The Last Templar aktm-1 Read online

  “Yes, of course. I’d better come with you. Wait here, I’ll just go and get my things,” Simon said. As bailiff, he was his lord’s representative in the court at Lydford, in charge of the local constables. Clearly, if by helping Tanner he could see thieves arrested, he was performing his duty. Even though Lydford did not cover Tanner’s area, it was every man’s responsibility to help catch felons. He walked out to the yard at the back of the house, shouting instructions to Hugh to saddle up a fresh horse, then swiftly kissed his wife and daughter before snatching up his sword and leading Tanner out to the front of the house.

  There they paused, waiting for Hugh. Simon fretted at the delay and when Hugh arrived with his horse he snatched the reins from him and was quickly in the saddle. Tanner mounted his great old beast more slowly, heaving his massive frame up with slow inevitability. The sight reminded Simon of watching a tree fall: there seemed the same slow beginning, the same initial faltering, followed by a sudden acceleration, until, at last, peace. The tree lying on the ground, the constable sitting in his saddle, with a small smile of achievement on his face, as if he too had doubted his ability to mount. Then they were on their way, gently cantering off to the Clanton farm.

  “So did he say anything else about these people?” Simon asked.

  “No. Seems they were travellers, but that’s all I know. The boy, he was tired out when he got to my house – couldn’t hardly talk. I left him with my wife.“

  “We may have to call up a posse,” said Simon reflectively. “When we get to the barton, we’ll find out where they were robbed and what happened. If we need the posse we can organise it from there.”

  “Yes, that’s what I thought. We may have to ride straight past the men’s houses anyway, if they came back this way.”

  They rode on in tense expectation, hardly talking for the rest of the journey, Tanner sitting stolid and imperturbable on his mount and Simon warily casting around as he went. He was staggered that this should have happened – especially so soon after his position had been granted. In all his years in the area he had only heard of three robberies, and the last was months ago. It seemed an appalling forewarning of his tenure of office that this should have happened so soon – especially after Brewer’s death. And for some reason he had a vague presentiment of evil, a suspicion that this affair would not be as easy or as straightforward as Tanner’s message seemed to imply.

  It only took them a matter of an hour to get to the Greenfield Barton, or farm, a solid building of granite blocks with the dark red mortar showing clearly between each. A fire was obviously lighted inside, the smoke was pouring out of the chimney, lending an apparently tranquil air to the surroundings.

  The two men dismounted quickly and tethered their horses, then Simon strode to the solid wooden door and rapped loudly. He could hear voices inside, and stepped back a little. There was a shuffling, and then the door was opened a little and a square, whiskered face peeped out, holding a suspicious frown in the old, faded blue eyes. Seeing only Simon, the door opened wider and he could see that it was Greenfield, a farmer whose fair hair, rumoured to have come from his Viking ancestors, had lost its colour and was now a pastel grey. The eyes peered out cautiously at the bailiff from around the edge of the part-opened door. Normally a calm man, easy-going and casual, the extent of his caution at the knocking of a stranger was concerning. His lined and worn face only cleared when he saw Tanner standing behind.

  “Ah, Stephen. Hello, so my boy got to you, then?”

  “Yes, John, I left him at home warming himself in front of the fire. He was worn out by the time he got to my house.”

  “Ah, well. At least he made it. So, it’s Mr. Puttock, isn’t it?” he said turning to him. Simon nodded.

  “He’s the bailiff now, John. That’s why I waited before coming over. I wanted to bring him.”

  “Ah. Best come in, I reckon.”

  They followed the old farmer through the doorway and into the screens: a wide corridor, lit by a series of sconces set into the wooden walls, built at the end of the hall to partition off the parlour and animal quarters. A heavy tapestry gave into the large, dark hall beyond, where four men sat ranged around the roaring fire, watching the farmer’s wife as she stirred a pot and prepared food over the flames.

  “Here’s the bailiff and the constable,” Greenfield said as he led the other two through the door, and as he entered, Simon recognised the men with a sudden shock. They were the four monks he had seen walking with their abbot while he was on his way to Furnshill.

  “Where’s the abbot?” he asked as he walked over to the men. They all gazed up at him, their faces lit by the fire, and as he looked at them, waiting for an answer, he saw that they were all frightened, as if fearful of his question. He looked enquiringly at the farmer. “Well?”

  Greenfield shrugged, as if he had no knowledge of an abbot, that these were the only men that had appeared.

  With a frown of concern on his face, Simon turned back to the monks. “Where is he?”

  At last one of them dropped his eyes and looked at his lap. “We don’t know,” he said sadly, and then his breath caught in his throat as if he was close to sobbing. “He was taken from us. He was taken hostage.”

  Simon walked over to lean against the wall not far from the fire, his eyes flitting from one to another as he crossed his arms. “Tell me what happened,” he said gently.

  At first it was difficult to get any sense from them. It took long enough merely to persuade them to talk. It was not only the shock of their experience, it was also the miserable night they had spent in the open, with no shelter from the bitter wind and rain. The oldest of them had completely lost his smile and genial appearance. He seemed to have suffered more than the others, he looked close to collapsing from fear and shock, and could hardly keep his hands from shaking as if he had the ague, his eyes downcast as though he wanted to avoid the bailiff’s gaze. Seeing this, and sensing his pain, Simon directed his questions to the youngest-looking, a man almost as old as himself, who seemed the least affected of them all.

  He began fitfully, with many pauses and sidelong glances at his companions to check that he was not leaving out any points of importance. “We… we were going on to Oakhampton…”

  “Why did it take so long? I left you days ago, you should have been there by now.”

  “We… the abbot wanted to rest and the… we stayed at the church at Crediton. We only started out again yesterday and… We got to Copplestone…”

  “Where were you when it happened?” Simon asked quietly, his hand toying with his sword hilt as he tried to control his impatience and the urge to make the man speak faster and get to the point.

  “Out beyond the village. We had left the village… must have been two hours before…”

  “Were you still on the road?”

  “Yes. Yes, we were…”

  “And you were all together?”

  “Yes, we were all walking, except for the abbot on his horse. Two men came up from behind us… they had swords. They rode through us – we had to get out of the way. They got to the abbot and…” and Simon stepped forward softly and crouched in front of the man, looking at him gravely. At first the monk dropped his eyes as if embarrassed, but then, gradually, his eyes came up again with a kind of defiance, and he spoke directly to the bailiff, his eyes staring straight into Simon’s and his voice losing its nervousness and slowly gaining strength from the sight of the grim officer in front of him, who listened as though with his whole body and soul in silent intensity.

  “We… we were scared. The abbot had been worried for days. He was sure that we’d be attacked. He never said why, but he was sure of it. He seemed to feel that we were always close to being attacked.” Simon nodded – that certainly matched his own observations. “Then these two men came up from behind and scattered us all. They wore helms, we couldn’t see their faces. Their swords were out and they went straight to the abbot… they knew what they wanted… One took the abbot’s
bridle, and he… The abbot had all of the money on his horse… We thought they’d go then, take the packs and go, let the abbot down and leave us alone, but, but they didn’t… they took the abbot’s reins and took him with them… They went off into the woods by the side of the road with him. We couldn’t do anything about it… We… we started to follow, we ran after them, but then we realised that if they saw us they might kill the abbot to get away… They shouted at us… they said they’d kill the abbot if we followed… We… they said they had others in the woods… They said they’d kill us as well if we didn’t leave… We had to leave them and come back… We tried to find somewhere to rest, but there wasn’t anywhere… we had to sleep on the road. We tried to get back to Copplestone, but it was too far…”

  Gently Simon touched his shoulder until the young monk subsided. “Did they have any marks on their helms?”

  “No… no, I don’t think so.”

  “How about their tunics? Any signs on them?”

  “No, nothing.”

  “So there was nothing to identify them?”

  “No.”

  “What about their horses – what colour were they?”

  “They were both brown. But one was a great big horse, like a knight’s. The other was smaller.”

  “Were there any marks on their clothes? Anything to show they were knights?”

  “No, no, I don’t think so,” said the young monk, frowning in concentration. “But it all happened so fast…”

  “So they simply rode up and took the abbot?” said Simon musingly, his brow puckered as he peered at the young monk in incomprehension, trying to make sense of the situation. “Did the abbot say anything?”

  “No, sir, he was completely silent – I think he was scared,” said the monk simply.

  Simon frowned at him for a moment, then, his face serious, he stood. “Stephen, we’ll need to go and look for the abbot. I’ll go on ahead and see what I can find. You must raise the posse and follow me when you can. We’ll have to try to rescue him.” He turned back to the young monk. “Would you come with me to show me where it all happened? Can you ride?”

  It was only as the monk gazed back at him with the fearful eyes of a petrified rabbit that the bailiff suddenly realised the full impact of the news. The abbot was taken! The abbot of an important and wealthy Cistercian monastery, almost certainly a high-born man! He must be found, and quickly – before he could be harmed.

  But who would hold an abbot hostage?

  Chapter Eleven

  Greenfield had a massive old grey horse that he used for pulling his cart, that Simon secretly felt should have been killed years before as an act of kindness, but he was grateful enough that the monk could borrow it when they left the farmhouse.

  Tanner, now he knew that a man, and an abbot at that, had been taken hostage, moved swiftly to his horse and was soon riding away to rouse his men. Simon and the monk had to wait for a while for the old horse to be saddled, the bailiff fretting at the delay, but soon it too was ready and they made their way quickly down from the old farm to the road. Once there they turned their heads to the sun and set off at a quick lope.

  “What’s your name? I forgot to ask back there.”

  “It’s David, bailiff.”

  “Fine. Keep your eyes open, then, David. I want to know as soon as we are getting close to the place where the abbot was taken yesterday. Alright?”

  The monk nodded, the fear still plain on his face. Of what may have happened to the abbot, Simon wondered, or of what may happen to us? Grimly he reached down and made sure that his sword was still at his waist. The feel of the hilt comforted him a little, but he was still wary and felt nervous himself about what they might find.

  They had covered more than seven miles from Copplestone when the young monk reined in his horse and slowed to a trot, falling back. Simon, noticing him out of the corner of his eye, slowed as well and let the monk ride up slowly and overtake him. He could see that the young man had a fixed frown of concentration on his face, and seemed to be glaring at the trees all round as he trotted forward. He stopped and waited for Simon to catch up.

  “I remember this bit,” he said, pointing up at an ash tree that had been blasted by lightning. “I noticed that just a few minutes before it happened.”

  Simon nodded and dropped lightly from his horse. The highway here was a wide track through the woods. Although the king’s order many years before had commanded that all roads should be cleared for yards on both sides to help stop outlaws from making ambushes, many like this one had not yet had the undergrowth cut down. The tall trees on either side seemed to enhance the sense of their solitude, as if reminding them how far they were from a hamlet or even a house, and the noises of their horses’ hoofs and harnesses were deadened this deep in among them, heightening their feeling of isolation.

  He tossed his reins to the monk and walked forward slowly, the monk following on his horse, as he carefully examined the hard-packed earth of the road. Occasionally he paused to study the ground in more detail, but the spoor of the monks and their attackers was too mixed in with the marks of other travellers, and the rain from the previous night had been heavy enough to wash away most of the signs. He shrugged. Maybe a hunter could follow what happened here, but he knew he could not. He continued on, the monk trailing slowly after him, his eyes flitting from the bailiff to the trees in his apprehension.

  Simon was concentrating so hard on the road that he was startled by the sudden cry from behind.

  Spinning round, he ran back to the monk, part-drawing his sword from its sheath in his fright. “What is it?” he hissed.

  Pointing in among the trees that lined the road, his eyes glittering, the monk turned to face him. “It was here,” he said simply.

  Sighing in his relief, the bailiff followed his finger. He could see that the ground was heavily disturbed at the verge on the north side of the road. Reseating his sword in its scabbard, he walked up to the fringe of the trees and peered into the darkness. Warily he subjected the woods to a minute study, his eyes going from tree to tree, until, at last content that no one was watching, he dropped to a crouch and looked at the ground. It was obvious that three horses had passed through. He could see the tracks clearly in the dirt between the trees – the rains from the night before had not washed the marks away. Simon frowned and peered into the darkness again, wondering what to do. It would be sensible to wait here for the posse to arrive, but that could be a long time. Tanner would have to visit twenty farmsteads and hamlets to call up all the men in the hundred, so by the time they arrived it would be dark. He made a decision and stood up.

  “David, I want you to wait here. The posse will be along soon enough, and you’ll be safe here. When they get here, tell them to follow me if I’m not back. I’m going into the woods to see if I can find where these tracks lead to.”

  The monk gripped his reins tightly in his fear and looked from the bailiff to the trees all round. When he spoke it was with a voice hushed by his concern and trepidation, as if the trees nearby were hiding the abbot’s abductors. “But… but, what if they come back? I can’t face them again… And what if they see you? They might…”

  “I don’t think so. We’ll be alright, whoever took the abbot has probably gone by now anyway. Don’t worry, all you have to do is wait here for the others. I should be back soon,” said Simon with more confidence than he felt. He glanced into the trees and felt his brow pucker into a scowl. He felt as nervous about going in among them as the monk was about waiting here on the road, but he had a responsibility to see whether he could track the hostage and his abductors. He patted the neck of his horse absentmindedly, smiled up at the monk, and was gone.

  It seemed to him, as he stepped in among the trees, that the woods themselves were listening and watching him. There was no sound apart from his feet as they occasionally crunched small twigs and leaves. Even his breathing sounded unnaturally loud. There was a hush, a deadness, that sapped his will, and it was
only after he had paused to look back and seen that he had only managed to cover forty yards that he continued. In his nervousness it seemed as if he could feel a malign presence lurking near: if he had been out of sight of the road he felt that he would have run back, but knowing that he could still see it made him impatient with himself and with his fear, so with a quick and angry gesture he forced himself to carry on.

  As he went deeper into the woods, he started to hear small noises. There was a scratching nearby, then a rasping, and all around him the tick and creak of the trees, which all together made him even more tense, the muscles of his scalp tingling with the strain as he stretched his ears to pick up any human sounds. At one point a bird high above clattered off from its roost, making him jump behind a large trunk in his alarm, only to grimace to himself in disgust. He heard a sudden yapping, then a sharp screech from far away that made him stand stockstill for a moment, hand on sword-hilt, but there was nothing more. Slowly he untensed his muscles and forced his feet forwards again, but now he kept his hand on the sword. He heard a quiet scraping and whirled, but it appeared to be one branch rubbing against another. He looked all around, considering whether to get back to the road, but then, glowering, he straightened his shoulders and went on. His fear was beginning to leave him now, he was moving less from a need to force himself to do his duty and more from a desire to help the abbot if he could. He could not forget the terror on the man’s face as he had asked for Simon’s help and company, as if – Simon suddenly stopped. As if he had known this was going to happen? He shook his head and continued. There would be time for speculation later.

  Maybe if he had agreed to join the abbot this would not have happened, though? Perhaps the sight of the bailiff and his servant would have put the two robbers off? And, if that was so, he had let the man down, and let him down badly. That thought, having taken root, built a small flame of anger deep inside him. It was not just the fact that the abbot was a frightened man who obviously wanted his protection and aid, it was that he was a man of God. He should not have been attacked, his cloth alone should have been sufficient defence on the road. The thought that someone here, in his own shire, could rob an abbot and take him hostage made Simon’s anger smoulder.