The Final Toll

by Denise Domning

  "But of course, sir," Marian replied, her gaze still downcast as she transferred the tray into his care.

  Without lifting her head, she extended a hand to her son. The instant Robert's fingers curled around hers she swiftly retreated around the house, dragging her child with her. Faucon watched her go, knowing he'd see no more of her or Robert this day. She'd send another servant with their meal rather than enter the hall whilst Will was in it.

  "I make her nervous," his brother said flatly, also watching Marian's swift retreat.

  "Not at all," Faucon lied. Having to tell polite lies was yet another thing he disliked about playing host to Will. He started up the steps with the tray. "She's but modest."

  Just in case, he added, "And devoted to her husband."

  Will snorted at the mention of Blacklea's steward as he followed Faucon. "I don't understand why you keep a crippled man to do a job that requires mobility, any more than I understand why you keep that rude clerk of yours. I'll play Father's role and ask you what good either of them does you."

  Faucon's eyes narrowed. This wasn't the first time Will had said this. He stopped on the landing before the thick oaken door with its metal bossing. Many an old scar marked that arched wooden panel, suggesting it had held back at least one wave of intruders. The door stood slightly ajar, and so it would remain as long as a fire burned on the hearth.

  Shifting to face Will on the steps, he touched his shoulder to the oaken door. "As I have already said, I keep Brother Edmund at our Uncle Hereford's request just as Sir John remains at Blacklea because Lord Rannulf asked it of me. But know this. Even if neither bishop nor baron had made their requests, I would still keep them both. Brother Edmund's knowledge of the law serves me well, and Sir John knows this place, all its folk and all its history, when I do not."

  Then, with little hope that Will would cease his subtle jabs, Faucon pushed with his shoulder to open the door.

  This hall hardly warranted the name. A short table made of wooden planks set on braces with a pair of benches for seats took up most of the space. The hearth, a low stone pedestal, stood opposite the door beyond the far end of the table. It was so small its fire was more useful for light than heat. Although it could hold but a little wood, it still produced smoke enough to paint the ceiling and the upper reaches of the once-white walls the color of charcoal.

  Sir Adam of Bagot sat at the table, a wooden cup cradled in his hands. If a warrior's habit put him on the bench facing the door, he'd shifted on the seat to watch the flames of the small fire. Behind him was the wall that divided Faucon's home into this public chamber and the bedchamber Will presently used.

  As Faucon set the tray on the table, his visitor came to his feet. The middle-aged knight was a little taller than both Faucon and Will, who were of average height. Rather than chain mail, Sir Adam wore his sword belted over a vest of boiled leather atop a knee-length blue tunic that had been gusseted more than once to accommodate his increasing girth. Thick brown chausses covered his legs, while soft leather boots were cross-gartered to his calves. Wind-torn hair the color of rust streamed out from under a simple brown woolen cap. His thick beard and faint brows were a lighter, golden-red color, his eyes a startling shade of blue.

  "I am Sir Faucon de Ramis, newly-elected Keeper of the Pleas for this shire," Faucon said in introduction, extending his hand, "and this is my brother Sir William de Ramis, presently visiting me from Essex. Sir Adam, is it?"

  "It is, and well met, Sir Faucon," Sir Adam replied, his voice deep and rough-edged. His grin was easy. He wrapped his hand around Faucon's fingers, then Will's, as they met man-to-man.

  With introductions complete, the older knight returned to his seat as Faucon pulled out the opposite bench and slid to its far end. That left Will sitting near the open door, in the path of the draft. It was a calculated and inhospitable choice on his part. A good host was expected to offer the warmest seats in his home to his guests.

  His gaze locked on Faucon, Sir Adam said, "I'm told by Father Otto of Haselor that you, and not our sheriff, are now responsible for inspecting the bodies of those who die under suspicious circumstances. He named you our new 'Crowner.'"

  Faucon smiled at that. His position had only been created at the Michaelmas court just past, and had been given the Latin title of Coronarius, which more or less meant 'a servant of the crown.' "That is what the commoners prefer to call me, but the title that best fits my duties is Keeper of the Pleas, as it is mine to see that all appeals for royal justice are scribed onto parchment and collected for that time when the Justices in Eyre arrive to hear the pleas," he said. "My clerk also makes note of my appraisals of the estates of those who murder, rape, or burgle, so our king can better determine what fine to collect from these wrongdoers.

  "But to your point, Father Otto is correct," Faucon continued. "It is now my duty to view the dead and call the inquest jury to confirm murder when I deem it was done."

  Sir Adam nodded, his expression considering. "Well that will be quite the change for Sir Alain, won't it?"

  So it had been, and not a happy one for the shire's sheriff. As with many sheriffs across the land, Alain had been accustomed to skimming a portion of the king's rightful fines as part of his own pay, sometimes legitimately, sometimes not. Faucon, who was allowed no compensation for his duty, knew for a fact that the sheriff had also accepted coins to ignore certain crimes.

  Faucon crossed his arms on the table. "Now I have a question for you, Sir Adam. How is it you came to speak with Father Otto about me? He hardly seems the sort of man a knight seeks out to ask who now investigates suspicious deaths in our shire." Haselor was a tiny hamlet, and Father Otto as English as those he served.

  "Ah that," the knight replied as he pushed his cup in suggestion toward the tray and the pitcher upon it.

  Before Faucon could unwind his arms, Will took the man's cup. He shot his younger brother a quick smile. "I'll pour." It was the first time since Will's unexpected arrival that Faucon caught a glimpse of the sibling he'd once adored.

  Will looked at Sir Adam. "It's freshly brewed ale if you'll have it."

  "Happily so," the older knight replied with a grateful nod. To Faucon he said, "Father Otto came in the night to give to Sir Robert of Offord, my father-by-marriage, his last rites. Although Offord is in Wootton Wawen's parish, Saint Mary's at Haselor is just as close. I sent for Father Otto because he is— shall we say, more likeable?— than the prior from Saint Peter ad Vincula."

  That Offord was near Haselor was news to Faucon. Although he would one day inherit a piece of land in Warwickshire, the same bit of forest land from his mother's dowry that had been intended to buy him a position in the Church, he was a newcomer to this shire.

  "After Sir Robert's passing," Sir Adam continued, "both the priest and Offord's bailiff, whose wife has kin in Haselor, told me of you. They also mentioned how you directed the search for a missing girl some days ago, and that the lass was found alive."

  "Aye, so she was, God be praised. A miracle indeed," Faucon said, as Will handed the knight his cup.

  Sir Adam lifted it to his host in salute, took a sip, then lowered it to the table and curled his hands around the base. "I'm hoping you yet have some sway with our Lord, Sir Faucon. As I said, my father-by-marriage died last night. Although there's no mark or wound on him, I'm certain he was murdered."

  "If there's no wound, what convinces you it was murder?" Faucon asked in surprise.

  Sir Adam made a harsh sound. "Because I watched him die just hours after he confronted the common whore he wed, rightfully accusing her of cuckolding him," he said, glancing from Faucon to Will, his voice rising with every word. "She killed him, even if I don't know how she did it. By God, I won't stand by while her bastard steals what is my son's rightful inheritance!" he finished at a roar.

  Faucon fought a smile. Well, that explained why the knight had raced to find his new Crowner. The sooner the widow could be accused of murder and her babe proven a bastard, the soon
er Sir Adam secured Offord for his own line. Regardless of the knight's twisted intent, Faucon was content to let the man use him. Anything was better than being trapped in here for the rest of the day with not-Will.

  "So you can prove the babe the widow carries isn't Sir Robert's child?" Faucon asked.

  "I know as sure as the sun rises in the morning," Sir Adam said, his expression hard, "as would be any man who had watched his wife swell with child. Hasn't my lady wife given me three living babes and two who didn't survive their first year? I know well enough that no woman's belly distends less than two months after her wedding night, not unless someone breached her gate before her rightful husband."

  With his elbows braced on the table, he glanced between the brothers. "Mark my words, sirs. Even if Sir Alain witnesses that babe's birth and declares it Robert's heir, the little bastard won't survive a day at Offord." Having stated this bold threat before witnesses, Sir Adam drained the contents of his cup and pushed it again toward Will.

  Honest exasperation filled the man's face. "I cannot comprehend what came over Robert. Since the birth of my son, his only grandson, Robert has been content with Young Robert as his heir. Then, right after celebrating his saint day last winter, Robert started fretting about needing a son of his own. Didn't he make a complete fool of himself by going a-wooing among our neighbors? God be praised that every knight in this shire had more sense than to give his daughter to Robert," Sir Adam finished, nodding his thanks to Will as Faucon's brother returned his cup.

  "They refused him because your father-by-marriage was elderly?" Faucon asked, thinking that more than a few of those men should have considered the union. A young girl wed to an aging man nigh on guaranteed that she'd make an even better second marriage, having added the value of her first dower to her existing dowry.

  "Robert wasn't elderly," Sir Adam retorted, startled. "He was but two score and five, only a year older than I. Nay, they refused him because everyone knows Robert is cursed. He can't seed a son."

  Leaning back on the bench, Sir Adam threw his hands wide. "Two wives he's had, and nothing but girls from either of them. And of all the babes he made, only his first daughter, Joia, my lady wife, survived. When no well-born man would give Robert his daughter, I thought that would be the end of it. Then two months ago, Robert went to Rochester to attended the Michaelmas court.

  The corner of the knight's mouth lifted. "Robert's been arguing for years with the king's clerks about a parcel of Offord's wasteland," he offered in aside. "Robert says it's inland, but they insist he owes tax on it because of some agreement made four score years ago. He went one more time, determined to finally put the argument to rest."

  Then, closing his fists, Sir Adam leaned toward his host. Outrage darkened his blue eyes. "Or so I thought! I couldn't believe it when Robert returned from Rochester already wedded and bedded to some cloth merchant's daughter. Without so much as a word to me or his own daughter about his intentions!

  "Tell me, sirs," he demanded. "Do either of you know any man— knight, baron, greedy merchant, or even a simple plowman— who weds off a daughter that quickly?" Sir Adam didn't wait for them to answer. "No, you do not! That is, unless the man knows his daughter's maidenhead has already been broken. Thus did I think the moment I saw that sly little blouze, and so she proved a month later when her belly started swelling."

  "He wed a tradesman's daughter?" Will said, his words thick with disgust.

  "Didn't I think the same?" Adam agreed, courting Will's reaction. "Where Robert was proud of how much fabric and silver she brought with her as her dowry, I told him that such riches were a sop, proof that her father knew she was damaged goods. I told Robert that greed had blinded him and turned him into a dolt. By God, he promised her the profit from Offord as dower if she bore him a son!" He shared this at a bellow, so his listeners understood just how wrong the dead man had been to do so.

  "Wed to a commoner," Will sneered again, this time shaking his head.

  Having recruited the support of his Crowner's brother, Sir Adam turned the full force of his persuasion on Faucon. "But Robert wouldn't hear me no matter what I said. Instead, he went on and on about how Prior Thierry had prayed on his behalf and how God had answered the prior, promising that Robert's seed would find fertile ground this time."

  The knight's lip curled. "It wasn't our Lord doing the promising. It was all Prior Thierry. That's because the prior wishes to plunder Robert's treasury so he can add a new chancel to that ancient church of his. Expensive nonsense! Only the prior and one monk live in that holy house.

  "But on and on Robert went, not caring that all this talk of sons was like a knife to his daughter's heart. Then, yesterday, Robert finally saw the truth. He at last heard me and demanded his wife admit the babe wasn't his, that some other man had plowed her field before they were wed. When she refused to name her babe's true father, he took his fists to her." Sir Adam paused to take another sip of his ale.

  "No better than she deserved," Will remarked.

  Nodding, Sir Adam set down the cup. "So it is."

  "Did Lady Offord surrender the name of her lover?" Faucon asked, using the widow's title to needle the two of them. It was her title after all. Just as Marian, who was also a merchant's daughter, was now Lady Marian, so too had Lady Offord become a gentlewoman the moment she wed Sir Robert.

  That teased a grimace out of Sir Adam. "She did not, but she might well have done if not for my brother Luc. May God take that boy! He intervened where he had no right to meddle. He said he couldn't bear to see a pregnant woman beaten, no matter whose babe she carried. He restrained Robert as the little whore made her escape. It wasn't until many hours later, just as Robert was breathing his last, that the servants finally found her hiding in Offord's dairy."

  "Wait," Faucon cried, holding up a hand as if he meant to stop the man's words in his fingers. "The woman you accuse of killing her husband wasn't in his presence for his last hours?"

  Concern flashed across Sir Adam's expression. "Why does that matter?"

  "I don't know that it does," Faucon replied. "It's just strange. Tell me this. Was Sir Robert hale and hearty prior to last night?"

  "Save for a few insignificant bouts of illness lately, he was," Sir Adam said, nodding emphatically, "and he has always been, at least for as long as I've known him. We met just after Robert returned from the first Irish campaign, which proved miraculous for him. Robert left as a squire and a third son with few prospects, but returned knighted with treasure enough to steal the heiress of Offord from me," he offered with a smile. "Men as full of life as Robert don't die so swiftly."

  In that Sir Adam was mistaken. Brother Edmund had a growing list of names, some of them men younger than Sir Robert, who had done just that with no one assisting them toward Saint Peter's gate. One more time, Faucon sought to guide the knight where he wanted him to go. "Can you describe how death came upon Sir Robert?"

  "I can, and may I say that it was horrible to watch. Hour by hour, Robert steadily lost control of his limbs until he couldn't move so much as a finger. It began just after our little celebration ended, perhaps around Vespers. He breathed his last not long after Matins this morn." Something that might have been grief twisted the man's face.

  "You say you were feasting? Did anything out of the ordinary happen at that meal?" Faucon asked.

  The knight frowned at him. "Do you mean other than an honorable if foolish man learning he'd been cuckolded?" he asked, a note of annoyance in his voice.

  Faucon tried again. "Describe the events of yesterday for me. The more detail you can give me, the better. And I'll beg your pardon in advance, for I may interrupt to ask for further explanation."

  Struggling to tame his impatience, Sir Adam leaned back on the bench and aimed his gaze at the curls of smoke writhing along the ceiling above them. "As I said, yesterday we celebrated my youngest daughter's fifth saint day."

  "Who was present?" Faucon asked.

  Sir Adam ticked his fingers as h
e spoke each name. "My lady Joia; our two daughters, Martha and Helena; my brother Sir Luc of Bagot, who acts as my steward during those seasons when my lady and I reside at Offord; Sir Robert; and, of course, that whore Idonea. As the servants cleared away the first course to bring the next, Idonea rose and started to leave the hall. Robert stopped her, demanding to know where she went. He was angry with her. He'd looked for her earlier in the day and couldn't find her. When she finally appeared, he'd demanded to know where she'd been. She told him in the latrine. But he had looked there and hadn't found her."

  The knight shot them a quick, hard grin. "That's when I saw my moment. When she said she was going to the latrine, I pointed to the bulge of her belly and told Robert that it had doubled in size in only two weeks. Then I reminded Robert that only a woman far gone with child needed to visit the latrine so often during the day. After that, I demanded Idonea tell us whose child grew in her, because it surely wasn't Robert's."

  As he spoke, Sir Adam again pushed his cup toward Will in suggestion. "That's when the whore started sobbing. She actually tried to tell us that she wasn't certain she was with child at all. Robert leapt to his feet in outrage. He shouted that she lied, that everyone could see a babe grew within her. Then Robert hit her, demanding she tell him whose bastard she bore, because it wasn't his babe."

  Still grinning, Sir Adam continued. "As I said, my brother Luc then intervened. He held Robert while Idonea fled the hall. Once she was free of the door, Luc released Robert. Robert immediately turned on my brother, beating him before he banished Luc from Offord Hall. As he should have done," the knight added harshly, then gave a sour laugh.

  "That was the end of poor Martha's happy celebration. Even though the second course included some of Robert's favorite dishes, he was more interested in keeping his cup filled than eating. For the rest of the meal he stayed in his chair at the high table and glowered at everyone. Joia and I tried to comfort him by telling him tales of how well Young Robert was doing."