The Butcher of Avignon (8 page)

Hildegard listened to them bickering amiably then she asked what they hoped to do next.

‘Get back to England as quick as we can. Sod Bohemia.’

Peter gave their prison a miserable glance. He held up his wrists in their manacles. ‘They’re not going to let us go without a fight, are they?’

Unsure how she could help them or what other ramifications would have to be taken into consideration Hildegard tried to rally their spirits. ‘Given that you arrived in barrels I’m sure you won’t object if you have to leave by the same means?’

‘We are in your hands, domina. You’re our only hope and saviour.’

**

The questions Hildegard had not asked them was who had brought them here and why. Were there hopes that silver deposits would be found among the marshes of the Provencale coastline? What little she knew of such matters did not suggest the likelihood of that. So why here?

If their meeting had not been cut short by the guard, who deemed that their prisoners had been prayed over long enough, she would have gone on to ask them. But she had to leave in a hurry, with time only to tell the guards that she would regard it an honour to be allowed to return and offer her services to the English prisoners again.

‘Fine by me, domina. That’s your job. So long as you let us do ours.’

If the question why the miners had been brought here was unclear, the question of who had abducted them was not.

**

Athanasius was still sipping his evil-smelling concoction of herbs against his fever when Hildegard entered his cell. He was not alone. The cardinal who had visited the pope’s treasury with them was sitting expansively on the only bench. His face was a perfect picture of grief and she caught the end of a phrase, something like, ‘and to see him nevermore…’

He rose to his feet in a disarray of brocade and velvet, great bell sleeves billowing as he returned her greeting and at once offered her his place. ‘I’ll perch on the end of the magister’s bed, if I may.’

He settled himself inside his robes with a rheumatic sigh.

‘Well, domina?’ Athanasius croaked through the fumes. ‘What news?’

‘I followed your suggestion.’ She gave a hasty glance at the cardinal.

‘Cardinal Grizac has no interest in our affairs,’ cut in Athanasius as he read her meaning. ‘I take it you want to tell me something about the two dolts?’

‘You’re harsh, magister. They’re skilled in their own craft by the sound of it, their expertise being the chief cause of their current plight which is not unconnected to a pair of barrels and a group of well-armed militia.’

‘They wish to be conveyed elsewhere?’

‘Home. As quickly as possible.’

‘Transportation often puts a strain on the resources at Avignon,’ he replied cryptically.

‘Indeed?’

‘This is a fortress. Yet every day many barrels convey goods in as well as out.’ He sighed and sipped more of the concoction. ‘I would not, however, advocate any interference in this matter. Clearly Sir John Fitzjohn intends them as a gift for our Holy Father.’

‘But against their will, magister?’

‘Pope Clement moves in a mysterious way, domina, ever watchful for our best interests.’

He couldn’t have sounded more like an out and out Clementist and she wondered if it was a show to appease the cardinal, Clement’s man.

Warned off for the moment she could only say lamely, ‘I feel sorry for them. Let’s hope he makes his decision soon.’

‘What do you think to the manner in which our Holy Father is conducting inquiries into the attack on his treasury, my friend?’ He turned to the cardinal.

‘It behoves us to give him every assistance. Pool our thoughts on the matter.’

‘He is ever discrete,’ Athanasius observed. ‘I wonder if he has had a proper look at the unfortunate young fellow?’

‘I would expect it.’

‘So would I.’

A look was exchanged.

‘The matter is still being gossiped about as attempted theft.’

‘Yet nothing was taken.’

‘No sack for the pickings,’ agreed the cardinal.

‘Nothing with him but a little jewelled dagger such as you or I might possess.’ Athanasius gave Grizac a piercing glance which the cardinal acknowledged with a shrug.

‘I’m told the dagger still lies with the body in the mortuary.’ The cardinal raised his head to gaze mournfully at the magister. ‘I would like to have it. A memento, shall we say?’

‘Have you had chance to explore the palace yet?’ Athanasius turned to Hildegard. ‘You’ll find our chapel next to the mortuary a place of wondrous beauty and most skilful craftsmanship. Your admiration for such craft skill will be amply rewarded should you care to visit St Martial’s chapel. The frescoes are very fine.’

‘I’ll make time to see them, magister, when duties permit.’

‘Your first duty might be this. See if the cardinal’s dagger is still there and bring it back for him? The second duty is that I would like you to go down to the apothecary and fetch me some elecampane. Will you do that kindness for me, domina?’

‘Certainly, magister.’

‘I would consider it a boon. You may have to find the master apothecary to advise you. There’s a tall fellow in there, often to be discovered mixing his mysterious potions. He’s the one you should speak to. He’ll give you what you need. I find he has some most efficacious cures. Elecampane, I think, in this instance, with a few leaves of horehound, the white variety, if you will, then I’ll be back on my feet in no time. But first, St Martial’s chapel, I suggest.’

‘My pleasure, magister.’ She got up to go. ‘Excuse me, your eminence.’ With an inclination of the head to the cardinal heaped on the end of the monks’ bed she went to the door. ‘Our Bohemian friends are many leagues distant,’ the cardinal murmured before she opened the door, ‘but no doubt we shall hear from them soon enough. They wish to free themselves from the Cistercian monopoly on their silver. It happens to be their greatest natural resource. They seek allies. Such conflict, everywhere we look.’

**

‘Extraordinary,’ she murmured to herself as she set off on her errand. So the cardinal did know something. It made Fitzjohn’s abduction of the miners even more suspect. Grizac even knew about the Cistercian control of silver at the mines of Kutna Hora.

As she was nearer to the kitchen quarters than the chapel she decided to make her first errand elecampane and horehound - and then a little jewelled dagger.

She headed towards the apothecary’s across the yard adjoining the kitchen wing. Plenty of people were scurrying about at their many different tasks and she attracted little notice. She found the apothecary but even without being told she would have found it by the scent of dried lavender and the mingled aromas of other herbs and plants that swirled through the open door.

Another nun was in there already, discussing cures with a man standing at a chopping board as he laid out several herbs for her inspection.

‘Try this,’ Hildegard heard him suggest. ‘Steeped in a little wine and honey, it should clear the matter up to your lady’s satisfaction.’

When the nun left Hildegard approached but she was unsure how to proceed. Was this the apothecary the magister had recommended? She decided to mention Athanasius straightaway. The man glanced covertly round the chamber at the name then beckoned her to follow him, leading the way behind a curtain of drying herbs suspended over a doorway that gave onto a smaller, windowless storeroom beyond. Peering at her, he asked, ‘The magister is still unwell?’

Hildegard nodded.

He reached for a bundle of dried leaves. ‘Elecampane. And white horehound.’ He smiled faintly. ‘I have both.’ He thrust a few long stalks into her hands. ‘He knows how to prepare it. Anything else?’

She shook her head.

‘Then give him this.’ He went to a table chest set against the wall, took a small key from inside his shirt, unlocked the box and removed something before quickly relocking it. He placed the object in the palm of her hand and closed her fingers round it. ‘Something I obtained with him in mind. A charm against the ague. Keep it safe. He may return it as he wishes.’ With that he gave her a meaningful look and returned to his next customer waiting in the main chamber.

When she got outside into the passage she peered at the object cupped in her hand. A figurine was revealed. It was shaped like a female saint with a staff and something like a sack or loaf of bread in one hand. It was the colour of lead. She rubbed it on her sleeve until it gleamed with a subdued lustre. Silver.

**

Next, to the chapel of St Martial. Adjoining it, the mortuary.

A choir was singing in the chancel when she entered. Sweet trebles spiralled ethereal melodies into the bright vault of the roof. It was not yet nones. The office of the ninth hour would not begin until later.

The chapel was on the highest level of the tower, the windows unimpeded by any other buildings. Light swam in through panes of green glass, sufficient to illuminate the frescoes Athanasius had mentioned, the excuse for her presence here, if an excuse were needed. An air of sanctity prevailed.

None of the officials paid any heed. One or two figures knelt in front of the gilded altar, lost in their meditations, a sacristan attended to the candles, intently scraping bees-wax from their ornate gold supports. Hildegard paced along the side wall with her attention on the frescoes depicting the miracles Martial was supposed to have wrought - here was the saint taking ship for the east, here he was with an anchor rope round his neck, and here he was under the sea with the white marble halls of a palace rising around him. When she came to the door into the mortuary she slipped inside.

On each side of the body two black robed nuns were mumbling prayers for the soul of the dead youth and did not raise their heads.

He was as she had last seen him. Now lying on a byre but still clothed. His fingers gripped the hilt of the dagger she had noticed earlier. Impossible to believe that less than twenty four hours ago he must have been as blithe as any living being.

She trod softly over the tiles. Neither nun paid any attention. Coming to a halt within the circle of candlelight she gazed down at the corpse for a few moments until she felt they were used to her presence, or, indeed, as it seemed, oblivious to it then, gathering her courage, she reached forward. Something made her take her eyes off the dagger for a moment and a glance across the body into the gloom on the other side showed two beady eyes watching intently from the confines of a cruelly tight wimple. It distorted the nun’s features so much she looked like a weasel. Even her nose twitched when she spoke.

‘A waste of time, domina. You will not take anything from him yet. The rigor of death still holds him tight. Soon you’ll be able to retrieve what is of value to you.’

Hildegard straightened a crease in one of his cuffs. ‘It is not for myself. It is my errand to retrieve the dagger for its owner.’

The woman gave her a derisory smile. ‘If you say so, sister.’

She lowered her head in a gesture that told Hildegard she was an interloper.

Cardinal Grizac could reclaim the dagger later, if it was his, she decided. She supposed she had been sent to get it to save him the bother. He looked in no fit state to do anything in his present state of grief. But something had seemed wrong about the request.

She withdrew her hand. The jewels on the hilt glittered. There was no sign of blood on the blade. It seemed to have significance for its decoration - and for the value the cardinal attached to it..

**

While on her errand to the apothecary, with the plight of the two miners on her mind, Hildegard had briefly entered the kitchen wing. Now she returned to have a proper look.

The wine store must be somewhere close by. The unloading bay where supplies were transferred from the sumpter wagons into the storehouses would also be close to where they were needed.

First, the kitchen. It was a circular stone built chamber with a high conical roof through which the smoke from the enormous fire could escape. It seethed with heat and noise. When she looked in earlier a whole hog was being manhandled onto a spit and now it had been roasting for an hour or so. The little barefoot spit boy, sweating and cursing, was turning the great iron handle, and fat was dripping out of the carcase into a pan underneath to be later left to set before being spread on hunks of bread. The logs roared and spat sparks and another boy went around sweeping them up with a besom and now and then beating out the flames with the back of an old black skillet.

Across the middle of the chamber several long trestles were lined up and on both sides kitcheners were standing up at the endless task of preparing the food to be served later that day. Some cleaned, some chopped, some scraped, some sliced and yet others grated ingredients onto the board. Utensils flashed. Sharp knives sliced. Wielded with deadly skill.

No-one spoke. The master of this seething cavern sat on a wooden dais so he could oversee the activities of his minions, while a clerk at his side checked off ingredients and cooking methods on parchment rolls stacked on a lectern.

One or two overseers seemed to control the work of the more menial staff, the cutters and parers. Others, boys mostly, came in and out with fresh provisions. She watched a puny boy stagger in with a pole swinging with dead geese. Others followed carrying birds from the morning’s shoot, snipe, teal, duck, larks from the nets and many other birds which they threw down in a heap onto the trestles. Someone else hefted a wide reed platter loaded with duck eggs. A hen, still squawking, was dumped on a table, its neck wrung, and almost before it had stopped struggling, its feathers were being plucked by someone else. Fish, wriggling and glistening with life, were brought in from the town ponds. The innards of wild boar slithered over the chopping board.

On a back wall were ranged the ovens, massive things, large enough to bake the enormous amount of bread that was eaten, their suddenly opened wooden doors blasting heat into the already sweltering kitchen.

Baskets of vegetables - beans, cabbages, onions, carrots - were carried in by pairs of staggering lads who gripped the looped handles of the baskets and thumped the loads onto the flagstones only to be shouted at by a servant who stepped back and nearly tripped over one.