Paul Doherty - Prince of Darkness

'You went by horse?'

'No, there's a quicker route across the fields, in daylight it's quite clear. Go out the other side of the priory, beyond the farm. You will see the track. It's not an hour's walk.' Ranulf sighed, pocketed the leather strap, waited for the porter to re-bury the bones and half-carried him back to the priory, listening to the fellow's litany of self-congratulation.

'Nobody would ever think,' he slurred, 'of looking beneath a gibbet!'

Ranulf humoured him and, once they were through the Galilee Gate, handed over the promised coins and went back to the guest house.

Corbett was still up, seated on the floor, pieces of parchment strewn around him. Ranulf knew his master had been scribbling his own memoranda, trying to make sense of the mystery which confronted them. Ranulf gave a brief account of what had happened. Corbett grunted, impatiently hurrying him on, and seized the tattered leather strap. He asked Ranulf to hold up a candle and carefully examined the inscription on the faded, leather collar 'Noli me tangere'. Do not touch me.

'What do you think, Ranulf?'

'A family motto?'

'Perhaps.'

Corbett rubbed the strap between his fingers and went to stare out of the window, half-listening to the sounds of the night outside. In his heart Corbett knew that the murder of

Lady Eleanor and the dreadful silent slaying of that mysterious young woman and her male companion in the nearby woods were inextricably linked.

The dungeons of the Louvre Palace were the antechambers of hell though very few of those who went down the dark stony steps ever emerged to recount their experiences. Philip IV's master torturers, a motley gang of Italians and strange, wild creatures from Wallachia, were expert in breaking the bodies and souls of their prisoners. Eudo Tailler, however, had proved to be one of their strongest victims. Despite the crossbow bolt in his thigh, Eudo had survived the rack, the boot and the strappado: every limb was broken but he clung tenaciously to life. He had seen the young French clerk whom Celeste had seduced, be broken in a matter of days and confess to whatever question had been put to him. Eudo was different. He was not frightened for he hated the French more than he feared death. Fifteen years earlier Philip's troops had attacked his father's village and razed it to the ground, wiping out in one night Eudo's brothers and sisters, as well as his young wife and child.

Eudo refused to say anything. Oh, he had told lies and they had trapped him by asking for the names of other English agents in Paris. He had told them many a fairy story and when they checked, they returned more furious than before, dragging him out of his dirty, fetid pit back into the great vaulted torture chamber to be questioned once again Sometimes Eudo had glimpsed the French King, his blond hair glinting in the guttering torchlight Philip would stand behind the black-masked torturers waiting for Eudo to speak. Now it was all over. Eudo knew he was going to die. He had also realised what the French wanted from him: the truth about the Prince of Wales' former mistress, now immured at Godstowe.

What had Corbett told him about her? they asked. Had she been married to the Prince? Were any of the nuns royal agents? Did the name de Courcy mean anything to them?

Eudo had replied through swollen, bloody lips that he knew nothing, so the questioners changed tack.

Who was the de Montfort assassin now stalking Edward of England? Was he at Godstowe or in London?

He could not have told them. All he knew was a conversation heard second-hand at a hostelry in Bordeaux, although Eudo, a Gascon, had a shrewd idea of the true identity of the assassin. Now, on this last day of his life, he showed he could stand the pain no more. The torturers had chained him to a wall, applying searing hot pokers to the softest and most tender parts of his body. Eudo opened his bloodied lips in a soundless scream.

'The assassin, Master Tailler?'

Eudo shook his head. Again the hot searing pain.

'The assassin, Master Eudo? Give us his name, then you can sleep.'

Eudo felt his life seeping from him. He felt detached, as if he was floating high up above them and the executioners were only playing with the useless bundle of flesh that had once been his body. He began softly to mutter the final act of contrition to himself. Surely God would remember he had been loyal to his king? The torturers were waved back by a senior clerk who had accompanied the French King to the dungeon. He hid his distaste as he pressed his ear up against the dying man's lips.

'What did you say, Monsieur Tailler? The name of the assassin?'

Eudo summoned all his strength, as if he could stand the pain no longer, and whispered a name. The clerk stood back, smiling triumphantly over his shoulder at his royal master.

'He has told us, Your Grace. We have our man.' Philip remained impassive. 'Ask him again!' he snapped.

The clerk moved forward, took one look at Eudo and hastily stepped back.

'He is dead, Your Grace.' Philip nodded.

'Cut him down!' he ordered. He turned to the clerk. 'Send the following despatch in cipher to Seigneur de Craon. He must have it as soon as possible.'

The next morning Corbett roused Ranulf, who awoke bleary-eyed.

'For the love of God, Master!'

'You've been too long in the service of the Devil,' Corbett joked. 'You drink too late and rise too late.'

'I have been too long in your service,' Ranulf grumbled. He rose, scrubbed his teeth by dipping his finger in some salt, washed his face in a bowl of rosewater, put on his boots and, led by a still joking Corbett, went downstairs to break his fast in the small buttery.

'What's the business of the day, Master?'

Corbett chewed thoughtfully on a small manchet loaf from a basket covered by a white linen cloth.

'Do you believe in Hell, Ranulf?' he asked suddenly.

'Of course, Master. Why?'

Corbett pointed to the one stained glass window in the room where the artist had painted a graphic vision of demons, their eyes glaring fiercely, their mouths and nostrils poured forth fetid breath as they tore the flesh of sinners with red hot pincers and pierced their bodies with glowing iron nails, whilst others beat the unfortunates with spikes and scourges. Ranulf studied the painting curiously and felt a shiver of apprehension as he saw how the sinners were thrust into hot ovens, cauldrons of boiling oil, or broken on huge revolving cartwheels. At the bottom of the picture serpents, dragons, adders, ferrets, loathsome toads and horrible worms, gathered to prey upon the damned.

'If you looked at that picture long enough! Master, you'd believe you were in Hell itself,' Ranulf murmured. 'Why do you ask?'

Corbett sipped thoughtfully from his goblet. 'A quiet place, Godstowe,' he replied. 'Just listen, Ranulf.'

His manservant turned, stared out of the doorway and caught the sounds of the priory community as it went about its daily tasks; the clang of milk pails, the rumble of cartwheels, and beneath the liquid song of the birds, the gentle chanting of the nuns from the priory church.

'Peaceful,' Corbett continued shortly. 'Yet I believe that Satan himself, the Prince of Darkness, has risen from his cauldron in Hell and now stalks this sun-dappled place.'

The servant shivered.

'Do you know, Ranulf,' Corbett continued, wiping his mouth on a napkin, 'when I was a boy, my mother took me to hear a famous preacher. He talked about Hell being a boiling hot lake full of venomous serpents. In it backbiters stood up to their knees. Fornicators,' Corbett threw a sly glance at Ranulf, 'up to their necks, adulterers and traitors up to their eyes.' Corbett smiled. I remember this sermon because my father, who never laughed but always kept a straight face when he joked, leaned over and murmured that this preacher spoke so eloquently of Hell, he must have been there himself.'