The Canterbury Murders

by Maureen Ash

  Miles glanced at Gianni, who had scribbled some words on his tablet and handed it to the knight. When he read what the lad had written, the knight realised that he had not, out of consideration for the widow, allowed her to finish her recounting of the last time she had seen the steward.

  “If I understood you correctly, you made mention of one final occasion on which you saw Inglis but did not speak with him,” he said to Cecily. “When was that?”

  “At church,” she replied. “We were both in the habit of attending St. Peter’s for early-morning Mass—it is the closest church to both the royal townhouse and my home—and although we never made any overt sign of our friendship lest it fuel the tongues of the scandalmongers, we would always greet each other courteously as we joined the congregation. But on this occasion—it was the morning of the day that the washerwoman was murdered, I remember—Inglis ignored me. I was hurt, but I could hardly make issue of it, especially as he was deep in conversation with Molly at the time.”

  “Did you hear what they were speaking about?” Miles asked her.

  “No,” she replied. “I was not close enough, but I made certain that I was standing in full view of Inglis so he would take note of my presence, and perhaps give me an opportunity to mend our argument. But, as I said, he ignored me and pretended to be preoccupied with whatever it was that he and Molly were discussing. Their conversation seemed intense and he was shaking his head in a most determined manner at whatever it was that she was saying. Then another man walked up and joined them and, as Inglis turned to greet him, he was forced to look in my direction. But he ignored me, and let his glance slide over me as though I were a stranger. There could be no doubt that his snub was intentional.”

  “I am sorry,” Miles said lamely but with sincerity. Even though he could not understand what it was that she had found attractive about the pompous steward, it was apparent her sorrow was genuine and he truly hoped that, with time, it would be eased. “This other man that joined them, did you know him?”

  “No, I had never seen him before. I assume he was one of the servants that had come with the king from Normandy, for he had a badge bearing the royal insignia stitched on the side of his hat.”

  “Can you describe him to me?” Miles asked.

  “He was tall, and of a clerkly appearance, with a rather large nose and receding chin.”

  Miles and Gianni exchanged glances. The man whom Cecily had described could only be Guillaume Aquarius, the king’s bath attendant. The fact that he had been in conversation with the two people who had, so soon after, been murdered might be of no import, but he would need to be questioned about it all the same. Thanking Cecily for her time, Miles rose from his seat and, with Gianni at his side, took leave of the grief-stricken widow.

  Chapter Twenty

  By the time Bascot and William Marshal had finished questioning de Ponte and his employees, snow was falling heavily and beginning to lie thick upon the ground. As they rode out of the bail, the Templar said that before he went to the royal townhouse to conduct further interviews with the servants, he would return to Watling Street to learn the outcome of Miles and Gianni’s visit to Mistress Cooper. The earl decided to accompany him. “Perhaps if I linger long enough,” he said, only half in jest, “Lady Nicolaa will invite me to stay for the midday meal. There are few travellers in the guesthouse at the moment and it will be pleasant to share the company of those who have a degree of bonhomie. The good brothers at the priory show me every courtesy, but are far from mirthful.”

  Giving Bascot a sidelong glance, he added, “I mean no disparagement of your calling, de Marins. The fault is mine. I fear my temperament is not suited to gravity.”

  The Templar smiled and took no offence at the statement. He had a liking for Marshal and welcomed his company.

  Shortly after they arrived at Watling Street, Gianni and Miles came in and joined them in the hall where they were sitting with Nicolaa, Gilles de Laubrec and Clare. Over a cup of mulled wine, Miles related what had passed during their visit to the washerwoman’s sister and how they had been told that Inglis had a paramour. He then went on to relate the details of their interview with Cecily Wattson, and her witness of what appeared to be an argument between her lover and the washerwoman.

  “She also said,” Miles added, “that a man joined the pair during the quarrel and her description fits Guillaume Aquarius, the bath attendant.”

  “If I recall the information in Gianni’s notes correctly,” Bascot said, “did Aquarius not say, during your interview with him, that he had no knowledge of any person with whom the washwoman was at odds?”

  “Yes. It is obvious he is lying, but I cannot fathom why. It could not have been to protect the steward from suspicion, for he, too, has since been murdered.”

  “Nonetheless, there must have been a reason,” Bascot said. “And one that must be found out. I will take the matter up with the bath attendant when I go to the townhouse.”

  At that moment, Dauton entered the chamber and announced that the midday meal was ready to be served. As the earl had hoped, Nicolaa invited him to join them and they all sat down to the repast, Gianni and Clare at the bottom of the table as befit their lower stations.

  All of them ate with relish; there was beef roasted over a spit and glazed with a crispy layer of fat, coney pie and a hearty lamb pottage, accompanied by small loaves of manchet bread and a wheel of creamy cheese. Once they had finished the main course, bowls of winter apples and preserves of apricot, apple and plum followed along with a huge platter of oatmeal griddle cakes. The conversation was lively. Miles encouraged the earl to speak of his younger days, when he had earned his livelihood on the tourney circuit, and there was much merriment as Marshal told of the time he had faced a raw young knight who had been so cack-handed there was a danger of being unseated by virtue of his clumsiness.

  “He sent his squire to me afterwards,” Marshal said, “asking my pardon for his inexperience and offering a purse of silver in recompense. Even though I had already won his saddle and armour, I took it, for he had, it seemed, more money than sense.”

  While the others laughed, Bascot noticed that Lady Nicolaa remained silent and lost in contemplation. In a murmured aside to Gilles, who was sitting next him, he asked if aught had occurred that morning to distract her.

  “Not that I know of,” de Laubrec answered. “She was a little pensive before we attended Mass at the cathedral, but the service seemed to hearten her, and she was in good spirits afterwards. But then she was called to a meeting with Archbishop Walter and her glum mood returned. She has hardly spoken a word since she left him.”

  Just as Marshal proclaimed his intention of returning to the priory, Dauton ushered in a man-at-arms from the castle, who had come with a message for the earl.

  “Constable Criel gives you his greeting, lord, and has sent me to tell you that the king has returned from Dover and requests that you join him at the cathedral guesthouse.” The soldier’s cloak was sodden with a layer of snow and Marshal, noting the fact, said he had better be on his way before the streets became impassable.

  After the earl left, and Miles and Gilles excused themselves, Nicolaa dismissed Clare and Gianni and asked Bascot to remain. Once the tables had been cleared, and Dauton had poured them both a cup of wine, she told the steward to shut the door behind him and ensure that she and the Templar were not disturbed.

  Once they were alone, Nicolaa took a sip of her wine and sat in silence for a moment before speaking. “I have a request to make of you, de Marins, concerning this murder investigation. But before I do so, I must ask you to keep in confidence what I am about to say and reveal it to no one, not even the Earl of Pembroke.”

  The seriousness with which she spoke made Bascot pause before he answered. He had no wish to offend her but could not, in all conscience, pledge to do as she asked, for he was constrained by the rules of the Order. “Lady, I would wi
llingly comply, but you must know that, as a Templar, I am bound to report all of my actions, and any information I learn, to Master Berard in London.”

  Nicolaa ran her fingers around the base of the wine cup, as though the movement would help her to phrase her next words. Finally, she said, “Apart from that proviso, will you give me your word?”

  “I will,” Bascot replied.

  Nicolaa sighed. “I cannot tell you the reason for what I am about to ask you to do; only that it is not of my making, nor to my liking, but that, in loyalty to my oath of fealty, I am duty bound to safeguard certain information. Do you understand?”

  “I think so, lady,” Bascot said. Her phrasing left him in no doubt that the matter was connected to the king.

  “Very well,” Nicolaa replied. “Then I must ask that if, during the course of the investigation, you discover the motive for the slayings, or the identity of the perpetrator, you take no action upon that finding, or share the details with anyone, not even Gianni, until you have first reported to me.”

  “That could prove difficult, lady, if, by so doing, the culprit might escape.”

  “I am aware of that, de Marins, and decry the need to restrain you in such a fashion. Nonetheless, I must ask for your pledge.”

  Bascot studied the castellan for a moment. That she was a woman who held honour as high as any man, he well knew. It was also obvious that the request was distasteful to her and that she would not have made it if there had been any other option. He owed her much, not only for the consideration she had shown him when he had arrived in Lincoln some years before, but also for her benevolent care of Gianni after he rejoined the Order. The very fact that she would never call these debts to account was reason enough to repay her; and if she allowed him to do so within the confines of his Templar oath, he saw no reason not to comply.

  “I will do as you ask, lady,” he said.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  The snow continued to fall and, by mid-afternoon, was well over a foot in depth. Because the snow had rendered the streets almost impassable, Bascot decided to leave re-interviewing the servants at the royal townhouse until the next day. Not only did he need to reflect on the reason for Nicolaa de la Haye’s request, he also, after learning about the argument Cecily Wattson had overheard between the two victims, and that Aquarius had been there while it was going on, wanted to again review the information that had been compiled about the bath attendant. To that last purpose, he looked for Gianni and, finding him in a small chamber sitting beside Clare while she sewed, asked him to bring the notes he had made. The lad ran to get his writings and returned with eager expectation on his face, presuming his former master would wish to discuss the details as they had been accustomed to do in the past. With a sad heart, and because of Nicolaa’s stricture, the Templar told him that he would see him later, at the evening meal, and dismissed him.

  There was hurt and disappointment in Gianni’s eyes as he left and although Bascot regretted being the cause, he had no other recourse. The lad was too sharp not to sense that something was being kept from him and the Templar could not take the risk of the lad accidentally stumbling across whatever it was that Nicolaa wished kept secret.

  Going to the small room he had been allotted as a bedchamber, Bascot used a tinder box to light a candle, then sat down on the pallet and laid the notes beside him. Removing the leather patch from his sightless eye, he leaned back against the wall and rubbed the distorted folds of flesh in the empty socket. It was an action he did only when alone, but it helped to focus his thoughts, as though the movement would restore his vision to wholeness and enable him to see the world with more clarity.

  He had no doubt the king was behind the limitation Nicolaa had imposed. Her mention of being forced to make her request due to her oath of fealty made that certain. And, with the king’s devious mind, it could be for many purposes; he had made many enemies during his short time on the throne, and not all of them were in the lands across the Narrow Sea.

  As he pondered thus, his eye fell on the pile of notes beside him. The top sheet detailed the interview Miles had held with Aquarius, and included the information that the bath attendant came from a town on the border of Brittany. One of the various motives being considered for the murders was that they had been perpetrated by a Breton taking revenge for the continuing imprisonment of their count, Arthur of Brittany, who was also John’s nephew. Arthur had disappeared some months before and the king had been adamant in his refusal to reveal his whereabouts. Could this secret be linked, in some fashion, to the stricture he had ordered, through Nicolaa, placed on the investigation?

  The Templar pondered on this possibility but could not see any connection. Surely, he thought, after so long a passage of time, there was no danger to John if Arthur’s location was discovered, or even if the Bretons had learned, as was rumoured, that he had killed the lad. Arthur had committed the grave transgression of breaking his oath of fealty and John had the right to punish him as he saw fit. If he had executed the lad, while it might be descried that he had done so covertly, it was still within the realm of justice.

  Bascot continued to speculate, testing one theory after another as to the reason for John’s dictate, even wondering if the two dead servants, because of their long service, had been in the king’s confidence about some important matter that might be revealed while their murders were being looked into, but neither that nor any of the other possibilities he considered seemed likely. Finally, he shook his head in frustration and replaced the leather patch over his eye. All of these meanderings were mere speculation, and brought no profit. With resolution he pushed Nicolaa’s request from his mind and, picking up the notes that lay beside him, began to reread them from the beginning.

  ***

  In the cathedral precincts, Archbishop Hubert Walter also felt a need to collect his thoughts and put them in some sort of order. But, unlike the Templar, he wished to escape the confines of the room in which he had just spent the last hour in tense discussion with the king. The harsh snowy weather outside precluded a walk in the cloisters, and so he had left the warmth of the chamber where he had just had a meeting with John—a room situated on a side aisle underneath the monk’s dorter—and threaded his way through the passages that led out into the nave of the cathedral.

  The great space was cold and empty, but the archbishop did not notice the chill. Underneath the heavy white wool of a robe of the Cistercian Order—of which he was a confrater, or associate member—worn for its comforting thickness, were several layers of woollen shirts and a pair of drawers. On his feet were leather buskins, calf-high boots that reached to his knees, that kept his feet well protected from the coldness of the stone slabs on the floor. He welcomed the silence in the nave; due to the harsh weather, none of the townsfolk had attended any services that day, and the monks, at this hour, had all repaired to the frater to partake of their evening meal.

  The king had arrived a little over an hour before, having ridden directly from Dover to St. Sepulchre and, after installing Queen Isabella safely in the nunnery, had continued on to Canterbury. Tired from the journey, and frustrated by the news that yet another of his servants had been murdered, John had immediately sought out the archbishop to discuss the situation.

  Walter, having just attended the service of Vespers, took the king to his private chamber underneath the dorter and had listened while John paced back and forth, raging at the person who had killed his servants. Walter had kept silent throughout the tirade; he knew that John, like his father, needed to vent his fury before he would be calm enough to listen to reason. King Henry, when infuriated, had often reacted violently, hurling himself to the ground and drumming his heels on the floor until his equanimity was restored. And so Walter had listened quietly while John had furiously expounded on the subject, and it had not been until he had threatened to torture all of the servants at the royal townhouse for information that the archbishop had f
inally spoken.

  “Such an action would outrage the citizens of Canterbury, sire, and might well alienate the nobles whose support you will need at the council in a few weeks’ time.”

  But John chose not to listen to Walter’s objection and had remained intent on carrying out his threat, saying that it was the only way to find out if one of them was guilty of the crimes. It had required all of Walter’s talent for persuasion to convince the king that it was far better to postpone such drastic measures until the investigation had run its course. Would it not be wiser, Walter had pleaded, to treat the whole matter until then in a detached fashion, lest the murderer be made aware of his distress and derive gratification from knowing he had caused it?

  John had finally calmed somewhat as he listened to the archbishop’s sensible counsel and, after receiving the king’s promise to follow his suggestion, Walter had told him about his conversation with Nicolaa de la Haye.

  “She has agreed, then, to my request to screen the information the Templar gathers?” John asked confidently.

  “Yes, sire, but only under strong protest, which she expressed most adamantly,” Walter replied. “It is my feeling that her trust in you has been severely compromised.” The archbishop then related Nicolaa’s exact words.

  John was shocked by her response and became truculent. “Did you not explain to her that what happened to Arthur was an accident, that it was not intentional?”

  “Of course,” Walter replied. “It is not the incident itself that discomforts her, sire, but the fact that you wish to keep the whole matter secret. And I would venture to say that her reaction is typical of any other of your nobles who might discover the truth, especially William Marshal.”