House of Shadows (16 page)

He fought back, managing to grasp one of the creature's legs that straddled his back. But his grip was lost on the slippery mud, and he could no longer breathe as the golem's hands closed on his throat. Abruptly he heard a thundering noise from somewhere above him. He felt his face pushed hard into the ground, and then the impossible weight was lifted from his back. For a while he lay gasping for breath, and then he managed
to sit up. Once again he was alone. The thunderous noise returned, and he recognized it as someone hammering on the door of the cellar. Of course, he had the key and whoever it was could not get in. But someone – or something – had done so, almost killing him. Ignoring the hammering on the door, he picked himself up and addressed the conundrum one more time. And it came to him like one of the flashes of lightning that had riven the sky that night. Feeling strangely light-headed, he laughed at his own stupidity, and the riddle that Peter had drummed into his skull came back to him.

‘Now, what was it again?' A tendril of fear drifted across his mind as he worried about his errant memory failing him. But he need not have been concerned, as the riddle stood out as clear as day. ‘“Look for geometric perfection, where the entrance numbers six, between eight and nine is the flaw. There is the three, and the name of God is creation.” Well, I know that geometric perfection can be exemplified by the cube. So…'

He stood in the centre of the room and slowly turned. A perfect cube – if you ignored the ribbing of the ceiling.

‘Now, let me remember some of the number symbolism Saphira recited to me from what she remembered of the Kabbalah. Three is water, six is…six is…' It wouldn't come. ‘Never mind for the moment. Eight is west, and nine is north. So the flaw is in the north-west corner.'

He held the lantern up to that corner of the room, but he could see no flaw other than the imperfect jointing of the crude wall that cut off the end of the room. Then he remembered.

‘Six is below, or depth.'

He crouched down and shed some light on the dark corner at his feet.

‘Aaaaah.'

There, close to the bottom of the side wall, was another niche. But this one was deeper than the others. Much deeper and stone-lined. Moreover, Falconer could hear the rush of water emanating from deep within it. Three is water. There was another way in and out of the cellar after all. He poked the lantern ahead of him and with a bit of effort squeezed his broad shoulders into the gap. He wished he was once again the slim young man who had sallied out as a mercenary soldier many years ago. But with a bit of wriggling he finally found himself head down in the entrance to a chilly tunnel that ran south. A thin strand of water lay along the bottom of the leat. It smelled stagnant and dank. Just beyond the edge of the light cast by his flickering lantern, he thought he detected movement. A sort of scuttling, and rustling accompanied it. Either rats or the golem, he was not sure which. Still, to prove what he was beginning to think about the comings and goings of the ill-fated trio of young novice monks, he knew what he had to do. He wormed his way back out of the tunnel entrance and sat on the floor of the room in which he was now sure the monks had met in secret. If he was to get down into the tunnel, it would have to be feet first, however. So he hoisted up the bottom of his dingy black robe and tucked it into the belt around his waist. Surveying his new boots, he contemplated the consequences of removing them and exposing his bare toes to the attentions of the rats in the tunnel. There was nothing for it but to take them off. He couldn't ruin them, as he would not be able to afford another pair for years. His pale legs and feet thus exposed, he took a deep breath and slid down into the void. The water at the bottom was cold and turbid. The mud squeezed up between his toes, giving him the sensation of being sucked down. Fearful of
attack in this vulnerable position, he made a quick, anxious twist of his torso and was inside the tunnel.

He had to crouch almost double, but he could stand, and would not have to crawl along its length. That was a relief at least. Holding the lantern before him, he made his way down a slight slope, his shoulders brushing the roof of the tunnel. Whatever hid in the dark ahead receded before his progress. Soon his back was aching, and he yearned to stand upright. But at least he had not encountered the golem again. The thought of struggling in such a confined space did not bear thinking about. He pressed on, aware of the water level rising around his ankles. Finally he could detect a greyish shape ahead of him. Nothing too distinct; simply a segment of darkness that was not as Stygian as the rest. It was the end of the tunnel, and he was glad. The water was lapping close to his thighs and running a little swifter here. Finally he was able to poke his head out and stand upright. Even the persistent drizzle washing over his face did not destroy his elation. He looked around and saw that he was in the open leat that ran under the reredorter. The dark bulk of the building rose to his left, and the water flowed swiftly down the leat towards the kitchen block and water mill to his right.

He sat on the grassy bank to collect his thoughts, damp soaking him from beneath and above. He shivered and wished he was back in Oxford, in his own solar and surrounded by his books and experiments. Roger Bacon had sent him halfway across the country on what had turned out to be a wild-goose chase. He had not even found a cure for his own forgetfulness. True, a Jewish herbalist had provided him with an extract of a nut that was supposed to strengthen memory. He had drunk it. But the only change it had wrought on him was to turn his teeth black. He later
discovered that the dark, resinous juice was from the marking nut, so called because scribes used it as an ink.

He rubbed his temples, determined not to consume any more khat leaves. They assuredly relieved his megrims, but they also altered his perceptions of the world. He could not be sure what it was that had attacked him in the cellar. Had it been a golem, a ghost, or something much more real? He pushed himself up off the bank and waded along the leat towards the reredorter building by the pale light of the nascent moon.

 

Falconer's emergence up through the long slot that formed the toilet seating in the reredorter had startled two bare-arsed monks who had risen early in anticipation of the prime bell. Their shouts of surprise had roused most of the dormitory, causing Brother Ranulf to scuttle off and find the prior before his charges ended up scattering like hens harried by a fox in their house. If Falconer's mission had not been so serious, he would have found all this amusing. And when John de Chartres arrived, Falconer was at the foot of the night stairs, at the top of which was a press of curious faces. The prior soon scattered them with a severe look, and Ranulf began to ring the bell announcing prime – an unnecessary act, as everyone was now awake, but one Ranulf thought would settle the monks back into a proper routine. The prior, meanwhile, was persuaded by Falconer to accompany him to the hospital.

‘Why do you want to go there, Master? We should be deciding what to do with the boy Martin Le Convers down in the cellar. By the way, have you got the key to the door? Brother Michael thinks you might have…' The prior struggled for the appropriate word that might not offend his guest, even though he had the deepest suspicions about the Regent Master.

‘Purloined it?'

John de Chartres blushed.

‘I did, actually. And made good use of it in your absence.'

‘I hope you did not release the boy. He is a murderer, and I need not tell you the consequences for yourself of such an act.'

‘Oh, I did not release Martin, but neither is he any longer in the cellar.'

The prior stopped in his tracks.

‘Please do not speak in riddles, Master Falconer. Either he is in the cellar or you released him. There can be no other answer.'

‘Believe me, Prior John, there is. And as I, too, was attacked down there, behind the same locked door, you will see there has to be another answer. But let us step into the hospital, and I will provide a solution for you.'

They had stopped in the entrance to the infirmary building, and the prior gave Falconer a cautious look but stepped inside. He clearly thought Falconer capable of some kind of evil magic. Making boys disappear, and claiming ghostly attacks on himself. He hoped the darker secret of the cellar that he had been vouchsafed did not enter into any of this current problem. He followed Falconer into the hospital. Inside, the space was much as it had been before. A few cubicles were occupied by elderly monks eking out the last of their days in a less harsh environment than was demanded in the priory as a whole. And at the end, Brother Thomas once again sat next to the prone figure of Brother Peter, whose chains still bound him to the bed.

The prior and Falconer walked down the central aisle with the solemn chanting of the first service of praise of the day washing over them from the priory church. They stopped at the foot of Peter's bed, and the boy's eyes opened. He looked blankly around him, as though
in a daze. The prior and Brother Thomas turned their gaze on Falconer, both expressing curiosity at what was to come next. What Falconer saw in the cubicle finally convinced him of his already shaping view on the murder of Eudo La Zouche. He just needed one more person to be present and hoped that his guess as to his whereabouts was correct. For the time being he didn't need Martin to reveal himself, however.

‘Prior, earlier tonight you feared that three of your monks had gone missing, only to find one of them – Brother Peter here – in a state of derangement. Your worry was that something evil had happened in the priory, and you were quick to blame Brother Martin.'

‘And it is clear now that I was correct in my opinion that Martin Le Convers was at the centre of all this evil. This Jew…'

Falconer held up his hand, fancying he could hear a rustling from somewhere else in the infirmary. He needed to stop the prior's invective before things got out of hand.

‘We will have no more about that, prior. Let us first ask Brother Peter what he and his two friends were doing in the cellar where Eudo La Zouche was found murdered.'

The prior sucked in his breath.

‘The cellar? How could they be doing things in the cellar? It has been locked for years, and Brother Michael has the only key. You saw how difficult it was to open that door. No one has been down there for a long time. I have expressly forbidden its use.'

‘And yet both Martin and Eudo were clearly in the cellar when we found them.'

The prior's face went pale when he thought of the implications. And Falconer wondered once again what it was that was down there that the prior wanted no one to know about. Something important enough to
kill for? He filed that away in his mind and continued his present train of thought.

‘Tell us, Peter, what you and Martin and Eudo were doing in the cellar.'

Falconer could see Peter's eyes clouding over as he strove to think of a judicious lie that he could tell. In the end he feigned incomprehension.

‘I wasn't there. Never.'

Falconer smiled coldly.

‘But there is someone else who can tell us the truth, isn't there, Peter? Martin was there. He knows what you were doing. Digging into ancient mystical philosophy and invoking the name of God to call up life from a heap of clay.'

The two other monks gasped and quickly crossed themselves as protection from such abomination. Peter just lay back, a blank look on his youthful features. His chains clanked as his arms dropped on either side of the bed. Falconer pressed on.

‘Martin can tell us if you were there. Can't you, Martin?'

He called this out loud, startling those present. The prior was forming a question on his lips, when a woman's voice called out from the gloom.

‘He is coming, William. And he is ashamed.'

From one of the nearby cubicles emerged Saphira Le Veske, still wrapped in Falconer's long grey cloak. She was pushing a reluctant Martin in front of her. His monk's garb was smeared with mud and soaked from the hem almost up to the boy's waist.

‘Brother Thomas, take the boy and lock him away. Somewhere safe this time.'

The prior's command was peremptory, but Falconer held back the herbalist before he was able to comply.

‘There is no need for all that, is there, Martin? You will not try to escape, will you?'

Martin Le Convers shook his head and looked shamefacedly down at the ground.

‘How can you believe his promises?' The prior was inexorable in his denigration of the young monk. ‘He has escaped once from his cell…And you still have not explained that, Master Falconer.'

‘He used the same route all three of them used whenever they wished to meet for their secret gatherings. There is a tunnel that links the cellar with the leat below the reredorter. All they had to do during the night was to sneak to the toilet, drop into the leat and walk along the tunnel to the room. How they found it the first time, perhaps they can tell us.'

It was Martin who supplied the answer.

‘Eudo found it. He saw the tunnel entrance one day when he was sent to clean out the leat as a punishment for laziness. He only meant to hide in it so no one would see he was not completing his task. But then he became curious and explored the whole length, coming out in the room. Later, when we sought somewhere to…practise our skills, he remembered it. It was perfect – in every way – a hidden room, and perfect in proportions.' His face crumpled. ‘And then it all went wrong.'

‘How?'

‘I don't know exactly, but there was something about the room. One night, when we were…when we were…exploring the names of God, the candle that Eudo had brought went out, snuffed out just like that. And yet there were no draughts in the room. Eudo accused me of messing around, trying to scare him. But it wasn't me. We argued and left the room, crawling back down the tunnel in the dark. I felt there was something behind me. But Peter and Eudo had gone ahead, so what could it have been? It was a week before we were brave enough to go back again. That was two nights ago.'