Veil of Lies

by Jeri Westerson

  “He’s a criminal,” said Lionel. “Call him that.”

  “He’s dead.” Crispin spoke from behind them. “At least have mercy on that. And he was murdered.”

  “Yes, and she did it!” Clarence stood and pointed an accusing finger at Philippa.

  “To what gain?” asked Crispin. “This very inquisition?”

  “Ah, you think you’re clever,” said Lionel. “But she did not know that Nicholas had brothers and that we could identify him. She thought to be sole heir.”

  Crispin’s sneer vanished. The man was right. Was the secret too much for her to bear? That was a better motive for murder than some fabled Italian syndicate.

  Then he remembered. Why didn’t she mention the cloth?

  “We are the heirs,” said Lionel. He threw his shoulders back triumphantly.

  “At least you said ‘we,’” grumbled Clarence.

  Maude stood to rest her hands on her husband’s shoulders. “That is so. Lionel and Clarence are the heirs. She has no rights at all. And I daresay, she wasn’t even lawfully married to the man she lived with for three years.”

  “What’s to be done with her?” Clarence asked.

  “Throw her out!” roared Maude. “We certainly don’t need that kind of chambermaid in this household. She’d stir up more trouble, I’ll wager.”

  “Well, woman,” said Wynchecombe. “You heard your mistress.”

  Lionel lurched toward the sheriff, but Wynchecombe’s glare stymied his progress. “You’re not going to arrest her?” he asked. “She stole Nicholas’s money!”

  “And surely she killed that man upstairs,” Maude added.

  Wynchecombe’s glance slid toward Crispin. Only the corner of his mouth drew up in a smile. “Shall I arrest her?”

  “Possibly, my lord.” Crispin rested his hands behind his back, the only way to keep from wrapping them around Wynchecombe’s throat. “But I would wait. There is more here than meets the eye. I make a solemn promise to you, Lord Sheriff, to keep an eye on her and report to you her whereabouts. She can’t go far.”

  “Indeed,” the sheriff chuckled. “Very well, Guest. She is your responsibility. If I decide to arrest her and she can’t be found, then I suppose you shall hang in her stead. It looks like everyone wins.” He clapped his hand on his sword hilt. “I will, of course, require a surety to allow her into your custody.”

  She shook her head at Crispin. He knew it would be a rich sum. He also knew she recently paid him with a full pouch and probably had nothing left on her person.

  With reluctance, Crispin reached into his purse and pulled out the coin pouch. Easily gotten, easily gone. “Will this be sufficient?”

  The sheriff took it and measured it in his palm. He smiled. “Why Crispin. You are full of surprises today.” The sheriff’s smile took in everyone before he pocketed the money pouch, turned, and swept out of the room.

  Once the sheriff left, the Walcotes moved collectively to one side of the room opposite Philippa; an army taking its defensive position.

  “I think it time the wench leaves,” said Maude.

  “I will help her collect her baggage,” said Crispin, but Lionel harrumphed himself forward and waved his hand in the air.

  “No, no, no. None of it belongs to her, after all, now does it?”

  “I suppose you’d like me to go off naked!”

  Both Lionel and Clarence raised their brows but Maude slapped her husband’s shoulder and offered an insincere smile. “She may take what she is wearing and return it when she can.”

  “Very charitable,” muttered Crispin. Philippa looked up at him defiantly, and he motioned for her to go. “Masters, mistress,” he said in parting. “I trust you do not mind seeing me again. I am still investigating a murder.”

  “So you say,” said Maude, staring meaningfully at Philippa. “But it seems to me that you put yourself to far more trouble than necessary.”

  17

  Crispin reached the fresh cold air of the courtyard and his shoulders finally relaxed. He led the silent Philippa beyond the gatehouse and they stood undecidedly at the muddy crossroads in front of the Walcote manor.

  Crispin tried to speak several times, but he did not think he could manage his anger.

  Abruptly she turned to him. “Say it all. You want to. You probably even think I killed him.”

  “Did you?”

  “You already asked me that. Didn’t you believe my answer?”

  “That was then.”

  “And now? Not just a chambermaid and an adulteress, but a liar, a thief, and a murderer. Is that it? Or maybe I left out whore.”

  Crispin eyed the street peripherally. Perhaps this wasn’t the best place for this discussion. He longed for a drink. “I don’t like being lied to.”

  “I didn’t lie to you. I, well, I tried not to. There were just some things I couldn’t tell you. Can’t you understand why? Everything that happened in that room was all that I feared. That is my home, Crispin.” Teardrops beaded her lashes. “I can’t even be a servant there no more. I haven’t two pence to rub together. Even these clothes—That bitch wants them back, and I’ll send them, mark my words!”

  Crispin’s throat felt thick. He wanted nothing more than to leave her in the street and get himself drunk at the Boar’s Tusk, but with his name on a surety he had no recourse but to keep an eye on her. “Where does your family dwell? I will take you there.”

  “I ain’t got a family. I got nowhere to go.”

  “Nowhere? No one?”

  She stood red-faced and tearstained, but still striking, still unashamed and defiant.

  God help me.

  She wiped her face with her hand. “I don’t need no one.”

  “I suppose…you may stay with me. Temporarily. I have nothing but the floor to offer you.”

  “I’ve had worse.”

  The sun lay far below the horizon by the time they neared the Shambles. Crispin noted a man in livery following them, but when Crispin stopped on the pretense of taking a pebble from his boot, the man vanished.

  Long shadows blended with the darkness, crossing over one another in a thatching of dismal contours. Philippa had stopped weeping a long time ago, and they hadn’t spoken since leaving the manor. When he looked past her, a hunched figure emerged from the dark.

  “Wait here,” he said to her before he joined the short man.

  Lenny’s bulging eyes winced furtively up and down the street.

  “What’s the news, Lenny?”

  “Good ev’n, Master Crispin,” he said with an abbreviated bow. He gestured toward Philippa rubbing her arms in the cold. “Don’t mean to interrupt your doings.” He added a wink.

  Crispin scowled. “Just tell me what you have for me.”

  “Well, I seen that Moor leave his lodgings and I followed him.”

  “Indeed. Where did he go?”

  “Hired himself a messenger. Gave him a paper and sent him off.”

  “And where did this messenger go?”

  “Ah! I thought you’d want to know that. So I followed him to the Walcote manor. That big stone house? Didn’t see nought else after that.”

  “Interesting. And when did all these mysterious doings take place?”

  “Last night around dusk. Then I went back to the Thistle to see if that Moor was still there.”

  “And was he?”

  “All at ease in his room, he was. The knave.”

  “Much thanks, Lenny.” Crispin managed to find a farthing in the corner of his purse and handed it over.

  “Oh, indeed!” said Lenny, saluting with the coin. “Right you are, Master Crispin. Any time, good sir. Am I to keep an eye peeled still for this Moor?”

  “If you would. Off with you now.”

  “Fare you well. And good luck with the lady.”

  Why would Mahmoud send a messenger to the Walcote manor? Sending a missive to Philippa? Crispin glanced at her. She seemed small and lost in the pall of her cloak. It covered all of her. On
ly her sheltered head and shoulders marked her shape.

  By the time he looked back, Lenny had vanished.

  “Who was that?”

  Her pale skin looked blue in the cloud-veiled moonlight. She composed herself but without the sparkle he knew before.

  He pulled his hood forward and sniffed at the cold. “An associate.” He strode forward and she followed.

  “You deal with many questionable characters.”

  He hurried his pace. “Yes—cutthroats, cutpurses, and the like. That is the scope of my universe,” he said tightly.

  “And now I am one of them.”

  He said nothing to that. The resignation in her voice might have been justified, but it rang inharmoniously on his ear.

  They reached the Shambles, which gave up its particular fragrance even in the darkness. No mistaking the odor of death and butchering. Even when the wind changed direction, the street was not spared. Tallow vats billowed their perfume skyward, clouds of it roaming lazily.

  Ahead lay the tinker’s shop, and Crispin directed Philippa and took out his key. They climbed the stairs, reached for the room’s lock, and the door flung open. “It’s about time, Master! I was worried—”

  Jack Tucker froze in place and stared at Philippa, her face streaked with old tears, one braid draped limply over a shoulder.

  Crispin leaned toward Jack. “Jack, would you do me the favor of finding other lodgings tonight? Mistress Wal…Philippa is going to be my guest.”

  Jack blushed and straightened. “Oh, right then. As you will.” He recovered quickly, licked his lips, and scratched his head. Freckles that took on a merry life of their own in the sunlight disappeared in the darkness of the landing. He thumbed behind him into the shadows. “I’ll just be going now, will I?”

  He backed out the door and Crispin closed it on him, but not before jutting his face between the slash of door and jamb. “I’ll make it up to you, Jack.”

  Jack winked, found a place in the corner of the landing, and curled up under his cloak.

  When Crispin turned back, he saw Philippa warming herself halfheartedly by the fire. He detected very little of the spirited woman she had been, but it was hardly unexpected.

  He realized he tended to her as if she were a highborn lady. Servants were accustomed to sleeping several in a bed, sometimes male and female together. Surely Philippa had done so. No need, then, to send Jack out, yet he made no move to call him back.

  He sat on the bed, pulled off his boots, and rubbed his feet. “Jack usually sleeps in that corner where the straw is. You’ll find it comfortable enough.”

  She nodded. Skirt folding beneath her, she sank down before the fire and unbraided her hair.

  Crispin tried not to watch and got up in his stocking feet to rummage among the jars and sacks on his pantry shelf. Finding a hard-crusted pasty leaning against a crock of pickled onions, he grabbed it, sniffed its slightly stale crust, and broke it in two. He laid one half on the table and pushed it toward her. He returned to the bed, laid down on his back, and tore into the stale meat pie.

  He chewed in silence for an uncomfortable moment before he glanced her way.

  The fire glazed her brassy hair, and the newly unbound tresses frizzed about her face in a golden halo. She raked her fingers through it, trying to comb out the curls. The action only served to soften her features. Her white face, fragile and alluring, shimmered in the firelight.

  The dry dough stuck in his throat. He sat up, hoping wine would help. “That one on the table is for you.”

  He reached for the wine jug and made a prayer of thanks when he lifted and found it full. He poured a bowl for himself and one for her. He scooted the chair to the table.

  Philippa held the pasty but did not eat.

  “You’d better eat that. That surety money was to pay for food. There isn’t any more.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  Crispin sighed. “Don’t vex yourself.”

  “You must hate me.”

  “No. I’m angry, but I don’t hate you.”

  “Surely you see how I couldn’t tell you. You’re honest. You would have had to report to the sheriff that my husband was not Nicholas Walcote. That’s why when Mahmoud threatened to tell—”

  She pressed her lips closed, frowned, and gingerly put the pasty to her trembling mouth.

  Crispin froze. He felt like a fool. Worse. “I’m an idiot,” he told the rafters.

  “I lay with that vile man as much to protect Nicholas as me. It was nothing to me,” she said, eyes closed over damp lashes. “I was not there with Mahmoud. I was anywhere but there.” She opened her eyes again and fixed them on Crispin. “Whatever else he was, Nicholas was good to me. I won’t forget him for that. I did it for him. I owed him. He would’ve understood that, wouldn’t he?”

  He shook his head. “I know not. This is a very sad affair.”

  “Do you think those Italians killed Nicholas? He was afraid they had followed him. He said as much.”

  When he’d dispatched the pasty he wiped his hands down his coat. Mahmoud’s missive recently sent to the Walcote Manor rose up in his mind. “Well, one thing is certain: Mahmoud will no longer extort you.”

  She sighed, her first sound of relief. She looked up at him from her place by the fire.

  Mahmoud. A vile man with vile habits. A Saracen. He glowered at her, wanting to know, yet not wanting to ask. “How could you do it?” he blurted. “Give yourself to a stranger. To a Saracen! What of your virtue—”

  “Virtue? Do you think I was a maiden when I met Nicholas, or whatever the poor bastard’s name was?” She pulled a piece of the crust away with her fingers and stuffed it in her mouth. “Life’s hard in the scullery,” she said, cheek bulging. “You do a lot for an extra scrap of bread.”

  “You said you were a chambermaid.”

  “I was at the Walcote manor, but I didn’t start that way. Me mum was a scullion. I worked alongside her. Don’t remember when I didn’t. One day, she was stirring a cauldron when the chain holding it above the fire broke. I remember water and steam everywhere. And I remember her screaming. It scalded her to death.” She chewed thoughtfully. “When I buried her, I vowed I’d get m’self out of the kitchens, and I did. I’d never thought to reach so high.” She sighed with her entire body. “Maybe it was only a dream. You can take the girl out of the scullery, perhaps, but you can’t take the scullery out of the girl.”

  Crispin tried hard to remember his own servants and could not recall if he had ever set eyes on a scullion in his manor in Sheen. He felt ashamed.

  He leaned on his arm and studied her. “You rose from the very bottom. You can even read. Remarkable.”

  “I’m a fair remarkable wench,” she said, smiling briefly. She finished the rest of her food in silence. She collected her wine bowl, pulled a stool to the table, and sat opposite him. “You’re fair remarkable yourself. So why’d you do it? Take me in, I mean.”

  “You remind me of someone.”

  “Oh? Who?”

  He smiled. “Me.”

  Her eyes brightened and she reached her hand across the table to touch his. Before she could, Crispin shot from his chair and moved away. She rose and edged toward him.

  “It don’t matter why.”

  “Philippa…”

  “What matters is you did. ’Cause you’re decent and true.” She stood toe to toe with him and looked up unafraid. He recognized that confidence, and it twisted a knot in his gut. Her hair, like fleece, curly and wild, was edged with gold from the firelight raging behind her. Her lips glistened with wine, but it wasn’t just the liquor that gave them their rosy hue.

  He stared at her for a long moment. Before he had time to question the sanity of it, he took a step toward her and dipped his face and kissed her soft lips, drawing on them until nothing remained but the taste of her. Hands found her back and he lifted her toward him, pressing her warm body against his, savoring the length of her, each dip and valley. The kiss grew harder, alm
ost cruel. But she gave as good as she got and used her teeth and tongue like weapons. His hands slid about her waist. Her soft body melded to his like a tight-fitting garment and he smothered himself in her, rejoicing in that brassy fleece cascading about his cheeks. He grasped her head with one hand, allowing the tresses to tickle his wrist. He sealed his mouth to hers and feasted, nose inhaling sweat and sweetness and woman.

  He released her head and waist to run his hands along her shoulders to the back of her neck, fingers working at the laces of her gown.

  “What are you doing?” she asked drowsily to his moist cheek.

  “I’m undressing you,” he rasped. “Any objections?”

  She gave a breathy laugh. “No.”

  The word barely left her lips when the gown slipped to her feet.

  18

  Crispin lay for the second time that night with his face under Philippa’s chin. His cheek rested comfortably on the softness of her bosom and he inhaled the muskiness of bedded woman.

  “Tell me who you are, Crispin,” she said again. He silenced her the first time with kisses that turned to more. Now he was weak and drowsy and all he could do was angle his face upward and kiss her jaw. It tasted of him.

  “Must we speak of such things?” His voice mumbled against her skin. “Are there not better topics of conversation when lovers are abed?”

  She smiled. He could tell because the shadows and angles of her jaw changed. “Are we lovers now?”

  “If you would have it so.”

  “Does that mean,” she said with a false coquette in her voice, “that you would lie with me again?”

  “And again and again. When a job is worth doing—” He nuzzled her until she pulled away.

  “Then you should tell me.”

  “Hmm?” He found a better spot to nuzzle, flicking his tongue.

  She squirmed away and gathered the bedclothes over her breasts. “About your past. You don’t belong on the Shambles. Why are you here, Crispin?”

  He stopped. Women! Sighing, he rolled off of her and lay on his back to stare up at the cobwebbed rafters. “Why is my history so important?”