The Cross Legged Knight (Owen Archer Book 8)

by Candace Robb

  ‘I shall.’

  Eudo crossed the room, reaching up to punch one of the ceiling beams as he passed beneath it, then the lintel before stepping out into the kitchen yard.

  Anna had quieted. Lucie lifted her chin. ‘Would you mind if I took the gloves away for a few days? I should like Captain Archer to see them.’

  The girl wiped her eyes with her sleeves. ‘Was Ma doing wrong? Is that why she died?’

  ‘We have no cause to think she did wrong.’

  Anna glanced over at her father. ‘Should we tell Pa about the gloves?’ He had returned to the doorway, leaning against it as he talked to the guard.

  ‘Not yet, Anna. He has enough sorrow to bear. Let him rest this evening.’ There was no predicting the man’s temper.

  Getting up on to a stool, Lucie took one of the jars from the bottom shelf and drew out the gloves, tucking them inside her girdle, beneath her surcoat. When she stepped down, she crouched and gave Anna a hug. ‘Little Will is cooler tonight. But if he worsens again, send for Goodwife Claire.’ The woman had gone home to see to her own family.

  ‘He will get better?’

  ‘I believe it is a catarrh, nothing more.’

  Lucie felt Eudo’s eyes on her as she made her way past Henry and Ned, and the overturned toy wagon they were repairing. The tawyer stood in the doorway, hands on his hips, legs spread, effectively blocking her way. His face was ruddy with drink, his eyes flinty.

  ‘I thank you for including me at the table today,’ she said. ‘It was good to hear how beloved Cisotta was by her friends and your fellows in the guild.’ Her breathless speech did not move him.

  ‘What did you tuck into your girdle?’ He moved his head, trying to see anything showing beneath the surcoat, which was cut low at the sides, allowing a glimpse of the girdle at her hips. ‘Something of my wife’s, was it? What are you and my Anna conspiring?’ Eudo brought his face uncomfortably close to Lucie’s, his jowls thrust forward, the pain of his loss visible in every line, every patch of swollen, reddened skin.

  Lucie hesitated. Anna had joined her and watched her with a frightened expression. She must think of the child in dealing with Eudo, not herself. If he did not believe his daughter, he might beat the truth out of her. ‘I did not wish to give you any more to worry over today, Eudo. It is Cisotta’s day, when we remember her and pray for her soul.’ Though he was not doing much of that while tippling. But as he had asked, Lucie showed him the gloves and told him what she knew.

  He stepped back and fell to studying the gloves. He held them close to his face, sniffing the leather, squinting at the decorative beads and stitching; then, with a gentleness she had not guessed possible with his large hands, he turned one of the gloves inside out, patiently working several of the fingers inside out as well. ‘Deerskin, tawyed by someone with skill. I thought at first it might be from a hide I had worked, but the oils are not mine. The stitching is fine.’

  How he changed when talking of his work, what he knew well. How at ease he seemed, confident. ‘See how smooth the tips of the fingers are. These have been worn a long while.’ He held the glove up to Lucie.

  Indeed, the nap had been worn smooth and darkened.

  ‘Though there is wear within, the stitching has held – the glover fitted these well,’ said Eudo. He turned the glove right side out again.

  ‘Can you identify the glover?’ Lucie asked.

  Eudo shook his head. ‘Jet and silver thread – these were made to order, I’d wager, not the glover’s common work.’

  ‘If you wished to make gloves like these, to whom would you go for the hides?’

  Eudo handed her the gloves. ‘I can tell you two merchants who trade in such hides – Peter Ferriby and of late Godwin Fitzbaldric.’

  Fourteen

  THE DEVIL’S SPORT

  Out in Patrick Pool, Lucie found herself uncertain whether to return home or continue on to Emma’s house. She was anxious to see how her friend was taking the news of her boys’ transgression. But she was worried she would be tempted to show Emma the gloves and she was not yet convinced it was the time to do so. It was best that Owen saw them before she showed them to anyone else. She dreaded telling him that Eudo had seen them.

  Yet she had learned much from Eudo’s comments, and Emma and Lady Pagnell knew far more about fine clothes such as the gloves than Lucie did. It would be helpful to Owen if they identified the glover or the former owner.

  And if the gloves had belonged to Emma or her mother? There was the rub.

  She turned down the street, heading for the Staithe. Watching the river might quiet her mind enough to think more clearly.

  *

  The rear door of the palace kitchen was wide open to the sunshine and what had calmed to a pleasant breeze. Inside, Owen found Maeve bent over a small brazier as she stirred a sauce and spoke in quiet tones to a maidservant who was cracking nuts and digging out the meats. They seemed absorbed in their work and Owen thought he might reach the screened corner unnoticed.

  But he had not taken two steps when Maeve cried out, ‘Captain! Did you mean to pass through without so much as a greeting?’ Instructing the maidservant to take over the stirring, the cook hastened towards Owen while wiping her hands on her apron.

  ‘I did not mean to take you from your work,’ he said. ‘You have a large household to feed.’

  ‘That is the least of my worries, Captain.’ Her rosy face was pulled together in a troubled frown. She leaned close and whispered, ‘I do not like what is ado in my kitchen. The devil is in that poor man who lies beyond that screen, mark me, I am right about that, and the Riverwoman sees naught amiss in it – indeed, she encourages him in his evil confusion.’

  Owen began to ask her what she meant, but she put a finger to her lips and motioned for him to follow her to the screen, then stayed him with an imperious hand while she peered round it. Drawing back, she whispered, ‘Look you, and hark what they say as well.’ With a last glance towards the screen, she crossed herself and left him to his spying.

  He heard Magda’s voice. She spoke softly, with immense calm. He felt a humid warmth even before he spied a small brazier with a pot of water simmering on the top, caught the scent of lavender and mint. The elderly healer was gently unwrapping Poins’s stump while coaxing him to stretch out his fingers, ease the cramp in his hand. The stump moved a little. Poins groaned. As Magda turned to dip the cloth in the simmering water, she nodded to Owen. With a stick she stirred the cloth through the water so that it might soak in heat, then lifted it and held it dripping over the water to cool a little before wringing it out.

  ‘Rest a moment,’ she said over her shoulder to Poins. ‘When thy shoulder is warm again it will be easier to move thine arm.’ She regarded Owen. ‘Thou knowest this pain, Magda thinks. Thy friend Martin Wirthir suffered it when his hand was severed.’

  ‘Aye, his thumb it was that woke him in the night. It does so still, so he says. And if he hits his right elbow, he swears the fingers tingle.’

  So this was the devil work Maeve feared, that Magda accepted Poins’s claim of pain in the severed arm.

  ‘I witnessed this in the camps as well, after a limb was severed,’ Owen added. ‘Not all suffer so. I never understood the cause.’

  ‘Neither does Magda, but the pain is real, thou canst be certain of it.’ She wrung out the warmed cloth, laid it gently on the stump.

  Owen sat down on a bench and stretched his legs. Noticing the injured man regarding him from the depth of his bandages, he said, ‘Good-day to you, Poins. I pray God you make a full recovery.’

  Poins turned away.

  ‘Does that ease it?’ Magda asked.

  When Poins nodded, Owen rose and approached him. ‘Are you able to talk?’

  Poins glanced towards him, then closed his eyes.

  Owen wished there were a way to trick him into talking. But though he could think of ways to elicit a scream or a shout, he doubted he could make the man actually communicate until he so cho
se.

  ‘Would you walk out into the sunlight with me, Magda?’

  ‘Aye.’ Magda eased herself to her feet, whispering to Poins that she would return, then headed for the closed door. ‘Best not to pass through the kitchen. Maeve has much to say and none of it what thou seekest to know.’

  On the sunlit path between the kitchen and the great hall Magda paused, blinking in the brightness, then headed to the cool shadows behind the hall. ‘He has not spoken again since that first night,’ she said.

  Owen noted that she looked pale. ‘Have you left his side since then?’

  Magda wagged her head. ‘Now and then. But Poins is thy concern, not Magda.’ She glanced away, summoning her thoughts. When she spoke again her tone was quiet, as if even out here the patient might be affected by her words. ‘His body will mend, but the burns will leave terrible scars, flesh that will pucker and misshape him even with daily salves. And the lack of an arm –’ She touched her right shoulder with a vein-patterned, wrinkled hand. ‘As he heals, worries will gnaw at his heart. What occupation can he have, a man who has been a servant, fetching and carrying, helping his master to dress? What woman will wed him?’

  ‘Aye.’ Owen remembered his own awakening to the change the knife of the jongleur’s leman had made in his life. He felt again the upwelling of anger that had carried him along for a time, and eased only to leave a void more terrible than either the anger or the physical pain. Death had beckoned, and he had decided to pursue it by sailing to the Continent to take up the life of a mercenary. Thoresby had offered him an alternative just in time.

  ‘Thou art deep in thy past,’ Magda said, settling down on the ground beside the hedge, where the afternoon shadows had lengthened.

  Owen crouched down beside her, noticed how straight her fingers were, despite the age of her hands. ‘I would talk to Poins, hear his tale of the fire.’

  ‘Aye, Magda knows what thou needst. Thou wilt be called at once when he is ready.’

  ‘So he truly has not spoken?’

  ‘Thou knowest well that Magda does not lie.’

  ‘Is it that he cannot, or that he will not?’

  ‘To Magda, there is no difference between the two, not in speech.’

  ‘Would that were true of sight as well.’

  Magda tilted her head to study him. ‘Dost thou so wish? And what wouldst thou do? Take up thy bow and fight for Lancaster? The crow thou dost serve needs no captain of archers.’

  ‘I may have erred in valuing the archbishop above the new duke, but I made the choice, my life is here now.’ Owen had been devoted to the former Duke of Lancaster, Henry of Grosmont. He had gladly followed him into Normandy and fought with confidence that his was a righteous cause. But the present duke was not Henry’s son; he was the son of King Edward, son-in-law to the old duke, and far from his equal. Over time, Owen had grown to respect him despite his shortcomings. How Thoresby had guessed his change of heart he did not know.

  ‘Thou didst not trust thy aim, that is truly why thou didst not stay with Lancaster. If thou couldst use thy left eye, what then?’

  ‘I would change nothing in my life.’

  Magda wagged her head. ‘Easily said, Bird-eye.’

  Her teasing unsettled him. ‘Have you changed your mind about my eye? Do you think I might yet have the use of it?’

  Magda chuckled. ‘Would Magda not tell thee?’

  ‘I wish I knew.’

  ‘Thou wouldst do well to search thy heart before wishing for what thou hast lost.’

  Owen’s knees ached. He rose slowly, silently cursing his weariness. ‘I have much to do. When should I come again to talk to Poins?’

  Magda reached up a hand. Owen took it and helped her rise, wincing at the strength of her grip.

  ‘Come tomorrow,’ she said. ‘Whether he will talk or keep his silence, that Magda cannot prophesy.’

  The gentle breeze and plentiful sunshine lifted Lucie’s mood a little as she neared the river. Though she had hoped the walk would quiet her mind, instead she worked on the problem of how she might present the gloves to Emma and Lady Pagnell. Little by little, she pieced together a lie that might work quite well with two women so devoted to elegant dress. Checking her steps, she headed back up Ousegate to Hosier Lane.

  A servant greeted Lucie at the door and led her through the hall. John and Ivo barely glanced up from their lessons as she passed the table. Their tutor took more note of her, but when she caught his eye he nodded curtly and went back to the lesson. Ever since the family had received word of Sir Ranulf’s imprisonment there had been a pall over the house, but never so thick and soul-dampening as this.

  Emma sat alone beneath an apple tree, paternoster beads in her hands. The old tree shone golden in the sun and a quince glowed a fiery red. Catching sight of her visitor, Emma kissed the beads, laid them aside and came forward, arms outspread. ‘Oh, my friend, it is good of you to come.’

  The warm greeting heartened Lucie, but Emma’s bloodshot eyes and poor colour concerned her. ‘The sleep draught is not helping?’

  Emma shook her head. ‘But your physick is not to blame. Even the most potent elixir would not have helped me sleep last night, not after learning that my sons kept such a secret from me.’ She pressed her square hands to her cheeks. ‘What are we to do? What will Wykeham do? Has Owen spoken to him?’

  ‘I have not heard.’

  Emma drew herself up, motioned Lucie to join her on the bench where she had been sitting in the shade of the apple tree. ‘Come, sit down, do. Are you thirsty?’

  ‘No. And I should not stay long. I have left Jasper alone in the shop too much of late.’ Only as she settled beside Emma did Lucie realize how tired she was, and she sighed with the relief of being received with affection by her friend.

  ‘Whatever time you can spare, I thank God for it,’ Emma said. ‘I had not thought to see you today and I am sorely in need of your counsel.’

  Lucie felt uneasy, coming there as she did with the gloves, and the dread that they might link Cisotta with Emma or Lady Pagnell. ‘My counsel? I do not know the Bishop of Winchester, not in the way you need. I do not see how I might guide you.’

  ‘We slept little last night. Peter believes that John is frightened about something greater than what we learned of. He has been so quiet of late, and has no appetite.’

  ‘He was so fond of Sir Ranulf. Could it not be that?’

  ‘I believe so. John wept most bitterly when Father departed for France. And when word came of his imprisonment, both he and Ivo spent many hours at St Crux praying for Father’s safe release. That must be what tears at his heart. And that he almost injured Wykeham – he understands the damage this will cause to our name if it becomes widely known.’

  ‘Ivo is not so disturbed?’

  ‘He is a child of quick moods. It is his nature. John is different, stolid, unflinching.’ Emma pressed a hand to her forehead for a moment. ‘Perhaps there is more to it – I cannot understand their not telling us. It has made it all so much more serious. I pray that Wykeham is wiser in this than he was with my father’s ransom.’

  ‘You can be assured that Owen will speak well of the boys.’

  ‘I am grateful for that.’

  Emma shifted on the bench and in doing so knocked the Paternoster beads to the ground. She was retrieving them when Matthew the steward stepped into the garden. Seeing Lucie, he bowed curtly and began to withdraw, but paused when Emma straightened.

  ‘So you have returned?’ Emma said with such an edge to her voice that Lucie glanced at her. ‘Surely by now you have covered all the properties under consideration, walked every bit of ground, climbed every tree. It seems to me the choice should be left to our neighbour, as it is he who must be pleased with the trade.’

  Expressionless, Matthew bowed deeply to her. ‘My lady has entrusted me with this task, Mistress Ferriby, and I mean to be thorough, weighing all with care, in the hope that Master Tewksby will be pleased with the first offering. Is my la
dy above?’

  ‘She is not to be disturbed.’ Emma dropped her attention to the beads, wrapping them round her wrist.

  Matthew bowed once more to her bent head and withdrew to the hall.

  ‘He is a worm,’ Emma said.

  ‘He works hard for Lady Pagnell. And your father never had complaint.’

  ‘The worm turned upon Father’s death – he plots to gain by Mother’s widowhood, I am certain of it.’

  ‘What has he done?’

  ‘Last night he argued with Mother, insisting that she take the boys away to the countryside, save them from the gossip.’

  ‘Some would consider that good counsel.’

  Emma leaned closer, grasping Lucie’s hand as if to ensure her attention. ‘He spoke as if he were her equal, Lucie. As if Mother were bound to heed his words.’

  Lucie could see that Emma expected her now to comprehend the nature of Matthew’s transgression. Perhaps the steward had overstepped his position, but she did not see anything improper in his suggestion. ‘The boys are yet here, so Lady Pagnell must have stood her ground.’

  ‘Not without some effort to appease him with gentle words. But yes, she did stand firm. “A Pagnell never runs away,” that is what she told him, and she would not be moved by anything further that he said.’

  ‘Then what is your worry?’

  Emma let go of Lucie’s hand as she rose and walked a few steps away from the bench, hugging herself. ‘I do not know why I fret so about her. She never has a civil word for me.’

  Nor did Emma for her mother. But Lucie kept her counsel. ‘I came on a trifling errand,’ she said. ‘Seeing your distress, I am almost embarrassed to bring it up. But perhaps it will distract you.’

  Emma sat down on the bench once more. ‘Something to do with the garden?’

  ‘No, the matter is a pair of fine gloves.’

  ‘Do you require a good glover?’

  ‘I hope to find a specific one. Aunt Phillippa had a pair of my mother’s gloves in her chest. I should love to have a pair like them, and I thought you might recognize the glover’s mark or the workmanship.’ Lucie drew the gloves from her scrip.