He shook his head. 'I cannot see it. Please believe me, sir, I am not being awkward, but I cannot see Brother Gabriel as a killer.'
'I have felt sorry for the man, even liked him. But we can't decide these things on the basis of emotion. We need cold logic. How can we know whether someone is capable of murder or not after a few days' acquaintance? Especially in this place, where all our senses are heightened and distorted by danger?'
'I still can't see it, sir. He seems so — soft-natured.'
'We might as well accuse Brother Edwig on the basis that he is a despicable creature, more like an animated calculus than a man. He is full of deceits too, and lusts as well, apparently. But that doesn't allow us to say he is a murderer.'
'He was away when Singleton was killed.'
'And Gabriel wasn't. And I can see a chain of motive for Gabriel. No, we must put emotion aside.'
'As you would have me do with Alice.'
'This is not the time to discuss that. Now, will you come with me to confront Gabriel?'
'Of course. I do want this killer caught too, sir.'
'Good. Then buckle on your sword again. Leave that other sword here, but bring the habit. Wring it out in the bowl first. Let us put these matters to the test.'
CHAPTER 21
My heart was pounding as we went back outside, but my head was clear. It was well past midday now, and the sun hung low in a hazy sky; one of those great red winter suns that you can look straight into, as though all the fire were leached out of it. And, in that cold, so it felt.
Brother Gabriel was in the church. He sat in the nave with the old monk I had seen copying in the library, examining a great pile of ancient volumes. They looked up at our approach, Gabriel's eyes flickering uneasily between Mark and me.
'More ancient books, Brother?' I asked.
'These are our service books, sir, with the musical notations. No one prints them, we have to copy them when they fade.'
I picked one up. The pages were parchment; Latin words were marked phonetically and interspersed with red musical notation, different psalms and prayers for each day of the calendar, the ink faded at the edges from long years of handling. I dropped it on a bench.
'I have some questions, Brother.' I turned to the old monk. 'Perhaps you could leave us?' He nodded and scuttled away.
'Is something amiss?' the sacrist asked. There was a tremor in his voice.
'You have not heard, then? About the body found in the fish pond?'
His eyes opened wide. 'I have been engaged, I have just come from fetching Brother Stephen from the library. A body?'
'We believe it to be a girl who disappeared two years ago. One Orphan Stonegarden.'
His mouth dropped open. He half-rose, then sat again.
'Her neck was broken. It appears she was killed and thrown in the pond. There was a sword there too; we think the one that killed Commissioner Singleton. And this.' I nodded to Mark, who passed me the habit. I waved the badge under the sacrist's nose. Your robe, Brother Gabriel.'
He sat there gaping.
'The badge is yours?'
'Yes, yes it is. That — it must be the robe that was stolen.'
'Stolen?'
'Two weeks ago I sent a habit to the launderer and it never came back. I enquired, but it was never found. The servants steal habits now and then; our winter robes are good wool. Please, sir, you cannot think—'
I leaned over him. 'Gabriel of Ashford, I put it to you that you killed Commissioner Singleton. He knew of your past, and discovered some recent felony you could have been tried and executed for. So you killed him.'
'No.' He shook his head. 'No!'