The Medieval Murderers - The Tainted Relic

Rob was silent.

Adam turned to him. ‘Why’re you so quiet?’

‘You were arguing with him about that box, and then you left shortly after him. Did you follow him, Adam?’

‘I had no need to. I was going home to my bed,’ Adam growled.

‘You wanted the box, though, and he wouldn’t let you have it. Did you kill him?’

Adam bit his lip, turned aside for a moment, and then flew at Rob. Rob ducked aside and darted behind the rounsey. ‘Do you mean to kill me too, then?’

‘I’ve killed no one.’

‘No one except the traveller.’

‘That was Will, not me. I only hit him.’

‘He’s just as dead. That was why we got the box in the first place.’

‘The box,’ Adam repeated, and he sighed. ‘Well, that’s done now. Can’t find that. It’s gone for good.’

‘Yeah,’ Rob agreed, avoiding his eyes. He saw the blood on his knuckles and wondered where it could have come from.

Before he could ask anything, Adam said, ‘I’m going to see if I can find someone else. You coming?’

‘I’ve got to finish the horses before I do anything.’

‘What about afterwards? There’s time to find another man,’ Adam said with a cold grin on his face. His head jutted forward, and Rob thought he looked like a foul demon, something with no feelings, no sympathy. The idea made him shiver.

He was glad that he could escape this mess. Soon he and Annie would have left Exeter and Adam for ever. She’d come round. There was nothing for either of them here. Not now.

‘Your son?’ Simon breathed. ‘That explains a few things.’

‘From my first marriage,’ she continued. Her husband sat on a stool and she stood behind him, her hands on his shoulders. ‘When he came back I was pleased, and begged my husband to let him stay.’

Simon asked, ‘You have changed your mind now?’

‘Look!’ the man, Jack, said, and while Sara, his wife, averted her eyes, he lifted the front of his old smock. On his belly and breast were bruises, some violent yellow and orange, others blue and grey. ‘When I asked for help with the money, this is how he repaid our kindness.’

‘Have you told anyone?’

‘Jack didn’t tell me about it until two days ago, and by then, what could we do?’ Sara asked.

‘I couldn’t throw him to the watch. They’d order him to behave himself or they’d fine him, and then they’d leave him here with us. And he would kill us,’ Jack said forcefully. The passion of his words seemed to exhaust him and he slumped back. ‘He’s beaten her too. He treats his own mother as badly as me.’

‘Let us know when he returns,’ Baldwin said, ‘and we shall have words with him. I swear that you will be safe from him soon enough.’

‘I wouldn’t see him killed,’ Sara said sadly. There were tears in her eyes.

It made Simon wonder what would make a mother lose her love for her child. Here was a woman who had seen her son beat her husband, who had felt his anger on her own person, and who yet supported and protected him. What could the lad do that would make her lose her love for him?

‘I shall order a man to keep watch on this place in case he returns,’ Baldwin said when they were outside again. ‘He’s a violent, dangerous man, this Adam.’

The three stood at the end of the alley for a moment, savouring the air. It was foul with excrement and urine, but seemed much more wholesome than the close atmosphere inside the house.

That held only the smell of fear.

Brother Joseph sat back on his old stool, feeling the sudden weakness where the worm had eaten away the socket of a leg, and rebalanced himself, leaning against the wall. There was no cure for the woodworm. It would keep attacking the place. Beds, chairs, panels, everything was at risk. It might take time, but the things would always get through in the end.

The lad looked little better. If anything he was growing worse. The stab wound was nasty, a deep thrust in the back, and it had made the lad feverish. Poor devil! It would be a miracle if he survived.

There was a soft knocking at the door, and he grunted as he rose and went to see who was there. A red-faced novice stood waiting. ‘Brother Joseph, I didn’t know what to do. She was so insistent.’

Joseph waved him away and stood in his doorway as the girl approached. ‘Yes?’

‘May I see your patient, even for only a moment, Brother? I think he is known to me,’ Annie said.

It had been a long day for Simon and Baldwin, and the two men repaired to their inn as soon as the light began to dim.

‘There is something odd about this affair,’ Baldwin said as they waited for their ales to arrive. A maid bustled up with a tray and two jugs which she deposited on the table between them, and then winked lecherously at Baldwin. He was shocked, and looked at the bailiff, who was grinning broadly. ‘What does she think she’s doing? Is she a whore?’

‘Clearly she doesn’t care about fashion, if she’s prepared to look at a man like you,’ the bailiff said dispassionately.

Baldwin glanced over to where the maid was speaking to another client. She was small, slim, dark haired and attractive, with doe eyes, a tip-tilted nose and freckles. Even as he looked her way, she faced him and smiled straight at him. He hastily returned to face Simon. ‘Absurd!’

‘Perhaps. Now, how will we find Adam?’

‘There is a man waiting for him to return to his house. In the meantime I want to find young Rob again. If it is true that he was with Will’s band, perhaps they too argued over this trinket, whatever it was, and fought?’ Baldwin sipped ale.

‘You were suspicious of him from the first, weren’t you?’ Simon said.

‘There was an inconsistency in his story,’ Baldwin admitted. ‘He said he found the body and was sick, but when I saw the vomit there on the ground, it was quite cold.’

‘You touched it?’ Simon winced.

‘There is no place for squeamishness when you are investigating a death,’ Baldwin stated sententiously.

‘Perhaps. But why should they kill him there? Why not out in the open that afternoon?’

Baldwin drank and winced at the flavour. ‘Perhaps it was the argument which resulted in the death. If so, better to kill him in a quiet alley than a busy tavern.’

‘Why would they gut their old companion?’ Simon wondered. ‘It sounds like more than a mere argument. Men like them would stab and kill without thinking, but to mutilate the body-that seems more than a dispute over money.’

‘Perhaps it was they who attacked the poor fellow in the hospital,’ Baldwin said. ‘I wonder whether he will recover enough to tell us who attacked him?’

‘I pray he will,’ Simon said glumly. ‘I don’t like to think that the killer could remain free, not seeing how he mutilated Will Chard’s body.’

Baldwin nodded, but as he did so he caught sight of Jonathan’s face. The clerk was reading a small parchment with an expression of horror. ‘What is it, man?’

‘Christ in Heaven…I think I know why they fought over the box!’

Annie was in her room. She had wept herself almost to sleep by the time the quiet knock came at her window, and she wiped her eyes hastily before rising and going to it. All the family were asleep, and she had to step carefully over their bodies as she made her way to the door, twitching the old blanket aside.

‘What is it?’ she hissed. ‘It’s late. You’ll wake them.’

Rob stared at her with wild eyes in a pale face. ‘We have to go. Will you marry me? We’ll get away from here, sell this box and make a new life for ourselves.’

‘I’m not going anywhere, Rob.’

‘It’s too dangerous here, though! First Andrew, then Will, and now Adam is saying he wants me to stay with him-he’ll kill me if I do!’