The Cross Legged Knight (Owen Archer Book 8)

by Candace Robb

  ‘Ah. Here come the rest of His Grace’s guests,’ said Michaelo.

  Following the monk’s gaze, Owen sighted the Fitzbaldrics and their maid approaching from the minster, flanked by Wykeham’s guards. Adeline carried the nosegay from the Dales’ garden, holding it at an awkward distance from her body, as if uncertain of its safety. Fitzbaldric still looked pathetic in his borrowed clothes. One of the guards carried a sack over his shoulder. The maid, pale and coughing, dragged behind all of them, carrying the cloth Julia Dale had urged on the Fitzbaldrics.

  ‘Before I meet with them,’ Owen said, ‘I want to see Magda and Poins.’

  ‘They are in the kitchen,’ Michaelo said. ‘A corner has been enclosed with screens. It should be warm, and the sound of the cook and her servants might cheer the invalid.’ He pressed his fingers to his temples. ‘How he must suffer. I do not know how he lies so quietly. Do you think he will survive?’

  ‘I pray that he does, at least long enough to tell us what happened last night.’

  Michaelo studied Owen. ‘Do you think he murdered the charm weaver?’

  ‘I have no way of knowing that yet. I wish I did.’ Owen bowed to him. ‘I shall leave you to your guests.’

  The morning’s clouds had burned away. The midday sun felt warm on Owen’s head and shoulders. Once he rounded the corner of the palace and slipped from observation, he paused, lifting his face to the radiance. If only it could burn away the scent of death on him. For several moments he stood there. When at last he opened his eyes the garden seemed bathed in a white light and as he moved into the shade of a linden he felt the sweat on his face cooling. There would not be many more days like this until spring, months away.

  By the time Lucie returned to the shop there was a lull in customers, and a good thing it was, for only a few spoonfuls of the cough syrup remained. While Jasper was out at the market, Lucie assembled the other ingredients. The hocks seeds and flowers, the gum Arabic and dragagantum were all within easy reach on the bottom shelves in the shop and the storeroom, but the quince seeds, seldom used in physicks made while a customer waited, or asked for specifically, were stored on a high shelf.

  Lucie hesitated – she had been fetching quince seeds when she fell. As if the memory were not enough, the cramp in her belly worsened. She rested on a stool, passed a few moments talking to a customer who bustled in – needing a toothache remedy, thank goodness. When the customer was gone, Lucie resolved that she would not spend the rest of her life fearing to climb to a high shelf. She was doing to herself what she had accused Owen of doing – assuming that once she’d had a fall, it would happen again and again.

  Positioning the small ladder, she gathered her skirts and climbed, with more caution than usual and with her breath held all the way. The jar was large and smooth, and she would need both hands to lift it from the shelf. She must let go her skirts and her grasp on the shelves in order to pull out the jar. Taking a deep breath, she reached for it. Her hands were clammy, slippery on the glazed pottery, but she clutched it tightly to her side, freeing the hand that must keep her skirts from underfoot, and backed down the ladder.

  Weak with relief and bent over with the cramp, she almost wept. But Jasper appeared just outside the shop door, greeting a neighbour. Catching her breath, Lucie set the jar on the counter and calmed herself by measuring out the seeds.

  The kitchen sat between the two palace halls, Thoresby’s and the more public great hall. Behind it, screened from the archbishop’s chapel and the minster by a juniper hedge, a large oven rose out of a patch of packed earth, squat and blackened from years of baking for archbishops of York. That is where Owen found Maeve, the archbishop’s cook, bent over a tray of fresh bread.

  She greeted Owen with a broad grin. ‘More mouths to feed.’ She straightened with a sigh of contentment, wiping her large hands on her apron. ‘I have made pandemain for the injured one. Easy to chew.’

  ‘I hope he wakes to relish it. He will not have such a treat again, I warrant. No one makes bread so light as yours.’

  ‘The Riverwoman tells me the poor man has said nothing, though he looked about him when they carried him in.’

  Owen was glad to hear that Poins had at least awakened.

  ‘How fares Mistress Wilton?’ Maeve asked.

  ‘No better nor worse than you might expect.’

  Maeve clucked in sympathy. ‘Tell me, what is Mistress Fitzbaldric like?’

  ‘No more demanding than Brother Michaelo, I promise you.’

  Maeve laughed. ‘Go on, then, Captain. I must not keep you. Bishop William is within.’ She gestured towards the kitchen.

  ‘The Bishop of Winchester is here? In the kitchen?’

  She nodded, then leaned towards him with a conspiratorial expression. ‘Discussing the treatment of burns and the severing of limbs. I preferred the autumn afternoon.’ She fanned her ruddy face. ‘Maggots and butchering knives – such talk does not belong in a kitchen. But I shall enjoy the Riverwoman’s company.’ She eyed him up and down. ‘You look hungry.’

  ‘I am. And thirsty. But I have no time –’

  ‘You have time for a cup of ale and a meat pasty, you will not gainsay me.’ She nodded to a bench where a tray covered with a cloth had the inviting shape of the items she had mentioned. ‘I brought it out for myself, but now I’ve no appetite. Talk to me for a moment while you eat. You will not digest a thing if you eat it in there.’ She rolled her eyes towards the kitchen.

  Owen had already settled on the bench and had drawn the cloth from the tray. The aroma of spiced meat tempted him to try that first, but with his mouth as dry as it was the food would choke him. He took a good long drink of ale. ‘Tom Merchet’s ale?’ he asked, picking up the pasty.

  ‘Aye. His Grace trades brandywine for ale from the York Tavern. Mistress Merchet is a stubborn bargainer.’ She watched him take a bite, chew. ‘How is that, then? Will that hold you until you can sit down to a decent meal?’

  ‘It will indeed.’

  ‘Good.’ Maeve bent once more to the oven, wielding a paddle with long-accustomed skill.

  Owen felt the food improving his mood. He washed the pasty down with the rest of the ale. ‘How long has the bishop been in the kitchen?’ he asked as he rose and brushed off the crumbs.

  Maeve stood with hands on her hips, considering. ‘Long enough for the bread to rise a goodly amount.’

  Owen felt a lethargy in his limbs as he walked across the yard to the kitchen door. The afternoon was so warm that sweat trickled down through his hair and his clothes stuck to him. He guessed by the damp heat and the utter stillness of the air that a storm was coming. He was grateful to enter the coolness of the kitchen. Across the room, plain wattle screens enclosed a corner just beyond the one window. He crossed over the rush-strewn floor and peered round the screens. Dressed in his clerical gown, his bejewelled hands pressed to his knees, Wykeham perched at the edge of a stool, straining to watch Magda, who knelt on a stool beside Poins, applying the tanning unguent to a raw area on the man’s right thigh. Poins flinched, then struggled to lift his head to see what Magda was doing. The bandage wrapped round his head and the swelling of his face made it impossible for Owen to interpret the man’s expression.

  ‘I understand that silver filings in an unguent speed the healing,’ said Wykeham.

  ‘Many claim that is so, but Magda uses no filings in wounds. They are too harsh.’

  ‘They scour the flesh, perhaps? It would seem preferable to maggots.’

  ‘Maggots attack only the dead flesh.’

  Their tones were calm, conversational.

  ‘If the maggots have consumed the dead flesh,’ Wykeham said, ‘what need have you of the unguent?’

  ‘The salve cleans the wound and protects it while new skin is growing.’ Magda glanced round at Owen. ‘Hast thou come to enquire after thy houseguest?’

  Wykeham swivelled, noted Owen and nodded.

  Owen stepped past the screens and bowed to Wykeham. ‘My L
ord.’

  ‘Captain Archer.’

  Owen joined Magda. ‘I did wonder at the haste with which you removed Poins. I see he wakes.’

  Poins lowered his head to the pillow and turned away from them.

  ‘Has he spoken?’ Owen asked.

  ‘He tried when he first woke. The pain stopped him.’ Magda finished smoothing the salve, stepped back to consider her work. ‘This is Owen Archer, the good man who gave thee shelter last night, Poins,’ she said.

  The patient twisted his head back to face them and grunted. His eyelids were heavy with salve, as were his lips.

  ‘You are fortunate to have the Riverwoman watching over you,’ Owen said.

  Poins glanced at Magda, then over in the vicinity of the bishop.

  Of Magda, Owen asked, ‘Do you have all you need?’

  ‘Aye. Go now, he must rest and thou hast much to do.’

  Wykeham rose. ‘I shall walk with you, Captain.’

  The crinkles round Magda’s eyes suggested laughter as she watched them depart.

  ‘She is a singular woman,’ Wykeham said as they entered the screens passage to Thoresby’s hall. ‘Confident of her skill, and rightly so, I am told, yet lacking all understanding of whence comes her gift. That troubles me.’ He said nothing more for a few paces, then, ‘Yet, having met her and observed her at work, I would not cast her out.’

  ‘I am glad you recognize her worth.’

  Wykeham made a sound in his throat. ‘Her worth is yet to be proved.’

  They paused by a door open to the garden. Wykeham stepped out and glanced around. ‘Such an October day is rare this far north, is it not?’

  Owen thought it an odd question. The bishop had possessed prebends in both Beverley and York, and not so long ago – he should know the weather in the shire. It revealed how seldom Wykeham had resided in either minster close.

  ‘We treasure these last days, My Lord, but they are not so rare. Sometimes we are blessed with a mild, dry autumn through Martinmas.’

  Wykeham tucked in his chin, studied the gravel path. ‘Who is to be first in your questioning, Captain?’

  ‘I think it best to allow the Fitzbaldrics time to settle themselves, so I would begin with your clerks.’ Owen had only just decided that as they departed the kitchen.

  Wykeham nodded. ‘I shall come with you.’

  When a page opened wide the bishop’s chamber door, the clerk Alain hastened to greet his master and bowed Owen in. Though Alain wore merely the bishop’s livery, he still managed an air of elegance.

  Guy rose from a table, setting his pen aside. He was not so elegant as his fellow, his gown bunching about his round middle, his hands stained with ink. He had lank, colourless hair, tiny, widely spaced eyes, a flat, broad nose.

  After making his obeisance to Wykeham he bowed to Owen. ‘Captain. We have awaited your visit.’

  The bishop turned to Owen. ‘My men will be more forthcoming in my absence. I leave you to them.’ As the page opened the door, Wykeham took a few steps and then paused, regarding Guy, then Alain. ‘Tell him all you know,’ he commanded. ‘Captain Archer has a reputation for bringing the truth to light. You have nothing to gain by dissembling with him.’

  ‘Yes, My Lord,’ Guy said.

  Alain bowed.

  ‘If you would not mind, Captain,’ Guy said as the page closed the door, ‘it will take but a moment for me to complete this letter.’

  Owen nodded to him.

  The guest chamber given over to Wykeham was a large room partitioned with carved wooden screens. The carving echoed the patterns in the window tracery above. The bishop’s bedchamber with a small altar for prayer was furthest from the door. The section in which Owen stood was furnished with several tables, benches, a comfortable chair for the bishop and several chests. A tapestry depicting the boy Jesus with the elders in the temple hung on the wall facing the table at which Guy worked.

  Owen settled in the comfortable chair.

  Alain arranged himself on a bench near the table. He was a handsome man, sharp blue eyes, fair hair cut neatly about his ears and fringing his arched brows. Of moderate height, he was slender and straight-backed. He had long-fingered, delicate hands, with which he now smoothed the folds of his gown. According to Thoresby, the bishop had engaged Alain as a favour to his family, to rescue him from the clutches of a scheming woman who would have ruined his name.

  After a final scratch of his pen, Guy put it aside, sprinkled sand on the parchment, shook it, then leaned away from the table to blow. ‘I have just finished.’ He shifted his stool to face away from the table, inclined his head towards Owen. ‘Captain.’

  ‘You have both heard of this morning’s discovery, that the woman who died in the undercroft was not of the Fitzbaldric household?’

  Guy nodded.

  ‘We have,’ Alain said, with a touch of irritation in his tone. ‘A woman of questionable character, I understand.’

  ‘Cisotta attended my wife during a recent illness. She will be missed.’

  Alain dipped his head.

  ‘My comrade’s ill humor is his weakness,’ Guy said. ‘He means nothing by it.’

  ‘Are you here to play cat and mouse with us, Captain?’ Alain had reached back to the table for Guy’s penknife and now began to clean his nails with it.

  Owen ignored the question. ‘I understand that both of you have been much at the house on Petergate, working in the records room in the undercroft.’

  ‘Such a dungeon,’ said Alain. ‘His Grace wished us to record what was there, but everything was in disarray. We spent our time trying to create order so we might work.’

  ‘Oh?’ This was news to Owen. ‘What records were kept there?’

  ‘God have mercy,’ said Guy, ‘has the fire destroyed all trace?’

  ‘I have not had the opportunity to make a search,’ said Owen. ‘But I suspect all is ruined.’

  ‘I had not realized the extent of the fire.’ Guy shook his head.

  ‘They were records for the bishop’s Yorkshire properties,’ Alain said.

  Guy nodded. ‘Forgive me, yes, property records. We have been most concerned about them, particularly the deeds, which of course should not have been kept in such a place. When will we be permitted to survey the damage?’

  ‘After such a fire, the undercroft must be shored up before any search begins. What other records were there besides the deeds?’

  ‘Some accounts, letters.’ Alain waved the penknife. ‘Including accounts from properties no longer in my lord’s possession, which explains our assignment.’

  To Owen it explained nothing. ‘Had you planned to come north for this purpose before Bishop William decided to escort Sir Ranulf’s remains?’

  ‘That you must ask my lord,’ said Guy.

  ‘By your questions are we to understand we are suspect?’ Alain asked.

  ‘Did either of you know Cisotta?’

  Alain shook his head. ‘Thank heaven, no. It is enough to deal with the fire.’

  ‘What business would I have with a midwife?’ Guy looked puzzled.

  ‘Tell me what you saw in Petergate last night,’ Owen said to Alain.

  ‘In faith, I can tell you little that you did not see. I arrived to find a street full of people running this way and that with buckets and pots, shouting directions to the nearest wells, forming lines to pass the water along. I know few people in the city, so I cannot provide you with names.’

  ‘And you were all the time in the minster in prayer?’ Owen asked Guy.

  The clerk bowed his head. ‘I was, Captain.’

  ‘Neither of you had been working in the undercroft yesterday evening?’

  ‘We did not work there at night,’ said Alain. ‘Rats – I am brave about most things, but not those hideous creatures.’

  He must have been brought up in a wealthy household in which he was protected from such creatures. It brought the Pagnells to mind.

  ‘I understand you have been involved in the nego
tiations with the Pagnells. In fact, you delivered property deeds to them.’

  Alain rolled his eyes. ‘They mean to squeeze everything they can from Bishop William.’

  ‘Were the deeds among those in the bishop’s undercroft?’

  ‘They were,’ said Alain.

  Owen wondered at Guy’s silence in this. ‘Have you also an unfavourable impression of the Pagnells?’

  Guy blinked nervously. ‘They have suffered a great loss in Sir Ranulf. I do not think it fair to judge them at such a time.’

  ‘Well said.’ Alain clapped his hands and laughed. ‘Only the other day you were about to explode with indignation after an encounter with Stephen Pagnell.’

  Guy winced. ‘He is a most discourteous man. Even so, he has some cause for his anger.’

  Feeling his lack of sleep clouding his thoughts, Owen hastened to conclude. He stood, leaned against the table and glanced at the parchment on which Guy had been writing. Wykeham’s signature already graced it, although the bishop had not touched it. Guy must have the bishop’s complete trust. Thoresby had mentioned that Wykeham had had charge of the clerk’s education from the beginning and that they were as father and son.

  ‘I cannot think how the son and heir tolerates the steward Matthew,’ Alain was saying. ‘I envision them spitting venom at one another over the accounts.’

  ‘Enough, Alain,’ Guy muttered, his balding pate pink with his discomfort. ‘Might we have a look at the records room, Captain? See whether we might salvage some of the more important documents?’

  ‘Resolve that there is nothing worth a cress,’ said Owen.

  Alain breathed a curse. ‘Leather-wrapped boards and thick parchment, they do not burn so quickly. I cannot believe nothing is left.’

  ‘You witnessed the fire,’ Owen said. ‘What is not ashes is sodden and unreadable, I warrant.’

  ‘We might save something if –’

  ‘I’ve told you it is not safe,’ said Owen, interrupting Guy. ‘But in time you will have access to what is there.’ He straightened. ‘If either of you remembers anything you have not told me, be so good as to send me word.’

  As soon as Jasper returned with the vinegar and sugar, Lucie withdrew to the workroom behind the shop and began to make the syrup that formed the base of the electuary, standing the bowl in which she had mixed the ingredients over a pot of water so that the syrup warmed, but did not burn. As she worked she became aware of a feeling of light-headedness. Perhaps she had stopped taking Magda’s tonic too soon. She should have considered how much blood she had lost. She found the jar on a shelf and mixed some in a cup of water, then pulled over a stool and relaxed with the drink, leaning over occasionally to stir the syrup. The warmth and the pleasant scent of warming sugar began to make her drowsy. She woke to find Jasper reaching past her to stir the syrup.