The Templars' destination was a substantial two-story house in the Flemish quarter of the city, gifted to the Order by the family of a knight-brother who had been killed at the siege of Tripoli. Though it had since been leased out to a prosperous Flemish wool merchant and his family, the merchant, one Johan Lindsay, had readily agreed to provide accommodation, in exchange for a remittance on his rent.

The early dusk of late October was settling as the Templars rode into Lindsay's prosperous yard. Within an hour, they were sitting down to meat with Lindsay and his two strapping sons, his wife and a teenage daughter having absented themselves out of deference to the Templar Rule that forbade contact with women. At Arnault's urging, Lindsay ventured to offer his Templar guests a local a.s.sessment of how the court of claims was progressing.

"Quite frankly, the folk of Berwick would like nothing better than to see this dispute settled by the end of the year," Lindsay informed his listeners. "Some few may be doing well enough, out of the increase in local trade, but the resources of the town are being strained beyond their limits. The drains are backed up, the streets are ankle-deep with rubbish, the local courts have been disrupted, and the incidence of thievery has doubled from what it was a year ago. Speaking as a merchant, most folk in these parts don't really care who gets the crown; all they want to do is to get back to business as usual."

Arnault was not surprised by this disclosure. From discussions with Torquil and Luc, he knew that the Guardians of Scotland had done their best to govern the country during the interregnum, but their powers were circ.u.mscribed. Only a duly enthroned monarch could hold full parliamentary a.s.semblies, confirm and grant charters, or treat authoritatively with another foreign sovereign. Until such time as Scotland once again had a king to sit upon her throne, royal burghs such as Berwick would continue to suffer from disruptions to trade and industry.

The various claims to the Scottish throne were being examined in detail by two separate juries, one Scottish and one English. The English jury of twenty-four had been chosen from among Edward's English barons; the Scottish jurors numbered eighty, half chosen by Balliol and half by Bruce, who were considered the princ.i.p.al contenders. At Edward's behest, these juries were conducting their deliberations behind closed doors in the upper levels of the castle keep. The respective reports of the two juries were relayed to the English king and his advisors in the castle's great hall, in the presence of the Scottish compet.i.tors, their auditors, and various eminent witnesses, both secular and religious. These reports were then turned over to Edward's own team of legal experts for a final review, by dint of whose deliberations the claim of Count Florence of Holland had recently been disallowed, leaving only John Balliol and Robert Bruce as increasingly bitter contenders.

"We understand that Balliol is generally acknowledged to have the stronger legal case," Arnault said.

"So he does," Lindsay said with a grimace. "And more's the pity."

"Why do you say that?" Jay asked sharply.

Lindsay shrugged. "Mind you, I am a Fleming, not a Scot, but if the Scots are to emerge from this business as a free and independent people, their new king, whoever he is, will have to face up to Edward's demands to be recognized as Scotland's feudal overlord. That is going to take more steel, I fear, than Balliol has in him."

"And you think the Bruces might be better fitted for such resistance?" Robert de Sautre asked, with the affected laugh that habitually characterized his manner.

"Aye, that I do," Lindsay answered bluntly. "The Bruces are no man's lackeys. Whatever the grandsire starts, the grandson will surely finish."

The following morning, Jay led the Templar delegation on horseback up to the castle. Here they were received by Sir William Latimer, one of the senior knights of Edward's royal household, to whom Jay made formal pet.i.tion that the Templar party be allowed to observe the proceedings of the court at first hand.

"Such a request is certainly in order," Latimer told Jay, when the latter had finished, "provided that you and your brother-knights are prepared to swear that you will commit no breach of privilege by openly discussing the proceedings of the court outside the confines of the session chamber."

Such oaths were an accepted formality, and Jay agreed without demur. When each of the Templar knights had submitted his oath in turn, Latimer conducted them to a doorway that gave access to the minstrels' gallery at the lower end of the castle's great hall. Here, they took their places among a number of other observers, who included representatives from several religious orders, a Norwegian emissary, and a legate from the papal court. From this vantage point, it was possible to hear and see everything that was going on in the hall below-and for most of those in the Templar delegation, it provided their first actual glimpse of the English king.

Edward Plantagenet was seated on a dais at the far end of the hall, flanked by a handful of personal advisors, long-limbed and yellow-haired, with hard, pale features and eyes as icy and unfathomable as a winter lake. He followed the speeches of the jurors in heavy-lidded silence, one long-fingered hand resting idle on his knee. The other was clasped with casual firmness around a golden pendant hanging from a rich chain about his neck, perhaps in echo of his obvious intent to keep a similar hold on the realm of Scotland.

"Isn't he the one?" Torquil muttered under his breath, so that only Arnault could hear him.

Arnault, less personally affronted, was more intent on weighing up the two chief compet.i.tors, Bruce and Balliol, who were also present in the hall, together with a select following of adherents. John Balliol of Barnard Castle was a lean, hatchet-faced man in his middle fifties, whose darting, close-set eyes held an acquisitive gleam. Robert Bruce of Annandale, by sharp contrast, was burly and truculent as a badger, still fiercely bellicose despite his seventy-two years. Arnault thought it likely that the old man had bequeathed more than his name to the grandson who stood at his shoulder: a fiery-looking youth of eighteen, with more than a hint of his grandsire's indomitable spirit in his keen gray eyes.

Standing at Balliol's right hand was his brother-in-law, Black John Comyn of Badenoch, accompanied by a clever-looking young man of much the same age as Torquil- surely Comyn's son-with restless dark eyes and a predatory excitement in his manner that put Arnault in mind of a hunting cat. Though Comyn figured publicly as Balliol's staunchest supporter, Arnault was struck by the curious impression that he, and not Balliol, was the one in authority. That impression prompted him to consider Comyn and his son more closely.

Outwardly, there was nothing to hint that the Comyns were anything other than they appeared: a wealthy, influential n.o.bleman and his promising young heir. But as Arnault continued to study them, his vision seemed gradually obscured by a curious darkening of the air in their vicinity, as if someone had cast about them a transparent veil of shadow.

He stiffened slightly and rubbed his eyes. With his next blink, the shadow was gone, leaving him to wonder whether it had been merely a curious trick of the light. His air of perplexity prompted Torquil to look at him askance, leaning slightly closer.

"What is it?" he whispered.

By no means certain of what he might-or might not- have seen, Arnault merely shook his head, summoning a fleeting smile.

"Nothing of import," he murmured back, hoping he was speaking the truth. "Just a momentary lapse in concentration."

But his deeper instincts, once roused, warned him that the Comyns would bear watching in the future.

All of them came away from that first day at the court of claims with heads in a daze over the conflicting complexities of various compendia of law. More debates followed during the days and weeks that followed, as October gave way to November. Hackles continued to bristle among the rival parties as their respective legal experts continued to trade arguments and reb.u.t.tals.

Then on the night of the sixteenth of November, after the court of claims had been adjourned for the day, the spokesmen for the two jury parties came together in King Edward's presence to deliver their final a.s.sessment. Edward heard them out in private. When they had finished, he gave orders calling for a general a.s.sembly to meet outside the castle on the morning of the seventeenth, there to hear the public proclamation of his verdict.

That night the folk of Berwick retired to their beds amid a storm of flying rumors. Up at the castle, lamps burned late in the stables as heralds made ready to carry the news abroad to the outlying corners of the land. Servants and clerks of the privy chamber stayed awake into the small hours of the morning, making preparations to commemorate the occasion with all due ceremony. Knights of the king's household put their arrays in order so as to do credit to their lord when he stepped forth into the sunlight to make his long-awaited proclamation.

The next morning, the Templar delegation was among the excited throng that gathered outside the castle walls. Nor were they long kept waiting. As the late autumn sun climbed in a cold gray sky, a flourish of trumpets heralded the appearance of Edward of England on the battlement, resplendent in his royal robes of ermine and cloth-of-gold and with a golden crown upon his head. With him, at the fore of the English king's retinue, was John Balliol of Barnard Castle.

Bruce of Annandale was nowhere to be seen. The significance of his absence was not lost on the crowd below. Though a second flourish of trumpets served as prelude to the official proclamation, the crowd gathered on the green were already cheering: "Long live John Balliol! Long live King John!"

There followed a ceremonial procession from the gates of the castle to the open field that adjoined the castle embankments. Here in the open air, with banners snapping all around in the cold, bright wind, Balliol was invited to come forward and place his hands between those of the King of England. In a ringing voice, Edward Plantagenet professed that he was now handing over the kingdom of Scotland to her rightfully appointed monarch. Arnault, however, could not help noticing the feudal significance of the gesture, which tacitly presented Balliol in the role of a va.s.sal submitting to an acknowledged overlord.

Lending reinforcement to the impression that Balliol's sovereignty was already compromised, the newly nominated King of Scots shortly proceeded to offer formal homage to the King of England. Balliol's oath was carefully worded to emphasize that he was acknowledging Edward's lordship only with respect to the lands that Edward had granted him in England, but Arnault doubted that Edward would notice-or heed-the technical distinction.

As this part of the ceremony was drawing to a close, the Bruces of Annandale arrived, without fanfare.

With them was the English Earl of Gloucester, who had allied himself to the Bruce family by means of marriage. Their faces were hard, and they carried themselves with an air of grim purpose. Antic.i.p.ating the possibility of violence, the crowds hastily opened the way before them as the Bruce contingent advanced on the dais where Balliol stood poised to receive the homage of his supporters.

The Comyns and their followers tensed, hands hovering near to weapons. Before they or anyone else could offer challenge, the Earl of Gloucester reached out as he walked and gripped the senior Robert Bruce by one gauntleted hand. Thus joined, the two men continued forward to confront King Edward, halting before the dais. With all eyes turned to them, the Earl of Gloucester addressed himself to Edward in ringing tones.

"Take heed, Your Majesty, of the kind of judgment you have given today," he warned loudly. "And remember that you must be judged at the Last Judgment!"

This admonition drew a suppressed gasp from the surrounding crowd, but before King Edward could summon more than a frigid glare, Robert Bruce of Annandale took up the veiled challenge.

"My n.o.ble lords, I shall be brief," he declared. "My family have fought long and hard to defend our right to the Scottish crown. Since the adjudicators have ruled against us, I feel it only fitting that I should henceforth absent myself from the Scottish court. To that end, I hereby renounce my t.i.tle as Earl of Carrick in favor of the son who bears my name. Let him do what is required here today, and let me retire with such honor as my services to the community of the realm have merited."

Following this dramatic resignation, the eldest Bruce of Annandale and his ally Gloucester bowed themselves out of King Edward's presence and retired from the field. Their departure was attended by a storm of speculative murmurs, and it was several minutes before the king's officers could restore order to the a.s.sembly. As the confusion subsided, the new king's brother-in-law strode forward decisively, to drop down on one knee at Balliol's feet.

"I, John Comyn, Lord of Badenoch, do hereby acknowledge King John Balliol to be my liege lord," he cried loudly, "in token of which fealty I present to him my sword, together with my right arm and the strength of my following, to defend the ancient kingdom of our ancestors and the honor of the Scottish crown!"

This ringing endors.e.m.e.nt drew cheers from the crowd. The cheers redoubled as a Comyn cousin, the Earl of Buchan, came forward to do homage in his turn. This example was copied by the earls and other n.o.bles who had supported Balliol's claim throughout the long, drawn-out court battle. When these had all fulfilled their feudal obligations, all eyes turned once again to the two remaining representatives of the Bruce family.

There was a moment's bristling silence. Then the new Earl of Carrick advanced to the edge of the dais and knelt, as custom required, to pledge his support to the new king. His face in profile wore an expression of grim resignation. Several members of the Comyn faction were openly smirking at his discomfiture, but Arnault wondered if it had perhaps escaped their attention that by sacrificing his own honor, the new earl was effectively preserving intact the honor of both his father and his son.

Following the solemn presentation of homages, a general celebration ensued, which would last over several days. When it became clear that no outright hostilities were likely to erupt over the day's developments-at least not in the immediate aftermath-Brian de Jay authorized procurement of a keg of ale for himself and his knights and gave leave for private indulgence within the privacy of Johan Lindsay's hall, himself giving reinforcement to the oft-quoted simile, "to drink like a Templar." Torquil, however, though obliged to join in Jay's gesture of magnanimity, could find little reason to take pleasure in the reason for the indulgence.

"But I think perhaps this is an occasion to get quietly drunk," he told Arnault bleakly, as the two nursed leather tankards of tasteless ale, a little apart from the others.

For no amount of revelry could alter the fact that John Balliol had won the crown at the expense of Scotland's independence. Edward of England had established himself as Scotland's suzerain; and with Balliol under his thumb, there was nothing to prevent him from further pressing his intention to eventually absorb Scotland into his own kingdom.

Chapter Eight.

WITH THE ELECTION OF JOHN BALLIOL TO THE SCOTTISH throne, the duties of Brian de Jay's Templar delegation now were to shift to those of peacekeepers as well as neutral observers; for the process begun in Berwick would culminate at the abbey of Scone, near Perth, once the capital of the ancient Pictish Kingdom of Dalriada, where Balliol's accession must be validated by enthronement upon the kingdom's sacred inaugural stone-the so-called Stone of Destiny.

It was to this place that the magnates of Scotland were summoned to appear on Saint Andrew's Day, the thirtieth of November, to witness the new king's formal inauguration. With a full fortnight allowed to move the court to Scone, Brian de Jay announced his intention to make the journey via Balantrodoch.

"I will wish to pick up an additional escort before proceeding to Scone," he told his fellow Templars, as they broached his keg of ale in Johan Lindsay's hall, "but the detour will not delay us overlong. We leave at first light."

Accordingly, while the folk of Berwick were still at their revels and Jay and his knights made short work of the allotted keg of ale, the lowlier serjeants set about making preparations to leave Berwick in the morning. Much later, when all had retired to their pallets laid out in the darkened Lindsay hall, Arnault sat hunched over the trestle table by the kitchen hearth, pen in hand and parchment and inkhorn before him, and put the finishing touches on his report of the day's proceedings, while the details were still fresh in his mind.

Troubled by Torquil's misgivings, that the election of John Balliol was only prelude to further disputes with Edward of England, Arnault tried to keep his report concise and objective. The flickering light of the fire and a cobbler's lamp cast a dappled, hypnotic pattern of shadows on the wall as he wrote; and before he was aware of it, he lapsed into a dreamlike doze between trance and sleep, pen slipping slack from his fingers.

His sleep was broken some time later by a sudden bellowing crash, like the roar of a cannon. He roused with a start, to the sounds of screams and wails and the harsh clang of warring weaponry-nearly in darkness, for the lamp had gone out and the fire had died down almost to embers. As if slowed by thick treacle, as his hand closed around the hilt of his sword and his leg muscles bunched to launch him to his feet, he seemed simultaneously to find himself bolting toward the door to the yard, wrenching at its bars to fling it wide and race to the street beyond.

The sounds of chaos doubly a.s.sailed him: The treble shrieking of women and children mingled with hoa.r.s.e battle cries and the din of repeating explosions. The street outside seemed a h.e.l.lish theater of fire and shadow, with armed and armored men clambering through clouds of roiling smoke with weapons brandished. As a family of three came bursting from a nearby pend, hotly pursued by two hard-eyed men-at-arms, the father turned to fend them off and the soldiers hacked him down, turning then on the mother and child, with b.l.o.o.d.y weapons raised.

Horrified, Arnault would have raced to their defense, but then-between one heartbeat and the next-the chaos vanished, leaving him still in the process of rising from his stool before the fire, fingers white-knuckled around the hilt of his sword and only silence around him.

Heart pounding, gently easing his sword from its scabbard, he made his way quietly around the sleeping bodies of his brother Templars and opened the door in fact, slipping out into the still, frosty yard to cross silently to the wicket gate that led into the street. The night was dark and peaceful, the houses all tight-shuttered against the mid-November chill, with only faint s.n.a.t.c.hes of song and laughter drifting on the darkness from a tavern in a neighboring street-and no fire, no smoke, no marauding soldiery, no murdered corpses in the gutter.

Only a dream, then-but its implications were so startling and horrendous that it refused simply to be put out of mind as a mere nightmare.

Drawing a deep, shuddering breath to calm his still racing pulse, Arnault returned his sword to its scabbard and made his way quietly back into the house, where he rebarred the door. Before settling back on his stool, he built up the fire again, considering whether such a dream might merely have been sparked by remarks Torquil had made-product of his disappointment and uneasiness about John Balliol's election. But the dream's images retained such immediacy that Arnault very much feared it might have been prophetic- Edward's soldiers running amok in a frenzy of mayhem, perhaps in response to an all-out invasion of Scotland.

Troubled on something of a personal level, for he had grown somewhat fond of the honest and pragmatic Johan Lindsay and his family during their weeks in Berwick, Arnault turned his thoughts to whether there was anything he might do to mitigate such a fate, at least for them. If and when his dream came to pa.s.s, it was all too likely that the wool merchant's little enclave would be caught up in the midst of it-and the house, at least, was Templar property.

Refreshing his quill from his inkhorn, he found a clean sc.r.a.p of parchment and thought a moment before he began to write, his words brief and to the point: This is to signify that the bearer and those of his household are under the protection of the Order of the Temple of Jerusalem. Let no man presume to do them injury, on pain of peril to his soul.

Arnault had no personal authority to issue such a writ, but he concluded this simple statement with his signature as a Knight of the Temple, to which he added an additional signatory flourish. That final element was, in fact, a potent symbol of blessing, transforming the doc.u.ment into an amulet of protection. He could do little else. When the ink was dry, he rolled the parchment tight and secured it with a twist of leather thonging from out of his scrip, with the heartfelt prayer that their host could be sufficiently persuaded of its virtues to keep it by him in the days that were to come.

He found opportunity to deliver it early the following morning, while horses were being saddled and Jay and his two attendant knights were busy satisfying themselves that the serjeants had not forgotten any of their equipment.

"Please take this," Arnault told Johan Lindsay, drawing him casually aside. "I want you and your family to have it."

Lindsay raised a quizzical eyebrow. "What is it?"

"A token of our esteem," Arnault said. "Or, if you prefer, a writ of indemnity against future misfortune."

Looking more quizzical still, Lindsay slid the leather thong off the little scroll and read the brief message inside. Raising his eyes to meet Arnault's, he said, "I appreciate the gesture, Frre Arnault, but-what makes you think we might need this?"

Arnault chose his next few words with care.

"A simple precaution; nothing more. From what we have observed over the past several weeks, it seems to me that Scotland's troubles are far from over. Having arbitrated the Scottish succession, King Edward may now feel that he has the right to dictate the course of Scottish affairs. You said when we first arrived that you had misgivings about John Balliol's ability to resist Edward. I fear that I share those misgivings."

He gestured toward the writ. "If war should come of it, I hope you'll not hesitate to claim the protection of the Order, which must be recognized by both sides as a neutral authority."

Lindsay refurled the scroll and wound the leather thonging back around it.

"It's good of you to make the offer," he told Arnault with a crooked grin. "Thank you. It never hurts to know where to find a port in a storm."

Three days later, amid a light flurry of snow, the Templars' party rode back through the gates of Balantrodoch. On hand to greet them in the yard was John de Sautre, left in charge of the preceptory in the absence of Brian de Jay. Once the party's horses and equipment had been seen to, Jay summoned the entire community to the chapel to announce the news from Berwick and the plans for a Templar contingent to attend the forthcoming invest.i.ture at Scone. Prayers were offered for the newly appointed king at the service of Vespers that followed, but even as he spoke the responses, Torquil kneeling at his side, Arnault found himself remembering glimpses of his vision with misgivings.

Supper that evening was the most informal that Arnault had experienced under Jay's authority, with the Rule being relaxed to allow mealtime discussion of what had been announced prior to Vespers.

Following Compline, as the community made preparations to retire, Arnault took Torquil with him for a quick private word with Luc, in the latter's tiny accounting office off the western cloister range.

Careful of his phrasing-though it no doubt was time to begin exposing Torquil to a little of what he and Luc did, and he doubted Torquil would take alarm, given his matter-of-fact acceptance of Luc's account of the purloined grave goods-Arnault told Luc about his Berwick vision, also mindful of how Torquil would react.

"If there is such a thing as prophetic vision," he concluded, knowing Luc would fathom his reason for qualifying the statement, "and the Scriptures certainly tell us that there is-this must surely be its curse: to perhaps be given such a glimpse, presumably in warning, but with no inkling of when such a disaster might actually occur, or how to prevent it.

"But perhaps it was all sparked by hearing Torquil wax pessimistic about Balliol's election," he added with a faint smile, conceding that very real possibility as he glanced at the younger man. "You know, you were poor company that night, Brother Torquil, with your dour Scots intimations regarding your new king's prospects."

Torquil snorted, apparently not at all dismayed.

"You'll not be telling a Scot about catching glimpses of the future," he said. "In the Highlands, we call it the Second Sight. My Da has it-though he doesn't usually know for sure until after something's happened."

"Isn't that called "~hindsight'?" Luc said, with a droll but not unkindly smile.

"Gently, Luc," Arnault said lightly. "I am quite prepared to believe that Brother Torquil's family are folk of special talents. How else could he work so well with men of such peculiar vocation as you and me?"

"That is certainly true," Luc allowed, well aware that Arnault was speaking on several levels. "Regarding prophetic vision, however, it seems to me that the greater question, even beyond the truth or falsehood of such visions, is whether the images themselves are part of a pattern already laid out, or whether they are simply mutable reflections of possibility."

"Surely we must believe that it's the latter," Torquil said promptly, then fell abruptly silent as both his elders looked at him in faint surprise.

"Please continue," Luc said. "I quite agree, but I should like to hear your reasons for thinking so."

"Well, if men are to have free will at all," Torquil went on, "then it seems to me that the future must always be fluid. Otherwise, what reason have we to hope? Surely Brother Arnault has done the best he could, to preserve at least a few of the innocents in Berwick. Now all of us must trust in-"

He broke off at a sudden loud crash from somewhere outside Luc's office, farther along the western cloister range. All of them started, and Luc glanced in the direction of the sound in some alarm.

"What, in G.o.d's name?" he murmured. "There shouldn't be anyone abroad in this part of the compound at this hour."

Taking up the lamp, he got to his feet and started for the door. He was unarmed save for a dagger at his waist, but Arnault and Torquil followed with hands on sword hilts, exchanging puzzled glances. As they left the room, another crash like the sound of splintering wood sounded at the far end of the corridor to their left, and all of them broke into a trot, Luc leading the way.

Only silence met them as they halted outside one of several doors at that end of the range. Pa.s.sing the lamp to Arnault, the treasurer swiftly selected a key from the ring at his belt and used it to open the door.

The room beyond was dark and windowless-and empty.

Leaving that door ajar, Luc moved on to the next one, the correct key already in his hand. As he tripped the lock and gave the door a shove, a breath of freezing air blew out the lamp, plunging them into near-darkness. Jerking back with a muttered oath, Luc bade his two armed companions guard the open doorway while he retreated far enough back up the corridor to relight the lamp from a wall torch.

Meanwhile, though nothing could be seen inside save a feeble swath of moonlight shining through a high, narrow window, both men quietly drew their swords.

When Luc returned, also carrying the torch, he pa.s.sed it to Torquil before signing for Arnault to enter the room ahead of them. Arnault did so, easing around the left of the door frame with his back against the wall as Luc thrust his lamp into the room: modest enough in size, its far wall lined with long wooden shutters behind a writing desk and a stool situated to give light from behind the sitter when the shutters were open. As Torquil, too, entered the room, the added illumination brought the room to life around them-and revealed a large, leather-bound book lying open and face down in front of the writing table, with other leaves of parchment scattered around the room like fallen leaves.

With a wordless exclamation of dismay, Luc darted over to the book and crouched to set down his lantern, picking up the splayed volume with a little crooning sound of regret. Arnault followed more cautiously, casting his wary glance into the shadows of the room and signaling uneasily for Torquil to close the door as he, too, hunkered down beside the older man, sword across his knees. Something about the room.

"Who could have done such a thing!" Luc muttered, as he turned the volume to a.s.sess the damage. "This was a rather fine copy of Ad.a.m.nan's Life of Saint Columba," he added indignantly.

He fingered the book's broken spine, where several pages toward the middle had been ripped out. These were lying close by, crumpled and ink-smudged, some of them torn, and Luc gave another murmur of dismay as he gathered them up, cradling them to his breast as though he were handling a wounded bird.

Glancing beyond Luc, Arnault saw more leaves of parchment lying scattered at the feet of the stool behind the writing table, with the contents of an inkhorn spilled wide across the pages, still shiny-wet.

Finding a candle stub amid the debris, he lit it from Luc's lantern and bent closer to pluck one of the pages from the mess, its delicate calligraphy all but obliterated by a spidery black stain.

"Well, this has to have happened when we heard the noise," he said, "though I can't imagine how the culprit got away without us seeing him. This ink is fresh. And this page doesn't look like it's part of that book," he said to Luc, noting the untrimmed edges of the parchment. "Have you any idea what it might have been?"