Prince of Darkness

small leather collar.
    'What is this?' Ranulf muttered.
    'Well, you've heard about the murder?' the porter replied. 'The young man and woman whose naked bodies were found in the marsh? A week afterwards, I was out poaching very near the place and I found the body of a small lap dog. The poor creature had died, probably from neglect, or else pined away for its mistress. Only a lady would have a lap dog. There was no one in the village who would own such a pet and the Lady Prioress is quite strict with her community on that, so I knew it must belong to the young woman who had been murdered.'
    The fellow grinned, his yellow stumps of teeth shining garishly in the poor light He pointed to the tattered piece of leather.
    'That's the only thing which gave any clue about her.'
    'Why didn't you hand it to the Sheriff or the Justices?'
    'Because there was a gold clasp on it,' the fellow muttered. I sold it to a tinker. So I thought I'd better bury the poor thing.' He glimpsed the look of anger in Ranulf's eyes. 'Take the collar!' he urged. 'There's a motto inscribed inside. Examine it carefully. Now, that's my secret,' he whined. 'I know nothing about Lady Eleanor. I was drunk as a bishop the night she died. The Lady Prioress had to sober me up to send me to Woodstock. God knows how I got there. I gave the message to some chamberlain and staggered back.'
    'You went by horse?'
    'No, there's a quicker route across the fields, in daylight it's quite clear. Go out the other side of the priory, beyond the farm. You will see the track. It's not an hour's walk.' Ranulf sighed, pocketed the leather strap, waited for the porter to re-bury the bones and half-carried him back to the priory, listening to the fellow's litany of self-congratulation.
    'Nobody would ever think,' he slurred, 'of looking beneath a gibbet!'
    Ranulf humoured him and, once they were through the Galilee Gate, handed over the promised coins and went back to the guest house.
    Corbett was still up, seated on the floor, pieces of parchment strewn around him. Ranulf knew his master had been scribbling his own memoranda, trying to make sense of the mystery which confronted them. Ranulf gave a brief account of what had happened. Corbett grunted, impatiently hurrying him on, and seized the tattered leather strap. He asked Ranulf to hold up a candle and carefully examined the inscription on the faded, leather collar 'Noli me tangere'. Do not touch me.
    'What do you think, Ranulf?'
    'A family motto?'
    'Perhaps.'
    Corbett rubbed the strap between his fingers and went to stare out of the window, half-listening to the sounds of the night outside. In his heart Corbett knew that the murder of
    Lady Eleanor and the dreadful silent slaying of that mysterious young woman and her male companion in the nearby woods were inextricably linked.
    The dungeons of the Louvre Palace were the antechambers of hell though very few of those who went down the dark stony steps ever emerged to recount their experiences. Philip IV's master torturers, a motley gang of Italians and strange, wild creatures from Wallachia, were expert in breaking the bodies and souls of their prisoners. Eudo Tailler, however, had proved to be one of their strongest victims. Despite the crossbow bolt in his thigh, Eudo had survived the rack, the boot and the strappado: every limb was broken but he clung tenaciously to life. He had seen the young French clerk whom Celeste had seduced, be broken in a matter of days and confess to whatever question had been put to him. Eudo was different. He was not frightened for he hated the French more than he feared death. Fifteen years earlier Philip's troops had attacked his father's village and razed it to the ground, wiping out in one night Eudo's brothers and sisters, as well as his young wife and child.
    Eudo refused to say anything. Oh, he had told lies and they had trapped him by asking for the names of other English agents in Paris. He had told them many a fairy story and when they checked, they returned more furious than before, dragging him out of his dirty, fetid pit back into the great vaulted torture chamber to be questioned once again Sometimes Eudo had glimpsed the French King, his blond hair glinting in the guttering torchlight Philip would stand behind the black-masked torturers waiting for Eudo to speak. Now it was all over. Eudo knew he was going to die. He had also realised what the French wanted from him: the truth about the Prince of Wales' former mistress, now