Veil of Lies

by Jeri Westerson

  She stepped back to gaze at him, or perhaps to get a better swing. Her hand struck his cheek with such force that he teetered. He raised his hand to the welt and smiled. “I beg your pardon,” he said.

  Her small lips curved. “Now we understand each other.”

  Crispin continued to rub his cheek. “You have a strong hand, Madam.”

  “I’m no weakling. I worked hard in this house. I carried water. I did the heavy cleaning. I did more than my share. It was natural that I should catch the master’s eye, though I never dreamed it would go so far.”

  For the first time he noticed a servant in the far corner of the hall pretending to sweep a small square of the floor with a gorse broom. Crispin lowered his voice. “Shall we retire to the parlor?”

  She folded her arms over her breasts. “Why? I have no wish to talk with you. You made it clear you would have nought to do with me.”

  “This is a murder inquiry. If you’d rather speak to the sheriff…”

  The sparkle in her eye dimmed. Glancing at the servant, Philippa nodded and led Crispin and Jack down a gallery to a warm chamber. She sat in the one large, ornate chair and gestured for Crispin to sit in the smaller one beside it.

  Jack stood behind Crispin’s chair and wrung the hem of his tunic.

  “Can your servant serve the wine?”

  Crispin swiveled his gaze toward Jack. Amusement had not left his features since Philippa doled out her slap. “Can you serve wine, Jack?”

  “Course I can!” Jack’s lower lip jutted forward and he narrowed his eyes at Philippa. He searched the room for the wine jug, and when he spied it, he stomped to the sideboard and sloppily poured two bowls. He eyed the silver before he offered a bowl to Crispin first. Crispin shook his head and nodded to the lady. Grumbling, Jack gave her the first bowl and Crispin the second. He retreated to the jug, no doubt wondering how he’d get himself a drink or slip the silver flagon under his cloak.

  Philippa drank and studied Crispin over the rim of her bowl.

  “So, you caught the master’s eye,” said Crispin.

  She nodded. “A body only hears about such in songs. But I caught his fancy, and before I knew it, I was mistress of this household.”

  “Did you love him?”

  The wine bowl paused at her lips. “A strange question. What does it matter?”

  Crispin shrugged. “It doesn’t. I merely wondered.”

  “And I wonder why you wonder.”

  “You forget.” He lowered his chin and ran his finger absently along the rim of the silver bowl. “I saw you at the Thistle.”

  She angled her head to stare into the fire. A wisp of hair escaped from her meticulous coif and posed along her neck in a sinuous wave. “There is so much you’ll never understand.”

  “Try me.”

  “We must talk about the cloth.”

  “Did Adam Becton hire you?”

  She added a drowsy smile to her features and settled her head against the chair’s high back. “Very well. Aye, Adam did hire me. What of it?”

  “He does not seem to approve of your current status.”

  “Neither do you.”

  “We weren’t talking about me.”

  “Weren’t we?” Her smile brightened enough to cause a frown on Crispin’s lips. “No matter. No, he never approved of Nicholas and me. The fool’s in love with me.”

  “That much I reckoned for myself. What I am uncertain of is how much he loves you.”

  She laughed this time. “You think Adam killed Nicholas?”

  “It is not beyond the realm of possibility.”

  “You don’t know Adam.”

  “And you, apparently, do not know what a man is capable of doing for love.”

  She drank her wine and set the bowl aside. “Can’t we discuss the cloth?”

  “Life as mistress of this house must have been difficult after being raised from a chambermaid.”

  Her lids stayed in their languid pose while regarding him. “It was difficult. No one ever gave me a moment’s peace.”

  “The servants?”

  “The servants, the vendors, everyone. Until one day I told them all. I am mistress here, and if they didn’t like it they could shift for themselves. Nicholas did not care if I bought beef from another butcher or corn from a different merchant. He laughed at it. I think he enjoyed raising me to his place. He was not afraid to be unconventional.”

  “And you rose to the occasion?”

  “Oh, aye. I learned to enjoy it, too. Any servant who sneered at me got cuffed right well or dismissed. That’s the way in this house.”

  “And even though your lord and master is dead?”

  Her sensuous lips firmed to a tight line. “Aye, it will remain the same. After three years of wedded life, I have learned this business well.”

  “Do you read, then?”

  “Only a little. I do sums, too. Nicholas taught me. But I will learn more.”

  He smiled into his wine bowl and sipped. He was beginning to like this Philippa Walcote in spite of her morals.

  “Enough,” she snorted. “The cloth. We must speak of that.”

  “Yes, and of fees.”

  She smiled. “So you will take my money now?”

  “I am a sensible man.”

  She rose and reached into the delicate pouch at her embroidered belt. “Sixpence, did you say?”

  “A day.”

  “Aye. Here, take a week’s worth, then.”

  She held out a small pouch too far away for Crispin to reach while sitting. He rose and looked her in the eye. Amusement played on her face, but money never amused him. He finally raised his hand to receive it, and without taking his eyes from hers, he lowered the pouch into his own purse and sat.

  “Tell me about this damned cloth.”

  “The Mandyllon.” She said the word and sobered. Sitting rigidly, she curled her free hand into a fist. “It is a veronica—”

  “Yes, you said all that. What is this ‘curse’ you’re so afraid of?”

  She drew her bottom lip between her teeth. “When in its presence, a person is absolutely incapable of telling a lie. It forces the truth out of you.”

  Crispin laughed. He set down his bowl before he spilled it. “And that is your curse? Yes, for women it must be so.”

  “You think it amusing?” she said flatly. “Think of this: What if you were bartering with a wealthy client and must speak the truth? What if you were with your enemy? Your spouse? Or a woman you found appealing?”

  Crispin’s laughter died.

  “Still amusing, is it?”

  “You mean to say, you must tell the absolute truth? What you’re thinking? What you are…feeling?”

  “Aye.”

  They gazed solemnly at one another.

  “I concede your point,” he said soberly. “Where did your husband acquire such a thing?”

  “I don’t know. Somewhere in the Holy Land, I think. I am uncertain.”

  “What does it look like?”

  “I only saw it once. So big,” she said, gesturing with her arms out. “Square. A simple cloth. But…with the face.”

  “And where did you last see it? Was it in this house? Some other place?”

  “In the house. In the solar.”

  “And where did your husband keep it?”

  She snapped to her feet. “If I knew I could find it for myself and destroy it!” Her skirts rippled wildly after her, desperate to keep step as she paced before the fire.

  “Destroy such a valuable relic? The face of Christ? Blasphemy.”

  “God forgive me.” She shook her head and crossed herself. “But I believe there is such a thing as too much honesty!”

  Crispin rose and joined her by the fire. “Then why all the locks? Were they to keep thieves out, or something in?”

  “I don’t know. Nicholas was”—she shrugged—“different from other men. Secretive. And wealthy.”

  “You must have searched the manor yourself, in ch
ests and behind sideboards.”

  “Of course I have!”

  “What of the others? Do they know what it is?”

  “The servants? No. Why should they?” She put her hands to her cheeks. Her fingers were long and chapped red, and her nails were bitten short.

  He shook his head. “Well, Madam, short of a miracle, I do not know how you expect me to find it.”

  “That’s your job. I’ve heard many people talk of your deeds, how you found lost objects with so few clues.”

  “Yes,” Crispin said. “I suppose if I had free access to the house, that would make it easier.”

  “I grant it. Perhaps I will have a key made for you. Adam will not like it,” she said with an unladylike smirk. Her accent thickened the angrier she got. “But I am long past worrying over what he likes and what he don’t.”

  “I would also like to examine the solar again.”

  She hugged herself. Her face shrank into a grimace. “Why must you go there?”

  He stood over her not answering, vaguely aware of Jack hovering somewhere in a corner.

  “It is just that he is there.”

  “You mean Walcote?”

  “Aye. I could not think of any place more suitable.”

  “I see. Then may I?”

  “Aye. And take your servant with you.”

  The firelight flickered on her rounded cheeks, ambering the pale skin. He wanted to say more, but remembered Jack.

  He bowed to her before he could stop himself. Old habits. He led Jack out of the parlor before he fully embarrassed himself.

  “She’s got her nerve,” Jack growled and followed Crispin. “‘Can your servant serve wine?’ ‘Take your servant with you.’ Acting like the great lady, and her a chambermaid.”

  “Strictly speaking, she is the lady of this manor and may act accordingly, whether you approve or not.”

  “You don’t approve.”

  “What I think is not your affair. Which reminds me. You are becoming far too familiar with me of late.”

  “I beg your pardon, Master. But this business has got me befuddled. She was a servant and is now a great lady, and you were a knight but are now little better than a servant. It’s getting so I don’t know who to bow to no more.”

  “Do you need to be cuffed to be reminded?” Jack fell silent as Crispin led the way to the solar. The door remained broken but the bits of sharp debris had been removed. Nicholas Walcote lay stretched out on a table covered up to his chest with a linen cloth. He had been cleaned and his hair combed out over his pillow.

  Crispin was grateful the merchant had not yet begun to smell.

  Jack hovered in the doorway and stared at the candles lit around the body. “I don’t much like dead bodies,” he whispered.

  “You need not come in,” said Crispin in the same quiet tone.

  “Thank you, Master.” Jack crossed his arms over his chest and ducked back into the gallery.

  No fire. The room was cold. It kept the body better, he reasoned, and he pulled his cloak over his chest for warmth. The daylight fell gray through the locked window, and it was only this and the meager candlelight that illuminated the now stark room.

  He did not know what he was looking for, but he summoned his imagination to feel what the room must have been like that night. He closed his eyes. He remembered how the room smelled of toasted oak and alder from a steady fire in the hearth.

  What had Walcote been doing at the time? Did he entertain his murderer? Was he working at the table and taken by surprise? Surely he let the killer in and locked the door behind him. But how did the culprit get out?

  Perhaps Walcote worked at the desk. Crispin relaxed and pictured it. Walcote worked and then rose to get a cup of wine. He held it in his hand, and the next thing he knew a knife stabbed his back. He dropped the cup, which spattered wine on the sideboard, and he turned to face his killer, and then—

  Crispin’s eyes snapped open. “Jack! Secure the door. Alert me if someone comes.”

  Only Jack’s nose appeared at the edge of the jamb. “Aye, Master,” he whispered, and the nose disappeared again.

  Crispin approached the bier and threw back the sheet. Walcote was wearing a simple linen shift. His skin wore that waxy sheen bereft of color seen only on the dead. Crispin did not hesitate in untying the man’s collar. Dead men no longer aroused his discomfort. He opened the shift and pulled the shroud down over his shoulders.

  Because the body was clean, he could plainly see the mark of the blade on the upper left shoulder. The blade had pierced the flesh in a smooth tear, but it was a halfhearted stroke. Why such a weak thrust?

  Crispin lifted the man’s shoulders and turned him on his side to view the wounds on his back. These were more vicious blows, one on top of the other. There were six in all. Jagged tears in the flesh of the back forming a mad herringbone pattern of violence.

  Since he did not defend himself, Crispin surmised he was stabbed in the back first. What was Walcote working on at his table? He returned the body like he found it, retying the shift and pulling up the sheet.

  He strode to the table, pulled out the high-backed chair, and sat on the soft cushion. He only allowed a momentary feeling of satisfaction with the chair before he settled to his work. Accounting books and journals bound in dark leather sat stacked before him. He picked up the first and thumbed through it, glancing at row upon row of tabulations and names of fabrics. He found the last entry easily. A quill marked the unfinished page. The last tabulation was incomplete. Not unusual. No blood appeared on the page, which reminded him again of the spilled bowl on the floor. Walcote had been surprised while drinking his wine. The second cup remained untouched. Propriety would suggest that that meant there were no visitors.

  Crispin thought a bit and turned the accounting book back to the first page and read the date: 1379. Five years ago. He picked up the journal and confirmed his thoughts by checking the first page. Also 1379. Was nothing in this house older than five years?

  He picked up another, heavier volume. This did not appear to be a personal accounting, but the expenses of the guild, mostly export taxes. He glanced at it quickly. Eleven hundred fifty-two sacks of raw wool leaving Sandwich. Two hundred bolts of worsted from East Anglia to Calais. The dry pages of commerce. He snorted and snapped the book shut, then stacked all the books together. “Jack!”

  The head poked in again.

  “Come. Take these books. I don’t think Mistress Walcote will mind our borrowing them.”

  Jack’s face squinted. “What do you want them books for?”

  “Motive. It wouldn’t be the first time a man was killed because of dubious bookkeeping.”

  Jack looked unconvinced, but he edged through the archway and stared at the covered body before he turned a pale face to Crispin.

  Crispin tapped his finger on the topmost book. “Hurry you now. I haven’t all day. Walcote won’t mind, I assure you.”

  Jack swallowed hard. “I ain’t so sure of that,” he whispered. He edged along the cloth-draped wall to the desk. He snatched the books and ran with them back to the door, skidding out into the gallery.

  Crispin chuckled. He sat a moment more and stared at the room and the open doorway, his back to the window. He turned and looked, but the window was barred as it had been the first time he entered the room. He looked at the snuffed candle, the blackened curl of a wick, the flat and now frozen pool of wax in its melted hollow.

  With a sudden thought, he shot to his feet.

  He left the room and stood outside it, looking down the gallery. Below lay the foyer leading south to the dining hall. Trestle tables were stacked against the walls, leaving the expansive floor empty. A few cressets lit a path, but no servants wandered the painted floorboards. Crispin moved to the west of the solar and found an open alcove with a window. Sunlight warmed the white plaster to gold though the alcove was still cold. Tucked in the corner was a small cot with a straw-stuffed mattress. No doubt a maid servant made this her bed.
He moved past the alcove and found a door. He knocked first, but without waiting for a reply, tried to open it. Locked. He glanced back at Jack, wondering if he should send him to get a key when he decided not to waste the time. He unbuttoned his coat and he crouched and used his dagger and the sharp aiglet of his shirt’s lace to pick the lock. It snapped open, and Jack, straining to watch from his post by the solar, smiled.

  Crispin pulled the door open and peered inside. Empty. Perhaps a storeroom.

  He shut the door and looked back at Jack. He looked at the door. With wide strides he counted the paces past the storeroom, past the window alcove, and back to the solar. He stared through the open doorway past Walcote’s body to the window and paced the steps again back to the storeroom.

  He stopped and smiled, rebuttoning his coat.

  “Jack,” he said, returning to the solar.

  “Aye, Master.”

  “Let’s go home. We’ve done all we can here whilst this body awaits burial.”

  “Thank you, Master.” Jack made a sling with his cloak and slipped the bulky books in under his arm.

  Crispin smiled, pleased with himself. They followed the lonely gallery from shadow to light. Crispin decided to skirt Adam and exit by the kitchen outbuildings.

  When they entered the kitchens, he cast about until he found the tall figure he sought. “Master Hoode.”

  John Hoode looked up and smiled on seeing Crispin. He hurried to his side. “Crispin. How did it go?”

  “Not badly. I will be here often as I continue my investigations.” He wasn’t certain if Hoode was up to the challenge, but he needed someone to do a little spying for him when he wasn’t about. “Can you favor me with an errand?” He pulled Hoode aside, and glanced about for any others. “You are new to this household. So it may not necessarily be strange for you to be found in the corridor. You were lost, after all. Yes?”

  Hoode studied Crispin’s eyes. It took him a few moments but he caught up. “Oh, aye! I get you. Keep me eyes open.”

  “That’s right.”

  Hoode giggled. “That’s all a bit of fun, ain’t it? Me spying on the likes of the Walcotes. What a grand jest that is.”

  Crispin kept his smile in place, though Hoode’s fey manner caused a ripple of discomfort sporting up his spine. “Just don’t be obvious.”