A Maiden Weeping

by Jeri Westerson

  Tremayne was staring at Rykener and finally tore his gaze away. ‘I … very well.’ He slumped back against the bench and snatched the goblet that a clerk retrieved for him, newly filled with wine. He drank a long, deep draught.

  ‘First, my lord,’ said Crispin, eyes sweeping over his beaming lawyer, ‘I should like for the witness John Rykener to testify.’

  The recorder watched John move from his place in the crowd to the bar. He squinted at him, and when John began to speak, he shrank back.

  ‘Your name is John Rykener,’ said Crispin.

  He cleared his throat. And with a still slightly raspy voice replied, ‘Yes.’

  ‘And your occupation?’

  ‘Well, that is a little more complicated. You see, I sometimes serve as an embroiderer. But I am also a, well … a harlot.’

  The crowd murmured. The sheriffs shifted to the edge of the bench.

  Crispin looked at him sternly. ‘How can you, a man, be a harlot?’

  ‘Because I wear the clothes of a woman when I am plying that trade. I use the name Eleanor …’

  Tremayne coughed, choking on his wine. He hacked for several moments. Sheriff Walcote slapped him on the back until he recovered. He sat back in his chair, red-faced and staring at John anew.

  John turned to the sheriffs. ‘I know it is wrong to do so, my lords. But a man has to make a living. And embroidering is slow work with an even slower pay day.’

  ‘What happened yesterday?’ Crispin looked on gently but spared an eye for an ever nervous John Tremayne.

  ‘I was dressed as Eleanor,’ said Rykener. ‘And I sought some new needles, for my trade, you see, as an embroideress. And there I met Richard Gernon in his shop. He’s a needle maker. Oh there were some fine needles there. Metal, bone, and lovely cases for them, too. Master Gernon was most solicitous to me, him thinking I was a woman. You see, my lords,’ he said, addressing those on the dais, ‘most men don’t know I’m not a woman. Even when we … well …’ He paused to scan the room and the fascinated faces of the crowd. He edged closer to the dais right up against the bar. ‘Even when I ply my trade as a whore. There are tricks one can do, you see.’ He gestured vaguely. ‘And so. It didn’t matter what manner of man I encountered. If they found me pleasing, we can get on with it. And Master Gernon was interested in more than my trade as an embroideress, if you get my meaning.’

  ‘We get it,’ Tremayne nearly barked. ‘Make haste with your testimony, Master … Master Rykener.’

  ‘Well, there I was. Making a purchase and minding my own business when Master Gernon propositioned me.’

  ‘That’s not true!’ cried Gernon. ‘She propositioned me! I mean … he …’

  Rykener waved his hand back and forth. ‘He propositioned, I propositioned … it matters little when there is the same result. In the end, he invited me up to his room. He proceeded to kiss me and make the noises men make when they are trying to soothe and cajole a woman; soft murmurings and promises of this silly thing or that. But then he asked me if I wouldn’t play a game with him. He would see how hard he could squeeze my neck while we were, er … captus in medio. I didn’t see the harm and I’ve had clients ask for stranger things, believe me. And so I agreed. He squeezed harder and harder. At first I could endure it. It seemed little enough to withstand for the promised silver. But it came to the point where he squeezed too tight, too tight for me to speak, to breathe. I could not stop him. I was falling into a faint. And if it weren’t for the timely arrival of Master Guest and his apprentice Master Tucker, I should no doubt be dead.’ He opened his cloak and showed the court the bruises on his neck, turning so that all could see.

  The crowd gasped, as did Sheriff Loveney.

  Tremayne raised his face to Gernon. ‘What have you to say for yourself, Master Gernon?’

  ‘I have nothing to say to this farce.’

  ‘Do you admit taking this man … er … this, this …’

  ‘Eleanor,’ John supplied.

  ‘Him to your rooms,’ said Tremayne, studiously ignoring Rykener.

  Gernon sniffed. ‘I don’t deny it.’

  ‘And this game you play. Do you play it often?’

  ‘It is merely a game. If the woman faints, I stop. It’s simple. There’s nothing wrong with it.’

  Crispin eyed the jury. Plainly, they thought there was something wrong with it. However, Gernon was no judge of the crowd. He could not seem to see that they were not with him. Yet Tremayne seemed to know it.

  ‘One plays a little game with a wench and offers them extra silver for their trouble,’ said Gernon with a toss of his hand.

  Loveney gripped the edge of the bench. ‘Master Gernon, are you aware that three women were killed in the Bread Street Ward just this past sennight? And that the office of the sheriff has more records of deaths other than their rightful deaths of women similarly strangled?’

  Gernon didn’t bother looking at the sheriff as he brushed off the sleeves of his houppelande. ‘I know nothing of that.’

  The court fell into silence. Tremayne’s brows danced over his eyes. He was plainly deciding and Crispin hoped that the final decision would be toward the cause of justice rather than a political one.

  At last Tremayne spoke. ‘Lord Sheriff, I implore you now to arrest this man for murder.’

  Gernon’s face snapped upward. ‘What? You dare!’

  ‘It is plain to me that more investigating in this matter – and in past situations – must be delved into more deeply. Master Guest, we thank you for bringing in this man for examination. It seems to me, though I am not a member of the jury, that this man is guilty of the murder of Elizabeth le Porter.’

  Crispin stepped forward. ‘Er … not quite, my lord.’

  Tremayne’s resigned expression mutated to sputtering rage. ‘What the devil, Guest! Is that not why you dragged this man here against my express orders?’

  ‘Well … yes, my lord. But upon examination of the facts, I do not think him guilty. At least not in this case. For the others he is abundantly so.’

  Cobmartin was desperately trying to get Crispin’s attention but he ignored the man.

  ‘If I might clarify,’ Crispin went on, ‘by calling back another witness.’

  Tremayne threw up his hands again. ‘By all means, Guest. Take your time. It is your neck, after all. And these jurymen have all the patience in the world.’

  Crispin glanced their way, and many did wear scowls. They had been away from their jobs for far too many days, far more than any other jury in his memory. He bowed to them. ‘Masters, this will not take long.’

  He waited as the serjeants hauled a struggling Richard Gernon away before he announced, ‘Will Hugh Buckton please come forth to testify?’

  Buckton seemed surprised to be mentioned, and he stood dumb for a moment before one of the men in the crowd tapped him on the shoulder. He seemed to awaken and walked slowly to the bar. He wore his rustic cotehardie, his hood and its long liripie, his belt, knife, and scrip. His eyes never left Crispin as Crispin walked around him.

  ‘Master Buckton, you told us before that you knew Elizabeth le Porter.’

  ‘Aye. She was a neighbor.’

  ‘And a pretty thing.’

  He flushed. ‘Aye.’

  ‘So pretty, in fact, that she cajoled you, as she had many men in the ward.’

  He blinked stupidly and shook his head. ‘I don’t know your meaning.’

  ‘She cajoled you into loaning her money. Money, I daresay, you could ill afford to lose. And now, of course, you’ll never get it back.’

  He ran his hands down his coat. ‘It … it was charity. She needed it.’

  ‘But so do you. Rent, bait for the eels. There is upkeep and whatnot. Expenses in any business.’

  ‘It was a kindness,’ he said in a harsher voice.

  ‘You asked her for it back.’

  ‘She couldn’t pay.’

  ‘But she had money. Her rent was paid, she had fine clothes, much finer than yo
urs. And men. More men paying her way for her. Men like you. Silly, misled men.’

  Buckton shifted but said nothing. He gnawed on his lip. Crispin decided on another tack. ‘You sought to help my apprentice find the killer, did you not?’

  The eel monger lifted his chin. ‘Aye. It … it seemed the proper thing to do.’

  ‘But you weren’t helping, were you? You were trying to get information out of him. You were getting in his way.’ Crispin reached carefully into his scrip and removed the burnt knife. ‘I retrieved this from my former lodgings. I call it “former” because it was burned down by an arsonist.’

  The crowd gasped. But Tremayne was losing patience. ‘Good Christ, Guest. What does this have to do with aught?’

  He sighed. ‘If you will allow me to go on, my lord, you will see the relevance.’

  Tremayne glanced at the window and the slant of the sun. ‘Make it fast. I have more trials to sit through, you know.’

  ‘The shop below me that belonged to my landlord was a tinker’s shop,’ said Crispin. ‘All his goods were destroyed. But I found this in the rubble.’ He lifted the knife so that all could see. ‘My landlord, the tinker, did not recognize it. He repairs many goods on the Shambles; butchering hooks, knives of all stripes, cooking pots and kettles. But he did not recognize this. And it certainly didn’t belong to me. It’s unusual, isn’t it?’ He turned it, showing off the long slender blade, its curve like a scythe. ‘And I wondered why it should be there. The only explanation was that it belonged to the arsonist.’ He squared with the now sweating eel monger. ‘Can we see your knife, Master Buckton?’

  His hand slapped to his sheath. ‘Why?’

  ‘I should like to compare.’

  Buckton turned to Tremayne, appealing to him. ‘M-my lord, I was asked to give testimony and I did that. May I go now?’

  ‘No. Give Guest your knife.’

  His wild eyes lit from face to face. He made a half-hearted laugh as he reached for his own blade. Slowly he withdrew it. ‘It’s a common knife. Any fishmonger is bound to have one. It’s for fileting.’ When he pulled the blade free, all and sundry could see it matched the burned one in Crispin’s hand.

  ‘And yet this one is yours. You left it behind when your torched my home, hoping to kill or hurt Jack Tucker, my apprentice, because he was getting too close to the truth.’

  ‘I never did!’

  ‘You did. That knife in your hand is brand new. See how the handle is still smooth and oiled. The blade not nicked or even marked by much sharpening. You needed to replace the one you accidently left behind.’

  ‘No, no. It … it just needed replacing, my old knife. My lord …’

  Crispin tossed the burned knife to the floor. It clanged and startled Buckton. ‘You went to Elizabeth le Porter’s rooms that night. You thought I’d left. You went to her at night, pleading with her, demanding that she pay back the money she borrowed. Did she laugh at you, poor sorry fool that you are? Did she tell you to wait, always wait? Or did she tell you to get out? Whatever she said, it enraged you. You grabbed her by the throat and you throttled her. And perhaps you would have done something to dispose of the body, but you then happened to notice me, still there, dead to the world, but a witness nonetheless. You fled.’

  ‘No! I did none of that. I don’t know who killed her. That man that was just here.’

  ‘Richard Gernon is a callus turd who strangles women for the thrill of it. He strangles whores whilst he swives them. But Elizabeth la Porter was not his victim. She was not playing the harlot for him that night. She already had someone abed with her. Me. What happened to Elizabeth le Porter was a random act by a desperate man. And while you strangled her to death, she fought. She fought so hard that bits of the skin and hair from her killer were still beneath her fingernails. And that surely left scars behind.’

  He lunged for Buckton, grabbed that ubiquitous hood and snaking liripipe, and yanked it away. The eel monger’s neck was covered in deep, reddened scratches, some so deep they had begun to fester.

  Crispin turned to Tremayne. ‘Hugh Buckton is your killer. Not I.’ He tossed down the hood. ‘Will you arrest him and charge the jury to acquit me?’

  Walcote surged forward, feet planted as he balanced on the edge of his seat. ‘But what of the Tears of the Virgin? What of the Noreys household?’

  ‘A distraction. A false path.’

  ‘But the Tears were stolen. Did the Noreyses—’

  ‘I stole the Tears,’ said Crispin.

  The crowd erupted. Tremayne stomped his foot, and the serjeants moved forward, threatening with their clubs.

  Once they had quieted, Crispin went on. ‘I stole the relic when you showed them to me in your chamber. I palmed the phial from the monstrance. And then I took it to the abbot of Westminster Abbey for safekeeping. But since they are false, there is no need to guard them any longer.’

  ‘False?’ asked Tremayne. He looked as if his head were spinning.

  ‘Yes.’ He bowed toward Helewise Peverel. There was nothing for it. He couldn’t let the deception go on. ‘The real relic was destroyed some years ago.’

  The crowd still softly murmured in anxious susurrations while Tremayne absorbed it all. He glanced again at Rykener and seemed to come to a decision. ‘Jurymen, I urge you all to acquit Crispin Guest from all wrongdoing. What will you decide?’

  To a man, it was ‘not guilty.’

  TWENTY-THREE

  Tuesday, 20 October

  Jack Tucker ran to keep up with Crispin’s hurried strides. ‘Master Crispin, how did you know?’

  ‘The knife. I saw the fish mongers on Old Fish Street using the very same style knife as they worked. That particular knife was too distinguishable. Martin never saw it before. And then I merely speculated about the fact that Buckton needed that money. He mentioned it a few times. And then there was his unusual habit of wrapping the liripipe of his hood around his neck to conceal his scars.’

  Nigellus, parchment rolls bundled in his arms, chuckled. ‘That was quite remarkable, Master Crispin. Quite good entertainment. When you whipped off that hood …’

  ‘I was quite overcome,’ said Rykener. ‘But our Crispin does know what he’s doing.’

  ‘I got lucky,’ he said. ‘If we had not passed by a fishmonger on our way to the inn, it might never have occurred to me in time.’

  Rykener laid a hand on his arm as they walked. ‘But Gernon is guilty, is he not?’

  ‘Oh yes. Of these other murders, I have no doubt. But as the plan to trap him went on, I began to speculate that it could not have been him. He had every reason to stay away from her. And of course, it was not him who hired me.’

  Cobmartin shook his head, amazed. ‘That was genius. Walter Noreys plainly hired you because he knew you wouldn’t harm her. Pure genius.’

  ‘And Mistress le Porter knew exactly who it was,’ said Crispin. ‘She scorned the notion of him, knew it was meant only as a threat without teeth. No doubt, if she hadn’t been murdered, she would have given him a piece of her mind on the matter. For once it was truly revealed she was also his cousin, he would have to have backed off.’

  ‘It don’t matter,’ said Jack cheerfully. ‘You’re free, sir. But how is it the sheriffs were compelled to free you on your own in the first place?’

  ‘“Compelled” is correct.’ Crispin slowed and the others slowed with him. They looked in the direction Crispin was looking. When they saw the man across the lane nonchalantly straightening his gauntlets, the others hung back as Crispin walked forward.

  Crispin stopped only when he stood directly before him, and with a slight bow, he said, ‘My Lord Derby.’

  Henry Bolingbroke smiled. ‘I was hoping we would meet.’

  ‘It was you, Henry, wasn’t it? Was it a letter or was it perhaps your secretary that took the order to the sheriffs?’

  ‘A letter. A letter seems to look more official to the self-important, what with its seals and all.’

  Crispin shook his
head but couldn’t contain his smile. ‘Thank you.’

  Henry’s smile faded. ‘I couldn’t stand the thought of you in that place again. I wouldn’t have let you hang, you know.’

  ‘I don’t know how you could have stopped it … hold. Did you think me guilty?’

  ‘Of course not. But I know John Tremayne and the rest. If you hadn’t a big enough bribe …’

  ‘I hadn’t a bribe at all.’

  ‘Then you would have hanged for a certainty. Aren’t you glad you didn’t?’

  He touched his neck lightly. ‘Exceedingly.’

  Henry glanced up to the sky. Two magpies chased each other across the clouds. ‘My father will be home soon.’

  ‘How is his grace of Lancaster?’

  ‘Disheartened. He did not win his crown. A pity.’ His gaze steadied on Crispin’s. ‘He would have worn a crown well, I think.’

  Crispin nodded solemnly. ‘I thought so, too. Once.’

  ‘So you did.’ Henry looked away again. ‘But I keep you from your friends. Surely there is to be a celebration.’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘And there is Young Jack!’ He grinned and waved. Crispin looked back to see Jack’s awed expression as he gingerly lifted his hand to return a feeble greeting.

  ‘You mustn’t tease him, Henry.’

  ‘Tucker knows it’s good-natured. Besides, I am glad that particular knave is your apprentice. He did good work for you.’

  ‘Oh? Have you been following the trial?’

  ‘Of course. All of court was most intrigued by it. Including my royal cousin.’

  ‘King Richard knew about it?’

  ‘Should not the king know all that transpires in his own realm?’

  Crispin grunted a sound of affirmation.

  ‘But here.’ Henry reached into his scrip and pulled out a small kidskin pouch. ‘Let me handle the fee for your lawyer.’

  ‘Haven’t you done enough for me?’

  ‘A simple letter? I’d have done far more if I could have. Take it, Crispin.’

  ‘I can pay my own way.’

  ‘But I want to.’