by Candace Robb
A shout from below the Round Tower startled Michaelo from his thoughts; he straightened suddenly, tottered, regained his balance. Three men at arms ran towards the commotion. The man who had called the alarm stood over the ditch that bordered the motte on which the tower squatted. The snow that blanketed the steep slope was scarred as if something had slid down from the top. Curiosity propelled Michaelo closer.
When he was but ten feet from what was now a small crowd, Michaelo saw three men lifting a body from the ditch. The lifeless form dripped ice, water and filth. The heavy rains had filled the ditch, making it a shallow moat, and the freeze had crusted it with ice. Poor soul must have slipped into the freezing water and drowned in a cold stupor before he got his wits about him to crawl out. But how had he come to be on the slope?
One of the men lifted what looked like a cloak from the mud, sniffed it, handed it to his companion. ‘Smell this, would you?’
His companion sniffed, recoiled. ‘Phew! Better in the tankard than soaked into the wool. What did the lad do, dive into the barrel?’
‘Drank a bellyful and thought he’d try sledding, I’d wager.’
Ah. Now Michaelo understood the scar in the snow. Sledding down the motte, unable to stop – a scenario many a mother had rehearsed with her wayward children in the past months, warning them of the danger. ‘Who is he?’ Michaelo called out.
‘Daniel. The page of Sir William of Wyndesore.’
‘Are you certain?’ Michaelo knew Daniel. A sweet-faced, gentle lad.
‘Looks like Daniel to me,’ the man said.
Michaelo pressed closer still, cutting across the mud without a thought now for his boots. The lad lay on the ground, eyes opened wide, his hair caked with mud, his arms outspread. As Michaelo squatted beside the body to lift the stiff hair from the face, he noticed something that did not belong on a drowned man: red welts on the wrists, just visible beneath the sleeves of the lad’s tunic. Michaelo wanted to push up a sleeve for a better look, but he resisted. He brushed back the hair, gently closed the lad’s eyelids.
‘So? Is it Daniel?’ The man held the cloak at arm’s length.
Michaelo straightened up, made the sign of the cross over the body. ‘Yes. Yes, poor lad.’ He hurried away without a word about Daniel’s wrists. Better mentioned to someone he could trust.
Sir William of Wyndesore instructed his servants to leave the lad’s body covered and to keep away the curious. Then he went out to speak with his men. He cursed under his breath as pale winter sunlight burned his eyes and a chill wind wrapped icy fingers round his bones. Wyndesore was a tough, seasoned campaigner, powerfully built; but he was no longer young, he had awakened with a head that felt several times its normal size thanks to some fine brandywine last night, and that awakening had been sudden and unpleasant, his servants distraught at the news of Daniel’s drowning. His men were assembled in the outer ward, some hopping from foot to foot trying to get warm, some dabbing their eyes, but many frowning fiercely and demanding Ned Townley.
‘Who?’ Wyndesore asked his squire.
Alan leaned close. ‘Ned Townley. He is Lancaster’s spy, left here to be the Duke’s ears while he’s fighting in Castile, so they say.’
‘Do they now? So what’s his sin, besides being Lancaster’s spy?’
‘I know not. But I saw Scoggins with him last night.’
Wyndesore straightened up, squinted out at his men, picked out Scoggins scowling with the best of them. ‘Well, Scoggins, what has this Townley done?’
‘He’s murdered Daniel, that’s what he’s done, my lord.’ The men muttered their approval of Scoggins’s explanation, their combined voices echoing against the stone walls surrounding them.
‘You witnessed him doing this, did you?’
Scoggins spat in the mud, shook his head. ‘Nay, my lord. But I saw the two of ‘em last night arguing over one of Mistress Perrers’s maids, that little Mary. And Townley told Daniel he’d pin him to the wall with his daggers if he found him round Mary again. That’s what he said, and that I can swear to, my lord. I called some men to escort him from the hall. He must’ve come back, waited for the lad without.’
Wyndesore closed his eyes. ‘And was Daniel stabbed?’ Scoggins was a gossip and troublemaker, but a good fighter, and loyal. Fiercely loyal. ‘Eh, Scoggins?’
The man shrugged. ‘I did not see the body, my lord.’
Wyndesore looked round. ‘Who did? Who found him?’
‘One of the King’s guards,’ Alan whispered. ‘But Bardolph and Crofter helped drag him from the ditch.’
‘Crofter!’
A fair, square-jawed man stepped forward. ‘I saw no stab wounds, my lord. The lad drowned, no doubt of that.’
Wyndesore nodded. ‘Then enough of this nonsense about Townley.’
Crofter shook his head. ‘Who’s to say Townley didn’t change his mind and make it look like an accident, my lord? Who’s to say?’ His tone was matter-of-fact, not argumentative.
Wyndesore scowled. ‘Stick to the facts, Crofter.’
Crofter bobbed his head in good-humoured deference. ‘He drowned, my lord.’
‘Thank you.’
But Crofter was not finished. ‘If it please you, my lord. His cloak reeked of ale. He must have spilled it all over himself. I suppose he might have been too drunk to judge what he was doing, my lord.’
Wyndesore turned to Scoggins. ‘Was Daniel drunk when he left the hall?’
Scoggins shrugged, looked down at his boots. ‘A bit, my lord.’
‘He was not accustomed to much drink, Scoggins. Did you encourage this?’
Scoggins faced his lord. ‘I did, my lord, and for that I shall do much penance.’
‘So you were drinking, too?’
‘Aye, my lord.’
‘Did someone offer to help young Daniel back to his bed?’
‘I did not see him leave, my lord.’
‘Too drunk by then?’
‘Aye, my lord.’
Wyndesore shielded his eyes against the sunlight as he looked back out at his men. ‘Go about your morning duties. You will have a chance to pray for Daniel at mass tomorrow morning.’ He turned on his heels and marched back inside, shouting for Alan to go wake Mistress Alice Perrers.
‘And Ned Townley, my lord?’
‘First Mistress Alice, damn you!’
Alan hurried away.
*
John Thoresby paced in his chamber waiting for his secretary. Michaelo’s tardiness was particularly irritating this morning. Thoresby had decided how to reconcile the King’s request with his own interests and he wished to complete the task. Where was his secretary? Admiring himself in his mirror?
When at last Michaelo arrived he was breathless, his face was flushed, and much to Thoresby’s surprise the hem of his habit was soggy.
‘Where have you been?’
‘Your Grace, there has been a terrible—’ Michaelo shook his head, sat down at the writing desk, and dabbed his face with a cloth, closed his eyes, took a deep breath.
‘A terrible what, Michaelo? You are all atremble.’
His secretary nodded, blotted his upper lip.
‘Michaelo!’
‘Forgive me, Your Grace. I wished to catch my breath.’ Michaelo shook his head. ‘It is the marks, Your Grace. And his cloak. He was floating in the moat, not an ale-cask. How does one spill so much ale as to soak an entire cloak? Even stranger, why wear a cloak while drinking?’ Michaelo bowed his head, pressed the cloth to one temple, then the other.
The Archbishop studied his uncharacteristically dishevelled, babbling secretary. ‘Have you overindulged this morning? One of your headaches?’
Michaelo raised his head slowly, frowned up at Thoresby as if puzzled. ‘No, Your Grace. I was making my way here when they discovered him and pulled him from the ditch.’
‘Who was pulled from what ditch?’
‘Did I not say? I pray you forgive me, Your Grace. It was Daniel. Sir William of Wyndesore’
s page. Down below the Round Tower. Drowned, Your Grace. Or worse.’
Worse? ‘Drowning is rather final, I should think. What could be worse?’
Michaelo’s brows pulled together. ‘I said nothing to the men who found him. I do not wish to make something of nothing. But there were marks on his wrists. As if his hands had been bound, Your Grace.’
That could be troublesome. But it was the victim’s identity that set off alarms in Thoresby’s head. His secretary had a weakness for handsome youths. ‘Daniel. A rather pretty young man, as I recall. You have not been breaking your vows again, have you, Michaelo?’
The question seemed to clear Michaelo’s head. He sat up, suddenly alert. ‘Your Grace! I was merely walking past.’
‘I do not doubt that, Michaelo, but your agitation bespeaks an attachment.’
Michaelo’s nostrils flared. ‘I kept my distance as always, Your Grace.’
Deo gratias. Thoresby hid a smile as Michaelo lifted his chin, his back stiff with indignation, raised his quill pen and sat with it poised above the parchment.
‘Shall we begin, Your Grace?’
His secretary’s injured feelings reassured Thoresby. ‘Indeed. I have resolved my approach to the letters our King has requested.’
It was a matter of emphasis, Thoresby had decided. Praise those aspects of Wykeham’s service of which the Cistercian abbots least approved – how in his past post of Clerk of Works and presently as Keeper of the Privy Seal the King found him indispensable, which, of course, emphasised Wykeham’s worldly loyalties. The King could not deny it, nor could he deny that Thoresby couched his words as praise. Thoresby smiled to himself as he began to dictate to Michaelo.
Rather elegantly gowned for an early morning walk, her brown hair carefully coiffed beneath a gossamer veil, Alice Perrers swept through the Norman Gate from the upper ward clutching a fur-lined cloak round her shivering body. It was too early to be abroad; the blood was not yet warmed in her extremities. The guard bowed to her. Her page hurried after her carrying a goblet and a flagon of watered-down and delicately spiced wine. Alice intended to wake properly with her usual morning refreshment no matter who had been found floating in the moat. After attending Sir William she must return to the apartments of the ailing Queen and attend her. There would be no time to see to Alice’s own needs. Not that she resented her duty to Queen Phillippa. Alice owed her position to the aged Queen’s affection. But she must also take care of herself – no one else would. She was nineteen years old and would soon lose the bloom of youth that so enchanted the King if she did not have a care for her health. She did not delude herself; she was no beauty. Her power was in her youthful, well-formed body, her understanding of men’s desires, and her cunning ambition.
At the door to Sir William of Wyndesore’s chambers Alice turned, eyebrows raised. ‘Gilbert?’
Her servant rushed forward, shifting the goblet to the hand with the flagon, and rapped sharply. He had learned that to spare his knuckles threw his lady into a temper.
As the door opened, Alice swept past Gilbert into a comfortable yet austere parlour, obviously furnished by a military man: two high-backed chairs, two companion tables, and a chest for storage. The chairs were arranged in front of a large brazier that radiated a pleasant heat from its dark corner. Sir William occupied one of the chairs, his feet stretched out towards the fire. He looked up lazily and nodded. He was a handsome man, over twenty years Alice’s senior but still a physically powerful man with rich dark hair – succumbing to silver streaks, but still abundant. How like him not to rise, Alice thought. When he served under the Duke of Clarence in Ireland had he behaved with such insolence? An intriguing question. She must pursue it. ‘Sir William.’
Wyndesore waved Alice over to the other chair. She sat down with a regal sweep of her skirts. A servant rushed over to place a small table by her. Gilbert came forward, poured the wine.
‘You carry your refreshment with you? As a precaution?’ Wyndesore grinned.
‘I have a particular thirst in the early morning, and, as we decided last night –’ she glanced up with a coy smile ‘– my cellar is excellent.’ Alice lifted her goblet as if toasting him, then drank.
Wyndesore watched her with amusement. ‘The King’s pampered pet.’
Alice bristled. ‘Not a pet.’
Wyndesore touched his heart and bowed his head. ‘Forgive me, Mistress Alice. I have the clumsy manners of a soldier.’
Alice paid no heed to his false apology.
Wyndesore looked bored with the game. ‘So. Ned Townley. He fancies your maid Mary?’
Alice ran her finger idly round the rim of her goblet. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘You have heard about my page?’
Alice made a sad face. ‘Poor Daniel. Sledding. Everyone has been expecting such an accident, but involving a child, not a young man.’ She lifted her eyes slowly. ‘Why do you mention Ned?’
‘Perhaps it was not an accident. Ned Townley threatened Daniel last night – about being with Mary. Was Daniel dallying with your maid?’
‘Sir William! Have you been consulting common gossips?’
Wyndesore leaned forward, impatient with Alice’s teasing. ‘Was he?’
Alice pouted and folded her hands like an obedient child. ‘Daniel had made a pest of himself of late, that I can say, though I dislike speaking ill of the dead. But he was not wooing Mary. That was clearly not his intention.’
Wyndesore sniffed. ‘Why else does a man spend time round a pretty woman?’
Alice feigned surprise at his comment. ‘She cannot be a friend if she is pretty?’ She tilted her head and tsked at Wyndesore.
He laughed.
Alice sipped her wine, serious again. ‘What are you thinking?’
Wyndesore drew his feet back, snapped his fingers for a cup of ale. ‘What I’m thinking does not matter. It’s my men. They think Townley killed Daniel.’ He took a long drink, watching Alice over the rim of his mazer.
Alice shook her head. ‘Ned did no such thing. I can vouch for him, and so can Mary. He was with her last night when I went up to bed – you will recall that was rather late.’ Alice sighed. Mary was a pretty child; Alice had plans for her – and they did not include a nobody like Ned Townley. ‘I have little hope for the preservation of Mary’s maidenhead.’
Wyndesore grinned. ‘There was never any hope for it, Mistress Alice. A pretty girl at court? Come now.’ Wyndesore drank down his ale, took a cloth from his sleeve and wiped his mouth like a gentleman. Manners of a soldier indeed. ‘Well, your word is enough for me, but my men will not agree. They were fond of the lad – he was their pet, I suppose. They’re angry he’s dead, they want blood, and Townley’s a man they delight in hating, with his courtly clothes and his swagger with his fancy daggers.’ Wyndesore laughed at his witticism.
Alice smiled politely; Wyndesore was handsome and powerful, but he was no wit. ‘Ned is also resented because he is Lancaster’s spy. The common folk have no love for the Duke.’ Gilbert refreshed Alice’s goblet. She used the interruption to consider the situation. ‘I wonder whether Ned knows he’s in danger?’
‘You may be sure he does. I’ll warn my men that if any harm comes to Townley, they’ll pay. But he’d be best away from here.’
‘That was not the Duke’s plan for him,’ Alice said. The Duke of Lancaster had left Ned at court, while he fought in Spain, to polish his manners and his skill at letter-writing, informing the Duke of the news at court.
‘Devil take the Duke!’ Wyndesore growled.
Alice winced. Wyndesore should have a care. In Ireland, he had been second in command, too important to offend. But here at the King’s court he was insignificant. And many felt he had betrayed his lord to the King. Men neither respected nor trusted such an opportunist. Wyndesore should tread softly.
‘How goes the King?’ Wyndesore asked, changing the subject.
Alice frowned, glanced towards Wyndesore’s servants. Hers was also a precarious perch at c
ourt. As the King’s mistress she was showered with gifts from him and wielded some power. But should he tire of her – or more likely, considering his age, should he die … Alice took great care to be discreet. She trusted her own servant, but what did she know of Wyndesore’s men? How carefully did he choose those who surrounded him? They certainly had no cause to be loyal to her.
Wyndesore snapped his fingers, dispersing the servants. ‘So?’
Alice shrugged. ‘He spits venom at Pope Urban at the moment.’
‘Wykeham is not yet a bishop, I know.’
‘Thomas Cobham has returned from Avignon with the news that His Holiness is pleased to allow Wykeham to handle the temporalities of the seat of Winchester until the successor is named. You can imagine Cobham’s red ears. The poor man was visibly trembling when he entered the King’s presence. And he was far worse before he backed away.’
‘Wykeham seems a suitable man. I do not understand the Pope’s resistance.’
‘All this is just a convenient way for His Holiness to show his power over the King. Two old men hitting each other with sticks.’
They shared a smile.
Smarting from the hostile glances all about him, Ned went in search of Mary’s sympathetic ear. She knew where he’d been last night; she of all people would bristle with righteous indignation on his behalf. He found her sitting by a tall window in Mistress Alice’s parlour, transferring pearls from one of her mistress’s fine dresses to another. Mary was a lovely young woman with a cloud of softly curling, raven-black hair, a face of such sweet innocence Ned had been amazed by the passion with which she’d responded to his kisses from the first, and the tiniest waist he had ever had the pleasure to wrap his arms round. Mary possessed his heart completely. Never again would he tease his friend Owen Archer about his devotion to his wife. Ned understood now.
Mary glanced up at Ned, revealing eyes red from weeping. She sniffed. Her heavenly hazel eyes filled with tears.
Ned dropped down to his knees before her, dismayed. ‘Oh, my sweet Mary, do not weep for me. Their unjust accusations are naught to me.’
