The King's Corrodian (6 page)

‘I’d ha warned you he was a sleekit, spying yadswiver,’ he said promptly. ‘We tellt you as much yesterday, how he’d go about the place, overhearing all sorts that was none o his mind, writing it down in his wee tablets and casting it up at a man later. He’d a go at me,’ he admitted, ‘wishing to call me into trouble for some language I used that was no seemly, but I preferred to take it to Chapter o Faults mysel, and so I tellt him. Wasny any great penance,’ he added.

‘Was he a man given to drink? Could he have been asleep when the fire started?’

‘That’s one thing he was moderate in,’ said Dickon consideringly. ‘I’m no certain I ever seen him fou, nor even a wee thing argumentative wi drink. He’d no need o a drink to start an argument,’ he added, his tone souring.

‘Had he any friend in the convent?’ Gil asked. ‘There’s no other permanent lodger, is there? No other corrodian?’

‘No. Faither Prior – no Prior Boyd but the previous one, Prior Blythe that’s novice-master now – he put his foot down when there was to ha been another, said we’d enough to do wi one, we’d ha no more. That one went to the Greyfriars, I heard. No, Pollock had no friends in the convent, though he’d spend enough time talking wi one or another o the friars, getting wee favours of them, getting them to run errands for him.’

‘Getting the friars to run errands?’ Gil repeated.

‘Aye.’

Brother Jamesie arrived with an armful of baskets, and a great sheet of tarred canvas folded into a bundle over his shoulder.

‘See, we could stack them on this, Brother Dickon,’ he said, ‘easier to get them all out the road after. Or I suppose we can use them for backfill,’ he added.

‘We’ll find a use for them,’ agreed his superior. ‘Good thinking, lad.’

‘And Sandy Raitts is in a right passion, ower there in the cloister,’ added Brother Jamesie, grinning. ‘Seems the pilgrim lady wants into his library, and he’s no for letting her in.’

‘What have I tellt ye about gossip, lad?’ said Dickon.

‘She said she wanted to see the library,’ said Gil with misgivings, and Brother Jamesie went red and ducked his head in apology.

‘She was being right civil to him,’ he assured them. ‘He’ll maybe no say anything that bad to her. Just he doesny like ladies ower much.’

‘Jamesie!’ said his superior sharply. ‘Get back to work, and less o your prating.’

‘Aye, but he doesny,’ argued Jamesie. ‘That’s why he’s been minding the library these two year and no out on the road, ken, so he doesny have to speak to ony ladies. How he managed afore he was tonsured— a’richt, I’m going, I’m going!’

‘And so I should think! Gossip’s a sin,’ Brother Dickon reminded him. ‘You’ll ha to confess that.’

‘Aye,’ said Jamesie, bitterly. ‘And if those better’n me ever confessed their faults likewise, I’d ha less objection.’

‘Jamesie.’

At the warning in his superior’s voice, Jamesie offered no more argument, but swung away to the section where he had been working. Brother Dickon glared at his back, but returned to his own task in silence.

‘Did Pollock have other friends?’ Gil asked after a moment. ‘I think you mentioned folk who visited him from the town.’

‘Aye, a few. They’d come and go freely enough in the outer yard, never tried to get inside the cloister that I noticed. I can let you have their names, likely.’

‘Had he money of his own? Apart from what was paid for his keep, I mean.’

‘Now that I couldny say.’ Brother Dickon hoisted his first basket of sherds and made for the tarpaulin. ‘But,’ he paused before tipping the blackened mass out, ‘he never wore the clothes that were provided him. Nor the shoes. Aye well clad he was, warmer than us this weather, and plenty coal and kindling to his wee house, more than my lads ever fetched to him.’

‘Did you ever run into him afore?’ Gil asked. ‘When you were still sergeant-at-arms, I mean. Given you were both members o James Third’s household.’

‘I did,’ replied Brother Dickon baldly. ‘I couldny say if he minded me,’ he added. ‘I’m a wee thing changed since then. The beard makes a difference.’

‘He’d hardly have enemies in a house of Religious like this,’ Gil went on delicately, slinging broken tiles as he spoke. His companion produced a sardonic grunt. ‘But did he have any particular unfriends about the place?’

‘Oh, I couldny say,’ said Brother Dickon. He shifted another handful of tiles, and paused, staring through the charred timbers below them. Gil paused too, watching him, as Dickon turned, very deliberately, threw the tiles into the waiting basket, and turned back to look closer. Then he crossed himself.

‘Is that—?’ Gil began.

‘Aye, it is, maister. We’ve found our missing laddie.’

Gil picked his way to join the lay brother. At the far end of the building, the other men gradually stopped, straightened up, watched them. When Gil bent his head and removed his hat the two grooms did likewise, and one by one the whole group left their task, drifted out of the tangle of ash and timber, drew closer. The little group of novices stood shoulder to shoulder, staring in awful fascination.

‘It’s him, then,’ said one. ‘I hoped he’d— I hoped …’

‘He’d ha turned up by now if he’d escaped the fire, Sandy,’ said another. ‘It was aye more likely.’ He crossed himself, tears in his eyes.

His neighbour, a tow-headed muscular young man, said quietly, ‘I wonder how he didny get out? Or was he maybe right at the heart o the fire? Could it ha started wi him?’

‘Don’t be daft, Adam,’ said someone else roundly.

‘He’s deid, then,’ said one of the lay brothers, possibly Brother Dod.

Brother Dickon gave him a look which should have shrivelled him, crossed himself again and began, ‘
Subvenite, sancti Dei, occurrite, angeli Domini
.’ By the second phrase his cohort had joined in, and the novices followed.
Aid him, ye saints of God, meet him, angels of the Lord
: the prayer for the dead, to be said as soon as life departed. A bit late, Gil thought, staring down at what he could see through the criss-crossed beams of the roof. Nobody alive looked like that.

The body lay on its back, partly covered by a very singed blanket and black woollen habit. It was curled up and set into a strange, contorted position, the knees drawn up into the belly, the fists clenched before the face, but he could see enough of the face that he wished he could not. The lips were drawn back, the gums and broken teeth exposed, the tongue showing red in the shadows behind them. All the visible skin was blackened, presumably with soot; coppery curls as singed as the blanket clung about the brow where the skin had split. It had split on the backs of the hands too, and across the jaw, exposing rather cooked-looking flesh. There was a smell of singed hair, singed wool, burned meat, which— he found himself gagging, and turned away.

Brother Dickon finished the prayer, crossed himself and said with some sympathy, ‘Aye, it gets to ye. Right, lads, we’ll get him out o there, and then someone can let them ken we’ve found him. Have a care how you go, we’d no want bits falling off him.’

‘Is that him right enough?’ asked Dandy. ‘Is it no some blackamoor?’

‘No wi red hair,’ said Tam. ‘Whoever seen a blackamoor wi red hair?’

‘It’s the smoke, see,’ said Brother Dod. ‘It blackens all it touches, ye ken.’

In fact it took all hands, under Brother Dickon’s competent direction, to clear the debris over the body and bring matters to a point where they felt they could lift it out onto the grass. By that time word had spread, the convent bell was tolling and the community had gathered, watching in sombre silence as the remains of the young man’s bedstead were hoisted complete with the burned bedding and the blackened corpse, and carried out to set at Prior Boyd’s feet.

He took a step back in dismay at the sight, and looked round for Gil.

‘Is it him?’ he said helplessly. ‘It – you’d never ken this face, it’s no—’

‘I never met him,’ Gil pointed out. ‘Does nobody else ken him?’

‘The hair’s right,’ observed Brother Dickon, standing at attention beside the exhibit. ‘Naeb’dy else in the place has hair like that.’

‘But he – and the teeth—’

‘It’s never Andrew, it’s some blackamoor, for certain,’ pronounced the subprior. One of the novices sobbed quietly.

‘I suppose he was owercome by the smoke,’ said Prior Boyd, still staring in horrified fascination. ‘Poor laddie. What a way to—’

‘No,’ said Gil. Brother Dickon glanced sharply at him, and returned to staring over the Prior’s shoulder.

‘No? What d’ye mean?’ asked Boyd.

‘It wasny the smoke that slew him,’ said Gil deliberately. He bent over the dreadful object, touching with care. ‘See, his skin’s blackened by the smoke, but there’s no sign it entered his mouth. He wasny breathing by the time the fire took hold.’

‘Not breathing?’ repeated his kinsman. ‘Why? He was well enough when I saw him after I spoke wi you, Gilbert. He wasny taken sick that fast.’

‘No,’ Gil agreed. ‘Here’s what killed him, sir.’ The corpse was rigid, presumably from the effects of the fire, but if one looked from the side, as Gil had done when they lifted the bedstead over the broken wall, it was clear enough. ‘Someone’s taen a knife to his throat, and slit it wide open, like killing a pig. I suspect we ken why Brother Augustine’s knife is missing.’

‘A library, mem?’ said Jennet warily. ‘All full o books and that?’

‘Yes, indeed,’ said Alys, and thought longingly of the library she had known in Paris, with Mère Isabelle peering at her latest acquisition for the convent and demonstrating its delights to her pupil.
A complete copy
, she would say with satisfaction.
The entire work
.

‘But is it safe?’ Jennet persisted. ‘They study a’ kind o things, don’t they no? Witchcraft and heresy and the like. And ackelmy, and the stars.’

‘Alchemy,’ Alys corrected. ‘They study such things, true, but in order to prove they are wrong. The books can do no harm – they can hardly leap off the shelves and attack you.’

‘Aye, for they’re chained,’ said Jennet.

‘You may stay by the door,’ Alys said, but was not surprised when her maidservant followed her into the library, sidling after her with an apprehensive gaze for the shelves.

It was not a large chamber, but it contained three big cases of books. There must be – she reckoned quickly – near 200 volumes, far more than Bishop Brown had said. A great collection. A row of reading-desks stood by the windows, with a big, broad-shouldered Dominican just raising his head to stare at her in surprise; beyond him was another man, getting to his feet from a writing-desk like Gil’s, shock and indignation written all across his narrow face.

‘You canny come in here!’ he hissed. ‘Shoo! This is no place for women! Go away, go away, shoo!’ He flapped his hands at them ineffectually. The man at the reading-desk bent his head to his book, clearly not wishing to be involved.

Alys curtsied, aware of Jennet bobbing behind her.

‘I should like to consult some of the books, Father,’ she said respectfully.

‘Consult? Women canny consult books – they canny read! It’s naught for you! And if it’s your fortune you want,’ he added suspiciously, ‘you can go elsewhere. I’m no having sic practices in my library.’

Alys met his eye, smiling reassuringly. He was a thin awkward man, with heavy dark eyebrows which twitched in agitation; his hands were trembling. He is afraid of us, she thought with incredulity.

‘Mère Isabelle deplored such practices too,’ she agreed. ‘How can paper and print know what God has in store for us? I’ll do your books no harm, sir, I’ll treat them wi care. See, my hands are clean.’

‘Go away!’ he said, ignoring her words. ‘Women canny consult books! They’re all in Latin, they’re no use to you.’

‘Mère Isabelle?’ said the other Dominican. He closed his book, marking his place with a tattered crow’s feather, and looked more closely at Alys. ‘In Paris? Do you speak of Isabelle de Marivaux? Is she still alive?’

‘Indeed, sir,’ said Alys, and curtsied again. ‘I had a letter from her quite lately, written before Yule. I was her pupil for two years.’

‘When you reply, gie her Henry White’s greetings,’ he said, and she bowed her head in assent. ‘Alexander, we could let the lady consult as she wishes. If Mother Isabelle de Marivaux taught her, she’s fit to enter the library.’

‘No – no, I’ll no have it—’ The librarian wrung his hands, almost dancing in despair. ‘It’s no right, it’s irregular. The rules canny permit it, I canny allow it!’

‘Away and ask Father Prior,’ suggested his colleague. ‘I’ll mind your books while you’re gone.’

‘And leave you – and leave you –’ Brother Alexander looked from White to Alys and back.

‘She has her woman wi her,’ White pointed out. ‘Away and speak wi Father Prior.’

The librarian crossed himself, then darted past Jennet and out of the door, which thudded heavily behind him. Jennet sighed in relief, and let go of her beads.

‘Now,’ said White as the echoes died. He was older than Alys had at first thought, though his hair was still thick and dark round the tonsure; he had a penetrating stare, now bent on her. ‘What did you wish to consult, daughter?’

‘Albert the Great,’ she said promptly. White’s eyebrows rose.

‘Indeed? His works are here. Which volume would you want, d’you suppose?’

‘His writings on alchemy.’

White considered her carefully. ‘Now, why would you want those?’ he said after a moment. ‘He never found how to make gold, you ken that.’

‘I do,’ she said. ‘But I wish to learn more o the subject, and I knew you’d have his writings here, seeing he’s—’

‘One o ours,’ he agreed. ‘He’s here. But I’ll ask again: why would you want to read his alchemy?’

‘I hope to learn more of his method,’ Alys said, with what she hoped was an earnest smile. ‘He was very clear on method.’

‘Hmm,’ said White. ‘Method you’ll find, but no summoning o spirits or the like.’

‘
A daemonibus doctuture
,’ she quoted, and continued in the Latin, ‘
It is taught by demons, it teaches about demons and it leads to demons
. He was very clear about that too.’

White frowned slightly, and after a moment turned to the furthest shelf. Scanning it briefly, he located a row of six disparate volumes carefully marked
A MAGN
on their fore-edges, drew out one and leafed through it.