Michael JECKS - Belladonna at Belstone

Her familia, the women who regularly messed with her in the frater some little while after Lady Elizabeth and her own little coterie of hangers-on had left, were already for her. It was the others Margherita needed to convince. The woman curled her lip at the thought of them: mostly they were fools and incompetents, yet sprinkled among them were a few Margherita would be happy to subvert, and some of these were wavering. They might be persuaded to join her camp. She had declared that her desire to run the convent was based upon a wish to see that it survived; faced with that, what could a nun say? No one could seriously suggest that Lady Elizabeth could look after the place better than Margherita. The very idea made the treasurer give a sardonic smile.

The trouble was, Prioress Elizabeth knew her well; she was quite well aware that Margherita would be doing just this. And at the same time, Elizabeth would be wooing Margherita’s friends.

The treasurer idly chewed her reed until she tasted the bitterness and spat out the ink she had inadvertently sucked. Her saliva left a black spot on the flag, and Margherita stared at it. A black spot – like the mark which would be set against the convent’s record soon. She wondered idly what the visitor would do to the Lady Elizabeth. After all, Margherita was able to give the most damning evidence against her.

Especially since she could explain why the virtuous, the important ‘high-born’ Lady Elizabeth had good reason to want to kill Moll – and Margherita could bear witness against her before the suffragan when he arrived.

Her eyes narrowed thoughtfully, and she considered her familia. There was no point mentioning Lady Elizabeth’s guilt to other nuns. No, it would be best to win them over by guile, but pointing out how their lives could improve with Margherita in charge, or in the case of the more religiously inclined, she could point out how much more pious she was, and how much more inspiring she would be as leader of the community.

Yes, that was the right approach: damn Lady Elizabeth before the suffragan and remind the others how miserable their lives had become because of the prioress. And make sure all the nuns got to hear about Lady Elizabeth’s guilt.

Later, when she had won the most senior position, she could produce her secret funds to make good the dilapidated buildings.

Bishop Bertrand rode up the long sweeping track to Sir Baldwin’s house at Furnshill with a feeling of impending doom.

The men Peter Clifford had insisted upon sending appeared dull, impassive types, better than the simple thugs who usually offered themselves for hire, but not as reassuring as men of the Bishop of Exeter’s own retinue. If it had been up to him, Bertrand would have sent to Exeter for more men from the cathedral, but as Peter Clifford had pointed out, not only would that involve an unnecessary delay, it would also mean entering into negotiations with the dean and chapter as to how many men Bertrand would need and for how long. The good Bishop Stapledon had himself taken many of them to protect him while he travelled to see the King, and the dean could be expected to argue strenuously against any further depletion of the cathedral’s strength. Far easier, Peter said, for him to take all the spare guards from Crediton.

Bertrand clattered up towards the stableyard. The house added to his feeling of glumness. It was a well-appointed place, obviously quite ancient, with solid cob walls to the hall at the centre, and two projecting arms at either side constructed of good timber, the plaster limewashed. The welcome sight it presented, with smoke rising from the louvre in the thatched roof and children playing with young dogs on the frosted lawn in front, only compounded his sombre spirits. It would be such a difficult place to defend, he thought, and with the news Peter had that morning received from Bristol, every man might soon be grateful for a place that was better protected.

After Prime, Katerine the novice walked out of the church with her head cast submissively downwards as she had been taught, not speaking, but moving slowly and contemplatively. Not that anyone could give a damn, not now with all the chatter. Katerine privately considered she could have run naked through the cloisters and no one would have noticed, not even the mistress of the novices. Everyone was too busy assessing Margherita’s chances.

They all knew the level of the antipathy between prioress and treasurer. In a place like this even the mildest arguments soon became common knowledge, but when the cause of the quarrel was the desire of one to oust the other from her post, the affair soon became vitriolic, and involved the whole community. Especially now Margherita appeared to have the upper hand. Lady Elizabeth herself seemed to have given up: she wore a perpetual worried, hunted expression.

To Katerine their mutual dislike was amusingly intense. Like boiling poison it had bubbled away for ages, every word between them acting like additional powders tossed into the brew until the potion was complete. All it had needed was the death of Moll to bring it to boiling point, but now it was ready, and the venom was destroying the whole convent.

For someone who knew who to use information, there could be opportunities, she thought.

Katerine would never have described herself as unpleasant. She had been orphaned when young, and the lesson this had taught her was that she must look to herself for everything. She was entirely self-reliant. When she learned something that could be profitable, she used it. There was no guilt in doing so: it was simply a means of survival. Blackmail was not something she had heard of, but if it was explained to her, she would in all honesty have felt it a justifiable means of gaining wealth: no worse than owning land and forcing serfs to work it and making them pay for the privilege; no worse than a lord raping a man’s wife merely because he had an urge and the power to do so.

Back in the cloister, she strode purposefully along the western corridor and up to the dorter, throwing a disgusted look up at the ceiling as she changed into her day shoes. The ragged hole allowed in so much water and wind it was a miracle none of the nuns or novices had frozen in their beds. As it was, Joan had escaped to the infirmary. The daft old sow couldn’t cope with the chill at her age.

It was all right for the prioress, Katerine thought. She had her own area set apart from the others, divided by partitions which kept the arctic gusts from ruining her sleep. Not that she would necessarily keep it for much longer, if the rumours were true; if the visitor was about to return, surely the first thing he would demand would be that the recommendations he made at his last visit should be carried out, and one of the first was that Lady Elizabeth’s partitions should come down.

Not that it would necessarily help much, Katerine considered as she walked down the stairs to the cloister again, then out to the lavatorium to wash and clean herself, going straight to the frater afterwards for a large pot of wine. There she sat at a wall, slightly huddled against the gusts that howled along the building.

No, what could the visitor be expected to do when the two women were so antagonistic? They hated each other, and never more so than now, with the competition between them for ruling the convent out in the open. That was why Margherita had sent her letter to Bertrand, after all. To show that a new prioress was needed here – one who could command the respect of the other nuns. And that was why she had told the nuns about the allegations in her letter: so that all would look askance at the prioress. By the time the visitor returned, no one would believe anything Lady Elizabeth said.

Margherita was a clever woman. Dangerous, too, Katerine considered. You had to keep on the right side of her; she might be a good ally for the future. The young novice shivered. This room with its high ceiling, benches and cold stone floor, was one of the chilliest in the place. Draining her cup she hurried to the warming room.