Thomas had long ago learned that silence was often the best way to encourage someone to speak, and soon enough Tom, the miller, couldn’t stand it any longer. “I left first,” he blurted out. “I’d had my skinful and needed to work the next day.”
“And when did you leave?”
The miller’s eyes darted to his friends, who had now found the sudsy contents of their beakers fascinating.
“Did you leave at about the same time as Lacy, Tom?”
“I don’t recall exactly. I was drunk. It may have been around then I left,” he murmured, his voice trailing off weakly.
The constable interrupted loudly. “By God, you followed him out, didn’t you?”
“I did not!” protested the miller. “I just left after he did, that’s all. Sure, it was about the same time, but I didn’t follow him. Why would I follow him? What would be the point of that?”
He looked about angrily. Everyone was staring at him.
“Wait, you don’t think …?” He laughed half-heartedly. “Now look here. I don’t know what you’re all suggesting, but I went and slept it off. And that’s all I did. I didn’t follow anyone, let alone some half-mad old vagabond.”
“A half-mad old vagabond with a sackful of coin,” added John before Thomas silenced him with an upraised hand.
“Your wife will say you were home, then?” Thomas asked.
“My wife?” He gave John a pleading look. “John, you know how I sleep it off at the mill. Tell him that’s what I do.” He turned to Thomas. “When I’ve had a bit too much to drink, I sleep it off at my mill, sir, so as not to disturb the missus and the little ones. You know how it is.”
“Is that where you went, Tom? To your mill?”
“I … I expect so. I don’t remember much. I was well and truly soused.”
He looked helplessly at his friends.
Ugly Adam cleared his throat. “Aye, he was right soused, weaving about, could barely get to his feet. We told him he’d had enough and should be on his way. He knows his missus won’t have him in the house when he gets like that, so he goes off to his mill until he comes round and cleans himself up.”
Tom smiled his thanks for the show of support.
“And did either of you others leave with him?” asked Thomas.
They both shook their heads.
“So neither of you can actually vouch for where he went?”
They looked at each other, and their eyes flicked back to the miller.
“This is ridiculous!” Tom blurted angrily. “You can’t possibly be accusing me?”
Thomas eased himself to his feet and tossed some coins onto the table. “Nobody is accusing you, Tom. We are just trying to put things together. Come on, John. We’ve got things to do.”
As they were leaving, the constable leaned over the table, resting his palms flat on its surface so that it keeled dangerously to the side under his weight. No small man himself, the miller shrank back on his stool.
“We’ll be back to talk some more to you.” John gave Tom one last hard stare, jabbed him again in the chest with his giant sausage finger, and they walked out, leaving a stunned silence behind them.
They had barely stepped out into the light when the constable decided to share his thoughts on what they had just heard.
“Well, I like him for it.”
“Who?”
“Tom Attwood. The miller.”
“You like him for what, John?”
“It’s as obvious as the nose on your face, ain’t it?” Thomas frowned at him questioningly. “He’s followed Lacy out, gone into the church and done for him, choked the life out of him, taken all the coin, and legged it off into the night.”
The big man gave a decided nod, satisfied he had tied it all together rather nicely.
“I thought it was heresy,” Thomas reminded him. “Didn’t you tell me it was a demon or a witch?”
“Well, I like to keep an open mind, don’t I? And, as I said, I like him for it. Always cheating honest folk, putting his fat thumb on the scale. He killed the poor old sod and took his money pouch. You see if he didn’t.”
Poor old sod seemed to have become the accepted term of reference in the village for Roger Lacy.
“That doesn’t seem likely if he was as drunk as they say,” argued Thomas.
It wasn’t a point the constable seemed to think important enough to disturb his analysis.
“You don’t need to be sober to strangle a man. And lots of folk do stupid things when they’ve tied one on. He got drunk, saw the poor old sod throwing around his money, saw his hefty coin purse, and thought to his self, I’ll have some o’ that, I will. And maybe he wasn’t so drunk after all. Maybe he just acted that way.” He gave Thomas a knowing wink. “You caught him lying. He’s our man. Yes, I am convinced of it.”
“Then where is the coin? He isn’t exactly living like a lord, is he?”
John narrowed his eyes and stroked his chin thoughtfully, scratching first at his scrubby beard and then his nose.
“He’s stashed it,” he said decidedly. “Oh, he’s no fool—he’ll have stashed it right quick. It’s probably in his mill, hidden in among the grain or in a sack of flour. Didn’t you see how squirmy he was? Wriggling about like he had ringworms up his arse and down his hose when you were asking him questions. Shuffling about uncomfortable-like.”
The miller had looked uncomfortable, thought Thomas, but who would not when accused of being a killer?
“And why was Lacy killed in the church, and why was the body splayed across the altar?”
“He followed him into the church, pretending as how he was going to pray himself, and then he offed him. Once he realized what he had done, he took fright, seeing he just killed the man, and he ran. Didn’t give a thought to it—just sort of tossed the body aside.”
“And he just happened to toss him across the holy altar, arms and legs splayed out like a human sacrifice?”
John didn’t find it necessary to dwell too deeply on that complication.
“No, he’s our man. You mark my words.” He winked again and tapped his nose, a nose that had been broken more than once and had healed a might crooked. “I have a nose for this sort of thing.”
Thomas very much doubted that the constable of Bottesford village had ever encountered this sort of thing.
“Where next then?” John asked cheerily. “To his lordship and tell him we figured it out?”
“No. Let’s head to the priory.”
“Why there?”
Thomas knew it was likely that both Lacy and Father Oswin had lain in the priory’s mortuary chapel before being put in the ground.
“I want to hear what the monks have to say about this fellow Lacy, and perhaps they can help us with the Dominican’s suggestion that Father Oswin was poisoned.”
The constable’s jaw sagged.
“By Christ and all that’s holy!” he exclaimed loudly, his hands flicking about his chest, tracing a cross, and his eyebrows shooting up into his ragged mop of hair. “The bloody vicar was poisoned and all, was he?”
Several bystanders turned to look at them, their faces full of shock.
“Keep your voice down, man,” hissed Thomas, giving the big man a withering look.
“Oh, aye,” he mumbled apologetically, tucking his head down. “Sorry about that. You caught me by surprise is all.”
Thomas sighed and set his mind to the tasks ahead. John Constable plodded along heavily at his side, as simple, straightforward, and uncomplicated as his name.
CHAPTER 8
The vicarage of Saint Mary’s was a timbered and thatched cottage sitting next to the much grander church, leaning humbly against that noble edifice as if someone had piled it there purely as an afterthought.
Friar Justus watched from the vicarage window as Thomas trudged down the main street, noted the monstrous creature lumbering along at his side, and then turned to face the late Father Oswin’s maidservant, who was sitting nervously in the middle
of the room, awaiting his pleasure.
She was far from being a maid in the traditional sense and was likely in her early thirties, edging steadily toward her matron years. He supposed she was not unattractive. A little plump, perhaps, and with one of those broad faces so common among the rustics in these parts. At first glance, one might suppose she was dressed modestly enough in a homespun green kirtle that fell down to her ankle boots. Justus noticed, however, that the dress was just tight enough to hint at the full figure beneath and that it was cinched rather saucily at the waist with a plain twist of leather, no doubt intended to emphasize a pair of generous hips. He did not approve of the immodesty, bordering somewhat on lasciviousness in his mind, but she had at least thought to cover her hair with a plain cap, even if several unkempt, ragged brown tresses had managed to burst out hither and thither.
The Dominican settled down into the chair opposite her. It was one of those high-backed chairs with padded armrests and deep, comfortable cushions—the kind one might expect to encounter in the family parlor of a country lord rather than in a tumbledown old vicarage. Justus did not like it. He preferred a hard stool that chafed one’s backside if planted on it for too long. One should never be too comfortable as a man of the cloth. Comfort is kin to sloth, and sloth is a sin.
The maid had somehow contrived to sit perched atop her own tiny milking stool with all the dignity of a queen on her throne. She seemed to have that knack some women possess of sitting up straight in the most difficult circumstances: shoulders drawn back, head raised, hands resting lightly in her lap—a posture that certainly made the most of her figure, something Justus observed only briefly before quickly averting his eyes from the temptation.
A glance at Guy, standing at the door eyeing the maid with undisguised lust, reminded Justus that not everyone possessed such laudable self-restraint. The Dominican’s lip curled up in disapproval. He had no intention of pandering to either the man’s deviances or the woman’s vanity.
“That will be all for now, Guy,” he said with a dismissive flick of his wrist.
The henchman’s eyes snapped up, and his face took on an expression that could only be described as surly. For a moment Justus thought he might actually refuse the command, but instead the ruffian shrugged his shoulders and stomped out of the room, making sure to slam the door shut behind him in a parting display of petulance.
Dominic, Justus was pleased to note, appeared completely unmoved by the woman’s presence. He was sitting unobtrusively in the corner of the room, his legs folded under him, busily tacking some parchment down onto the writing tray perched on his knee; inkhorn, pumice stone, and quill all ready to hand. Justus smiled with approval and turned his attention back to the vicar’s maid, who was now regarding him expectantly.
“Agnes, isn’t it?” Justus asked, leaning forward on his staff.
“Yes, Father.”
The Dominican found it interesting that she chose to call him Father. He liked that. It bespoke a certain respect, and of course it was quite appropriate as he had been ordained and was no simple friar.
“Agnes,” he repeated slowly. “What a pretty name.”
Agnes smiled back her thanks for the small compliment.
“And a rather popular name as well. It seems that every other young woman I meet hereabouts is an Agnes. No doubt you were named after your mother?”
The pitch of his last word rose, along with his eyebrows, in the traditional manner of turning a statement into a question.
“I was named after my grandmother, sir,” she explained proudly. “Though she was Agneta,” Agnes added, emphasizing the “ta” for the friar’s benefit.
“A most subtle but no doubt important difference. How clever of your mother to distinguish you so. She must be a very astute woman. Is she still with us, I wonder?”
“No, sir. She passed away five years ago this winter.”
“Oh, I am very sorry to hear it,” he said, bowing his head and giving her hand a comforting little squeeze before looking up again with a happy smile. “On the bright side, I suppose that would serve to free up her own name …?” He raised his eyebrows again.
“Margery,” said Agnes, answering the unasked question.
“How lovely!” he declared. “Why, between Agnes, Alicia, Margery, and Matilda, I believe we might have captured the names of the greater part of the female population in this country. Remarkable.” Justus shook his head in wonder. “Truly remarkable.”
Agnes offered him a weak, faltering smile, uncertain whether she was being mocked.
“I must say you are quite charming, my dear, and I could happily sit here and talk genealogy and nomenclature with you all day, but I am afraid we must turn our minds to far less enjoyable matters.”
Justus made the merest gesture with his finger to Dominic, who up to this point had been watching silently. The young friar dabbed his quill into the small pot of ink and sat up straight, nib poised above the parchment, ready to transcribe at his master’s direction.
“Now, pray tell, how long had you worked for Father Oswin?”
“Since my husband died a few years back.”
Interesting, thought Justus. A widow. He might make something of that.
“And you tended to his … uh … needs?”
“Oh yes, I did. In that I washed and cleaned and cooked and helped out about the church, laundering the altar cloths, the vestments and the like,” she explained hurriedly, having belatedly caught the question’s potential double meaning.
“It must have been a terrible shock for you when Father Oswin died. You found him, did you not?”
“Yes, sir. I can’t say that I was completely shocked, though. Everybody knew he suffered with his heart.”
“So I have heard,” conceded Justus. “And yet I believe him to have been poisoned.”
Agnes’s mouth sagged open in surprise. “Poisoned? No, sir, it was his heart. I am sure of it.”
“Ah, so you are familiar with the signs of poisoning then?” he asked mildly. “Is that correct, Agnes? Do you profess to have some intimate knowledge of poisons?”
“I am sure I do not, sir,” she replied indignantly. “I know nothing of such things.”
“Then I have to ask myself why you would say with such confidence that he was not poisoned. Unless”—he narrowed his eyes and waggled a finger, as though struck by a sudden thought—“unless you wish us to believe such is the case; unless, perhaps, you are trying to hide something from us. Is that why you insist that Father Oswin was not poisoned, Agnes? Are you trying to hide something from us?”
“No, Father! I only knew he suffered with his heart. That’s all.”
“So, isn’t the truth, given your professed ignorance of these matters, that you do not know one way or another whether Father Oswin was poisoned?”
Agnes thought hard, her face creasing up in a look that made Justus wonder if she needed to visit the necessarium.
“I suppose I cannot say.”
Justus crooked a bony finger to his scribe, barely raising it from his staff, rolling it in a circular motion to indicate that Dominic should begin writing.
“Indeed, you would then surely have to agree that it is possible he was poisoned. As far as you know, at least. Quite possible.”
“I suppose so,” she replied after another long think. “But … but I really do not think—”
Justus suddenly slammed his staff onto the ground, thumping it noisily against the hard-packed earth floor.
“We have been over this! I say he was poisoned. Poisoned!” he repeated. “Do you dare to call me a liar, madam? Is that what you are about?”
“N–no, Father, I—”
“Then do you take me for a fool? Is that it? Am I some addle-brained imbecile, drooling and dribbling for your personal amusement?”
Justus waved his hands about, stuck out his tongue, and rolled his eyes, doing his best impression of a madman.
He then glared angrily at her for a long moment before
sitting back and dabbing daintily at his mouth with the sleeve of his robe. “Forgive me, Agnes. These are troubling times. The Devil crouches at our threshold and threatens us all.”
Agnes’s eyes flicked nervously to the door, almost as though she expected to see some hideous monster lurking there.
“Now, you were telling me how, when you found Father Oswin, you thought to yourself that he might have been poisoned?”
“I did not, I—”
Thump, thump, thump, went the staff, causing Agnes to wince at each blow.
“Are you mocking me, Agnes?”
She shook her head vigorously, a touch of panic in her eyes.
“I rather suspect that you are. You know, my dear, I am surprised you have not yet remarried. Is it not the custom hereabouts for the local reeve to find another man for a young widow such as yourself? Or perhaps, for some reason, you do not wish another husband?”
Agnes’s eyes began to water as she stammered out her response. “His lordship has been kind to me. He knows how much I cared for my husband.”
“Yes, but it is not quite right for a woman as young as you to be unmarried. It does not sit comfortably with me. It is a widow’s duty to remarry, especially a widow of your age who could reasonably be expected to procreate. You ought to know this.”
He stroked his chin thoughtfully.
“And you say that your husband passed away like your last master. Did he also die of a heart ailment?”
Agnes nodded slowly.
“Well, I must say, Agnes, it is fortunate indeed that I am here to protect you from suspicion. Another sent to investigate these matters might wonder at these coincidences. That first your husband and then your master dies, and both so suddenly and of weakened hearts. And perhaps they might wonder that a comely young widow had not yet sought another husband. They might suspect you of having poisoned both of them. Or perhaps they might suspect you of having tended rather too closely to Father Oswin’s needs. That perhaps you whored yourself for the old priest, satisfying your own lusts at the same time; and that you even did so in the church itself, committing the most heinous sacrilege, squealing with delight as you lay together in the very altar cloths you claim to have laundered.”
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