Edward Marston - The Stallions of Woodstock

Clacking hooves, jingling harness and raised voices seemed to fill the courtyard below. Ralph opened the shutters to look down. Golde stood at his shoulder to see what had caused the untimely tumult.

The castle gates had been flung wide open. Flaming torches had been brought to illumine the spectacle. Four knights in armour rode into the bailey with a prisoner whose hands were bound fast behind his back. The man had been dragged along by ropes and was obviously racked with pain and fatigue. When the prisoner fell to the ground, one of the knights dismounted to haul him roughly to his feet and to spit in his face.

There was harsher treatment to come. A powerful figure in a rich tunic and mantle swept down the steps of the keep with a sword in his hand. His bellowing voice echoed around the courtyard. Shaking with fear, the prisoner fell to his knees in supplication but the newcomer showed no mercy. He grabbed the man unceremoniously to lift him upright before howling an accusation into his face. The prisoner shook his head wildly in denial of the charge. His accuser wasted no more words.

Clubbing him to the ground with the hilt of his sword, he proceeded to kick the prisoner hard until his tongue stopped groaning and his body stopped twitching. On a command from their master, the four knights dragged the captive through the dust to the dungeon.

Golde was appalled by what she had witnessed. As she watched the figure in the tunic stride towards the keep, she was positively trembling with disgust.

‘That was barbaric! Who is that man, Ralph?’

He took a deep breath before breaking the news to her.

‘Robert d’Oilly,’ he said apologetically. ‘Our host.’

Gervase Bret was kneeling at the altar rail when he heard the noise from the bailey. The thick walls of the church partially muffled the sound but it was still loud enough to interrupt his prayers. Lifting his head, he strained his ears to listen but he could make out nothing of what was being said by the angry voices. The distant clamour ended as abruptly as it had begun. A comforting silence invaded the church. Gervase lowered his chin, closed his eyes and surrendered himself once more.

The habit of prayer had been inculcated in him during his time at Eltham Abbey and, though he had elected not to take the cowl at the end of his novitiate, he did not abjure all that he had been taught.

Prayer replenished Gervase. It stilled his anxieties, cleansed his soul, offered guidance and allowed him personal communion with his Maker. Prayer never let him down. His simple act of faith and humility was always rewarded with peace of mind.

It was only when he rose to leave that he realised he was not alone in the church. Standing in the shadows at the rear of the nave was a tall, slim figure who seemed to blend with the dark stone itself. The place had been empty when Gervase entered it so the newcomer must have slipped in unnoticed and that made the visitor wary. How long had he been watched at prayer? Why had his privacy been intruded upon? As Gervase walked back down the aisle, the man stepped forward to greet him and flickering candles disclosed his identity at once. He wore clerical garb and moved with the measured tread of someone at ease in the house of God.

‘I am Arnulf the Chaplain,’ he confirmed in a low and melodious voice. ‘You, I believe, are Gervase Bret.’

‘That is so.’

‘Brother Columbanus spoke fondly of you. He much enjoyed your company on the ride to Oxford. You talked at great length together, I understand.’

‘Brother Columbanus thrives on conversation.’

‘So I have discovered. I look to have much debate with him myself.

He holds you in high esteem.’

‘I am flattered.’

‘His portrait of you was clearly accurate.’

‘In what way?’

‘He told me what an unusual person you were.’

‘Unusual?’

‘Nineteen of you rode into the castle this evening. Tired, damp and hungry after your arduous journey. Apart from Brother Columbanus himself, you are the only member of the party who thought to come here in order to thank God for your safe arrival. That marks you out as very unusual.’

‘Most of my companions are soldiers.’

‘Say no more. This is a garrison church. I am acquainted with the difficulty of luring soldiers here for regular devotions. It is a problem with which I contend every day.’

He spoke without rancour. Arnulf the Chaplain accepted the role assigned to him and sought to discharge his duties as conscientiously as he could. There was no trace of reproach or self-pity in him. He was a pragmatic Christian.

Gervase’s first impressions of the man were wholly favourable.

Behind the chaplain’s friendly smile, he sensed a keen intelligence and a deep commitment to his ministry. Arnulf had a long, thin, clean-shaven face that tapered towards the chin and positively glowed in the candlelight. Large, kind, watchful eyes were set beneath a high, domed forehead. Though in his early thirties, the chaplain retained an almost boyish enthusiasm. He was neither pious nor judgemental.

‘Did you hear the disturbance?’ said Arnulf, glancing over his shoulder. ‘There was quite a commotion out there earlier on. It was deafening.’

‘The noise reached me in here.’

‘I thought that it might.’

‘Do you know what caused it?’

‘Yes. I was in the bailey when they brought him in.’

‘Him?’

‘The assassin,’ explained Arnulf. ‘Or so it is alleged. Earlier today, a man was murdered near the forest of Woodstock. My lord sheriff sent out a posse in search of the killer and they have captured him.

The fellow now lies in the dungeon, awaiting his fate. If his guilt be established, no mercy will be shown to him.’

‘And if he is proved to be innocent of the charge?’

‘That seems unlikely. The posse are convinced that they have apprehended the man responsible for this heinous crime.’

‘Who was the victim?’

‘One of Bertrand Gamberell’s knights.’

Gervase raised an inquisitive eyebrow. ‘Gamberell?’

‘You know him?’

‘Only by name. He is to appear before us at the shire hall.’ He ran a pensive hand across his chin. ‘The timing of this murder is curious.

It occurs on the very day that we arrive in Oxford.’

‘An unfortunate coincidence.’

‘Probably so.’

‘What else could it be?’

‘Nothing,’ said Gervase. ‘Nothing at all.’

But his mind was already grappling with another faint possibility.

Bertrand Gamberell was locked into an acrimonious property dispute with two rival claimants, Wymarc and Milo Crispin. Gervase was bound to wonder if the murder was in some way connected with that fraught situation. He was not ready to confide in Arnulf until he knew the man better and until more facts about the crime were at his disposal. His suspicion might yet prove to be completely unfounded.

‘I would hear more about this,’ he said at length.

‘Then I will tell you all I know,’ offered the chaplain, putting a hand on his sleeve. ‘But let us adjourn to the hall while we talk. A meal is waiting for you. Brother Columbanus tells me that you are all starving. You should not deny yourself a moment longer.’

He opened the door and led Gervase out into darkness.

Robert d’Oilly made only the briefest of appearances in the hall to welcome his guests and to assure them that they would want for nothing while they were in his care. He promised to spend more time with them on the morrow when his wife would return from a visit to her relatives and he himself might not be so weighed down with the cares of office. The castellan was unfailingly civil but there was little warmth behind that civility. When he took his leave of them, he did so with an undue alacrity. They felt unwanted.