The room was bare and small, though the ceiling was high, having a large inset window facing east. We could see very little until a monk entered with a lamp. As soon as there was light, a terrible sight assailed our eyes. There on the floor lay the poor brother, in a pool of blood, his face contorted in a horrible grimace. His head had been badly beaten, but there seemed to be no weapon about. The circa was telling the abbot with a trembling voice, that his last round had been at the tenth hour and at that time he had helped Brother Daniel to the latrines and back to his room. Thereafter he had neither heard nor seen anything suspicious.
Many monks now peered through the door, over the heads of others, and soon the room began to fill with the sound of their voices. I forced myself to look at the body clinically, concentrating on the stony face, the eyes open, perhaps with a look of surprise. My master walked over to the body of the old brother and I saw him pick up the man’s foot. He removed a sandal and inspected the sole, but said nothing. He simply replaced it, leant over the body, felt for a pulse, and finding none, closed the man’s terrible eyes and pronounced him dead to a chorus of gasps and strangled whispers.
My master then turned to the inquisitor who had been ordering his archers to search the compound for a weapon. ‘Now you can see that this is not the work of the cook nor the infirmarian.’
‘I do not see that at all, preceptor!’ he answered. ‘It is well known that sorcerers can kill from a distance by the use of their infernal powers.’
‘This is clearly a case of violence, Rainiero, otherwise you would not be wasting your men’s time looking for a weapon,’ my master said exasperated. ‘Somewhere the murderer has left his indelible mark and I believe it is a physical one.’
‘Physical or metaphysical, it matters little. The ways of sorcerers are many and varied. No, this death only serves to emphasise the urgency of appropriating guilt and carrying out punishment as soon as possible.’
‘This one differs from the others . . . Brother Daniel was killed by an instrument, a sharp instrument, we see that here . . .’ he pointed to some substance on the ground which, to my horror, looked like fragments of brain matter, ‘ . . . it has penetrated his skull. The others, I believe to have been poisoned . . .’
At that moment, Brother Setubar entered the group. His tortured frame moved awkwardly to the body of his friend and then he let out a groan that seemed to emanate from the pit of his soul. He made the sign of the cross and turned, bestowing a look pregnant with fierce malevolence on all of us.
‘Satan has struck us once again!’ he cried, as though he himself had been struck on the chest by a blow. He steadied himself on the abbot’s arm and continued a little out of breath, ‘God has turned his countenance away from us all. Brother Daniel, architect of our destiny, venerated brother and friend, dies because this very night the Devil’s instrument has once again penetrated the sanctuary where no man must go!’ This was followed by a great agitation. Setubar shook his head. ‘Now God will turn His rage on all men and as Joel has warned, He will make it that the sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood. The earth will tremble, and the stars shall fall to the earth, and the earth shall shake with His anger and when men hide themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains then we shall cry to the mountains and rocks to fall upon us and hide us from the face of Him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the lamb!
You!’ He pointed a deformed finger at the inquisitor. ‘Sanctify ye, call a solemn assembly, gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land into the house of the Lord your God and cry unto the Lord, alas for the day! For the day of the Lord is at hand, and as a destruction from the Almighty shall it come!’
The old man was led away by the abbot who encouraged the assembly to disperse, and the poor body was taken to the infirmary. My master, having been given permission to inspect the room before it was summarily cleaned, remained. He paused before the doorway, and kneeling on the ground, investigated something that he could see on the floor.
‘Red dirt.’ He brought the clay-like substance nearer to his face. ‘But why not on the brother’s shoes?’ He paused, thinking. ‘Of course!’ he exclaimed. ‘Not on his shoes because not he, but another here tonight, has entered the tunnels besides us. That is why Daniel’s death is achieved by a different means.’
‘We may have partially solved our mystery then,’ I said, ‘we can surmise that the red dirt has something to do with the deaths.’
‘Do not place too much faith in syllogisms. It is true the other three may have had red dirt on their shoes, but you also had red dirt on your shoes, and you are not dead, moreover whoever stood here tonight with red dirt on his sandals is also not dead. This leads me to postulate that merely entering the tunnels has not caused the demise of the other three, but plainly something else . . . some substance in the cursed place with which neither you nor I, nor indeed the killer has come in contact. This death satisfies the assumption that it was a desperate act of violence. Furthermore I would like to know how our venerable Setubar knows that we entered the tunnels tonight, for he said someone had broken the interdict once more?’