There was silence. Somebody in the next dormitory laughed and was immediately hushed. The cry of what might have been an animal came from far off, too far for it to be identified. Decuman leaned forward in his bed, his upper lip raised from his teeth.
'Now attend to me, Hubert,' he said. 'And you other two attend. Near my father's house in Barnet there's a monastery, at a place called Hadley a little outside the town. Last year, a monk was caught in an act of unchastity—adultery or fornication, I don't know. The Prior showed him great lenience. Instead of bringing him before the Consistory, he awarded him a summary punishment of twenty lashes and warned him that, if he offended again, nothing could save him. Four months later, the noodle did offend again and was again caught. The Consistory examined him for flagrant and incorrigible unchastity, found him guilty, and handed him over to the Secular Arm. It was quick after that; he went to the pulley.'
'Oh, Mother of God,' said Thomas.
'May She comfort his soul,' said Decuman, staring grimly at the other three as he made the Sign of the Cross. 'Attend further, you. This man knew all along the penalty he faced. Perhaps the first time he was rash or indiscreet. Not the second time. He preferred the risk of being pulled to pieces to not fucking. That tells us something, yes? We still don't truly know what it's like, but we do know how much he wanted to doit.'
'Those who are altered never want to do it,' said Hubert.
'The worse for them. From knowing how much that wretched monk wanted to do it, we know how important it is. More important than anything else.'
'Men do such things in war,' said Mark. 'I mean they face such hazards.'
'Very well, very well. This is as important as war, then, and we already know how important war is. War against the Infidel, Mark. So, Hubert, not only will you never do it, you'll never so much as want to do it. Never so much as want to do a thing of such tremendous importance. You'll live only half a life, my dear.'
'Singing is important,' said Hubert.
'When did a man hazard his life sooner than not sing?'
'You offer poor comfort,' said Thomas.
'I mean to offer none. And I've another story to tell. What do you know of Austell Spencer?'
Thomas acted as spokesman. 'A... an altered singer, once of this Chapel. Dead some years ago by an accident here.'
'Dead in 1964,' said Decuman, with a nod of something like satisfaction, 'at the age of twenty-one, having fallen from the belfry-tower. A rare misfortune indeed, with no reason for his presence in the tower and nobody else there at the time. Yes, I asked among the servants as soon as I heard of him, when I first entered as clerk, but I forgot the tale until now. Austell Spencer committed the unforgivable sin...'
The other three gasped and Mark crossed himself.
'... because he so much regretted that he'd been altered.'
'You guess,' said Thomas.
'I know. He left a letter to the Abbot, but not in a packet-he must have wanted everyone to hear. Someone saw the letter and told someone who told the buttery-boy, who told me for a ha'penny. Austell Spencer said that his alteration had been in vain. His voice had fallen off and he could no longer find high notes with any surety. He was about to lose his post, or that was what he thought, that was what he wrote to the Abbot. He was fit for no other function and had given away his manhood for nothing. What should he do but kill himself, Hubert?'
'This was only one man,' said Thomas before Hubert could speak. 'He might have been mad or—'
'The only one we know of,' said Decuman. After a pause, he went on, 'Now for more discomfort. Granted that your voice does hold, Hubert, what would you be at twenty-one, thirty-one, forty-one? Not merely a man who has never fucked. Not merely a man with no wife and no children: there are plenty of such and it's no shame to them. You would not be a man at all, but a human ox. Those you met would be respectful to your face, but behind your back what would they say? What would they think of you? Wait-there's one thing you might not have heard. Now an altered man doesn't change as he grows up, he gets no hair on his face, his complexion stays the same, like a boy's, and of course his voice stays like a boy's, yes? Or like a woman's. What you might not have heard, Hubert, any of you-I only heard it from somebody my brother brought to the house who keeps doubtful company in Rome-well, it seems there are certain oddities who, instead of just chasing after boys or other men, chase eunuchs because they're men who look and speak like boys or women. How that's desirable I can't tell, but to these types it is. So, Hubert, even friendship would be difficult for you. Any man you deal with might be an oddity of this sort, or be said to be. Behind your back.'
'Be quiet, Decuman,' said Thomas, who had been trying to break in for some time. 'Hubert is helpless: he must be altered. Therefore all you do is—'
'I defy that notion.' Decuman's expression now resembled a gargoyle's. 'There are a dozen things he can do, and my purpose is to encourage him to do some one of them. Hubert: you can appeal to the Cardinal-Archbishop, you can look for sanctuary, you could even tell the Abbot you've changed your mind and just see what happens, or you can run away to North-England or West-England, you can hide in the woods above the farm and we'll bring you food. You can fight, whatever happens at last. You must fight.'
'This is the Devil's counsel, Hubert,' said Mark.
'No,' said Decuman. 'No. It's the counsel of almost everyone and everything we really understand, whether we feel we understand it or not.'
'Remember your feeling as you sang in the Agnus Dei, Hubert,' said Thomas.
There was a longer silence than before. Finally Hubert said, 'Is there any TR for us?'
'Nothing new,' said Thomas. 'I must go to Ned again.'
'I'll go,' said Hubert.
Chapter Four
Brother Collam Flackerty, friar of the Augustinian Order, sat behind his cabinet desk in the Archiepiscopal Palace of Westminster, an extensive Egidian building situated half a mile up river from the Cathedral of St Peter and the House of Convocation. He was a small, narrow-framed person with carefully-combed fair hair at the fashionable shoulder length and cheeks rouged perhaps a little more than was fashionable. Today he wore an olive-green silk cassock, selvedged with the traditional black, that had cost him four and a half guineas at one of the new bottegas in Chelsea village. He also wore an expensive scent that was too delicate to contend with the emanations of the lilies of the valley, pink moss roses and reseda hanging in baskets from the blue-starred ceiling or lining the window that looked out over the Thames. Before him was an open manuscript book to which he occasionally referred or added a note. With his hands clasped against his chest and his head on one side, he said in a voice that held no trace of a West-English accent, though he had been born in Dublin, 'So let me sum. Here's the order—not easy to come by, as I expected. The Abbot goes at first to the Domestic Office of Convocation and fetches his document, his paper. When he has it signed, he takes it back to the Office and takes in return another paper. This gives the surgeon leave to act; it's a non senza. Now, the point where the order can be checked is when the first paper goes back. The Office may call it void and refuse to grant the second paper, giving no reason. The Abbot may then appeal to the Lord Intendant, who may, or may not, place a tribunal, citing whom he pleases. There's no appeal against whatever the tribunal finds.'
Father Lyall nodded and rubbed his upper lip. 'This question of the refusal of the second paper. Would the grounds I attest be sufficient?-that I and only I am qualified to sign the first one and that any other signatory must be an impostor.'