‘Then remember what the apostle Paul said.’
Matthias caught the humour in the hermit’s voice.
‘Love covers a multitude of sins.’ He rose to a half-crouch and stretched out his arms. ‘So come, Matthias, here in our secret place, one last embrace.’
This time the hermit squeezed him tightly, holding him so close the boy could feel the man’s tears wet on his cheek. The hermit released him.
‘Go now, little one. Go on!’ He clapped his hands. ‘Show me how fast you can run.’
Matthias did so. He felt a lump in his throat. He wanted to stay. When he reached the ruined lych-gate, he stopped and turned round but the hermit had gone. Matthias ran into the woods, following his secret way, creeping past the guards, now shouting and laughing as they filled their tankards and discussed, yet again, the Preacher’s strange sermon. Matthias returned to the village, slipping back into his house. He fled to his chamber and, lying on his bed, wondered what would happen to the hermit.
At Tenebral the hermit, who had taken the name of Otto Grandison, was already preparing for what would happen the following morning. He lay face down in the sanctuary, the tears streaming down his cheeks, his body trembling with sobs as he whispered into the darkness.
‘I have loved and I will not lose,’ he said. ‘I have tried one way and I have failed. I will return!’
He lay stock-still waiting for the answer but the only image which filled his soul was of the beautiful woman, hair bright as the sun, her hands stretched out to take the thornless rose.
Then another image followed: the small, dark face of the boy, proof that, at last, if he searched long enough for love, love would respond.
6
The chronicler at Tewkesbury described the villagers’ attack on the hermit at Tenebral in the most colourful language. According to the old monk, who blew on his knuckles and scratched the parchment with his quill, the night before was riven with protests. A blazing comet was seen in the sky, the stars dripped blood and a screech owl was heard in the woods around the village. Strange beasts appeared, plodding through the night: men with the heads of dogs; ghostly hunters speeding through the trees. Black Vaughan and his demon riders pounded along moonlit trackways. An angel perched on the spire of the church and, in the graveyard, ghosts were seen, their grey empty shapes moving amongst the tombstones and lichen-covered crosses. Strange knockings were made on doors. The patter of invisible feet was heard in passageways. When the sun rose, Tenebral was bathed in a fiery reddish glow of Hell.
Of course these were legends. The arrest of the hermit was a simple, even pathetic affair. Matthias, forbidden to leave the house, had spent the previous evening avoiding both his father and mother as well as the sinister, chilling presence of the Preacher. The men of the village, armed to the teeth, with arbalests, longbows, spears, hatchets, dirks and daggers, marched towards Tenebral like a phalanx across a battlefield. The hermit was waiting: standing under the ruined lych-gate, he did not struggle when they bound his hands. Some of the younger men beat him with sticks and drew blood from his nose and mouth yet he offered no objection. They tied the other end of the rope to Fulcher’s great horse and dragged him like a sack of dirt into the village.
The Preacher was in charge. Parson Osbert bleated about compassion and the rights of the prisoner but the peasants’ blood was up: they were determined to try this hermit for his life.
Christina did not come down that morning but stayed in bed. Matthias heard the uproar as the men dragged the hermit into the nave of the church. He slipped out of the house and joined the women and children of the village as they thronged the church, eagerly awaiting the trial. A jury was empanelled, twelve good men and true symbolising the apostles who followed Christ. There was, however, nothing Christlike about the Preacher. Parson Osbert could only stand flailing his hands, bemoaning the violence of his parishioners. The Preacher acted as both judge and prosecutor. The jury sat on the benches facing each other across the nave. The prisoner was bound to a pillar whilst the Preacher dominated the proceedings from the pulpit. Walter Mapp the scrivener had a small table brought from the sacristy as he would act as clerk. He pompously laid out the parchment, ink horns, quills, pumice stone and the keen little knife which would keep his pen sharp.
The Preacher clapped his hands three times.
‘
A roar like the howl of some great beast filled the church. Men, women and children stamped their feet and held their hands out, a sign they always used in the manor court when petitioning for justice.
‘What is your name?’ the Preacher demanded.
‘What is yours?’ the hermit coolly replied, bringing back his head.
The Preacher looked nonplussed. ‘My name is not your business!’
‘Then neither is mine yours!’ the hermit retorted.
The Preacher, his face flushed with anger, looked down at the scrivener. ‘Take careful note of what the prisoner says.’
‘I am glad you will,’ the hermit replied, ‘for the record will condemn you, your own words and actions.’
The Preacher drew himself up. He was disconcerted by the cool mockery in the hermit’s voice.
‘What do you mean?’ The Preacher could have bitten his tongue out.
‘By what authority do you try me?’ the hermit demanded. ‘You are not a member of this village. You are not a tenant of the manor. You hold no warrant either from the Crown or the Church. So, by what authority do you try me? By what right do you hold this court? What warrant gives you the role of judge and prosecutor?’
A murmur of approval greeted the hermit’s words. The villagers peered anxiously at each other, then at the Preacher. They accepted the power of the prisoner’s words. The villagers had a reverential awe of the written word, the sealed warrant, the rites and ancient customs. More importantly, what would Baron Sanguis say when he returned? Manor lords were very jealous about their rights.
The Preacher in the pulpit was also concerned. Unless he reasserted his authority, these proceedings would end like some mummers’ farce. He dug into his wallet and drew out a scroll of parchment, dark and greasy with age. He unrolled this, holding it up so the villagers could see the indentations down the side and especially the great purple blob of wax at the bottom, an official seal.
The villagers sighed with relief.
‘What is that?’ the hermit mocked.
‘The warrant of Holy Mother Church!’ the Preacher snapped. ‘Permission from the great Order of the Hospital to preach God’s words, extirpate heresy and bring wrongdoers to justice.’
‘It has no authority here,’ the hermit declared.
‘Hasn’t it?’ the Preacher replied silkily.
He came down the steps of the pulpit. He now realised standing there was a mistake. Too aloof, too distant from the people he wished to manage. The Preacher handed his warrant to the scrivener, who studied it carefully and nodded wisely.
‘It has the authority of Holy Mother Church,’ the scrivener lied.
‘Then why am I bound?’ The hermit seemed determined to fight the Preacher every step of the way.
The Preacher nodded and gestured at Simon the reeve. He must not allow the prisoner too much sympathy. The cords were cut. The hermit, rubbing his wrists and flexing his arms, walked into the centre of the nave. Matthias, who had managed to worm his way to the front of the crowd, squatted open-mouthed. The hermit caught his eye, smiled faintly and winked.
‘I accuse you,’ the Preacher decided to waste no more time, ‘of the murder of Edith, daughter of Fulcher the blacksmith!’
‘What proof do you have?’
‘So, you don’t deny it?’
The Preacher now walked up and down, more intent on the parishioners than the prisoner.
