed himself to his saga of disclosures, he almost seemed to be enjoying it. 'You had no means of checking against John Capie's tallies, did you? I went out of my way to ask Capie to explain how he did it with his sticks and his cords — just as a matter of idle curiosity, you understand? Then when I saw them on Elias's table, along with what Elias had listed in his rolls, I saw that there were numerous omissions in that day's entries.'

'Do you mean in respect of the Customs dues on the wool?' asked de Furnellis.

The priest was scathing in his dismissal of the sheriff's suggestion. 'No, not that! Everyone knows that the wool tax is fiddled all the time; John Capie and the bailiff see to that. I mean the alleged imports of wine, and cloth and fruits — sometimes even tin and marble!'

'Why didn't you tell us this before?' snapped the sheriff.

The old priest stared at the floor. 'I have to live here, my son. I am old and have not much longer to endure this world, but there is nowhere else I can go.' He faced the altar and crossed himself, Thomas following suit. 'I turned a blind eye, God forgive me, until that lad was strangled and I saw his young body in the pit I meant for my dog. Then the Keeper was slain and that drunken hawker. My conscience began to overwhelm me, and now that you king's men have descended upon us and will carry off those who would have wreaked vengeance on me if I had betrayed them I cannot hold my tongue any longer.'