Michael JECKS - Belladonna at Belstone

“You weren’t walking about that night?”

“I did take a stroll, but when I saw Denise in the frater I told her to leave the wine for the night and go to bed. I went up as well.”

“Why were you holding a dagger?” Baldwin demanded relentlessly.

Margherita gave a small sigh. “If I wake in the night, I usually carry a small dagger with me: there are such awful rumours of murder and mayhem in convents these days, and the good prioress has allowed our walls to collapse in places; it would be easy for men to break in. I went down to the cloister to think, and while I was meditating there, I thought I saw a man slip from the church door and go to the dorter. Naturally I followed, and equally naturally I grabbed my knife to defend myself.

“Denise said you were out in the yard behind the cloister,” Baldwin pointed out.

Margherita froze a moment. “Ah, yes, she was quite correct. I had been here in the cloister, and saw the man there…” She pointed at the door to the church. “He slipped, as I thought, along the church wall and out along that alley.” Where the nun indicated there was a narrow way leading along the church’s outer wall, away from the cloister. “It gives out to the kitchen garden behind the cloister. From there a man can walk up, past the kitchen and out to the back of the frater here. It occurred to me that he would avoid the cloister itself, where he would be more likely to be seen.” She indicated another alley between the frater and the next building. “From there he could gain access to the dorter, where the nuns were all asleep in their beds.”

“So you tried to ambush him?” Baldwin asked.

“Yes. I went up this alley and waited at the top. When I didn’t see him, I walked along the outer wall of the frater, but still saw nothing. Then I noticed that Denise was sitting alone in there again with a pot of wine. I confess I was angry to see her awake so late, and ordered her to return to her bed. Soon after I went up to the dorter myself, wondering if the man had already got there somehow. I went up, but I saw no stranger.”

“Does the door to the dorter lead to other rooms?” Simon demanded.

“Yes – to the infirmary. But I knocked there and Constance, our infirmarer, told me no one had entered before me.” Margherita glanced down at her hands. The infirmarer had been quite rude about it, forcing the treasurer back from the room and closing the door behind them, snapping that Margherita should not trespass on her domain when she had the sick to protect.

“By now Denise had gone to her bed, so I did likewise and soon I was asleep. I was very tired – I suppose it’s the work I do, making sure that the account-rolls are up to date.” She was keen to appear helpful to this serious-looking knight. “When the bell tolled, I woke and went to church.”

“And at this stage there was no hint that Moll was unwell?”

“Constance, our infirmarer, is a very diligent woman,” Margherita said in a voice that brooked no argument. “She saw that her charges were sleeping before going to church for Nocturns. She would hardly have missed the wound inflicted upon Moll.”

“So it couldn’t have been a nun,” Simon exclaimed. “They were all at church.”

Margherita tilted her head with a grimace. “Constance first went to the laver. She woke and realised that her hands were dirty, so between her leaving and the nocturn bell…”

“I see,” said Baldwin. “Who was in the infirmary with the girl?”

“Joan, one of our oldest nuns, and a lay sister, Cecily, who fell down a rotten stair and broke her wrist. And Constance herself, of course, in her cot next to the infirmary.”

“Does she always sleep there?” Baldwin asked.

“When she has patients to look after, yes. And in a place the size of this, there is usually someone who has been bled, or a lay sister who needs to recover from her efforts, so I suppose she spends much of her time out there,” Margherita said shortly, beginning to feel a trifle acerbic at his questioning. “When Matins were finished, she’d have gone back to her patients. That was when she saw Moll’s vein had opened again.”

“Yet someone thought that there might be another explanation, rather than an accidental nick in an artery. Someone thought it was murder.”

“Well, some of us wondered,” Margherita stumbled, looking to the visitor for aid.

Bertrand tried to sound conciliatory. “Come, Sir Baldwin. We are concerned only with the death itself.”

“Quite right, and to investigate that I need to know what suspicions people have, why they have them, and who else shares them.”

“Why?” Bertrand asked.

Baldwin turned to him, an expression of puzzled enquiry on his face. “My Lord Bishop, I am here to assist in this matter, but I really must be permitted to conduct my questioning in my own way.”

“Oh, very well,” Bertrand agreed, and gave Margherita a smile as if in apology.

“Now,” Baldwin said. “Why did you assume this was a case of murder?”

Margherita gave the impression of being uncertain. She dropped her eyes and muttered as if unwillingly: “It’s the money.”

The knight blinked with surprise, and she could see she had his attention. Before he could ask her any more questions, she clasped her hands before her and held his gaze, putting all the conviction she could into her face.

“You see, our buildings are all in such a state. As I said, poor Cecily fell and broke her wrist because of the condition of the stairs from the laundry; look at the roofs of the church and dorter. Both wrecked. And it’s all because of the prioress.”

“Explain,” Baldwin ordered.

“We are a poor institution. Ten, maybe twenty years ago, we had some wealth, but then the rich families stopped sending their daughters to us, and how else can we get money? No patron will give us funds, for what would be the point? Any man would give his donations to the larger places, where it is obvious that there will be people for many years to come, to say prayers for his soul; and then he would only give money to male convents. Monasteries get the chantry money, not nunneries; nuns can’t hold services.”

“What has this to do with the girl’s death?”

“Sir Rodney of Oakhampton has seen the dire condition of the priory, and wishes to confer upon our convent the parish church of Belstone, in order that the priory can build a new Lady Chapel, providing the prioress will allow him to have his tomb erected within it, and providing that she will also pay for a priest to celebrate Mass each day within the chapel and pray for Sir Rodney and his family.”

“I presume that a parish church like Belstone would allow the convent to afford this?” Baldwin probed. In truth he had never had much understanding of finance, and had no idea how much a little church like Belstone’s would generate.

“Oh, yes, Sir Baldwin. It’s a generous offer. He wishes nothing that need be overly expensive to the priory. Four candles to burn each day, and the priory’s own chaplain to celebrate a daily Mass for the Blessed Virgin. That was about all his demand. Oh, and he expects us to accept any young girl whom he desires us to take as a nun, or when he has died, any girl nominated by his heirs.”

“I see no reason why you should thus assume the prioress to have been involved in the novice’s death.“

“Sir, as a gesture of good faith the noble knight gave the priory the first instalment to help us in the short period while the church is being made over to us. That money has gone straight to the new priest.” She held Baldwin’s eye a moment, then looked at Bertrand, speaking primly. “It was intended for the roofs. Instead it has gone to this man.”

“Who has seen her with the priest?” Simon demanded.