Bone of Contention

by Roberta Gellis

  Magdalene sighed. “I think you should hire some men and boys and have all the alleyways between the Lively Hop and the Broached Barrel searched, particularly around The Wheat Sheaf. If I have read Jules’s character aright, whatever he meant to do when he left Hardel’s place, he might well have ended up in the nearest alehouse.”

  “No, because his horse was gone from the stable.”

  “The horse was gone,” Magdalene repeated, her voice now faint and her eyes large with sudden anxiety. “When? When was it gone?”

  “When I came to Oxford to look for Jules yesterday. I saw the horse was not in the stable, so I called myself a fool, thinking I had passed Jules along the way because he had stopped to piss or some such thing. I rode back to Osney, but he was not there. I was furious, but Marguerite was beside herself, so I gathered up some servants and we searched the woods along the road, thinking he might have fallen off or simply taken the horse into the wood so he could sleep. We didn’t find him and by then it was getting dark, so we returned to Osney and went to bed. But the horse returned in the night.”

  “Oh.” Magdalene felt herself pale. “That is not good news at all.”

  “There was no blood! I examined the saddle and the beast itself almost hair by hair. No blood. No sign of strain or scuffing on the stirrups.” He took a deep breath. “That was when I came back to Oxford and began to try to find where he had gone. And after asking all those questions and learning so little, I cursed myself for a fool and thought the likeliest place he would go would be to a whorehouse. It would even explain the horse, if he left it tied in front and it got loose. So I came here—Jules had mentioned the place—and once I was here I asked the whoremistress for you because I remembered the landlord had said you spoke to Jules at The Broached Barrel.”

  “He did not come here, apparently. Florete knew him and would have…no, she might not if he paid her to…”

  Magdalene gestured for Ormerod to stay put and went out the door to speak to the whoremistress. When she returned she shook her head at Ormerod.

  “I thought he might have paid Florete to say he was not here. When I spoke to him, he sounded resentful of his sister’s watchful care. But Florete would not lie to me. Jules was not here last night, and neither was I. Bell and I went to Noke to fetch back Niall Arvagh and Mistress Loveday for an audience with the king.”

  There was a silence. Then Ormerod said, “He had no money… I mean above a few pence in farthings to pay for his drink. Where could he have gone? No, he went nowhere because the horse came back alone.” Another silence followed before Ormerod asked, very softly, “Do you think he is dead, Magdalene?”

  She bit her lip and tears came into her eyes. “We should not have asked what he saw that night. The back door of the alehouse was open. But he said again and again that he saw nothing, and it was noisy inside, and we were not shouting. Oh, I am so sorry if any hurt befell him. But Bell warned him and I warned him, too, to go right home.”

  She remembered that neither she nor Bell had believed completely what Jules said and wondered if it had been his expression that betrayed him, which no one in the alehouse could have seen, or something in his body or voice. If his tone had betrayed him, a listener might have taken alarm. Magdalene put a hand across her lips to still their trembling and sniffed.

  “No. Let us not believe the worst, not yet. What did the stableman say? Did Jules himself take his horse? Was he too drunk to ride? Could he have fallen right near the stable and then crawled away to sleep in a corner?”

  “Of course he took his own…no, I don’t know. When I was with him, I dragged him with me to the stable so he could walk off the drink a little, but now I remember that the landlord of The Broached Barrel was going to send a boy to get Jules’s horse. I didn’t speak to the stableman. I saw the horse was not in its usual stall and rode out again. It was a different man this morning. He hadn’t seen Jules.”

  “A different man?” Magdalene said faintly, then shook herself. “No. I will not think horrors. Come, Lord Ormerod, I will go to the stable with you—”

  “You? What do you know about horses or saddling or how to talk to stablemen?” He stood up and looked down at her. “Besides, if what I fear is true then what happened to Jules is likely your fault. What business is it of yours to be interfering with the law and hunting a murderer? Is your life so clean? Or were you trying to warn the killer? Who knows what a whore will do for money?”

  Magdalene was so shocked by the sudden attack from a man who had always been civil to her, despite being well aware of what she was, that she simply sat staring at him as he whirled away from her and flung himself out of the room, slamming the door behind him. Then a wave of fury hit her, and she rose to her feet stiffly, feeling for her pocket. She had a sudden impulse to pay Rand and Ogden to follow Ormerod to the stable and lesson him to mind his tongue.

  She sank back down on the stool before she touched the coins. How stupid! Rand and Ogden were doubtless known to the sheriff, and beating a nobleman could only get Florete in trouble. Then she blinked, recognizing the reason for her own fury, had she not been missaid far worse before? She was angry because she felt guilty for any harm that came to Sir Jules, and Lord Ormerod’s fury was not really directed at her at all but at himself for not having been with Jules, of whom he was truly fond.

  Yes, likely he was, Magdalene thought, but even so, would not Lord Ormerod’s guilt and thus his fury be even more intense if he was half-hoping that Jules was lying dead somewhere? That would surely make Marguerite the heir to the entire Osney estate and a real prize for his brother. And if Ormerod had already killed St. Cyr so that Jules could marry Loveday, would it not be that much easier to kill again?

  Magdalene shook herself like a dog ridding its fur of something unpleasant. Nonsense. She had known Lord Ormerod for nearly five years, from the time he was a blushing boy, and she knew him for a good-hearted man. She sighed. But he did love his lands and held what was his in a tight grip. If he felt Jules was misusing his land and thus robbing his brother of what would rightfully be his… No, she told herself, surely she was making this all up in her head. Surely Jules would turn up none the worse for his absence except for his aching head and empty gut.

  She went to fetch her sewing basket from the shelf and drew out the ribbon she was embroidering for Ella, fixing her mind on trying to recall what she had decided about the next row of flowers. Having remembered and planned the pattern, she chose a yellow thread to do the knots that would be the heart of the flower, but put it down again at the scratch on her door.

  “Come,” she called, then grabbed for the scissors from the basket, fearing that it was Ormerod returning to tell her Jules was dead and attack her to punish her. She had welcomed him once, and Florete would never think to have her men stop him.

  Even as the thought came, she dropped the scissors and laughed. A man bent on beating a woman does not scratch politely on the door. And when the door opened, it was the whore Hertha who poked her head in. Geneva followed close on her heels.

  “You said you wanted to hear anything even faintly connected to St. Cyr?”

  “Yes,” Magdalene said, and gestured to the other stools near the table.

  The two women seated themselves and Hertha said, “The looby was in again yesterday, late. It would have been near Vespers.” Then she shrugged. “He didn’t mention St. Cyr, though. All he kept talking about was how good his memory is and how he remembered—”

  “Yes he did,” Geneva said. “It was when he was standing by Florete’s table. He was arranging to have you at the same time each day—”

  Hertha nodded and groaned, then almost smiled. “He isn’t so bad. He’s in and out in no time and he doesn’t hit. If he didn’t smell so bad…” Then she giggled. “I wonder if he can remember the way he said. I told him he should take a bath and he blinked at me, stupid as an owl, but he said he would. If he’s clean when he comes tomorrow—”

  “What did he say about St. Cyr?�
� Magdalene asked, but she could not help smiling at the women and hoping that Manville d’Arras would take a bath.

  “He said that Aimery—he always calls him Aimery, not St. Cyr—was cleverer than he, but that when Aimery needed something remembered, like where he had left something to be repaired, it was he, Arras, who remembered.”

  “Interesting,” Magdalene remarked, feeling in her pocket for farthings, “but I don’t see it gets us any further toward who murdered St. Cyr. What else did Arras talk about?”

  “Nothing to do with St. Cyr, not even his will, which he was so full of the last time he came. This time he was going on and on about where the bishop of Salisbury’s men were lodged. He seemed to think it was very funny that they were in St. Peter’s churchyard out in the rain because the church isn’t big enough to hold them all.”

  “He thought that was funny?” Magdalene asked.

  “Yes, because there were some half-empty lodgings just across the road.” Hertha shrugged. “Oh, yes, it was St. Cyr who told him that and when I asked Arras why it made him laugh, he said that Aimery had laughed when he told him that might happen. Sorry. That was another time he mentioned St. Cyr.”

  “There was something else,” Geneva said, “which is why I stuck myself in here. His voice is very loud and after he talked about the empty lodging, he laughed and said, ‘I’ve got you. I’ve got you.’ Likely it doesn’t mean anything, but when I asked Hertha about it, she said she remembered him calling out but he was just about to spill his seed, and she thought it was that that made him cry out. But it didn’t sound like that to me,’ Geneva added, a bit defensively, as if she were afraid Magdalene wouldn’t credit her tale. “Usually he just chokes and gurgles, and you did say ‘anything,’ so I thought I’d come and tell you.”

  Magdalene laid the two farthings she had removed from her pocket on the table. “I don’t know what it means, if anything, but I’m glad you came to me. For one thing, I’m glad the man is alive and well. Yesterday at Noke Manor he was swearing that he would find St. Cyr’s killer and be avenged for the loss of his friend. It is a relief to me that his mind is fixed on something else now. I doubt that finding the plight of Salisbury’s men amusing will get him into any more serious trouble than a beating.”

  “One more thing was a little odd,” Hertha said. “He paid Florete to be sure I would be free tomorrow, then a man left Chloris’s room, that’s the one right near the outside door. Arras watched his back—the way one does sometimes watch someone moving away—then he said to me he’d see me tomorrow. But his face…his mind moves so slowly you can almost see him thinking. Anyway, he didn’t even finish his sentence, but went out the door.”

  Magdalene frowned. “Did you recognize Chloris’s client?”

  “No,” Hertha said, and there was nothing in her manner that hinted to Magdalene that she was lying to protect the man.

  “Never really saw him,” Geneva agreed. “Just a glimpse of dark hair and a shoulder in a red cloak going out the door.”

  Red cloak. Half the men she knew, including Bell, wore red cloaks. Magdalene dismissed that. “Do you think Arras was following the man who had left Chloris?”

  Both whores pursed their lips thoughtfully. “I don’t think he was,” Geneva said. “It was as if he remembered something and intended to take care of it.”

  “You only say that because you heard him say he remembered things.” Hertha was clearly annoyed. “What were you doing there anyway?”

  “I had come out to—”

  ‘To see if you could snatch a customer from me,” Hertha snapped.

  “Well, the way you groan and complain every time he shows up, I thought you would be glad to be rid of him.”

  Geneva snatched up her farthing, got to her feet, and walked out. Hertha said angrily, “She wouldn’t leave the rest of us a single man if she could. I told her not to come with me. You’ve just wasted a farthing on her.”

  “Maybe so.” Magdalene smiled. “But it isn’t my farthing, so it is easier to part with. And to speak the truth, I don’t know what will be useful. Nothing I’ve heard today, I suspect. Still…I am still ready to pay for anything Arras says, or if anyone asks about St. Cyr.”

  “I will listen,” Hertha said, also picking up her farthing and going out.

  Magdalene worked on Ella’s ribbon for a time, thinking over what the women had told her. She hoped Geneva had been wrong about Arras’s exclamation, just trying to earn another farthing. She also hoped his sudden departure had nothing to do with the man he had seen leaving—she must ask Chloris if she knew the man. It was some comfort to her that Arras had talked about nothing except the lodging of the bishop of Salisbury’s men. Probably he could hold no more than one idea in his head at a time.

  She began to feel hungry and put aside her embroidery to tell Diccon to go out and get her a meal, but she heard the rain pouring down so she picked up the embroidery again. Most of the time she was grateful for the almost mindless quality of the work, which permitted her to listen while hiding her expression from impatient clients. But today she wished it held her thoughts better to exclude Arras and Sir Jules.

  Eventually the rain eased off and she stepped out to give Diccon her order. She found that Rand was going as well as the boy. None of the whores wanted to go out in the rain and Florete had collected a sum that would cover meals for everyone. Magdalene gladly contributed her portion, then added four more farthings and asked to have three meals brought to her.

  “The men are supposed to feed you!” Florete remarked dryly, “Not you them.”

  Magdalene laughed. “It is not a matter of money with Bell. You saw the meal he sent in the other day. And William…well, he pays me generously enough so that I would be ashamed to charge him for a meal here and there. Anyway, it is just to be sure. I doubt either of them will come today—they are both tied up at Court—but Bell will probably spend the night.” She grinned, wrinkling her nose. “Likely Diccon will eat very well this afternoon and tomorrow morning.”

  Since the rain had discouraged custom, the Soft Nest was quiet and Magdalene sat down beside Florete to gossip, as she had been longing to do since she arrived.

  “I hope I did no wrong in sending Hertha and Geneva to you,” the whoremistress said. “I was afraid they were just spinning tales to winkle out another farthing or two from you, but you did say you wanted to hear anything about the looby—Florete grinned suddenly “—and I figured you were old enough and wise enough to be rid of them if they had nothing to tell you.”

  Magdalene grinned back. “And you have to deal with them day by day, so it is better for me, who will soon be gone from Oxford, to disappoint them than for you to try to keep them away from me.”

  “Exactly!” Florete said, giggling. Then her eyes filled suddenly with tears. “Oh, Magdalene, it is so good to talk to someone who understands and has no bitterness. How? How do you keep your spirit so light?”

  “Because God, or perhaps the Merciful Mother, has been very good to me.”

  “To make you a whore?”

  Magdalene put her hand over Florete’s. “If you knew from what I fled to whoredom, you would agree. And beyond that, I have William to protect me—”

  “And a handsome young lover to make up for any lacks in your great patron’s looks and ability.” Florete glanced sidelong at Magdalene.

  “It is more than that with Bell,” Magdalene admitted. “We laugh at the same things and we think about many things the same way, we have the same kind of curiosity, too. Bell will worry away at St. Cyr’s death until he finds the truth…and so will I.”

  Florete shuddered. “While I would be only too glad to forget it, no matter who did it. Which brings me back to the looby. Did he say anything that might be useful to you?”

  “No, he seems to have been distracted from his friend’s death to the problem of lodging the bishop of Salisbury’s men—in which, thank God and all His saints, I have no interest at all. I thought he was going to make trouble ab
out…ah…that girl’s betrothal—” Magdalene’s voice checked suddenly and she caught her breath. Loveday’s betrothal! How St. Cyr had learned that Loveday was an heiress! Heaven help her, she had forgotten that she must tell Raoul de Samur at once about the hidey hole in Waleran’s house. Or should she tell William first? No, Niall would tell William, he probably had told him already. She glanced out the door and saw that the rain was little more than a fine mist now.

  “I have just remembered that I must speak with Raoul de Samur. He is one of Lord Waleran’s captains.”

  If Florete was surprised by Magdalene’s truncated first remark and the non sequitur that followed it, she gave no sign of it. All she said was, “As soon as he returns, Diccon can carry a message to Samur.”

  “No. No. I do not want anyone in Waleran’s lodging to know Samur received a message. Can one of your girls go, perhaps acting as if she were just seeking custom? Geneva. She was the one who lay with Samur a few days ago, so she need not say she is from the Soft Nest or that I wish to speak to him. He will guess. Let her name another whorehouse if anyone might hear her invite him to come back with her. I will pay, of course.” Then Magdalene snorted lightly and grinned. “Perhaps she should pay me. From what I hear, she is always seeking customers. She may find a few more in that lodging.” Florete looked toward the closed curtain of the cocking chamber. “She is with someone right now, but will find a way to be rid of him, I am sure, when Rand gets back with the meal. You can talk to her then.”

  So Magdalene asked for Chloris, but when Ogden fetched her out, she could remember nothing about the man who had gone into the corridor when Arras was there. In fact, she was not at all sure which day or which man Magdalene wanted her to remember, until Magdalene mentioned the red cloak. Then she nodded recognition but she could still say little. He had offended her by asking about the other whores while he was futtering her, and he might have been a gentleman from his speech because his English was halting. His face? Chloris shrugged. Who looked at them? It was a face. He had dark hair…or maybe it was only wet with sweat.