‘Please excuse me, Golde.’
‘Of course, my lady. Thank you again.’
‘It was a pleasure to get out of the castle for once.’
‘I did appreciate it.’
‘So did I. But we are back where we started now.’
With the help of an ostler, she dismounted and went off in the direction of the keep to confront her husband. Golde wondered why Durand kept his domestic and official duties so rigidly separate. It led to obvious friction with his wife. Not for the first time, she was grateful to be married to a man who took her into his confidence instead of using his work as a means of shutting her out. Hers was one story, Maud’s quite another. As she was helped down from the saddle, she found herself wondering what kind of story Aelgar and Forne were about to write.
Ralph Delchard waited until they left the abbey before he started to hurl a stream of questions at Gervase Bret.
‘What did you learn?’ he said.
‘A great deal.’
‘Did they tell you anything new? What sort of boys were they?
How freely were you able to talk to them? Why did they climb up that ladder in the first place? Had they ever been up in the bell tower before? Well, Gervase? Aren’t you going to tell me?’
‘I will, when I’m allowed to speak.’
‘Who is preventing you from speaking?’
‘You, Ralph.’
‘Me?’ Righteous indignation showed. ‘Me?’
‘Who else?’
Ralph unleashed another flurry of questions at him and only stopped when Gervase burst into laughter. Seeing himself through his friend’s eyes at last, Ralph joined in the mirth. They mounted their horses and let them walk slowly off along the street.
‘Let us start again,’ suggested Gervase. ‘What did you find out?’
‘That I could never be a monk.’
‘Was that ever in doubt?’
‘It’s this rule of complete obedience. Abbot Serlo seems like an intelligent and caring man, but I could never treat him as my father and bow to his every wish. He was not easy to woo but I managed it in the end. He told me all I wished to know and even allowed me to view the body in the mortuary.’
‘Did that reveal anything?’
‘I think so.’
Ralph described his assessment of Brother Nicholas then explained how much the abbot had helped him. He considered the promise to provide a list of abbey tenants to be the greatest concession he had wrung out of Serlo. Gervase talked of his own findings.
‘It was a valuable meeting.’
‘Good.’
‘Give or take a few problems.’
‘What sort of problems?’
‘Canon Hubert was the main one,’ said Gervase. ‘It was he who asked me to act as his interpreter so he controlled the interview at the start. I had to wait some time before I could work in questions of my own, questions which Hubert would not have asked on his own.’
‘At least he got you close to those novices.’
‘I could not get too close, Ralph. There was another problem.’
‘What?’
‘The Precentor. Brother Frewine.’
‘What was he doing there?’
‘Protecting the novices. They obviously trusted him and looked for his support whenever the questions had them in retreat.
Brother Frewine is a good man, honest and fair-minded, but he did defend them well.’
‘Would you have got more out of them had he not been there?’
‘I don’t know. Kenelm and Elaf may have shut up completely.
They were both very shocked by what happened. I don’t think there will be any more midnight antics from them.’
‘So what did you glean from the wretches?’
Gervase told him in as much detail as he could remember.
Ralph was a restive listener, constantly throwing in additional questions or asking for fuller explanations. When his friend came to the end of his litany, Ralph thought about the pale, hairless body stretched out on the mortuary slab. Brother Nicholas was an enigma.
‘They didn’t like the way he looked at them?’
‘That’s what they said, Ralph.’
‘Why not?’
‘They were too embarrassed to explain.’
‘Could the Precentor throw no light on the subject?’
‘No,’ said Gervase. ‘He spoke fondly of the deceased.’
‘So did Abbot Serlo, yet we know for a fact that everyone else seems to have disliked Brother Nicholas. Why? Did he look at them in a strange way as well? What was so unsettling about him?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘It seems he was an excellent rent collector,’ said Ralph. ‘It was not just a case of someone not wishing to speak ill of the dead. Abbot Serlo could not praise him enough for his efficiency in bringing money into the abbey coffers. A fair amount of money at that,’ he recalled, ‘when you think how many sub-tenants inhabit abbey land.’
‘Brother Nicholas must have been trusted. His satchel would have been bulging with money when he returned to the abbey.
A robber would have made off with an appreciable haul.’
‘Yet nothing was stolen from him, apparently.’
‘Was the abbot certain of that?’
‘Yes, Gervase. As soon as he got back to the abbey, Brother Nicholas would hand the day’s takings over so that they could be entered into the account book then locked away.’
‘So he could not have been killed for gain?’
‘Unlikely.’
‘What, then, was the motive? Anger? Enmity?’
‘I will know more when I speak to the people he visited on his rounds. That is where the real clues lie, Gervase, outside the abbey.’
‘There is still much more within those walls to be dug out,’
said Gervase. ‘I would like to speak to Kenelm and Elaf alone at some stage and I would value another talk with Brother Frewine.
He is a sage old man who has been here longer than anyone else. Nobody is so aware of the undercurrents of monastic life as the Precentor.’
‘Will you take Hubert with you next time?’
Gervase smiled. ‘I will omit to remember to do so.’
Their conversation had taken them as far as the castle but Ralph called a halt before they entered it. He had been keeping his most telling find until the last moment.
‘When I climbed up that ladder, I chanced on something else.’
‘Another dead monk?’
‘Nothing quite as dramatic as that, Gervase. No,’ he said, opening a palm and stretching it out to his friend, ‘I found this.’
‘Where?’
‘Directly below those two hooks I mentioned.’
‘May I see it?’ Gervase picked up the strip of leather and turned it over. ‘Where could this have come from?’
‘You tell me.’
‘Look at that frayed edge. It was torn off something.’
‘Yes, but what?’
Gervase handed it back. ‘This could be a vital clue.’
‘That’s why I’ll treasure it.’
‘What about the sheriff?’
‘Durand? There’s no way I’ll treasure that rogue. Oh,’ he added with a grin, realising what Gervase had meant. ‘Will I tell our host about this little strip of leather?’
‘Will you?’
‘No, Gervase.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because it was up to him to find it for himself.’
‘What about those hooks?’
‘Those, too. They are our clues. He has enough of his own.’
‘But we’re withholding evidence, Ralph.’
‘So we are.’
‘Durand will be livid if he finds out.’
‘He’ll turn purple with rage if he discovers that we’ve been snooping around at the abbey and he’s bound to do that if we tell him about the hooks and the strip of leather. Serlo won’t betray us, neither will Canon Hubert. There’s no need for the sheriff to learn about this.’
‘It’s inevitable at some stage.’
‘By that time, we’ll have handed the killer over to him.’
‘Can we keep him in the dark that long?’