The old man took a swig and wiped the back of his hand across his lips. ‘Are you satisfied with how tonight’s dealing went, then?’
‘Yes.’ Richart straightened, letting out a deep breath. He hoped so. They had met with two of his friends: Cristofo Loredan, a Venetian trader of great wealth, and Miró Barthé, a friend of his father’s, who owned a dye venture in Mirascon and lands outside the city. Richart had given two sums of money to Cristofo: one amount to safeguard and an equal amount for setting up an agency in Venice to export cloth of Mirascon Blue. Miró had invested in the enterprise as well.
‘Are you sure you and Miró can trust the Venetian? What you’ve arranged is as risky as supping with Satan.’
‘I’ve done that already,’ muttered Richart, remembering his oath of fealty to John Plantagenet—and no Lady Alys yet! ‘Anyway, it’s not as though I’m borrowing from Loredan and putting the fiefdom in debt.’
Henri shook his head disapprovingly. ‘The old lord would never have done such a thing.’
‘The old lord is dead, Henri!’ Responsibility for the people of Mirascon was his now. Well, maybe not entirely; his uncle, Seguinus, Bishop of Mirascon, claimed jurisdiction over their souls. ‘I’m making provision against lean times. Remember the story in the scriptures of Joseph’s dream and how he advised Pharaoh to fill the granaries.’
‘Aye, but the Almighty took the trouble to advise Joseph. I haven’t noticed you and the Lord God having a tête-à-tête over cider and sweetcakes. You’ve some newfangled notions, Richart, that’s all I can say, an’ if wind of this reaches your uncle or Jaufré …’
‘No ifs, Henri.’
‘Aye, well, I’ll not say a word, you have my oath on it.’
‘Miró won’t blab. His daughter is a Cathar. He’d go to Hell himself to keep her safe.’
‘As would I, Richart. You know my wife, Marie, means the world to me, even if she is a heretic. She’s scared, lad. Mayhap you’re right to safeguard some of your wealth with this bloody crusade of the pope’s in the offing. If Raymon de Toulouse were here now, I’d spit on him, the craven, misbegotten whoreson, getting us into this foulness, letting one of his creatures kill the pope’s man.’
‘I’m sure many would agree with you, old friend.’ Richart stood up, reaching for the torch.
‘Wait!’ The castellan took hold of his arm. ‘Just an instant more, my lord. Scant time to tell you on the way down, but there’s something I’ve been chewing over an’ wondering if age is addling my wits. However, I’ll say it here while there’s no risk of being overheard.’ He was unbuckling his purse. ‘Found this beneath your grandsire’s pillow just when they were moving him to his coffin. I’ve not told a soul save Marie, and I swear no one saw me take it.’
Puzzled, Richart accepted a small drawstring bag. ‘I’ll look at it in better light,’ he decided, stowing it in the pouch on his belt as he started climbing.
‘Make sure you’re alone when you do and be careful.’
‘Careful?’ Richart halted abruptly. Why? He stared down at the old knight, saw the sweat glistening on his brow, the one eye troubled and fearful. ‘Henri, good friend, tell me!’ he said gently. The Castellan of Mirascon grimaced and drew an anxious hand across his stubble.
‘Lad, I think your grandsire was poisoned.’
‘Well, well, been praying, have we, my lord?’ King John’s dwarf sprang out of the dark shadows so suddenly as Richart left the chapel that his dagger was out in an instant. His left hand slammed the wretch’s face against the wall.
‘Never, never do that to me again, little man!’ he snarled, letting the blade tip torment the fellow’s skin. ‘What the devil are you doing lurking about here like a bloody incubus?’ The fool would be threatened with empty eye sockets if he had discovered the concealed opening. It was fortunate Henri had left the chapel earlier.
‘Bored, see, couldn’t sleep,’ mumbled Derwent through squashed lips. ‘I … c-can’t be … hanged for … that.’
Richart lessened the pressure against the small man’s head, but the fool infuriated him further by babbling, ‘Judging by the sweat of your fingers, o lordly one, you must have prayed right vigorously to work up such heat or did the luscious Yolande feel the need for confession also?’
‘Cala, fols!’ Damn this babbler! Richart permitted the reckless creature to free his disagreeable face from the stonework, then he hauled him across into a patch of moonlight. Had the dwarf confronted Sir Henri as well? The castellan had been wise to leave the chapel well ahead of him, but Richart needed to be certain. For all he knew, his fierce response had just ignited the dwarf’s curiosity where none existed.
‘You annoy me greatly, little foreigner,’ he said more lightly, trying to glue on the wolfish grin of a satisfied lover.
‘Just because I know you were at your “devotions”, my lord?’ replied the dwarf, managing an offended tone even if he had just been half-choked. ‘Is that an offence in Mirascon?’
‘Yes, I believe it is. You abuse my hospitality by spying on me.’
‘I was not spying, my lord. It was … an unhappy coincidence of circumambulation.’
The man’s tone sounded more honest now, but Richart continued sternly: ‘My household sleep in their beds like Christians. I advise you to do the same from now on. Come!’
‘Christians, my lord?’ The ironic tone implied the little northerner condemned them as a land of heretics.
‘Yes, Christians, honest men who can inter their dead with dignity, unlike your fellow countrymen.’
Moving his grip to the back of the dwarf’s tunic, Richart marched him across to the guardhouse. Sir Henri was standing at the trestle table with a tankard in his hand, speaking with two of his men. The three of them all tensed to polite attention. For an instant, Richart wondered if coming to the guardhouse was another bad error, but the old knight looked to have recovered from his exertion.
‘Seigneur?’ The castellan’s intelligent gaze fell on the dwarf and he scowled. ‘What mischief has he been up to?’
‘Derwent suffers from lack of sleep, Sir Henri.’
‘Oh, does he, my lord.’ Faultless understanding. Yes, the outsider would be watched more closely. Henri gestured to his men. ‘Go and rearrange the fool on his pallet, lads.’
Satisfied at seeing a chastened Derwent escorted to the keep, Richart returned to the chapel. Damn it, Henri’s suspicions were ridiculous even if the physicians could not put a name to the illness that had suddenly weakened his grandsire. Poison? There had been family at the bedside for days.
He wandered up to the flagstone that hid the passage entrance. Was it possible that his grandfather had not been jesting, and there was a secret staircase up to the lord’s chambers? Could someone have stolen in that way? Quickly, softly, he barred the chapel door and then he climbed down into the passageway with a more discerning eye. The tunnel broadened into a small storage room before the descent began, and there he noticed for the first time the odd scrape marks on the ground.
Pushed inwards, an ingenious wooden frame, covered with a veneer of stone, swung upwards—horizontal. It was sufficient space to permit an agile man to scramble through. He peered inside. The flambeau revealed stone stairs, this time ascending, and the air smelled as heavy and dusty as his ancestors’ crypt beneath the cathedral. Instinct told him no one had passed through for years. No assassin nor a lusty whore. Relieved, he returned to the chapel and inched the stone flap back in place, eager to discover whether the furnishings in the lord’s bedchamber hid a similar opening.
In his new quarters, he let his body-servant disrobe him. Requesting solitude, he had leisure to push aside the tapestries and run his hands along the walls. Nothing. Maybe the hidden staircase opened in the antechamber? Examining the floor, he recognised for the first time the even embrace of several boards between the wall and the bed-steps. With a ‘ha’ of triumph, he uncovered a square of wooden planks. An aged gash at one end had been stained to make it unremarkable. Smil
ing, Richart barred the outer door against interruptions and then he prised the planks open. Beneath them was an iron ring handle affixed to a second layer of boards. When pulled, it grunted open, lifting both layers of wood. Candlelight revealed sound stone steps leading downwards within the wall cavity. Holding up the light, he clambered in. Predictably, it led to the junction with the chapel passageway, and, well pleased with his adventure, he returned to his bedchamber. The passageway would be a means of escape if ever he needed it. No wonder the old lord had never wanted the bed-steps moved. Helping himself from a flagon, he began to ruminate upon Henri’s allegation. Poison? The symptoms had been unusual, but …
Pah! It had to be a nonsense. And yet … He slammed the cup down abruptly, his face hardening as he stared at it. If someone had successfully poisoned his grandsire, would he be next?
‘Uuugh! Are you out of your wits?’
The protest came from Grand-mère next morning as Richart deshrouded the rat onto the hearth in the great chamber. There were no mourners. Only himself, his widowed grandmother, Sir Henri and his wife, Marie, the deputy châtelaine, were present. He had not invited Jaufré or Uncle Seguinus.
‘I fed the creature with the arsenic that Henri found in Grandpère’s bedchamber. Did you know he was taking regular doses, Grand-maman?’
With a distressed squish of lips, the vicomtesse swept to the window, hugging her shoulders for a few heartbeats. When she turned, tears glistened on her cheeks.
‘He wanted to tup me like the old days,’ she muttered, easing the linen band beneath her chin as though it was choking her, ‘and not just me, either. His manly vigour, you see,’ she added, her cheeks reddening now beneath the streaks of moisture. ‘Before your grandfather went to Saint-Gilles, he was complaining he needed … “more vigour in his wick”. He started taking a powder. I didn’t ask him what it was. He said that “used in small doses” it helps the lungs act as bellows to inflate a … a faltering cock.’ She stared past Marie’s shocked face. ‘You were his great friend, Henri. Did you suggest the remedy, sirrah?’
‘No, God strike me dead, ma domna! As if I would countenance such folly.’
An aphrodisiac, then. Richart let out a slow breath and poured himself a goblet of wine. Stupid old dotard! he thought, recalling his grandfather’s bleeding gums and swollen skin, the continual calling for water, the grumbling of no feeling in his feet. God’s mercy! Better to die by the sword than perish so.
‘Well, Henri,’ he said, ‘it seems we are misguided in seeking a culprit. Thank Heaven for that.’ And reassuring himself further, he added, ‘I have heard that some dishonest horse-traders give small amounts of arsenic to their livestock before a fair to improve the beasts’ coats and bring a higher price. The old lord bred horses. Maybe he knew those practices.’
‘Aye, my lord, he did, and yet …’
‘And yet …’ Richart echoed. ‘No, I think you tilt at shadows, good friend. There was a score of people coming and going at his bedside and all well known to us. However,’ he weighed his goblet consideringly, ‘you have my leave to employ a food taster for me if it will set your mind at rest.’
The castellan bowed. ‘Thank you, my lord, I already have.’
Chapter Five
And the lashes in discipline ought not to be too soft or easy, but moderately sharp, after the commandment of the abbess.
A nunnery rule
For her father in flesh hath been converted from the world and taken the monastic vow … For, albeit, the maiden is not without tincture of letters, yet in the ancient monasteries of our parts we have the evil custom that money is preferred to knowledge.
Letter of monastic reformer Vitalis de Mortain
‘You’re in the way, sweeting!’
Adela started in surprise when two strong hands shifted her aside as though she weighed naught. The owner, a handsome creature in a leather brigandine, flashed a smile over his shoulder. The brief stare that followed was of puzzlement before his attention swivelled back to the two men struggling out of Lady Alys’s quarters with a boiled leather chest. The latter, reinforced with iron bands, was so heavy that they could hardly hoist it above their boot caps and the knight, their master, strode across to chivvy the poor wretches.
Curious, Adela followed them outside to the laneway. A row of sturdy little packhorses was drawn up along the convent wall, some laden with panniers and sacks, others with canvas tents trussed to their saddles. Their drivers were checking knots and testing straps.
‘Quite a retinue, eh? Goes all round the corner, too.’ Maud the laundress chuckled, joining her in the archway. ‘An’ that there Sir William’s a comely piece of work.’
‘Your lady must be as rich as Croesus.’
‘Aye, whoever he was. Mind, little Alys wouldn’t know what she has, never set foot on the lands that her father left to her. Leastways, not the ones this side o’ the water.’
‘So she’s always lived in England?’
‘Aye, raised by the nuns at Romsey Abbey afore she was wed to her first husband. Then when the old fellow passed away, she was sent to wait on my Lady of Gloucester. I’ve been wi’ her some years, but I ain’t too sure about leavin’ England for good. I know precious little about this new Vee-comte of Mirror-scone or whatever he’s called.’
‘His grandson looks to be a fine man. I have seen him several times.’ Almost embraced him, Adela added sadly to herself, remembering their collision.
‘Grandson, have you really?’ Maud turned her head sharply. ‘But when was that?’
‘At C—’ Adela caught herself in time. ‘A few weeks after Michaelmas. He passed through Bordeaux with his retinue.’ When she had been nigh dead from hunger, glimpsing him across the marketplace.
Maud nodded. ‘Then I reckon this grandson wot you speak of is my lady’s betrothed ’cause the old lord of Mirror-scone, who died in January, was still a married man. My lady was right pleased to hear her betrothed had already gained his inheritance, I can tell you. Many a slip twixt cup and lip these days. Put a bit of a spur on, she did.’
I’ll warrant that! That creature to have Lord Richart? Life was not fair. And to think that she had been dreaming of him all these months.
‘But then, of course, we was stuck at Dover waitin’ for the right wind to blow us, an—’ Maud seemed to realise she was blabbing too much. Glancing over her shoulder at the knight, she reined in her tongue, shrugged and added, ‘An’ now we’re ’ere.’
Adela nodded distractedly, wistfully accepting that a nobleman like Lord Richart was beyond her reach and always would be. ‘I suppose they like each other well enow?’ she muttered.
‘Sir Will—Oh, you mean, her bridegroom? Bless you, no. Never set eyes on each other. The king’s commandment, her being a rich widow an’ all, my lady didn’t have no say in the matter. These great ladies don’t, do they? Anyways, she’s drawn the long straw this time if he’s as winsome as you say.’ But when Adela ignored the elbow nudge, the laundress ceased to grin. ‘I’d better keep movin’ or that foul tabby Herliva will be chewin’ my tail feathers.’
‘That’s a cross I wouldn’t bear. Why doesn’t your lady dismiss her?’
‘Poor relative of her late husband, that’s why. The old lord made her promise to give the scold employment.’ The laundress reached out and squeezed Adela’s arm. ‘If I don’t see you again, treasure, God give you good fortune!’
An idea was kindling in Adela’s head. ‘Amen to that. Safe journey, Maud.’
More carts, roofed with hide, were arriving, creaking with chests and coffers. These, Adela guessed, must contain valuable plate and treasure judging by the heavy iron locks and the helmed escort. Then three men in long dark gowns halted near her. Two wore pectoral crosses and the broad-brimmed hats favoured by travelling priests; the third, a physician’s cap; and coming to join them strode a bearded fellow in tunic and chausses. With his evenly tanned skin, he was probably a local man. Perhaps he was to be the company’s guide on the road to T
oulouse for one of the churchmen turned and made some remark about the weather and then all four of them were debating the state of the roads. One of the priests was elderly, his head pitched forwards as though his hearing was becoming fragile.
‘You’re in the way again, girl,’ observed the knight’s voice from behind her. He dispatched her back through the archway well goosed. ‘And you two,’ he shouted at the menservants roping the heavy coffer in place. ‘Must you make a meal of it? Make haste!’
It was uncharitable to wish Lady Alys and her scold of a servant to the Devil, but as Adela watched Herliva tying back the striped curtains and plumping the pretty cushions of my lady’s chariot in the convent yard, she hoped the Lord of Darkness was sharpening his toasting prongs.
It would have been sensible to attend to her own duties, but as the oblates and postulants trickled out to watch their guest’s departure, Adela mingled in their midst. Before long, nearly all the nuns were gathered outside enjoying the event (you could wager there would be penances later). Even the abbess, together with the convent’s office-bearers, came down the steps to farewell the company. It was only then that Lady Alys minced forth, her gloved hand resting on the handsome knight’s wrist as he led her to make the formal exchange of thanks, donations and good wishes for the journey. The elderly of the two priests stepped forward, making his farewell to the abbess, too.
Considering she was a promised bride to another man, Lady Alys was in high feather, rather preoccupied with smiling at Sir William as he assisted her up the back steps of her chariot. Nor was he disinterested for he murmured something as he tidied the tail of my lady’s crimson gown around her feet—a garland of words that made my lady’s cheeks flower rosily. This was a young man who would never suffer from celibacy, Adela decided, and then suspicious thoughts crept through her mind like wicked little demons. Had he been lingering at Dover with my lady? Was that what Maud had been going to say?
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