Dunheved finished his ministrations. He murmured about changing his vestments and hastily left. Both king and favourite had apparently dressed hurriedly in long purple velvet sleeveless robes over shirt and hose, their feet pushed into soft buskins. They slipped and slithered on the muck-strewn yard. Both men were unshaven, hair bedraggled, their eyes bleary as if they’d spent the previous evening deep in their cups. Gaveston crouched beside the corpse. He moved Lanercost’s head and fingered the ghastly bruises on the face, neck, chest and legs. I had already concluded that Lanercost must have fallen sheer from the tower and hit the sloping roof of the church before tumbling over for the second long fall to the ground. Gaveston stretched across and tipped me under the chin; tears brimmed his eyes.
‘A fall?’ he asked.
‘Presumably, my lord.’
‘Presumably!’ Gaveston sneered. ‘Or murder, or suicide? I suppose I will have to accept whatever that coxcomb of a coroner Ingelram Berenger decides.’
I stared back. I shared the same low opinion of Berenger as he did but I had the sense to keep a still tongue in my head. The king’s coroner was the king’s coroner; he would do what he had to and so would I.
‘My lord,’ I whispered, ‘can you tell me why Lanercost should be in the bell tower?’
Gaveston glanced up. ‘I don’t know,’ he replied. ‘I haven’t talked to him for the last two days.’
Gaveston could be a liar, but I sensed he was telling the truth. Yet there was something else, a look of guilt mingled with his compassion. As if to avoid my scrutiny, he returned to the corpse. I got to my feet. Two knight bannerets from the king’s chamber arrived, fully harnessed and armoured, as if the Scots had attacked, to disperse the crowd. The morning was chilly after a long night’s rain. Lay brothers had wheeled fiery braziers into the great yard. The charcoal crackled noisily, the sparks flying up. A bell tolled deep in the friary. Oveners from a nearby bakery drifted across whilst I studied the mangled corpse of that young man who’d fallen, been pushed or jumped. Gaveston rose to his feet. I caught a look of profound sadness in those beautiful eyes, lips twisted as he fought back his grief. I sensed the Gascon’s deep desolation. Here he was, ‘the king’s own brother’, Earl of Cornwall, royal favourite, yet he was hiding deep in a Franciscan friary in York. Nevertheless, even here he wasn’t safe. I had no proof, just a suspicion that murder had followed Lanercost into that tower and sent him whirling to his death. Gaveston sensed the same. Three years ago he had been cock of the walk, Lord of Westminster, a man who could bring anyone down, but now even his own squires were not safe. Isabella was correct: the glass was darkening. God knows what the future held!
A scurrier came hurrying across. He knelt on the rain-soaked cobbles before the king and whispered his message.
‘My lord.’ Edward stepped closer, one ringed hand extended to grasp his favourite. ‘Peter, my brother.’ His voice carried an urgency. ‘Other matters await; we have news from the south. Mathilde, ma coeur.’ Edward’s face grew soft, smiling, full of that lazy charm that could so easily disarm you. ‘For me, Mathilde,’ he whispered. He fumbled in the wallet beneath his coat, drew out a small cast of the secret seal and handed it to me. ‘Your licence. Search, Mathilde, find the truth behind this. Now, Peter. .’
Gaveston crouched down again. He pressed his lips against Lanercost’s blood-splattered hair, a mother’s kiss. He stroked the side of the dead man’s face, smiled tearfully up at me, rose and followed the king across the yard. Father Prior agreed to have Lanercost’s corpse taken to the corpse house. I slipped the wax seal into my gown pocket and walked back into the church. As far as I could see, the nave stretching up to the sanctuary was deserted. Isabella and her companions must have left by the coffin door. I walked deeper into the darkness and stared round. An ancient, hallowed place, the shadows lurking in the corner ready to creep out once the light faded. The incensed air was full of memories of plainchant, bells and the sacred words of the mass. All now lay deathly quiet. Battered statues of angels and saints, their faces bathed in candle-glow, stared stonily down at me. Gargoyles grimaced through the gloom. I closed my eyes. Earlier today Lanercost came into this church. He walked across into the gloomy recess and up those tower steps to the belfry. Why? Did he feel guilty at his brother’s murder and committed suicide? Or had he been enticed in, trapped and hurled to his death? But why should someone murder Lanercost, one of the Aquilae Petri? I started. The squeak and slither of mice scurrying in the shadowed light echoed eerily.
‘Good morrow, Mistress Mathilde.’
I whirled round, hand to my mouth, as the Beaumonts sauntered out from the gloomy corner where the baptismal font stood. All three were swathed in rich green cloaks. I realised they must have been meeting secretly in that deserted nook of the church.
‘My lords, my lady.’ I bowed, using courtesy to mask my alarm.
‘We were here in the church.’ Henry pulled the muffler down from across his mouth.
‘Of course you were, my lord. Praying?’
‘We all must pray, Mathilde.’
‘Some more than others, my lord?’
‘True.’ Lady Vesci smiled. She came forward and grasped my hands tightly as if in friendship. In truth she wanted me to stay. She pulled her face into a look of concern. ‘That poor squire, one of Gaveston’s henchmen?’ Her voice betrayed duplicity; she was in the same camp as Gaveston, but I doubted if she was his friend.
‘What happened?’ Louis asked in that sanctimonious voice some priests adopt, as if they consider the laity as witless as a flock of pigeons.
‘Domine,’ I replied, freeing my hands. ‘Lanercost apparently fell from the belfry.’
‘Why was he there?’ Louis whispered.
‘He did not tell me,’ I retorted. ‘I have yet to search, but surely, if you were in church, my lords, you must have seen him enter the bell tower?’
All three shook their heads in unison. On any other occasion I would have found it amusing, but the Beaumonts were never amusing, just dangerous in their vaulting ambition. I bowed.
‘I must go.’
‘My lady.’ Sir Henry moved closer, green eyes sharp and unsmiling. ‘Is my lord Gaveston secretly treating with the Scots?’
‘For all I know,’ I replied, ‘he could be treating with the lord Satan. He does not discuss such matters with me. I have other duties.’
‘So do we all.’ Henry smiled. ‘But. .’ He just shrugged and gestured dismissively at me.
Again I bowed and walked over to the darkening recess leading to the door of the bell tower. I paused, my hand on the latch, then turned and glanced back. All three Beaumonts had followed me and were now standing close, scrutinising me carefully. I recalled certain information Isabella had given me. The Beaumonts were powerful lords north of the border. During the old king’s time they’d been given extensive estates, manor houses, castles, barns and granges. I realised why they were interested in Gaveston. If Edward settled with Bruce, what would happen to their estates?
‘I recognise your interest, my lord, about Gaveston and Scottish affairs, but that does not concern me.’
Henry shrugged. ‘One day, Mathilde, it might! My lord Gaveston’s hours are surely numbered. His grace the king cannot wander up and down the roads of this country like some witless pilgrim or hapless mendicant. He should be in the south, at Westminster.’
‘Then, my lord,’ I retorted, ‘that is a matter for you to tell him, not me. I bid you adieu.’
I pressed down the latch, the door swung open and I walked in. The stairwell was so dark I almost screamed at the shape that rose out of the gloom. I stepped back. The grey-garbed lay brother looked like a gargoyle come down from the walclass="underline" a long, thin, bony face, popping eyes, a mouth that never kept still and ears sticking out from the side of his head like the handles of a jug. He scratched his bald head.