by Mel Starr
Three grooms sat about a smoldering fire. They had looked up when we appeared and were watching my brief conversation with Sir John intently. Sir John turned to one of these and said, “Fetch Ranulf.” The man stood from his log and hurried away.
Ranulf did not immediately appear. When he did so he was as disheveled as Sir John and rubbing sleep from his eyes. The man had grown old and toothless in Sir John’s service. Likely he was once young and full of vigor, but now he was bent and scrawny. His hair was a tangled grey circlet about his bare skull, and his eyes were pale with cataracts. I wondered why such a doddering fellow was a part of Sir John’s company on campaign. And this was the man who saw me and Arthur with Sir Simon in the night? I doubted that he could identify a man in daylight from more than ten paces away. Indeed, he seemed to look past me when I spoke to him, able to see clearly only those things and men not directly before his gaze. ’Tis no wonder Sir John did not wish to name the fellow as he who saw me with Sir Simon.
I required of Ranulf that he follow me to Lord Gilbert’s tents. I wanted him away from Sir John’s influence, and in a place where his master could not hear the replies he made to my questions. He looked inquiringly to Sir John, as if to ask if he must do this, and Sir John replied by turning and entering his tent.
I sat the fellow upon a bench before my tent, walked a few paces from him, and held three fingers before my chest. I asked Ranulf how many fingers he saw. The man turned his gaze aside and squinted in the direction of my voice.
“How many fingers am I holding before you?” I repeated.
After more squinting and shifting himself upon the bench the man replied. “Four,” he said.
“Three,” I replied. “You cannot count fingers whilst it is day, but you claim to have seen me with Sir Simon after darkness had fallen, on a cloudy night with no moon till past midnight. How can this be so?”
“Heard you an’ Sir Simon.”
“You recognize voices?”
“Aye. Don’t see so well, but me ears is good. Knew Sir Simon’s voice.”
“You have not heard me speak until this hour. Why did you tell Sir John ’twas me who accompanied Sir Simon?”
“’Cause of what you said, an’ what Sir Simon replied.”
“What was said to Sir Simon?”
“‘Best keep your dagger sheathed next time,’ you said. An’ Sir Simon said, ‘Next time you’ll not have it from me.’ All Sir John’s men know of you seizin’ Sir Simon’s dagger. That’s ’ow I knew ’twas you with ’im.”
“And you claim that, although you cannot see well, you heard the conversation clearly?”
“Aye, I did.”
“At what hour did you hear this?”
“Why d’you ask? You was there, speakin’ to Sir Simon.”
“Nay. ’Twas not me nor any other of Lord Gilbert’s men that you heard. And why were you following Sir Simon about in the night?”
“Wasn’t. Goin’ to yon wood to relieve myself an’ come upon you an’ Sir Simon goin’ same way.”
“How many paces were you from Sir Simon when you heard this conversation?”
“Dunno. Don’t see so well.”
“Hazard a guess.”
Ranulf was silent for a moment. Perhaps he understood what I was about to do. “Ten paces,” he finally said.
“Arthur,” I said, “walk ten paces toward that wood, then say something. Face away from us, as Sir Simon would have been turned away from Ranulf if he was behind and following Sir Simon.”
Arthur did so. “This fellow is likely deaf as well as blind,” he said. I could only just make out the words myself.
“What did my man say?” I asked Ranulf.
“He said I’m near dead an’ a blunderer.”
I turned to Arthur, who had rejoined us. “Repeat what you said.”
He did so.
“He never said that,” Ranulf protested.
“Aye, I did so, an’ true it is. You hear little an’ see less.”
“’Tis my belief,” I said, “that you heard nothing of daggers, either sheathed or otherwise. After you heard Sir Simon speak to his companion, which way then did they go? Could you see that?”
“Toward the sun, which was near to setting. I could see that well enough.”
Sir John had told all that I was seen with Sir Simon after sunset. Why? Had Ranulf changed his story? Had he been told to do so? Did it make a difference?
Ranulf pointed as he spoke, in the direction of Couzeix.
“And two men were with Sir Simon, so you say. Did they both speak?”
“Dunno. That great lout is ever with you, so Sir John does say.”
“So shadows were long, ’twas evening, you could see little, and you heard two voices. But you did not see three men. Is this not so?”
“Aye,” he admitted.
“Did you hear any other conversation?”
I asked this, but did not expect a helpful answer. I was wrong. Again.
“Aye. Sir Simon an’ you, or whoever ’twas, began to speak in low voices, like they knew some man might be about. Mayhap they seen me. But then the other fellow cried out, ‘Go your own way, then. I’m done with you.’”
“This was a shout? And not Sir Simon?”
“Aye. Couldn’t mistake that. Whole camp might’ve ’eard, was that loud.”
Ranulf’s ears functioned little better than his eyes, but I was inclined to believe his report. Even an aged man might hear plainly words bellowed in anger.
If Sir Simon then went his own way, where was that? Couzeix? And where did the other man go? Was it he who surprised Sir Simon and the lass? If so, ’twas likely he who slew Sir Simon. What did the two men say in hushed tones which caused them to part in anger? If I knew that, I might know the felon who came upon Sir Simon and Heloise.
Whoever the man was, he and Sir Simon had been friends, else they would not have gone off together in the evening. Friends may fall out, and it seemed now likely that this had happened the evening Sir Simon was slain.
I admonished Ranulf that if he remembered anything else of that encounter with Sir Simon and the other, he must seek me and tell me of it. Arthur and I then led him back to Sir John’s camp. I suppose he would have found his way on his own. As we returned I asked why Sir John required an aged man with clouded vision to accompany him on this campaign.
“Didn’t demand it of me. I wished to go.”
“Why so? You are of an age when a man might rest and savor the few days he has remaining before he meets the Lord Christ.”
“When you have become old you will understand,” Ranulf said. “I was with Sir John at Poitiers. No man wishes to find himself useless. I’ll die soon, I know this. May as well be in battle as in bed.”
Perhaps when I am old and decrepit I will understand better Ranulf’s view.
Sir John stood when we approached. “So … have you threatened my man so to make him change his report?”
“No threat, but his tale is now somewhat unlike what it was. Ranulf can neither see nor hear well, but you have charged me with felony upon his witness. He could not see who was with Sir Simon Saturday eve, nor could he hear what was said. You put words into his mouth to entangle me in your son’s murder, even before you knew if his death was mischance or murder. Do you hate me so that you would see me hang rather than the true malefactor? Or did you think that you could be rid of me, then seek the true villain when I was in my grave?”
As I spoke I saw that Sir John yet held his head askew. He was pale, his brow furrowed with puzzlement or pain.
“Thought it was likely you or some other of Lord Gilbert’s men who slew him. You had cause, I know.”
“So I did. Others did also. Few men esteemed your son, I have learned.”
Sir John shrugged, admitting silently to the truth of the assertion, then reached a hand to his right ear and cupped it gently. I saw him grimace.
“You are in pain?”
“Aye.”
“Your ea
r aches?”
“It does.”
“For how long have you been vexed?”
“Two days.”
“And the pain grows greater?”
“Aye. Can’t sleep for the hurt.”
That explained Sir John’s disheveled appearance when I approached his tents earlier. Indeed, his countenance was little improved even now that the day was no longer new.
“You bein’ a surgeon, have you a remedy for such an affliction?”
The thought crossed my mind that Sir John, who had plotted evil against me, should suffer for his iniquity. But I then remembered a scripture I had read in my Bible shortly before departing Bampton. The Lord Christ commanded that we not return evil for evil, but do good to those who would use us ill. This, I admit, I did not want to do. I suspect that the Lord Christ did not wish to die for my sins, either, but He did so.
“There are potions which may sometimes ease such discomfort,” I said.
“Sometimes?” Sir John replied.
“Not all aches are caused by the same disorder.”
“Have you the potions of which you speak?”
“I have with me some of the ingredients. I came with Lord Gilbert prepared to deal with wounds and injuries, not earaches and scrofulous sores and such.”
“I will be much obliged to you if you can offer me relief,” Sir John said softly. He understood how little he warranted my service after the accusation he had made against me, but pain drove him to abase himself and beg my charity. The ache must have been severe for him to do so.
“I have within my tent a chest which contains herbs that may bring you relief. I will go and prepare an ointment. You know where Lord Gilbert’s camp is.”
Sir John nodded, then grimaced as his ache reminded him to hold his head quiet.
“Come to my tent in an hour. I will have the balm ready.”
I had within my chest three of the ingredients I would need to treat Sir John’s affliction: root of monkshood, savin leaves, and seeds of henbane. I crushed a dozen henbane seeds in a small cup, then ground savin leaves and a small fragment of monkshood root into the mixture till all was as fine as grains of pepper. This I then blended with a syrup of crushed poppy seeds which I make each year from the poppies that grow in wild profusion in fields about Bampton.
I was concluding the preparation when I heard Arthur greet Sir John. Sir John’s pain had driven him to my tent early. I had warned Arthur that the knight would soon arrive and not to take his coming amiss.
Arthur held the tent flap aside for Sir John to enter. I told the knight to recline upon my pallet with his aching ear up, then took a small funnel and poured some of my concoction into his ear. To keep the liquid from draining from Sir John’s ear, I folded a small scrap of wool and stuffed it into the ear. I told Sir John he could then rise.
“That’s all?” he said.
“I have prepared an ointment which is often effective for afflictions like yours. Here is a small vial of what remains. Have a groom pour some into your ear morning and night, then replace the scrap of wool so the potion will remain to do its work.”
Sir John took the vial and said, “What is owed for this relief?”
Sir John is a wealthy man, and deserves no consideration from me, so I was tempted to ask an excessive fee. But I thought better of it. What good a heavy purse if it drags a man down to hell?
“Three pence,” I said.
Sir John produced the coins and turned to leave with his vial, but I asked him to again be seated. He did so with a quizzical expression upon his face.
I said, “You have heard, I suppose, what Ranulf thought he heard of the conversation between your son and some other man. Much of this was mistaken, as you well know, for Ranulf can neither see nor hear well. But I give credence to one thing he claims to have heard. He said that Sir Simon seemed to part from the other man in ill temper. The other fellow shouted, ‘Go your own way, then. I’m done with you.’
“If some man in anger said that he was done with Sir Simon, that man must have had to do with him until that falling out. And when Sir Simon left your camp Saturday evening it is likely he would have done so in company with a friend.
“Who were your son’s closest companions? Do any of these now seem out of sorts, or look away rather than meet your eye?”
Sir John sat upon my pallet absent-mindedly stroking his aching ear as he considered my question. He did not soon reply. I believe he found it distasteful to provide me with the names of Sir Simon’s friends, and thereby cast suspicion upon them, when likely all but one were innocent of his son’s blood. Perhaps all were, but I doubted so.
“John de Boys and Simon were friends. Roger Wrawe and Richard Heryng also.” Sir John then fell silent. Three friends. I was not surprised that Sir John could name no more. And if Sir Simon’s friends resembled him, dealing with them would be vexatious. Perhaps it was well that the man had few friends. ’Twould make my work the easier.
“Are any of these knights?” I asked.
“Nay. Gentlemen. John, I think, will be knighted soon. Roger and Richard are but lads.”
“Say nothing to these men of this conversation, but watch their behavior.”
Sir John slowly shook his head. His beard, already grey when he was sheriff of Oxford some years past, had grown long and unkempt whilst on this campaign, and was now nearly white.
“Can’t believe one of them would have pitched him into a well,” he said.
“Easier to believe it of me, eh?”
“When a man dies, ’tis always assumed he was slain at the hands of an enemy, not a friend.”
“True enough,” I said. “But friends fall out, and I believe this has happened. The man who murdered Sir Simon was one of the three you have named, I’ll wager, or some other whose name has not yet occurred to you. If some other man comes to mind, send me word.”
“What do you intend?”
“I do not yet know.”
This was true. But had I already a scheme in mind, I would not have told Sir John of it.
An hour later I had consumed my dinner – pottage, of course – and was considering methods whereby I might ferret out truth from Sir Simon’s friends, when I heard a muffled roar from over the ridge beyond which lay Limoges.
Arthur and I exchanged glances, then rose and hurried to learn what had caused the clamor. As we topped the hill I saw wisps of smoke from near the wall and understood what this meant. The Cornish miners had completed their excavation and the shaft’s support beams had been set alight. The timbers were recently hewn from a nearby wood, and so were green. What began as grey wisps issuing from the shed became a thickening cloud as the blaze began to gnaw at the damp beams.
Lord Gilbert had said that undermining the wall, then setting the supports afire, was not assured of success in bringing down the wall. And even if the work achieved this goal, the fire might burn for several days before it consumed the beams and collapsed the wall.
Nearly all of the English army was by this time upon the hill overlooking Limoges. A few knights and men-at-arms had donned their armor, archers leaned upon their bows, and many infantrymen wore their padded aketons and grasped poleaxes and halberds. All was ready if and when the wall collapsed.
I stood watching alongside the others, but I was still turning my puzzle over in my mind. Heloise had placed Sir Simon’s chauces and braes in the Easter Sepulcher, but when I found the garments no shoes or dagger were there. Had the lass taken these? If so, why not take the other clothing also? Or did the murderer take shoes and dagger?
If the felon was a friend to Sir Simon he would not wear the shoes or be seen with the dagger, but mayhap he concealed them in some hidden place, to use or sell at some future time.
I looked about at the English warriors who waited expectantly to see a section of Limoges’s wall crumble. I saw some of Sir John’s men, but he seemed not to be among them. Perhaps his aching ear caused him to remain in his tent. If so, he might be the only man
of his company to do so. This presented an opportunity if ’twas so.
I gathered Arthur and Uctred and told them we must hasten back to the camp. Their eyes questioned this. Surely they wished to remain. Who would want to miss seeing a city wall tumble? How many times in a lifetime might a man view such a spectacle?
I trotted down the ridge with Arthur and Uctred puffing behind. Running is not an exercise in which Arthur excels. Uctred may once have been swift upon his feet, but the years have taken a toll. I slowed to a rapid walk before we arrived at the tents so as not to outpace my companions.
Arthur and Uctred were yet breathless when we stopped before Sir John’s tent. While they caught their breath I called to Sir John, unsure if he was within or not, and unwilling to enter without his consent.
I called his name a second time and heard the rustle of fabric and a stifled groan. Sir John, or some page perhaps, was within, but I thought it unlikely that a page would have cause to moan in pain.
“Who is it?” Sir John said. “Who’s there?”
“Master Hugh. I must have words with you. ’Tis urgent.”
Sir John was silent for some time. I wondered if he had swooned. “Very well. Enter,” he finally said.
I told Arthur and Uctred to remain at the entrance to the tent and call out if any man approached, then drew the flap aside and entered. Sir John sat upon his bed, his features yet contorted with pain.
“The potion has not succeeded,” he said, assuming that to be the reason for my appearance.
“’Twill need several days to do its work,” I replied. “I should have warned you of that. ’Tis why I sent the vial with you and told you to apply the ointment twice each day.
“But I am come upon another matter. You alone of your company are at camp rather than watching to learn if the wall of Limoges will fall.”
“Aye. I am useless in a fight as I now am.”
“In which of your tents do de Boys, Wrawe, and Heryng sleep?”
“What do you intend?”
“I told you of Sir Simon’s clothes being found in the Easter Sepulcher of the Couzeix church. But neither his shoes nor his dagger have been found. Perhaps the man who slew him took them. I cannot identify his shoes, but I know his dagger. It might be profitable to search his friends’ possessions. If Sir Simon’s dagger is found where it ought not be, we will know who sent him to meet the Lord Christ.”
