‘Fierce, little spear-maiden.’ Bertrand kissed me full and sweet on the lips. So swiftly, my spate of words dried up. I went to kiss him back but he brushed my lips with his fingers.
‘Mathilde, Mathilde, listen to my confession. I am a priest; I consecrate the bread and wine, turning them into Christ’s body and blood. Yet here I am in the fleshy sinews of life,’ he smiled thinly, ‘fighting all kinds of demons.’
‘My uncle,’ I retorted, ‘once discussed the same with me. He said a Templar is dedicated to the love of God and his neighbour. He not only struggles against flesh and blood, but also wages a spiritual war against the Lords of the Air. Uncle Reginald talked of a clash of realities; of how life should be and how it really is. How we would like to do good but often simply do what we have to.’
‘And the Eucharist, Christ’s body and blood? Did your uncle Reginald talk about that? Would he explain why I celebrate mass in the morning and fight for my life in the evening?’
‘Yes, I think he would. Whether you found his answer acceptable or not would be a matter for you. He claimed that Christ became man to become involved in the petty but vicious politics of Nazareth, of Galilee, so why should we now reject those of the Louvre, Westminster or Cheapside?’
Demontaigu sat staring at the hanging on the wall. Abruptly, from the taproom, as if some invisible being had been listening to what we’d said, a beautiful voice carolled. I do not know if it was a boy or a girl, but the song was haunting and heart-tingling. It was about ruined dreams, yet the second verse described how those same dreams, although never realised, made it all worthwhile. Tears stung my eyes. I watched the moths, small and golden, hover dangerously round the candle flame. Demontaigu’s hand covered mine.
‘Mathilde, let’s move to the point of the arrow.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I met Ausel today. We Templars house a traitor close to our heart. No, no, listen. The only people who knew about when and where we were to meet last night were Ausel, myself and Padraig. Ausel and I are responsible for organising such conventicles, and as far as the time and place are concerned, only as few as possible are informed, including our leaders. The rest were only told to meet at a certain point at a certain time. They were then brought to the Chapel of the Hanged. None was given the time to inform Alexander of Lisbon so he could bring so many men to that place. The Noctales were prepared, Mathilde; they let us go in and thought they had us trapped.’ He paused. ‘At first I blamed those taken up and imprisoned in Newgate, but they wouldn’t have known.’
I pushed away my platter and tankard. In the corner a spider clambered down into the heart of its web to feed on an imprisoned fly. A cat moved out into the shadows. A mouse screeched in the corner, whilst cold air seeped through the ale chamber, ruffling the smelly rushes and dousing a candle. I wanted to leave. We had discussed the harsh realities of life; Demontaigu had just told me one of these. His news was chilling.
‘You have suspicions?’
‘No one, Mathilde, but any Templar caught last night would have expected little mercy. That is the problem we always face: betrayal. This is the first time, in England, that we have suspected a traitor amongst us.’ Demontaigu turned to face me. ‘What we need is protection, pardons so that we can move freely. At this moment in time we live in the murky twilight between the law and being declared utlegatum — beyond it. Alexander of Lisbon, or any reward hunter, can trap, imprison, even kill us. We have lost the favour of both God and man. The king has ordered our arrest, the pope has declared us excommunicate. In truth, I should not even be celebrating mass. Mathilde, this cannot go on. I am a realist. The Templar order has been destroyed, and will never reconvene. We need protection. If we cannot get it here, then we will move into Scotland.’ He gazed expectantly at me.
I knew what he was asking. Isabella often petitioned the chancery to issue pardons under the privy seal, but for that, she would need royal approval.
‘You’d have to name yourself,’ I murmured, ‘confess who you really are. Bertrand, King Edward is fickle. He could hang you from a beam, embrace you as a brother, or dismiss it as a matter of petty importance.’
‘Either way,’ Demontaigu conceded, ‘this must be brought to an end.’ He patted my hand. ‘Think about it, but the hour is growing late; we must return.’
We did so without incident. Demontaigu left me at the gatehouse of Burgundy Hall. Ap Ythel was dicing with a group of archers in the guardhouse. He grinned and gestured with his head towards the main door of the hall.
‘It smells a little sweeter now, mistress. The masons and carpenters have been very busy.’ His voice took a wry tone. ‘Even his grace helped to clean one of the refuse ditches.’
This provoked muted laughter from his companions. The king’s fascination for physical labour, be it thatching a roof or digging a ditch, was common knowledge at the court. Some mocked it. Others claimed it was a legacy of the prince being left to his own devices by his warlike father. The old king had relegated his son to the care of servants and labourers at the palace of King’s Langley, where the young prince had spent his youth consulting and consorting with companions such as Absalom the boatman. I thanked Ap Ythel and passed into the hall. My mind was a jumble of mosaic pieces. Yes, that was what is was like: those miniature paintings you find in a Book of Hours, so small, yet so complex, full of detail and observation. Pax-Bread’s naked corpse, that horrible blue-red mark around his throat; Agnes and Gaveston touching each other; Hawisa staring at me wide-eyed — had she been lying? Demontaigu’s tight face in that alehouse. Ap Ythel staring slyly up at me as I passed.
The galleries and staircases were a blaze of light. The workmen were still busy, surly faces peeping out of heads and capuchons. Carpenters planed wood for new shafts for the garderobes. Masons studied charts and plans. Even then, albeit distracted, I noticed how many were milling about at such a late hour. Yet that was Edward: he showed greater tolerance for labourers and artisans than his fellow princes or lords. The queen’s chamber was equally busy. Isabella was choosing gowns for the solemn high mass the next morning. We had little time to talk. I told her about my visit to The Secret of Solomon. She heard me out, nodded, and promised to tell Edward and Gaveston, adding that tomorrow’s meeting between the queen dowager and the earls was of more importance. She teased me about how the news of her so-called pregnancy had now swept the palace. I asked her if she had told the truth to the king. She winked at me.
‘Perhaps.’ She smiled. ‘Perhaps not, we will see.’
The rest I cannot recall, a swirl of events. The mass the next morning celebrated the solemn liturgy of Lent. The abbot, prior and sub-prior, clothed in glorious purple and gold, almost hidden by the rich gusts of incense, offered the holy sacrifice. A magnificent occasion. The choir intoned the introit, kyrie and other verses in the majestic tones of plainchant. The candles clustered on the high altar and elsewhere blazed. Sunlight poured through the glazed coloured glass to shimmer on the gilded cornices and precious chalices, patens and pyxes along the ivory, white and red-embroidered altar cloths.
Edward and Isabella knelt at their own prie-dieu. Gaveston and others of the royal party gathered in a special enclosure to their right. At the top of the sanctuary steps stood Lincoln, Pembroke and their entourage. I was relegated to standing in the hallowed precincts of the Lady Chapel with its statue of the Madonna clothed as Queen of Heaven, the Divine Infant resting on her lap, little hands raised in blessing. Beneath the statue, protected by an exquisite glass case framed in gold and studded with precious gems, lay the abbey’s greatest relic, the Cincture Cord once worn by the Virgin. My eyes drifted to that as they did to the various tombs in the royal mausoleum: Edward the Confessor’s in magnificent red and gold; Edward I’s sombre black purbeck marble; close to it the gracefully carved tomb of his beloved first queen, Eleanor of Castile. I remembered how the old king had supposedly wept himself to sleep at her death and marked the stages of her funeral cortege south with gloriously sculpted soaring stone crosses. A thought occurred to me, but I let it go. Perhaps, on reflection, I should have seen it as a prayer brought by the invisible hands of some angel. However, on that particular Sunday, angels scarce moved in the harsh, tense atmosphere of the abbey sanctuary. The previous evening members of the Lords’ retinues had met those of Gaveston as both groups took horses down to the river to water. The Lords’ retainers had accused Gaveston of being quasi rex — almost a king — as well as being a coward, hiding behind his royal master and refusing to meet his accusers. Gaveston’s retainers had replied with a spurt of invective, calling the Lords nicknames. According to Isabella’s hushed, hasty whisper when I met her before the mass, these insults, the creation of Gaveston’s nimble wit, had apparently struck home. Gloucester was a whoreson; Lincoln Burst Belly; Warwick the Black Dog of Arden; Pembroke Joseph the Jew; Lancaster the Churl. I turned my head and looked around the great drum pillars of the abbey. The Lords stood stone-faced and hard-eyed, muttering amongst themselves. Now and again they would turn towards Gaveston and his coterie, fingers touching the scabbards on their brocaded belts. Deo gratias, all weapons had wisely been left with the lay brothers in the Galilee Porch of the abbey.