Plague Land Read online

  I didn’t like to disturb him, but he wasn’t angry with me when I did.

  He left the chapel to fetch some medicines from the cellar in the main house, but returned so quickly I wondered if he kept some supplies in the porch. I didn’t remark on his speed since the bites were now red and swelling, and I was simply relieved when he pasted a potion of salt, honey and crushed onion onto my ankles. The smell was strong but not unpleasant – a clean and natural odour after the stench of the Starvecrow hovel.

  I let the balm slowly cool the inflammation. ‘I need to talk to you about my father,’ I said, as he wrapped a bandage around my ankle.

  Peter sighed. ‘Why, Oswald? Your father’s sins are not worth worrying about. Don’t concern yourself with them.’

  ‘But I should know the truth about Father. Particularly if everybody else does.’

  ‘It’s just gossip. And let me tell you. Only one tenth of village gossip is ever true.’

  Then he accidentally dropped the coil of lint and we watched it roll along the floor, unravelling on its way across the slabs marking the dead of my family. Huffing, he bent down to pick it up again. ‘It won’t be easy for you to step into your father’s shoes, Oswald. The man was like a beech tree. He cast such deep shade that nothing could grow beneath him. You will be a much better lord than he, but you must give yourself time.’

  ‘What time is there?’

  ‘Plenty. You are young.’

  ‘William and Richard would have been ready.’

  Peter sat up again. ‘I don’t think so. From what I knew of your brothers, they were as unprepared for this role as you are. At least you had some years at the abbey. It gave you the chance to grow in your own light.’ He took my hand and smiled. ‘They were good times, weren’t they, Oswald? Before the Plague.’

  I knew Peter’s tactics of old. He was trying to change the subject. ‘Does my father have bastard children about the estate?’ I asked him again. ‘Please tell me the truth.’

  He dropped my hand and sighed. ‘Most probably, Oswald. Though only Our Lord knows for sure.’

  ‘Do you know their names?’

  Peter bristled. ‘Of course I don’t! And take care to whom you ask that question, or face every scoundrel in the village claiming to be your sibling.’

  ‘Were Matilda and Alison Starvecrow his children?’ Peter looked away. ‘Matilda said such strange things to me, Brother.’

  ‘What type of things?’

  ‘Nothing that made sense exactly.’

  ‘That’s because the girl is possessed. You can’t believe a word she says. If I were her priest, I would cast out her demons.’

  ‘But is it possible she is my half-sister?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’ Then he took my hand again. ‘Listen to me, Oswald. I knew the Starvecrow family quite well, as I was often here, copying manuscripts from your father’s library. In my opinion Alison and Matilda resembled their own father well enough. I never heard anything to the contrary. And don’t forget I sometimes took confession at the parish church. Village gossip will reach a confessional quicker than a fly smells blood.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes, Oswald. Really.’

  Despite Peter’s conviction, I continued to run over the events of the day until I felt wholly exhausted. I had always admired, if not loved, my father, but now his character was being unpicked like one of Clemence’s tapestries. I tried to rediscover my quiet place of calm, but the more I attempted to dismiss my thoughts, the more they took hold of me.

  As I climbed into bed that night and pulled the linen sheet over my head, an agitation came upon me. Images flickered across my eyes, and answers to the riddle of this mystery formed and then drifted apart like faces in a cloudy sky. It was a hot and still night, the type that threatens thunder, but we could not open the windows in the bedchamber as the panes of glass were fixed into their lead fittings.

  At this time of year I sometimes envied the villagers and their airy homes. Unable to afford glass, they simply covered a square in the wall with shutters – shutters that could easily be opened to the sky in the heat of a stifling night. (I am told, however, this arrangement is less agreeable in winter, when a person will often wake from sleep with ice upon their eyelashes.)

  My bedfellow Peter was less understanding than usual about my restiveness, and kept telling me to go to sleep. At my repeated turning, he finally offered me a sleeping draught, which I accepted. So, instead of lying in bed determining that tomorrow I would make more progress with the investigation, I drifted off to sleep – wondering how far away the stars were from the earth, and why the moon waxes and wanes. Not even the imaginary howl of a distant wolf disturbed me.

  I woke the next day feeling relaxed and calm, but it was not to last.

  There had been another murder.

  Chapter Four

  Gilbert roused me with the news, and I thought I might still be dreaming – his words nothing more than a trick of the mind. But the roughness of Gilbert’s hand upon my arm and the foul smell of his morning breath soon pitched me into reality.

  I pulled back the sheets. ‘Are you sure? I saw Matilda yesterday afternoon.’ I still felt giddy, since the sleeping draught had not fully drained from my head.

  Gilbert grunted something and then added, ‘Mind you, they haven’t found her body.’

  ‘So how can we be sure she’s been murdered then?’

  ‘I’m told there’s blood all about the Starvecrow cottage, sire. Looks like a slaughterhouse.’ I jumped out of bed and Gilbert helped to lift my leather kirtle over my shirt. ‘Those dog heads must be getting bolder,’ he said. ‘Coming up to the village. We should set the fires tonight.’

  ‘There are no such creatures, Gilbert. Nobody in this household is to say so.’

  Gilbert recoiled a little at my abruptness. ‘As you like, sire.’

  I went to apologise, but stopped myself since I had noted Gilbert distrusted courtesy, especially from me. Instead I told him to saddle my horse.

  ‘Where’re you going, sire?’

  ‘To the Starvecrow cottage.’

  When Gilbert had left the room, I tried to roll Brother Peter onto his side and wake him, since I needed his advice. But the man slept as deeply as a dormouse and would not be roused.

  The air that morning was still, and no stiller than in that damp pocket of land that the Starvecrows inhabited. Even the stream, which had previously beaten its path so brutally through the nettles, now slipped silently down the hill like melted butter.

  Looking down at the cottage in the hollow below, I wondered what new horrors awaited? But then a wave of hope washed over me, as the story could well be an exaggeration. Brother Peter was accurate in his assessment of village gossip. It was quite possible that Matilda had simply wandered away from the house, and this supposed ‘slaughterhouse’ might amount to nothing more than a few drops of blood upon the floor.

  I had expected to meet a crowd at the cottage, but instead found myself to be completely alone. After tying my horse to a tree, I descended the damp bank of angelica and buttercups towards the cottage, making certain this time not to fall over.

  Not only was there an absence of people about the place, but the pigs that had roamed about the garden yesterday were now nowhere to be seen. No doubt a neighbour had taken the beasts before anybody else had the opportunity. And then, shamefully, I found myself wondering who would actually inherit the possession of the Starvecrow property, if Matilda were actually dead? This land belonged to the manor, so there was only the livestock to be passed on – other than the ragged bits and pieces that furnished the cottage. And who would pay my rent, since nobody would choose to live in this place, when better quality plots were vacant? And lastly and most shamefully of all – I wondered who would pay my death heriot? As the owner of this land, there was at least one pig due to me.

  I walked on and put these matters out of my mind, but nearing the cottage I could hear noises from within, and realised there
was another person here after all. Treading silently towards the door, I wanted to spy upon this opportunistic thief. Peeping through a gap in the wood, it was the most unexpected person I saw inside the place. A man on his knees, feeling about in the rushes of the floor.

  I would have watched him for longer, but the sun breached the clouds and threw my shadow across the room, revealing my presence. He turned to look at me. It was John of Cornwall. As surprised to see my face as I had been to see his.

  For once I had the advantage of the man.

  He stumbled quickly to his feet as I opened the door fully. ‘My lord. I was looking for the footprints of the beast. There are some outside.’

  I ignored this claim and walked across the threshold. ‘I’m told Matilda Starvecrow is missing.’

  Cornwall nodded.

  I looked about, but it was difficult to see very much inside this gloomy abode. The smell overcame me again, and I took some mint from my belt – a bunch that I had picked on my way down the slope in expectation of the unpleasant stench. Crushing a few of the leaves, I inhaled their fresh and sharp scent, prompting Cornwall to look at me with such scorn that I dropped the leaves to the floor.

  ‘I can’t see the blood they speak of,’ I said quickly. ‘Where is it?’

  Cornwall pointed to an area near the one and only bed. ‘It’s here,’ he said. As my eyes became accustomed to the dark, I could see the bedclothes were indeed stained with spots of blood – though the marks were difficult to make out against the dirty grey of the woollen blanket. Looking closer I saw a viscous puddle of blood beneath the bed frame, its surface peppered with soil and dirt.

  ‘I covered her blood with dust,’ boasted Cornwall. ‘To prevent the flies from causing a nuisance.’ He pronounced the word ‘flies’ with a long and peculiar drawl that I imagined he thought sounded refined.

  Kneeling to study the puddle, there was more blood than I had originally supposed. It had pooled into a small raised mound, bound together with the dust and dirt of the floor. ‘You may have destroyed some evidence by doing this, Cornwall,’ I told him.

  ‘It was simply blood, sire. You could tell nothing more from it.’

  ‘Maybe.’ I studied the bed frame for a while. ‘I think Matilda must have been attacked while she was sleeping.’

  He nodded. ‘That sounds likely, my lord. The beasts will creep up upon their victims while they sleep and bite their throats.’

  I looked up at him. ‘Randomly?’

  ‘Sire?’

  ‘I just wondered why these creatures targeted two sisters, that’s all? When they could have attacked anybody in the village?’

  Cornwall huffed. ‘There’s a simple explanation for that. The sisters did not attend mass regularly.’

  I sighed and stood up. My hands felt sticky and hot. ‘I visited Matilda yesterday and there was a woman here. She didn’t wear a wimple, though she was certainly old enough to be married. Do you know her?’

  I would tell you Cornwall gave a flicker of recognition at my description, but the light was too dark to draw any conclusion. ‘She doesn’t sound familiar to me,’ he said blankly. ‘But she cannot be connected with this crime.’

  ‘How so?’

  ‘Because the girl was killed by the beast.’

  I was beginning to lose patience. ‘What is your substantiation for such a story, Cornwall?’

  My tone was discourteous and he visibly inhaled at my words, his chest rising through his cape. ‘I believe you will find this proof enough.’ He led me to the door and pointed to some footprints in the mud – though it was impossible to narrow this spurious evidence down to anything more specific than an animal with padded feet.

  ‘I thought these creatures only carried the head of a dog,’ I said. ‘So why are we looking at paw prints?’

  Cornwall fixed me with his eyes, light blue and cold. ‘They are shape changers, and can take any form between man and dog.’

  I raised an eyebrow. ‘Really? I don’t remember learning about such phantoms at the abbey.’

  ‘Then your education remains incomplete, sire.’

  ‘Perhaps so. We concentrated upon the gospels and the learning of Latin and Greek. So there was little time for fairy tales.’

  Cornwall sucked his teeth. ‘This is not a fairy tale. It is the work of the Devil. And I pray to Heaven for salvation.’

  ‘But will Heaven care?’ He flared his nostrils, but I didn’t regret my candour. He had riled me with his imaginary nonsense. A creature that could take any form between man and dog was a vague and illusive quarry – only suited for terrifying a group of simple villagers. People who had only just recovered from the horrors of a plague.

  The argument might have continued, but the door blew open and a shard of sunlight suddenly illuminated a pathway to the area under Matilda’s bed, picking out a collection of bright dots scattered about in the rushes and dust. Leaning down, I quickly collected each one of them while the light still shone upon me, finding the objects to be ten small red beads.

  ‘Look at these,’ I said, opening my palm to Cornwall. He leant forward to take a bead, but I pulled away my hand and looked at him quizzically. Suddenly I had the suspicion that the rest of the beads were in his pocket.

  ‘I’ll keep them safe,’ I said. ‘The sheriff will want to see them.’

  He snorted. ‘The sheriff?’

  ‘Yes. This time we will raise the hue and cry.’

  ‘But—’

  I put my hand on his arm. ‘You are Chief Tithing-Man, are you not?’

  ‘Yes, sire.’

  ‘Then gather the men outside the manor house. Without delay.’

  The men came mostly on small ponies, but Cornwall arrived in their midst on a fine destrier, and my first thought was to wonder how a priest could afford such a war horse? Not wanting to be overshadowed by the man, I foolishly asked our stableboy Piers to saddle up my father’s black stallion, a horse named Tempest – the most capricious and unpredictable mount in the stable. Piers baulked at my request, as nobody had ridden Tempest since Father’s death and I was the least likely member of the household to end his spell of freedom from duty. I was fortunate therefore that the horse was in an amiable mood that particular morning and did not buck me off in front of the men.

  Drawing the crowd together, I informed them we were not only searching for a murderer, but also Matilda’s body. I then described the stone-faced woman from the Starvecrow cottage, asking if anybody knew her identity. My request for information was met with vehement shakings of the head and exaggerated shrugs. When a young boy tried to raise his hand to answer my question, he was soundly shoved by his neighbour.

  It was a mistake not to press the boy further, but Cornwall’s horse was now pawing at the ground as if trained to cause a diversion. With the attention of the group now wandering from me and settling upon the priest, I cantered grandly around the men before setting out across the meadows towards the forest. It wasn’t long before Cornwall chose to ride ahead of me. Digging my heels into Tempest, I tried to regain my position, but suddenly my horse lost interest, and soon I was riding alongside the old men on their small mules and ponies. As we reached the forest path I even kept pace for a while with an ancient man on a donkey, who told me he had only joined the search party since he refused to stay at home and listen to the wittering of the women.

  As we spread out amongst the coppiced chestnuts, Cornwall contradicted my instructions to the men at every turn – and soon it seemed we were not looking for a murderer, nor even a body. Instead the men spent most of the morning searching for the signs of evil, though Cornwall was none too specific in his description of what these might be. Not that this lack of clarity concerned the men, as they were utterly taken in by Cornwall’s story – his premise only further supported by the small group who claimed to have heard the howls of dogs the previous night, their calls advancing and retreating about the village like the roll of thunder. It was scarcely possible to argue with these tales, sinc
e the men were so convinced by their authenticity that each had a more dramatic account to tell than the last.

  Gower had slept with the fire alight and an axe by his bed. He had barricaded the door to his house with a bench and a trestle table. When John Penrice claimed to have taken the very same measures, Gower then boasted he had even corralled his stinking pigs into his home, to keep them safe. The smell and effluent of these creatures within a small cottage must have been astounding, and demonstrated the true evil of Cornwall’s fairy tale. Gower still had a small child alive, and this poor boy had spent the night in the company of pigs, merely because his father had been hoodwinked into believing that dog-headed devils were roaming our estate.

  When I questioned their stories further, it seemed more than coincidence to me that these were the same men who had also been drinking late at the tavern. Though they protested heartily, I doubted a single one of them had heard the milk-souring howls they claimed to have. More likely it was the screech of an owl or the squeal of a fox.

  When we had failed to find any evidence of Cornwall’s evil in the forest, I took the opportunity to repeat my more practical instructions to the men. Look for anything out of the ordinary. A hiding place. Newly made tracks or newly turned soil. Blood-stained clothing.

  The curl of a sneer crept across Cornwall’s face as he listened to my words, but I was determined to give reason and logic a chance to solve this crime. Why should his wild superstition and delusions have all the answers? My approach was far more likely to produce a perpetrator than his mad visions of devilry. I just needed time to convince the men.

  At first it seemed I might be succeeding. They began a methodical search, keeping their eyes to the forest floor and their mouths shut. But when a young boy stumbled across a tree adorned with the skulls of small animals, my work was immediately undone.