John of Nottingham had explained that the religious teaching about the devil and his demons was based on a lack of understandingand the Church’s own bigoted animosity towards any kind of learning that was not founded in their own limited understandings. For his part, John asserted that he was as Christian as any man in Coventry. ‘Look to the world outside the church, Robert,and you find that there are more truths in this world than priests could ever comprehend.’
However, in the morning, as Robert walked the last few steps to Richard de Sowe’s house, his courage began to fail him. Fromthe street outside he could hear the hoarse screams from the shuttered window.
Robert tried to boost his quailing spirit by reminding himself that there was a splendid irony about de Sowe’s fate. Johnof Nottingham had a dry, acerbic wit, and Robert attempted to emulate it now. He reminded himself that throughout his lifethis man Richard de Sowe had been content to take what he could at every opportunity, willingly using force to steal fromthose weaker or poorer than he. So now the irony was, that his life was being ripped from him without the motivation even of theft. There was no revenge in this — nothing. The assassination of Richard de Sowe was nothing more than an experiment. If John and Robert achieved his death, it wouldbe the proof of the process and other victims could be worked upon.
But this first, slow death was hideous. Even as he listened to the demented screaming from the solar, he felt appalled to think of what he had achieved.
‘Please, in God’s name, help us!’ a servant blurted, and Robert jumped. ‘Are you all right, Master Robert?’
‘I am fine! Don’t interrupt my considerations!’ Robert snapped, and saw the man’s eyes drop as though cowed; but even as le Mareschal turned away, the thick black gown swirling about his feet, his cloak flapping, he was sure that he could feel theman’s eyes on him weighted with loathing, as though he knew what Robert had done. It made his heart shrivel. The penalty wouldbe fierce if he was discovered.
At first it had been the thought of what he might learn from his master that had prompted him. To take up a position witha necromancer was daunting only for a man who was not determined to learn all he might. For a man like Robert le Mareschal,the fact that Master John plainly knew much about succeeding through his use of magic was enough to lure him. With the knowledgehe would glean here, he would be able to follow his own ambition. Only after that came the desire for money.
Fifteen pounds! That was Robert’s payment, all in silver, simply for helping his master as he may. At the time it had seemedan enormous amount of money, and all of it just to help him to learn his master’s arts. The men were paying John of Nottinghamto assassinate some other men, that was all. Many of the foul churls from about the priory here at Coventry, those who scraped a living by their skills at begging from the doorman, would have accepted far less to overtakethe knight and slip a knife between his ribs, but that was not the point. Any man might kill another in a brash and bloodthirstymanner: the art here was to do so without anyone’s realising. To kill a man without touching him; to kill him while murderer and victim remained miles apart — thereinlay the skill.
The payment had been made in part, along with the seven pounds of wax and two ells of cloth, and soon afterwards Master Johnbegan instructing Robert in how to form the bodies. One was larger than the others, and wore a small crown encircling hishead. A second was shorter, a more corpulent fellow; the third taller, more slender, with a hawkish, cruel set to his features;another squat and fat … seven in all. Each wonderfully, if simply, fashioned to indicate whom they represented …
There was a lengthy shriek from the solar, and Robert crossed himself. The man was enduring the torments of the devil in there.
‘Come with me! You have to help us! He doesn’t recognise any of us — no one! Please!’ Robert recognised the shouting figure: Henry, Richard de Sowe’s steward, a short, thickset man with an almost bald head and gaunt, anxious features. Henry grabbed Robert’s arm and all but dragged him indoors, turning into the little hall, and striding through it to the stairway beyond. He mounted the stairs two at a time, gripping the rope to heave himself upwards, all the while clutching Robert’s sleeve,while the apprentice panted reluctantly behind him, and then they came into the room.
It was a spare chamber lit by clusters of guttering candles and a large charcoal brazier. Over the burning tallow Robert could smell the sourness of urine: the knight had lost all bodily control. The windows were fastened and shuttered to keepunhealthy odours from the sick man, but within the place there was an overwhelming, unpleasant stench. Robert had smelledenough dead and rotting flesh to recognise the foulness of decay.
When he had discussed the commission with Master John, it had seemed almost a game. The idea of killing a man from half amile distant had seemed — well, almost laughable. It was ridiculous. Even when they had taken the down payment, Robert feltmore like a mischievous student than the accomplice to a murder. Now he was being confronted with the fruits of his labours.
Steeling his heart, he took two paces into the room.
Sir Richard was straining, every muscle taut, as though the bed was drenched in a burning acid. He was a man in agony, boundto the posts of his bed with thongs, and gripped by four of his strongest servants, who tried to prevent his thrashing toovigorously and hurting himself still more. They gazed at Robert pleadingly, hoping that he might procure a swift release from Sir Richard’s anguish. Which indeed he would.
‘How is he?’ Robert asked now, and Henry looked at him as though he was mad.
Sir Richard de Sowe’s teeth were bared. Every sinew showed, from his neck to his skinny calves, and his red-rimmed eyes dartedfrom one to another of his retainers like a torture victim surveying his tormentors. There was blood at his mouth, at hiswrists, at his ankles. It had sprayed from his lips to spatter the breast of his stained linen shirt. With every jerk andtwitch of his body came a relentless moaning, like a dog’s whining anguish when its back was broken. Richard de Sowe knew, in that small space where rational thought still survived, that he was dying. Yet when his servantsglanced at him, he flinched as though not recognising any of them.
Robert recoiled as Sir Richard’s gaze flicked towards him. ‘My Christ!’
With the shutters firmly closed, the only light came from the tallow candles, but their fumes were those of animal pyres. It made the chamber a charnel house.
‘He was fine yesterday,’ the man who held Richard de Sowe’s head mumbled. ‘What could do this to him?’
‘Perhaps his humours are disturbed,’ Robert blurted. ‘Let me go to … I can ask Master John of Nottingham. He will know…’
Henry released Robert’s sleeve, as though recognising at last that the fellow before him was as unable to help his masteras he himself. He held Robert’s eyes for a long moment, before a gasp and shriek from the bed drew his attention once more.‘You ask him. Me, I’d think it more likely that only the devil himself could answer for this.’
Tavistock Abbey
As soon as he heard of the death, John de Courtenay knew that at last he would receive the reward he had craved. There wasno sorrow, no sadness at the ending of a life which had been so full of generosity and goodness, only a boundless relief. At last that God-bothering, cretinous obstacle to his advancement had been withdrawn.
For the rest of his life he would recall this moment: where he sat, how he felt, what the weather was like. Abbot Robert Champeauxwas dead!