Veil of Lies

by Jeri Westerson

“I do believe you.” Crispin entered the room and grimaced at the smell. All the rosemary and spices in the world could not mask the odor of decay. Only two candles were lit and the sheet was drawn up over the shrunken features of the dead merchant. Burial tomorrow would not come soon enough.

  Crispin turned toward the wall. Movement. A figure lurking in the shadows. Crispin pulled his dagger and regretted for the thousandth time that he no longer carried a sword.

  “You there! I see you! Make yourself known!”

  Candlelight cast a wan glow on the man’s features.

  “Put your weapon away, friend Crispin,” said John Hoode, his voice trembling. He put his hand back up to his face, covering nose and mouth from the smell.

  Crispin’s heart started again and he slammed the blade in its sheath. “You frightened the wits out of me,” he said and wiped the sweat away from his upper lip. “What are you doing here?”

  “There’s the burial tomorrow. I thought—”

  Crispin’s agitation melted and he reached out and patted Hoode’s shoulder. Crispin nodded and glanced back toward Philippa in the doorway. He leaned in toward Hoode and asked softly, “What’s the news from the kitchens?”

  “The kitchens? That’s not my—”

  Hoode stopped and stared at Crispin. His gaze made a quick circuit of the room, caught Philippa in the doorway, and finally lit on Crispin again. His lips turned up in a frightened smile. “I must go.”

  Crispin followed him out past Philippa and caught up with him on the gallery. Hoode glanced at his mistress’s back nervously.

  “What is it, John? Anything to report to me?”

  Hoode looked again at Philippa and Crispin edged him further away from her. “I did not wish to speak before her,” he said. “But it’s that Adam Becton again. Verily, he can get himself into a rage.”

  “I think that Becton is”—he glanced once at Philippa—“preoccupied.”

  “I think he is unstable. Mark me. He’s going to hurt someone. I hope it won’t be me.” He raised his smooth fingers to his lips.

  “Don’t worry. Stay out of his way. I hope to conclude this soon.” He patted Hoode’s shoulder again, and sent him on his way. He made an apologetic lilt to his shoulders to Philippa and steered her back toward the solar.

  “Who was that peculiar fellow?” she asked.

  “He’s one of your servants. I asked him to keep an eye on things.”

  “He’s going to protect me?”

  “He’s my sentinel only. I was to be called immediately.”

  She vaguely nodded and made no move to enter the room.

  “Philippa, you must come in.”

  “Must I?”

  He glanced at Walcote on his bier. “He is covered.”

  She breathed a trembling sigh and crossed the threshold, averting her gaze from the body. “It can’t be in here. I searched it myself.”

  “Yet it is.”

  “Where?”

  He walked to the far wall adjacent to the window. Dark blue drapery hung from mid-height along the walls of the entire room, covering the lime-washed plaster. He slipped his hand beneath the cloth, pushing it aside as best he could, and ran his hands along the plaster surface. “Fetch me a candle.”

  Philippa pressed her lips together and grasped enough courage to take one of the fat candles at Walcote’s head. She brought it to Crispin and held it for him. “What are you looking for?”

  “A way in.”

  “What do you mean ‘a way in’?”

  “There is a secret door to a secret room.”

  She stared at him. The candlelight warmed her face, beautiful even in its perplexity. “How do you know?”

  “Have you ever been to the Tower of London?”

  “Of course not.”

  “If you had, you would know that there is a level of false windows in the White Tower.”

  “False windows? Why?”

  “To confuse the enemy. An attacking force would believe there is another level. More men, more defenses.”

  “What has this to do with—”

  “I noticed a window on the outside wall quite close to this one. Too close. When I investigated inside and paced it off, the windows I saw inside did not correspond to the windows I saw outside. Thicker walls where there should not be. Ergo, secret room.”

  She shook her head. “If this wall opens, I shall pay you twice what I owe you.”

  “When this wall opens I will have earned it.”

  Crispin’s fingers searched along the way under the heavy blue cloth. But the drapery was proving to be an impediment to his progress and he almost tore it down in his frustration. Instead, he carefully unhooked it from the pegs set in the wall and laid it down upon the wooden floor, fold on fold. He stepped over the bunched cloth and continued his slow examination of the solar’s north wall. Philippa followed as he inched along, holding the candle for him with trembling fingers. The yellow glow cast a slanted halo across the smooth plane.

  Crispin knocked on the wall with his knuckles, cocking his head to listen for a change in tone. He had been at it a long time. What if he were wrong? He certainly didn’t relish appearing the fool in front of the woman, especially after his bravado about knowing where the damned cloth was.

  He slid his fingers toward the corner and felt nothing but the same even plaster. His disappointment was almost keener than his embarrassment. If this secret door was not so, then he had no idea where this cloth could be. And he hated to be wrong, particularly where his fee was concerned.

  Just as he was about to give up, his fingertips encountered a seam by the corner timber. “Ah!” Relief and a renewed wave of confidence made him chuckle. He drew his dagger and worked it into the crack. It widened. What appeared to be an ordinary plaster wall, was instead a clever door.

  A click and creaking wood. A portion of the wall eased aside. A dark, narrow gap appeared at the corner nearest the window and the smell of mold and mildew tumbled out with a sighing puff of air. The door opened only a shoulder’s width, but it was enough for a man to squeeze through.

  “The candle.” He put out his hand. Philippa’s excited breath gusted on his neck. His hand closed over the thick column of wax as she thrust the candle into his palm. The flame wavered from his own excitement and he gingerly pushed the candle through the opening.

  Immediately the small space jumped into view. He was surprised by what he saw. Certainly he had seen similar passages in palaces and castles, but nothing like this in a manor house. It made him wonder if his own long-lost manor had such spaces.

  A thick layer of dust covered the walls and floor. His eyes ran over the textures of stone alcoves and carved pillars. No hasty room this. This was created when the house was built. God only knew why.

  Crispin lowered the candle, dripping some wax on his boot as he tilted the wax pillar for better light. A set of scrambled footprints on the floor mingled with drops of dried blood. He knelt on one knee and studied the scene.

  “Did you find the cloth?” Philippa’s hushed voice came from the doorway.

  “Not yet. But I did find how the murderer entered and exited the solar.”

  Her head appeared at the edge and she strained to look. He pointed to the footprints and the dark drops among them. When he lifted the candle, the light illumined a small area, but he saw that the passage went farther. “This is not a room only. It is a passage.”

  “Nicholas never mentioned this.”

  “No, I don’t imagine he would have done.” Crispin walked down the narrow corridor, moving the candle above and below. A stone staircase trailing downward fell away in the gloom.

  “Don’t go!” Philippa’s whispered echo skipped along the narrow walls.

  He turned. She was lit by the sliver of the doorway where the candlelight and a rushlight outside the solar cast her in a ghostly glow. “Will you not have me search?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I will be gone for only a few moments. This passa
ge may not go very far.”

  Maneuvering carefully down the steps, he made certain to keep one hand on the wall. Should the flame go out, his touch with the wall might be his only hope of finding his way back through the suffocating darkness.

  The steps curved in a long, easy spiral, descending for what seemed like a long time. The walls muffled the sounds of servants, and he smelled vague odors. The kitchens?

  Other than the ethereal resonances behind the thick timbers and daub, Crispin’s footsteps were his only company save for the secret noises of a rat close by gnawing on its dinner.

  Crispin continued until his echoing steps changed to flat splashes. He lowered the candle’s light toward the floor and it reflected back at him.

  Water. And rising. It smelled stagnant of mildew. By the echoing sound of his steps, he sensed a wall blocking his progress. When he neared, the candle’s light confirmed it. Ahead he saw the faint outline of a door.

  He set the candle down in the ankle-deep water and used both hands to feel along the wall’s edges. He pushed and pried but nothing budged. “Open, dammit!” and he slammed the corner with his fist. The stone groaned and opened. Cold, wet air whooshed in, snuffing the candle.

  The soft outside light more than filled the small space—until the door jammed, open only a cubit wide.

  Crispin looked at the candle with its wisp of evaporating smoke and then back up the blackened passage. He sighed. He did not savor feeling his way blindly back to the solar. He turned to the opening and decided to go that way. Wherever that led. He only hoped he could fit through the crack.

  He shoved his shoulder in, closed his eyes, and tried to relax. Easing forward, he scraped both sides of his body squeezing through. Now I know what wheat feels like ground between millstones. He winced. His dagger hilt screeched along the rock. The door never budged, and he breathed evenly, trying not to think about getting stuck. And just as the thought lifted into the ether, he could move no further.

  Damn. His head aimed toward the opening. No chance to look behind him for any kind of assistance. He tried to ease back. No good. Just as stuck that way, too.

  His predicament was much like this investigation. Caught between two opposing forces, he moved blindly. Either way could stop him in his tracks.

  He pulled in his gut and pushed as hard as he could, grunting with the effort, but he was stuck fast. Philippa knew where he was, but it might be some time before she sent someone to look for him. He pushed again with a great exhaled groan and his body suddenly slipped. He could move again!

  Inching forward, he felt cold ahead. His hand touched something wet but he dared not yank the hand back. The shoulder freed and he popped his head out. Green and brown stippled light cascaded around him, and then he realized he stood along a wall of dead ivy. He pulled himself out the rest of the way and stood on the gravel path, feeling a bit as if he were birthed from the wall.

  The garden. The hidden passage meandered around and down again toward the back courtyard garden. He looked up at the solar’s window some fifteen feet up and then at the false one beside it. Looking down at his coat, he straightened his belt that was wrenched halfway around him and then wiped away the granite dust from his chest. He walked to the part of the garden wall he had scaled before with Jack, and climbed.

  He lighted on the other side and strode around the wall to the front entrance. Adam Becton answered his knock and opened the door. The steward looked surprised but said nothing, and stepped aside to let Crispin through. Crispin took the stairs two at a time, crossed the solar’s threshold, and stood noiselessly behind Philippa whose head and shoulders were lost within the passage’s gloom.

  “Lose something?”

  It was worth it to see her jump. She spun so quickly she nearly lost her balance.

  “What are you doing there!”

  “The passage lets out in the garden. Since my candle went out, I thought it safer to come round.”

  She tried to retrieve her tattered dignity by lifting her chin. “What about the Mandyllon?”

  “I quite lost track of that,” he mumbled sheepishly and stepped back into the passage. “Candle.” He held out his hand again.

  “It’s the only one left.” She slapped it into his palm.

  Before the footprints and blood had distracted him, he remembered seeing an alcove near the passage’s doorway cut into the inner wall with a lancet arch and carved pillars on either side. There, on a shelf, sat a carved wooden box as long and as wide as the length of a man’s arm. Chip-carved geometric designs with a center rosette decorated the lid. The box had no dust on it.

  Crispin motioned Philippa forward. She hesitated before plunging into the passage. He handed her the candle and lifted the box. He carried it out of the passage and set it on Walcote’s desk. She followed him, her hand at her throat.

  Crispin felt a tingle of excitement trill through his gut. It was a bit like finding a fairy’s legendary cache of gold. Perhaps it would all disappear with the daylight.

  He ran his hands over the carved designs. “Moorish,” he announced.

  His thumbs pressed the front of the lid and raised it.

  The gray light from the window flowed over the shadows within the box and revealed a folded yellowed cloth. Crispin dipped his fingers in the box and lifted the material into the light. He laid it on the table and unfolded it. At first, it merely looked like a discolored and very old piece of linen, about the size of a baby’s swaddling. He ran the fabric between his fingers, feeling its smoothness, its tight weave. He lifted it and turned it toward the window, bathing the cloth in the last rays of the dreary day.

  Then he saw it.

  Faint, as if rubbed and touched by countless fingers for centuries, the dim, brown image of a face.

  “Blessed Jesu.” The skeptic in Crispin fled to the corner and cowered. The face on the cloth was that of a man with a beard, someone about Crispin’s age or older. An ordinary face, as if the maker smeared his skin with some sort of pigment and carefully transferred his features to the cloth. Except that the eyes were open and the brown stains did not appear to be pigment. The image almost looked…burned on.

  Crispin tried to breathe and when he successfully inhaled once, he chided himself. Don’t be a fool, Crispin. You know such things do not exist.

  The cloth felt very light in weight and smelled slightly musty with a wisp of the scent of balsam. His fingers tingled where he touched it, or was it merely his imagination?

  “That’s it, isn’t it?” Philippa’s voice constricted to a gasp.

  Crispin folded the cloth. “Yes, it looks like it. Would you like to get a better look?”

  She shook her head vigorously. “Just take it away.”

  Instead of replacing it into the box, Crispin unbuttoned his coat and stuffed it in. He closed the box and carried it back to the alcove. He scanned the hidden passage one last time and stepped back over its threshold. With both hands, he pushed on the door, which obliged by moving back into place and clicking closed. The innocuous seam disappeared into the shadows and out of detection. He pulled the folds of drapery from the floor and replaced them artfully on their pegs.

  When he turned, Philippa held out a pouch with the full length of her arm. She shook the little bag, and he heard the jangle of coins. “Take it. You’ve earned it.”

  Should he hold out his hand like a beggar? It was especially galling from the likes of Philippa, but just then, his confused emotions could not sort out exactly why this simple transaction disturbed him. He swallowed his pride and snatched the pouch, dispatching it in his purse.

  “There is no doubt,” he said, buttoning his coat, “that the murderer left this room through that portal. Possibly he even entered by it.”

  “Why didn’t he take the cloth then?”

  “Perhaps he was frightened off by a servant and thought to come back later. Or he had no time to search for it.”

  “Very well,” she said, her tone clipped. “You have found your kill
er’s secret and that cloth. And you’ve been paid. Now, please, take it away.”

  He bowed. “Yes, Madam.”

  Crispin moved toward the threshold. He didn’t yet know what he would do with the cloth, or what he would tell the sheriff. Or who killed Walcote, for that matter. Or what to do about the foreigners.

  When Philippa spoke, her words stopped his thoughts altogether. “Is this the last I see of you?”

  He turned and saw the sinuous undulation of woman lit by the glittering flattery of candlelight. His senses warmed.

  Crispin took strange delight in saying, “There is still a murder to investigate. I believe you will see me again.”

  He wasn’t certain if he detected a mote of triumph in her face. She was on the cusp of saying more when there was a scrambling on the stairs. Adam Becton stumbled in, nearly knocking Crispin aside.

  He bowed to Philippa. “Mistress,” he panted. “There are—There is—” He stared at Crispin.

  She clucked her tongue at Adam and raised her chin. “What is it, Adam? Tell me.”

  “Well,” he glanced at Crispin, “they’ve just arrived. They are in the parlor.”

  Philippa tightened her shoulders. Crispin imagined all the mourners and how tiresome they could become. “Who?” she asked, exasperated.

  “Master Walcote’s brothers,” he breathed.

  Philippa’s flushed cheeks suddenly drained of color. “Brothers? Merciful Jesus!”

  15

  Philippa’s hand went to her throat. She hurried out the door with Adam at her heels.

  Crispin stood alone in the solar with the ripe body of Nicholas Walcote for company. He looked at the corpse but knew he’d get better answers downstairs.

  Adam scrambled to precede Philippa to the parlor and he unlocked the door and entered. Crispin made it to the shadow of the doorway in time to observe three people—two men and one woman—stand and turn their heads. Adam bowed and announced, “Madam Philippa Walcote,” and stepped aside.

  One of the men marched forward. His frowning dark brows matched dark greasy hair that was cut across his forehead and was covered by a green rondelle hat, which sported a shell pin from Santiago de Compostela. His green houppelande sleeves boasted two more pilgrim badges, but it was the gown’s design Crispin took special note of. The sleeves were cut long as was the fashion, but they didn’t quite touch the floor as he expected from a man in a wealthy cloth merchant family. Nor did the toes of his shoes stretch out in exaggerated points.