Michael JECKS - The Devil's Acolyte

‘I…’ Sara swallowed, her face a picture of confusion. ‘But you said you beat him.’

He laughed shortly. ‘Does any man like to admit that he’s been bested? No, my love.’

‘You said you wanted no more to do with me, that you’d deny your own child.’

‘No, never,’ Joce said firmly. He stepped forward and took her elbow, guiding her on, keeping his eye upon her the while, stepping up the lanes, away from the main roadway, away from the Abbey, and down an alley which led to the back of his house. He could enter without being seen. ‘How could I reject my own child? Impossible.’

But confusion was already turning to anger as Sara recalled their last two meetings. She shook her arm free. ‘No! You’re not going to take me in the back here, like a slut. You swore to wed me, and that means I have the right to enter by your front door.’

‘Darling, please come with me just this once,’ Joce said, smiling. ‘It is a whim of mine.’

‘Don’t treat me like a fool!’ she threatened him. She was rubbing at her elbow where he had gripped her. ‘If you’re serious about honouring our vows, and are not going to deny me again, and if you will support Ellis as well, if he is accused, then I shall enter your house, for the sake of my children, as your wife. But I shall not go in the back door so that you can deny seeing me in the future. Ah, no!’

‘Stop rubbing your arm, woman. Come! I merely wish to see my horses.’

‘Then you can, once we’ve entered by your front door. Or is this all merely a jest to satisfy some cruel amusement of yours?’ she asked.

‘This is no jest, I assure you, Wife.’

She said nothing. Her hand was at her elbow still. As he watched, she picked at the material, and pulled a face as she realised that it was covered in mud. ‘Oh, look at that. My best linen shirt, too. What have you been up to?’

He could say nothing. Suddenly he felt as though the blood was draining from his face as she took him in, her features at first sharp and irritated, and then subtly altering, until they registered pure horror. ‘My God!’ she whispered. ‘It was you, wasn’t it? You tried to kill that boy!’

His arm was up and at her throat in a moment while he fumbled for his knife, but he was too late to prevent the scream that burst from her. She kicked at his feet, and he stumbled, and then she had broken free. Two men appeared from his gateway, and he stared at them dully, before bolting back the way he had come.

He made it to the bridge without anyone catching him, and then he found himself confronted by a traveller on a tired old nag. Without pausing, Joce ran to the man’s side. The nag side-stepped, rearing his head, and Joce caught the man’s foot, thrusting upwards viciously. In a moment the rider was up and over his mount, falling on the other side with an audible crunch as his shoulder struck the cobbled way. It took no time to shove one foot in the stirrup and lift himself up into the saddle. Kicking the beast’s flanks cruelly, Joce urged it into a slow canter.

No one else had a horse behind him, but now he was committed, whether he wanted it or not. The road south was at the other side of the river. He could attempt to ford it further downstream, but that would be hazardous. No, he was better off trying to cross over the moors.

In any case, this was the way he should be taking, he realised. What had the lad said? That Wally, the shit , had sold the plate to some foreign bastard on the moors. That was what Gerard had said, and he’d said it in the extremity of his pain, when he was trying to save his life. Surely that was what Joce must do now, then. Find these travellers and retrieve his pewter.

With that resolve, he whipped the reins across the flanks of the horse and forced it to go faster.

Joce would go up by the main roadway, for none of the line of beaters would expect the murderer to be behind them. Then he would ride to the first mining camp and ask about strange-speaking foreigners and whether anyone had seen them. And if the foreign bastards refused to give his property back to him, Joce smiled coldly, he would kill them. Without compunction. He had tried to kill twice today already, with Gerard and then Sara, and he was keen to succeed the third time.

Simon waited until Baldwin had followed the stretcher through a doorway, and then wandered down to fetch an ale. Mark was sitting as usual on his little stool in the doorway to his salting rooms.

‘Bailiff! Who was that?’ he called out, staring after the stretcher.

Simon walked over to him. ‘That poor acolyte Gerard. He was caught and attacked by someone on the other side of the river. We don’t know who it was, but we’ll get him.’

‘It wasn’t me, Master Bailiff! I have been here all day. And an exciting one it has been too.’

Gratefully taking a mazer filled with an excellent spiced wine, Simon leaned against the doorway. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘if you were to learn of a monk who’d been stealing from the Abbey you’d want to punish him wouldn’t you?’

Mark eyed him curiously, then drained his cup. ‘Of course. No question.’

‘So what has been happening here, then?’

‘Nothing that would excite you, I daresay, Bailiff, but for a crowd of old women like we monks, it was quite thrilling. Young Reginald was discovered sprawled before the altar this morning, quite beside himself. Old Peter spoke to him last night, but it didn’t improve Reg’s mood. Poor fellow’s been put to bed in the infirmary to recover.’

‘You have not yet lost your sense of freedom, have you?’ Simon said suddenly.

‘What do you mean?’ Mark’s eyes narrowed slightly.

‘Monks who have been brought up to the Abbey are more cautious in their speech, especially with relative strangers – by which I mean any outsider, like, for instance, a Bailiff.’

‘Aha! I have lived too long in the secular world, you mean,’ Mark said, picking up a jug and refilling his mazer. He waved it at Simon, who held up his hand in mild protest. ‘True, I can see further than the end of my nose, which makes me stand out a little. I mean, look at Brother Peter! A worthy, kindly enough man at first sight, but in reality, he has a terrible desire for knowledge about other monks. He cannot help but sniff out any little secrets, purely with the aim of satisfying his own inquisitive nature. If he had been apprenticed to a master like my old one, he’d have had that nosiness knocked out of him soon enough! Then there’s Augerus. He is less pious than he should be, but he has known only the cloister. How can a man respect the religious way of life if he can remember no other?’

Simon was tempted to remind Mark that his own faults included gossip and imbibing too freely, but restrained his tongue.

Mark continued, ‘My own strength comes from the knowledge of the outside world and the way that real people live. To me, there can be nothing more sacred than this convent, because I have seen how people live outside. That,’ he sighed to himself, but giving Simon a sharp glance, ‘is why I revere this place so much more than some of my brother monks do.’

Simon said nothing but meaningfully raised an eyebrow.

‘I don’t suppose it matters now,’ Mark said. ‘I have seen Gerard about at night. I feel sure that he was the thief, although I imagine he passed his stolen goods on to someone else.’

‘Did you speak to him about his stealing?’

‘Good God, no! I told the Abbot, though. And now, well, his guilt is proven, isn’t it? Why else should the boy have committed apostasy, if he wasn’t torn apart by guilt? Or unless he wanted to make off with his profits, of course.’

Baldwin entered the room to find Peter standing at the side of the bed on which Gerard had been deposited.