The Butcher of St Peter's: (Knights Templar 19) (9 page)

Baldwin had lost many friends at Acre, but when he and Edgar were both wounded, the Templars saved them both and gave their
lives new purpose. Suddenly Baldwin had recognized that he had a new duty. If the kingdom was gone, he must work with all
his might to support the warriors of God, the Templars, and help to force the decision to enter a new crusade against the
Moorish hordes who had stolen Christ’s country.

To repay their debt, Baldwin and Edgar had willingly joined the Order, and they served it until its destruction. All through
the dreadful years of despair and misery, the only man on whom Baldwin could count was Edgar, and even now his servant was
the first to protect him and avenge any harm or dishonour which was brought upon his head.

Over the years Baldwin had suffered many injuries. He had the scars of lance-thrusts, of sword-slashes, a glancing axe-cut
that could have removed his arm at the shoulder if it had struck straight, and three crossbow and arrow wounds, each of which
could have killed him had he been a little less fortunate.

But fortunate he had been. He was a man whose life appeared to have been blessed so far. Especially since he had met his darling
Jeanne.

‘Your wound, Sir Baldwin?’

There was a note of solicitousness in the knight’s voice as he asked the question that made Baldwin glance at him in surprise.
‘I shall be all right.’

He had never, to his knowledge, given Sir Peregrine any reason to think that he cared for the other knight’s companionship,
let alone his friendship, but he knew that Sir Peregrine was a resolute man who would seek any potential allies in his determination
to curb the powers wrested from the crown by the Despenser family. He had already lost his place at the side of his master,
Lord Hugh de Courtenay, and would perhaps be prepared to lose his life in the fight, but Baldwin was not. He had seen the
remains of those who had tried to best the King, and although he had no fear of death himself, he did fear the results of
his death: the ruination of his wife and daughter, the despoiling of his manor, the destruction of his lands and the harm
done to his peasants. There were too many people who depended upon him for him to willingly throw away his life. He felt the
weight of his responsibilities.

‘I hope so, my friend.’

Baldwin grunted non-committally. ‘What have you heard of this man who wanders about at night?’ he asked, keen to keep the
subject away from national politics.

‘Nothing. It is a new tale to me. A man who opens doors and shutters to peer in at sleeping children? It is hardly likely.’

‘There are some who desire the young and firm,’ Baldwin said tentatively. He had heard of many perversions in his time in
the East. There were many there who felt that the sins of the flesh, which in England would be punished by castration or
death, were not so important. They weighed less in the minds of people there. Men would lie with men, and sometimes with boys.
It was a habit which had at first appalled him, but after a while he grew less intolerant. Such behaviour, although it repelled
him personally, should not lead to a man’s execution. Even Pope Leo III had argued that occasional offenders should not be
severely punished.

His own feelings were tempered by his experiences as a Templar. He had witnessed the humiliation of many hundreds of honourable,
decent monks, their torture and ruin. Many had been accused of sodomy, and their bodies were broken to force their confessions.
No, Baldwin could not believe that catamites were as evil as those who inflicted suffering upon the innocent.

Sir Peregrine had spoken and Baldwin had to force his mind to stop wandering. ‘I am sorry, sir?’

‘I said, if a man is guilty of such behaviour, surely he will soon be caught and killed. No one can really think to break
into men’s houses and lasciviously eye their sons and daughters with impunity.’

‘No,’ Baldwin agreed.

‘I rather hope that foolish sergeant finds the man again.’

His hope was soon to be fulfilled.

Henry was present at the inquest when it was held, but for all the good it did anyone he might just as well have stayed away.
That poor old bastard, Ham, had no one to talk for him. Just the same as any old sod in this city. They could go and hang
themselves as far as the courts were concerned. What was the point of going to the courts to demand justice, when the Coroner
would stand up there and listen to a bunch of arses telling the story the sergeant had paid them to tell? There was no fairness
in a place like this.

He had no faith. Not now. His shoulder was as well healed as it ever would be, but the pain was something he had to cope with
every day of his life. There was no escape for him. Just as there was none for Estmund. Est had lost his family, and trying
to help him had cost Henry his livelihood and future, thanks to the shit Daniel, the man who’d nearly killed him and ruined
his body.

Henry looked over at the sergeant.

Daniel stood leaning heavily on his staff like a man weary almost to death. To Henry’s mind he looked like someone who had
slept only fitfully for many days. His eyes flitted from one face to another almost fearfully, and Henry suddenly had a sense
of what the man’s life must be like: scared at all times in case a felon saw him as his natural prey and chose to attack him
for no apparent reason. Constantly anxious, sleeping lightly so as to spring awake at the slightest disturbance. And now he
had slaughtered poor Ham, and many here would not forget or forgive that. One lapse of temper had cost Daniel the trust of
the people he was supposed to depend on for his authority.

Yes, he was scared. He started at every sound … soon he must go mad if he was going to continue like this.

So much the better. The bastard deserved death.

Hiding under her blanket, Cecily told herself she had never been scared by the man. Not really. And of course now, with that
new board covering the old hole and splinter in the shutter, there was nothing to fear anyway. She was safe enough, and no
need to be scared, not of the man, nor of dreams. They wouldn’t hurt her. No, Mother had said she wouldn’t have those dreams
again.

The weather was changing again, and she felt the chill at her
fingertips and toes. Seeking some comfort, she rolled over and cuddled Arthur. There was a muffled squeak from him when he
felt her frozen hands, her cold knees, but he was too deeply asleep to complain loudly. He pushed at her half-heartedly, muttered
a little in his sleep, but then simply moved away from her, leaving a warm cocoon where he had lain. Gratefully she snuggled
into the conquered territory and closed her eyes again. Sleep soon took her.

When the sound came, she snapped awake in an instant, but was too anxious to turn and see what had made the noise, a strange
scraping that seemed to come from the window. Now it was silent, and she was about to persuade herself that she had imagined
it when she heard something again. This time it was a quiet slithering, a faint, ever so quiet squeak, like polished metal
slipping against a smooth piece of burnished timber, and then there was a rough scraping like a blade rubbing on wood.

She felt the hair start to rise on her neck. Dread filled her heart and she wanted to scream until her father came to rescue
her, but she remembered clearly how he had thrashed her the last time she woke him by playing in the chamber when he was trying
to sleep. Even a ghost wouldn’t make her disturb him unnecessarily.

A rattle and a thud, and she slowly turned her head, feeling the flesh of her scalp start to move. The peg that stopped the
bar had been pushed out again, and now she could see the wooden bar lift from its brackets.

Her breath was uncontrollable. Her ribs spasmed painfully and she found she was panting with terror, moving away from the
window in the bed. She wanted to cover her head and face with the blankets and skins, but dared not. Petrified, she was too
frightened to avert her gaze, torn between the horror of
seeing what might enter and the equal dread of hiding and not seeing it.

The hinges squeaked as the shutter was pulled open, and she saw, or thought she saw, a dark figure in the opening. A man’s
body clad in a black robe with a cowl over the head, the face hidden. He seemed to stare in, and then a leg appeared and was
thrust inside.

She was close to being sick. Her stomach was rebelling against the tension, and she felt sure that she must dirty herself
like a baby when she saw him take hold of the sill and enter fully. He stood there a moment as though listening, and then
he started to walk towards her and Arthur.

It was too much. She gave a short cry of panic and hurled herself from the bed, ripping the coverings from it. Arthur was
startled awake and gave a shrill scream even as Cecily tripped on a blanket and fell headlong. There was a clatter as her
head knocked an iron candle-holder against a table, the candle rolling over the table top, the metal stand striking a pewter
plate, which rang with a shivering rattle as it rolled across the floor.

There was a roar, a harsh, unintelligible bellow, and the clumping of heavy feet. Cecily looked up to see her father and the
hooded man grappling. There was a blow, a shriek, and she saw her father’s face twisted and distorted with horror and agony
just before he collapsed, and then her mother grabbed her and mercifully covered her eyes as the tide of blood crept over
his shirt, his eyes still staring accusingly towards his killer as the stranger fled through the window.

There was that snuffling again, and if Jeanne had heard that every night for the last few years she would be out of her mind
by now. As things were, she listened to it sympathetically and even with some thankfulness.

Edgar had been guarding his master from a murderous attack when he was knocked down. This snuffling was the result. Jeanne
only hoped that whatever was causing it would eventually right itself, because if she knew Edgar’s wife Petronilla, he would
not be forgiven for keeping her awake at night.

The main thing was that both these men, one whom she regarded with the single-minded adoration of a girl for a first lover,
the other with the respect of a mistress for an entirely faithful servant who would die in order to protect his master and
herself, were alive and safe, although Baldwin was not quite out of the woods yet. His physician, Ralph of Malmesbury, an
insufferably arrogant man with the manners of a prince who knew his own importance, had drawn Jeanne aside only four days
ago to tell her to watch her man carefully.

‘If he begins to find himself breathless, or his colour changes, let me know, madam. And if his humours appear disordered,
send for me.’

She knew what that meant, of course. The well-being of a
man’s body depended upon maintaining the correct balance of the natural humours. Baldwin had always been somewhat sanguine,
and she had more than once been a little anxious at the sight of his reddened complexion after he had taken exercise. Even
more concerning was his occasional lapse into a phlegmatic disposition, such as when he had to spend too much time at one
of the many courts at which he sat in justice; at such times his manner became desperately indolent. He would drink more than
usual and eat more, and his belly would begin to grow until he had a paunch.

If anything, he was looking quite phlegmatic just now, she felt. While Edgar snored quietly on his palliasse on the floor
by their door, Jeanne eyed her husband.

He lay on his back with his face to the ceiling, his expression, even in sleep, fixed into that intense glower which she recognized
so well. The first time she had seen that look she had thought that it denoted either doubt or disapproval, but more recently
she’d realized that it was a sign of his confusion about the world. He had many secrets … she knew a few of them, but
she knew also that there were large parts of his life about which she might never learn. It didn’t concern her. Provided he
continued to love her, that was all that mattered. She could still recall her desperation only a short while ago when she
had thought that she had lost his love. That had hurt her more than she had thought possible. It was appalling to think that
her man could have grown like her first husband, the unlamented Ralph de Liddinstone.

No. Baldwin was not like him. He was kind, generous-hearted and thoughtful. He had a natural empathy with others that went
deeper than mere understanding of another man’s position. Baldwin had endured a depth of suffering that meant he could comprehend
how others reacted to their own pain.

She loved him. A hand went to his face to stroke his cheek, but although she allowed it to hover a little way above him, she
couldn’t disturb him. He looked so restful. Even the intensity of the frown on his face only served to make him look more
childlike, somehow, like a boy trying to understand what made a river continue to flow and never empty. There was a depth
of innocence in his expression that was entirely endearing to her.

There was a rattling at the inn’s front door, and she saw his face stiffen slightly. A disturbance in Edgar’s breathing told
her that he too was awake. At the sound of steps and a shout, Edgar sprang up. Still naked, he snatched his sword from the
stool beside his makeshift bed. At the same time Baldwin tried to rise, grunting as the pain in his shoulder returned. He
stood flexing the muscles for a moment, then picked up his sword and drew the blade free of the scabbard, the blue steel flashing
as he tested its weight on his wrist, spinning it round and round.

‘Sir Baldwin! There’s a message for you. The Coroner asks you to go with him.’

Baldwin threw a look over his shoulder at his wife, who drew the bedclothes up to her chin with a smile. ‘Leave me a moment
and I shall be with you,’ he called, and reached for his clothes.

The body lay at the foot of the stairs. Not far from him there was a discarded rag doll, and Baldwin was struck by the similarity
between the two figures. Both looked derelict, unnecessary and unloved. The doll should have been in the child’s arms; the
man should still have been in his wife’s bed. Instead they had been cast aside lifeless. Neither possessed even the semblance
of vigour.

‘What happened?’ Baldwin asked.

The man at the body’s side was a youngster with a perpetually running nose. Watery grey eyes peered at Baldwin from under
reddened lids, and he gripped his staff with the resolution of a man clinging to a rope dangling over a chasm. ‘The maid said
that there was someone down here. They heard the children cry out, and he came down. His woman followed to help, and was just
in time to see the murderer getting out through the window.’

‘Did anybody else see the man?’

‘Only the wife and the little girl.’

‘Where is the woman?’

The man nodded towards the front of the building. ‘She’s taken the two children to the neighbour’s house over the road: widow
Gwen’s place. Took them in as soon as their screams were heard.’

‘Some people can show true Christian charity,’ the Coroner observed.

He had entered in Baldwin’s wake, and Baldwin felt his hackles rise just to hear that smooth, silky voice behind him. It was
unjustified, he knew, but he couldn’t help it. There was something about this knight that always rubbed him up the wrong way.
He nodded curtly, and instantly felt guilty as Sir Peregrine led the way back out into the road. There was no need to be gratuitously
rude to the man. He was only performing his duties in the way he knew best. It was no crime to make a comment on the kind
behaviour of a neighbour.

On the road Sir Peregrine paused. ‘I would ask, Sir Baldwin, that you be kind to the woman. She has seen much to disturb her
this night.’

It was tempting to snap at him, but Baldwin took a breath and agreed. He walked along behind the Coroner, meeting a glance
from his servant. Edgar smiled broadly.

‘I know,’ Baldwin muttered. Both of them could remember how Daniel had walked alone from St Peter’s on the previous Sunday.
Juliana had walked some distance in front of her man as though not with him. Perhaps she disliked him – even hated him? ‘Yes,
I know: Estmund was not viewed as a threat by people, or they would have attacked him, or at least threatened him with the
law. Instead they tolerated him because of his loss. And of course many times a man’s murder will be caused by a jealous wife.’

Peter de la Fosse shivered as he pulled on his robe, and licked his lips nervously. Out in the close, he knew his men would
be waiting, and he stared fixedly at the cross before he could think of joining them.

‘God, forgive me if this is wrong, but I am only a weak man,’ he pleaded. He bent his head in an obeisance, and walked quickly
from his hall into the bright November day.

It was all Jordan’s fault, he told himself. One series of mistakes, and he would spend his life in regrets – but there was
nothing else he could do. How else could a man survive when caught up in such sinful times?

He had never felt that he had a vocation for the Church. The third son of an esquire, he had shown a certain skill for writing
and reading at an early age, and the local priest had been so impressed that he had written himself to the Bishop’s man. Soon
a message had come back asking Peter to go to the cathedral, and the path of his life was set out for him. He would become
a chorister, then a secondary, and finally a vicar. If he was very fortunate, he might be elevated into the cathedral’s chapter.

And so, in due course, he became a canon – but by that time he was in debt, heavily in debt, to Jordan le Bolle.

The man was a snake. He had no feelings for others, only the desire to benefit himself. He owned the brothels where Peter
had first been tempted by female flesh, and the gambling dens below where the cleric had gradually frittered away all his
money, and inevitably, in time, he owned Peter.

Perhaps, if he had been more courageous years ago, Peter could have gone to the Dean or the Bishop and admitted what he’d
done. The penance might have been severe, but it would have been better than this extended horror. He might not love the cathedral
as he should, but there was a foulness in continually acting to the detriment of a holy place like this.

At least his actions today were justified. He was convinced of that.

Perhaps he should speak to the Dean and explain why he had become so deeply involved with Jordan le Bolle. The Dean was an
intelligent, understanding man of the world. He must see that there was nothing else that Peter could have done.

The canon was the victim of a felon’s malevolent will.

Juliana Austyn was a beautiful woman. Baldwin had never considered himself immune from the attractions of ladies who possessed
physical splendour, but he was still shocked by the impact her glance had upon him. She was slim and dark, with a face that
was almost triangular, her chin was so fine. A small mouth didn’t marr her looks, it merely seemed in proportion – or perhaps
it was that the mouth and nose emphasized her large grey-green eyes. They were serious today, but he could all too readily
imagine them fired with passion, and the thought was curiously unsettling. Looking at the other men here, he could see that
they were struck by the same impression.

Sir Peregrine was deliberately avoiding her gaze as though
he feared that a single gleam from her eye could make him fall into an adolescent fit of giggling and nervousness. Edgar was
more confident. He gave the woman his full attention, turning to face her directly, as though there was no one else in the
room, and Baldwin had to conceal a smile. His servant had always been a confident and successful seducer, ever since the destruction
of their Order. It was almost as though he had felt himself constrained all the time that he had been a Templar, and once
he was freed from the shackles of his vows he went on to make up for all the years of abstinence. Clearly Edgar felt this
woman was deserving of attention. Her beauty certainly made her worth the hunt, although Baldwin felt sure Edgar would regret
any adultery were he to attempt it; his wife Petronilla would be bound to learn of it. Nothing could be concealed from her,
and if she were to feel herself let down, Edgar would not be long in knowing about it. In any case, Baldwin did not wish to
see Edgar propositioning a recently bereaved widow. He must make that plain to his man.

Strangely, seeing his servant’s reaction made Baldwin more confident, and the look of sheep-like humility on Sir Peregrine’s
face only served to strengthen his resolve.

‘Your husband was murdered last night?’

‘In the middle of the night,’ she agreed. Her eyes were turned to him, and they held a confidence and self-assurance that
was rather out of place. ‘I heard a noise, and woke my husband, but before he could get down the stairs our daughter screamed.
Cecily has always been a good sleeper and is not prey to mares at night, so when we heard that, Daniel grasped his sword and
ran down the stairs.’

‘You went with him?’

‘When I reached the top of the stairs, I saw him struggling with someone. I screamed, I think, and …’ Her face had lost
its composure now, and a fine sheen of sweat broke out over her brow. She lowered her face, and Baldwin was instantly reminded
of an actor he had once seen, pretending a display of grief. His mistrust of the woman grew.

‘Continue, lady.’

‘I saw them fight. I saw a dagger,’ she said, but her eyes wouldn’t meet his. ‘And then my husband collapsed like a pole-axed
calf. Straight down on the floor.’ The body had lain there like a wretched felon’s. At first she had wondered, but then she
saw that although his eyes appeared to be staring at her they were unfocused, their ire directed towards someone else she
couldn’t see. ‘He was dead.’

‘Who else saw this fight?’

‘My little Cecily. Arthur, my son, had covered his head, I think. He saw or heard nothing, or so he says. He is terribly young.
Only four years old.’

‘And your daughter?’

‘She is nine.’

‘Your husband told us of the man Webber who entered your house at night. He has been doing this for long?’

‘Six years or so.’

‘And in all that time you’ve been living in fear of him?’

‘Of course not!’

Baldwin and Sir Peregrine exchanged a glance. Sir Peregrine was frankly surprised. Baldwin said, ‘But your husband told us
that he feared this man. So what had changed? Why be afraid of him now?’

She shook her head obstinately. ‘I don’t know why Daniel was more worried recently.’

‘Has there been a suggestion that Estmund Webber is suddenly more dangerous?’

She shook her head again. ‘No.’

‘Daniel must have had some reason for his suspicion of him, surely?’ Sir Peregrine asked more gently.

‘I … I don’t know.’

‘Come, woman, he must have had cause to fear something,’ Baldwin said. ‘And he was right, too, wasn’t he?
Someone
must have warned him of some danger!’

She said nothing, but her eyes filled with tears again and she looked away.

Baldwin studied her for a few moments. ‘Tell me, good lady. Who could have wanted your man dead? Did he have many enemies?’

‘Of course he did! He was an officer. Do you think
you
have none?’

Baldwin smiled at her sudden outburst. It was true enough that any man who spent his days capturing law-breakers and seeing
to their accusation and conviction would inevitably earn himself adversaries who would be glad to see him removed. Daniel
was no different from any other in this. ‘So you think that this attacker in the night was a man who bore your husband a grudge?’