The Outlaw's Tale (Sister Frevisse Medieval Mysteries)

by Margaret Frazer

  She waited for them in the hall, composing herself outwardly far more than she was inwardly. They came, with Lovie hasty at their side to introduce them. To Frevisse's relief she knew neither of them. If the crowner had been Master Montfort from her own side of Oxfordshire, he might have tried to find other answers than the ones she gave him, merely out of his deep dislike for her that had grown from their other encounters. But this crowner was an older man, with a settled countenance, who would listen to a responsible description of the facts, and build his conclusion from that.

  The sheriff was younger, with a keen eye, and said as they were introduced and Frevisse curtseyed to them both, “Master Payne is indeed dead?"

  The distance between door and hall had been time enough for Lovie to tell at least that much.

  “Yes," Frevisse said, forcing her voice to steadiness. “He was killed in front of all of us. We have the man who did it tied up in the barn."

  “Is it the peddler? The one Payne had the hunt up for, for killing Colfoot?" the sheriff asked.

  “No. The peddler didn't kill Colfoot." Her hands tucked up her habit's sleeves tightened painfully on her forearms but she still held her voice even. “Master Payne killed Colfoot. Master Payne was killed by an outlaw he had had dealings with. That's whom we have prisoner in the barn."

  She had been too intent on the sheriff and crowner to more than marginally notice the half dozen of their men who had come in with them. Now a familiar voice said, “Frevisse? You mean Nicholas?"

  Hardly daring to believe, caught between relief and alarm, she saw past the sheriff and crowner to Thomas Chaucer coming toward her. Elegant in blue riding houppelande, furred hat, and high boots, he had his usual way of looking as if he belonged where he was and expected to be obeyed in anything he said. Though he had consistently through the years refused the honors of nobility offered to him by the Crown he served, he had wealth and power enough that he lacked no authority he cared to have. And he was the dearest friend she had.

  Now, clearly known to the sheriff and crowner, he held out his hand to her, and she gratefully took it as he said by way of introduction, “This is my niece I told you of. Is it Nicholas you have in the barn?"

  Frevisse nodded.

  Chaucer forbore to say the several things she saw cross his mind. Instead he said, “I have someone else you may be glad of, too," and gestured behind him to Master Naylor come from among the other men.

  Relief as great as the fear she had secretly carried since the outlaws had taken him from the camp suffused her. “Oh, I am glad you're all right!" Frevisse exclaimed. “I wasn't – couldn’t be – sure."

  “I'm well," he said, bowing to her.

  “But I think all that needs to be told should be told somewhere more private than this," Chaucer said. “And hopefully in comfort. Geoff? James? You agree?"

  The sheriff nodded. “It sounds as if there's a deal of telling," he agreed.

  “This is too fine a house to lack a solar," Chaucer suggested. “Or is there a parlor? And something to drink perhaps."

  She took them to the parlor and, careful of everything she said, told them all that needed to be told to make as much of an end as there could be to everything that had happened.

  Pale, watery sunshine fell weakly yellow through the window and across the floor of the parlor. While she talked, Frevisse watched the shadow of a joint stool move slowly across the carpet, because the shadow had nothing to do with anything that mattered. It had no passion of love or hate or greed or any other thing. That lack was very comforting just now.

  She talked and the men listened, and when she had finished the sheriff and crowner thanked her for making it all clear and simple, then went to question others in the household and Nicholas.

  Exhausted, still staring at the shadow of the stool, Frevisse slumped down in her chair. She doubted they would learn anything that would hurt her tale. She wished there had been no need to say any of it.

  Quietly, evenly, Chaucer said, “That was well done, Frevisse. Now suppose you tell me the part you didn't tell them."

  Frevisse let out a deep and trembling breath. “Was it that plain?"

  “Not to anyone who doesn't know you well. What else happened?"

  She cast a look at Master Naylor standing quietly out of the way in a corner. His face was lined with tiredness and the strain of a man who has not rested in several days. Avoiding her uncle's question, she said, “Master Naylor, I need to ask your pardon for siding against you in the outlaws' camp."

  The steward was rarely given to smiling, but his eyes held a shadowy amusement. “Hasting me away from there before I forced Nicholas out of patience you likely saved me from what came to Master Payne."

  “You also loosed him to come to me," Thomas put in.

  “Not back to Domina Edith?" Frevisse asked.

  “To Domina Edith first, after Sister Emma's family," Master Naylor assured her. “And she sent me on to Master Chaucer, in time to reach him when you letter from here did."

  “Did you send her word of that?" Frevisse asked, with memory of the letter she had never written to her prioress.

  “Of that, and that we were going to fetch you home," Chaucer said. “Her mind is as at ease as it can be until you ride back through the priory gates. Now, what is it you haven't told us?"

  Chaucer was not a man to be balked, whether in Parliament or in private. Carefully, Frevisse explained that Evan was not merely a peddler, that he was one of Nicholas's outlaws; and described, in greater detail than she had given the sheriff and crowner, her help to Magdalen in saving and hiding him. Only at the last, when she added her guilt in deliberately drugging Sister Emma, did she bow her head, letting her shame show. She had known at the time what she was doing, and been willing to take the burden of it, but it sounded worse told aloud to others than it had in her own mind while she did it. Almost everything she had done these past few days sounded worse told aloud and at length. Abuse of Sister Emma's trust was only one of her sins. She had lied repeatedly. Betrayed the people who had given her shelter. Helped bring about Master Payne's death. Deceived apparently without end.

  “It's done, Frevisse," Chaucer said. He laid a hand on her arm.

  Her hands, out of sight up her sleeves, tightened. It was penance she was in need of now, not sympathy. Wearily she pointed out, “Because of what I did, Nicholas is a prisoner, guilty of murder, and a man is dead who would not be if I'd not interfered."

  “You couldn't see what would come of what you did."

  “I might have seen if I'd looked. But I didn't look. And outcome or not, what I did were sins. And behind them all was the worst sin. Pride. My pride that made me believe that I should interfere because I knew best what should be done."

  “Only pride, Frevisse?" Thomas' doubt was warm with sympathy. “Not affection? Not desire to help those in direst need, who had no other help but you to turn to? Only pride?"

  “I don't know," she whispered. “I can't judge now. I don't know."

  Chaucer released her. They knew each other's minds well; in a different situation they could have cheerfully argued the matter far into the night, but there was no cheer in her just now. Instead, he responded to the strain behind her voice. “Do you wish to leave here now? As soon as may be? I know someone who lives not far from here where you could go instead."

  Frevisse very desperately wanted to be away, but without raising her head she answered, “Sister Emma can't travel today. Her cough is still heavy. Tomorrow."

  “Tomorrow then. Or longer if need be. We'll stay here until she can travel."

  “Will the crowner allow it before he's finished investigating?" Master Naylor asked.

  “I don't see why not," Chaucer said. “Frevisse has told him all she can tell him. And if I can't persuade James of that, I can give recognizance for her, that she won't go anywhere he can't find her. I think my word will stretch that far." He smiled. “Is there anything I can do for you at present, Frevisse?"

 
; She shook her head. “Just be here. It helps to know you are." To know that if she could not carry this through, she could turn to him for help. “I had better go see how Sister Emma does."

  She found Mistress Payne and her children – Katherine, Kate and Bartholomew ranged on one side of her, Richard on the other – praying beside her husband's body in the great bedroom. They were not yet dressed in mourning, but were all kneeling with their heads bowed, silent except for an occasional shivery sob from one of the little girls.

  Magdalen was there, too, but on the far side of the bed from them, deep in her own prayers for her brother's soul. Sir Perys read prayers for the dead at the foot of the bed, and Lovie and Maud stood at hand to help if anything were needed.

  Only Edward was missing. But he was Master Payne now, head of the family and probably with the sheriff and crowner. The adulthood he had been assuming a few days ago was fully and too soon come on him.

  Lastly Frevisse made herself look at Oliver Payne laid out on the bed. His wife and her women had already cleaned his body and dressed him in the red houpplande he had worn when Frevisse first met him. In death his face had the reposed confidence of that evening. She gazed on it a long while, unable to break the brittle, grieving peace of the scene, not wanting to do what she had to do next.

  But necessity was stronger than desire. With a brief prayer, she crossed herself and went to lay a hand on Mistress Payne's shoulder.

  She looked up, and Frevisse saw that she was between tears just now. The first shock of grief had passed; long and deep-set grieving had not yet taken hold. In that pause between the onrush and floods of sorrow she was dazed but not blind with pain. And she had no knowledge yet of what part Frevisse had had in her husband's dying.

  So her look was only questioning. And when Frevisse moved her head to show she wanted her to come away, she only paused to murmur one more prayer, crossed herself, and came.

  Frevisse had been unable to think of anywhere to go that would be both private and not excite questions from anyone who saw them. So they went simply to the head of the stairs between the Payne's room and Magdalen's, where no one could overhear or come on them unknown.

  Briefly Frevisse explained that her uncle had come and that she and Sister Emma would be leaving as soon as possible, probably tomorrow, to ease the family's burden at least a little. Mistress Payne made no answer beyond a nod. Words, like tears, were temporarily drained out of her. She was so small a woman, and so drawn in around her grief, that she seemed hardly more than a child now, standing in front of Frevisse with her head drooping, her face hidden.

  But Frevisse went on. “I've spoken to Edward. Has he told you of that? Of what we agreed to tell the sheriff? That it wasn't Magdalen's Evan who killed Colfoot. That it was your husband."

  Mistress Payne shivered. And still did not look up. But nodded.

  Frevisse brought her right hand out of her left sleeve where she had kept it all this while and held out the bloodied belt she had caught up from Magdalen's floor. Mistress Payne's head jerked sharply away from it. “The sheriff will want you to say this was your husband's. Will you do that?" Frevisse asked.

  Mistress Payne's head jerked again, caught between nod and denial. But she said, her voice cracking with grief, “He's dead. I'll say it. It won't hurt him now."

  “But you know it isn't his. Don't you?"

  Mistress Payne's head finally came up. Her eyes widened on Frevisse's face but she said nothing.

  Gently, very gently, Frevisse said, “It's Edward's, isn't it?"

  “No." The strength that Magdalen had said was in her sister-in-law now showed itself. “No. It's my husband's. I've told you so. I'll tell the sheriff and crowner so if they ask me. It's my husband's belt."

  “The wear mark of the buckle in the leather," Frevisse said, holding it out so she could see, “shows it went around a waist much narrower than your husband's. A boy's waist. Edward's."

  Mistress Payne seized the belt out of her hands. In rapid, jerking movements, she coiled it up buckle inward, covering the mark, leaving the bloodied end to hang free. “It was my husband's belt," she repeated.

  “That's what you must keep saying." Frevisse assured her. “But I want to know how Edward came to fight with Colfoot. He's told you about it?"

  Mistress Payne held silent a moment longer, but perhaps it was a relief to say what would never be said to anyone else. A relief to say what she had thought would have to stay sealed in her forever. Or perhaps she simply bent to what she could not avoid. “He heard the quarrel between his father and Colfoot, and Colfoot's threats against both us and Magdalen. When Colfoot left here, Edward went after him, not even taking a horse. He just cut through the woods and intercepted him along the road. Edward didn't mean anything, only to talk with him, to try to talk him out of it. But Colfoot was still in a fury. He saw Edward as no more than an intruding child and cursed at him and brought out his sword and struck him over the shoulders with the flat of it. Edward lost his temper. He had only his dagger but they were so close together and Colfoot wasn't expecting it that I think Edward killed him before either of them knew what they were doing. He didn't believe he'd done it, that somehow he'd only pulled Colfoot from his horse. But when he knelt by him, Colfoot was almost dead and died while Edward was looking at him. Then Edward was frightened. He cleaned the dagger in the woods and came home. He was so frightened. He didn't know he had bloodied his belt. I saw it when he came in. It had to be by God's mercy I was the first to see him when he came home. He looked so torn and in pain. We didn't know what to do. I couldn't let anyone else see him. And I had to do something about the belt, but I didn't know what. So we went to his father, in the parlor where no one would come if Oliver didn't let them. It seemed the only safe place. We were all so frightened."

  Her voice trailed away, remembering not only her fear for Edward but her husband's.

  Gently, Frevisse said, “Then your husband hid the belt until he could have a chance to be safely rid of it?" Mistress Payne nodded dumbly. “And Edward put on different clothes so its lack would not be so apparent. And at supper that night Master Payne had the idea of making the stranger in the orchard out to be the murderer."

  Mistress Payne sighed. “It seemed the safest, the simplest thing to do. We didn't know he was Magdalen's lover."

  “And when you did, it didn't matter, because he was still no more than a peddler and no one but Magdalen would care if he died."

  “It was... necessary," Mistress Payne agreed softly. She moved past remembering to what was necessary now. “Are you going to let us keep our secret?"

  Lying. Deception. Abuse of trust. Here they all were, joined together in a single act. For this, more than all the rest, there would be penance so deep in her own heart that she might never be free of it. But the choice had been made already.

  Quietly Frevisse said, “I've helped you make it. I'll help you keep it. Tell Edward that he'll have my daily prayers through all his life to come."

  * * * * *

  THE END

  Author's Note

  Given the strict cloistering to which nuns were supposed to submit, Frevisse and Dame Emma's venturing out to a family christening may seem surprising. Indeed, nuns in medieval England were officially cloistered and supposed to stay shut from the world behind nunnery walls, but in fact leave could be granted for them to visit outside the cloister for any "manifest necessity" – and as Eileen Power observes in Medieval English Nunneries, "they could with a little skill, stretch the 'manifest necessity' clause to cover almost all their wanderings," whether on pilgrimage, for pleasure, or on family matters. To judge by the centuries-long efforts of bishops and other churchmen to regulate and curb these jaunts, nuns seem rarely to have faltered in treating cloistering as far more open to choice than their bishops liked.

  For those accustomed to view medieval society as a straightforward matter of Nobles vs. Peasants, Master Payne's household may seen fanciful, but in truth there was a rapidly growin
g free middle class in England through all the later Middle Ages – prospering merchants in cities and towns; the gentry in the countryside – who owned their own property, ran their own lives, and served lords only insofar as they chose, even, as in Master Payne's case, making a business of doing so.

  As may be readily expected, Robin Hood was a popular figure in medieval England, though not always in the guise more modern tellings give him. Robin Hood and Other Outlaw Tales, edited by Stephen Knight and Thomas Ohlgren, provides both a study and a number of stories of Robin Hood and other medieval outlaws that Nicholas and his men could readily have known.

  Margaret Frazer

  Margaret Frazer is the award-winning author of more than twenty historical murder mysteries and novels. She makes her home in Minneapolis, Minnesota, surrounded by her books, but she lives her life in the 1400s. In writing her Edgar-nominated Sister Frevisse (The Novice's Tale) and Player Joliffe (A Play of Isaac) novels she delves far inside medieval perceptions, seeking to look at medieval England more from its point of view than ours. "Because the pleasure of going thoroughly into otherwhen as well as otherwhere is one of the great pleasures in reading."

  She can be visited online at http://www.margaretfrazer.com.

  * * * * *

  Sister Frevisse Mysteries

  Beginning in the year of Our Lord's grace 1431, the Sister Frevisse mysteries are an epic journey of murder and mayhem in 15th century England.

  The Novice's Tale

  The Servant's Tale (Edgar-Award Nominee)

  The Outlaw's Tale

  The Bishop's Tale (Minnesota Book Award Nominee)