Michael JECKS - The Templar's Penance

Carefully, he removed Joana’s tunic and undershift, and when she was naked, her slim, well-formed body lying neatly, he fetched a bucket and filled it from the well. He could find no cloth, so he tore a large piece from her tunic, and soaked that to clean her. There was little enough to clean. As he wiped at her brow and skull, he could feel the broken shards of bones shifting beneath his fingers. A large flap of flesh had been removed from her cheek, and her face, her beautiful face, had been so savaged that it was impossible to recognise her. No one, not even her mother, would know her.

Not even her lover, he thought, and with that the tears began to flow in earnest.

‘My friend, may I assist you?’

The soft tone interrupted his weeping, and Ramón jerked up, staring at the figure who stood in the dark. Apologetically, the man stepped forward, as if realising that he was almost completely hidden in the shadows. ‘My name is Gregory. I hope you don’t mind that I followed you here. I knew her, you see. Only a little, but enough to honour her.’

Ramón covered his face with a hand, then wiped at it and sniffed. ‘I loved her.’

‘Let us tidy her, then. It is the last service we can do for her.’

Ramón accepted his aid, but reluctantly. He wanted Joana all to himself, and wanted to do this for her alone, but having another man with him, especially one who wore the pilgrim’s cockleshell, was soothing. And the man certainly had the skill of preparing a body.

When Ramón had finished washing her, cleaning the dirt and sweat from her feet and legs, under her armpits, around her breasts, he finished by removing the last traces of blood from her thighs. Then Gregory took the bucket, now pink with her blood, to her head, and gently dangled the sodden hair in the water, rubbing the long tresses between his fingers. When he had the worst of the blood out of it, he went out, rinsed the bucket, and returned with it refilled. He soaked her hair again, until at last it had recovered its silken sheen. Only then did he take the bucket out and throw away the last of the water. When he came back, he carried a thick bolt of linen. ‘A lady outside asked if you wanted some cloth to wrap her in.’

They clothed her, setting her out neatly with her hands crossed over her breast, and then knelt together and prayed for her.

‘How did you know her?’ Ramón asked when both stood again, staring down at her still form.

‘I used to know her mistress,’ Gregory said quietly. ‘She seemed a kind, charming girl. And generous. I saw her giving alms to a beggar this morning.’

‘She was ever big-hearted,’ Ramón said, gazing sadly at the still body of his fiancée.

By the time that Simon and Baldwin left Señor Munio, it was growing dark. The Pesquisidor had taken them to a small tavern. There he had spoken to them both, with the cleric taking notes, drinking copious quantities of wine and grimly munching on dry bread and olives. Nothing that they told him could ease the sour temper into which he had sunk since hearing from the gatekeepers that no one could remember a lady dressed like Joana leaving the city. It seemed as though he would have an unsolved murder on his hands, and his expression told of how much he disliked unsolved crimes.

Baldwin was intrigued by the cleric. He was scribbling on scraps of parchment that had been cut from pages when the latter were squared, and the knight was impressed that use could be made of such small pieces, instead of discarding them. The cleric was a serious soul named Guillem. He smiled rarely, but when Baldwin spoke in his fluent if somewhat rusty Latin, he beamed. It was, he said, good to speak to a man who had an understanding of the Holy tongue. His enthusiasm made Baldwin feign a certain dimness – an automatic reaction. He dared not be discovered as an escaped Templar.

‘Who was that woman to whom you spoke – the beggar?’ Munio had asked Baldwin.

‘She called herself María of Venialbo,’ Baldwin said. ‘Do you know of her?’

Munio shrugged and grunted. ‘I’ve a good wife to look after me – I don’t need her sort. Anyway, a woman who turns to begging or whoring will always change her name so that she doesn’t bring shame upon her family – if she has any remaining.’

He sighed and looked thoroughly out of sorts. Baldwin knew how he felt. In his own investigations, there had been times when he had realised there was little likelihood of finding a culprit, and he too had known despair and annoyance at the thought that a guilty man might go free.

Simon had been getting jumpier and jumpier as the questioning went on, and his trepidation had been obvious to Munio. ‘So, you are sure you can tell me no more?’ the Pesquisidor asked searchingly.

‘We’ve told you all we know,’ Simon stated resolutely.

‘Then you can go.’

Simon had paused with his mouth slightly open, and then shot a look at Baldwin.

Catching sight of his expression, Baldwin smiled. ‘What – do you want to stay here?’

‘I thought …’

Munio knew what was passing through his mind. ‘You thought you’d be grabbed and arrested, maybe dragged off to a cell and tortured, didn’t you? You English! You think that every other land is without compassion and meaningful law. The only way is the English way; the only law is English law. Listen, my good fellow. We don’t torture people here unless there is good reason. If someone is found red-handed and denies guilt, he might be tortured to get at the truth – but not when there is no reason to suspect a man.’

Simon felt his nervousness fade as he watched the investigator moodily crumbling a crust between his fingers. He had heavy hands with thick fingers, the hands of a man who was used to working. ‘What will you do now?’ the Bailiff asked.

‘Ask if anyone else knows this person, María. Joana’s mistress, for a start.’ Munio had permitted Doña Stefanía to leave on compassionate grounds, on the proviso that he could speak to her properly the following morning. She had walked away disconsolate, shuffling like a woman suddenly aged.

The only help the Prioress had been able to give them was to tell them that Joana had been with her for many years. She and a cousin of hers lived not far from the Prioress’s estates at Vigo. Another cousin called Caterina lived hereabouts in the city, but that was the limit of her knowledge of her maid’s family. As far as she knew, Joana had no enemies; she was honest, dependable, and had her mistress’s absolute trust. The two of them had just been to Orthez on business, and were on their way home to Vigo. And now … now the Prioress would have to return alone, and break the news of their Sister’s death to the other nuns in the convent. It was a terrible day, truly awful. She didn’t know how she would be able to make the journey alone.

Baldwin ended with the impression that if Joana was still alive, her mistress would be berating her for her selfishness in being killed.

‘None of the guards at the gates saw this woman, you said?’ Baldwin mused.

‘That is right. I described her and her distinctive blue tunic, but none noticed her. It came as no surprise. Many hundreds of people walk in and out every day by all the gates. This is an important city.’

‘Yes. And yet I should have thought that a bored guard would have noticed a pretty young woman in her prime, with wealth stamped all over her. From the look of her, she would have been a woman with style.’

The Pesquisidor grunted. ‘Perhaps. But all too often the gatekeepers sit in their little chambers and gossip; they don’t watch the people outside. Why should they? All they are supposed to do is see that people coming to sell goods pay their tolls, but if they’re doing that, it’s hard for them to keep an eye on people leaving the city as well.’