Revelation

'I entered the novitiate when I was sixteen. My father got me in, he did carpentry for the abbey. He didn't want me working for him, said I was clumsy. Though it was my eyes, of course.' Cantrell's voice had sunk to a sad monotone.

'How came you to work in the infirmary?'

He shrugged. 'Goddard wanted someone to train up and I was the only young monk there. I didn't mind, I thought it would be better than copying old texts, which is what I did before. They burned them all, when the house went down.' He laughed bitterly.

'Do you miss the life?'

He shrugged. 'I liked the routine, after a while I believed all they said, about our serving God. But — well — it was all wrong, so they say now, 'tis as futile to say Masses for the dead as throw a stone against the wind.' He paused. 'The world has gone all crooked. Do you not think so, sir?'

'Tell me about Dr Goddard,' I said. 'What he did that killed his patients.'

'I won't get into trouble?' he asked nervously.

'You will if you don't answer,' Barak said.

Cantrell considered. 'Dr Goddard was an impatient man. Sometimes he used to prescribe what I thought was too much medicine, and the person would die. There was an old monk, too, he fell down some stairs and smashed his arm badly. It had to come off. Goddard used to do the operations himself, it cost money to bring in the barber-surgeon, and he gave the monk a big dose of some stuff that sends you to sleep; he slept through the operation all right but never woke up afterwards. Goddard said he must have given him too much. He said, at least he'd never have to hear his creaky whining again.'

'This medicine, was it called dwale?'

'Yes, sir.' He looked surprised that we knew.

'Surely if you thought the doctor was hastening people out of the world, you should have spoken.'

Cantrell shifted uncomfortably. 'I wasn't sure, sir, I'm no doctor. He would have talked his way out of it, and I'd just have got into trouble. And you don't know what he was like.' He hesitated. 'He would look at me sometimes as a man will look at a beetle on his table.' Then he laughed, uneasily. 'I'd be working away in the infirmary sometimes, not saying anything because he didn't like conversing with inferiors like me. Then suddenly he'd fly at me for some little mistake, nothing.' A strained, bitter smile flickered over his thin face. 'I think he did it just to make me jump.' He paused. 'What has he done, sir?' he asked again.

'I am afraid I cannot say. Your eyes, they are still weak?'

'Even with the glasses I can hardly see. They say the King wears glasses now.' He laughed bitterly again. 'I'll wager he can see better than me.' He seemed to slump further on the stool. 'When I left the monastery I went back to work for my father, but I was no good. After he died I gave up the business.' He looked at an inner door. 'That was his workshop. Do you want to see?'

I looked at Barak. He shrugged. I stood up.

'Thank you, no. But thank you for your help,' I said. 'If you think of anything that might help us, anything at all, I can be reached at Lincoln's Inn.' I hesitated, then added, 'I am sorry for the trouble with your eyes. Have you ever seen a doctor?'

'There is nothing anyone can do,' he said flatly. 'I will go blind eventually.'

'I know someone—'

'I have little faith in doctors, sir.' His mouth twisted in a sardonic smile. 'After my time with Dr Goddard. You understand.'

OUTSIDE, BARAK shook his head. 'You'd send every sparrow that falls from a tree to the old Moor.'

I laughed. Then Barak touched my arm. 'Look, over there, that old woman's waving to us.'

I followed his gaze. An aged, respectable-looking goodwife in a white coif, carrying a basket in which a pair of dead rabbits lolled, beckoned to us from the other side of the street. We crossed over to her. She fixed us with a pair of sharp eyes.

'Were you visiting Charlie Cantrell?' she asked.

'What's that to you?' Barak asked.

'He's not in trouble, is he?'

'No. Helping with some legal enquiries, that is all.'

'He's a poor fellow, I don't think he stirs much from that house. His father died last year and Charlie inherited the house and business. I was a friend of his father. Adrian was that skilled with wood, he was always turning away business. Charlie can't do carpentry with his poor vision, now all he has is his monk's pension.' She looked between us, waiting for a reply, eager for gossip.

'You live nearby, goodwife?' I asked.

'Five houses down. I've asked Charlie if he'd like some help with cleaning, his house is filthy and he could afford someone else to do it out of that pension, but he won't have anyone there. I reckon he's ashamed.'

'Poor young fellow.' I looked at her stolidly, and seeing she was not going to get anything out of us she wrinkled her face at me then turned and walked off, the rabbits' heads hanging out of her basket, bobbing up and down.

'Nosy old bitch,' Barak said.

'Young Cantrell is not one of those who went from the Dissolution to a better life.'