by Candace Robb
The wait was agony, her heart pounding, hands and feet going so cold they ached, but she dared not move. She wanted to catch Nan in the act. She was certain now, Nan had risen almost at once when the door opened down below. She must have been lying awake, alert, waiting. For whom? Eleanor meant to find out. Perhaps this was why she could not sleep, this was God’s will, that she was awake to discover Nan’s betrayal.
No, she was judging before she knew the truth. Quiet, Eleanor, empty yourself. She closed her eyes for a moment, breathed.
The door creaked open. The leather hinges were old, dry, causing the wooden door to rub against the doorway. Someone had lit a candle or lamp down below, and Eleanor could just make out Nan’s outline in the doorway.
When the maidservant was out of sight, Eleanor rose, rubbing her hands and stepping from foot to foot to bring life back to them, listening at the open door. Rose stirred. Eleanor whispered that it was nothing.
Down below, Nan called softly, “Robin? Is that you?”
“No, Nan. Not Robin.”
Katherine. It was Katherine down below. God bless her. Eleanor rose, threw on a light mantle, and slipped out to the landing.
Though Kate would have preferred the dark, she was too unfamiliar with her mother’s hall to move about blindly, so she’d brought a lantern from home, opening the shutter just enough to find a sheltered spot and settle. She was about to close the shutter when the floorboards creaked directly overhead. Stealthy movements. Someone dressing? She held her breath, waiting. A door groaned open. Bare feet on the creaky steps.
“Robin? Is that you?” Nan’s voice.
Rising from her corner, Kate shone her light on the young woman.
“No, Nan. Not Robin.”
The young woman gasped. “I—I thought—” Nan’s fair hair hung loose round her shoulders. She carried shoes in her hands, and a scarf.
Kate took her firmly by the arm and guided her out through the starlit garden to the kitchen. For Griffin’s benefit. He should hear what Nan had to say for herself. She indicated a bench near the door. “Sit down. Now. You thought what? Was it this Robin who frightened Sister Dina? Were you expecting him to return tonight? To finish what he’d begun?”
“No. No, I . . .” Nan began to cry. “I fear something terrible has happened to him.”
Griffin stepped out from the small bedchamber, shielding his eyes from the sudden light. “Who is Robin?”
“Tell us all, Nan. All of it,” said Kate. “Who is he? Where does he lodge?”
Nan drew her scarf round her. “I don’t know. I’ve no idea where he lives. He comes to Mother’s house. Always there. So that I can keep watch while my brothers and sisters sleep up above.” Kate glanced up at the doorway, where her mother now stood. “He is gentle with me.”
“Oh, no doubt,” Eleanor muttered.
“Peace, Mother,” said Kate. The brash young maidservant from the Martha House had crumpled before her eyes—the yearning in her voice, the trembling hand clutching the scarf. “Where did you meet him?” she asked.
“At market. He said he noticed me. Couldn’t stop thinking about me.” Tears welled up. “He said I was a bright bauble of a woman and I inspired him to mend his ways.”
“Was it he who came last night?”
Nan shook her head. “I don’t know. He did not come to me last night. I waited at home—my mother’s house. Waited and waited.”
Kate found a pitcher of water and filled a wooden bowl for Nan, handing it to her as she settled beside her. “Drink. Calm yourself.”
Sniffs.
“You betrayed us,” said Dame Eleanor.
“No!”
Griffin offered Eleanor a chair, but she shook her head.
Sitting beside Nan, Kate asked gently, “You said ‘mend his ways.’ What are his sins?”
“Naught but that he wants me. I cannot think what an honest, hardworking man would want with me.” She plucked at her colorful skirt, touched the comb in her hair. “He has the coin for these pretty things, but where he earns it, and how, he will never say. ‘What you don’t know cannot harm you, eh, my Nan?’ he says.”
So he is a thief, thought Kate. What might he think worth stealing in the kitchen of a Martha House? “What did you tell him about the Martha House, Nan? Why would he be in the kitchen?”
A hurt expression. “Do you think I sent him here? Why would I do such a thing?”
“I mean no such thing, Nan. I merely wonder whether you might have mentioned something of value in the house, and he might have bragged of the fine establishment in which his lady worked, eh?”
Nan shook her head. But she would not look at Kate. Was that significant?
“He might be hurt,” Nan whimpered. “Sister Dina was bloody, they say. And her dagger is missing.”
“That is true,” said Kate. “And we must find him so that he can receive proper care. What might he have been after here in the kitchen?”
“The key,” Nan whispered.
“To what?”
“The main house. Dame Agnes hid it here. I might have said . . . I might have said so many things. I love him. I wanted him to know what fine, holy women employ me. I am trusted. I can be trusted. Only that’s not true. Not true!” She covered her face with her hands and sobbed.
Eleanor stepped forward with a hand up. Kate knew that look, that posture. She meant to slap Nan to stop her crying.
“Mother, if you touch her, you will have no more help from me,” Kate said.
The hand hovered. Then Eleanor dropped it to her side. “It still stinks of blood in here.”
Nan’s sobs grew louder.
“God have mercy,” Eleanor whispered. “It is best I leave you to your work.” She withdrew.
Kate watched her mother cross the garden and step into the hall, closing the door behind her. The set of her shoulders, her bowed head, bespoke defeat.
With a sigh, she looked up at Griffin, who leaned against the wall. “What now?”
“Go to the hall, get some rest,” he said. “Nan can sleep out here in my bed, where I can guard her. I’ll sleep beneath the stars. I’ve done it often enough. Helps me think.”
He was right. There was nothing more to do in the middle of the night. Kate helped Nan to the small chamber, then dragged herself back to the hall.
7
A VIOLENT END
An angry challenge, a man’s frightened cry. Kate sat up in the dark, confused for a moment, the hall so dark, the bed so hard. Had it been a dream? Someone softly snored up above. Her mother. She had forgotten her mother’s snore.
“Halt!” a man shouted out on the street.
This was no dream. She thought she heard the pounding rhythm of people running. Not so near as Hertergate. Castlegate, more likely. Was it the night watch? Or Griffin?
Rising and slipping on her shoes, Kate felt her way across the hall to the garden door. Opening it, she paused a moment, listening. Men’s voices, quieter now. She stepped out into the garden. The blankets near the kitchen door had been tossed aside, as if Griffin had risen in a hurry. She went round the side of the house, moving with caution down the alleyway as she drew her knife from her skirt. Out on Hertergate she spied Griffin coming toward her, assisting someone who limped badly, a lantern dangling from his hand. In the distance, muffled voices again, then silence. The injured one tried to pull away at the sound of the voices, his lantern swinging wildly, lighting up shrubbery, the warehouse on the corner, himself. It was Severen, one of the night watchmen. Griffin said something to him and shook his head. They continued on toward her.
“Bloody-minded bas—” Severen cut off his curse as he noticed Kate standing in front of the Martha House. “Beg pardon for waking you, Mistress Clifford.”
She shielded her eyes from the light now aimed at her, inspiring Severen to mutter another apology as she relieved him of the lantern and turned to guide the two men back down the alleyway to the kitchen. Once inside, Griffin settled the injured man in a chair
.
Nan stumbled out of her chamber, wrapped in a blanket, rubbing her eyes. “What is it? What has happened?”
“Severen was wounded in a scuffle with a group of drunk soldiers,” said Griffin.
“Soldiers, pah,” growled the watchman. “Cutthroat villains, more like. No livery that I could see. Here to cause trouble, they are. I say if they have no captain here to watch over them, let them camp outside the gates. They want access to the city for drinking and whoring and thieving, naught more.”
While Severen talked, Nan gently removed his hat and brushed the hair from his high forehead, revealing a long gash that bled profusely. She fetched water and a cloth and began to clean it as Griffin asked about the men.
“One of them was far drunker than the rest. They dragged him along.” Severen winced and waved Nan away. But she stood her ground, giving him the eye. He surrendered, sitting back and closing his eyes. “When I called out, they dropped him,” he said. “He lay there as they came at me. Three men, reeking of ale, such cursing as to please the devil himself. Before I had a chance to draw my dagger I was slashed, punched in the belly and kicked in the—” He winced again, this time from the memory, Kate guessed. But he smiled wanly and patted Nan’s hand as she wrapped a cloth round his head. Not so badly injured. “I finally dropped my lantern to draw my dagger, but they were gone on down Castlegate. Disappeared down the gardens, I think, going down along the bank of the Foss, trying to stay clear of the other watchmen, I’d wager.”
“Did they gather up the one lying on the ground?” Kate asked.
“Not right away,” said Griffin. “He’s right about the gardens. While I was helping Severen I saw several men dragging something off the road and down into Holme’s property.”
“I saw none of that. My head was splitting by then.” Severen followed Nan with his eyes as she took away the bowl of bloody water, pouring it out in the garden.
“I should have gone after them,” Griffin whispered, as if to himself.
Kate did not disagree, but she was chasing another thought. She drew him to one side. “Did you notice how Nan took over the care of Severen, and his ease with her touch, how he patted her hand? Yes, he winced at the pain, but he understood that look she gave him and gave way to her.”
Griffin watched Nan return, check her work on Severen’s head, and bend close to whisper something in his ear.
“Lovers?” he said.
“Perhaps not now, but they’ve been intimate,” said Kate. “I’ve wondered about her courage in walking to her mother’s house and back in the dark. And she’s apparently been unchallenged by the night watch. Could Severen be her escort?”
“Ah. Because Robin would have been challenged. If you are right, I wonder what he might know about this Robin?”
Kate nodded. “See what you can learn. I’m taking Lille and Ghent down through Thomas Holme’s gardens for a look round.”
“Just you and the hounds?”
“Matt will wake when I fetch them. I’ll take him along.”
“I have not yet earned your trust?”
“I’ve trained Matt to handle Lille and Ghent should I need him. You are still needed to guard here, remember? Now you’ve Severen and Nan.”
“Of course.” He caught her hand as she turned to leave. “Take Severen’s lantern. He will not be going out again tonight.”
He was right. Slumped in the chair, the watchman already slept. Kate took the lantern and stepped out into the mild summer night. Crossing through the hedgerow, she paused, listening. Was that a splash she heard? No, she was too far from the river. Her mind played tricks on her, the shadows secretive, mysterious. Shadows. The sky was lightening. She shuttered the lantern and could see the outline of the house before her. Whatever she found, there would be no more sleep tonight.
Lille and Ghent were at the door, ready for her, Matt standing behind them, rubbing his eyes.
“Has the intruder returned?” he asked.
“No. Trouble out on the street. They injured Severen the watchman, then headed down the gardens to the Foss. One of the men was either very drunk or injured. I want to see if they left him behind. I just need one item.” She slipped out of her shoes and padded up to the solar.
Jennet stood at the top of the landing, holding out the leather-sheathed axe. “The girls are tucked up in your bed. I heard you down below and retrieved this as quietly as I might, thinking you might need more than a dagger.”
Kate thanked her. “Keep them safe. I’m taking Matt and the dogs to the gardens.”
The four slipped from the house, down the alleyway, and crossed Castlegate. Kate opened the lantern shutter as they moved down into the gardens, Lille and Ghent leading. In the silence before the dawn their descent sounded loud in her ears and she glanced around, realizing how vulnerable they were with the light, the noise. But the hounds showed no sign of alarm, focused on moving down the hill. Matt limped more than usual as he kept up with them, though it had been months since an accident that had hobbled him for a while. The dogs led them to a tree with broken branches dangling, the ground churned up beneath.
“It looks as if something was dragged across that flower bed and over the rosebush,” said Matt. Easing himself down by the bush he teased a piece of cloth from the thorns, holding it up to Kate.
“Not something, but someone,” she said softly.
Now they dropped farther down toward the water, the hounds watchful, pausing now and then to sniff the air before returning their noses to the ground. Kate brushed against flowers and shrubs, releasing their scents. Thorns caught at her skirts. A root almost brought Matt down, but she reached out in time to steady him. Down, down they wound, the smells less sweet as they neared the water. In the quiet before the city awoke she could hear subtle interruptions in the Foss’s current, flotsam and jetsam thumping against the bank, eddies gurgling. Suddenly the dogs halted, standing alert, on guard.
She touched Lille’s head, Ghent’s, and they moved aside to flank her for protection. She handed Matt the lantern. He crouched down, shining it on a body. The man lay on his stomach, his arms outstretched, not crumpled beneath him—he’d not had time to break his fall. Drunk? Or already dead? Kate smelled nothing until she crouched beside Matt, then she caught the scents of urine, shit, ale—and blood, but faintly.
“God help us,” said Matt. “The intruder?”
“Let us roll him over and see.”
“I can manage.” Matt set the lantern aside, crab-walked uphill from the body, grabbed hold of the shoulder and hip closest to him, and began to roll the man, but stopped with a gasp as the head moved unnaturally. He looked to Kate, visibly sickened. “Neck’s broken.”
“I can help,” she said. “Go gently.” She held the head so that it moved with the body as Matt eased the man down on his back.
“Sorry. I’m not hardened to this yet.”
“Pray you never are.”
He sat back on his heels and wiped his forehead, then turned and emptied his stomach.
Kate shone the lantern on the dead man’s battered face. “Hans,” she whispered. One of the menservants her mother brought from Strasbourg. As the beguines were accustomed to having no men on the premises, the two menservants had gone to work for Thomas Holme for most of the spring and summer. She crossed herself, saying a silent prayer for his soul.
She had seen bodies more badly beaten, but, as with Matt, she hoped she never found it easy to witness such suffering. Hans’s nose had been broken, the blood crusting his face, and beneath that, bruises discolored the flesh. She lifted his hands, examining his fingers. A few split knuckles. He’d fought back. Whoever had done this might wear the scars. Another broken nose? A blackened eye?
“A brawl,” Kate whispered to herself, thinking of what Griffin had seen at the camp on Toft Green, and later what Severen had described. But Hans had impressed her as a gentle man.
“To the death,” Matt said. His breathing was easier.
“So many s
oldiers in the city,” said Kate. “Any one of them might have the strength. They are all hungering for blood.” Thinking of Griffin’s description of the men dragging the body off Castlegate and into the gardens, she added, “I pray Severen can provide some description.” But why here? In the garden? Mere chance that he fell on the street above it?
Matt lifted the man’s tunic and shirt. “I see no sign of a wound that would have bloodied Sister Dina,” he said. “Shall I check his arms and legs?”
“That can wait until later, when he is stripped and washed, prepared for burial.”
Kate gave Lille and Ghent the order to track. They led her down to the water, sniffed along the bank, then sat, looking out over the water. She remembered the splash she thought she’d heard.
Matt was close behind, clearly preferring not to be left alone with the corpse. She understood. “Thomas Holme should know at once. Go to him. Ask him to send a servant to the sheriff. He may want to return with you to watch the body. If not, ask if Hans’s friend Werner is there, and bring him back to wait with you.”
Matt nodded and headed up the hill.
Leading the dogs back to Griffin and Severen, she found Griffin curled up beneath his blankets, seemingly asleep. Severen still snored on the bench in the kitchen. And Nan? The door to her bedchamber swung wide. No Nan. Kate slipped back into the hall to check whether the maidservant was there. There was enough light coming through the chinks in the shutters to see her mother kneeling on a prie-dieu before the lady altar.
She glanced up. “Katherine?”
“Have you seen Nan?”
“Was she not sleeping out in the kitchen?”
“She was, but not now.”
Nan had slipped through their fingers. Griffin’s fingers. And Severen’s. The two of them were worthless. Cursing under her breath, Kate started for the door.
“What is it?” her mother asked. “What is wrong?”
“Finish your morning prayers, Mother.” There would be time enough to tell her of Hans’s death.
