Paul Doherty - The Cup of Ghosts

‘What happened to Raoul?’

Gaveston pulled a face. ‘He fled. The Inquisition were hunting him for consulting magicians. So, what do you think of Julian’s story?’

‘I don’t know,’ I confessed.

‘I asked a question, wise woman.’ Gaveston grasped my shoulders, his grip so hard I winced. Isabella protested and Gaveston released his hand.

‘Please,’ his voice turned beseeching, ‘as a woman who has studied potions and powders.’

‘Some would allege it was witchcraft,’ I replied. ‘Others that the man was healed by God’s kind courtesy and boundless mercy, as well as the intervention of the Blessed Virgin and St Anthony.’

‘Or?’

The silence in the chamber grew oppressive.

‘I’d be more prudent myself,’ I conceded. ‘There are certain potions, wild fruit, the juice of mushrooms, not to mention the oil from the skin of a toad. These can create magical fantasies, nightmarish dreams; hence the story about witches who claim to fly, or the visions of madmen, or saints,’ I added.

‘And the physical symptoms?’ Gaveston asked. ‘The blindness, the deafness?’

‘They too would follow.’ I picked up my wine goblet. ‘It’s no different from this.’ I swilled the wine around the cup. ‘Wine can create illusions and dreams. Its effects on the body are well known. What is true of the fruit of the grape is true of other plants.’

‘But what do you believe, Mathilde, magic or scientia?’

‘Scientia,’ I replied quickly. ‘All natural causes must be removed before any others can be put forward as an explanation.’

‘Good, good.’ Gaveston leaned back on the chair. ‘I thought you would say that.’

The sombre atmosphere, however, did not lift. Gaveston rose, studied the hour candle burning on its spigot in the corner and went to the door. From the conversation I gathered Sandewic had been replaced by two of Gaveston’s Irish retainers, mercenaries wearing the livery of the scarlet eagle.

‘Come in, do come in.’ Gaveston welcomed the notary Jean de Clauvelin into the chamber, inviting him over to the fifth chair. He made him sit down, filled a goblet to the brim with rich claret and pulled across a silver trancher so de Clauvelin could eat the leftovers. Isabella looked surprised. Edward sat, chin in hands. De Clauvelin attempted to bow and scrape but the king gestured to the chair, murmuring that this was not the occasion for courtesies. Gaveston sat close to the overwrought notary, picked up a piece of meat, dipped it into a bowl of sauce and thrust it into de Clauvelin’s mouth.

‘Jean, Jean!’ Gaveston declared brusquely. ‘I am so glad you are in attendance.’

‘Your grace, it was a great honour to be included in my lady’s retinue. .’

‘Of course, of course.’ Gaveston refilled de Clauvelin’s goblet. ‘I need words with you, sir, regarding the Abbey of St Jean des Vignes, or rather its abbot, who is indebted to me for certain sums. I need your advice, now. .’

I watched the tableau with a growing sense of horror. Gaveston reminded me of a powerful cat playing with a mouse. De Clauvelin was overcome by the favourite’s chatter and grace, and failed to sense the anger seething in this powerful lord. Just the way Gaveston kept tearing at the meat, filling de Clauvelin’s goblet. . Once the flagon was empty, he went across to the dresser table to refill it. De Clauvelin, flattered, gossiped about the abbey. Gaveston waited for the wine to take full effect, then rose to his feet, stepped behind de Clauvelin, and in the blink of an eye the garrotte string was looped over the notary’s head and wrapped fast around his throat. De Clauvelin dropped his goblet, half staggering to his feet, but Gaveston, face bright with angry glee, forced him back.

Isabella went to protest; Edward caught her with a restraining hand. The king sat fascinated, face slightly flushed, head to one side, watching de Clauvelin half choke. Gaveston bent down, pulling at the garrotte.

‘Jean de Clauvelin,’ he intoned with mock solemnity, ‘more rightly known as Julian Sarnene: you, sir, are an assassin, a cunning man from the town of Bearn in Gascony. You drank a potion and saw a vision. You claimed to fall into the hands of the powers of darkness, only to be cured. When the miracle was examined, my mother Agnes de Gaveston was asked by the local bishop for her advice.’ Gaveston pulled at the cord, then relaxed it. ‘She rejected your claims, mocked them and said it was nothing to do with Satan but depended on what you had eaten or drunk, whether you had taken any potion.’ Gaveston loosened the garrotte string a little more. ‘Your ploy to gain sympathy and raise money from an alleged miracle proved unsuccessful. Your whole story became suspect, your allegations against your former employer of dabbling in witchcraft not proven. You hoped to acquire his wealth, to be rewarded. Later, when my father, Arnaud de Gaveston, was away soldiering, you secretly denounced my mother as a witch to the Inquisition. There were many, envious and hateful, who were quick to believe you. You provided information about my mother’s knowledge of potions and herbs. My mother was truthful. She answered the questions, but in doing so condemned herself by rejecting stories of demons and miraculous cures and insisting that natural causes must be first examined. She was tried and burned. You were given silver and protection. You disappeared, only to resurrect as Jean de Clauvelin, lawyer and notary.’

Gaveston pressed his lips closer to Clauvelin’s ear.

‘I have hunted you, sir, high and low. Mirabila dictu — it is wonderful to say what you can discover as Earl of Cornwall, regent of England, close confidant of its king. Last year, when I was in France, I discovered your true name and hiding place.’

‘It’s not me, it’s not me!’ Clauvelin begged.

‘The Inquisition, near Carcassonne, says it is.’ Gaveston released the garrotte string completely, leaving his victim to sprawl in his chair. ‘The Inquisition are men of great detail,’ Gaveston continued. ‘You have a mole on the right of your neck.’ He seized de Clauvelin by his scrawny hair, tugging down the man’s high collar and twisting his head for us to see. ‘You also have a scar, an inch long, on the inside of your left arm.’ He took the notary’s arm, ripping back the sleeve of his jerkin, sending clasps and buttons scattering across the table, and turned the arm so we could glimpse the raised welt. Finally, one hand on de Clauvelin’s shoulder, Gaveston thrust his hand down the front of the notary’s jerkin and dragged up the metal cross on its copper chain. In the candlelight I glimpsed the embossed crucifix of the Inquisition. Gaveston ripped this from his neck and threw it on the table.

‘Given to everyone,’ he hissed, ‘who falls within the protection of the Domini Canes — the Dominicans, the Hounds of God, Sancta Inquisicio, the Holy Inquisition.’

De Clauvelin, pale-faced and drenched with sweat, leaned against the table.

‘They would not reveal. .’ he gasped.

‘Oh yes they would,’ Gaveston scoffed, sitting down next to his victim. ‘Oh yes they did! Money and power, Monsieur Notary, are the two keys to any secret. You don’t deny it. Well, of course you don’t. You do remember, so many years ago, de Clauvelin, what, twenty-two?’ He pushed his face closer. ‘I was a mere babe. You thought I’d forget.’ He picked a crumb from the notary’s jerkin, brushing it tenderly. ‘I hunted you down, I searched France for you. The Abbot of St Jean des Vignes does owe me money; he did turn on you, didn’t he? He began to question you about certain rents which had disappeared, as well as the claims of a young woman about your forced attentions. You were only too willing to receive King Philip’s letter of appointment; he, of course, couldn’t give a fig about you!’