[Roger the Chapman 06] - The Wicked Winter (21 page)

A close scrutiny of this, however, failed to reveal anything extraordinary, which left the crucifix. I wondered what Father Godyer, that gentle, timid man, had thought of it when he had come here to celebrate Mass for Lady Cederwell in her private chapel. Had he found the contorted face and body of the ivory Christ as terrifying as I did myself? There was something deeply disturbing about it; a warning that only through immense suffering could men attain a state of grace and approach the throne of God. How could Jeanette Cederwell have gazed upon it every day of her life and not gone mad?

Fulk had obviously looked behind it, which was why it now hung askew. I followed his example, but there was nothing to be discovered except the smooth back of the ebony cross. Slowly I replaced the crucifix against the wall and stood back a pace, forcing myself to scan it up and down and trying to ignore the frisson of horror that it gave me. I decided that I could not leave it as it was; it offended my sense of symmetry. So I stepped forward again, clasping it around Our Saviour's knees and shifting it half an inch to the left, hoping against hope that my action would not loosen the rusty hook on which it was suspended and cause it to come crashing down to fell me beneath its formidable weight.

It was then that I noticed a crack where the carved loincloth had begun to split away from the main block of ivory which formed the body. And tucked into that crack, barely noticeable even when standing very close, was a piece of paper. Only its edge was visible and it took some prising loose, particularly as I had used my knife that morning to pare my nails. But I managed to tease it free at last, spreading it out on top of the prie-dieu and casting my eyes over the neatly written script.

Whatever else had been neglected in Jeanette Cederwell's childhood, it had not been her education. She wrote as well as, presumably, she could read, and here, clearly stated, were the charges against her husband and stepson which Fulk Disney had been seeking. They might also suggest a motive for murder by one of the three. Or by Hamon at Mistress Lynom's instigation, for surely the lady could not have wished her adultery to become common knowledge. At present, whatever was suspected of her relationship with Sir Hugh by members of both households, it was nothing more than servants' gossip which could easily be refuted. But a formal accusation placed in the hands of the Church by a wronged wife was something altogether different and could prove dangerous.

Had Lady Cederwell warned her husband, I wondered, of her intention to commit her accusations to paper, ready for Brother Simeon's arrival? And had he, in his turn, warned his son? Sir Hugh had seemed to know nothing of her invitation to the friar when first we talked with him in the kitchen, but that could simply have been a wish to deceive us. Whether he knew of the paper or merely suspected its existence I could not begin to guess, but I was the finder and now had to decide what to do with it. Should I place it in Brother Simeon's keeping immediately or wait a while until I was more sure of my ground? I had no positive proof, either in the case of Jeanette or her brother, that murder had been committed, and even with the list of condemnations in my hand, I still felt uneasy. The friar, however, would have no such doubts and would set off as soon as the bad weather lifted to wreak havoc on all four lives.

Slowly I refolded the thin parchment sheet and pushed it into the leather pouch at my belt. I would take the rest of the day to think the matter over and, if necessary, sleep on it as well. The faces of Phillipa Talke and Adela Empryngham kept surfacing in my mind, and who knew what others among the Cederwell servants had borne a secret grudge against their mistress? I cast another look around the chapel, now restored to its original order, then started to descend the stairs.

I was standing on the second step of the worn and slippery flight when someone pushed me hard in the back, and I went plunging through the air to the floor below.

Chapter Fourteen

I swam up through the mists of unconsciousness to find Brother Simeon bending over me, his narrow features alive with concern.

'Chapman! What's happened? Are you all right?'
 

I sat up slowly, tentatively stretching each limb to make sure that no bones were broken. Satisfied on that score, I became aware of my throbbing head and the fact that I was feeling dizzy.

'Someone pushed me,' I said, 'from the top of the stairs.'
 

The friar nodded. 'I wondered if something untoward might have happened when I found you like this.' He added by way of explanation, 'When I awoke from my doze, you were missing, and Martha Grindcobb told me that you'd gone out, in her opinion to play at dice with the grooms in the stables. However, remembering your words of this morning, I made straight for the tower. As I approached, a man came out of the door, but when he saw me, he turned to his right and disappeared along the path through the scrubland.'
 

'Did you see who it was?' I demanded with an eagerness that once again made my head spin.

'Unfortunately, no. I was too far away, and whoever it was had his hood pulled forward, concealing his face.' The friar helped me painfully to my feet. 'At first, I thought it must be you, then I realised the figure was too short of stature.

Furthermore, your cloak is dun-coloured and his was reddish-brown. Here, sit down a while.' And he guided me to the stool by the table
·

Into my mind sprang an instant picture of Fulk Disney as I had seen him that morning, wrapped in a thick, russet-hued woollen cloak. I must have uttered his name aloud, because Brother Simeon looked sharply at me and raised his eyebrows inquiringly.

I told him of my earlier encounter with Fulk and the conclusions I had drawn from it. 'I also met him in the passageway,' I added, 'just before I quit the house. He either had unfinished business of his own in the tower, or he suspected my destination and decided to follow me.

Whichever it was, because I delayed in order to pay a visit to Mistress Empryngham, he arrived first; and when I did, finally, get here, he must have concealed his presence by keeping one floor ahead of me and watching me from the top of each flight of stairs. While I was in Lady Cederwell's chapel, he was on the steps leading to the look-out platform
·
I broke off with a sudden cry, struck by the full import of what I had said. I fumbled in the pouch at my belt, unhooked it and shook it upside down, but as I had feared it was empty
.
The letter to Brother Simeon had gone.

I explained this to the friar and his manner underwent a change. Any compassion he had been feeling for me was replaced by exasperation.

'You had her list of accusations in your possession and you allowed them to be stolen?' he thundered. 'You incompetent dim-wit! You jackass ! You fool!' It needed all my strength of will not to retaliate in kind.

'How was I to know that there was anyone else in the tower?' I protested
.
'I had no sure idea of what I might find, nor indeed if I should discover anything at all.' I added, in a bid to regain his sympathy, 'A fall like that could have broken my neck.'

'True,' he admitted, relenting a trifle. 'What saved you?'
 

'I don't know. I think I must have been aware, just a second or two before I was pushed, that someone was behind me. Perhaps I felt his breath on my cheek. But, for whatever reason, I instinctively jumped sideways from the staircase in the very instant that Fulk shoved me in the back
.
' Tenderly, I fingered the bump which was swelling above my left eye.

Brother Simeon was silent for several moments, then hunched his thin shoulders.

'I suppose you're not altogether to blame,' he said grudgingly. 'But you had the evidence against Sir Hugh and Maurice Cederwell in your hands and now it's gone. It's what I call careless, Chapman. Very careless! Without it, there is nothing I can do. The wicked will continue to flourish and enjoy the fruits of their wrongdoing because there are no charges I can now lay against them. Never having spoken to Lady Cederwell, I have no means of proving why she asked me to visit her here at the manor.'

'Not unless somebody else would be willing to testify against them,' I agreed.

The friar curled his lip. 'Small chance of that. Morals are tax everywhere nowadays. The sins of the flesh are no longer regarded as important. King Edward's court sets the example for the rest of the country. Do you seriously suppose that any inhabitant of Cederwell Manor would jeopardise his or her position in order to bring allegations of adultery and worse against the master and his heir? But I tell you this, Chapman!' Brother Simeon's eyes glowed with zealous fire. 'Wherever God may call upon me to travel in the future, however far afield the journey may take me, I shall never forget Sir Hugh Cederwell and the saintly young life that he has destroyed. If I can do him a disservice in any way whatsoever, it shall be done.' I gave an involuntary shiver. Such malevolence was disturbing. Then I realised that he was looking at me. 'You could stand witness,' he suggested. 'You could swear to what you overheard this morning between Sir Hugh and Mistress Lynom.'

I carefully refrained from shaking my head, but my answer was still emphatic.

'No! I won't repeat things I was never intended to hear.'
 

'You're prepared to condone immorality, that's what you mean.' The friar was contemptuous. 'You're like so many of the young; evil doesn't disgust you as it should. Well, I suppose I ought to have known better than to ask. Can you walk now? You have a nasty swelling on your forehead. It's time you returned to the house and had it tended.'
 

I rose unsteadily to my feet. 'What do we say about what's happened?'

'What can we say?' was the acid retort. 'We have no evidence that Fulk Disney attacked you. He has only to deny his presence in the tower and he'll be believed. You may be certain that he'll have rid himself of Lady Cederwell's letter by this time. It's been tom up and scattered to the wind, lost amongst the snowdrifts.'

'Very well,' I concurred, 'I shall say that curiosity drove me to look around the place and that I felt down the stairs. You found me. It's the truth after all.'

He nodded, and we descended the final flight of stairs to let ourselves out into the open air. I glanced briefly along what was visible of the path through the scrubland, but knew that at present I was in no fit state to go exploring. With a sigh, I followed Friar Simeon as he made his way back towards the house.

'I don't know!' Martha Grindcobb scolded. 'A widower with a child did you say you are? More like a great boy who's never grown up!' She fussed around me, making a poultice of rue and borage mixed with honey which she applied to the lump over my eye, holding it in place with a long strip of linen wound about my head. Brother Simeon made little attempt to hide his mirth at the spectacle, and i was thankful that none of the kitchen-maids was present. The three of them, Martha told me, had been summoned by Phillipa Talke to assist with their mistress's laying-out. The body had finally lost all of its rigor and could be decently washed and clothed, ready for burial.

With this information and such knowledge as I possessed, I tried to work out the time of Lady Cederwell's death the preceding day, but my senses began to swim again and I almost keeled sideways off my stool.

'You'd best lie down, lad,' Martha ordered. She cast a disparaging glance around the kitchen. 'There's no comfort here. Give him a hand, Friar, and help him to the men's dormitory. There'll be spare cots until bedtime, and Roger can snatch an hour or two's rest before supper. I daresay,' she added to me, 'that you'll be black and blue all over by tomorrow rnoming, but that's your own fault. All the same, I'll give you a drink of lettuce juice to make you sleep. Why did you want to go poking around in that horrible old tower anyway? Tell me that if you can.'

Unfortunately I could make no answer without revealing far more than I was prepared to, and allowed her to reproach me with what she regarded as my childish escapade until Simeon and I were out of earshot. We emerged once again into the fresh air to find that it had stopped snowing, but was even colder than before. The sky was like lead, and although only an hour or so past noon, the thin winter daylight was already receding, leaving behind it a grey and ghostly stillness.

The men's sleeping quarters were immediately beneath the women's dormitory at the back of the great hall, the shuttered window protected by the gallery's overhang and therefore making the room a little warmer than the more draughty upstairs chamber. Otherwise, it was almost a replica of the one above, with its row of wooden-framed cots, its solitary clothes chest and a table bearing candies and tinder-box.

The place was empty but for ourselves, and the friar thankfully let me drop on to the nearest cot, glad to be relieved of my weight. Then, having helped me remove my boots, he felt free to go.

'Stay there for a while,' he advised, 'and try to rest. If you're still awake at suppertime, I'll bring you a bowl of broth.'

'Don't bother,' I murmured drowsily, Martha Grindcobb's potion beginning to do its work. 'If I'm awake, I'll get up for some proper food.'

I heard him give a rare snort of laughter before I was engulfed in a black tide of unconsciousness. I spiralled down and down into those depths of sleep which is the nearest approach in this earthly life that we ever come to death. We see nothing, we hear nothing, we are nothing, while time drifts by, all unheeded, over our heads...