Michael JECKS - The Devil's Acolyte

Aye, the children were easy, as he often told himself. It was the adults whose reactions were more difficult for him to cope with. The women, who once might have smiled and glanced back at him from the corner of their eyes, measuring his strong body against their private erotic gauges, now grimaced at the sight of him, as though he had some disease that could contaminate them. All knew that God infected some because of their sins, like lepers. Perhaps that was the reason behind the women’s reaction: they assumed that he had been so foul in his youth that he had been branded in this way.

Well, so he had thought himself, once upon a time, he recalled, and yes, it was quite possible that this wound was payment for his earlier offences against God.

Men were prone to stare. God forgive him, but that hurt more than anything. Even if it was God’s means of humbling him, it was a sorry trial, for never beforehand had he been looked at in such a foul manner. He was like a midget or a dancing bear, a curious sight, something to be watched with interest. Once he’d only have been looked at for a moment, and then he’d have made sure that the man staring would have to look away, but not now. Now he must accept, aye, and forgive those who gawped at him so rudely, so unchivalrously. The fit and well, the unscarred.

‘Yes, I wished to speak with you, Brother,’ the Abbot said, beckoning vaguely with all the fingers of his left hand. ‘How long is it since you first came here, Almoner?’

‘Six summers, my Lord.’

‘You know the men of the Abbey as well as most, do you not? Better than most, I’ll wager.’

‘I think I can claim to know many of the novices better than most, aye. And my Brothers are a gentle, goodly family. I feel very much at home here.’

‘I am glad to hear it. I have been given some terrible news today, so anything that gladdens my heart is welcome.’

‘My Lord Abbot?’

‘We have a pewterer staying with us. A Master Godley from London. This morning he has come to me and told me that two pewter plates he had stored securely beneath his bed have gone. Stolen in the night.’

Peter sat back and stared. He had feared that something of this nature might happen, but had hoped that after talking to Gerard the lad would be sensible enough to desist.

‘You know something of this, don’t you, Brother?’ Abbot Robert observed. ‘I do not demand that you answer me with the culprit’s name immediately, but I urge you to speak to the fellow and tell him that I can be understanding, but that I want those plates back right speedily. I will not allow the reputation of this Abbey to be harmed because of one felon in Benedictine habit!’

‘I… I shall do what I can, my Lord,’ Peter stammered.

‘Have you heard that a man has been found dead?’ His words shot out like a blade from a scabbard, making Peter still more uncomfortable.

‘I had not heard, my Lord.’

‘Up on the moors. Your friend Walwynus.’ The Abbot’s face was pulled into a frown of concern. ‘I would not wish this Abbey to become a laughing stock. We are a small community, and any suggestion that we might be harbouring a killer – worse, a devil – would harm us severely, Brother.’

Now Peter understood. He felt his mouth fall open. ‘I have had nothing to do with this, my Lord Abbot,’ he protested.

Abbot Robert’s voice was harsh with distrust. ‘I took you in, Brother Peter, to help you and give you a place of peace. Your corrody, your retirement, was to serve as Almoner here. If you killed this man, tell me now. I can comprehend your crime, if I cannot forgive it.’

‘I and he have lived in this town for a long time, Abbot. I forgave him in my heart many years ago,’ Peter said, fingering his scar. ‘I have had nothing to do with death since I moved here. Whoever killed Wally, it was not me.’

‘The rumours will harm us,’ Abbot Robert repeated. ‘The Abbot’s Way. My God in heaven, why did he have to be found on that trail, the Abbot’s Way?’

The Almoner nodded slowly, his eyes hooded. Now the Abbot was making sense. According to legend, first the Abbot’s wine had been stolen, then the Jew had been murdered. Aye, and then the thieving monks had been gathered up, so the legend had it, and taken away by the devil himself. ‘It is a coincidence, my Lord,’ he agreed slowly. ‘But there is nothing to suggest that this man out on the moors had anything to do with the Abbey, is there?’

‘You know how the people will talk. There doesn’t need to be a connection, Brother.’

The Abbot’s eyes were fixed on him with that intensity which Peter knew so well. Abbot Robert was no man’s fool. No, and he could see a man’s soul and judge it, Peter sometimes thought. Abbot Robert Champeaux had been elected to lead the Abbey after years of incompetence, and he had rebuilt it with a single-minded dedication. No man would be permitted to destroy what he had created.

‘You were on the moors a few days ago, Brother,’ the Abbot said.

Peter could feel the full force of his eyes upon him. ‘I know nothing about the man’s death, my Lord Abbot, I assure you,’ he said as strongly as he could.

‘You were up there?’

‘After the coining. Aye, on the fast day, Friday.’

‘You are Almoner and may pass beyond our doors, but why did you need to go up to the moors that day?’

‘My Lord Abbot, I had to take alms to John, your shepherd with the hurt leg.’

‘Oh! Young John? And then you came back?’

‘Aye, but slowly. I was born in the wilds of the northern March, and the open spaces are in my nature.’

‘You should have your humours tested then, Brother. You should be content with God’s company here in the Abbey.’

‘I try to be content,’ he said, his tongue clicking in his mouth, it had become so dry.

‘Do so. Did you see any man up there?’

‘Only Walwynus. He was returning to his little hovel.’

The Abbot gazed at him. ‘I see. Did you speak to him?’

‘I called out to him, but he didn’t seem to want to chat. He was crapulous, I fear.’

‘Did you follow along behind him?’

‘I went up to the moors, aye. And I came back. But I saw no dead man up there, my Lord Abbot.’

‘No. Because if you had, of course you would have come back here and told me, wouldn’t you? So that we could try to save the man’s soul.’

‘Aye, my Lord Abbot.’

The Abbot stared at him for a moment. ‘And this was the same Walwynus whom you knew, wasn’t it, Peter?’

‘He was in the group who did this to me,’ Peter said harshly, touching the scar again. ‘I’d not be likely to forget him, Abbot. Yet I had forgiven him, and I wouldn’t have harmed him. In fact, I spoke to him and told him that he was forgiven, on the day of the coining.’

‘How so?’

‘I met him before the coining began, and told him. It was the first time I’d spoken to him since the attack on me,’ Peter added thoughtfully. ‘It was most curious, speaking to him again like that. I fear he was terrified. Probably thought I’d beat his head in.’

‘For wounding you like that?’

‘Aye. That and other things,’ Peter said, but he didn’t elaborate.

Gerard was relieved to be out of the church, as always, but he felt no great comfort. His predicament weighed too heavily on his mind.

He had been out in the courtyard when the tall, grim-faced Bailiff had returned, bellowing for messengers, for grooms and for the Abbey’s man of law. Moments after he had stalked off to the Abbot’s lodging, his discovery had been bruited all about the community. The dead man up on the moors was definitely Walwynus.

The news that Wally was dead – that was really scary. All the novices and Brothers were talking about it, especially the odd one or two who had a superstitious bent. The parallels between the story of Milbrosa and this dead man were too tempting: the thefts of the Abbot’s wine followed by the murder of a tinner on the moors. Of course the miner hadn’t been dumped in a bog, nor was he hugely rich, and there was no indication that a monk had anything to do with it, but that didn’t stop them talking. There was little else of excitement ever happened in a monastery, after all.