The Medieval Murderers - House of Shadows

Geoffrey indicated to Will that he should go with him. They walked through the gatehouse and turned left into the outer court. There was a second arched gateway at the end. Chaucer had been greeted here the previous evening by Brother Philip. Now a lay figure was lounging in the shadow of the gate. He was a hulky man. He was picking at his teeth with a twig. His face lightened when he saw Will but not in a pleasant way.

‘Morning, young Will,’ he said. ‘How are you this fine morning? How’s your mother?’

He cupped his hands under imagined breasts. The boy did not respond. Then the man seemed to notice Chaucer for the first time.

‘You keep this gate?’ said Geoffrey.

‘I help the brother who does. Who wants to know?’

‘Never mind that. What I want to know is whether anyone has passed through here.’

The large man pretended to think. He scraped between his teeth with the twig and examined the result with more interest than he was giving to his questioner. ‘Many people pass through this gate,’ he said finally. Then, seeing Geoffrey’s expression, added: ‘What’s happened?’

‘A workman is dead. Killed by one of his fellows. If the killer attempts to pass, you must stop him.’

The hulking man stopped lounging and stood up straight. Geoffrey took pleasure at the confusion and fear which settled on his face.

‘How will I know him? How can I stop him if there is only one of me?’

‘Then you are equally matched because there is only one of him. You should recognize him easily. He has a hand like this.’ Geoffrey held up his left hand like a crooked claw. ‘Oh, and he may be running away. Adam is his name.’

The gatekeeper started. He obviously recognized the description. Without waiting to see any further results of his words, Geoffrey ushered Will through the arch and into the street beyond. He didn’t really think that the murderous Adam would try to leave the priory by the main gate, but he was satisfied enough to have alarmed the deputy gatekeeper. The chances were that the fugitive would make his escape to the south or east where the priory’s grounds joined the flat countryside surrounding them. It wasn’t surprising that the insolent keeper had heard nothing. The scuffle and the murder had taken place in the inner courtyard a hundred yards away, behind thick walls and buildings that blocked the noise. Anyway, the monks did not go in for the uproar and the hue and cry which would have followed a similar attack in the city streets.

Outside the gate he paused. ‘Where is it you live, Will? Where is your home?’

The freckle-faced lad hesitated, then pointed to his right. The wall of the priory continued for a distance. They passed the entrance to another cemetery. The crosses and stone markers here were dotted more at random than their equivalents in the monks’ graveyard. Chaucer guessed this was where the lay workers would be buried. Quite a few of them, accumulated over the two hundred and fifty years of the priory’s existence. Never any shortage of the dead.

To their left the land stretched away to the muddy foreshore of the river, which glinted in the sun. The further bank was half-obscured by the haze of the morning, although the White Tower of the great castle on the northern bank was visible. The sails of a few boats stood prominent against the flatness. Gulls swooped and squawked above the water. It must be somewhere here that the miraculous little cross had landed, dropped from the beak of a bird that was larger than the largest eagle.

They came to a row of mean dwellings, more or less single rooms equipped with a door and walls and a roof with a hole to allow smoke out and a window-space at the front to let light in. Each house seemed to be leaning against the one next to it for support. If you took away the end one, they might all topple down. A couple of children were playing outside a doorway. One of them waved at Will and he waved back. Chaucer assumed that they were heading for the row, but Will wandered beyond it, in the direction of a house standing a little apart from the others.

At that instant a woman emerged from the door. She was carrying a leather bucket. She was about to throw its contents beyond the door but stopped when she saw Geoffrey and Will. Chaucer realized who she must be from her face. She was attractive, with an ample figure apparent even under a loose smock, but there was an echo of her looks in the boy. This was the woman, he remembered, who supposedly had a priest for a father. It was possible. Priests were human. They might not be allowed to marry, but they had female housekeepers and other servants.

‘What’s he done?’ she said to Geoffrey.

‘He’s done nothing. Are you Mistress Morton? Susanna Morton?’

‘Yes. What’s wrong?’

‘Is your husband here?’

‘Inside, sir.’

The woman moved from the door. She stood uncertainly clasping the bucket of water. Chaucer peered into the room. After the brightness of the day, he couldn’t see much. The remains of a fire sent up a spiral of smoke, some of which found its way through the hole in the roof. On the far side was a large bed, which took up perhaps a quarter of all the available space. A man was lying on it, a blanket pulled up to his chin. Next to him was a great bolster. Since the bed would contain the whole family, the bolster was probably used to demarcate areas of it. Even as Geoffrey watched, the sleeping man groaned and murmured some inaudible words. Meantime, Will ignored his mother and father. He brushed past Chaucer and went to a corner of the room. He crouched down and busied himself about some activity.

‘Have you come to report on him, sir?’ said Mistress Morton. ‘He’s sick. Celler knows he’s sick and cannot work.’

Celler? She meant the cellarer of the priory.

‘He tried to get up this morning but his legs would not stand him,’ continued the woman. ‘He was sweating and very feeble.’

‘What is the matter with him?’

She shrugged. ‘Fever. He has had it ever since he was down underground.’

‘It’s all right,’ said Geoffrey, not sure what the woman was talking about. ‘I haven’t come to check on your husband. Anyone can see he is too ill to work. Can we speak somewhere private?’

Even as he said the words he realized that it was a foolish question. This was as private as they were going to get. Already the presence of an unfamiliar figure had caused the occupants of other dwellings to poke their heads out, perhaps alerted by the playing children. Geoffrey moved into the shadow of the Mortons’ doorway.

‘It is the wife of John Morton I wish to speak to.’

‘John’s wife? He has a wife over Chatham way. But they had a falling-out and so John has been living here with us for as long as there is work at the priory. He is brother to my Simon.’

She nodded towards the man in the bed. Then, realizing the drift of Chaucer’s words and picking up on his half-whispered tones, she said: ‘Something has happened, hasn’t it? Something’s happened to our John?’

‘I’m afraid so.’

Swiftly Geoffrey explained the circumstances of her brother-in-law’s death. He thought it best to give her an unvarnished account. A fight of some kind in the inner court of the priory – and even as he said this, he realized he didn’t know whether there had been a fight or a simple, unprovoked attack by the claw-handed Adam – which had resulted in a shocking death. In truth, there wasn’t very much more to say. Mistress Morton dropped the leather bucket, and dirty water splashed over their feet and leggings. She stood wringing her hands. She swayed against the doorpost. Will looked up at his mother from the corner where he was still crouched.

‘I knew it,’ she said.

‘Knew what?’