The young voices were shrill, but pure, and as their singing drew to an end, the boys formed a procession and walked slowly through the choir to the screen, offering incense to the Cross and then singing still more prayers. Baldwin found himself relaxing, feeling the worry and strain of the last few days falling from him.
Simon was quiet, he noticed. At the end of the service when they all walked out, Baldwin glanced at his friend. ‘Are you all right?’
‘Yes, yes. I just want to leave this place, that’s all. Get back to my wife and daughter,’ Simon said. He stood aside while a young woman pushed to the doors ahead of him. ‘I wasn’t made for city life. I need space.’
‘I can easily understand that,’ Baldwin said. There was a tinge of sadness to his voice. There had been a time, when he was many years younger, when he would have enjoyed living in a city much larger than this one, but with the passing of the years he had grown to appreciate the peace and relative calm of the pastoral life. In his manor all he need worry about was providing enough food for his table. Matters of politics left him cold, the more so since the destruction of his Order. Oddly enough he found that spending time in a place such as this led him to suspect the motives of all about him.
And not only the motives. There were people whom he was convinced had misled him intentionally. Intelligent, educated people had deliberately led him astray for their own reasons.
‘Simon, Jeanne, I would like to detour a short way before returning to our inn.’
The hall was lighted when they arrived, although it was clear from the face of the bottler who opened the door that the servants and their master had been given leave to go to their beds.
‘Please ask if we may see your master,’ Baldwin said as the door opened upon the bleary-eyed and bitter-looking man.
Grumpily the bottler grunted assent and took them up the stairs to the upper hall. Here they were greeted with warmth, if a little surprise.
‘Sir Baldwin! And hmm your good lady wife – Lady ahm Jeanne, is it not? And Bailiff Puttock. Please enter and take seats. Ah, wine. Yes, bring wine, warmed and spiced. You would like warmed wine? Ah, yes, of course.’
Baldwin smiled and nodded and as the Dean bustled around, his head ducking in a curiously birdlike manner, Baldwin sat and observed him. The Dean appeared to notice his close scrutiny and asked, faintly bemused, ‘Is there um a difficulty, Sir Baldwin?’
‘No. Not now that we have found the killer of the people in the city. All is resolved.’
‘Once poor Adam and Jolinde are cured.’
‘Yes. One hopes they will soon um recover. The physician seemed hopeful, even about Jolinde.’
They lapsed into silence. All knew how even the smallest nick in the flesh could give rise to appalling infection.
The Dean broke the sombre mood. ‘What can I do for you so late in the evening?’
‘I wanted to ask why you suspected one of your own staff to be guilty of the murders.’
‘What makes you think I suspected anyone, Sir Baldwin?’
‘You were convinced that someone from your Treasury was guilty. Naturally you thought it was likely to be a young, callow, untrained Secondary, but you were not stupid enough to think that only a youth would steal. A large sum could be a temptation to anyone, couldn’t it? No, you felt anxious that someone else could have been guilty. And so you asked for two unknowns in the area to come forward and seek the murderer. You could only do so when there was another death – of one of the two Secondaries about whom you already harboured suspicions – but you were not so certain that you felt you could take anyone into your confidence.’
The bottler arrived and dispensed wine, but once he had left, the Dean waved a hand airily. ‘Please continue.’
‘I think that you held suspicions about someone. Someone with access to privileged information, someone with a motive, or perhaps someone whom you feel is not entirely trustworthy.’
‘Perhaps. But what does this have to do with anything?’
‘I would like to know the truth. Perhaps it was because you didn’t trust the man’s brother? That led you to think that brothers will sometimes behave alike.’
‘Ahm, yes. So you have heard about that. But I may not be able to inform you of certain secrets. So much of my life is tied up with secrecy. The confessional, Church diplomatic matters, affairs of state. All these can mean my mouth must, um, necessarily be stilled.’
‘Can you give us no explanation, Dean?’
‘Perhaps I can give you a slight hint. No more.’ As the Dean studied Baldwin, the knight saw the eyes glitter in a friendly manner, and Baldwin noticed how the reticence disappeared like a ruse thrown away after its deceit had served its purpose.
‘Sir Baldwin, ah it is difficult to protect the Cathedral. We monitor everything that we can, with clerks trained in finance to check all our accounts, but it is very difficult when we have such a large project going on. A block of lead is worth a lot of money, but if you have several hundred of them, one can go missing. I was suspicious that money was being filtered out, but I had no idea who was doing it, nor how.
‘If you know that the brother of one of your senior dignitaries is a felon, you have to wonder about him when some money goes missing. And if a sum of money is stolen from a merchant transporting it for you, you wonder anew. Especially if only a short time later you hear that a glover to whom much treasure had been given has been killed and robbed. So many coincidences. So much wealth lost.’
‘So you expected us to investigate your own Treasurer?’
‘No. I wanted to make sure that all were investigated. I only hoped you would do so without showing favours.’
‘You know that Adam was responsible for selling candles on the side?’ Baldwin asked.
‘Please do not remind me!’ the Dean said and shuddered. ‘It is hard enough seeing how he has failed academically and socially without being told of his dishonesty.’ He looked up at the window, sadness tightening his features. ‘When I look at him,’ he murmured, ‘I can see, even if from a distance, the beauty of his mother. It will be extremely painful to see him go.’
‘So you suspected him of responsibility for these other losses?’
‘God forgive me, but yes.’
‘How was he granted a position here in the first place?’ Baldwin asked gently.
‘When he was old enough, the famine was beginning. I had kept in touch with his mother, and she asked if we, ah, could look after him. I felt it was the least I could do. I never thought it would come to this.’
His words made Simon pucker his brow.
‘You don’t understand,’ the Dean smiled. ‘It is simple. Adam is my son – half-brother to Sir Thomas’s woman and that foolish boy who lives with them. Adam was the first-born. Stephen was a useful go-between some years ago, for there was every reason for him to visit his brother when he still owned his lands, and Stephen would deliver messages for me and bring back her own. And then she married a good man and gave birth to other children – although only Jen and Hob survived. Thus I heard what was happening to Adam.’
‘I think I understand. He will leave the Cathedral?’ asked Baldwin.
‘I cannot allow him to remain.’
‘What of Jolinde?’
‘He has gone. He had decided to leave before this final disaster.’
‘Will Luke stay?’
The Dean eyed him a moment contemplatively. ‘When the, ah, family lost everything in a squabble with their neighbour, who happened to be a friend of the King, Luke’s mother was already dead. With his father an outlaw, it was, um, natural that his uncle, our Canon Stephen, would protect the child as best he may. And he concealed the true nature of his brother’s activities from the child. Why should the boy learn the demeaning truth – that his own father was a felon? If we can, we should hide that shame from him.’