The Merchant's Tale

by Ann Swinfen

  I tried to reassure him that the South Gate was much more convenient for most people, leading as it did to Grandpont and the main road heading south from Oxford, while the priory’s postern merely opened on to the meadows lying south of the town. It was convenient for the priory, since the priory grange lay some distance away, at the far side of the meadow land. Without this gate the only way to reach the grange would be to go into the town, down the High Street to the East Gate, then walk nearly to the East Bridge and come at the grange from the far side, almost twice the distance. I thought the town’s threat of seizing control of the postern was made merely from spite, and not from any real need to possess the gate.

  On leaving Canon Aubery, I made for this postern gate myself, for although of little general use during most of the year, it was very convenient for reaching the fair. I had told Alice Walsea I would bring her any information I had gained at the priory. There was little enough of interest to her, although Aubery had confirmed that the two books I had seen were indeed missing from the priory’s library. I was glad to see the church plate and the books safely stowed away behind the high altar in the church. Sub-Prior Resham had told me that he was organising a watch to be kept there by the canons and, when they could be spared from duties at the fair, also by the senior lay servants of the priory, including the steward. Unless a veritable army of thieves broke in, everything should be safe.

  None of this, however, seemed to have any connection with Mistress Walsea’s mission and the suspected French criminal.

  I stopped at Peter Winchingham’s booth and found him displaying a bolt of the finest woollen cloth in a rich forest green to a stout matron with a commanding voice and the look in her eye of a woman who would be prepared to stand there an hour haggling over the price. The merchant spared a moment to smile at me, and he seemed well enough recovered from his injury, although he wore a capuchon wound over his head in a fashion which hid it from view. Satisfied that he seemed none the worse for the attack, I gave him a quick nod, then made my way briskly down to the lower end of the fair, where a row of modest stalls was set out near Trill Mill Stream, close to the temporary jetty. It was here that Peter Winchingham had berthed his boat, I recalled. There were half a dozen or so moored there now, from wide, substantial barges, with plenty of room for cargo, down to one small craft which was probably poled up here by a single man, from somewhere not far away.

  Alice Walsea’s stall was neat but not ostentatious, between one selling embroidered gloves and girdles and another from which an enticing scent of gingerbread arose. One of the maidservants I recognised from the Mitre was just concluding the purchase of a bunch of bright ribbons, laughing with Alice over some exchange, while a girl laid out a fresh wheel of ribbons in different colours to fill the empty place where they had lain on the counter.

  The maidservant turned away and, catching sight of me, dropped a curtsey.

  ‘Good morrow to you, Master Elyot.’

  ‘Good morrow, Millie.’

  She could be no older than Juliana Farringdon, I thought, but I knew that she had been working at the inn for at least two years.

  ‘I am going to buy some gingerbread, Millie,’ I said. ‘Would you like some?’

  Her face lit up. I do not suppose she was often given such small treats. I bought four gingerbread babies and she went away, nibbling hers, as I carried the others to Alice’s stall.

  ‘Can you eat these without harm to your stock?’ I asked, handing one each to Alice and her girl.

  ‘Indeed, if we are careful. Joan, take yours down by the stream, well away from the ribbons. And Nicholas, you may sit on Joan’s stool.’

  Eating the gingerbread was excellent cover for a private discussion, but I had little to tell her.

  ‘I have warned Canon Aubery of what Peter Winchingham overheard, so he will be on the alert, but they have stored all the priory’s valuables behind the high altar. Unfortunately, he never saw the French vintner, so I must try to persuade Hamo Belancer to tell me who he is. Moreover, Francis Aubery knows of no secret entrance to the priory, so I wonder whether Hamo was deceiving the Frenchman in speaking of one, for some reason we do not know.’

  I shook my head, and brushed the crumbs from my fingers.

  ‘I am never sure whether Hamo loves or hates the French. He is half French himself, of course, and likes to boast of it, as though that makes him superior to mere native Englishmen. Yet he is implacable in his hatred of the French army and the French king, who have seized his Guyenne vineyards. Master Winchingham thought he seemed to be conspiring with the Frenchman, but perhaps there is no secret way into the priory and it is all a scheme to make a fool of the man. Who can say?’

  Alice frowned. ‘Is he a man given to such foolery?’

  ‘I barely know him. He is a man on poor terms with his neighbours, and even with his fellow members of the Guild of Vintners, always aware of any perceived slights or insults. But would he devise a plan to humiliate a Frenchman he claims to know from the days when he owned his French vineyards?’ I shrugged. ‘It seems unlikely. What could be his reason? Although I do believe he might be spiteful, if he thought the man had done him an injury.’

  ‘It seems we are hardly any further ahead,’ she said. ‘This afternoon I might stroll past the vintners’ booths and see whether I can overhear aught, or pick out the fellow with the southern complexion.’

  ‘And I shall visit Hamo Belancer. I will make some excuse about wanting to buy French wine, and would like his recommendation of one of the vintners.’

  I was just rising from my stool when a growing noise from the riverside caused us both to exchange worried glances. We had already heard some shouting. Now it was beginning to sound like a fight.

  Chapter Seven

  The noise was getting louder and more menacing. ‘Stay here,’ I said to Alice, ‘and mind your goods. It only needs a disturbance like this for the petty thieves to take their chance. I will find your girl and send her back to you.’

  I ran along to the end of the row of stalls, where a crowd of buyers and stall-holders had already gathered, looking down toward the jetty with more curiosity than fear. About half a dozen men were brawling on the narrow wooden platform of the jetty, and one man was in the water, struggling with an awkward kind of dog paddle to reach the bank. I pushed my way to the front.

  ‘What’s amiss?’ I asked my neighbour, a tin smith I knew by sight, though not by name. He would have a stall in this lower part of the fair, selling cooking pots, candlesticks, and cheap plates.

  ‘Don’t rightly know, maister. Them Frenchies was shouting insults at our lads, and our lads give the same back. Then somebody threw a punch, and they was all at it.’

  It would be difficult to tell who had started it. The prosperous merchants who owned the larger boats would leave a man here to keep an eye on their goods, despite the few lay servants of the priory who were paid to provide a guard. It was a tedious job, kicking your heels while everyone else was enjoying the fair. No wonder tempers flared.

  ‘So much for the truce between our countries,’ I said. ‘It looks as though war has broken out again here in Oxford.’

  ‘Aye, well, ’tain’t natural to be friends with a Frenchman, treacherous, thieving bastards. Never trust ’em, myself.’

  I caught sight of the girl Joan, who was standing on the bank, far too close to the jetty, watching the fight with her mouth open. I half ran, half slid down the bank to her. With all the to and fro of merchants unloading their goods, the grass was worn down to mud, and this part of the meadow was always damp and slippery. I came near to losing my footing and following the first casualty into the water.

  I grabbed Joan by the arm. ‘Come away,’ I said. ‘This could quite easily spill over on to the bank here and you would not be safe. Come back to your mistress.’

  She looked at me in some surprise, as if she thought the fight was nothing more than entertainment laid on for her amusement, then she turned obediently and followed a
s we made our awkward way back up to where the watching crowd was standing.

  ‘There’s been blood drawn now,’ the tin smith said, giving me a nod. He sounded almost satisfied.

  ‘Knives?’ I said.

  ‘Nay, nobbut bloody noses.’

  ‘Go back to Mistress Walsea,’ I said to the girl.

  Once I was sure she was on her way to the stall, I turned back to the fight. The man from the river was climbing into one of the French boats, bowing out of the combat and presumably in search of dry clothes, but the rest of the men were pounding each other even more furiously. One of the Frenchmen – distinguishable by their different style of dress – hooked an Englishman’s legs from under him and tipped him into the river.

  ‘Where are the priory’s lay servants?’ I said. ‘And some of the town constables should be here.’

  ‘They’ll be away by the rich booths,’ the tin smith said. ‘They don’t bother with the likes of us. But a lad run off to fetch ’em.’

  Now I looked, I could see a purposeful group of men heading down towards us. I hoped they were enough to put an end to the fight, for it was looking increasingly nasty. A few more had joined in. I saw the flash of a knife – no, a dagger. These men would not carry swords, but even a knife can kill as easily as a sword. Set to guard their masters’ goods, all of these men would be armed.

  Before the priory’s lay servants could reach us, there was a cry of pain, and one of the English servants fell to his knees, clutching his left side. Even from where we stood, we could see the blood welling between his fingers. Instinctively I stepped forward, but the tin smith laid his hand on my arm.

  ‘Best not, maister. You’ll likely be struck yourself. Let them as are here for it take care of the trouble.’

  I felt like a coward, yielding to his advice, and there was a raised outcry amongst the younger men in the crowd.

  ‘That’s one of ours down! Come on, lads!’

  Fortunately, before the skirmish could turn into a full scale battle, the senior steward of the priory arrived, attended by half a dozen of his men, and including two of the town constables. They herded the would-be volunteer soldiers back amongst the rest of us, and began separating the combatants, wielding their clubs indiscriminately amongst both native and foreign heads.

  As they began to march the men away, now relieved of their weapons, I said to the priory steward, ‘That man is badly injured,’ pointing to the man who was bleeding freely.

  ‘Never fear, Master Elyot,’ he said. ‘We’ll take him to the infirmary before we lock him up. It won’t be the first fight we’ve had at the fair, though one of the worst. No surprise, with the French here.’

  ‘The owners of these boats will not be pleased,’ I said to the tin smith, as we watched the procession making its way back to the priory. ‘Their goods must stay unguarded, or they must lose the work of one of their other servants to guard them.’

  He smiled sourly, and spat. ‘I’d not mind having the problems of a rich merchant.’ With that he turned on his heel and returned to his stall.

  I noticed that the unintentional French swimmer was peeping from his master’s boat with what looked like a smile of relief. He might have had a soaking, but he had avoided imprisonment. As I was about to step back and give a brief account of the affair to Alice Walsea, a dripping figure emerge from behind the row of stalls. The Englishman who had been dumped into the river.

  He winked at me. ‘Let myself drift downstream when I saw the knives coming out. Kept out of the way of them constables.’

  He went off whistling to his own boat, no doubt – like the discreet Frenchman – in search of dry clothes. Honours were about even.

  I told Alice what I had seen, but she had already heard most of it from the other stallholders. Indeed, while so many were absent, she had been able to stop some pilfering from the glover’s stall.

  ‘So knives were used,’ she said, ‘not just fists. That is a bad omen.’

  ‘There might have been deaths,’ I said, ‘if the steward and constables had not arrived when they did, but all is quiet for the moment.’

  As Margaret was today serving at the fair, along with Beatrice, I took my dinner again at the Cross’s stall close by the postern gate to the priory. As I ate my rabbit pie and bread (neither as good as my sister’s), I turned over in my mind the puzzle of this secret entrance to the priory. On all sides St Frideswide’s Priory was protected by a stone wall, here on the south side making use of a portion of the town’s own wall, a formidable fortification. The rest of the walls were not so impressive, but ample enough. The main gatehouse was on the north side of the enclave, opening directly into the town. Short of some easy route to climb over the wall, I could not see what was meant by this secret way. And in any case, climbing over a wall was far from secret. One would be observed from the surrounding houses, and even from Oriel college.

  I wondered whether I could persuade Hamo Belancer to let me into the secret, but I dismissed the idea, for it would merely serve to warn him that Peter Winchingham had indeed overheard at least part of his conversation with the Frenchman. Better to restrict myself to discovering which of the French vintners was known to him, and then try to see whether his appearance matched that of the man Winchingham had seen briefly last night.

  Before going to visit Belancer, I went home and checked on the work Walter and Roger were doing while the shop was closed. On my desk, I found Lady Amilia’s book of hours, which Roger had collected from the bookbinder. Henry Stalbroke had achieved a superb purple for the leather, which I knew would delight my demanding customer. With some regret, I turned over the pages. Some had been carried with Emma in her flight from Godstow, some had been completed on the small table at the house in St Mildred Street. There seemed too much of our lives, mine and Emma’s, caught up in the book, to be handed over to that heedless woman, but there was no help for it.

  ‘Walter,’ I said, ‘I need you to deliver this to the Lady Amilia and collect the payment. Do not let her put you off with delays. You know the tricks she plays.’

  He grinned. ‘Aye. I’ll be the thick headed servant – “Maister said as how I must wait for payment”. And just bide there until she hands me the chinks.’

  ‘Well, do not over play it. She is aware that you are my journeyman. Their town house is almost opposite the Guildhall.’

  ‘I know it. My own window overlooks it.’

  ‘So it does. You may as well go now.’

  I found Mistress Farringdon and Juliana in the garden with the children. They had brought Maysant with them and were looking after all three children – and the dog – while Margaret was occupied at the fair. During this period of busy activity, I had come to realise just how much of Margaret’s time was taken up with my children. Normally, of course, I was at work in the shop, so that Margaret could go to market or attend to other errands without worry about Alysoun and Rafe, but when I took myself off, it was Margaret who must make arrangements to care for them. More than once I had suggested hiring a girl to help her, but she had scorned the idea. I suppose that if all such girls were as empty headed as Alice Walsea’s Joan appeared to be, Margaret might find a maidservant simply one more burden.

  ‘You have all that you need, Maud?’ I asked.

  ‘Indeed,’ she said. ‘We have found a few more apples that were missed the other day, and I told Margaret that I would make a start on separating the honey from the combs she has already brought in from the skeps.’

  ‘There is no need for you to do that.’

  ‘Oh, I like to keep busy. And Margaret has promised me a pot of the honey.’

  I laughed. ‘More than one pot, I hope. Well, I shall leave you to your labours. I am going to call on Master Hamo Belancer.’

  ‘Emma told us what happened last night. I hope he will not be violent.’

  ‘It was the other man, we believe, who felled Master Winchingham. I know Belancer of old. I think he is unlikely to strike me. Where is Emma?’ I added ca
sually.

  ‘She has gone to Beatrice’s cottage to see Stephen. She had promised to hear him read, and he wants her to help him learn to draw.’

  I nodded, sorry that Emma was not here, but glad that she was befriending the boy. I suspected that he was often lonely. I had a sense, sometimes, that there was a whole separate world of women and children which was conducted out of the sight of men.

  When I reached the vintner’s shop, I was surprised to see that it looked as shut as it had when we had passed it last night. All the shutters were closed, although it was a bright, clear autumn day. The whole building – the shop below and the house above – had a curiously abandoned look. Yet it was not quite abandoned, I realised as I crossed the street, for I could hear a dog barking. Hamo Belancer owned a big rangy beast, heavier built than a lymer, but without the great square head and vicious jaws of an alaunt. It was a dog which he claimed he had used for hunting when he was on his estates in France. How extensive those estates had ever been, no one knew. They seemed to grow in the telling with the passing years, the longer they were lost to him.

  The dog was elderly by now, but he still had a hearty pair of lungs. His ceaseless barking was interspersed with long, mournful howls, which put me in mind of the howling wolves which found their way into some of Walter’s more sinister stories, banned by Margaret before the children’s bedtime.

  I stood hesitating in front of the house, wondering whether to venture down the unsavoury alleyway. It did not appear quite so dangerous by day, but it was still filthy and odorous.

  ‘Tell him to silence that dog, or I will come round myself and shoot it.’

  A man had emerged from the house on the opposite corner of the alley, glowering at me, as if the dog’s noise were my fault.

  ‘Good day to you, Goodman Brinley,’ I said, for I knew the man, a cobbler who, like every other shopkeeper in Oxford, had idle time on his hands for the duration of the fair. ‘What is afoot with the dog? Is he sick?’