The Traitor's Tale

by Margaret Frazer

  Sunk in her own thoughts and grown used to Sister Margrett's accepting silence, Frevisse was startled by the question and said, her surprise showing, "Yes. I swear it. Willingly." She steadied. "I swear I saw no other way to do this."

  Sister Margrett regarded her solemnly, then asked, "You trust both of these men, then?"

  Frevisse paused over answering that, before saying, "Lady Alice trusts Nicholas Vaughn. Knowing him as little as I do, I have to trust her judgment of him. As for Master Noreys, I know him somewhat better and, yes, him I do trust."

  The ease with which that answer came surprised her. But she did trust him. Each time they had met over the years she had been forced to trust him further. She could wonder whether trust brought on by necessity counted as strongly as trust by free and unforced choice, but then without necessity how could a trust's worth be proved and known? And in necessity, she reminded herself yet again, Joliffe had never betrayed her trust. Had sometimes pulled it nearly to its breaking point but never betrayed it.

  Sister Margrett, apparently satisfied, gave a short nod and took up her breviary.

  There were a great many miles between them and St. Albans, more than a good day's ride. "Meaning we'll have to make a bad day's ride of it," Joliffe had said cheerily when they parted last night.

  Frevisse had not doubted he meant it, and indeed they set out in the morning when the world was still gray, with only barely light enough to show their way out of Bicester, and they were more than several miles on their way by the time the first sunlight spilled thickly gold over the horizon and into their faces. Joliffe looked none the better for it but not so bad as Frevisse had feared he might. No worse than Vaughn, anyway.

  Tierce's familiar words, when she and Sister Margrett prayed the Office as best they could between one time of cantering and the next, had a different richness to them, with Frevisse knowing what she knew, fearing what she feared. Dominus lux mea et salus mea. Quern timebo? Dominuspraesidium vitae meae. A quo trepidabo? The Lord is my light and my safety. Whom shall I fear? The Lord is the guard of my lift-By whom shall I be frightened?

  The countryside became wider, with more open fields and fewer hedges. The day promised to stay clear, was even warm with remembered summer although the lay of light across the harvested fields was entirely autumn and last night had been chill. As always after harvest-time there were gleaners in the stripped fields, people without land to grow food enough for themselves searching for whatever might have escaped the harvesters. The harvest had been fine this year, though, and if people were good to one another, no one should go hungry this winter. The barns and granaries were full and there were goodly numbers of cattle grazing the stubbled grain fields.

  It had all the look of a world at peace, but somewhere in it the duke of York was moving southward with men enough that he had been able to face down and force aside the king's men in Wales; and somewhere maybe the king was moving with more men to meet him, and somewhere other lords and men were beyond doubt on the move, some to join York, some for the king. It was the way—given the foolishness to which men could sink—that battles happened. Some place as presently at peace as these fields could in a day or two or in a week or before the month was done become a place where men were killing one another.

  And the letter she was carrying hidden might be the thing that brought them to it.

  She wished she were back in St. Frideswide's, unwitting of all of this from beginning to end. She knew that was cowardice and did not care.

  They stopped in Aylesbury at an inn, dismounting in the small cobbled yard, leaving Ned, Bartelme, and Perkyn with the horses, the rest of them going inside where a cheerful woman served them ale and slices of a meat pie warm from the morning's baking. Some was sent out to the men in the yard while Joliffe asked the woman if she had heard of troubles anywhere near. "Like there were all summer," he said. "We don't want to ride into anything."

  "I've not heard tell of any stirrings lately, no," the woman said comfortably. "Harvest-time settled most folk, I think. Set them tending to business instead of to trouble, and not beforetime, either. Haply it was more talk than doing around here, anyway."

  Frevisse said with not much outward show of interest, "We heard at the nunnery that the duke of York has come back from Ireland. Have you heard anything of that?"

  "Oh, aye, I've heard that. That's making some manner of stir. There was a fret of men through here yesterday on their way to somewhere because of it."

  "York's men?" Frevisse asked.

  "Not his, no. Most of the ones I saw had the Stafford knot for their badge. The duke of Buckingham's men, see you. But there were some of Lord Warrene's among them, too, like it was an in-gathering. One of them said they were on their way to Towchester. That's a fair ways from here, but that's what he said."

  "Why?" Joliffe asked as if in all innocence.

  "Ah, who knows? They didn't seem to know, that's sure. Only that Buckingham had summoned them up and away they were going. If it means the duke of York is truly back from Ireland, then it's none too soon and I'm only glad of it, that's all I can say. Say what you will about the duke of Suffolk, we didn't have trouble like Jack Cade when he was seeing to things. We can only hope the duke of York, God keep him, takes his place and sees to things. Since it seems the king won't," she added darkly, then crossed herself and added hastily, "God keep King Henry, and never think I mean otherwise. But York's his cousin after all, and so who better to take place close to him?"

  "The duke of Somerset?" Vaughn said. "He's likewise the king's cousin."

  The woman made a scornful noise. "Don't talk to me of Somerset. The way he handed Normandy back to the Dauphin as if it was his to give away and never mind all. I've a cousin buried over there, killed these twenty years ago when that French witch made all that trouble at Orleans and afterwards. Don't talk to me about cousins. There he is, Somerset, settling in with the king as if it never happened, if I've heard rightly, while all those poor people who've lost their homes and everything are still on the roads and miserable. There's a family here. Jack Wryght indentured to go to Normandy when the duke of York was governor there. Did so well that when his indenture was up, he bought a house in Falaise and set up to be a blade-smith, just like he was here, and his wife went out to join him five years ago or so. Took their two boys and all. Has had two little girls since then, so it was all six of them came dragging back here not three weeks ago, all ragged and everything they own piled in a little handcart he was pulling while the rest of them walked, all but the littlest girl, and poor Alison was carrying her and looked fit to drop, so people say who saw them. They've nothing here now, of course, and nothing left in Normandy. They're staying with his brother and trying to put a life together here again out of what's left to them. They're better off than many, but that isn't saying much." She sniffed mightily. "So why Somerset shouldn't be called to account for what he's done, king's cousin or not, I don't know. He ought to be charged with treason, and I hope the duke of York sees to it."

  Joliffe said in strong agreement, "We can only pray," and shortly thereafter gathered them all up and had them out of there, leaving Vaughn to pay their bill, but saying to him when they were all a-horse again and riding out of Aylesbury, "There was a woman who knew her own mind about matters."

  "She did that," Vaughn agreed. "I just wish the king was as firm-set as she is about things."

  "We can only pray," said Joliffe.

  Not many miles further on they made the steep climb into the wooded Chiltern Hills. The hours grew longer and so did the miles as they rode, and their shadows that had been behind them and then beside were now ahead of them. They rode with purpose and no pleasure, paused for food and drink in Berkhampstead and heard nothing they had not already heard, and rode on and came into St. Albans in early evening, the white tower of the abbey church glowing rose-red in the westering light. The long, wide marketplace outside the abbey gates had only townsfolk going about their business—no armed men in the street
s, no signs of alarm. Whatever trouble might be spreading to meet Richard of York, it was not here yet.

  St. Alban's abbey was one of the great abbeys of England, its abbot summoned to Parliament as the equal of many a temporal lord. Named for the saint who had been martyred in far off Roman times on the very hillside where the monastery now stood behind its enclosing walls, the church was also his burial place, his tomb a well-accustomed place of pilgrimage. Their little company was received at the abbey's gatehouse without trouble, no one even asking to see what bishop's papers the nuns carried to give them permission to travel.

  Beyond the abbey's broad gatehouse the wide guestyard lay four-square, with a long line of stables to the right and the various guesthalls around the other three sides. Above the red-tile rooftops the west front of the church rose massive against the sky. Sister Margrett had looked longingly toward it as they rode toward the gateway, and she looked back now, asking Frevisse, "Will there be time to see the shrine?"

  "Tomorrow assuredly," Frevisse said. "We're too late for even Vespers tonight, I fear."

  Only from the guesthall master was there trouble and— finally—sure word of York.

  "His foreriders came in not two hours ago," the black-robed monk said with unhappy fluster. "He's at Stony Stratford tonight and will be here tomorrow. His grace and I'm not clear how many more. Enough to fill us to overflowing, certes, even without the pilgrims already here. Not that there are so many, nor have been these past weeks. With all the troubles there are, people aren't taking to the roads like they would be otherwise."

  Unmoved by the man's troubles, Joliffe said, "Fortunate for us we've come ahead of the duke, then, while you've still beds for us. If you'll show us where to go, we'll gladly leave you to your other duties and wish St. Benedict's blessing on you."

  The monk started what might have become a protest to that, but Sister Margrett added very gently, with only the faintest hint that she might be going to slide from her horse in helpless weariness, "We're so tired."

  Frevisse suspected that, more than anything, got them their beds. Ned, Bartelme, and Perkyn were shunted toward the stable with the horses and promise of places in the lesser guesthall meant for servants. Joliffe and Vaughn were sent to the men's guesthall. She and Sister Margrett were led away by a guesthall servant to the dorter kept for visiting nuns. The woman advised them that supper was nearly finished in the hall, and after a quick washing of face and hands, they went to eat out of plain need for food, more than any wish to stay upright much longer. They saw Joliffe and Vaughn there, looking as weary as Frevisse felt, but they did not speak together, and afterward Frevisse and Sister Margrett returned to the dorter, murmured something like Compline, and crept with aching weariness into their bed. There was not a worry or an ache sufficient to keep Frevisse awake. She was asleep from the moment of settling her head on the pillow.

  Chapter 26

  night's sleep made more difference to his weariness than Joliffe had dared to hope. He awoke in the morning with his side aching but not so badly he had to give it much heed, and after breaking fast in the abbey's guesthall, he was restless enough that he told Vaughn, "I'm going to see what rumors and news are in town."

  "I'll go with you," Vaughn said with an alacrity that showed he was restless, too—or else unwilling to let Joliffe go unwatched.

  Joliffe, having nothing more in mind than asking questions and listening, did not mind which way it was, was even somewhat glad of his companionship as they, first, wandered the length of St. Albans' long marketplace, overhearing what talk they could but nothing new to either of them. Along the way, Joliffe bought a good, dark blue doublet from a used clothing shop to replace his own, given back to him at St. Frideswide's mended and enough of the bloodstain cleansed away to make it wearable but not much presentable. He and Vaughn then made use of the town's public bathhouse to wash and shave, and with that and the "new" doublet Joliffe felt far more ready for the rest of the day.

  For a while after that, the two of them drifted into and out of the several taverns and inns along the marketplace and nearer streets, listening to the talk around them, sometimes asking questions as if they were pilgrims worried how safe their journey home was going to be, "with all this shifting of lords' men about the countryside," Joliffe said several times to lead men on to more talk, but he learned nothing much new. Even talk with a pedlar lately out from London brought hardly anything. "The king's in Kent with that dog's toss-up Somerset and some others," the man said. "They're beating the whey out of the poor bastards as thought they had pardon last summer after Cade's rebellion. Is there more trouble than that? Because I'm heading north and don't want to walk into anything."

  "Then I'd head west if I were you," Vaughn answered.

  "Or sit it out here," Joliffe offered. "Once the duke of York is gone through, what trouble there is will likely go with him."

  The pedlar frowned. "Aye. That business in Wales."

  "Word of that has spread, has it?" Vaughn asked.

  "It's being talked of in London, aye. People reckon it was Somerset's doing."

  "Giving orders to the king's officers in Wales? That's moving fast for someone just come back from France," Joliffe said. "He never seemed that sharp to me. He wasn't when it came to saving Normandy, that's for certain."

  "Happen losing Normandy has sharpened his wits, like, the pedlar said grimly. He raised his leather jack of ale. "Here's to Richard of York seeing to it Somerset gets what's coming to him."

  Joliffe and Vaughn both drank to that with him, Joliffe at least with a whole heart.

  To the good was that there was no word of any fighting, giving good hope there had been none because word of even a skirmish between York's men and anyone else's would have come racing up Watling Street like wind-born smoke ahead of a fire.

  "Nor it doesn't seem the king or anyone is coming out to meet him on his way," Vaughn said as he and Joliffe sat finally alone at a table in the corner of another tavern, drinking thin wine.

  "I wish I thought that was a good thing," Joliffe said.

  "You'd rather it came to a fight?"

  "Not by half. But for there to be seeming-nothing being done on the king's side is strange. Or seems so to me."

  "Urn," said Vaughn, which might have meant anything.

  Joliffe leaned back against the wall and tried to seem he was not as weary as he was. Far wearier than he should be. He needed more strength than this if he was going to be use to anyone, including himself.

  Vaughn ended the silence between them by asking, "Have you read this letter, to know if it's going to make enough of a difference to be worth the trouble we've taken with it?"

  Keeping voice and body at ease, Joliffe said, "So far as I know, no one has read it since Suffolk sealed it. As to what it's worth . . ." He shrugged. ". . . somebody thinks it's worth the trouble of killing men for it. I'm trusting the letter will tell us who."

  Vaughn sat staring into his almost empty bowl a long moment before saying, "I'm going at this as if my lady of Suffolk was already agreed and allied with York. I could be very far in the wrong for it."

  "The choice and the burden of it lies on Dame Frevisse, not on you. She's acting in her grace of Suffolk's name."

  Still staring into the bowl, Vaughn moved his head slowly side to side, refusing that way out. "I don't know if that's good enough."

  Joliffe held back from saying, "It has to be."

  Instead, he considered his other answers, then carefully offered, "If Burgate was right and Suffolk's death was purposed and not by merely rogue sailors, then it was ordered, and the order came from someone with the power to stop any questioning about it afterward. Can we agree on that?"

  "Yes," Vaughn said stiffly, not looking at him.

  "Can we likewise agree that the someone who ordered Suffolk's death is likely the someone behind all these other deaths and likewise keeping any useful questions from being asked?"

  Vaughn finally raised his gaze to him, frowning, st
ill wary even while assenting, "Yes. Well enough. It's likely that's the way of it."

  "Then if whoever has the power to do all that decides to be afraid that Lady Alice knows too much about the same thing these men are being killed for, what chance will she have against him?"

  Vaughn took his time over answering that, not because he did not know the answer, Joliffe thought, but because he hated even to think it. But finally he said, "Now that she's had chance to talk to Burgate and it's known first Gyllam and then you went for the letter, whoever is doing this probably does think she knows too much." He made a frustrated sound and said half-angrily, "Why didn't Buckingham just kill Burgate outright?"

  "Because none of this is coming from Buckingham," Joliffe shot back. "The duke of Buckingham never troubled himself with a new thought all his own in his whole life, let alone subtleties like are tangled here. And don't tell me Somerset, either. Somerset has all the subtlety of a five-year-old who thinks that by hiding his hands with a stolen apple behind his back he can make his mother believe he doesn't have it. Burgate is alive because someone was leaving it to God whether he would live or die, whether they'd have his secret or lose it. That's like tossing dice with God and telling yourself however it comes out, it's God's doing."