Unholy Innocence Page 14

  Oh yes, my role in life at last to emulate Judas. I don’t know whether I was still light-headed from lack of sleep or simply bewildered, but my only thought at that moment was to regret that such a beautiful object as the casket should have been so wantonly destroyed.

  Chapter 13

  INCARCERATION

  The abbey gaol is on the first floor of Abbot Anselm’s tower, a few yards behind the west entry of the abbey church. As prisons go it isn’t such a bad place. It’s high up so it’s dry and quite spacious, certainly roomy enough to share with my fellow occupants of rats, bats and pigeons. The bats can be a bit of a nuisance since their droppings rain down on me in a constant drizzle as I lie here on my filthy rushes, but otherwise they are no trouble. They hang upside down in the rafters most of the day occasionally squabbling over the available space like bad-tempered siblings in a bed and then as darkness falls they fly out into the night to do…whatever it is bats do at night. I can attest that the notion they get tangled in the hair is a myth, not that my tonsure provides them with much in which to entangle themselves. In fact, they never seem to bump into anything no matter how dark it gets; their nocturnal aerobatics being far superior to those of birds. How they achieve it is indeed a mystery. I can see why they have a reputation for possessing supernatural powers.

  My gaoler is an equally harmless fellow though his conversation is somewhat limited. This is because he had his tongue removed as a boy for slandering his parish priest – at least I think that’s what he said. Being both illiterate and mute he is ideally suited to his chosen profession since it is impossible for a prisoner to communicate through him with the outside world. Indeed, a man could rot in this place for years and no-one would hear about it. He sits outside my cage in his little cubby-hole drinking and farting which he can do with amazing facility and laughs with great gusto at each noisome explosion. The louder and smellier the expulsion the more amused he is by it. I think he would like me to compete but I haven’t his mastery of the art.

  I get a good view of the town from up here. I can see the whole length of Churchgate Street right up to the little chapel at the top where we monks congregate on feast days. If I’m still here next Tuesday I can help celebrate the Feast of Saint Vitus who is the patron saint of dancers, epileptics and rheumatics. Maybe they won’t have a procession for Saint Vitus this year what with the King being in the town. It can get a bit chaotic, all that gyrating about, nothing as refined as the stately court dances we used to have in my father’s great hall in Ixworth. Or if I’m still here on the 24th I can join in the Feast of St John the Baptist. The night before the feast a leg bone is taken from a - hopefully dead - frog, cleaned and dried over a fire of rowan and then powdered and sprinkled on food as a love potion. I’m told it works. In some places in the north young people jump through the embers of the fire to be blessed, then everyone joins in the dancing until dawn.

  Do I sound bitter? Well yes, as a matter of fact, I am. De Saye’s men took great delight in hauling me off into this miserable hole despite the protests of my fellow monks. For all they may despise me – and this morning in the chapterhouse several of my brethren would have happily seen me flogged to within an inch of my life – it is another matter for someone else to be doing the flogging. The point is that Samson should never have allowed me to be incarcerated at all. De Saye isn’t the Baron of the Liberty of Saint Edmund, Samson is. Not even the Sheriff of Suffolk has jurisdiction here. If Samson had wanted me released there was nothing de Saye could have done about it. Clearly I have displeased his grace in some way even though I had nothing to do with sending him to Mildenhall and have been working hard to limit the hysteria over this boy martyr – not helped, incidentally, by my erstwhile assistant, Jocelin, who is turning out to be a snake in the grass. He came to see me a couple of hours ago. Conscience made him do that.

  ‘H-h-h-h-how are y-y-you?’

  ‘Jocelin, if you’re going to stutter there’s no point in your being here. I can talk gibberish with him.’ I jutted a thumb towards my gaoler who was slouched, semi-comatose with booze, in the corner. But I immediately regretted saying it. ‘I’m sorry, that was unkind. I’m fine. Thank you for asking – and thank you for coming.’

  He took a deep breath. ‘I n-never s-said I didn’t think M-matthew was a m-martyr,’ he stammered shamefaced. That was presumably a reference to his falling on his knees in the chapterhouse before the grotesque corpse of that unfortunate child who was still being murdered even in death.

  ‘And you do, don’t you? Despite what you saw at his autopsy.’

  He winced and lowered his eyes.

  ‘Jocelin,’ I said, ‘you know as well as I do that those marks Egbert pointed out were not on the body when we examined it. Someone is playing games.’

  ‘I’ve heard it s-said that exceptionally holy people can spontaneously show the marks of the cross on their own bodies as proof of God’s love and of their own p-purity.’

  ‘You think that’s what they are on Matthew’s body?’

  He frowned. ‘I don’t know, I don’t know. But why not? Just think - Matthew as the first stigmatic saint. It is b-bound to happen somewhere one day. Why not today, here, now?’ He shook his head passionately. ‘Why are you always so d-dismissive?’

  I sighed and sat down cross-legged on the floor and motioned Jocelin to do the same. ‘I don’t dismiss it, Jocelin. I long for a sign from God as much as you do. Sometimes I long for it so much it hurts inside me. But there is knavery afoot here. That so-called oath that Matthew’s mother was supposed to have sworn. You said yourself it was copied virtually word for word from Thomas of Monmouth’s account of Saint William’s martyrdom. Egbert and his friends are so keen on having a martyr they will stoop to any trickery to secure it.’

  ‘Even sacrilege? Surely they would not so d-deceive themselves?’

  ‘Sometimes when we want to believe something so badly and are convinced of it so thoroughly we can be tempted to make the facts fit even when they are telling us the opposite. It is then that we must be on our guard lest our enthusiasm overwhelm our reason.’ I looked at his earnest face and spoke seriously: ‘This is no academic dispute, brother. A man’s life depends on our actions. We must follow the evidence wherever it leads however painful that path and however much it contradicts our sincerest held beliefs.’

  ‘What about those chains in Isaac’s cellar?’ he pointed out. ‘Why k-keep them if not to use them?’

  ‘The house was a former butcher’s shop. Isaac told us that himself.’

  ‘Well he would say that, wouldn’t he? M-maybe it wasn’t a butcher’s shop at all. Or maybe it’s butchery of a different kind.’

  ‘But the shaft,’ I protested with exasperation. ‘It was obvious that’s where the carcasses were delivered in times past. And those chains were decades old, full of rust.’

  He shook his head. ‘Perfectly serviceable – as restraints for a child. And M-matthew was restrained – we both s-saw that.’

  ‘But we come back to the fact that the marks on the body we saw in Chapter were freshly manufactured, nothing to do with chains. There were no puncture wounds on the boy’s head when we examined him, only bruising. Nothing on the hands or on the feet, only on the wrists.’

  Jocelin was wearing that exalted look on his face again. ‘A sign of divine favour?’

  I sighed in resignation. We were going around in circles. There was no point theorizing. Isaac’s life hung on the question and the only way it was going to be answered was to find out who the real murderer was. For saint or not, there was no doubt that Matthew’s life had been taken by someone’s hand.

  ‘You know the stories are growing, don’t you?’ he said quietly.

  ‘Stories? What stories?’

  ‘Of m-miracles.’

  My heart sank. ‘What miracles?’

  ‘It is being said Matthew was a devout child, even while still in his cradle.’

  ‘That’s nonsense,’ I scoffed, but I could see from J
ocelin’s face that he was in earnest. ‘Go on, then. Tell me. What miracle is this babe supposed to have performed?’

  His eyes lit up – bless him, he couldn’t help himself. ‘It seems that as a baby he had been set to lying in his crib in the garden while his mother was b-busy in the house. A horse broke loose from a neighbouring field and g-galloped wildly at the child set to trample it to death. B-but Matthew calmly made the sign of the cross and the horse was immediately quietened. His mother came out to find it passively eating the g-grass at Matthew’s feet.’

  I almost laughed at the absurdity of it. ‘And you believe this? Where did this story come from? Was it in that fabricated oath of his mother’s? No. Has she mentioned it to anybody? Again, no. I bet she doesn’t even know the tale.’

  A sort of sad smile spread across Jocelin’s face. ‘This is how it was with Robert, I remember. Stories begin. One m-man tells another and soon everyone has a d-different version of the tale. A divine impulse seizes them. They rush to s-see and they find what they seek: An innocent child m-martyred for his purity. They see the injustice. They are indignant and angry. Then they look for someone to blame. Only that time there was no s-single suspect so all Jews were blamed. A-and then came the Palm Sunday massacre as just retribution.’

  I shuddered at his words. They reminded me that I still needed to ask about his own treatise on the miracles of Saint Robert and whether he’d been into my cell to remove it and along with it Isaac’s testament hidden inside. But how to broach the subject without giving away its significance? If he’d found it he surely would have mentioned it by now. But if not Jocelin then someone else must have taken it – most likely the awful Geoffrey de Saye. Oh, it was a mess and I could see no way of it being resolved, certainly not with me incarcerated in this place.

  ‘Jocelin,’ I said earnestly. ‘I’m doing no good in here. I have to get out. You must use your influence with Samson to get him to release me.’

  ‘M-my influence?’ he asked, alarmed.

  ‘Yes. He thinks more highly of you than you think. He will listen to you. Tell him I know who killed the boy. Tell him if he wants to avoid more bloodshed he must let me out to prove it. Tell him anything you like but get me out of here.’

  ‘D-do you know who d-did it?’ he asked in awe.

  ‘No,’ I said as the gaoler belched and snorted in his drunken sleep behind Jocelin. ‘But I’m never going to find out stuck in here.’

  *

  I was still very tired but I was also hungry, thirsty and with a wind whipping through the open belfry I was also growing cold despite it being a balmy June night. I’d tried to follow the order of the services throughout the day as the bell for each office sounded. I could see my fellow monks filing in and out of the abbey just a few feet below me and despite knowing I was there not one deigned to look up. During the day the men working on the scaffolding of Samson’s towers were at eye level. One threw an apple core at me. It came straight in through the narrow window, bounced off my naked pate and his colleagues cheered as he hit his mark. Later, a few of the pilgrims down below stood about gawping up at my cell wondering if there was anyone in here. I was tempted out of boredom to moan like a ghoul just to see their reaction which I could easily do since there is a marvellous echo up here. But I decided against. My friend the mute gaoler probably wouldn’t have approved. He might even have gagged me.

  I was frustrated but I had to learn patience and could only hope that Jocelin was working to secure my release. I must say I prayed more devoutly in my solitude than ever I did in collective prayer in the choir. I was beginning to see the attraction of the austere life of the anchorite, walled up as he was in his cell for years on end. Or perhaps as Saint Simeon Stylites perched on high atop his lonely finger of rock. It wasn’t as high here in the tower but the principle was the same.

  There again, perhaps not. I’m not good with heights. Bad enough sitting up here barely twenty feet off the ground. Maybe in year or so I could get permission to visit the new order of secluded monks at Witham in Somerset, though from the sound of it I wouldn’t get to see any of the inmates since they don’t even have contact with each other let alone visitors from outside. But it did sound very peaceful – just a bed, a lectern, a tiny garden and the perpetual solitude of your own thoughts oblivious to the intrigues of the outside world.

  Who was I kidding? It must be the lack of food addling my brain. I’d go mad if I didn’t have someone to talk to. Even as a child I was always being chastised for a chatterbox. I could no more change my character than I could control these damned bat-droppings. The mind plays tricks when it is left to listen to itself and I had much to keep a clear head about. It is a wise man who knows his own limitations and I have not the strength of will to live the life of a hermit. But I admire those who can.

  Oh, come on Jocelin, hurry up. What was he doing? Stuttering some apologetic tale to Samson no doubt. I need to get out of here: There is so much to do. De Saye had taken the casket from my cell and presumably the testament along with it. I could not even admit to the testament’s existence for fear of antagonising Samson further, having already lied about the casket. If he found out I also had Isaac’s testament and had not told him he might keep me in this filthy hole for a year. Oh, it’s so frustrating just sitting here unable to do anything.

  Hold fast. What’s this coming down the hill now? I recognize that rolling gait even in this dim light. It’s Mother Han again. It’s well past curfew. What’s she doing out at this time? I swear if she is back plying her wicked trade in the abbey grounds again I will have her arrested and gaoled – just as soon as I get out of the place myself. She’s stopping, looking about her – furtively. Damn these prison bars. I can’t quite see what she’s doing. Aha, now she’s gone beneath me. I’m sure she’s going in through the tower gate again. I’ll go to the other side and see her come out. No, wait - she’s stopped. What’s she doing now? My God, she’s coming up here!

  *

  I was right. Mother Han had indeed entered the tower and had climbed the stairs in order to keep a rendezvous she clearly had arranged some time before. She had come to visit my gaoler for which purpose good taste and limited vocabulary prevent me from attempting to describe. I was appalled at what they were doing. Even King John had not been so shameless as to actually perform in front of me. The sight – and the sound – of those two going at it like dogs up against the bars of my cage was enough to confirm a man in celibacy for life. If ever I have another night trying to resist carnal temptation I will need only to conjure visions of Mother Han and my gaoler grunting and pawing each other to dampen the fiercest ardour. God in Heaven, is the whole world, from these two rutting mongrels all the way up to the King, obsessed with this one thought? The woman must be in her seventh decade and the man hardly less. They took not the slightest notice of me watching – or rather, trying not to watch – from the other side of the bars whence I had retreated to the furthest corner of my realm. And when they had finished they calmly sat down and proceeded to share the meal that Mother Han had brought wrapped in her shawl. She was still wearing her eye-patch, I noticed, which she now took off and lay to one side. Her supposed bad eyesight was evidently just another of her shams. There was nothing wrong with her eye. I snorted loudly. I don’t know why I never guessed.

  ‘Oh, it’s you,’ she said squinting at me through the half-light. ‘Thought I recognised that snooty laugh.’

  ‘I was merely lamenting just how far we have fallen since Adam was expelled from the Garden of Eden.’

  ‘Were you so?’ She looked about her. ‘And how far would you say you’ve fallen to have landed here?’

  ‘About as low as it gets,’ I nodded drawing my robes about me and eyeing her mutton chop covetously. She was making some disgusting noises as she chomped. I wrinkled my nose. How anybody could eat like that was beyond me.

  ‘Hungry?’

  ‘No.’

  She grunted and carried on chewing. She must have known I ha
dn’t eaten since breakfast, her gaoler-lover not having offered me so much as a taste of his drink - not that I would have accepted any if he had. It smelled like the stuff shepherds pour on sheep to kill ticks. But Mother Han’s juicy chop was another matter. I looked at it dripping with fat and dangling provocatively just inches from my nose feeling my mouth begin to water. She belched again, wiped her own mouth on her sleeve and then held the half-eaten mutton joint through the bars. After a moment’s hesitation I grabbed it and started to gorge. Within a minute I had the bone stripped clean. It tasted like ambrosia.

  ‘You’ve caused quite a ruckus up on pennypinch hill.’

  I took her to mean the area of select dwellings above the noise and smells of the town where Isaac ben Moy had his house. ‘Why do you call it that?’ I asked.

  ‘Because that’s what they are what live up there. The mean beggars. Folk with too much money. Pennypinchers I call ’em. Your Jew friend for one.’

  ‘Isaac Moy? He’s not my friend. He’s not even a client. I hardly know him in fact.’

  ‘That’s what Peter said the day our Lord was hanged.’

  ‘No really, I don’t know him,’ I insisted. ‘I only met him a few days ago.’

  ‘Yep, he said that too.’ She wiped a filthy sleeve across her mouth.

  I pursed my lips. ‘Mother Han, if you’ve come to torment me I’m sorry to disappoint you. More accomplished practitioners are already on the job.’

  ‘I haven’t come for you at all,’ she snorted.

  ‘So I saw,’ I said eyeing the dumb gaoler who was gnawing happily away at another bone in his corner.

  ‘Well, he is my husband. I can’t stay and he can’t leave. What would you have us do?’

  ‘Your husband?’ I said nearly regurgitating my meal.

  ‘Yes, my husband,’ she insisted indignantly. ‘Hard to credit me with a husband, isn’t it? Well, the father of my children at any rate. Same thing,’ she sniffed.

  That’s who the gaoler reminded me of, the young man on the market stall. I knew there was something familiar about him. Maybe these two really were husband and wife.