Read 31 - City of Fiends for Free Online Page A

ruddy-complexioned, with powerful shoulders and arms. He had the sort of face that would have suited a
knight more than a man of God: square, rugged, with strong brows over intent, green eyes – a face that could have snared many a maid’s heart. However, today there was a pained look
about him.
    ‘Do you know why you are here?’
    ‘Janekyn saw me at the gate, Precentor. But that murder was nothing to do with me. I had been with Father Paul in his church, and when I realised how late was the hour, I hurried back.
That is all.’
    ‘Did you go into the lane where this maid was killed?’
    ‘I didn’t kill her, Precentor. I happened to be passing by on my way back from the Church of Holy Trinity, that is all. I would never harm a maid.’
    ‘You didn’t go up the road there?’
    ‘Are you accusing me of kicking a maid to death?’ Father Laurence demanded with spirit. ‘Look at me! I am no felon, Precentor. I have never had an accusation of any kind
against me. It is simple villeiny-saying to suggest I could have had anything to do with her injuries.’
    Precentor Murimuth remained gazing at him for a long time, but the vicar stared back stolidly.
    ‘Very well,’ Murimuth said at last. ‘You may go for now, but I think it would be well, were you to remain within the Close for some days. At least until after the
inquest.’
    ‘Yes, Precentor,’ Laurence said. ‘You may be right.’
    Church of the Holy Trinity, South Gate
    Father Paul watched as his little congregation drifted away from his church, and then made his own way from the nave into the small room at the north side.
    He had a large chest here, and he pulled off his vestments and stored them carefully within it. The alb was showing its age, he thought, as he folded the long white linen tunic; and so were most
of the other ceremonial items. His daily robes, too, he thought, glancing down. But it didn’t matter, not today. He had other things on his mind.
    Last evening, he had seen Philip Marsille out in the road. He knew the Marsilles, and how desperate was their plight, so he went to speak to the lad.
    ‘Philip. Are you well?’ he asked gently.
    Philip looked up at him with eyes raw from weeping. He was a tall, well-favoured lad with a shock of fair hair and blue eyes in a pale face. ‘You couldn’t understand, Father.
It’s a matter of love between a man and a woman. Or not!’ His eyes filled again, and he bent his head to his hands. Through them, he choked, ‘She doesn’t love me.’
    There was the sound of a door opening, and Father Paul saw that Henry Paffard and his family were emerging from their home. Henry’s son and daughter walked out, then his wife, all
following after him like servants in a Canon’s familia , descending the short flight of steps one by one.
    Philip stared at them, his face working. The eldest son, Gregory, glanced back at him without emotion, as if the poor boy was beneath his dignity. The master of the house peered briefly at him,
but Philip was his tenant, and what interest would a man like him have in a fatherless son, after all?
    The lad should pull himself together, Father Paul thought. It was ridiculous that he should be so, so . . . overwrought.
    It was then that Philip had hissed the words that so alarmed Father Paul.
    ‘You bastard, Henry! You son of a pox-ridden whore! I’ll kill you!’
    Hearing of a murder in Combe Street, Father Paul had immediately assumed that Philip had gone ahead with his stated purpose: to strike down Henry Paffard. He had knelt in front of the cross,
hands clasped, knowing he could have done nothing to prevent the crime, but rocking with the guilt nonetheless.
    This morning, he had heard it was a maidservant who’d been killed – some wench trying her luck as a tickle-tail no doubt, and the relief had been overwhelming. If it had been
Paffard, he would never have forgiven himself.
    There were many such women selling themselves, tempting men with their leering and