In the past, Flora had always felt a sense of dread when she had passed beneath the gateway, but this time, there was nothing, except the gradual awakening of pain from the dreadful burns on her thighs and face.
And the awareness of the silent sobs of the knight who held her so softly and yet so well.
He was still there as night came on fully.
It took him an age to get the body down. He was unused to clambering up trees, but he must reach out along that branch and slash away at the leather, slowly sawing with his little blunt eating knife until at last there was a short ripping noise and the badly cured leather gave way.
Huward fell silently, and somehow Mark thought that was wrong. A man dropping so far, at least ten feet, should at least gasp or wail, but this body simply disappeared from view and landed on the grass and leaves. When Mark looked down, the bloated face and curiously bloodshot eyes met his accusingly.
It took some while to climb back down, and then Mark was startled to hear Surval’s voice.
‘Be gracious to him. He was a good man,’ the hermit said.
‘I never heard a bad word about him.’
‘No. I think that was what he feared most,’ Surval said contemplatively. ‘The idea that all the men he knew in the vill might begin to think of him as a figure of ridicule. He was a kind fellow, but proud, and the idea of losing any respect from the folk here was too appalling for him.’
‘He has killed them all, hasn’t he? He said something about Sir Ralph.’
Surval gave him a sombre look. ‘What would you have done?’ he said. ‘Huward learned that Sir Ralph fathered all the children: Ben, Flora and Mary were his, not Huward’s.’
‘He told you all this?’
‘And more.’
Mark nodded. He was setting out the body as neatly as he could, trying not to look into Huward’s eyes. Huward’s hands he crossed over his breast, and then those terrible eyes were closed. Mark bent his head and said a long prayer over the dead man, pleading for Jesus’s intervention, asking St Mary to protect Huward’s soul and give him her compassion. It seemed ironic to be pleading with her when the whole cycle of death and horror had started with her namesake’s murder.
Surval was uncompromising. ‘I liked him, but he committed suicide.’
‘He did so while he was temporarily mad. That wasn’t his fault. Just as,’ Mark added, rising to his feet, ‘the murder of his family wasn’t his fault either. That was down to Sir Ralph.’
Suddenly, as he stood gazing about him, the full horror of Surval’s words struck at him, and he uttered a faint gasp as he tottered on legs suddenly powerless to support him. He closed his eyes as the terrible truth was revealed.
‘Christ in Heaven!’
‘Boy? What is it?’ Surval demanded. He had crossed to Mark’s side and now he leaned on his staff and peered at the young man, but Mark was incapable of responding.
If it was true that Sir Ralph was the father of the children of Huward’s family, then Mark had been sleeping with his own sister! Half-sister, perhaps, but that was no defence. Worse – he had made her pregnant!
‘Oh God!’
‘You sound petrified, boy,’ Surval said quietly. ‘What is this – has something alarmed you?’
‘You know, don’t you?’ Mark croaked.
‘Perhaps.’ Surval lowered his head. ‘There is a family resemblance. But remember, vengeance is the Lord’s, not ours.’
Mark didn’t agree. Standing and staring down at the corpse, he was aware of a revulsion so complete, so all-enveloping, that it made him feel quite weak. Sir Ralph – he was the man responsible for all this misery.
Sir Ralph! He had condemned Mark to Hell, for unknowingly, Mark had committed the sin of incest, but his own ignorance was no excuse. All so that Sir Ralph could slake his carnal lusts with a woman other than his wife. Mark could comprehend a man’s desire for a woman, but to have cuckolded a man to this extent, leaving so many souls to perish, that was appalling! Sir Ralph had ruined so many by his thoughtless satisfaction of his desires.
Mark felt sick. He couldn’t meet Surval’s eyes. Instead he found his gaze passing down his body toward his own cods, staring at his groin with loathing. There, there was the root of all man’s sin, he felt. Sex. It had led Sir Ralph to Gilda and then he himself to Mary, poor, beautiful Mary. ‘Christ!’ At least she had died without knowing the depth of her sins. She didn’t have to live with her guilt as Mark would.
Even the sin of self-murder was better than this self-hatred. How could any man live with the weight of this crime burdening him?
‘What are you thinking, lad? That Sir Ralph is deserving of death? Leave him for the moment. Come with me to my home and I’ll give you a safe bed for the night. Tomorrow I can tell the Coroner about this man’s body. Meantime, you can escape. You don’t want to be found, do you?’
‘Thank you, no. I have to make my way to the Bishop’s palace. There’s nothing for me here,’ Mark said sadly. ‘I shouldn’t have waited around so long. I should have gone this morning.’
Surval nodded twice with deliberate emphasis. ‘If you’re sure, fine. But leave vengeance to God. He’s better placed to determine guilt than we are.’
‘I want to go and pray at my chapel first, though.’
‘There’s nothing there, lad. It was burned by the vill,’ Surval said sympathetically.
So even that had been taken from him. Everything had gone. His soul was tormented by his crime against God’s law of incest, his woman was dead and his living was gone; his chapel, which should have been a holy refuge, was destroyed, and now Huward’s family was dead, all killed because of Sir Ralph’s adultery. Mark knew his thoughts were not rational, knew that he was being less than sensible, but could do nothing about it.
He bade Surval farewell and walked from that grim, desolate place. He knew what he must do: he would go to his burned chapel and pray at the ruined altar, pleading for all those poor souls – Mary, Huward, Gilda, Flora, Ben and Wylkyn. That would take him until the night was at its deepest and darkest, and then he could go to the castle. Nobody would expect him there. He could enter by the fence, the same way he had got out of the place last night.
He had to get back in if he was to kill Sir Ralph.
Baldwin tried hard to refuse Sir Ralph’s hospitality, but he did feel as weak as a newborn lamb after his exertions in the fire, and Simon was worse. They had little choice but to accept the man’s offer.
As soon as they all arrived the men began bawling for wine and food, and Baldwin was happy enough to sit at a table and gulp at the pot of wine set in front of him while others cared for the wounded. In a change of role that he would have found amusing, were the circumstances less serious, he saw that the still pale-faced Hugh had returned to his duties and was now serving his paler-faced master.
Simon was not looking well, and occasionally gave a dry, hacking cough, but Baldwin was comfortably sure that he would recover. He was younger than Baldwin, and had not been exposed to the fire or smoke for long. The knight watched Hugh fussing over his master with a fond smile. Their companionship, which always appeared to be based upon mutual antipathy, sullen disagreement and regular arguments, was as strong as that which any master could enjoy with a servant.
That was the way of a man’s life, though. Service was the basic fact of life, no matter who the man was, and from service grew respect and even, sometimes, love. It took love for a man to risk his own life in saving his master’s, as Hugh had when he thrust Simon from the path of that fool Esmon.
Esmon. He had not arrived at the fire, and now, as Baldwin glanced about the room, he could see no sign of the lad. Surely he should be here with his men, but for some reason he was not. The noise in here was deafening, and on a whim, Baldwin got up and walked out to the court.