A Mortal Bane(147)

[page]“You did not look out?” the bishop asked.

“No.” A touch of color stained the sacristan’s pallid cheeks. “I thought it was a pair of sinners seeking a dark and quiet place. I thought I heard running as I came close and believed they were gone, so I only caught the edge of the door and swung it shut.” Then every bit of color faded from his face until it was whiter than bleached parchment. “Are you telling me that when I went to the door, the papal messenger was bleeding his life away on the north porch? Have I killed two men by my carelessness and mistaken zeal?”

“No, Brother Paulinus,” the infirmarian said firmly. “Both had taken fatal wounds at the hands of their murderers. Nothing you could have done would have saved either one.”

“Perhaps,” the sacristan said and took a few steps forward to confront Beaumeis more closely. “I was not the man who spoke to Messer Baldassare or the man who went out with him and stabbed him on the north porch. I will swear it on a cross heated red. Will you swear on a burning cross that I was the man you saw, Richard de Beaumeis?”

Beaumeis had shrunk away and would not meet the sacristan’s eyes. Between the two, Magdalene knew she would choose the sacristan, much as she disliked him, as the truth-teller. She suspected that everyone else in the room felt the same, and it was clear from the way Beaumeis was almost panting for breath that he knew he had damaged his own cause by accusing Brother Paulinus.

The bishop, however, had little patience with religious fanaticism; his voice was cool when he said, “We have not yet come to such an impasse as to need a trial by ordeal. Can you offer any support at all for this tale of yours, Beaumeis?”

“What can I offer?” Beaumeis cried. “You are condemning me because you hate me.”

That was true enough to make everyone uncomfortable. The bishop glared. The priest and the Archdeacon of St. Paul’s looked at the floor or their toes. The monks drew closer together and whispered among themselves.

Emboldened, Beaumeis continued. “I was trying not to be seen. I—” He started to shake his head and then drew in his breath. “Oh, wait. Brother Godwine saw me going out the gate. He said, ‘I thought you left at Vespers.’ I had said I was leaving after Vespers. I did not answer, but he will be able to tell you—”

“Brother Godwine is dead,” the bishop interrupted. “He was murdered on Wednesday night.”

“No!” Beaumeis wailed, growing even paler. “I was not even here Wednesday night,” he gasped, his eyes nearly starting from his head and his body shaking so hard that he almost toppled over. “I was with my uncle, the Abbot of St. Albans. No! You are only trying to frighten me into confessing what I have not done, because you think I did you a despite.” He was sobbing hopelessly, and then he did fall, folding in on himself and collapsing to the floor.

The bishop turned to Bell, his face hard and angry, clearly about to order the knight to bring Beaumeis to his senses by any necessary means, but the prior spoke first.

“If what he says about being in St. Albans is true, he could not have killed Brother Godwine.”

“That is still no proof that he did not cut Baldassare’s throat.” Winchester’s voice was calm, but the rigidity of his expression betrayed his fury.

Father Benin bent and put a hand on his arm. “My lord,” he said softly, “you need real proof, hard proof. He is such a nothing that no one here really believes he could have murdered Baldassare. Even if you bring him to confess….”

The prior shook his head and went around the table, clearly intending to see to Beaumeis. There was an instant of breath-held tension and then the bishop turned his head and looked at Bell. Bell in turn beckoned to the men-at-arms and told them to take Beaumeis back to the chamber in which they had kept him and keep him there.