Fortune Like the Moon (8 page)

‘It is very cold down in the crypt, even now in high summer.’ The Abbess’s voice was cool, and her matter-of-fact tone brought him back to himself. ‘We thought it best to lay her here, while we await her family’s instructions as to her burial.’

There was no need for her to explain. He, too, would have found it hard to concentrate on his devotions with this silent, malodorous companion. Better – how much better, for his own purpose – that she had been put away in the cold of the crypt.

He swallowed, and took a step nearer to the coffin, on its simple bier. The coffin was made of fairly rough planks, butted and nailed together rather than carefully jointed. The lid was secured with six more nails. He looked around for some sort of implement with which to lever them out – fool, not to have thought of it before! – and was about to announce that he would have to go and find something when the Abbess silently pointed into a corner. Whoever had made the coffin had had wood left over, and had stacked it neatly under the stairs.

Josse selected a stout length of timber – presumably rejected as too thick – and, trying to control his strength so that both coffin and bier didn’t end up being thrown over, banged its thicker end up under the edge of the coffin lid until he had made a wide enough gap to insert the other, thinner end. The Abbess, practical woman, perceived his difficulty and went to stand at the coffin’s head, steadying it.

Now he could put his weight behind the effort. Leaning down on the end of the plank, he heaved as hard as he could. There was an ominous creak, and the plank began to bend; out of the corner of his eye he saw the Abbess take a firmer grip, as if she could predict his next move and was allowing for it. Placing his hands nearer the top of his lever, he took a breath, flexed his shoulder and arm muscles, and pushed down with all his might.

The coffin slewed sideways and all but fell, but the Abbess grabbed at it and saved it. And there was no need to see if he had been successful: the smell told them both that he had.

The Abbess had draped a fold of her wide sleeve across her face, and, taking hold of his arm, she pulled him away to the far side of the crypt. ‘Let the noxious air dissipate for a few moments,’ she said quietly.

It made sense. There seemed to be a good supply of air in the crypt, its slight draught making the candle flame dance. Standing there beside the Abbess, he looked at the coffin. The lid was a hand’s breadth above the base on the side where he had been working; it would be easy, now, to tear it off.

When the smell had lessened – either that, he thought ruefully, or I’m getting used to it – he and Abbess Helewise walked back to the coffin, and he thrust the lid out of the way.

He hadn’t really known what to expect. He had seen dead bodies before, many of them, seen the dreadful mutilations caused by warfare, seen bloated corpses that had lain too long on a sunny battlefield, seen half-putrid flesh crawling with maggots. He had been prepared for all of that.

The body of Gunnora, although clearly in the early stages of decomposition, was still relatively unchanged by death. The white skin of the hands and face, the only visible flesh, had a slight greenish tinge, and on her right hand, placed on top of the left, the main blood vessels were badly discoloured.

Someone had closed her eyelids. But the lower part of her face, still twisted into a rictus of horror, more than compensated for the absence of any expression there might have been in the dead eyes.

‘She died hard,’ he murmured.

‘She did.’ The Abbess, too, spoke softly. ‘You will wish to see the death wound.’

‘Aye.’ Again, her undramatic tone was a help.

He watched as her swift hands folded back the veil and untied the barbette that bound the smooth forehead, revealing the ends of the wimple, neatly fastened on top of the short hair.

She lowered the wimple, laying it across the still chest.

And the great slash that killed Gunnora was revealed.

He felt a moment’s faintness, and the hard stone beneath his feet seemed suddenly a perilously uncertain slope. He made himself relax. She is dead, he told himself firmly. Dead. And the best service I can do her now is to find her killer.

He leaned forward, bending close. The wound ran from ear to ear, a smooth, symmetrical cut that had severed the blood vessels and severely damaged the windpipe. It would, a detached part of his mind thought, be a matter of conjecture whether she died from loss of blood or asphyxia. He studied the ends of the cut. Interesting.

He had seen many men killed or injured by sword cuts, and it could usually be determined whether the attacker had used his left or his right hand, especially to anyone experienced in sword use. A cut was normally deeper at the initial point of incision, where it bore the full weight of the assault.

But this cut on the thin throat of Gunnora was as even, as perfect, as a quarter moon. Somebody had done it very carefully. Artistically, even. What an extraordinary thing to do.

It prompted him to look at her hands. He drew back the wide cuffs, trying to fold them as tidily as the Abbess had dealt with the veil and wimple; he might have ordered this violation of the dead girl’s final peace, but at least he could show respect. He felt the Abbess’s eyes on him, but she did not intervene. Feeling he had been awarded a good mark, he bent over Gunnora’s hands and forearms.

There was a slight scratch on the left wrist, but it looked old; a scab had formed and partly fallen off, which he did not think would have happened had it been done at the time of death. The nails were bitten, and on the right forefinger a torn quick felt unpleasantly squelchy. Other than that, the hands were undamaged.

‘Look, Abbess,’ he said. ‘Look at her hands.’

The Abbess did so. Then said, ‘She did not put up a fight.’

‘No, exactly. Had she struggled, tried to ward off the knife, her hands would show it.’ He frowned, trying to work out what that meant. Either she was unconscious when the attack came – or asleep? – or … Or what?

Or she was assailed by more than one person.

He returned to the sleeves, pushing at them more urgently now, searching the upper arms … finding what he sought.

‘Look.’ He pointed. On the white flesh were small bruises, two on the right arm, four on the left. Without pausing to think if it was appropriate, he hurried round to stand behind the Abbess, holding her arms. ‘You see? She was held, like this, from the rear. Held hard enough for the attacker’s fingers to make those bruises.’

‘Held by one man, whilst another cut her throat,’ the Abbess said, infinite pity in her voice. Standing so close to her, still holding her arms, he felt the slight sagging of her body. Then, as if they had simultaneously realised the unseemliness of their position, he stepped back and she moved forwards. His hands dropped to his sides, and he was about to apologise when she spoke.

‘Do you wish to look at any more of the corpse?’ she asked briskly. Corpse, he noticed. Perhaps it made it easier, to refer to Gunnora as a corpse.

‘I think not. I am content to take the word of your infirmarer as to the contrived evidence of rape.’ He sensed her relief.

He walked slowly round the coffin. There was something else he should check, he was sure. What? Absently he watched the Abbess as she rearranged the dead girl’s clothing, placing the plain wooden crucifix under the crossed hands, smoothing the veil so that it lay in perfect folds …

Yes. That was it.

‘May I look at her feet?’

The enquiry in the Abbess’s eyes was not vocalised. Instead, she turned back the hem of the habit, revealing small feet in narrow leather shoes.

The soles felt cold, and, pushing with a finger, he detected moisture. Yes, she had been out in the middle of the night, hadn’t she? Of course her shoes would be wet with dew. He inspected the feet, then the ankles, but the skin was clean.

‘Would her body have been washed?’ he asked.

‘Naturally. The blood.’

‘Aye, that. I meant her feet, her lower legs.’

The Abbess shrugged. ‘I cannot say for sure. I imagine so.’ Then, although he could sense her reluctance to have to ask, ‘Why?’

‘I’m wondering, Abbess, as I’ve been wondering all along, what a nun was doing out of her dormitory – out of her convent, even – in the middle of the night. I’m thinking, did she go far? She met her death close by, yes, but was she on her way out or on her way back? I ask about her feet and legs because, had she left the track, which she would have had to do had she gone further than the shrine, then she would have been walking through long grass. I would expect to have found the signs on her legs, on the hem of her garments. And her shoes would have been soaked through.’

The Abbess nodded quickly. ‘Yes, yes, I see. You are right – the paths only extend to the shrine and the monks’ house, and to the little pool that forms below the shrine. That track – the one, in fact, on which she was found – is smaller. It is not much used.’

That, then, was one question answered. Whatever mission had taken Gunnora out that night, she had not gone far. But, as seemed increasingly to be the case, one question answered posed more: had she completed what she had set out to do, or had she been killed on the way?

He watched as, again, the Abbess performed her rearranging task.

Then, coming to stand beside him, they both stood in silence, gazing at the dead girl.

He no longer had the feeling that there was more to be learned from her. It was time, finally, to leave her alone. He stepped forward, picked up the coffin lid and replaced it. Then, inserting the tips of the nails back into their holes, he used his baulk of timber to bang them down again.

He resumed his place beside the Abbess. Then, as if they had been waiting for some inaudible sign that they were dismissed, they turned and went back up the spiral staircase.

*   *   *

‘I have been trying to arrange it that someone usually sits in vigil,’ she said as they left the church, which, as it had been when they went in, was still conspicuously empty. ‘But it has been so long, now. I sensed that my nuns were distressed by the task, that, by continuing to take their turn at sitting with poor Gunnora, this dreadful event was kept in the forefront of their minds.’ She gave a slight shrug. ‘I no longer insist on it.’

‘Wise, if I may be allowed to comment,’ he said. ‘Probably the feeling that she has been abandoned, that no one from her family has come for her, increases the poignancy.’

‘It does indeed. My lord d’Acquin, it is strange, is it not, this failure in response? I sent word, of course, as soon as I could, and the family home is but a day’s ride away at most. And I know my message was received, for the bearer reported back to me to that effect.’

‘Did the bearer say how the tidings were greeted? With shock and distress, I’m sure, but—’

‘He – it was one of the lay brothers – did say that the father appeared shocked, yes. But it was peculiar, he said, because the man seemed shocked before the brother had so much as got down from his horse.’

‘He guessed, do you think? Surmised that a rider arriving on a hard-ridden horse from the Abbey where his daughter lives must be bringing bad news?’

‘Perhaps.’ She frowned. ‘Yes, probably no more than that. But it’s odd…’

He waited. ‘Yes?’

Again, the shrug. ‘The brother had the strong impression that the father hardly took in the news. He – the brother – took some pains to repeat his brief account of what had happened, this time in the presence of two of the household servants.’

‘With no more response the second time?’

She gave a half smile, as if even she found it hard to believe what she was suggesting. ‘That’s the strangest thing of all. The father, so the lay brother says, seemed to brush him away. Gave the strong impression that he was preoccupied with something else, that this dire news of his daughter was a distraction.’

‘A distraction,’ Josse echoed. Yes, it was strange. ‘You can trust the word of the lay brother? He is not the sort of man to embellish a tale so as to increase the drama?’

‘Absolutely not.’ She was vehement. ‘Brother Saul is an excellent man, reliable, trustworthy, and observant.’ She glared at Josse, as if to say, why else do you imagine I chose him?

‘Very well. Then let us ask ourselves why a father should treat news of a daughter’s death – her murder, indeed – as if it were something of a nuisance, taking him away from more important matters.’

‘Matters already causing distress,’ she added.

‘Aye. That too.’

They had moved right away from the church and were standing in the shade of the cloisters, and she, he was sure, was as relieved as he was to breathe in the clean, warm air. Now she made a move towards a doorway in the wing of the building on her left, gesturing with her hand.

‘Let us reflect on that,’ she said, ‘while we make our way to the refectory for the midday meal.’

Chapter Six

The midday meal – more of the excellent bread, this time with a vegetable stew containing a few morsels of mutton – was taken in silence, other than the melodious voice of a nun reading from the Gospels. It was the parable of the talents, and, Josse decided, had a special meaning for him. The exhortation to use his talents, in the symbolic sense, was well-timed, and his shaky self-confidence was boosted as he reminded himself that, inexperienced as he was, he had wits.

And, as he ate his stew, he employed them.

He glanced around at the assembled company, trying not to make it obvious. He counted sixty-eight nuns sitting at the long main table, another seventeen sitting by themselves at a smaller table, separated from the main refectory by a screen. With the addition of the Abbess and the nun reading from the Gospels, that made eighty-seven. Plus, he reminded himself, the three sisters who chose to isolate themselves in the leper house. And, presumably, ten or a dozen sisters who were on duty in the hospital while the rest of the community ate their meal. Say, a hundred, roughly, in all.

Was one of them a killer?

Looking from face to face, he couldn’t make himself believe it. Of the women he was able to study – for one or two kept their heads bent over the table, so that his view of them was cut off by their veils – not one showed any expression that was not calm and pleasant, not to say serene. There were women of all ages, from black-veiled fully professed nuns, in middle age or more, down to the obviously youthful, who wore the white veil of the novice or, in the case of one girl who looked scarcely out of her teen years, the plain black garb of the postulant. Was she, he wondered, the unsuitable Elvera, who had befriended the dead nun? Of all the women, he observed, she alone showed any signs of distress; there was a suggestion of redness around the eyes, and he caught her in the act of shooting him a rapid look; her eyes dropped the instant she noticed that he was studying her.