The newcomer was a young man, short and slight of frame, with a sunbrowned, oval face, and Simon did not recognise him. Roger didn’t either apparently, for he looked enquiringly at the fellow. ‘You aren’t from round this vill, then?’
‘No, I come from Temple. Father John sent me.’
‘Ah. Well, Father Adam’s up there in the church,’ Roger said.
The two watched as the youth made his way up the bank to the porch of the church, and then entered.
‘Did you learn anything from Nicholas at the castle?’ Roger asked.
Simon shook his head. ‘Only that he is the father of Richer, and I see no reason why he should claim paternity unless it is true.’
Roger nodded, but just then the messenger came back from the church. As he passed them, Roger could see Adam peering out at them from the vantage point of the church’s porch, and the clerk had the impression that Adam wanted to talk to him. He asked Simon to wait a short while and walked to the open door.
‘Is that Bailiff outside still, Brother?’ Adam hissed from the shadows.
‘Yes,’ Roger said, and then he gasped as he saw the flash of a knife. He tried to leap back, stumbled on the step and fell, shouting, ‘Murder! Murder! He’s killing me!’
‘Not soon enough, you devil!’ Adam screamed, and rushed forward, the dagger gripped under his fist, ready to plunge it down into Roger’s breast.
Roger saw the silver-blue steel racing towards him and raised both hands to block it. As luck would have it, his wrists crossed, and the knife fell between his hands, caught in the scissor-like grip. Roger bleated, shoving his fists up over his head as Adam fell onto him, pushing the knife higher, the point scratching over his right eyebrow, and then Roger gripped his assailant’s wrist in both of his own and tried to wrest the knife from him. Adam responded by pounding Roger’s face and neck with his free hand, Roger shrieking at the top of his voice all the while. And then the clerk was sure that he must have fainted, because all became quiet, and the weight of Adam’s body grew lighter and lighter, as though Roger’s soul was passing away. He closed his eyes when he seemed to see Adam’s face receding into the darkness, and then he heard a chuckle and opened his eyes fully to see Simon standing over him studying Adam’s knife.
‘Don’t worry, clerk. He’s no threat to you now,’ he said offhandedly as he shoved the knife into his own belt and stood over the body of the priest.
‘Is he dead?’ Roger managed, climbing to his feet.
‘Nope. Not yet,’ Simon answered. ‘But I’d like to know why he sprang on you like that. Have you any idea?’
‘None,’ Roger said, his hand on his forehead at the scratch. If it had been an inch lower, it would have spiked his eyeball, he thought, and suddenly felt quite sick, leaning his back against the doorway.
‘Well, as soon as he comes round, we’ll ask him,’ Simon said.
‘Yes,’ Roger said, and then, quite elegantly, he fainted and sank slowly to the floor, a ridiculous smile fitted to his blanched face.
John finished the service and put away the vestments and sacramental vessels in his little ambry, then locked the door over the hole in the wall.
He was filled with a sense of looming disaster. There was little he could do to avoid it, bearing in mind Warin’s close questioning, but it was no help to be aware of the fact.
It had all started many years ago, when John’s grandfather had been a close ally of Sir Henry’s. The two men had been companions in the crusade of the last century, both going to the southern reaches of Christendom to fight the heretics known as Albigensians, and since then the two families had been close. John had known Sir Henry all his life, and counted him as a friend, although Sir Henry was much older. It was entirely due to Sir Henry that he had been granted this little post in the backwater that was Temple.
He had been given this position in early 1315 at the height of the famine. Yes, there had been hints of disputes even then, but the vitriol that later came to characterise the relationship between Earl Thomas of Lancaster and his cousin the King were less apparent in those famine years.
John remembered those times so clearly. Even to journey here had been difficult, with food for his pony rocketing in price as the rains fell. Harsh, terrible weather, it was.
And then life changed dramatically. Earl Thomas’s arguments with the King had grown more acrimonious, and the Earl himself had been captured and executed, along with his followers and supporters — many of them John’s friends. He felt sick again, just thinking of all those good men — comrades of his father, some of them. At least his father had himself died many years ago, at Bannockburn, when the Scottish made King Edward II turn and flee.
His father had been a loyal supporter of the Crown, but John’s uncle had gradually changed his allegiance. It was all to do with the situation on the Marches. When the Despensers began to increase in power and wealth, taking any pieces of land they wanted, one man to suffer was his uncle, and he resented it. As a result, seeing his holdings reduced to a few small farms, he took up his weapons and went to support the Earl of Lancaster. And he fought in the last Battle of Boroughbridge, dying at the side of the Earl of Hereford. The poor man had been stabbed in the vitals by a man under the bridge. The fellow thrust upwards with a lance, and the point found the gap between the Earl’s buttocks, entering his backside and tearing him apart. While he screamed, John’s uncle went to him, and as he reached out to comfort the man, a bolt slammed into his breast. He was dead in moments.
Afterwards, John had waited, certain that the family’s disloyalty must have been noted. Perhaps the King would order that he was one of those who must be punished for association. Many were. Or Sir Henry might realise that the man he had installed in this chapel was related to a traitor, and seek to have him removed to show his own devotion. Yet nothing had happened so far. Only that visit from Warin, and the subsequent veiled threat from the Coroner’s man, Roger. Damn him!
Here in the wilds of Cornwall he had thought himself as safe as a man could be, far from the centre of power, whether it resided in London or York or one of the many cities dotted about the English countryside, but even here there was no security. John was grown accustomed to searching the faces of all visitors, always alert to the wrong expression. There were too many travellers who might be spies sent by the King. Or by one of his enemies.
Warin had appeared to be safe enough at first. He reminded John of their fathers’ friendship, chatted happily about their pasts, and only later did he spring on John the reason for his visit. He was here to investigate the allegiances of all the men in the vills hereabouts. He wanted to know, should his father Sir Henry seek an alliance with an enemy of the King, would his people obey him.
Whatever John said could be reported and used against him. If he said that he was a devoted supporter of the King, and Sir Henry sought to turn to Mortimer, John would be in danger, but if Warin’s father was testing him, and intended remaining loyal to King Edward II, John could be branded a traitor. No, there was no safety. His only security lay in praying for Bishop Stapeldon’s support, were he to be arrested. The good Bishop was absolutely committed to the King, so he could be a useful ally, but not if he felt John was himself turning to treachery.
He’d thought Warin was joking at first, but then he’d realised that the squire was too well briefed. He knew all about John’s uncle, and that meant John was in danger, as was Adam, because Warin had hinted at suspicions about the priest at Cardinham too. Not for treachery, but for that other sin which even the Bishop couldn’t condone. Ah, Christ, what could a man do, when all these forces were ranged against him?
There was nothing he could do during the morning, because there was no one whom he could send to warn Adam, but when the men started coming back from the fields for their lunch, he quickly scribbled a note, gave it to one of them and asked him to ensure that it only went to Adam’s own hand.