Michael JECKS - Belladonna at Belstone

When Hugh studied him, he thought the lay brother could only be some twenty-five summers old, no more, and yet his expression was as forbidding as a moorland farmer who had lived forty years on the bleak and inhospitable land.

Elias continued, “I’m a lay brother. I may not be a priest, but that’s only because of my education. I’m not going to be disloyal to my prioress.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean anything,” Hugh said hastily. There was an edge of truculence to Elias’s voice that promised violence, and Hugh had no wish to be arrested for quarrelling in a convent. He hurried on soothingly, “Look, though – all those lads seem happy enough to take her. Are they all just unreligious or something?”

Elias glanced over Hugh’s shoulder to where other brothers sat drinking. Rose had gone into the little room at the back with one of her clients, out of view of the rest so that those who wanted to stick to their vows wouldn’t be quite so sorely tempted. “They’re religious enough,” he said sadly. “But you don’t realise how hard it is to obey the Rule all the time, every day. Sometimes the men who’ve been serving longest just have to break free. Don’t condemn them for being men.” He took a gloomy sip of his drink.

“I can’t blame them,“ Hugh agreed. ”How could I? She’s a lively little thing, that girl. She could tempt Christ Himself with those bright eyes of hers.“

Elias nodded. It was hard suffering the torments of lust, especially as a man who had sworn his life to the service of his God. Whether a man could love his Lord so perfectly when he desired a woman – well, the answer was easy, wasn’t it? The Rule said that any fornication was wrong, and the lay brothers must put aside lecherous thoughts. Not that it was easy when every day they knew that just a few yards away, over the wall that ran down the centre of the church, were women: some old, some young, and surely several of them as lusty as any of the men on this side.

“You must be very God-fearing to be able to resist her charms, that’s all I can say,” said Hugh affably. He rose unsteadily. “Well, I’d best be getting back to my master’s room. Thanks for the ale.”

“You’re most welcome.”

Elias watched Hugh walk slowly and cautiously to the door, and then out into the darkening yard. And as he watched the servant, Elias could feel tears prickling in his eyes.

“Who are you?” Bertrand barked.

Denise dropped her broom and fell back a step, her mouth working with alarm.

Baldwin touched Bertrand’s arm and stepped around him, smiling reassuringly. “Do not worry, Sister. This is the visitor, here to speak to your prioress about the death of the novice. My friend and I are both assisting him.”

“I am the sacrist, My Lord Bishop,” Denise said breathlessly. “I am sure that Lady Elizabeth would…”

Bertrand waved his hand dismissively. “I’ll see her later. For now, tell us where the poor girl’s body has been put.”

Baldwin walked at Simon’s side a short way behind the visitor. Bertrand was rushing at this affair like a maddened boar, he thought. The man had no idea of subtlety. Even now he moved along at a cracking pace, hands clasped behind his back, withered left hand grasped in his right as if there was need for urgency. Baldwin was convinced that there was not. As far as he was concerned, the first thing to clear up was whether or not there had been a murder. No matter what the treasurer’s letter to Bertrand had said, deaths could often look suspicious. Especially if someone wanted things to look odd, and from the allegation the treasurer had made, she clearly thought something strange was going on. No, Baldwin hoped the whole matter had come up because of an accidental death; if so, then so much the better, for then they could all return to their homes.

But if the treasurer was right and there had been a deliberate killing, Baldwin wasn’t sure the hot-headed bishop would want to solve the crime. He felt no personal animosity towards Bertrand, other than the automatic dislike for a Frenchman of the cloth based upon his Order’s destruction, but he had a wish to get back to Furnshill as quickly as possible in case war should break out. In any event, no matter what Peter Clifford had told the bishop, enquiring into a murder in a convent was work for a priest, not a Keeper.

Denise brought them to the eastern wall of the cloister, and now she hesitated at the door to a small room. Baldwin thanked her before he stepped inside. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the gloom, and then he saw the body lying wrapped up on a trestle at the far side beneath a window.

“Could you fetch us light?” he asked, and Denise gave him a doubtful look before she nodded and went back to the church.

“Come, Simon.”

The reluctant bailiff followed him to the body and the two men began unwrapping the linen shroud. Simon disliked this task; he always found it unpleasant but this case was particularly difficult, for the girl was only a little older than his daughter Edith, and she had a similar build. As he helped pull her yielding body over to tug the shroud from her, he found himself contemplating his feelings, were he to see a man do this to his own little Edith. His imagination took hold of him, and for a moment he almost believed that when the covering was lifted he would see Edith’s sightless face looking up at him. The superstitious vision conjured in his mind almost made him stop and step away.

Moll was naked. Her tunic had been saved for another novice. It was a relief to see that the woman they were exposing was a brunette and not a blonde like Edith.

“Here’s the surgeon’s mark,” Baldwin said. There was a small cut in the arm, just as any blood-letter would make. “It is hard to believe that so small a scar could cause death.”

“It’s like I said, Sir Baldwin. The phlebotomist is known to me. He wouldn’t make an elementary mistake like that.”

“So you say,” Baldwin agreed absently. He was pulling the linen away from the corpse’s face. As the last of the covering came away, he stood a moment studying her carefully.

It was clear that she had been a pretty little thing. Here in the dimly lit chamber, she appeared to have almost a pale glow about her, and in the cool atmosphere there was none of the unpleasant stench that was the usual concomitant to death. Even Simon was little affected, Baldwin saw. Baldwin was used to Simon retreating as a corpse was revealed, his stomach rebelling. With her eyes shut, this dead novice had the appearance of a girl asleep, and as Baldwin surveyed her, he was almost persuaded that there was a smile upon her face.

“Surely this child wasn’t murdered. She seems so relaxed,” he said.

Bertrand gave him a sharp glance. “You sure?”

“No, I am only going on my first impression, but her face shows no signs of fear or pain.”

Denise returned carrying a large stand with three fat candles, only one of which was alight. “They all blew out,” she said anxiously. “I had to return to light one.“

Baldwin smiled his thanks, and used the one still burning to relight the others. Then he set the stand by Moll’s head. “Her features are definitely relaxed, but we have to see that there is no other wound on her body, if you want to be certain.” He looked enquiringly at the bishop, who waved his withered hand in assent.

Holding the candle high over her body, Baldwin surveyed the whole of her torso, her limbs and face. There was no obvious wound. With Denise’s and Simon’s help he rolled the corpse over, but her back displayed only the darkening to be expected on a dead body left to lie. Blood, as Baldwin knew, tended to drain downwards in a corpse. Then he went to her head and squatted down, carefully feeling the whole of her skull, parting the locks in his search for any sign of blood, broken bones or bruising. He had once missed a crushed skull, proof of murder, on a child, and was keen not to repeat that error.