Paul Doherty - The Treason of the Ghosts

‘In what way?’ Corbett asked sharply.

The curate walked forward, scratching at his mop of hair. He’s not as nervous as he looks, Corbett thought. Bellen’s eyes were troubled but steady.

‘She came to me in the confessional pew.’

‘But you never met her outside your priestly duties?’

‘No, Sir Hugh, why should I? I am a priest, sworn to celibacy. I heard her petty sins and shrived her. You know Canon Law, clerk.’

‘I know Church Law, priest! I have no intention of asking you what you heard under the seal of confession. It is a sacred seal, is it not?’

The curate smiled with his eyes.

‘I mean no offence.’ Corbett took his gloves off and pushed them into his war belt. ‘But the poor girl lies dead.’

‘Aye, Sir Hugh, she does but her soul’s with God. Elizabeth Wheelwright was guilty of no serious sin, at least none that she confessed to me.’

‘And Sir Roger Chapeleys?’ Corbett queried, glancing at Grimstone.

‘We’ve had this conversation before, Sir Hugh. I’ve told you what I know. Sir Roger’s last confession was heard by a visiting friar but he did say that Sir Roger had not confessed to any murders.’

‘You think he was innocent?’

‘No man is innocent.’

‘You think he was a murderer?’ Corbett demanded.

‘I don’t know.’ Parson Grimstone sat in a high-backed chair between two chests. ‘I know nothing about Sir Roger. I would not describe him as a man of God. Oh, he attended Mass on Sundays and when he had to. He gave a triptych to the church which was later burnt.’

‘Why was it burnt?’ Ranulf asked.

‘You’ve asked me that before. Perhaps a member of my parish resented anything from a Chapeleys hanging in this church.’

‘Were Molkyn the miller and Thorkle churchgoers?’

‘Thorkle more than Molkyn,’ Grimstone replied. ‘The miller feared neither God nor man. He did not like priests.’

Corbett came over and took the Book of the Dead from the parson’s fingers. ‘You are a priest, you hear confessions?’

‘Yes, both in the shriving pew and elsewhere.’

‘Father,’ Corbett crouched down to hold his gaze, ‘there’s a killer loose in Melford. He has killed Widow Walmer and other women. I believe he was responsible for the grisly execution of an innocent man. Don’t you know anything that can help me?’

‘Ask me,’ the parson stammered. ‘Ask me anything you wish.’

Corbett tapped the Book of the Dead. He got to his feet and glanced at the curate.

‘Melford is a busy place. It trades in wool, is well served by roads and trackways. People come and go. Has anyone ever knocked at your door and asked about a missing girl? Tinkers’ families, traders, Moon People?’ He smiled at Burghesh. ‘Even professional soldiers who move their families from castle to castle?’

‘We have had a number,’ the curate replied, ‘over the years. But, there again, I am not too sure whether the girls returned or whether they had run away. Sometime last spring I met a group of chapmen with their gaggle of women and children. They were asking about some wench who’d gone missing. I listened, but how could I help?’

‘Curate Robert is correct,’ Burghesh added. ‘For the love of God, Sir Hugh, go to Ipswich. You will find the alleyways and streets packed with young women who have fled their family or master. Widow Walmer is a good case in point.’

‘Did you know her?’

‘No, Sir Hugh, but I would have liked to.’

Corbett flicked through the book, with its close-marked entries. He accepted what Burghesh said. If it was true of Ipswich, it was certainly true of London. The brothels of Southwark were always on the lookout for runaways. The purveyors of soft flesh were constantly searching for what was new; it was so serious a matter even the King’s council had debated it.

He glanced at Ranulf, standing near the door, and hoped that he hid his unease. It was comfortable to sit in his bedchamber and spin theories like some master in the Schools at Oxford but what he needed was evidence, proof.

‘Let me ask you another question.’ Corbett walked over to the small latticed window so as to study the entries more carefully. ‘The parish of St Edmund’s serves most of Melford, yes? In your graveyard you have a plot called the Potter’s Field?’

‘That’s right,’ Parson Grimstone declared. ‘It’s that area of God’s acre which is reserved for the corpses of strangers, the victims of sudden violence and contagion. Often we don’t even know their names. We have such deaths in Melford: a tinker falls ill of the sweat or a beggar is crushed under a cart.’

‘And the corpses of unknown women?’ Corbett demanded.

Grimstone chewed on his lower lip and stared beseechingly at the curate.

‘Robert, I can’t remember, can you?’

‘There was one,’ Burghesh declared, taking the book from Corbett’s hand. ‘About two years ago. A young woman’s corpse was fished out of the Swaile.’

‘Ah yes, I remember.’ Parson Grimstone clicked his fingers. ‘That poor creature. She had been in the water for so long, she was sheeted immediately for burial.’

‘There!’ Burghesh had found the entry.

Corbett followed his stubby fingers across the page and translated the Latin entry.

‘Buried, the corpse of an unknown woman: the feast of St John the Baptist, 1301.’

‘And this book?’ Corbett handed it back to the parson. ‘It contains no other entries which might provoke suspicion? Where was this unknown corpse found?’

‘Down near Beauchamp Place,’ Burghesh replied. ‘We think poachers had been out on the river and probably dislodged it. It was found floating amongst the weeds.’

‘Poaching?’ Corbett smiled. ‘I met Sorrel yesterday, Furrell the poacher’s wife.’

‘Oh, that poor, benighted thing.’

‘Did Furrell ever come and see you?’ Corbett asked.

The parson shook his head.

‘Yes, he did!’ Robert the curate declared. ‘And it was just after Sir Roger had been executed.’

‘And what happened?’ Parson Grimstone asked.

‘Don’t you remember, Father,’ the curate insisted, ‘you met him in the parlour.’

Grimstone blinked. Corbett stared at him closely. The parson’s face was vein-streaked around the nose. Corbett noticed three dark blotches: one on his neck, the other on his forehead, the third on his right cheek. Corbett recalled what his physician friend had told him in London — how such blotches were the mark of an inveterate drinker.

‘Yes he did.’ Parson Grimstone asserted himself. ‘He came in and told fantastical stories of how Sir Roger was innocent. I didn’t believe him. In fact, I only half listened but he did say something interesting — about a Mummer’s Man. But Furrell was always full of tales.’

‘Why does Sorrel still search for his corpse?’ Burghesh asked. He came over and stood beside the chair and patted the parson on the shoulder.

‘What do you mean?’ Corbett asked.

‘Well, I’m not a countryman,’ the old soldier replied, ‘but you have seen the land round here, Sir Hugh. Every piece is grassed over, whilst Furrell and Sorrel knew the woods like the backs of their hands.’

Corbett followed his drift. ‘Of course,’ he murmured. ‘A newly marked grave might be ignored by a stranger but someone like Sorrel would find it soon enough. Whilst, if you dig a plot on meadow land, a shepherd or labourer would notice it, not to mention wild animals, who can sniff decaying flesh and dig it out.’

‘So his corpse must be well hidden,’ Ranulf declared.

‘Aye, that’s what convinces me about Sir Roger’s innocence,’ Corbett continued. ‘Furrell spoke in his defence and Furrell disappeared.’