Devil's Acre (24 page)

‘Brother Walter.
I was wondering if I might see you again.’

‘Good evening, f
ather,’ I said stepping out. ‘Did you think I wouldn’t come?’

‘No
, I knew you would. Shall we walk?’

On the short walk to the prioress’s lodge he confirmed more or less everything that I had already deduced
, including his reason for helping with the plot. It was as part penance for what he had done all those years before - his sin of pride.

‘So,
do you feel you have paid your dues now to God and Saint Edmund? Or perhaps you think you may even have added to the tally?’

He frowned.
‘What happened to Jane was indeed a tragedy.’

I snorted.
‘A little more than that, surely father? She was your wife, wasn’t she?’

H
e thought for a moment. ‘Jane was a good and faithful servant, and although her passing is a matter of great personal sorrow to me, servant was all she was.’

‘
She didn’t see it that way.’

‘No,
but she was in error. Anything she might have said to you to the contrary will be in her head only.’

‘Oh, well that’s all right then.
After all, she was only a servant, whereas Nicholas was...what was he exactly?’

Ralf frowned painfully.
To give him his due he did look in genuine remorse. ‘I don’t expect you to understand, brother, but accept from me there are weightier matters at stake which transcend even the tragic death of one servant.’

‘Well I hope you’re right, father
, for I should not like to have your conscience if you are wrong. No doubt God will take all this into account when he comes to judge.’

‘God knows what was in my heart. I leave it in his hands.’

We walked the remainder of the path in silence.

‘
What will you do now you no longer have Jane to take care of you?’ I asked when we got to the lodge.

He
had stopped directly in front of the prioress’s gate, no doubt knowing the exact number of steps.

‘
I dare say I’ll manage. Brother, in a perfect world our plan would have gone exactly as we had hoped. Alas it was not to be. What we did, we did for the best of motives. To have done nothing would have been worse. I can only hope that in time the bitterness I hear in your voice will fade and you will find it in your heart to understand - and perhaps even forgive.’

In any event there was no more time to pursue the matter for the next morning immediately after prime we said our farewells to the Sisters of Saint George and took to the road for the last time thankful at last to be heading for Bury and home. It was a calm and clear day with the first promise of spring. We rode in silence and only when we were beyond the cross at Barnham Moor did we finally begin to talk. It was Samson who initiated it:

‘
Walter, I owe you an apology.’

‘Really father?
What makes you say that?’

‘Oh don’t be difficult, Walter. Can’t you see I’m trying to make amends?’

‘Amends for what? For keeping me in the dark as to the true purpose of our journey, perhaps? For letting me believe Ralf was dead? For not taking me into your confidence when to do so might have made things entirely easier?’

He frowned.
‘I’ve explained all that. I couldn’t tell you the truth before for fear you might not agree. There was too much at stake. Deception wasn’t pleasant but necessary. Besides,’ he sniffed, ‘the others insisted.’

‘By “others” I take it you mean the countess.’

‘The countess, yes. You have to understand, she didn’t know you then. She only had my recommendation to go on. She had to satisfy herself that you were the right man for the job. And she was. I don’t know what it was you said to her in the falconry but she was mightily impressed I can tell you,
mightily
impressed.’

‘
Yes, it’s all right father, you can stop now. There’s no squire to resurrect anymore. You can stop flattering me.’

‘No truly.
What you did no other man could have done. Why else do you think I chose you to come with me?’

‘
It would have been easier if you’d simply told me the truth. Goodness me, you knew what I felt about the boy being squired. I kept trying to point out his unsuitability but each time my protest was dismissed. You, the countess, Maynus - all of you. I was beginning to think I was the only person who could see it.’

‘
Yes, that was cruel of us. But we had to play devil’s advocate. We had to be sure when the time came that you would be on Nicholas’s side.’

‘So it was a test
?’

‘If you like. A test that you passed admirably
, as I always knew you would.’

‘
I sense a “but” coming.’

He grimaced.
‘The countess wanted more. It was after all her flesh and blood we were toying with.’

I nodded. ‘
Yes, I see. But none of this answers the bigger question.’

‘
Which is?’

‘
Ralf. Not only did you manufacture his death but when I confronted you about it you told me you had killed him. Why did you do that?’

‘
That was naughty of me.’

‘
Father you lied.’

He squirmed.
‘Not
lied
exactly. You kept pestering me for answers. You’ve no idea how close I came to telling you the truth. All right, you wanted answers, I gave you one. I was being
metaphysical
. And in a sense I did kill Ralf. It was necessary to make it appear so in order to make the plan work.’

‘
That wasn’t your only deception.’

He sighed. ‘Go on. I’m on the rack
. You may as well turn the wheel another notch.’

‘
Ralf told me you and he had a battle - a duel he said.’

‘
Did he now? Well that’s his word for it. There was a duel, but a duel of the mind not daggers at dawn - good Lord, what do you take me for? It was an intellectual disputation, not a physical one.’

‘
And the nature of this disputation?’

‘
The same one you and I debated upon. Ralf was always an argumentative cuss. That time I took the same position as you. He demonstrated to me my error just as I did to you. Only Ralf was no horseman. There was an accident and he was blinded.’ He shrugged. ‘That’s all there was to it.’

‘He
told me it was Saint Edmund who blinded him. He said he had a debt to repay.’

‘
That was his conscience. All I can tell you is that when Mother Odell approached him and explained what we were trying to do he was only too happy to help. There now. You know it all. Is that it? Am I dismissed?’

‘
Not quite. You intimated that you and the countess were friends in your youth - more than friends in fact. Did you in fact have a special affection for her back then?’

‘You’ve met her.
What do you think?’

‘I think you were in love with her. I think that’s the hold she had over you.
I think you’re still in love with her.’

His eyes glazed a little. ‘
Even now she’s an amazing woman. Of course I was love with her. How could any man not be?’

‘I knew it!’

He shook his head. ‘But I loved God more.’

And there he left it
. A short while later I heard him snoring in his saddle despite his protuberances. Fortunately Clytemnestra knew her own way home.

And now I must sleep too. Like Samson I have thought too hard and too long about this matter. I have done my best to resolve the puzzle but I have to admit I have failed. I know now I won’t ever know the truth about the boy Nicholas. And it cannot matter to me anymore for I have a higher conundrum that I am about to face, one in which the vicissitudes of earthly life can hardly matter. But I have assimilated all the facts I can and secreted a copy to Monica-Jerome’s safe-keeping to do as she sees fit. It is for others now to make of them what they will.

Perhaps I have underestimated my opponents. Gerard, I know, is not all he pretends
- oh yes, I know his name. I deliberately got it wrong in order to annoy him. An angry man is a careless man. He was too keen to become my carer, too attentive to my needs. Someone is behind him, some shadowy figure I have not been able to identify. I could almost believe it might be my old adversary Geoffrey de Saye except that he died a dozen years ago. Even his revenge cannot reach beyond the grave - unless like Ralf he too has become one of the undead. They are all among the undead now, in my mind at least - Samson, the countess, earl Hamelin, Maynus, Jocelin. And in the great scheme of things what does it really matter? Maybe the world is better with a mystery or two left unsolved. I will just lie here for a while with my eyes closed. Gerard will find me in the morning and think me dead. But I won’t be. I’ll still be here listening and thinking - teeheehee!

Chapter
28

THE END OF EVERYTHING

‘Is
he dead?’

‘Yes. He must have slipped away
in the night. I found him this morning.’

‘
Found - or helped?’

‘I don’t think he suffered. He had a smile on his face
at the end.’

‘So it
is finished. No more riddles for him to solve. But what of his notes?’

‘I have them.’

‘Did you read them?’

‘That’s just it - there is nothing to read.’

‘What do you mean, nothing to read? He wrote for months.’

‘His name.’

‘What?’

‘He wrote his name. Hundreds of times. He thought he was writing a great history but in the end it was just his name. Walter de Ixworth,
over and over. He really was gaga after all.’

‘And there’s nothing else?
No copy?’

‘None that I have been able to discover. I have kept the closest watch as you know.’

‘Still, better to let me have them. I will destroy them properly in case he has left some code.’

‘Of course, my lord - just as soon as the proper rites have been observed. Abbot Henry will insist upon it. It would be improper to rush things - and suspicious.’

‘You’re not trying to hoodwink me are you, Gerard? You wouldn’t be the first monk to suffer for his treachery.’

‘No treachery, my lord. I am as keen to destroy his work as you are.
But there is one matter you could clarify before you go: what really happened to your cousin Nicholas.’

‘I thought you said
there were no notes.’

‘Words,
Lord Richard. He told me the story in words. Words evaporate as soon as they are spoken. Surely it can do no harm to tell me now. Surely I have earned the right having done your bidding. It was after all his final quest. It would be a pity not to honour it.’

‘Good God Gerard, I do believe you’ve grown fond of the old quack.’

‘Just tying loose ends. Do you - does anybody know the true identity of Nicholas’s parents?’

‘Who do you think
they were?’

‘I really have no idea. I thought at first it might be the countess, but she was too old. And Adela could not have been mother to both Richard and Nicholas. Abbot Samson possibly for the father. Or the blind priest, Ralf.’

‘I can see you have been doing your homework, Gerard. Well the answer is nobody knows who Nicholas’s parents were. Those who did know are all dead. In all likelihood he was the child of some villein couple from one of the Warenne manors who happened to be the right age and who bore a close physical resemblance. Possibly even a bastard line of their own - there have been so many there would be no shortage of candidates.’

‘Then forgive me,
my lord, but why was the boy kept for fourteen years? If he was of villein stock, why take him in at all? What possible use did he serve?’

‘If you haven’t yet worked that out Gerard then you’re no better a detective than Brother Walter was. But let me ask you this: our present liege lord
and king, Henricus Tercius, is not popular at the moment. There is even talk of possible revolt and a return to the baronial wars of his father, King John. If there was the least hint of imbecility in his family just imagine the sport his enemies would make of that.’

‘So you’re saying that Nicholas was of royal lineage after all? He was truly King John’s son?’

‘No. He was as I said, a mere peasant’s brat.’

‘Well can you at least tell me what happened to him after he
disappeared?’

‘
Nicholas? Nothing happened to him. I am still here. Richard, on the other hand, died last year on a farm belonging to the Abbot of Bury where he’d been living for forty years - tending pigs.’