The Good Wife of Bath

by Karen Brooks

  Geoffrey tried to pull her away. There were cries of pain, anger. I struggled to rise, the room moving in peculiar waves. Milda rushed to my side, desperate to help. Less than an arm’s reach away, Alyson fought Jankin. Astride him, she determined to punish him. Not just for this night, but for every word, every blow he’d ever inflicted. For the agony he’d caused me and in doing that, caused her too.

  There was an unnatural flash.

  Milda gave a piercing scream.

  ‘No!’ shouted Geoffrey, springing over us, just as Jankin plunged a knife deep into Alyson’s neck.

  Blood spurted from where the blade jutted, spraying Jankin, Geoffrey, Milda and me. Terrible gurgling noises issued from Alyson’s throat; her eyes were wide, disbelieving. She whimpered, her hands rushing to the hilt as she looked to me to undo what had happened.

  I managed to get onto my hands and knees. Milda fell back on her heels in horror. I crawled to Alyson, who’d gone white as fallen snow, her hands trapped birds fluttering near the wound. I drew her off Jankin, who just lay staring, covered in blood.

  Alyson’s face was a peculiar shade – stained with blood, yet so pale beneath it. Her eyes filled with terror as I dragged her onto my lap. Blood, hot and plentiful pumped down her neck, over her breasts, pooling on my kirtle. Geoffrey knelt beside us. ‘No, dear God, no.’

  I wanted to draw the knife out, but was afraid. ‘Alyson, Alyson, my love, my love,’ I whispered, trying not to stare at the obscenity protruding from her neck, focusing on her eyes, those beautiful, spring day eyes, and smoothing the hair from her face.

  Milda made a feeble attempt to staunch the blood with her apron. I pushed her gently away.

  ‘What do I do?’ I whispered to Geoffrey.

  He was a picture of sorrow. Carmine spattered one cheek, his beard. It was everywhere. He tried to push against Alyson’s neck, around the blade, to stop the life flowing from her. It was hopeless.

  Alyson tried to speak, her voice barely a sigh. Her eyelids were heavy. I pushed my good ear close to her mouth, but all I could hear was soft susurrations that resembled my name.

  Eleanor …

  ‘I’m here, my love, I’m here.’ Sobs were stealing my voice. I forced them back. ‘I’m here.’ I smiled at her through unseeing eyes, my tears dripping on her cheek. ‘It will be alright. We’ll fetch the doctor, he’ll tend your wound. Don’t worry.’

  Alyson found my hand and gripped it weakly.

  Her face was a palette of grey. Her lips had taken on a violet hue.

  I bent closer. My nose streamed. My mouth was full, my heart overflowing. ‘Don’t leave me, Alyson. Please, God, don’t let her leave me,’ I moaned.

  Ever so gently, I pressed my lips to hers, uncaring of the blood escaping her mouth.

  A great shiver racked her body. She gazed at me with a love so fierce and hot, it reduced my soul to ash. Then, my beautiful, patient, wise Alyson, my Godsib and most beloved, was gone.

  Geoffrey was weeping. He closed Alyson’s unseeing eyes and caressed her soft cheek. ‘Sweet, loyal lady.’

  Beside us, my husband groaned and stirred.

  He killed her. Brutally took the person I loved more than anyone else on this cold, hard, thankless earth.

  He raised himself on one elbow and leaning close, studied his handiwork. ‘Is she dead?’ There was no remorse, no guilt. ‘One less wicked woman for men to abide.’

  There was a beat.

  With a yowl of rage and grief, I pulled the knife from Alyson’s neck and plunged it into Jankin’s eye.

  ‘Now you need never see our wickedness again.’

  THIRTY-TWO

  Bath

  The Year of Our Lord 1386

  In the tenth year of the reign of Richard II

  I was Diana. I was Venus. I was Mars.

  As Jankin lay senseless beside me, the knife’s hilt casting a long shadow across his face, I felt nothing. Empty. A hollow vessel. I looked from him to Alyson and back again, waiting for the rage that had spurred me to such violence to return; for overwhelming sorrow to overtake me.

  Around me chaos erupted.

  Geoffrey first dragged Alyson off me, then clambered to his feet and, placing his hands beneath my arms, heaved me to a standing position. Milda calmly took my place and, ignoring the pools of blood and gore, wiped the stains from Alyson’s face and neck. Dear God, Milda had borne witness to this horror. Geoffrey checked Jankin and, first removing the knife, covered his face with a kerchief, then used a piece of fabric draped over a stool to wipe the blade. The ringing in my ears was so loud, I couldn’t hear what Geoffrey was saying. Milda stopped her attentions and stared. He forced me to face him and shook me hard.

  ‘You must leave,’ he said. His hands left bloody marks on my kirtle.

  I blinked. ‘Leave?’ I gazed at Alyson.

  Gone. She was gone.

  ‘Aye, get away. Now. Wash off the blood, change your clothes, don a cloak. Go. Go to Alyson’s house and wait. Milda and I will tend to this. Do you understand?’

  I did, but I wasn’t sure I could do it. Leave? Leave Alyson?

  ‘Is she really dead?’ Her upturned face, the pool of blood about her head, were my answer.

  Geoffrey shoved me in the back. ‘Don’t think. Do as I say. Go.’

  In a daze, I stepped over Jankin’s body and, without looking back, went to my room, washed, threw out the bloody water (I had the sense to make sure it landed on the gravel, not the snow where it would arouse suspicion), and changed my clothes. An acrid metallic odour filled my nostrils.

  Outside, the dogs began to bark, as if they knew something evil had occurred.

  That bastard killed my Alyson. But I felled him. Surely, surely, that went some way to putting things aright? Why then did everything feel so wrong? Why did I?

  I passed by the door of the solar, but could hear nothing within. Like a spirit, I moved through the passages of the house, out the front door and into the street. The cold didn’t touch me. I felt as if nothing could anymore. Obediently, I went to Alyson’s. The fire still blazed, the table held plates and a loaf with two slices cut. A distaff leaned in one corner, a basket of wool waiting to be spun in another. There were signs of life, of Alyson, everywhere. Her scent, roses and violet. Further back in the house were faint giggles. The two young maids who lived with Alyson sounded as if they were entertaining. It was hard to shut out their joy, or the dogs’ incessant barking, but I did. I sank into Alyson’s old chair and, lifting the distaff away from the wall and picking up the spindle, continued where she’d left off.

  I kept replaying the moment Jankin plunged the knife into Alyson’s throat. How easily it had glided in; how long it seemed to take for us all to react, as if we were in a daze. Mayhap, we were.

  One thing I knew with sickening clarity was that I no longer doubted Jankin had killed Simon.

  And, just as I’d been the cause of that murder, I’d caused Alyson’s.

  Dear God, I should have taken her away or, better still, thrown Jankin out on his tight rump the moment he first laid a hand on me … on us.

  Jankin’s hand may have driven the blade, but through my refusal to admit what he was, what he was capable of, I’d created the conditions for this tragedy to unfold.

  The fire had guttered by the time Geoffrey found me. The wool had long since been turned into thread, unlike my thoughts, which had unspooled about my feet. Church bells had marked the passing of many hours – or was that the noise of my crazed mind?

  First pouring a drink for me and then himself, Geoffrey forced the mazer into my hands and pulled up a chair. Our knees almost touched, he sat so close.

  ‘Listen to me very carefully, Eleanor.’

  I could barely hear him. Something was wrong with my ears. The ringing I’d thought was endless echoes of the church bells wouldn’t cease. I shook my head, tipped it to one side.

  Geoffrey held my hand. ‘What’s amiss?’

  ‘I can scarce hear. The blow Jankin gave me.
It’s caused a ringing in my head.’

  ‘Can you hear me now?’ Geoffrey said more loudly, one eye upon the door lest someone come through.

  ‘Just,’ I said. ‘But it’s as if you’re talking to me from far away.’

  ‘You’ll need to see a doctor.’

  ‘I need to see a sergeant,’ I said grimly. ‘Tell him what has happened. Confess to my part.’

  ‘And what’s that?’ asked Geoffrey, his hold tightening. There was blood on his shirt.

  ‘I killed my husband.’

  ‘No, you defended your friend.’

  An image of Alyson’s lifeless body appeared before me. The tears I’d denied myself spilled. ‘Oh, dear God, Geoffrey. She’s gone, she’s dead. That bastard. That devil-sent beast. This, this is my doing. All of it.’ My words were jumbled, garbled. I drew a deep, shuddering breath. ‘I’ll hang for this. But it’s no more than I deserve.’

  ‘Listen to me,’ said Geoffrey forcefully, shaking my shoulders. ‘You deserve nothing. Jankin deserved everything he got and more.’

  I shook my head. ‘I should have made her stay away. Stay here, in her cottage where she was safe. She shouldn’t have been there. If only I’d known she loathed that story as much as I did –’

  ‘It wasn’t the story she hated; it was what he did to you. What he’s been doing for months. She told me as much in this very room.’ His voice was so stern, so authoritative, I ceased to cry and sniffed. ‘And that’s why you’ll do everything I say.’

  ‘Since when have I ever listened to you?’

  ‘Never. But this time, your life depends on it. Milda’s and mine as well.’

  I paid attention.

  In harsh whispers, tolerating my interruptions, Geoffrey spoke into my least afflicted ear, and outlined a plan.

  Alyson’s and Jankin’s bodies had already been removed from the house. Forced to get help, Milda had fetched those she trusted above anyone else: Arnold, Sweteman and Oriel.

  I gasped. Now they too were party to our crime – my crime.

  Between them, Arnold and Sweteman had loaded a cart and taken the bodies far out into the countryside where the snow was deepest. There, they’d bury them.

  ‘But what about the sacrament? What about Alyson’s soul?’ I gripped Geoffrey’s hands, lifting them in anguish. ‘You must get Father Elias. She must have prayers said. She is unshriven. Her soul can’t rest –’

  ‘Hush, hush,’ he said, pressing his fingers to my lips to stop me talking.

  ‘If we summon Elias, we may as well summon the authorities. It’s bad enough your servants are involved. But if we include anyone else, especially a man of God, you risk being hauled away to prison and thence to the King’s bench to face charges of murder. And then, Eleanor Binder, you will hang.’

  ‘But you said I wouldn’t, that it would be understood as self-defence.’

  Geoffrey regarded me with a look I knew all too well. ‘I said that to make you feel better. To make you listen. The truth is, you will be facing men, Eleanor. They’ll be entrusted with your story, your sentence. Do you think they’ll care about what you’ve endured? About justice? No? Neither do I. Hiding the bodies is the sensible thing, the only thing to do – for now. It gives you time to get away but, more importantly, it gives us time to invent a story.’

  ‘Get away? You mean, leave Bath?’

  ‘I do.’

  Then the remainder of what Geoffrey said hit me. ‘Why do I have to invent a story?’

  ‘Because, and this is the hard part, you can no longer be you.’

  ‘But, if I’m not me, Eleanor, wife of Bath, then who am I?’

  ‘From hereon, Eleanor, you will be Alyson. Your names are very close, it won’t be hard.’ He didn’t sound convincing.

  I gasped. ‘Why?’ Then I shook my head furiously. ‘I can’t be her. It’s wrong. It’s evil, it’s –’

  ‘It’s the only thing that will keep you safe. Until we come up with something else.’

  I began to have trouble breathing. Geoffrey wrapped an arm around me, and spoke softly, rubbing my back, waiting for me to calm. When my breathing settled, he reached for a drink and brought it to my mouth.

  ‘Now, don’t interrupt.’

  Geoffrey’s plan was that I leave Bath immediately, tonight. Milda would accompany me. Along with Sweteman, Arnold and Oriel, he would put about a story that Jankin and I had gone on a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela.

  ‘But no-one would believe we’d be so foolish as to go in the middle of winter,’ I objected.

  ‘I’ve already thought of that. Wy and some of the others may doubt it, but they won’t counter it. Especially if we say you’ve gone to Dover to await a ship to take you across the channel. You’re remaining in Paris until such time as it’s safe to make the passage through the Pyrenees. Everyone knows you’ve wanted to do that pilgrimage for years. We’ll say Jankin arranged it as a surprise for you.’

  ‘I … I …’ I didn’t know what to say. ‘What about the … bodies?’ My eyes began to fill again at the thought of Alyson lying there in the snow, freezing, unabsolved.

  ‘No-one will find them until the snow melts and then everyone will believe what we tell them.’

  I looked at him questioningly.

  ‘That tragically, Jankin and his wife, Eleanor, must have been set upon by brigands and killed on their way to the coast.’

  ‘Eleanor? You mean for people to think Alyson is me? No-one will mistake Alyson for –’ I began, then recalled not only how many people had spoken of the resemblance between us, but by the time she was found, it was unlikely she’d bear any semblance to the woman she … was. I began to cry. ‘Oh, Geoffrey, Geoffrey. I cannot do this, I cannot leave Alyson. Alone, without the sacrament said for her soul.’

  ‘The sacrament will be said … eventually.’ He took both my hands in his. ‘Do you really believe that God wouldn’t take a soul like Alyson’s to His side? Do you really believe she’s not looking down upon you this very minute and telling you to do as I say? Urging you to flee? Would she want you to be held responsible for her death? No. She would want you to take revenge for her murder in the best way possible.’

  ‘I thought I had. I killed the bastard.’

  ‘There’s a better way.’ His voice was so kind.

  ‘What’s that?’ I asked through swimming eyes.

  ‘By becoming Alyson yourself and being a stronger and better woman than anyone, especially Jankin and men like him, thought possible.’

  I pondered his words, studied the ink-stained hands clasping my own. He continued. ‘You can no longer think of yourself as Eleanor. She died in that room tonight.’ He pointed towards my house. ‘As of now, you are Alyson – Alyson Bigod, or whatever you choose to call yourself. But never again must you be Eleanor Binder. You must humble yourself, Ele— Alyson. Take what you can, but leave everything else behind. Your clothes, your fripperies, your old life. Add her years to yours. Do you have a will?’

  ‘Of sorts,’ I said through tears. ‘Master Le Lene in London holds a copy. There’s another in my bedroom. Oriel knows where. I left everything to –’ I burst into fresh tears.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘In the event of Jankin’s death? Alyson.’

  ‘Good, good,’ muttered Geoffrey. I could tell by the look on his face, he was thinking ahead. ‘I want you to go to Canterbury, pay penance to the Lord and seek indulgences on behalf of your mistress. You must wear a veil. Pretend to be ill; do what you can to avoid company. You must remain ignorant of your mistress’s death until such time the news is delivered.’

  ‘But where will I go after Canterbury?’

  ‘You’ll come to me in London. From there, we’ll work out what to do. But again, you come to me as Alyson, not Eleanor. Your life will depend on you maintaining a disguise. This is not something temporary, you’re not a mummer in a play. The role you don tonight will be for the rest of your life.’

  ‘Must I be her, though? Even for a short tim
e? I feel as if I’m dishonouring her memory … what she was to me …’

  ‘On the contrary,’ said Geoffrey. ‘You can show no greater love.’ He rose. ‘And, if you don’t, then you put others at risk, others who have been drawn into this horror.’

  I raised my tear-streaked face. Of course. Geoffrey, Milda and now Sweteman, Arnold and Oriel, were party to murder, to terrible deceit. This was no longer just about me or Alyson, but about protecting those who couldn’t protect themselves … Because of my actions. Because of my husband’s actions.

  I took a deep breath, stoppered up my tears and stood. Shaky at first, I found a strength I didn’t know I possessed. Not my strength. Alyson’s.

  ‘What about the others? Wy? Peter? Aggy, Rag? The weavers, the maids?’

  ‘They must believe you dead too. When Eleanor’s body is found, we’ll tell them Alyson couldn’t bear to return here; that it was too much for her. She has made a new life elsewhere.’ I began to protest. ‘Do not worry, I will look to their wellbeing. Sweteman will help me.’

  ‘I don’t want them to suffer for my sins, not in any way.’

  ‘I assure you, they won’t. Now, wait here. When Milda has finished collecting what you need and you’re suitably dressed, I’ll send for the horses and you’ll be on your way. It will be as if none of this happened, do you understand? You are Mistress Alyson, off to visit the shrine of Thomas à Becket while your Godsib and new husband go on a grand adventure.’

  ‘I’d never – she’d never leave without me – Eleanor would never go without Alyson.’

  Geoffrey gave me a sad smile. ‘No, she would not. And you must think of how you, Alyson, feel about that too.’

  Milda appeared a short time later and gave me Alyson’s clothes to change into. While I dressed, Geoffrey turned his back to protect my modesty. The modesty of a murderer. Or was I the one murdered now?

  None of my clothes were in the burlap Milda had packed. They were all Alyson’s.

  I dressed slowly, savouring her smell on every garment, trying not to burst into tears. The linen underdress, her hose, kirtle, tunic and cloak. My boots were my own, the hat was hers, as was the pilgrim’s cloak and staff. She’d never really liked wearing all the badges that adorned mine, shunning their display as a vanity that undermined the whole purpose of the pilgrimage. I missed my badges and made a promise I would buy some more. For me, for her.