by Candace Robb
The lad sat on a stool beside his mother, holding her good hand.
Owen crouched down beside him. ‘Might I look at your mother’s palm, Hubert?’
‘Captain Archer,’ the boy said, his eyes welling with tears. ‘If I’d gone with you to York –’ He turned away, sniffing.
Owen lifted Ysenda’s good hand. The palm was bruised and scraped, as it would be if she’d tried to break a tumble forward.
A servant brought a tray with a flagon of wine and a mazer. Owen thanked her, then sat back to study Hubert, who still averted his face.
‘Do you think the fire wouldn’t have happened if you’d been in York?’ Owen asked as he poured the wine. ‘Is that what you were going to say?’
Hubert shrugged. ‘Why did you come back?’
‘I learned that Drogo grew up here. Another man was murdered, Hubert. Father Nicholas’s school is closed. I’m worried that more people will suffer. If you have anything you’ve not yet told me, I pray you, trust me with it.’
He noticed a subtle change in the boy’s breathing. He’d raised his shoulders a little as if protecting himself.
‘Why do you feel so guilty about your mother’s injuries?’
‘She’s always counted on me to be there to help her.’
At least he was talking. ‘Does she need a lot of help?’
‘When Da’s not there.’ Hubert’s voice caught and he looked away. ‘It’s all gone. Our home. Everything.’
Owen remembered how hard it had been for him as a boy when his family moved from the home in which he’d been born, how he’d missed every nook and corner.
‘I am sorry. I know it is a great loss.’
The boy took a deep, shuddering breath and nodded.
‘Did Drogo say anything to you when he took the scrip, Hubert? Did he know you?’
It was clear that the question startled the boy. He moved his head this way and that as if he didn’t know where to look.
‘He did, didn’t he?’ Owen asked, pressing him in this vulnerable moment.
Lady Gamyll came in, explaining that she was to smooth more grease on Ysenda’s burned hand.
Owen silently cursed.
‘Why don’t we stretch our legs, Hubert?’ he said, rising. ‘I’d like to go to the scene of the fire. Will you take me there?’
‘I want to stay by Ma.’
Lady Gamyll gave Owen a sympathetic smile.
He wanted to grab up the boy and take him away from the stench, but he respected his wishes and left alone.
Closing his eyes, Hubert struggled with the urge to run after Captain Archer to tell him what Drogo said to him the day he took the scrip. He wanted to tell him, but he was afraid that the captain would push his mother to talk. She needed rest. He might be too angry – two men had died – to be patient with her. And Hubert was frightened.
Aubrey had sat with him earlier. He looked awful. Hubert had asked him whether the wine had helped, and he’d groaned. Hubert wondered how someone like Captain Archer, who seemed to know so much, dealt with the hard things in life. He bet he didn’t drink to forget.
Enough thinking now. He was here to pray for his ma. He tried to push everything else out of his mind and concentrate on his prayers for his mother’s recovery, and her safety. She frightened him sometimes, and hurt him, but she was his mother and he loved her. Nothing would ever be all right again if he lost her.
Eleven
COVETOUSNESS
Owen carried the flagon and mazer with him into the hall and looked around for Aubrey. He found him sitting by the fire and settled down beside him despite Aubrey’s unfriendly look.
Owen held up the flagon. ‘I’ve more than enough for both of us.’
Aubrey groaned. He sat with his elbows on his knees, his hands supporting his head. He smelled of stale sweat.
‘I have a head full of last night’s wine, Captain. I hoped if I sat very still I might survive the morning.’
Owen was familiar with that feeling. ‘If we were in York I’d offer you some feverfew in watered wine for your aching head, with some additional herbs for your belly. My wife is an apothecary.’
‘Your wife?’ Aubrey winced as he turned towards Owen. His colour was pale and dull. ‘I didn’t think of you as a married man. But my lord did say you’d had your son with you last time.’ He paused for breath. ‘I suppose you have more questions?’
‘Aye. It would help to know where you were for several days.’
Aubrey pressed his temples. ‘How would that help? Do you think I went to York and murdered those men?’ He’d returned his gaze to the fire, his speech listless, not angry.
‘No, I’m accusing you of nothing.’
‘Are you blaming my son?’
‘No, I am not blaming Hubert.’
An elderly woman with an air of authority strode through the hall towards Ysenda’s room. The local healer/midwife, Owen guessed, expecting Aubrey to go talk to her. But he stayed where he was.
‘I believe that your wife began a chain of misfortune that led to the death of two men, Master Aubrey. Your wife took the Gamyll birthing cross, though no one thinks she was with child, and she kept the cross hidden in her belongings. Your son found it when he was searching for something of his mother’s to carry with him, to feel she was near him while he was away and worried about her. In York he lost it to Drogo, a man who grew up on this manor and seems to have understood what the cross was. He showed it to a goldsmith’s journeyman, I presume to discover its worth, but then gave the cross to Father Nicholas, your parish priest, to return to the Gamylls. Then Drogo was murdered. The journeyman was murdered. Father Nicholas is now frightened for his life, and I would think your family might be as well. In fact, when Sir Baldwin mentioned a fire I feared I’d come too late.’
‘All for a birthing cross,’ Aubrey muttered.
‘I don’t know why a simple gold cross that has long protected the women of your parish in childbirth has become deadly,’ said Owen. ‘That is why I’m here. That is why knowing anything about your family’s activities since this all began might help me find the murderer.’
Owen drank down the wine in the cup and was considering whether to pour more when Aubrey sat up and turned to face him.
‘I hadn’t strung it together like that. I don’t know much about what my son and wife have done in my absence. I’ve been home less than a fortnight. My son came home without an escort, without his master’s permission and unwilling to talk about his reasons except to say he was worried about his mother. Ysenda kept whining about wanting to go collect firewood, go to market, go here, go there. I know while I was gone she went about as she pleased, but when I am here I try to keep her at home. You can see why – look what she’s stirred up.’ He looked haggard beyond the discomfort of a night’s heavy drinking, his pale blue eyes dull with weariness.
‘Why do you wish to keep her at home?’ Owen asked.
‘I told you – look what trouble she’s begun. She’s a beautiful woman, Captain, but there’s something lacking in her, God forgive me for saying so. She is a bit of a fool.’
Owen did not believe Aubrey thought his wife a fool, not at all, but he did not think it a good idea to contradict the man when he was finally talking.
‘As for where I’ve been, Captain,’ Aubrey continued, ‘I have a shed I once used for sheep where I stay when I fear I’ll lose all control of my temper with Ysenda. It’s over the hill, at the edge of my land. Hubert was there with me the afternoon of the fire. I’d seen him walking and took him in to get warm by the fire. He’s a good lad.’ Aubrey closed his eyes. ‘He fell asleep, and I let him rest until the sun was low in the sky, and then I woke him so he would be home before Ysenda began to worry. I walked back with him. As we came over the crest of the hill we saw the fire. The lad wanted to run in to search for his mother. Osmund and Sir Baldwin had come by then, and Sir Baldwin held him fast.’ He took a deep breath. ‘And that’s all there is to tell.’
All he�
��d said was helpful, but incomplete, the motions, but not the content. Owen chose his next questions with care. ‘What do you suppose your wife was reaching for when she burned her hand? Was there something in the house precious to her?’
‘For the love of God, a burning door, a burning cloak, how clearly would she have been thinking by then?’ In Aubrey’s eyes was a desperation that Owen read as a plea for time to calm himself.
Perhaps that would serve Owen’s purpose. ‘I’ve bothered you long enough,’ he said. ‘A walk in the cold air might help your head and your belly. I swear I’ll be quiet.’
‘I am comfortable here.’ Aubrey’s words were barely out of his mouth when his son appeared. ‘Hubert?’
The boy did not look at his father but planted himself in front of Owen. ‘There was a man who sometimes came and Ma would walk out with him, never asked him to come in.’ The words poured forth as if Hubert were desperate to be rid of the secrets. ‘When I saw Drogo at the barges I thought he might be that man. And he noticed me watching him. He pulled so hard at the scrip the knot gave way, and he said, “Why it’s Ysenda’s lad. What treasure have you stolen from her hoard, boy?” and he bounced the scrip in his hand, feeling its weight.’ Hubert took a breath. ‘He frightened me. That’s why I ran. I didn’t even wait to see if he’d give it back. I just ran. I wanted you to know that, Captain. I’m going back to Ma now.’ As suddenly as Hubert had appeared, he rushed away.
Owen looked at Aubrey, who was shaking his head. He looked neither dismayed nor confused, but guarded. ‘Do you know anything about a hoard?’ Owen asked.
‘I don’t know what the lad’s talking about,’ Aubrey flatly declared.
Owen did not believe him, but right now thought Hubert seemed a more likely informant. Leaving Aubrey, Owen went in search of the boy and his mother. The elderly woman he’d noticed earlier stood in the doorway to the room in which Ysenda was lodged. She put a finger to her lips and shook her head as he approached. The woman had a powerful presence, almost as powerful as Magda Digby’s.
‘I want to talk to the lad,’ Owen whispered.
The woman nodded towards the bed, where Hubert had his forehead pressed to his mother’s uninjured hand. He could tell by the boy’s trembling shoulders that he was weeping. ‘He is in no wise so disposed,’ the woman said.
Owen could see that, and though he grumbled to himself that the lad had all the time in the world to be with Ysenda later he withdrew, having not the heart to wrest him from her.
He found Alfred and led him out of the hall. ‘Let us see the ruins,’ he said. ‘Aubrey’s land is not far – just beyond that tall, old hedge.’
They took off across the snow, exchanging the facts they’d collected. They agreed that so far it was pitifully little except for what Hubert had just told Owen.
‘Have you talked to Sir Baldwin about Ysenda?’ asked Alfred. ‘She’s plainly at the centre of the web, Captain.’
‘No, I haven’t. I wish the boy had told us about Drogo’s comment earlier. We’ve wasted precious time.’ Owen slapped the hedge with a stick as they ducked through, dislodging the shrivelled corpse of a small animal.
‘Country,’ Alfred growled, kicking it away. ‘Full of death the country is. Give me a city – full of life, a city is.’
They were upon the outbuildings of Aubrey’s farm before Owen realised it, so changed was the clearing without the house. The charred remains were a scant memorial to a home in which a family had lived.
‘God was watching over her, to have escaped that,’ said Alfred as he crossed himself.
They stepped with care through the slushy debris in the ruin, gently nudging piles with their boots, but they found nothing of help. Footprints in the ashes gave evidence that others had already moved things about, so even had Owen found something of interest he wouldn’t have known whether or not it had been moved.
‘A hoard.’ Owen gazed round. ‘Let’s search the outbuildings while it’s light.’
Alfred looked doubtful, already stomping and blowing on his fingers. ‘What are we searching for?’
‘I don’t know,’ Owen admitted. ‘But I’ll know when I find it.’
Despite opening the doors of the outbuildings as wide as the snow and terrain allowed, they found the interiors dark and difficult to search. In the one closest to the house, scorched on one corner but remarkably intact for having been so near, they found four large jugs of cider and a small barrel of wine.
‘They enjoy their drink,’ said Alfred. ‘Their food stores were likely in the house – ashes now, but I doubt they’ll starve. Their lord seems a generous man, eh?’
‘Dried apples here,’ Owen said, poking a sack hanging from a rafter.
Avoiding the building with the livestock for now, they tried one farther away from the house. When Alfred tripped over something near the rear wall they both crouched down, feeling with their hands how the floor bulged there. Alfred went for a shovel they’d noted in another building, while Owen kicked a hole in the wall to let in what little light was left.
‘This will warm me,’ Alfred said as he began to dig.
Gradually he uncovered a chest an arm’s length long and half as wide. He rested on the shovel once he’d uncovered the lid, watching Owen lift it.
‘God’s blood,’ Alfred murmured.
Owen gazed down at the contents: cloth, a pewter plate, a mazer, several lamps. He reached beneath the cloth, which felt like silk, and found a small box – inside were perhaps two dozen sterlings.
‘A hoard indeed,’ he said, sitting back on his heels. He wondered whether the gold cross had been but one minor part of this treasure, and who had helped Ysenda bury it. ‘I have a feeling Sir Baldwin might recognise some of this. Let’s dig it out and carry it back to the hall.’
‘I feared you’d want to do that,’ said Alfred.
‘I’ll share the work,’ Owen assured him.
By the time they reached the hall the shadows were very long. It was no small hole they’d had to dig, and though the chest was not full it was heavy and awkward to carry so far in the snow, across unfamiliar ground.
Lady Gamyll expressed great relief at their return, having feared for them in the dark and cold. ‘But what is this? Did you salvage some things from the fire?’
‘From one of the outbuildings,’ said Owen, sighing with relief as a servant pulled off his boots. ‘Where is Sir Baldwin?’
‘In the stables,’ said Lady Gamyll.
The servants asked where to put the chest.
‘By the fire,’ Owen suggested. ‘Sir Baldwin will wish to see it. Where is Aubrey?’
‘In the stables with my husband. Might we talk before I send for them?’
Owen readily agreed. ‘It has lain hidden a long while, there is no cause for hurry now. What is it?’
‘Dame Ysenda. She’s frightened the boy, moaning and calling out for my lord’s son.’
Osmund?’
Lady Gamyll took a deep breath and nodded. ‘I was glad that she spoke – it is a sign that the fever is abating and that she is still with us. But I cannot explain her calling for him.’
‘And it frightened Hubert.’
She met his eye, and he saw that she was worried. ‘He ran out to the stables. Perhaps it was not so much whose name she cried out but how she sounded.’ As Janet spoke she led them to a small table set with drink, near the fire. ‘I do not know her well, but I trow her voice sounds too weak for him to bear. Come, rest yourselves. We are quiet here this evening, but do ask for whatever you need.’
Owen thought that the tragedy had brought out a calm strength in her. Sir Baldwin was a fortunate man.
‘Where is Osmund?’ Owen asked as he took a seat. ‘I’ve not yet met him.’
The question made her ill at ease. She fussed with the drape of her wimple. ‘He was in a temper after the fire, arguing with his father about the smallest things. My husband said it was best that we leave him alone. Osmund would likely stay in his room behind
the stables and take his meals at the inn in Weston for a few days, then rejoin us in the hall when he’d forgotten his anger. It is their way.’
‘You’ve not seen him since the searches yesterday?’
‘I have not seen him since the evening before.’ She looked embarrassed. ‘I know it must sound as if we’re a family at war, but my husband was away, and I’m not so much older than Osmund …’ her voice trailed off. Owen guessed she realised that he had not asked for an explanation and felt she’d revealed too much.
‘Ysenda’s calling out his name has you wondering what there is between her and Osmund,’ Owen said.
Blushing, she nodded.
‘Might one of the servants show us to Osmund’s room?’
Lady Gamyll seemed to finally grasp the significance of Owen’s questions. ‘To his – have you had news of him? Has he done anything wrong? Has something happened?’
Owen thought the order of her questions interesting. ‘Not so far as I know,’ he said, ‘but his name being the first on Dame Ysenda’s lips when she woke is of concern to me.’
‘I thought perhaps I should tell my husband – out of Master Aubrey’s hearing, of course. He might –’ She shook her head. ‘I cannot think but that they have been lovers.’ She called a servant over. ‘Escort Captain Archer and his lieutenant to Master Osmund’s room behind the stables.’
A weariness was settling over Owen despite thinking that he might finally get some answers. Riding so hard for a day and part of the morning was no longer the pace of his life, had not been for a long while, and the aches were settling in and stiffening his stride. As they passed the front of the stables he could hear Aubrey’s deep voice and he realised how like his own father’s voice it was, a powerful singing voice. He must be tired to be thinking of the father Owen had not seen since leaving Wales as an archer in his youth. When Owen had at last returned to Wales a few years past he’d learned his father was long dead, and that he’d died horribly, struck down by lightening. It was not something he wished to think of right now.
The stables were of more solid construction and fabric than Aubrey’s hall had been. In the back was a high stone wall that broke the wind from the fields beyond, and in the courtyard a wooden stairway led up to a well-fitted oak door. The servant knocked, and another servant answered.
