The Leper's Return (27 page)

At his side he felt Edgar’s presence, and was grateful for it. The servant, still more than his master, seemed to exude confidence and strength, and Simon kept close to him, as though a little of it could rub off on him—and as if there might be some prophylactic merit in numbers. For his part, he was fearful to the point of feeling sick—not merely queasy, but genuinely close to vomiting.

Ralph led them at a smart pace past the church, along a patch of lawn, which was rimed with hoar-frost, and into one of the little buildings.

Baldwin glanced in, and almost drew back at the smell. It was not only the stench of disease, but of unwashed bodies, dirty clothes, and filth. He had to swallow hard before he could steel himself to cross the threshold.

The brother moved confidently to a shadowed corner, but the knight had to pause again, this time to accustom his eyes to the darkness. It was as if the disgusting fumes were clogging all his senses, even his eyes, and blinding him. It was impossible to see anything at first. Then, thankfully, the monk struck a flame from flint and steel, and Baldwin could look about him.

It was merely a hovel. There was a hearth in the middle, and two straw-filled palliasses lay at either side. Ralph stood between the two, candle held high to illuminate his patients.

“Quivil!” Baldwin exclaimed.

“Sir Baldwin?”

The voice was strained, but it was not merely the hoarseness of the leprosy that made the voice feeble. Baldwin motioned, and Ralph held the light nearer. By it the knight saw the bruises, the clotted blood over the bridge of the nose, the long, ragged slash down one cheek where the flesh had been torn like cloth.

“Who dared do this?” Baldwin hissed.

“It was the good gentlefolk of this pleasant town,” said another voice, and Baldwin turned and peered at the man on the other bed.

Thomas Rodde grimaced as the candle came closer, shutting his eyes against the glare.

“Why should they do this to you?”

“They fear us. That makes them hate us. And it only takes a couple of stupid comments about how a leper might have seduced a girl, for drunks to decide to take revenge.”

“This was done by drunks, you say?”

“Oh yes. At least, I assume they were. They had an interesting vocabulary; not the sort of thing I’d expect sober men to use.”

“Did you recognize them?”

Quivil spoke again. “Arthur, and Jack the smith…” The names were all familiar to Baldwin. None was a great troublemaker, but all were known to take their own action when the fancy took them, rather than troubling the officers of the law.

“Jack,” he mused, then shot a glance at the other bed again. “You’re not from this town, are you? Your accent is strange.”

“No, sir. I hail from London originally, although I have been travelling in the north of the country in recent years. I only came to this place a few weeks ago. Now I begin to regret it.”

“I cannot blame you,” Baldwin smiled sympathetically. “It is not the kind of welcome I would appreciate either, if I was a newcomer. Have you caused insult to any man since you arrived?”

“Me?” Thomas Rodde was driven to laugh at such an innocent question. When he spoke again, his voice had lost all trace of humor, and his eyes were cold. “What do you think, Sir Knight? Look on me! I used to be a comely enough man: hale, powerful and wealthy. Now? Yes—look on me! I am a shell, something for men and women of all conditions to avoid, pityingly perhaps, but with revulsion. Look on me, Sir Knight! I insult all by existing!”

“I make no apology, friend, for all I am trying to do is discover who could have had reason to wound you,” Baldwin said soothingly. “You must know that I need to ask questions to find out why this happened.”

“You have been told who was responsible.”

“And these men could have got it into their heads to do this,” agreed the knight, “but I always expect to find some other reason to explain why. Men do not suddenly go mad and throw stones at others, no—not even at lepers—without good cause, in my experience. Do you know of any reason why these men should take it into their heads to assault you in the streets?”

Seeing that both lepers were silent, Ralph interjected, “I know why, Sir Baldwin.”

The knight could see that the leper master had worked himself into an angry, bitter mood. His lips were pursed, his eyes unblinking. The hand that held the candle didn’t shake, but the other was working steadily, the middle finger clicking its nail against that of the thumb to create an irritated percussion.

“Why, then, Brother?”

“Come with me!”

Ralph led the way out of the hovel and over the grass toward the church. Opening the door of the chapel, he thrust it open and strode inside, his shoes making a strange flapping noise as he passed over the cobbles.

Simon walked along behind Baldwin, wondering what the monk could be about to show them. He felt a strange premonition that another dead man was at the heart of it, and his expectation seemed to be fulfilled when he came upon the aisle and saw the hearse before the altar. The simple metal frame, draped with its cheap black cloth, with the three candles in each of the triangular brackets at head and foot, obviously covered another dead body, and Simon took a deep swallow. He had seen enough dead men in his time, and almost all of them were the victims of violence, but he had never lost his squeamishness. It was different when the body was that of a man who had died in his sleep after a long and useful life, his family and friends at his bedside, the priest ready to give comfort to the passing spirit; then it was a natural, an acceptable event.

Here, in the chapel of St. Lawrence’s, Simon knew that the body beneath the draped hearse would be that of a leper, someone who had lived out his last years in pain and suffering, always aware that those who had been his friends and relations now despised him for his appalling disease.

It was with unutterable relief that he realized the priest was not heading toward it. Instead Ralph turned, made his obeisance, and went out to a small chamber at the side. As Simon came closer, he could hear a strange sound. Approaching the door, he realized it was a subdued moaning that issued from within. At first the bailiff was fearful what he might discover inside, but as the monk shoved the door wide, he saw it was only a young woman.

Baldwin stopped. “Mary? Mary Cordwainer?”

“Yes, sir?”

Her eyes were red and swollen from weeping—that was the first thing Simon noticed about her. They appeared luminous in the gloom of the dark room, which was little more than a cupboard beside the altar, a kind of lean-to affair at the side of the church which was used as a storeroom for brushes and other essentials necessary to clean the place.

Ralph threw his arm toward her. “Ask her—ask Mary what was going on last night!”

“Mary? We have come from Edmund and his friend—you know that they were beaten? Can you tell us anything about it?”

The knight’s voice, so calm and gentle, was enough to help her take control of herself. She took two deep breaths; each racked her frame, as if she was about to sob anew. She looked at her hands, seeing their cracked and dried skin, and held them over her eyes while a convulsive shudder shook her, and then let them fall.

She was exhausted. Knowing that her man was taken from her, that the life she had planned and prayed for was denied to her, was a hideous shock, but now to have to suffer so much more, when all she was trying to do was alleviate the anguish of others, was still worse. She had looked to her friends and neighbors to support her in her tribulation, and they had rejected her.

“Can you tell us?” Baldwin asked.

“Yes, sir. Yes, I am well now, thank you.”

The knight studied her. He remembered her from before Quivil’s illness as a bright, cheery girl, one who was given to playing pranks when she was still running about the streets with her hair unbraided, who had taken on a solemn steadiness when she was betrothed, as if it was a more fitting demeanor for a wife-to-be. Her face still looked as if it was better suited to laughing than crying, but all pleasure had been wiped from it, as if by a malignant cloth.

Mary stared past him to the bailiff in the doorway. “It was men in the town. I come here every day to help Brother Ralph. There isn’t much for me to do, but I wanted to help all I could. It was the only thing I could do for my poor Edmund, him being so low after his disease. Well, who wouldn’t be low, knowing they’ve got this?” She waved a hand as if to indicate all the inmates and their disease.

“I’ve been coming since the day he was brought here, to dust and sweep, to help change the bandages of the sick men, and sometimes to sit up with the dying, like with the poor soul out there, Bernard, so poor Brother Ralph can get some rest.”

“She has been a tower of strength to me,” murmured Ralph.

“Poor Edmund had no one who could love him like I could,” she asserted defensively. “Who else could help him in his last months or years? Not even his mother would come here to see him, but I dared, because how could God strike me down for helping the ill? And if He did, then I would go to my grave knowing I’d done all I could for another suffering creature, and I would go to join my Edmund in Heaven.”

Baldwin nodded understandingly. He had a pleasant face, she thought. A little like the statue of Jesus by the altar. The attentive concentration in his face was attractive, and she felt her heart warming to him. Instinctively she felt she could trust him.

“Last night, the same as each day before, I left here at twilight to go home. I still live with my parents, sir, and it is a lengthy walk, so I try to leave before nightfall. It was when I got to the crossroads near the inn I realized I’d left my coat here. I ran back, but it meant that when I left the second time it was already dark, and as I went through the streets, some men called to me, thinking I might be about some other business.”

Her face darkened as she recalled the two figures leering and making suggestive gestures as they praised her strong, young body. A female out and about in the dark, they had said, must be after one thing and one thing only. One of them had shaken his purse before her, trying to tempt her into an alley with him. It was only when a passer-by had shouted that she worked daily at the leper camp that they had pulled away, disdaining her with curses as if she had invited their lechery.

It was only a short walk after that to where she had found Quivil and Rodde. The two were cowering by a wall, arms up to protect their heads from the stones, clods of earth, broken sticks and rubbish that were being hurled at them by the small crowd of jeering, swearing townspeople.

She had stood a moment, aghast, then run forward, beating with her bare hands at the men nearest, thrusting them from her path and kicking at all who refused to move. In a few seconds she had broken through the press, and was between the men and their prey. “What are you doing? Don’t you know these men are defenseless?”

One of the men had given a scornful laugh. “You want to protect them? I didn’t think whores took that much interest in their punters!”

“Who calls me whore?” she had spat, thinking it was one man speaking through his ale, but others had taken up the call. Although the lepers were safe now, the crowd was eager to attack another target. Mary saw that Edmund was slumped at the wall, blood dribbling from a gash in his cheek and another on his scalp, and the other leper was crouched at his side cleaning the wounds as best he could. “How dare you call me that!”

“I dare.” It was Jack, the smith. He stood with his arms akimbo, meeting her gaze steadily. “You think we’re all so stupid we don’t realize what you’re doing in the lazar house every day—well, we do! You say you nurse the men there, but how many do you service a day, eh?”

She had felt the blood rise to her face, the hot blood of injustice. That she could be accused of consorting with any man was foul, but to suggest that she was capable of throwing her body at the poor diseased souls of St. Lawrence’s when all she was doing was looking after them because no one else would, stung her into retaliation. She said nothing, but remained where she was for a long period, then launched herself forward, fists bunched and ready to strike.

The smith laughed with contempt. As she came close, he grabbed her flailing hands and held her fast. “What do you think, lads? Is she worth taking?”

“Not now,” another responded, jerking his head at the two lepers. “She’s damaged!”

“Yeah!” Jack sneered, his breath reeking of alcohol as he surveyed her. “Go on, stay with your friends, wench.” And with that he shoved hard. She stumbled, weeping tears of rage, tripped on a stone and fell at Rodde’s feet. He shook his head in sympathy, but couldn’t take her hand in front of the crowd. It was forbidden for a leper to touch a healthy person. When she looked again, all the men were dispersing.

As she came to the end of her tale, Baldwin patted her hand. “What then?”

“I was going to walk back here with Edmund and Rodde, but Rodde said I ought to go straight home. He said it wasn’t good for me to come here any more, that I would be in danger, that the mob might attack me for lewd behavior, that they could burn me for heresy. He refused to let me help him, but sent me on my way.”

“That showed some good sense…and some stupidity,” Baldwin muttered. “What if you had been attacked again on the way home? He should have asked someone to escort you. Anyway, let us hope that this is an end to the violence. Mary, I am sorry. I will speak today to the smith and tell him plainly that if there’s any other disturbance, he will be in the jail before he can pick up a stone to throw. As it is, I’ll have him on a charge for slandering you and causing a riot. That should cost him several pretty pennies!”

“And what about poor Mary?” cried Ralph. “Go on, girl, tell the knight the rest. Tell him what happened when you arrived home!”

Mary’s gaze dropped to her hands once again, and she allowed her face to fall into them. She wasn’t weeping now, for she felt so exhausted with her crying that there was no energy left with which to fuel her grief. All she had was with her—there rolled up in her kerchief by the door. First she had lost her husband, but now she had lost everything else. It truly was too fabulous a disaster for her to fully comprehend.