The Forest Laird(75)

Balliol, as all men ought to know, was deposed and forced to abdicate eventually by his own nobles, his name disgraced forever in the eyes of his countrymen. But one man, one defiant rebel, continued to name him King and to champion his cause, to the great grief of Edward, England, and the majority of the Scots magnates.

That man was William Wallace.





CHAPTER NINE

1

Will spent his own years in Purgatory, a period that began on Wednesday, November 19th. I have never forgotten that date, partly because, as a librarian, I had become obsessive about such things. More than that, though, the date became memorable because of a concatenation of unforeseeable events.

Word of the auditors’ decision arrived from the south in the dead of night, in the middle of a torrential rainstorm that lasted through the dawn and threatened to flood the countryside for miles around, but the entire Abbey community awoke in darkness to the joyous tidings of the new King and happily ignored the foulness of the weather as they threw themselves into preparing for a solemn Mass to celebrate such a triumphal occasion. Mass was celebrated every morning in the Abbey, of course, but on certain occasions, such as liturgical feasts and festivals, holy days of obligation, and days of general rejoicing like this one, special efforts were expended to make the experience of the Mass more memorable. The Sacrifice was concelebrated by the senior members of the clergy in residence; the regalia worn by the celebrants was the finest that the Abbey possessed; and the instruments and vessels used in the ceremonials, from thuribles for the burning of incense, to candle holders, Crosses, and ciboria and chalices for holding the Communion   bread and wine, were the most magnificent in our treasury. Even the congregation, the Abbey brethren themselves, dressed in their finest habits, and the sound of their massed voices in the incense-laden air always seemed to take on a new dignity on those occasions. And so Mass that morning, filled with the promise of an early coronation and a return to righteousness and order throughout the reunited land, was a wondrous affair.

Those feelings of goodwill and renewed hope, unfortunately, barely survived the ending of the ceremony.

I had left the Abbey church directly after Mass and run through the pouring rain to the library, where I was helping Brother Duncan with a study of several water-damaged documents from the oldest monastery on the island of Iona. They had been drenched during a catastrophic storm, when one wall of the ancient building collapsed and many priceless and irreplaceable documents were soaked almost beyond redemption. We had not been back at work for long, I know, but we were already sufficiently engrossed in what we were doing that the clamour of excitement from outside took a long time to register. When it did, though, we knew that something unusual was unfolding nearby, and so we carefully set aside our work and made our way outside to the cloisters, where we found ourselves in a scene out of Chaos. I could make no sense of what was happening, for though there were people moving everywhere I looked, none of them appeared to be going anywhere, and all of them looked stunned or appalled and were chittering like frightened squirrels.

Brother Duncan roared for silence, and within moments everyone was gazing wide-eyed at him. He looked around at the watching faces and spoke into the hushed stillness.

“My thanks for your silence. Now, will someone please explain to me what is happening here? The reason for this uproar, so soon after Mass on a peaceful morning?”

“Murder.”

The single word, spoken in a dull, lifeless voice, provoked a concerted hiss of indrawn breath. The speaker was Brother Callum, one of the principal assistants in the Abbey kitchens. Duncan swung to face him.

“Murder, Callum? Are you sure of that? Who was murdered?”

Callum swallowed hard. “Women, on their way here to attend Mass this morning.”

“Who told you this?”

“I heard someone shouting it to somebody else, when I came out of the kitchens.”

Duncan and I exchanged glances and then he raised his voice again. “Is there anyone here who can tell us more about this? Anything at all?”

The faces staring back at him all remained blank and slightly panic stricken.

“Very well,” Brother Duncan said. “Something is clearly afoot, but since no one here knows what, it might be safe to presume that we are granting too much significance to something that might not be as serious as it appears. I want all of you, therefore, to return to what you were doing. Those of you with tasks to perform, return to them. Those of you with none, retire to your cells and pray that what we have heard is no more than speculation and misunderstanding. God grant it be so.”

As the monks dispersed, Duncan waved me to his side. “You and I will go and find out what’s going on. Let’s hope it’s not as bad as Callum reported.”