Michael Jecks - The Templar, the Queen and Her Lover

Baldwin merely looked at him for a minute.

‘Very well. But you are still here under diplomatic protection. No one can arrest you here.’

‘Even if that were true, it would still damage the whole embassy were the negotiators on the other side to hear that I had the reputation of being a renegade Templar.’ Baldwin spat. ‘No. I must leave, I think. And immediately. There is nothingI can do here.’

‘But how can you do that?’

‘Well, I shall have to see Lord Cromwell and tell him …’

‘Yes. Tell him what? You cannot tell him the truth, can you, Baldwin? If he were to hear that you were once a Templar, hewould be duty bound to see you arrested too.’

Baldwin swore under his breath. There was nothing he could do that was safe.

‘Even if you make it back to England, what then?’ Simon said. ‘Won’t you still be in the same danger there?’

‘It is possible,’ Baldwin allowed. ‘But what else can I do?’

‘Stay here, remain with the Queen, and perhaps she can protect you.’

‘I don’t think she can …’

And that was the rub. If the King of France decided that there was money or some other advantage to be gained by destroyingBaldwin, he would do so instantly. He was ruthless, the last of the Capetian line. It was his father who had utterly brokenthe Templars, and Charles would be content to see another Templar burned at the stake. No matter how much Isabella tried toprotect Baldwin, in the end, even if she desired to, she must succumb to her brother’s authority. Not least because her embassyabout Guyenne was so important.

‘I am sure Queen Isabella would protect you,’ Simon was saying earnestly.

It made Baldwin smile to himself. The idea that anyone could protect a Templar against King Charles IV was so innocent, soentirely wrong , that it was enough to make a man laugh aloud.

Still, even laughter was a form of defence. If he showed no fear or concern, it would make any such allegations less believable. Were he to ride suddenly for the coast, it would surely make him an easy target. A fleeing man in a strange countrymust be suspicious, and the suspicious would all too often be arrested. Better perhaps to brazen it out, if there were anyaccusations. So long as he was not forced to lie. To deny his Order would be hard, but to agree that the Templars were evil,that they committed terrible crimes, would be all but impossible.

‘What is it?’

‘Very well,’ Baldwin said. ‘I shall remain. We shall do all we can to seek the killer of Paul. Not that there is much we canhope to achieve. We know no one here.’

And it was that thought which occupied his mind as they meandered about the streets of Paris. There was little point in stoppingmen to question them. There was nobody who had a motive, so far as Baldwin knew, other than the man he had already spokento. And Mortimer had been convincing. Much though he disliked admitting it even to himself, he found himself instinctivelytrusting Mortimer. He had seemed rather too much like Baldwin himself a few years ago. Baldwin knew what it was to lose everything;to have position, wealth, even friends and comrades, ripped from him. Mortimer had suffered the same. He even had a deathsentence hanging over him, just as Baldwin did.

Yes. Wandering aimlessly around the greatest city in Christendom, Baldwin came to be convinced that Mortimer was more likelythan not to be speaking the truth.

It was as he decided to trust the man that Baldwin caught sight of a familiar figure.

Simon saw his eyes narrow. ‘What is it?’

Baldwin was frowning ahead. ‘That man, there. See him?’

‘The executioner from the King’s gibbet, isn’t he?’

‘Not him, no. The slender fellow in the tatty clothes behind him. I think he’s the man I saw on the day that the old man was killed and Robert de Chatillon injured. It looks like him.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘I saw him momentarily — I can’t be certain, no, but it definitely looks like him.’

‘Then let us catch him, Baldwin,’ Simon said.

They moved off after the fellow. Observing him with great care, Baldwin felt convinced that the man was moving with a setpurpose, and it was no time before he came to the conclusion that the fellow was himself trailing the executioner.

At this time of the morning, the streets were filled with the noise of the population. It was not a market day, but the shopswere doing a brisk trade in bread, cakes, pies and other foodstuffs, and the raucous shouting of wares was deafening.

It was not only their ears which were assaulted, though. The people of Paris enjoyed wearing bright colours, and in the sunlightafter the last few days of rain Simon felt as though his eyes were being burned out by the garish clothing worn all abouthim. And the odours! Poorly tanned leather, sweat-soaked wool, old, slightly rancid linen that had been bleached in fermentedurine once too often without being washed properly, and over all the smell of excrement, that pervasive tang that spoke ofany city anywhere.

A sumpter horse clopped past, and Simon lost sight of their man for a moment, but then he caught sight of the executioner,and a matter of only two or three paces behind was the man Baldwin had last seen at Poissy. ‘Come on, Baldwin!’ Simon exclaimed,and darted off again.

The executioner turned left now, and the two saw the stalker’s elbow rise beneath his cloak, and then seem to move as thoughconcealing something.

‘He’s drawn a dagger, Simon,’ Baldwin breathed, and then he bellowed: ‘EXECUTIONER, ’WARE THAT MAN! SHEATHE YOUR KNIFE, CHURL!’

The executioner turned in surprise, and saw Baldwin, but then he noticed the man who was just a little too close behind him, andsaw the blade. He threw himself sideways as the knife slipped by where his belly would have been, and bounced off the wall.In a moment, he had his own knife out, but already the attacker had retreated into the Paris mob. Amidst the screams of womenwho thought they had witnessed a murder, he bolted up the street.

Simon and Baldwin took off after him, pelting up the cobbles, but in a short time it was obvious that they would not catchhim. The throng was too tightly packed in the narrow thoroughfare, and whereas one man could slip from one side to the other,and gradually make headway, two men together could not. Baldwin and Simon tried their hardest, but in a short time had toaccept defeat.

‘Master, I am indebted to you,’ Arnaud said, bending low and introducing himself. ‘You saved my life.’

‘And you can return the favour by telling me about that man there. Why did he want to kill you?’

Arnaud looked at them over the rim of his cup, sipping slowly.

To Simon’s mind, he had the look of a cunning toad. His wide-set eyes were quick and shrewd, and the bailiff instinctivelydisliked his appearance. A lot of the brutality of his way of life had been scored into his flesh, from the look of his cold,unfeeling expression. There was little enough there to commend him, certainly. And the thought of the number of men he hadkilled or maimed in his life made him repellent. Simon had the feeling that were he to touch the man, a little of the miseryand anguish he had caused over the years would pass on to him.

Baldwin was clearly much less bothered by him. ‘So you are called Arnaud? And you are a public executioner?’

‘Yes. I punish those the King tells me to. I’ve been working for the King for many years.’

‘But that man? Who was he?’

The executioner snorted and sat back in his seat, shaking his head slowly. ‘He is a devil. The devil, perhaps. He was a guard at a royal castle with me-’

‘Château Gaillard,’ Simon said flatly.

‘Yes,’ Arnaud agreed, his cold eyes going to the bailiff with a measuring assessment. He appeared not to like what he saw,and transferred his gaze to Baldwin. ‘I was there too. His name is Jean. Often called Jean de Pamiers. He was a guard at thecastle while I was there as the King’s gaoler.’