The Alehouse Murders tk-1

by Maureen Ash

  The bail was nearly deserted, with only a few guards at their posts on the wall, and a lone goatherd milking one of his herd. Bascot made his way to a small dank chamber set at one side of the old tower where, under cover of a stout stone arch, one of the castle wells was situated. With the aid of a bucket, he filled a large padded wooden tub with cold water, then stripped off his clothes and stepped into the soothing coolness. On a small table several tablets of soap made from wood ash and tallow were kept, and Bascot helped himself to one, scrubbing vigorously with a brush as he lathered away the sweat and dirt that had collected on his body. The water was quickly lined with scum, and once he had finished cleansing himself, he emptied the tub out onto the ground and rinsed himself off.

  As he did so, he thought of d’Arderon’s words again. Was the preceptor right-should he rejoin the Templars? Ruefully he looked down at the tub from which he had just stepped. He would have to go back to wearing the sheepskin drawers and lambskin girdle the Saracens had forced him to discard. There would no longer be the pleasure of washing his naked body all over as he had just done. A small price to pay for vowing service to the Lord? Perhaps. He did not know. As for Gianni-the boy was growing up, already there had been a rift, if a slight one, between them. Bascot had been too lenient, treating the lad as if he were an equal and not a servant. If the boy were to stay in his service, he-Bascot-would have to be more severe, show Gianni his place, not let the lad usurp his authority. Had he the heart to do that? Again, he did not know.

  He picked up a piece of rough linen from a pile that lay beside the supply of soap and began to towel himself dry. Life was difficult to understand. He knew that if he left the Order, he would be rootless, like a puff of sea spray blown onto an arid shore, left to dry and disappear forever. All the time he had been in the Holy Land there had always been, at the back of his mind, the thought of home-his father and brother, a new generation come from his sister-by-marriage’s swollen belly. Through imprisonment and torture there had always been that comforting thought, that he did not matter, he was only another soldier for Christ, his father’s line would carry on without his help. When he had returned to England he had been bowed, but not completely broken, looking forward to the consolation of his family, the security of the walls of his father’s keep. Within that sanctuary he would have been able to build up his strength, recover his faith and return to the Order.

  But now it was all gone, and with it his life, his meaning. It was he who should have died, not them. The pity he had felt for Gianni had been from the comfortable perspective of a knight of Christ and the member of a solid living family. It had been his intention to leave the lad in his father’s care, knowing the boy would be well looked after and would thrive. But instead he found that he and Gianni were two of a kind, both adrift, both lost and homeless. Perhaps that was why he had become so attached to the child, using him as an anchor against his own uncertainty. Sweet Jesu, where did his future lie? He did not know what it was that God wanted him to do, nor less did he know what he himself wanted.

  He looked down at the wet ground, felt the pain surge in his ankle now that his boot had been removed. Outside the bathhouse door the bail was deserted. Flies droned, the weak bleating of lambs could be heard in the afternoon heat. A discarded rag rolled lazily across the doorway. Did he belong here, in Lincoln? Part of it, yet not a part? Apart-wasn’t that what he had always been, as a child in the monastery, in the loneliness of his vows to the Order? Or was he wrong, was he a part of something after all? And if so, of what? He reminded himself of the vows he had taken-poverty, chastity, obedience. The first two were easy to follow, but the third… How could one be obedient when it was not clear in what direction that obedience lay? God had guided him unerringly through the web of lies and deceit that had surrounded Isobel Scothern’s crimes and, he had to admit, the fact that he had been the means whereby the souls of her victims had been granted retribution was very satisfying. But had he truly been an instrument of the Lord’s will or was his gratification causing him to be guilty of the sin of pride? He wished God would give him a similar assistance in determining the path of his own destiny.

  Bascot folded the towel and replaced it, then turned to pick up his clothes. As he did so, he caught the sense of a slight movement at the entrance to the bathhouse. It was Gianni. Slowly the boy came forward, holding Bascot’s clean tunic and hose in his arms. Without a change of his solemn expression, the lad held up the clothes for his master to take, then turned to fold up the discarded and soiled ones. When he had finished and Bascot had dressed, he raised his face to his master and Bascot could see tears welling in the lad’s eyes.

  “Does Lady Hilde no longer require your presence?” Bascot asked and Gianni shook his head. “Did she tell you to come back here and attend me?” Again the boy moved his head from side to side, then suddenly knelt and put his head down to his knees in an attitude of subjection.

  Bascot reached down and lifted him gently. “I think it is time we had something to eat. Go to the kitchens and get some food. Afterwards, you may practice your letters while I sleep. Then we shall return to the tourney field and join in the festivities.”

  Gianni raised his head, a smile beginning to form tremulously on his lips. With a quick movement, he had straightened and was running towards the castle kitchens, Bascot’s dirty clothing bundled under his arm. The Templar reached into the pouch at his belt and took out a candi. He felt light-headed-a transient, fleeting sense of freedom. It was not permanent, he knew, but he enjoyed it all the same. Perhaps God was giving him a direction after all. For the present, at least, he would remain in Lincoln.

  Epilogue

  Hamo, the templar serjeant that d’Arderon had sent on Bascot’s quest to discover the truth of dead Hugo’s identity, returned, as the preceptor had ordered, ten days after he had left. As expected, the young couple that had been slain were confirmed by the boy’s mother as Philip de Kyme’s illegitimate son and his wife. The distraught woman was herself prostrate with grief after receiving William Scothern’s letter telling of her son’s death only the day before Hamo’s arrival. She still planned to make a trip to the shrine of St. James in Compostella, this time to pray for her dead son’s soul instead of to give thanks for his good fortune.

  Isobel Scothern was never brought to answer the charge of murder before the king’s justices. The morning after the tourney she was found dead in her cell, a cup on the floor beside her which the infirmarian from the Priory of All Saints declared to contain the dregs of a strong distillation of foxglove leaves, a deadly poison.

  The elderly monk, called from his patients to examine the murderess’ body, had gently closed Isobel’s lids over her sightless amber-coloured eyes, murmuring as he did so, “By committing a mortal sin she has escaped her earthly judgement, but I fear her heavenly trial will be far more terrible. May God have mercy on her soul.”

  A few days later, without ceremony, Isobel Scothern’s body, with the child she had carried dead in her womb, was buried in a patch of unhallowed ground at the edge of a stony field outside the walls of Lincoln.

  Author’s Note

  The setting for The Alehouse Murders is an authentic one. Nicolaa de la Haye was hereditary castellan of Lincoln castle during this period and her husband, Gerard Camville, was sheriff. The personalities they have been given in the story have been formed by conclusions the author has drawn from events during the reigns of King Richard I and King John.

  For details of the town of Lincoln, I am much indebted to J. W. F. Hill’s Medieval Lincoln and, for information about the Order of the Knights Templar, to John J. Robinson’s very definitive book, Dungeon, Fire and Sword.

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