Honour Be Damned (20 page)

‘Then we will have to push on,’ said Markham, slightly annoyed.

‘I think it is safe to do so.’

The church of Notre Dame de Vacluse had been more than just that. It consisted of a number of stone buildings nestling haphazardly in a shallow valley, some made for animals, some for humans, and others for the storage of the products garnered from the surrounding farmlands. The main construct was the church itself, more imposing structures inside stout old-fashioned walls. De Puy described it when it was bustling; carts rumbling in and out of the gates, while inside, in the large courtyard, men toiled to unload and stack what they carried. The spire of the basilica rose above it all, square and Romanesque. But even from the edge of the woods Markham could see, before he passed his small telescope to the Frenchman, that the bells it once contained were gone, the belfry a gaping empty hole.

De Puy observed the same things as Markham. There wasn’t a single roof, door or window that had not been burnt away and that included the gates that had once enclosed the courtyard. Aramon was dejected. But allowing for his gloomy nature, once he swept the area with the telescope, de Puy seemed fairly sanguine. Both Markham and the Monsignor had watched him carefully, trying to discern which particular building interested him. But he seemed intent on giving them all equal attention. That was as far as it went. Asked for his opinion as to the merits of proceeding, he declined to give them.

Markham was at a loss as to what to do. Germain could hardly stay upright in his saddle, and the case was the same here as it had been on the coast. Any shelter was better than another night in the forest. But he took no chances, and sent men both ways along the rim of the woods to make sure that no French force was waiting in ambush.

After the protection of the trees, going out into the stubble of the uncultivated fields made him feel naked. He and the two men he’d brought had a quarter of mile of almost totally open country to traverse, through corn stubble or untidy rows of herbs that threw up pungent smells as their boots kicked or crushed the tiny flowers. Even where there were hedgerows or trees they were overlooked by the forest from which they’d just emerged. Despite the reassurances he’d received from his own men he felt certain that there were eyes upon him, perhaps even muskets trained on his back. The hairs on his neck were tingling, and judging by the way Gibbons and Leech kept jerking round, they were feeling the same sensation.

The sun was sinking, creating an angled golden light that turned the corn stalks mellow, and deepened the purple of the strips of lavender. It also threw every standing object into sharp relief. Long shadows stretched across the landscape, shimmering in the heat, creating the illusion of dark moving figures. The time it took to reach the outer wall by the gate seemed like an eternity. Still hot from the sun, the wall towered above them. This was a real medieval setting, and these stones had been raised for defence against invaders. Odd that they’d probably been destroyed by the very people who once worshipped in the church.

Markham went through first, edging round the huge gudgeons which had once held the studded gates to flatten himself against the inner wall, in the deep shadow under the wooden parapet. The
courtyard was bare earth running to the steps that led up to the church. There was an arched portico over that, with elaborate carvings that had, up to just above head height, been hacked so that whatever figures of antiquity they represented lacked noses and arms. The entrance to the church itself was just a black hole in the middle of that surmounted by a crucified Christ who had escaped the attention of the ransacking mob.

There was a heavily scented wind, and in the confines of the walls it swirled round, sending up little wisps of dust. There had been wooden structures set against the walls between the doors that led to what looked like monky cells, the outline of the odd lean-to still visible. The sound of banging he heard was too rhythmic to be human; a door or perhaps a shutter that had survived the inferno this must have been. It was easy to imagine the place full of life and prosperity, just as it was depressing to see what it had become, a victim of blind revolutionary prejudice.

‘Right, you two, forward down the walls and round to the church door, one each side.’

Markham stayed still, his eyes never wavering from that black hole. Leech and Gibbons stooped at every doorway, to peer through before jumping the gap and turning to see if that produced a reaction, Leech in deep shadow, Gibbons in the last of the bright sun, both with bayoneted muskets out in front of them like feelers on an insect. As soon as they were in position Markham moved, walking right down the middle, up the steps and into the body of the church.

He crossed himself before he called his Lobsters in. Markham wasn’t religious, but right now he felt superstitious enough to believe that ignoring the ritual would be madness. All three stood just inside the doorway, staring at the bells that had been burnt out of the belfry, to crash into the stones of the nave. In here it was silence, excepting the odd fluttering as a pigeon changed its perch. Their boots sounded very loud on the stone floor, as they moved past the bells to look at the altar.

They heard him before they saw him, a single kneeling figure, brown robed, the chanted words of his prayer bouncing ever so gently off the barren walls. The discoloration of the stone showed where they had once had paintings or tapestries, the vaulted ceiling a place for singing voices to echo from the now ruined choir stalls. The monk, which was what Markham supposed him to be, remained still as they approached, even though he must
have easily heard them. Then, when they were no more than five paces distant, he stood, crossed himself, and turned to face them.

But he had no face to speak of, just twisted, wrinkled and
burn-blackened
skin with one blue eye staring straight out. There was a patch above that, on a leather thong. The other eye was an empty socket; there was no hair on the head or around the eye and the nose looked like those of the gargoyles outside, a stump. Both marines, even with muskets extended, recoiled from the sight, taking a sharp inward breath and a pace back. Markham felt that familiar stabbing ache pass down through his stomach to his groin when faced with a horrendous wound. No amount of experience could render him immune; it was his imagination transferring the pain and suffering to his own body. And then the monk smiled.

‘Welcome to Notre Dame de Vacluse. If you come in peace, the church receives you in peace.’

It was a beautiful voice, deep and masculine, but at the same time tender and truly welcoming, all the more remarkable given the horrible visage of its owner. The face tried to smile, but that made it even more ugly, exposing teeth that only threw the blackness of the skin into prominence. The one eye flicked unblinkingly from bayonet tip to bayonet tip, then to Markham’s pistol. Immediately he dropped it, and ordered his men to do likewise.

‘You were not alarmed by our approach?’

‘No. I saw you come across the fields with such caution that I knew you presaged no danger. Men who kill and burn come in confidence and greater numbers.’

‘Are you a monk?’ asked Markham.

‘Yes.’

‘And you were here when this happened.’

The monk raised his arms, to encompass what had once been.

‘God has punished us for being too worldly. Our church had wealth in abundance. The friends I had who inhabited this place loved good food and wine more than piety. Other sins of the flesh were commonplace. So is it not fitting that we suffered the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah?’

The hand flicked to the ruined face, stroking the gnarled burnt skin.

‘I suffered from too much vanity, cultivated my appearance and spent too much of my time with ladies of quality rather than in
prayer. This is what was visited on me. How would those
wellborn
women look on me now.’

There wasn’t a trace of self-pity in the explanation, just a matter-of-fact acceptance of his fate.

‘Quite a number of them will have lost their heads to the Revolution. It may be that they would envy you.’

‘Then I must pray for them on two counts.’

‘We require shelter.’

‘Would you believe, monsieur, that is what this church was set up to do hundreds of years ago. A place of sanctuary for weary travellers. It is a good thing that it should be returned to the proper function.’

‘We have a wounded man. Do any of your monks have knowledge of medicine.’

To see him laugh was alarming in the way it rendered him so ugly, the horror of the face so at odds with the humour of the noise that came from his throat.

‘There are no monks other than me here now. Some have returned to the life of the laity, and profess to deny God. The rest have moved to other places, ones that are intact and can still feed them and fill them full of wine.’

‘Yet you chose to stay.’

‘God chose, not I.’

‘Do you have a name?’

‘Not one that I wish to share.’

‘Are there any soldiers around?’

‘There are you three.’

‘You are a Frenchman?’

‘I am.’

‘Then,’ Markham said, ‘I have to admit that we are the enemies of your country.’

‘I was a soldier myself at one time, young man. I know only too well the colour of that coat your wear.’ He ran a hand over his face. Perhaps now God has now seen fit to forgive me for the men I killed, both on my own side, and on yours.’

Markham wanted to ask him where he had served, and what actions he had taken part in. But under the gaze of that basilisk, single, unblinking eye, he found any deviation from religion and his purpose in being here impossible. Was the fellow mad or sane? He certainly had the right to be the former. The pain he’d suffered must have been horrendous, enough to turn his wits. Yet he
sounded sane enough, if you took away the fact of his solitary existence in this place.

‘Leech, signal to Sergeant Rannoch that it is safe to come in.’

There was a pause before the order was obeyed; one caused by the very simple fact that neither marine had the faintest idea what was going on. But once moving, Leech did so quickly, the sound of his crashing boots reverberating off the walls.

‘I will leave you to your prayer. I must look at your walls and seek to set up some kind of defence.’

‘There is no need for that,’ the monk snapped, displaying the first hint of displeasure.

‘Rest assured I will not defile any holy place.’

‘Indeed you will not,’ he hissed.

Markham forced himself to look into that eye, not out of any desire to challenge, more to see if he could discern the workings of the man’s brain.

‘I must tell you, sir, that a force of French infantry is pursuing us. Should they come upon this place I would be loath to surrender.’

‘There will be no fighting, and certainly no killing. And should you choose to ask me why that will be so, I will tell you. It will be my duty to stop it. No one will die within the limits of Notre Dame de Vacluse unless I expire first.’

There was no expression on the face by which to judge the veracity of such words. Nor did the eye, lacking eyebrows, lids and lashes convey truth or bombast. But Markham made no attempt to argue. He would do what he had to and mount a defence, without, if possible upsetting this cruelly deformed monk.

‘You said you had a wounded man.’

‘He has taken a musket ball in the shoulder. It is still there.’

‘Then bring him to my cell, which used to be the vestry by the side of the altar.’

‘You can tend to him?’

‘With the help of God, yes.’

That, to a man with little in the way of faith, was hardly reassuring. But Markham had little choice. There was no one in his party who could offer Germain any real help. That ball, left where it was, would probably kill him. God’s help, through the agency of this solitary monk, was better than nothing.

‘Gibbons, have a good poke round, but do not go beyond the altar. See if there is any other part of the property that has a sound enough roof to give us a bit of shelter.’

M
arkham had toured the perimeter by the time the remainder of the party trooped in, their shadows even longer as the last of the light sunk to the very rim of the mountains to the west, the Massif des Maures. The walls were not much use against a modern enemy, having been built centuries before to withstand spears and arrows. Not that he could, anyway, hold it with a dozen men against any type of determined assault. His job was to get out of here as fast as possible.

Germain had finally passed out, and had to be carried to the vestry at the back of the church. The one-eyed monk, as soon as his Lobsters had got over the shock of his appearance, had them lay him face down on his cot, no easy matter in a room into which he crowded everything he had salvaged from the once thriving religious house. There were books, brass candlesticks and crucifixes, parts of tapestries and half-burnt altar cloths. A writing stand stood in the way of the cot, surrounded by all the things necessary for illuminating manuscripts. Parts of the choir stalls, heavy craved oak, had been stacked in one corner, in such a way that they looked as though they would topple over. There were horse collars, yokes and leather bits and girths, saddles and the wheels off what had probably been a dog-cart, as well as a mass of unused church candles.

But there was also a whole chest full of proper surgical instruments, saws, cleavers and ampoules for bleeding, including the probes necessary to undertake an extraction. Another contained jars of pounded herbs, which the monk assured them would act to help save the captain’s life. Men were sent to fetch water from the well house, and a fire was lit in the grate to heat it. The operation took place immediately that was ready, while Germain was still unconscious, watched with morbid fascination by as many of the men who could dodge their duties.

Gibbons wasn’t one of them. He had found a couple of cells where the roof could be repaired. Candles were fetched and one
was allocated to Ghislane, with the next-door cell for her maid. Another larger room, more open to the elements, contained Aramon and de Puy, plus the three servants.

It was curious to observe the cleric fidget. So close to the prize he sought, he had lost some of his self-assurance. The relationship between him and de Puy now seemed altered, with the latter making it clear that nothing could be achieved in the dark. Clearly the cavalry officer was now in charge. It didn’t seem to trouble him, the way he was constrained in his movements by the watchful eyes of the four men who shared his accommodation. If fact, as soon as he could he made up a bed. Then with a determination that could only be explained by his newfound superiority, he lay down and went straight to sleep.

Markham himself found a separate billet for the Lobsters, a former stable close to the exit. He wanted them all in one place, with an easy way out, so that they could depart in the pre-dawn hours without fuss. If anyone wondered why the two horses were in the cell of a monk instead of here, let them do so. Fouquert was placed in a corner, furthest from the doorway, where they could keep an eye on him. Markham tied him to a ring bolt in the wall, removing his gag only when he was secure. That began a long and loud complaint at his treatment, the noise of which threatened to carry to the ears of the other civilians. Markham didn’t threaten him personally. He sent Rannoch in to do that. As soon as Fouquert saw the look of hate in the Highlander’s eyes, and the way the man was caressing his bayonet, he ceased to moan.

Markham paced the rim of the courtyard, checking each cell and room, while trying to think what to do next. He was dog-tired but had too much on his mind to even contemplate sleep. The whole party had to be fed, and now it was dark that meant consuming more of his rations or asking the monk what he had. Judging by the man’s sparse, aesthetic frame that would not amount to much.

He had to get his men ready, and brief them on what he planned, make sure that they took with them only what was needed to ensure that they moved with maximum speed. That meant abandoning some of their kit, which wouldn’t please them since regulations stated that replacements had to be paid for out of their pay. Then there was the notion of what they thought they had come here to recover. What were the words Rannoch had
used, ‘Gold and silver, as well as jewels the size of bird’s eggs.’ Perhaps, with that in mind, they’d refuse to move at all.

The news that they were leaving would have to be left till later, so that they did not give the game away by loud carping. Then there was the captain. He could hardly go without seeing Germain. He hoped the patient would still be unconscious, so that he could leave him a note rather than proffering a verbal explanation to a man who would probably become a prisoner of the French. All that about arrangement for his ship to pick him up was stuff and nonsense.

And finally he had to consider Aramon and de Puy. Should he write out some kind of explanation for leaving them high and dry, perhaps striking a confident note that the forthcoming battle on the frontier, made successful by his prompt action, would solve the problem for them by opening the road to Rome. Deep down he knew that would be more a missive aimed at Ghislane Moulins that either of the two men. She was the only person to whom he would want to explain his conduct.

Aramon he’d never had much time for. But de Puy had slipped from the respect he’d enjoyed at Calvi to something a great deal less. Whatever reason he had for his secrecy, had it never occurred to him that it potentially jeopardised them all? That once they were ashore in France it would have been better to have been open and honest so that each and everyone of his men could have been sure they were risking their life for some purpose other than Germain’s reputation.

Even though sleep was vital, so that his men would be rested and fully fit at dawn, he would have to post piquets on the walls. Really he should put guards out closer to the woods, so as to give ample warning of any incursions. But they were too weary. At the very least he, Rannoch and Halsey would have to split the twelve hours of duty between them so that they each got the maximum amount of rest. Since he would be leading them out in the morning, the last should be his, which meant that he should get his head down right now. Yet he still had to eat, and formulate some plan, as well as a route, from the map he’d failed to return to de Puy. And that should include a talk with Rannoch.

The task of getting back to
Syilphide,
to a fatigued mind, looked insurmountable. He could see in his mind’s eye all the things that could go wrong. They had no time to make any errors of judgement, since he’d never know what might hold them up. They
could traverse the whole forest only to find some unknown factor that would delay his access to the shoreline. That meant getting there as early as possible, which in turn left little margin on the journey. Any man hurt by a wound or a fall would have to be left behind, and that, in deep forest, could easily be a sentence of death. And it might very well be him.

George Markham was not a pessimist, and was incapable of maintaining such a gloomy state. Confidence soon reasserted itself.

‘Food,
boyo,
that’s the first thing. Then sleep. You’ll feel a different man then.’

At first he thought the scream came from the back of the church, from Germain’s pain as the monk, who might be a butcher as well as a healer, probed his wound. It didn’t help that it was so loud that it echoed all around the inside of the walls. But then he realised that he could not have heard it from that source, the vestry being buried at the very back of the church. That impression was confirmed by the yelling and shouting now coming from the stables. He ran to the entrance, and saw Rannoch struggling with the one-eyed monk, the brief impression he had of Fouquert showed him cowering in the corner, still attached to his ring bolt.

He was amazed that Rannoch, huge and as strong as an ox, was struggling against such a seemingly feeble foe. He was desperately trying to hold on to a hand that held a surgical cleaver. The single eye of the monk, gazing over the Scotsman’s shoulder had no more expression now than it had contained before. But the nature of his movements was frenzied. He was kicking and biting, pulling like a madman to get his arm free, cursing and swearing like the trooper he had once been, a wholly different animal from the tense calm creature Markham had met not two hours before.

The strength of the man was phenomenal, and Markham understood why Rannoch was having such a fight as he tried to assist. The first task was to get that cleaver well away from the Highlander’s head, but the grip the monk had taken seemed unbreakable. Markham smashed his hand against the stone of the wall to no avail. It must have caused excruciating pain, but perhaps that was nothing to a man who’d suffered so much. Halsey and Dornan ran in, and it was only the latter’s strength, applied solely to bending back the monk’s thumb, which
persuaded him to let go. It took all four of them to pin him, still spitting incomprehensible abuse, to the wall.

‘What in God’s name set him off?’ demanded Markham, too busy to be aware of the ambiguity.

Rannoch was breathing almost as heavily as the monk. ‘Damn me, Lieutenant I do not know.’

Dornan hit the monk, full force, in the stomach, driving all the air from his lungs and temporarily reducing his struggles. Even though his officer yelled ‘belay that’, Markham was grateful, since the victim slumped down, a sob breaking from his lips.

‘He walked in here looking for you,’ Rannoch continued, easing the pressure of his grip. ‘He then told me to pass on the message that the musket ball had been removed, and that with God’s will the captain would be all right.’

‘And then he went berserk?’

‘No. He spotted that slug in the corner.’

‘Fouquert?’

The name set the monk off again, and having relaxed their grip it took some effort to restrain him.

‘He asked who he was and I told him. Then he went to have a look and wanted to know if he could be released. I said no and he departed, with me thinking nothing of it. Two minutes later he came through that door like a bat out of hell, swinging that cleaver and screaming abuse.’

‘At you?’

‘Not me.’

Markham looked over his shoulder to the cowering Fouquert. He dropped his head so that he could at least partially look in to the monk’s face. If he’d been ugly before he was doubly so now. Whatever had been benign had gone completely. The skin was even more gnarled than it had been before and tears were streaming from the ducts of that single eye.

‘You know this man?’

The monk must have realised that he could not prevail. His body went limp. The head was nodding slowly, and the screaming and shouting had turned to continuous sobbing.

‘Was he here when the church was burnt?’ That just brought forth another sob, so Markham released his grip and walked over to gaze down at Fouquert. ‘Look at me, damn you.’

The black eyes that fixed on his showed real terror, the kind Markham supposed that Fouquert had seen in the eyes of his
victims just before he went to work on them. There was a trickle of saliva running from the corner of his mouth, and he was shaking slightly.

‘Were you here when this place was burnt?’ The head dropped again. ‘Answer me, Fouquert, or as God is my witness I’ll walk out of here and leave you alone with that monk and his cleaver.’

‘Yes.’

Markham was trying to remember who it was had said to him that Fouquert had the face of a Jesuit. It wouldn’t come but the thought remained and it had resonance. You didn’t need to know too much about history to realise how much death and destruction the Catholic Church had visited on the world. Priests had condoned, sometimes even carried out, the kind of work of which Fouquert had been so proud. It took no great leap of the imagination to see Monsignor Aramon in the same light. Both he and Fouquert had the certainty of a cause to sustain them, as they spread misery, poverty and death.

The monk was crumpled now, the words he was mouthing prayers rather than curses. Markham indicated that his men should cease to hold him and step back. It was just as well that he was stood between the monk and his intended victim. He didn’t actually stop the headlong dive, but he did deflect it, so that the man had only just got his arms round Fouquert’s throat before the four of them intervened.

It took several minutes to get him off and back to the far side of the room. Now it was Fouquert who was sobbing, demanding to be released so that he could defend himself. Markham was bent over the monk, repeating over and over again a request to be told what had happened. It came out slowly, in all its horror, loud enough for the perpetrator to hear, mixed with a repeated chant of the monks’ sin of vanity, and cries to
le
Bon
Dieu
to lift the curse it had brought.

Most of the monks and priests had begged for mercy, some had even gone as far as to renounce their god rather than face the violence from the mob Fouquert had brought along. Not this monk! His vanity forced him into outright defiance. Faced with a handsome and proud man, who would not bow the knee to him, Fouquert had taken a torch from one of his men and, full of the wines looted from the cellars, personally burnt the skin off the man’s face.

It had been done slowly, piece by piece, the eye that was missing
going because the drunken torturer staggered and poked the torch too hard. The screams of pain and anguish only egged him on, The hair was on fire as he left the torch on the nose, so that what had been fine and patrician, ended up as the stump it now was. None of his men could understand a word of the explanation, but they could observe his growing pallor and wonder. And maybe they understood the pleas to God for forgiveness that punctuated the telling.

Markham had to fight back his own feelings. How could he explain to someone who’d suffered so much that he was to be barred from his legitimate revenge? How could he return this man to the level of piety and peace he displayed when they’d arrived? Even if Markham could calm him now, would he stay that way? He couldn’t take the chance. They had to keep Fouquert alive, and it was with a voice as heavy as his heart that he ordered his men to tie the monk up.