A Head for Poisoning

by Simon Beaufort

  “We have already secured ourselves some lodgings,” said Helbye, clearly pleased not to be riding farther that day. “It is not grand accommodation, but it is better than a tree root in the small of the back.”

  Geoffrey left the others to their preparations for an evening of dice with the soldiers in the King’s guard, while he went to see to his destrier. It was with some difficulty that he made the stable-boy understand that only Aumary’s war-horse—not Geoffrey’s—was to be transferred to the area reserved for the King’s personal mounts. Reasonably satisfied that his own horse would be there for him to reclaim in the morning, he found a place to sleep and then ate a large, rich meal with some knights in the King’s retinue, where he drank more than was wise.

  But later, as he tried to sleep, his head swam with questions, despite his serious attempt to induce a state of drunken forgetfulness. Why had someone killed Aumary? The documents that the knight had bragged about so much had not been stolen, and neither had the scrap of parchment with the recipe for horse liniment. Had Geoffrey disturbed the killer before he had been given a chance to complete a search of the body? But in that case, why had Geoffrey not been shot, too?

  Aumary was vainglorious and shallow, and Geoffrey had suspected from the start that he had deliberately lent his letters more importance than they deserved in order to enhance his standing with his fellow-travellers. It was true that the King had been pleased to learn that his castle of Domfront was turning a tidy profit, and might have rewarded Aumary well for bringing him such good news, but it was scarcely the crucial missive the knight had claimed to carry.

  So, had the recipe for horse liniment been some coded message that the King alone could decipher? Geoffrey had seen that particular scrap of parchment on several occasions—Aumary had used it to wrap the cloves he constantly chewed to alleviate the stench of his rotten breath. Had this casual use of the parchment been a ploy to divert attention away from it until it could be handed to the King? Or was even Aumary unaware of the alleged importance of his clove wrapper?

  Geoffrey frowned up at the wooden rafters of the bedchamber and considered. Aumary might well have thrown the parchment away or carelessly mislaid it if he had not appreciated its importance, and as a means of conveying an important message to the King, it was risky at best. The more Geoffrey thought about it, the more he came to believe that the parchment was nothing, and that the King had merely pretended to have discovered something crucial in it in order to make any onlookers think that Aumary had been killed because of a vital message.

  And that suggested to Geoffrey that the King knew more about Aumary’s death than he intended to tell. He had not even questioned Caerdig about the attack, and had accepted Geoffrey’s concise account of the botched ambush without a single question. Did the King know, or suspect, that the attack might have been orchestrated by Geoffrey’s brothers, and that Geoffrey and not Aumary, had been the intended victim?

  But, Geoffrey reasoned, the King doubtless had his fingers in a good many pies, and Aumary’s death was probably nothing to do with the affairs at Goodrich Castle. Since he was not going to deduce anything conclusive without more evidence, Geoffrey dismissed Aumary from his mind, and thought about his family.

  Could there be any truth in the King’s conviction that Godric was being poisoned? Geoffrey was reluctant to think that one of his brothers would stoop to so despicable an act as to attempt the death of their father by slow poisoning. He could very well imagine that one of them—especially the fiery Henry—might lash out in anger and kill on a sudden impulse, but the cold, premeditated act of sentencing their father to a lingering death was another matter entirely.

  He took a deep breath and watched the shifting smoke, which filled the room because the chimney needed sweeping. As to the other matter—keeping the Goodrich estates from the Earl of Shrewsbury’s grasping hands—Geoffrey did not imagine for an instant that any of his kinsmen would allow Shrewsbury or anyone else to take Goodrich while there was still breath in their bodies.

  As his eyes closed and he finally drifted into a restless doze, he made the firm resolution that he would stay in England only long enough to ensure that one of his grasping siblings inherited Goodrich from the dying Godric—which one he did not care—and then ride for France as fast as his destrier would take him.

  The copious amounts of wine he had imbibed meant that Geoffrey slept a good deal later the following day than he had intended, and the sun was already high in the sky before he emerged from his lodgings. He was not the only one—Barlow had also drunk far too much the previous night and was in no state to travel. Meanwhile, Helbye was nowhere to be found, and it was some time before Geoffrey tracked him down to a brothel near the river. And Ingram was involved in some complex negotiations to buy a donkey from one of the King’s grooms and insisted that such delicate transactions could not be hurried.

  It was noon before they were saddled up and ready to leave. Caerdig and his man appeared from nowhere, evidently planning on making the most of an armed escort through the outlaw-ridden Forest of Dene. Geoffrey ignored them all, and bent to check the straps on his horse’s girth.

  “It is high time we were back at Lann Martin,” said Caerdig, glancing at the sky. “I heard in a tavern last night that the King knows all about Godric being poisoned, and is very concerned about it. King Henry does not worry for nothing, and so we should hurry before one of your kin has his way and I have some crazed murderer for a neighbour.”

  “Most Normans are crazed murderers,” said the Saxon Ingram, not without admiration. “That is what makes them such superb warriors. I wish I were a Norman.”

  “Do you mean you wish you were a superb warrior or a crazed murderer?” asked Geoffrey, favouring him with a cool stare. “I do not think that one necessarily leads to the other.”

  His attention strayed to the scratch on his mount’s leg, and he led it away from the two young soldiers to see if the animal limped. They watched Geoffrey critically.

  “He does altogether too much thinking,” muttered Ingram to Barlow. “He would be better thinking less and … and …”

  “Killing more?” supplied Barlow helpfully.

  “It is all this reading and learning that has made him like he is,” Ingram continued. “It has brought him nothing but trouble. And I wager you half my treasure that it will only be a matter of time before it leads him to problems at home. His brothers are rightly very suspicious of a man with letters.”

  “What are you two mumbling about?” asked Helbye, looking up as he checked the buckles on his treasure bags.

  “We were just saying that learning and reading is the quickest way to the Devil,” said Ingram with passion, casting a defiant look at Geoffrey.

  “Quite right,” said Helbye sagely. “Reading is the surest way to end up in the Devil’s service.”

  “Then perhaps you should have a word with the Pope, and inform him that most of his monks are bound for Hell,” said Geoffrey mildly. “Because most churchmen can read.”

  Ingram glowered, and Geoffrey smiled at him, trying to coax a better mood out of the habitually surly man-at-arms. Geoffrey was popular with his soldiers, who liked his easy and pleasant manner—even if they were suspicious of his penchant for monkish pastimes, like reading. Ingram, however, was different, and had regarded Geoffrey with a deep distrust since he had first come under the knight’s command—mainly stemming from his inability to understand why Geoffrey did not always leap at the opportunity to indulge in a little unprovoked slaughter or impromptu pillaging.

  “Think about it, Ingram,” Geoffrey said. “How would you have had reliable news from home if it had not been for Enide’s letters to me? Reading and writing is not all bad.”

  Ingram pursed his lips and declined to answer.

  “Well, I would not trust anything important to a letter,” said Helbye firmly. “I sent a spoken message with Eudo of Rosse to tell my wife that I was coming home—Eudo was due to return here two weeks before
us. I did not send her one of those evil letters for all and sundry to be reading.”

  “‘All and sundry’ cannot read,” pointed out Geoffrey. “And anyway, how do you know your Eudo of Rosse did not tell ‘all and sundry’ every detail in your message to your wife?”

  “You wait and see,” said Helbye, after a brief moment of doubt. “My wife will be waiting for me to come home, while those of you who entrusted news of your return to letters—” here he paused to eye Ingram and Barlow disapprovingly—“will find that they are not expected.”

  “It would probably have been better to do both,” said Caerdig, sensing that here was a debate that was not the first time in the airing. “Then the letters would have reached home if the messenger had been delayed, and the messenger would have delivered the news if the letters had been lost. But Goodrich and Lann Martin are humming with the news that Sir Geoffrey is expected soon—that is why I knew who he was when he trespassed on my land—and so obviously some message or other arrived.”

  Bored with the discussion, Geoffrey dug his heels into his horse’s flanks, and went clattering out of the castle bailey. Caerdig, about to add his own opinion regarding the virtues and drawbacks of literacy, had to urge his own mount into a gallop in order to catch up with him.

  “So?” asked the Welshman, once they had cleared the cluster of shabby buildings that had grown up around the castle, and were riding through open countryside. “What did the King say yesterday? You still have not told me.”

  “The King believed Aumary to have been killed by unknown assailants because of a scrap of parchment the constable found,” said Geoffrey, carefully omitting the fact that the vital missive had been a recipe for horse liniment. “He did not ask for details of the ambush, and seemed satisfied with the account I gave him.”

  “And that was?” demanded Caerdig.

  Geoffrey sighed. “You heard. I said no more to King Henry than I told the constable—that Aumary was shot by an arrow as we travelled through the Forest of Dene.”

  “What did you tell him about me?” asked Caerdig.

  “Nothing!” said Geoffrey, beginning to be impatient. “He did not ask, so I did not mention you.”

  “You did not tell him about my role in the ambush?”

  “I have already answered that,” said Geoffrey curtly. “No.”

  “How do I know that you were not telling the King about it while you were whispering together away from my hearing?” pressed Caerdig.

  “Do you imagine that the King would allow you to ride away if he thought you were ambushing travellers in his forests?” asked Geoffrey, forcing himself not to lose his temper at Caerdig’s persistence.

  Caerdig fell silent, and Geoffrey led the way along the path that hugged the river. It was busy with farmers and traders going to and from the surrounding villages with their wares. Progress was slow, hampered by lumbering carts that groaned and creaked under the weight of unsold produce and that stuck fast in the clinging mud at every turn.

  As they rode, a wood-pigeon suddenly flapped noisily in the undergrowth, and in an instant Geoffrey had his sword half drawn. Caerdig regarded him askance.

  “It is only a bird,” he said. “What were you planning to do? Run it through, like a Saracen?”

  “Or shear its head from its shoulders?” called Ingram, who was riding immediately behind them.

  Caerdig whipped round in his saddle and glared with such ferocity at the young soldier that Ingram blanched and fell back. Geoffrey was puzzled, wondering what there had been in Ingram’s innocent jest to cause such a reaction, but decided that Caerdig had probably been irritated by the young soldier’s insolent contribution to a conversation that was none of his affair.

  Geoffrey put his weapon away. His reaction had been instinctive, and any of his fellow knights who had been on the Crusade would have done the same. Those who would not were long since dead.

  As dusk began to fall, the shadows lengthened and the path became empty. When it was too dark to negotiate the protruding roots and muddy surface, Geoffrey turned aside and arranged to spend the night in a rickety stable owned by a forester. The forester was reluctant to extend hospitality to seriously armed soldiers, but only the foolish declined the demand of a knight, and with bad grace he supplied fresh straw and gritty, flat bread for his unwelcome guests. When he had gone to his house and left them alone, Ingram pulled a sizeable piece of cheese from inside his jerkin.

  “Where did you get that?” asked Helbye in amazement. “We went nowhere near a market today.”

  “I hope you did not steal it from the King,” said Geoffrey, fixing Ingram with his steady gaze, and remembering the trestle tables piled high with food in the hall at Chepstow.

  Ingram shifted uncomfortably. “One of the serving wenches gave it to me last night. She took a fancy to a gallant young Crusader.”

  He grinned conspiratorially, but Geoffrey did not smile back. Ingram was playing a dangerous game, he thought—he was insolent to the knight he served, and he stole from the King. When Ingram offered him a piece of the cheese, he declined it, although no one else had any such scruples.

  Later, as his men slept, Geoffrey dozed lightly, leaning against the wall with his sword resting across his knees. Caerdig began to move nearer to him, rustling through the straw. The dog opened a malevolent eye at the disturbance, growled, and closed it again. Geoffrey’s fingers tightened their grip on the sword.

  “I do not understand you,” Caerdig said, when he had settled himself close enough to Geoffrey to avoid waking the others as he spoke. “You could have told the King that my people killed Sir Aumary, and then Lann Martin might have been yours.”

  “How many more times do I need to tell you?” said Geoffrey softly. “I do not want it. If I had wished to be a landlord, I could have had something ten times the size of Lann Martin in the Holy Land.”

  “But your brothers would have been pleased to have it for themselves,” pressed Caerdig. “What will they say when they hear that you missed such a valuable opportunity to acquire it for them?”

  “They can say what they like.” Geoffrey grinned at Caerdig in the darkness. “I will tell them that they should be grateful I did not tell the King what you suspected—that the arrow which killed Aumary was actually intended for me.”

  “That is no laughing matter,” said Caerdig severely. “You will not last long among the Mappestones if you underestimate them. My uncle Ynys underestimated them, and look what happened to him.”

  “What did happen to him?” asked Geoffrey. “You say he was killed by my brother Henry?”

  Caerdig was silent for a moment, and Geoffrey could hear him fiddling with the buckle on his belt.

  “There was a silly argument over our sheep—Henry claimed that they had broken a fence and grazed his pastureland. You know how Henry can be—he came spitting fire and demanding instant reparation. Bitter words were exchanged, and Henry threatened to kill Ynys. The next day, Ynys’s body was found. He had been killed by a hacking blow from a sword—as if someone had tried to sever his head from his body.”

  Geoffrey suddenly recollected Caerdig’s reaction to Ingram’s jest—about hacking a bird’s head from its shoulders—when Geoffrey had been quick to draw his sword earlier that day. Was that the reason for his curious response? Ingram had a spiteful tongue, and might have learned about the fate of Caerdig’s uncle in the taverns the previous night. Geoffrey would not put a deliberately provoking remark about such a matter past the malicious man-at-arms.

  Caerdig continued, suppressed rage making his voice unsteady. “Of course, there were no witnesses to the crime, and Henry denies having anything to do with it. But not many men are allowed to own swords in the woods—you know that swords are forbidden by the Forest laws—although Henry has permission to carry one. Henry has the Norman love of fighting and killing, even though he is no knight.”

  Geoffrey drummed his fingers on the conical helmet that lay at his side. “Was there no enquiry into th
e murder? Was the Earl of Hereford informed? He is overlord here, is he not?”

  “Hereford!” spat Caerdig in disgust. “He has no power in these parts. It is the Earl of Shrewsbury who is the dominant force in the border lands now.”

  “Shrewsbury, then,” Geoffrey said impatiently. “Did Shrewsbury look into Ynys’s death?”

  “He did, but he lost interest when he heard Ynys had named an heir—me—and that the lands were not lying vacant. All Shrewsbury did was to warn Henry not to do it again.”

  “Well, Henry is unlikely to kill Ynys a second time,” said Geoffrey wryly. “But it seems to me that the Earl of Shrewsbury is causing a number of problems in the border regions.”

  “I should say,” agreed Caerdig fervently. “He has been busy bribing the Welsh princes to back him against King Henry of England, should the need ever arise. But the Earl is not a man to act unless there is some benefit to be had for himself, and there was nothing to gain from Henry’s arrest for Ynys murder. It might even have had a negative effect, since the King, for some unaccountable reason, likes your brother Henry.”

  “What is said in these parts about the death of King William Rufus?” asked Geoffrey curiously. “It was rumoured in the Holy Land that King Henry had much to gain from his brother’s sudden and most convenient demise.”

  “So he did,” said Caerdig, startled by the sudden turn in conversation. He glanced around nervously. “But this is not a topic for wise men to be discussing in a barn with thin walls.”

  “Wise men do not ambush knights,” Geoffrey pointed out. “But what of Shrewsbury? Is there talk that he might have had something to do with the regicide?”

  “No,” said Caerdig, surprised. “Nothing was ever said against Shrewsbury. Why would Rufus’s death be advantageous to the Earl when Rufus liked him so? But King Henry had much to gain from Rufus’s death—if you suspect foul play, do not look to Shrewsbury, look to King Henry.”

  Geoffrey was silent, thinking. Few people openly questioned whether Rufus’s death was anything other than a terrible accident at the hands of the unlucky Tirel, although there were rumours and suspicions galore. But Tirel was protesting his innocence in France, and King Henry believed that the Earl of Shrewsbury had played a role in the death, while others believed Henry might know more of the matter than he was revealing. Who was lying and who was telling the truth? Geoffrey rubbed his eyes tiredly, and decided that he did not want to know anyway.