Plague Land Read online

  Her brow now tightened into its familiar frown. ‘Absolutely not. You disappeared from his home without bidding him farewell. Walter was concerned for your safety.’ Then she smirked. ‘I’m told you were very drunk.’

  ‘That’s not what happened.’

  She crossed her arms and lowered her voice to a vicious whisper. ‘I know exactly what happened, little brother. You went to Versey with lies about Father’s will. Thinking to thwart my chance at marriage.’ She then pointed at Brother Peter. ‘No doubt it was his idea. But you’ve been found out. Both of you.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Nothing will stop my union to Walter. Do you understand? Not you or your pathetic priest.’

  Clemence drew up her gown and left the room, slamming the door behind her and rattling the thin panelling of the partition wall. A wooden crucifix fell from its alcove, and though Peter tried to catch it, it bounced profanely about the floor.

  When it had finally come to rest, Peter picked the ornament up and then joined me on the bed, sighing so deeply his chin sank into his chest. ‘You should have listened to me, Oswald. The letter might have worked.’ His eyelids hung heavily and he needed to shave. He turned the crucifix over and over in his hands. ‘You shouldn’t have gone to Versey without me. You put your life in danger.’

  I took his hand to stop this repeated fiddling. His skin was dry and cold. ‘There’s something I need to talk to you about, Brother. It concerns the Starvecrow murders.’

  I felt his hand stiffen, but his eyes remained glued to the crucifix. ‘We should be more concerned about attempted murder. Yours.’

  ‘Please just listen to me. I did not become delirious in the forest. When I climbed from the plague pit, I was surrounded by strange creatures.’

  Now he looked up, but said nothing.

  I took a deep breath. ‘It was dark, but they had the heads of dogs. I’m sure of it.’

  If I had hoped for some understanding, it was not forthcoming. Instead Peter pulled away his hand from me and burst out laughing. ‘Not you as well? This story is becoming as contagious as the Plague!’

  ‘Don’t mock me, Brother. I’m not imagining it.’

  Peter stood up and paced across the rush matting of the bedchamber floor. ‘Then what in the Lord’s name are you talking about? I thought better of you than this.’

  ‘The creatures would have attacked me. I was saved by Leofwin.’

  Now he guffawed. ‘Of course! You were rescued from a pack of dog heads by a boy with the face of a dog!’ He leant over me. ‘You don’t think this story sounds in the least bit extraordinary?’

  ‘No. It’s what happened.’

  He drew even closer. ‘Are you sure you didn’t eat some fly agaric mushrooms? It’s easily done, if you’re starving. They are red and spotted, and would appeal to an exhausted and fevered mind.’

  I didn’t care to respond to this ridiculous suggestion, so I pulled back the sheets and put my feet clumsily onto the floor. ‘It was not a hallucination.’

  ‘What are you doing now? Stay in bed.’

  I pushed him away. ‘Just leave me alone, Brother. I don’t need your help.’

  But he stood in my path and it was impossible to circumvent his wiry frame. As he took me in his grip his breath smelt of onions and beer, but the weave of his black gown was familiar and reassuring. He was right in one respect. I was exhausted. I was still feverish. Cold sweat dripped from my face and clung to my chest. I had managed to stand, but now only had the energy to rest my head upon his shoulder – though it was as bony as the backside of a dairy cow.

  He patted my back gently. ‘I’m sorry, Oswald. I know you’re not a liar.’

  ‘Then don’t treat me as one.’

  ‘But you must consider the likelihood of your story.’ I pushed him away again, but now he took my hand. ‘You put yourself through an ordeal. It was foolhardy to confront de Caburn. But it was still brave, and I do admire you for it.’

  ‘It doesn’t seem that way.’

  ‘But think how such an ordeal will affect a person’s mind. You were frightened and desperate. So desperate, you hid amongst the dead in a plague pit.’

  ‘You believe that much then?’

  ‘You have the stinking clothes to prove that part of the story.’

  ‘It’s not a story!’

  He took my head in his hands and forced me to look into his eyes. ‘Dear Oswald. Do you remember being in that cottage? When the Plague finally took over your body?’

  I tried to look away, not wanting to think about it. The filthy straw bed. The flies. The clammy stink of prowling Death. But Peter wouldn’t release his grip. ‘You were delirious, Oswald. Talking of dragons and demons in the rafters, waiting to drop down and eat you. You even accused me of lancing your sores to drain the gold from your body.’

  ‘I had a fever, Brother.’

  ‘And you’ve had a fever for the last few days. Can’t you see that?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ My resolve was weakening.

  ‘I’m sure it’s what happened to you.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Please, Oswald.’ He released my face. ‘Just think about it. For me.’

  When I had recovered, I walked to the churchyard and sat beside Alison’s grave. The weeds were not yet growing over her freshly turned soil, so once again I whispered my story into the earth.

  Alison didn’t find my tale extraordinary.

  In fact, she said nothing at all.

  The next day the marriage notice of Clemence and de Caburn was posted on the door of St Giles, and a betrothal ceremony was conducted soon afterwards by Cornwall. I was not invited to this ceremony and could only take this as a deliberate slight. After I searched out Clemence the same evening, she reluctantly agreed to speak with me. We took a walk into the orchard and sat on the bench beneath a tree heavy with green fruit.

  Clemence folded her arms and wouldn’t look me in the eye. ‘I can’t see why you feel snubbed. You oppose my marriage, so why attend the betrothal?’

  ‘Because I’m your brother. I should have been there.’

  ‘Then give me a dowry.’ She scowled. ‘Brother.’

  I tried to touch her shoulder, but she shifted away from me. ‘Please don’t marry him, Clemence.’

  ‘And stay here with you and Mother for the rest of my days?’

  ‘But he’s a cruel man.’

  ‘No he’s not.’

  ‘Of course he is. Everybody knows how he treats his wives.’

  She waved her hand in front of her face, as if she were swatting away a fly. ‘They were green apples, little brother. Walter won’t behave that way towards me. I wouldn’t let him.’ Then she stood up. ‘Am I excused now?’

  I insisted she sit back down again – a request to which she grudgingly complied. ‘What if I were to expressly forbid this marriage? As head of this family, you still have to obey me.’

  She smiled. ‘You might be a lord, Oswald. But you’re not related to the king are you?’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘I forgot to tell you. We have the blessing of Earl Stephen.’ My expression of shock must have delighted her, since she only just suppressed a squeal.

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  ‘The earl has written to Walter and congratulated him. They have become especial friends. Would you care to see the letter?’

  I thought of the earl, and put my head in my hands. I still hadn’t replied to his request for a money payment rather than military service from the Somershill estate. It might be possible to ignore his letter until the autumn, but I couldn’t ignore the man’s wishes when it came to this marriage. He held Versey as well as Somershill from the king, and had vast lands that circled both mine and de Caburn’s. Nothing could move in or out of our estates without passing along one of his roads, or crossing one of his bridges. Father had always kept the earl happy, but de Caburn had been less keen on diplomacy. When the king granted the earl a pavage tax on his road to Rochester, de
Caburn drove his sheep across the fields to avoid the toll. The two men had feuded ever since. But now, inexplicably, it appeared they were friends.

  The wheel of fortune was turning ever more treacherously against me. I asked Clemence to talk with me a little longer, but she refused. Instead she stood up, bobbed a curtsy, and left.

  I pulled an apple from the tree and took a large bite. It was as sour as my sister.

  As Mother readied the house for the wedding, I threw myself into work on the estate. Thankfully, my remaining men had tired of searching the woods for dog heads and were slowly returning to the demesne. The sheep were eventually sheared after a fashion, and the hay was scythed and collected. But, despite all my best efforts, it seemed nothing in the fates was prepared to assist me.

  It continued to rain, making the hay damp and difficult to cut. My herd of sheep was thirty ewes down since the last head count, and my workforce grumbled about the quality of the food and drink that was provided for them by the house. My father was said to lay on a banquet after the hay harvest. Their earnest faces belied the blatant untruth of this claim. Even I knew that Father was loath to offer anything at harvest other than the toughest rye bread and most adulterated ale.

  When I passed their complaints on to Mother, she told me she had no intention of wasting good food on a few ragged peasants, when she was stockpiling our scant supplies for the wedding feast. She didn’t have long to amass this store cupboard, since Clemence and de Caburn were to marry in a matter of days – much sooner than the usual forty days between the betrothal and the wedding.

  Brother Peter continued to warn me of the dangers this marriage would pose to my position, but what was I supposed to do? The earl had sanctioned it, and although it was not his family’s name carved into the door lintel at Somershill, it might as well have been. Not only did I have to agree to the union in order to please him, now I was faced with offering the dowry to Clemence, which I had previously refused. I did not mention the earl’s blessing on the marriage to Peter, since I could not bear to be counselled against yet another enemy.

  In truth I had taken to avoiding Peter – as his advice was beginning to wear. The shapes by the plague pit had been an illusion – I had reluctantly accepted this story. Yes, I had drunk too much ale, been chased by de Caburn and his dogs, and hidden in the filth of the plague pit. Yes, my mind had been warped sufficiently to cause delirium. But I did not need to be constantly reminded of it. And then I wondered if I did truly accept this explanation? Peter’s argument made more sense than my own account.

  But who then had blindfolded me, if not Leofwin?

  And who had taken my silver ring?

  Around this time I began to suffer nightmares. My sleep disturbed by the same dream. I was in the dirty cottage where Peter had saved my life. His rosary hung over my head as my body arched in pain. And then he took his blade to me. It was cold and sharp against my hot skin. But when he made his first searing incision I woke with a scream, feeling at my armpits and groin, but finding no oozing sores. Only the ridged and tender scars of a tortuous ordeal.

  During these few days my investigation into the death of Alison and Matilda Starvecrow progressed no further. There was no news of Matilda’s whereabouts – which did not surprise me, since I never believed she had found her way to another village, being both penniless and mad. Equally, there was no sign of a body. I visited Alison’s grave to apologise at my failure to find our sister, but the soil remained silent. Sensing the girl was angry with me, I returned to the gaol house on two more occasions to press Joan Bath for the location of Matilda’s corpse, but the woman either continued to protest her innocence, or wouldn’t speak to me at all.

  Old Ralph, on the other hand, was pleased to speak to anybody. Having recovered from his fever, he was telling any soul who would listen to him that his own daughter should hang for the murder of the Starvecrow sisters.

  He had been moved back to his own home, where I gathered he was bereft of visitors apart from myself and a neighbourly woman who left food outside his door before scampering away. When I did summon the courage to visit the old man, I found a distinctly unpleasant smell lingering about the cottage, which went over and above the usual stink of the man. His arm had become infected – a wound he had suffered after being tightly bound by Joan and her sons. I knew the smell instantly, but could not persuade the old fool that his limb was gangrenous.

  I offered to bring Brother Peter, assuring Old Ralph that Peter was skilled at amputation and could even administer a potion to ensure he wouldn’t feel his own arm being sawn off. But Ralph insisted he could cure the arm himself with a herbal concoction. Apparently it had worked on such a wound before. No matter how much I tried to convince him this was impossible, he would not believe me that a limb simply does not recover from gangrene. On all my subsequent visits, he would delight in showing me how well this ointment was working, only for me to see how a little more of his arm had been eaten away. With the date for the Hundreds court still more than two weeks away, I could only hope the man would survive long enough to be a witness.

  The mood in the village was unclear with regards to Joan. There were a few goodwives pleased their husband’s nocturnal activities with the local whore were curtailed. On the other hand, there was also a group of widowers who were missing Joan and her services. Two of the men started a fight needlessly at the hay harvest and had to be separated by Featherby. I thought back to my days amongst the novices and remembered what it is to have too many men cooped together without the company of women. They are like a cage of cock robins. Too eager for a fight. So, when I heard rumours that Joan had resumed trading at her new address, aided and abetted by Henry the gaoler, I did nothing to investigate.

  On the Sunday before the marriage, I had decided to take communion at St Giles rather than at our own chapel. Not only did I need some respite from my mother, but in truth I was also hoping to see Mirabel again. And there was the question of Cornwall. I had also been avoiding the man since his visit to my sickbed and this weakness would not have gone unnoticed. Cornwall currently held the advantage in our quarrel, and I needed to wrest it back.

  With the wedding only days away, Mother’s hysteria had been building relentlessly. The blue cloth for Clemence’s dress had been ‘too muddy’ in its tone, the ale for the feast was ‘too cloudy’, and the hogs ‘too melancholy’. This was an unlikely problem, but still Mother insisted she could predict how a pig would taste just from looking at the expression on its face. There was no arguing with her.

  Clemence, for her part, was less tolerant of Mother’s quirks than ever, and had stabbed her fingers more than usual with her embroidery needle. Her tapestry was blotted with bloodstains. We had all noticed de Caburn’s absence from the house, but dared not mention it to Clemence. The man was making no effort at all to court his wife-to-be. In fact, since the betrothal ceremony, he had not paid a single visit to Somershill. Not that it concerned me. I was quite happy to meet my tormentor as little as possible.

  As I left for mass that morning, Brother Peter came running out after me. I wished then I had ridden, since he would never have caught up with me. His words of wisdom and constant fussing over my welfare were becoming suffocating.

  ‘There’s no need for you to join me,’ I said. ‘You’ve said mass already this morning.’

  He ran along to keep up with me. ‘It will be interesting for me. I want to hear Cornwall’s sermon.’

  ‘I don’t. But it will give me the chance to sleep.’

  Brother Peter laughed. ‘I doubt it. The man is said to nearly blow the roof from the nave.’

  As we entered the village, I once again regretted the lack of a horse. We must have cut a strange sight. A young lord, accompanied by a red-faced priest who could barely keep pace. The villagers bowed or curtsied as we passed, but it seemed more of a wearied reflex than a genuine act of respect. I looked about for Mirabel amongst their downcast and worn-out faces, but her lovely eyes were nowhere to be
seen. Instead, a thin trail of brown-clothed people made their way towards St Giles, hobbling forward like a gang of captive soldiers.

  I joined their meagre group and stepped inside the church. From the exterior it was a building of simple proportions with a square tower and plain glass in the arched windows. But inside it was gaudily decorated with icons, tapestries, and carvings.

  ‘Look at this place,’ I whispered to Brother Peter. A trestle table to the side of the altar was now laid with a selection of skulls, squares of cloth, and shrivelled pieces of skin.

  Peter nodded. ‘Cornwall has turned your church into a market stall.’

  I took my place in the front bench, facing the rood screen, and watched Cornwall prepare for his mass. The man was every inch a performer, wearing a new yellow chasuble that could have been made for the part of Gabriel himself in a miracle play. He moved about his stage deliberately, as if every step he took were coated in significance.

  As the poor prayed, crossed themselves and came to the rood screen for communion, Peter and I listened with increasing bafflement to the mass. Cornwall clearly had little grasp of Latin, and the further he mumbled his way through the liturgy, the worse it became. At one point I even stifled a laugh as he repeated the same invented words over and over again to accompany the blessing of the bread and wine. Hearing my snigger, Cornwall turned to look at me, his eyes meeting mine with the affection of a poisoned dart. Yet, throughout the mass, the other communicants carried on their devotions, ignorant of the gibberish accompanying their worship. Only the childless wooden Virgin seemed to notice – her sad face more troubled than ever.

  When the mass was over we were treated to Cornwall’s popular sermon, broadcast to the congregation in common English. Cornwall was clearly much more comfortable with this part of proceedings, stepping into the nave and wandering amongst us. With his ornate and copiously folded chasuble trailing along the floor and the large crucifix around his neck, he looked ready to perform the next act of his show.

  For the second time that morning he fixed me with a stare, then announced his sermon would address the sin of bearing false witness. Hushed anticipation spread throughout the congregation.