Sir Hugh Corbett 11 - The Demon Archer

side of the church rose stately mansions of honey-coloured brick, every window sheeted in glass.
    ‘Our dormitories and refectory are over there,’ Sister Veronica pointed out. ‘We have a guest house and infirmary. Lady Madeleine has her own chambers on the far side of the cloister path near the forest wall. We also own a library and a scriptorium,’ she added proudly.
    ‘So, your priory is well endowed?’
    Sister Veronica stopped abruptly. ‘We bring our own dowries here. The priory has fruitful estates and, of course, St Hawisia looks after us.’ She marched on, her shoulders stooped. ‘I can’t take you into our enclosure. The priory is not yet ready for visitors and Lady Madeleine is very strict about men coming here, be they clerk or prince. That’s why you have to wait in church.’
    She waved them up the steps but, as Ranulf passed, she caught him by the sleeve.
    ‘You be careful what you touch. This is God’s house, not some stall in the marketplace!’
    Ranulf seized her hand and, before she could protest, raised it to his lips.
    ‘Sister, I wouldn’t dream of it. I have had the deepest devotion to St Hawisia ever since I was a child. Do you know, when I was a boy I even had a vision of her?’
    Sister Veronica’s jaw sagged.
    ‘Later, Ranulf!’ Corbett warned.
    Ranulf again kissed her hand and, before the good nun could think of a suitable reply, followed Corbett into the church.
    They stood in the doorway marvelling at the beauty and elegance of this jewel of a chapel. The flagstone floor was scrubbed clean. The pillars, shielding off the transepts, were painted a dark blue with gold crowns. The walls beyond glowed with brilliantly coloured frescoes illustrating scenes from the Bible. At the far end a heavily carved rood screen sheltered the choir stalls and sanctuary. The air was perfumed by flowers in small copper pots at the base of each pillar. Faint clouds of incense still drifted through the air, catching the coloured sunlight shafting through the stained glass windows.
    ‘Well endowed indeed,’ Ranulf commented. ‘Better than a royal chapel.’
    ‘With one difference,’ Corbett said. He pointed to the windows painted in shimmering reds, golds, greens and blues.
    ‘You are a senior clerk in the Office of the Green Wax, Master Ranulf. You have to be keen of wit and sharp of eye. Have you noticed anything? The Paintings and the windows?’
    Ranulf walked along the church. He prided himself on his education. Hadn’t he his own copy of the Bible and two Books of Hours? And, wherever he went, Ranulf always watched and listened. Some of the scenes he couldn’t recognise but others he could. Judith, from the Old Testament, cutting off her enemy’s head. Ruth the Moabite. One scene caught his eye and he smiled: it showed the serpent tempting Adam. But this time Adam’s body was concealed, only his head stuck out from a thick wall of privet. Eve, however, was shown in all her glory, hand raised as if warning Adam not to succumb. On the wall beneath the window a dramatic scene showed Christ harrowing Hell after the crucifixion where he divided the good from the bad. Ranulf laughed.
    ‘ It’s women,’ he said. ‘Every scene depicts women! There are hardly any men, apart from Adam’s head and Christ. And look, master, even the Saviour, with his long hair and delicate face, has a girlish cast about him.’
    ‘And have you noticed the damned?’ Corbett asked. He pointed to the dark shadowy forms, each of whom was dressed in battered armour. ‘Look, Ranulf, all those cursed by God are male but the saved are...’
    ‘They are all women!’ Ranulf exclaimed. ‘Even the angels!’
    They walked along the church. On the one hand the paintings were lavish, brilliant in their colours and expertly depicted but their message was the same. In Heaven as on earth, the woman was good, the male worthy of condemnation.
    Corbett looked up the nave. He saw the Lady Chapel to the left and, to the right, a gleaming oak wood sarcophagus, the glass case at its head shimmering in the light of dozens of beeswax candles.
    ‘St Hawisia’s last resting place,’ he explained.
    He was about to go up and investigate when from the choir stalls in the sanctuary came a young woman’s voice intoning the Salve Regina : ‘Salve Regina , Mater Misericordia, Vita Dulcedo et Spes Nostra, Salve!’
    Corbett raised his finger to his lips and, followed by Ranulf, entered the gorgeously decorated sanctuary with