‘You had better come in and dry off, sir.’
Though Falconer was more used to English vernacular, enough French was spoken in higher circles in England that he could still comprehend the invitation. He peered through the gloomy doorway at the figure silhouetted in the open entrance to the convent. The man was tall and wore the habit of a Trinitarian — a white robe emblazoned with a cross of which the upright was red and the crossbar blue. He ducked through the archway out of the rain.
‘Many thanks, Brother. It seems that Paris is as wet as Oxford, though I am thankful for the lack of mud in the streets.’
The monk closed the door behind him.
‘Ah, you are a master at Oxford, then, that other hotbed of Averroism.’
He made reference to an interpretation of Aristotle’s theories now disapproved of but close to Falconer’s own heart. He was about to argue with the monk when he spotted the hint of a smile on the man’s lips. He was being teased and refrained from rising to the bait, returning the jibe.
‘Not if your bishop has his way.’
The monk laughed and waved his hand dismissively, stepping through a small door set in the thickness of the convent’s wall. He quickly re-emerged with a coarse cloth in his hand.
‘Here, take this and dry yourself.’ He handed the cloth to Falconer, who began to dry himself as the monk carried on talking. ‘There are many serious false assertions made by Aristotle, but they will matter little to you if you catch a chill and die.’
Falconer vigorously towelled off his wet hair and face, and replied.
‘I could debate with you long and hard about the doctrine of souls and monopsychism, but I fear my errand is more mundane. And not a little melancholy.’
‘You have come about the boy.’
It was a statement, not a question, from the monk, who took the wet cloth back from Falconer. William quickly saw that the monk had assumed he had some official status as he was of the same nation as Paul Hebborn. He didn’t bother to correct the mistake. It would make seeing the body all the easier, and, after all, he was not lying. He had come to see the boy.
He nodded sadly.
‘Yes, I have.’
‘He is in the side chapel. Follow me.’
Falconer followed the white-robed monk into the church, his wet boots squelching on the tiled floor. The interior rose high above his head in a series of round arches set on sturdy pillars. Nothing disturbed the silence except the sound of their respective footsteps. They entered one of the side chapels, an ill-lit chamber where the cold made it quite suitable for the storage of a dead body. When the monk stepped aside, Falconer saw the corpse on a bier before the altar. The greyish shaft of light — heavy with dust motes — that filtered through the small circular window above only added to the melancholy scene. The body was shrouded in a white sheet that bore ominous dark stains on it. Reluctantly, Falconer drew the sheet aside. The sight made his gorge rise.
The poor boy’s skull had been smashed and his face was distorted by the impact with the ground. But even so, Falconer could discern a look of horror in the bulging eyes, the pupils nothing but dark pools. Mercifully, the broken body was still clad in a particoloured surcoat over a white tunic, held tight by a belt from which hung the boy’s purse. The brightness of the surcoat and the red woollen hose that were on Hebborn’s legs suggested he was of noble birth. In Paris, as in Oxford, wealthy clerks were at pains to show off their station in life. But still, all his family’s wealth had not saved him from a terrible death.
The patient monk whispered something that Falconer did not catch.
‘I’m sorry. What did you say?’
‘I was asking if you had seen enough. Only it will soon be nones, and I must go and pray for his soul.’
‘Indeed.’ Falconer paused for a moment, as if moved by the sight of the boy who in fact he had never met. ‘I wonder if I may have a moment alone with… Paul.’
The white-clad monk bowed his head in acquiescence and silently glided from the chapel. A short while later, Falconer followed him out. In response to the monk’s enquiry about the disposition of the body, he hesitated. The Trinitarian monk clearly still imagined he was somehow related to the boy, or acting on behalf of the family.
‘I am sure his family will be in touch very soon. Thank you for your time, Brother.’
He hustled out of the convent before any more embarrassing questions could be asked of him. Hidden in his sleeve was the purse that had hung at Paul Hebborn’s waist.
‘You stole a dead person’s scrip?’
Thomas, back from his long session noting down Roger Bacon’s thoughts, was sitting opposite Falconer at the long refectory table in St Victor’s Abbey. They were taking a modest supper, and though no one else sat close to them his tones were low. But he could still hardly believe what William had said that had caused his outburst. Falconer, for his part, soaked his crust in some ale and shovelled the sweet softness into his mouth. He smiled and swallowed before replying.
‘He no longer had any use for it, and it may yet tell us something about his death. I have not yet had chance to look inside it, but we can do that after vespers.’
Symon paled.
‘We? So I am to be involved in this sacrilege, am I?’
Falconer leaned across the scarred oak table and took the stale bread that his former student had left in front of him. He held it up questioningly. And when Thomas, with a sigh, ceded the scrap to him, Falconer repeated his previous manoeuvre, and chewed on another ale-soaked crust.
‘You know you are as curious as I am about this. You just don’t have the nerve to do what I did.’
Thomas shook his head wearily and watched as Falconer rose from the table, wiping his fingers down the front of his shabby black robe.
‘Come. Let us return to the abbey guest house and see what we have recovered.’
They left the refectory and walked along the south side of the cloister to the passage that gave out on to the separate buildings that made up the abbey’s infirmary and guest quarters. The two of them shared a room there, which in barely two months Falconer had cluttered with all sorts of curiosities and texts. Indeed, it had begun to resemble his own solar back in Aristotle’s Hall in Oxford. Thomas, who preferred tidiness around him, guessed that it made the regent master feel more at home in his temporary sojourn in Paris. As for himself, he felt like an interloper. But he fancied he was such an ascetic that it shouldn’t matter. He could make his home wherever he could lay his head. And now he was so fired up with his new task of recording Doctor Mirabilis’s thoughts that any discomfort seemed to pale into insignificance. But he would have liked to have discussed what the friar had said to him today after Falconer had left.
‘Listen, young Thomas,’ said Bacon, ‘and I will tell you about the boundless corruption everywhere. Even the Court of Rome is torn by the deceit and fraud of unjust men. The whole Papal Court is defamed of lechery, and gluttony is lord of all.’
Thomas had gone pale at such words being spoken out loud, and he was not surprised that the Franciscan order had kept Bacon under lock and key so long. He had been anxious to test Falconer with his friend’s words. But William was more intent on examining Paul Hebborn’s scrip. He was already pulling the drawstring and tipping the contents out on to a space he had cleared on the small table in the centre of the room.