Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Author’s Note
The Middle Ages Come to Life . . . To Bring Us Murder.
A Play of Isaac
“The player Joliffe appeared occasionally in Frazer’s delightful series featuring the nun Dame Frevisse. Now he has his own story . . . In the course of the book, we learn a great deal about theatrical customs of the fifteenth century, including intricate details of stagecraft, costume construction and the like. In the hands of a lesser writer, it could seem preachy; for Frazer, it is another element in a rich tapestry.”—Contra Costa Times (CA)
“Careful research and a profusion of details, especially those dealing with staging a fifteenth-century miracle play, bring the sights, smells and sounds of the era directly to the reader’s senses. There’s also a fine sense of history, all woven together in a medieval tapestry of rich colors.
“Looking over Ms. Frazer’s impressive list of novels already to her credit, I can see a lot of pleasurable reading ahead. I especially look forward to meeting Joliffe and the players again.”—Round Table Reviews
“The mystery, and the events surrounding it, are played out quite naturally through Joliffe’s unquenchable curiosity. For lovers of mystery and lovers of history, this is a find; a mystery backed by solid research. I hope to see much more of this likable group in future volumes.”
—Romance Readers Connection
“A terrific historical who-done-it that will please amateur sleuth and historical mystery fans.”
—Midwest Book Review
Praise for The Dame Frevisse Medieval Mystery Series By Two-Time Edgar® Award Nominee Margaret Frazer “An exceptionally strong series . . . full of the richness of the fifteenth century, handled with the care it deserves.”
—Minneapolis Star Tribune
The Hunter’s Tale
“Will please both Frevisse aficionados and historical mystery readers new to the series.”—Booklist
The Bastard’s Tale
“Anyone who values high historical drama will feel amply rewarded . . . Of note is the poignant and amusing relationship between Joliffe and Dame Frevisse. History fans will relish every minute they spend with the characters in this powerfully created medieval world. Prose that at times verges on the poetic.”—Publishers Weekly
The Clerk’s Tale
“As usual, Frazer vividly recreates the medieval world through meticulous historical detail [and] remarkable scholarship . . . History aficionados will delight and fans will rejoice that the devout yet human Dame Frevisse is back . . . a dramatic and surprising conclusion.”
—Publishers Weekly
The Novice’s Tale
“Frazer uses her extensive knowledge of the period to create an unusual plot . . . appealing characters and crisp writing.” —Los Angeles Times
The Servant’s Tale
“A good mystery . . . excellently drawn . . . very authentic . . . the essence of a truly historical story is that the people should feel and believe according to their times. Margaret Frazer has accomplished this extraordinarily well.”—Anne Perry
The Outlaw’s Tale
“A tale well told, filled with intrigue and spiced with romance and rogues.”—School Library Journal
The Bishop’s Tale
“Some truly shocking scenes and psychological twists.”
—Mystery Loves Company
The Boy’s Tale
“This fast-paced historical mystery comes complete with a surprise ending—one that will hopefully lead to another ‘Tale’ of mystery and intrigue.”—Affaire de Coeur
The Murderer’s Tale
“The period detail is lavish, and the characters are full-blooded.” —Minneapolis Star Tribune
The Prioress’ Tale
“Will delight history buffs and mystery fans alike.”
—Murder Ink
The Maiden’s Tale
“Great fun for all lovers of history with their mystery.”
—Minneapolis Star Tribune
The Reeve’s Tale
“A brilliantly realized vision of a typical medieval English village . . . Suspenseful from start to surprising conclusion . . . another gem.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
The Squire’s Tale
“Meticulous detail that speaks of trustworthy scholarship and a sympathetic imagination.”—The New York Times
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A PLAY OF DUX MORAUD
A Berkley Prime Crime Book / published by arrangement with the author
PRINTING HISTORY
Berkley Prime Crime mass-market edition / August 2005
Copyright © 2005 by Gail Frazer.
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Maydyn so louely and komly of syte,
I prey thee for loue thou wyl lystyn to me; To here my resun I prey thee wel tythe,
Loue so deryn me most schewe to thee . . .
Anonymous,
Dux Moraud
Chapter 1
The summons from Lord Lovell came while they were packing their goods away for the last time before taking to the road again. The playing had gone well. There was no reason for alarm, but out of long habit a quick, assessing look passed among the five of them. Their small company had been Lord Lovell’s players for hardly three months. For years before that they had been lordless, with no protection in their travels and work except other people’s goodwill and their own wits.
So wariness still came readily, and before the servant was further than, “Lord Lovell has asked you come . . .” Basset, Ellis, and Joliffe were looking at each other, silently asking why, and Rose’s face was gone very still, and even half-grown Piers had frozen out of his happy talk into watching his mother and the others as the servant finished, “. . . to him, Master Basset, if you please. And the one of you called Joliffe.”
With lordly graciousness, no outward sign of alarm, and a slight bow of his head, Basset said, “It is our honor and pleasure to obey.”
Rose immediately came to straighten the upright collar of his doublet and twitch the folds of his surcoat to hang better from his shoulders. She was the only woman in the company and keeper of all their clothing, both for their plays and otherwise. Not that there was much “otherwise” about them. They had been a poor, small playing company for a long while, with almost everything they earned spent to keep them barely going from village to village to sometimes a town, not on such things as new clothing or too much food. To come under Lord Lovell’s patronage and protection had been their best stroke of luck. “Ever,” Basset had said, and he would best know, having formed the company years before Joliffe had joined.
So when Lord Lovell had made them his company of players and bade them come to Minster Lovell at Michaelmas this year of God’s grace 1434 to divert both his household and his officials come for the end-of-harvest reckoning, they had come and were just ending their week here. They were too small a company to have much choice of plays, and filling that much time with suitable ones had been difficult, but by eking it out with Rose’s tumbling and Ellis’ and Piers’ juggling and Joliffe’s skill with the lute, they thought they had done well, especially against the general gloom that had come with yet another year’s bad harvest. The summer that had started bright and fair had gone to rain and cold by St. Mary Magdalen Day, first delaying the harvest, then rotting too much of it in the fields. Last year had been lean after a bad harvest. This year, with a second bad harvest to follow the other, would be leaner. The players lived only on what other people would give for their work, and when other people had little to give, the players tended to have nothing. Lord Lovell’s patronage—and the money that went with it—had come just in time. As they had walked beside their cart toward Minster Lovell, with yet more rain pattering into the road’s mud and the hedges and ruined fields around them, Basset had said what they all knew. “We’d not have made it through another year like last.”
Now Lord Lovell wanted to see two of them, and while they all thought they had done well enough that he was pleased with them, “The last thing you ever take for certainty is anyone’s goodwill,” Basset had told Joliffe in his early days with the company. “You may have done everything you could and earned it ten times over and still not get it.” Which Joliffe was remembering as he followed Basset away from the shed they had been sharing with their cart and horse. In the servant’s wake, they crossed the manor’s outer yard, went through the cobbled gateway into the smaller inner yard and across it not to the wide way into the great hall—tall and newly built with golden Cotswold stone—but to a lesser door in the older wing of rooms directly across from the gateway. Word was that Lord Lovell would be having those rebuilt sometime soon, too.
“And pleasant it must be to have the money for putting up new when the old isn’t falling down yet,” Ellis had grumbled when Rose mentioned she had heard it. He had been stitching a new patch onto their old tent at the time and not been happy at his work.
“Lord Lovell is doing well enough by us,” Basset had said back. “Don’t you complain about his money.”
“Not so long as enough of it comes our way,” Joliffe had added. But fear that an end of it might be coming their way was in him and undoubtedly in Basset, no matter how straight-backed and at seeming ease they went together into the low-beamed room where Lord Lovell awaited them, standing at a glassed window that looked out at an orchard.
He turned as they entered, a man of medium height with a long swoop of a nose and eyes set rather too near it, dressed in a floor-long houpelande of deep blue wool, its thick folds gathered low on his waist by a wide belt set with silver, its end hanging past his knees. Between the French war and his many lands across England, he was a wealthy man, who—from what Joliffe had seen here—failed in no comforts for himself or his family. At a ready guess, the room was where he did business, with a wide table set to catch the best light from the window, a row of scrolls laid at one end of it with pens and inkpot beside them, and chests and a closed-door aumbry along one wall where other scrolls and documents could be kept. There was a single chair beside the table, with a wide, curved seat and carven arms and back, and as Basset and Joliffe made their deep bows to him, marking the gulf between his high place in the world and their low one, Lord Lovell sat down and regarded them with a benevolence that somewhat eased Joliffe’s mind. He did not look like a man about to unhire them.
Nor was he. Instead he smiled and said, “With one thing and another, I’ve had little chance to say how well pleased I’ve been with your company, Master Basset. That you could raise laughs so often after this glum harvest-time is tribute to your skill, besides that my lady wife was most particularly moved by your play of Cain and Abel.”
Basset bowed again. “Our pleasure in pleasing you is twice-doubled by knowing she was pleased.”
“My steward delivered your quarter’s money to you?”
“He did, my lord. Thank you for this chance to thank you for it myself.”
“I’ve noted, though, that you’ve added no one to your company. I thought by now you would have.”
They did indeed need and want to have a larger company. With only three men—with Joliffe usually playing the women’s roles—and a small boy, the plays they might do were limited; but Basset said, “As yet we’ve had no place for someone else. Joliffe”—Joliffe bowed—“is reworking plays to that end, but until then another player would not earn his way, I fear.”
Lord Lovell took several silver coins from the flat leather purse hung from his belt beside his dagger, laid them on the table, and pushed them toward Basset. “Would that help toward taking on another man? Or boy.”
Basset glanced easily at the coins, as if they were not as much as the company might have earned in a very good month, and said smoothly, “Your lordship has someone in mind?”
Lord Lovell barked a pleased laugh. “Sharp, Master Basset. Very sharp. Yes, I’ve someone in mind. He’s a younger son of one of my bailiffs. Thus far, he’s not proved suited to anything his father has set him. After watching your company, he claims he wants to be a player. His father, for lack of anything else to do with him, has asked if I might place him with you.”
Standing where he was, Joliffe could not see Basset’s face but he kept his own carefully brightly interested in Lord Lovell’s words, and probably Basset was doing the same—hiding his sure dismay at the likelihood of being saddled with some moonstruck youngling of surely no skill and possibly few wits—though Joliffe would willing grant that a certain degree of witlessness was necessary in anyone who became a player. Otherwise they’d not choose to be a player.
“In truth,” Lord Lovell finis
hed, “no one knows what else to do with him.”
Whether Basset could do anything with him was beside the point, since there was no wise way to turn down what Lord Lovell asked of them; and putting the best front to it that he could, Basset bowed and said with apparent willingness, “I’ll be pleased to give him a chance.”
Lord Lovell nodded, satisfied. “I can have my clerk draw up a formal contract of apprenticeship while the boy packs.”
Quickly Basset said, “By your leave, my lord, no contract.”
“No?” Lord Lovell asked, surprised. A successful lord, like a successful merchant, knew the benefit of contracts.
So did Basset, but, “Someone is either a player or they’re not, my lord. It would be shame to bind the lad and find he hates the life. Besides that, there are skills I can teach anyone, but there are other things that are either in a man or not, and only time and trying will tell. Binding with a contract will make no difference.”
And if the boy proved impossible, being rid of him would be the easier if there were no contract. But Basset did not say that, and if Lord Lovell thought it, he let it go, too, simply said crisply, “Well enough. I’ll have him sent to you as soon as we’re done here. Now, there’s another matter.” One that he was less easy about: he paused to shift one of the scrolls lying on the table a little to one side and then back to where it had been before he looked up, not at Basset but past him, for the first time fully at Joliffe. “Last summer. That business at the Penteneys. You found your way through the tangle before anyone else did.”
There was much to be said for a player’s skill at keeping one thing on his face while his mind raced through any number of very other thoughts. Just now Joliffe held his face to a mild interest while in his mind he quickly shifted what he had supposed about the matter at the Penteneys. Yes, he had sorted out the tangle but those who knew that were few and he had not thought Lord Lovell was among them. Keeping his surprise to himself, he simply bowed, and said mildly, “Yes, my lord.”
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