The Twice-Hanged Man Read online

  Thomas replied with an innocuous phrase that encouraged the man to say more and managed not to betray his eagerness to hear details.

  The brother looked apprehensively over his shoulder. Hearing a muffled wail from his sister from within the chapel, he bent closer and whispered, “When he was a youth, before giving himself to God, he saw the whore and Satan struck him with hellish lust. Even after he took vows, he followed the Prince of Darkness to her bed. I put my hands over my ears when he admitted the wickedness so cannot say how often she lured him to sin or how he managed to escape over the abbey walls to couple with her. He confessed he had been caught by the abbot and whipped in Chapter many times for his lust, or at least he was until he grew too old to punish.”

  Will I ever grow too old to be whipped or even burned at the stake for my sins? Thomas wondered.

  “And she was married! Her husband was a peddler who was rarely home and thus cuckolded while earning enough to put food in her mouth and clothes on her back.”

  “Did her man not know of this?” For one who covered his ears, Thomas thought, the brother has learned a great deal.

  The man snorted. “A simple, God-fearing man? One who was witless enough to trust his wife? My brother pitied him but claimed he felt no guilt over how often he took the husband’s spot by the whore’s side in bed.”

  “With good cause, you fear for your brother’s soul. Yet he may have given up this sin and reconciled with God before he died.”

  “Nay, Brother. When I came to watch the hanging of the Welsh brigand, I spoke with Payn then. He admitted he still met with her when it was safe to do so.”

  Letting go of the monk’s sleeve, he began to scratch his ears. “Surely this itching means something evil is near,” he muttered and scratched harder.

  Thomas dutifully looked around and told the man he smelled no smoke and saw no signs of imps.

  Payn’s brother seemed relieved and stopped scratching. “There was another reason I knew she had been sent by the Devil to win my brother’s soul,” he said. “What godly woman can keep a man enthralled when her breasts sag and her face grows hair and warts? She had to be a witch.”

  “Do you know her name and where she lives?”

  The man stared with horror at the monk.

  “I do not ask so I might fall victim to her myself,” Thomas said. The dismay in his voice at the very thought of coupling with any woman had been genuine for years. “But to know an imp’s name is to have power over it, and in this way I may be able to exorcise it from the woman so others will not be brought down as your brother was.”

  “I refused to let Payn speak her name or where her hut was out of fear of the Devil. Even if I knew, I could not utter the words to you. My own soul would be endangered! You are vowed to God, Brother, and He will protect you. I am not so blessed!” He began to shiver and wrapped his arms around himself.

  Of course he knows who she is and where she lives, Thomas thought. But he chose not to force the man to speak words that terrified him. Despite his condemnation of his brother, Thomas felt sorry for the man. Although terrified and dismayed over Father Payn’s sins, he still visited him, and they spoke openly about the priest’s mistress. In a way, the monk thought, he had never stopped loving his brother. That also meant he grieved deeply over Payn’s death, conflicted as he was over the sins, and he cared about the fate of his soul.

  “If Father Payn was known by his abbot and confessor to have committed the sins of lust and adultery all these years,” Thomas said, “surely he tried to struggle against the Prince of Darkness and was given acts of penance to perform. It is therefore quite likely that the only sins of this nature on his soul, when he died, were committed that night—if, indeed, they were committed at all. It is possible Father Payn had gone to preach the virtuous path to this woman.”

  The man blinked. The light of hope flickered briefly.

  “And so the only sins for which he must suffer are those we all commit as weak creatures of the flesh. Some time in Purgatory may cleanse his yet. Prayers for his soul would be quite useful.”

  Had Sister Anne not returned alone just then, Thomas feared the man might have fallen to his knees in gratitude, a gesture he could not have allowed. Unable to explain why the man would be committing a transgression by kneeling to one as befouled as Thomas believed himself to be, the monk would have feigned the virtue of humility and thus greatly compounded his own egregious sinning.

  Fortunately, the man rushed into the chapel to join his sister in prayer before their dead brother’s corpse. He was so eager to start his orisons on behalf of Payn, who was suffering in Purgatory, that he failed to say anything further to the monk.

  Thomas was relieved.

  * * *

  “Are you convinced that Father Payn died a natural death?” Thomas asked the sub-infirmarian a short while later as they stood looking down at the black river surging under the rough stone bridge.

  Anne hesitated. “I believe less in ghosts.”

  “I agree,” he replied.

  Chapter Seven

  Although Robert tried to persuade his sister to sleep, she insisted on waiting for the return of her two monastics.

  “I apologize for keeping you from your task in the village,” she said, pointedly changing the subject to let him know that further argument was useless.

  He looked confused, and then replied, “Ah! That can wait.” He grinned, hoping to disguise that he had forgotten the stratagem he had used to go with her and the abbot.

  Eleanor smiled sweetly in return. She had always read her brother well, and the gray now evident in his hair did not mean he had grown cleverer in fooling her. With a servant in attendance, there had been no reason for him to accompany her, and he knew that. So why had he lied? She decided not to ask. Either he would explain later or she would find out another way.

  A slight flush in his cheeks suggested he knew he had failed to deceive her. “Shall I leave you in peace?”

  She gently touched his cheek. “Kiss my little niece and tell your wife I send my blessings.”

  “Have you need of anything while you wait?”

  “Go, Robert! I know you long to be with them, and I am content. Sister Anne and Brother Thomas will not be long.” Playfully, she pushed him toward the stairs.

  Throwing her an affectionate kiss, Robert swiftly left the room.

  Rarely have I met such a devoted father, the prioress thought with pleasure. Then she began to pace around the hall to stay awake.

  * * *

  Soon Sister Anne and Brother Thomas joined her and recounted what they had observed.

  “With no evidence that Father Payn died by any form of violence,” Sister Anne said, “there is surely no basis to pursue this matter raised by the abbot.”

  Eleanor knew she must disappoint her friend but struggled to find words to make her thinking clear. “I agree that is reasonable,” she said, after a long pause, “except that Abbot Gerald will not accept your conclusions as adequate proof that nothing untoward happened.”

  Brother Thomas stiffened. “If he will not accept conclusions based on knowledgeable observations, what could possibly convince him that a vengeful spirit did not kill the priest?”

  Eleanor was surprised at his impatient tone, then realized that he, too, was suffering from grinding fatigue. “He claims there was a credible witness to a ghost. If we can prove the man really saw nothing, or that he saw someone else and mistook him for Hywel, that would be a forceful argument. There are witnesses to subsequent sightings of this alleged phantom. Prove them wrong, and we will have won our case.”

  “Perhaps Father Payn was visiting his mistress that night…” Sister Anne stopped and looked at Thomas.

  “And the peddler husband returned to find them together, killed the priest in a way we were not able to detect on such a superficial examination, and dump
ed his body in the forest?” He shook his head with evident regret. “I apologize for offering such a weak argument.”

  Anne concurred.

  “I wonder where the hanged man’s brothers are,” Eleanor said. “Might one of them have been mistaken for Hywel by this allegedly competent witness?”

  “We do not know where the men are,” Sister Anne replied.

  “We must still question others, or at least some more thoroughly.” Eleanor looked sympathetically at her two monastics.

  Anne understood exactly what her friend meant. “I shall talk to the priest’s mistress. She is more likely to confide in a nun of simple birth rather than a prioress from a baronial family.” She smiled at Eleanor. “Gentle though you might be, you would terrify her.”

  “And I shall seek this Bardolph,” Thomas said. “As for any others who might have seen the ghost, I spoke with a friendly merchant today. He might know more of this haunting, or else lead me to men who have witnessed the creature. I think it best if we do this immediately before memories fade further or rumors that we are seeking information cause people to improve on the stories they might tell.”

  Eleanor shook her head. “You have both slept little since we left my brother’s manor.”

  “I slept while you were all awaiting the birth of little Alienor. Not all my time was spent in prayer.” Thomas smiled to hide his lie, and then added with greater honesty, “I am delighted with the choice of name, my lady.”

  Eleanor blushed.

  “And I napped after you returned to talk with Abbot Gerald and before Brother Thomas came back from the village. That rest was adequate enough.” Noticing Eleanor sway on her feet, Sister Anne put a firm hand on her friend’s shoulder. “It is time for you to sleep. If you need me, you can send a servant. The village is small enough that anyone can offer direction to the woman with whom Father Payn stayed.”

  Try though she might, the prioress did not have the strength to argue. After arranging for a reliable woman, long in her brother’s service, to accompany the sub-infirmarian, Eleanor sent them off to discover what they could.

  Brother Thomas had already left to find Bardolph.

  Then Eleanor climbed the stairs to the solar and found the tiny room her brother had made ready where she could sleep without hearing the babe. The moment she lay down on her straw mat, the Prioress of Tyndal fell into the gentle arms of deep sleep.

  Chapter Eight

  Sister Anne had no doubt that everyone in such a small village knew Father Payn had a mistress and who she was. Nonetheless, she chose diplomatic phrasing when asking directions to where the woman lived.

  Smiling modestly, she waited for the baker, who had been promoting the freshness of his bread as well as the honest weight of the loaves, to respond. From the delicious smell, she doubted he lacked customers.

  “You’ll be wanting the house in the middle of that close with the wall at the end. Just ask for Mistress Berta, the peddler’s wife.” He pointed to a lane so narrow only one person could walk through it.

  “Is her husband home?”

  He laughed. “He so rarely is that many of us call her widow. I’d take you there, but I must stay with my wares. Just knock on any door nearby if you want. We all know her well.”

  Anne did not get the impression that Mistress Berta was condemned for her union with Father Payn. Such was often the case with the mistresses of priests in small villages, especially if the relationship was of long duration and both were from local families.

  The first door she knocked on was opened by an elderly but spry woman who glanced at the servant by Anne’s side, then at the nun.

  “Well, I know neither of you,” she said, but nodded amiably at the servant and then turned her gaze on the nun. “You haven’t come from the abbey, that’s for certain.” She tilted her head and waited for an explanation.

  “I arrived late last night with Robert of Wynethorpe in the company of his sister, Prioress Eleanor of Tyndal Priory. My prioress has learned from Abbot Gerald of the death of Father Payn. She sent me to speak with Mistress Berta about some matters pertaining to that sad event and…”

  The woman scowled. “You needn’t say more, Sister. The abbot’s been wandering about, wringing his hands, and wailing about evil spirits. I shooed him off when he came here. The mistress is grieved enough without having to face this nonsense about imps and phantoms. And if you want to worry her with talk of souls back from Hell, you can just turn around, walk back to that hunting lodge, and tell your prioress that the abbot needs to find something else to fret about and leave sorrowing folks alone.”

  “I have no intention of that. I am more concerned with his mortal health when Mistress Berta last saw him. If I may ask a few questions, I will be on my way and not trouble her again.”

  The woman’s forbidding gaze wavered but did not concede defeat.

  “Perhaps it would give her some comfort if she and I prayed together for Father Payn’s soul. Such was my prioress’ hope and command to me. I swear to be gentle with her grief.”

  “Aye, it would.” She almost smiled. “That is more than that mewling abbot offered. Come in. I shall let her know you are here to offer consolation.”

  * * *

  Mistress Berta was a surprise.

  Unlike the description suggested by the priest’s brother and passed on by Brother Thomas, this woman was of agreeable enough appearance, albeit with plain features, wrinkles, and gray hair. No warts were in evidence, although she was missing a few teeth. She most certainly did not fit the common image of a seductive whore, sent by Satan to lure a priest into breaking his vows, but neither was she ugly. Her charms were a mouth circled by deep furrows, suggestive of a natural merriment, and a youthfully soft skin devoid of scars or other disfigurement. Her eyes, however, were red and puffy from weeping.

  Sister Anne introduced herself, then reached out to take the woman’s hands.

  An instant later, Mistress Berta was in the nun’s arms, sobbing with grief.

  When her tears subsided, the woman looked up at the sub-infirmarian with much embarrassment and begged her pardon. “He was a good man,” she murmured and called out to the elderly servant to bring fresh ale.

  Sister Anne talked soothingly and avoided questions until she was given a mazer and Mistress Berta had calmed further. “You were long acquainted?” Anne asked, and then sipped. The ale was surprisingly good.

  “Our families lived next to each other. We grew up together.” Berta drank. Suddenly, she hiccupped, and her face turned scarlet. “I should never drink when I’ve been crying.”

  “Take a deep breath and hold it for a moment. Press your hand against your chest, just here.” She showed her. “Then drink very slowly. It will ease a little of your pain.” The nun waited until the woman swallowed without ill effect and then continued. “You were friends from an early age, then.”

  “Aye! More like brother and sister, or so many said. Our parents jested, saying we were like pups from the same litter when we ran out the door and saw one another. Our families decided we would marry one day.” She rubbed her eyes and struggled not to weep again.

  Anne did not ask why this had not occurred, hoping she would soon learn.

  “When we were older, we wanted to marry and even lay together, assuming God would forgive us for anticipating the wedding day we expected soon.” She looked at the nun as if seeking forgiveness.

  “A deed not uncommon amongst the young,” Anne said gently. In truth, she found no sin in that, having bedded her own husband before the marriage vows were uttered. Even after her spouse became Brother John, he never claimed that they had sinned in so doing, for a betrothal was as binding as the later church door vows.

  “And so we all believed, until a vile plague hit our village and many died. Payn’s family survived, as did mine, but his father decided he owed God a gift for His mercy. His
offering was to give his son to the abbey.” Mistress Berta turned her head away to hide a sorrow she had never shaken off.

  “Had he no other son to give or had Payn discovered a calling after surviving death?”

  “At that point, he was the youngest, and his only future would have been to work for his father as a baker and, later, the older brother.” She covered her eyes. “Afterwards, his mother bore another son and a daughter, but, by that time, it was too late to change their decision. The daughter was allowed to marry. The youngest brother was apprenticed to the smithy after that man’s own son died. Opportunities in the village had changed.”

  Anne decided that the last two children were the ones she and Brother Thomas had met at the abbey. The eldest must be the baker from whom she had asked directions, unless he had since died and another taken his place. A village this small would only have one.

  “So Payn was sent to the abbey, there being no other trade he could have followed here. He argued that he had no religious vocation, wanted to marry me, and would take on whatever labor there was to earn our keep. His father insisted that giving up the world and taking vows out of gratitude for God’s mercy could be any man’s calling.”

  “And thus he became Father Payn.”

  “His parents rejected much of the world too. His father turned the bakery over to his eldest son. The parents spent most of their time kneeling in the abbey church, other than the times they lay together to bring forth two more children.”

  Anne noted the bitterness in the woman’s words.

  Mistress Berta bowed her head and sighed. “Forgive me, Sister. I should not offend your vows and blessedly chaste life by speaking of such matters. I have no right to criticize them, for I am the worst of sinners.”

  Anne touched the woman’s shoulder. “We all sin,” she said, “and I entered the religious life after being married for several years. Remember that God loves a kind heart, faults and all. It is the sanctimony of hypocrites that He curses.”

  “I confess I resented them for not draping themselves in celibacy and still finding solace with each other in bed when they demanded that Payn and I deny ourselves the same comfort.”