Plague Land (7 page)

I let the balm slowly cool the inflammation. ‘I need to talk to you about my father,’ I said, as he wrapped a bandage around my ankle.

Peter sighed. ‘Why, Oswald? Your father’s sins are not worth worrying about. Don’t concern yourself with them.’

‘But I should know the truth about Father. Particularly if everybody else does.’

‘It’s just gossip. And let me tell you. Only one tenth of village gossip is ever true.’

Then he accidentally dropped the coil of lint and we watched it roll along the floor, unravelling on its way across the slabs marking the dead of my family. Huffing, he bent down to pick it up again. ‘It won’t be easy for you to step into your father’s shoes, Oswald. The man was like a beech tree. He cast such deep shade that nothing could grow beneath him. You will be a much better lord than he, but you must give yourself time.’

‘What time is there?’

‘Plenty. You are young.’

‘William and Richard would have been ready.’

Peter sat up again. ‘I don’t think so. From what I knew of your brothers, they were as unprepared for this role as you are. At least you had some years at the abbey. It gave you the chance to grow in your own light.’ He took my hand and smiled. ‘They were good times, weren’t they, Oswald? Before the Plague.’

I knew Peter’s tactics of old. He was trying to change the subject. ‘Does my father have bastard children about the estate?’ I asked him again. ‘Please tell me the truth.’

He dropped my hand and sighed. ‘Most probably, Oswald. Though only Our Lord knows for sure.’

‘Do you know their names?’

Peter bristled. ‘Of course I don’t! And take care to whom you ask that question, or face every scoundrel in the village claiming to be your sibling.’

‘Were Matilda and Alison Starvecrow his children?’ Peter looked away. ‘Matilda said such strange things to me, Brother.’

‘What type of things?’

‘Nothing that made sense exactly.’

‘That’s because the girl is possessed. You can’t believe a word she says. If I were her priest, I would cast out her demons.’

‘But is it possible she is my half-sister?’

‘I don’t think so.’ Then he took my hand again. ‘Listen to me, Oswald. I knew the Starvecrow family quite well, as I was often here, copying manuscripts from your father’s library. In my opinion Alison and Matilda resembled their own father well enough. I never heard anything to the contrary. And don’t forget I sometimes took confession at the parish church. Village gossip will reach a confessional quicker than a fly smells blood.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes, Oswald. Really.’

Despite Peter’s conviction, I continued to run over the events of the day until I felt wholly exhausted. I had always admired, if not loved, my father, but now his character was being unpicked like one of Clemence’s tapestries. I tried to rediscover my quiet place of calm, but the more I attempted to dismiss my thoughts, the more they took hold of me.

As I climbed into bed that night and pulled the linen sheet over my head, an agitation came upon me. Images flickered across my eyes, and answers to the riddle of this mystery formed and then drifted apart like faces in a cloudy sky. It was a hot and still night, the type that threatens thunder, but we could not open the windows in the bedchamber as the panes of glass were fixed into their lead fittings.

At this time of year I sometimes envied the villagers and their airy homes. Unable to afford glass, they simply covered a square in the wall with shutters – shutters that could easily be opened to the sky in the heat of a stifling night. (I am told, however, this arrangement is less agreeable in winter, when a person will often wake from sleep with ice upon their eyelashes.)

My bedfellow Peter was less understanding than usual about my restiveness, and kept telling me to go to sleep. At my repeated turning, he finally offered me a sleeping draught, which I accepted. So, instead of lying in bed determining that tomorrow I would make more progress with the investigation, I drifted off to sleep – wondering how far away the stars were from the earth, and why the moon waxes and wanes. Not even the imaginary howl of a distant wolf disturbed me.

I woke the next day feeling relaxed and calm, but it was not to last.

There had been another murder.

Chapter Four

Gilbert roused me with the news, and I thought I might still be dreaming – his words nothing more than a trick of the mind. But the roughness of Gilbert’s hand upon my arm and the foul smell of his morning breath soon pitched me into reality.

I pulled back the sheets. ‘Are you sure? I saw Matilda yesterday afternoon.’ I still felt giddy, since the sleeping draught had not fully drained from my head.

Gilbert grunted something and then added, ‘Mind you, they haven’t found her body.’

‘So how can we be sure she’s been murdered then?’

‘I’m told there’s blood all about the Starvecrow cottage, sire. Looks like a slaughterhouse.’ I jumped out of bed and Gilbert helped to lift my leather kirtle over my shirt. ‘Those dog heads must be getting bolder,’ he said. ‘Coming up to the village. We should set the fires tonight.’

‘There are no such creatures, Gilbert. Nobody in this household is to say so.’

Gilbert recoiled a little at my abruptness. ‘As you like, sire.’

I went to apologise, but stopped myself since I had noted Gilbert distrusted courtesy, especially from me. Instead I told him to saddle my horse.

‘Where’re you going, sire?’

‘To the Starvecrow cottage.’

When Gilbert had left the room, I tried to roll Brother Peter onto his side and wake him, since I needed his advice. But the man slept as deeply as a dormouse and would not be roused.

The air that morning was still, and no stiller than in that damp pocket of land that the Starvecrows inhabited. Even the stream, which had previously beaten its path so brutally through the nettles, now slipped silently down the hill like melted butter.

Looking down at the cottage in the hollow below, I wondered what new horrors awaited? But then a wave of hope washed over me, as the story could well be an exaggeration. Brother Peter was accurate in his assessment of village gossip. It was quite possible that Matilda had simply wandered away from the house, and this supposed ‘slaughterhouse’ might amount to nothing more than a few drops of blood upon the floor.

I had expected to meet a crowd at the cottage, but instead found myself to be completely alone. After tying my horse to a tree, I descended the damp bank of angelica and buttercups towards the cottage, making certain this time not to fall over.

Not only was there an absence of people about the place, but the pigs that had roamed about the garden yesterday were now nowhere to be seen. No doubt a neighbour had taken the beasts before anybody else had the opportunity. And then, shamefully, I found myself wondering who would actually inherit the possession of the Starvecrow property, if Matilda were actually dead? This land belonged to the manor, so there was only the livestock to be passed on – other than the ragged bits and pieces that furnished the cottage. And who would pay my rent, since nobody would choose to live in this place, when better quality plots were vacant? And lastly and most shamefully of all – I wondered who would pay my death heriot? As the owner of this land, there was at least one pig due to me.

I walked on and put these matters out of my mind, but nearing the cottage I could hear noises from within, and realised there was another person here after all. Treading silently towards the door, I wanted to spy upon this opportunistic thief. Peeping through a gap in the wood, it was the most unexpected person I saw inside the place. A man on his knees, feeling about in the rushes of the floor.

I would have watched him for longer, but the sun breached the clouds and threw my shadow across the room, revealing my presence. He turned to look at me. It was John of Cornwall. As surprised to see my face as I had been to see his.

For once I had the advantage of the man.

He stumbled quickly to his feet as I opened the door fully. ‘My lord. I was looking for the footprints of the beast. There are some outside.’

I ignored this claim and walked across the threshold. ‘I’m told Matilda Starvecrow is missing.’

Cornwall nodded.

I looked about, but it was difficult to see very much inside this gloomy abode. The smell overcame me again, and I took some mint from my belt – a bunch that I had picked on my way down the slope in expectation of the unpleasant stench. Crushing a few of the leaves, I inhaled their fresh and sharp scent, prompting Cornwall to look at me with such scorn that I dropped the leaves to the floor.

‘I can’t see the blood they speak of,’ I said quickly. ‘Where is it?’

Cornwall pointed to an area near the one and only bed. ‘It’s here,’ he said. As my eyes became accustomed to the dark, I could see the bedclothes were indeed stained with spots of blood – though the marks were difficult to make out against the dirty grey of the woollen blanket. Looking closer I saw a viscous puddle of blood beneath the bed frame, its surface peppered with soil and dirt.

‘I covered her blood with dust,’ boasted Cornwall. ‘To prevent the flies from causing a nuisance.’ He pronounced the word ‘flies’ with a long and peculiar drawl that I imagined he thought sounded refined.

Kneeling to study the puddle, there was more blood than I had originally supposed. It had pooled into a small raised mound, bound together with the dust and dirt of the floor. ‘You may have destroyed some evidence by doing this, Cornwall,’ I told him.

‘It was simply blood, sire. You could tell nothing more from it.’

‘Maybe.’ I studied the bed frame for a while. ‘I think Matilda must have been attacked while she was sleeping.’

He nodded. ‘That sounds likely, my lord. The beasts will creep up upon their victims while they sleep and bite their throats.’

I looked up at him. ‘Randomly?’

‘Sire?’

‘I just wondered why these creatures targeted two sisters, that’s all? When they could have attacked anybody in the village?’

Cornwall huffed. ‘There’s a simple explanation for that. The sisters did not attend mass regularly.’

I sighed and stood up. My hands felt sticky and hot. ‘I visited Matilda yesterday and there was a woman here. She didn’t wear a wimple, though she was certainly old enough to be married. Do you know her?’

I would tell you Cornwall gave a flicker of recognition at my description, but the light was too dark to draw any conclusion. ‘She doesn’t sound familiar to me,’ he said blankly. ‘But she cannot be connected with this crime.’

‘How so?’

‘Because the girl was killed by the beast.’

I was beginning to lose patience. ‘What is your substantiation for such a story, Cornwall?’

My tone was discourteous and he visibly inhaled at my words, his chest rising through his cape. ‘I believe you will find this proof enough.’ He led me to the door and pointed to some footprints in the mud – though it was impossible to narrow this spurious evidence down to anything more specific than an animal with padded feet.

‘I thought these creatures only carried the head of a dog,’ I said. ‘So why are we looking at paw prints?’

Cornwall fixed me with his eyes, light blue and cold. ‘They are shape changers, and can take any form between man and dog.’

I raised an eyebrow. ‘Really? I don’t remember learning about such phantoms at the abbey.’

‘Then your education remains incomplete, sire.’

‘Perhaps so. We concentrated upon the gospels and the learning of Latin and Greek. So there was little time for fairy tales.’

Cornwall sucked his teeth. ‘This is not a fairy tale. It is the work of the Devil. And I pray to Heaven for salvation.’

‘But will Heaven care?’ He flared his nostrils, but I didn’t regret my candour. He had riled me with his imaginary nonsense. A creature that could take any form between man and dog was a vague and illusive quarry – only suited for terrifying a group of simple villagers. People who had only just recovered from the horrors of a plague.

The argument might have continued, but the door blew open and a shard of sunlight suddenly illuminated a pathway to the area under Matilda’s bed, picking out a collection of bright dots scattered about in the rushes and dust. Leaning down, I quickly collected each one of them while the light still shone upon me, finding the objects to be ten small red beads.