The Tainted Coin hds-5

by Mel Starr

  “You require lodging for a woman, I am told,” the infirmarer said. Arthur, who had been standing near, displaying Lord Gilbert’s blue-and-black livery to add emphasis to my request, now spoke:

  “You’ve injured yourself?” he said to the other monk. It was impolitic for Arthur to interrupt so, but he is accustomed to speaking his mind, and voiced but what I had thought.

  “Nay, no injury. A fistula which will not heal.”

  “Master Hugh can deal with such as that,” Arthur said confidently. “Seen ’im put a man’s skull back together after a tree fell on ’im.”

  “You are a physician?” the monk asked.

  “Nay, a surgeon. Is there no brother in the abbey, trained in medicine, who can help you?”

  “Brother Bartholomew has prepared salves, but none will cure me. I will go to my grave with this, I think. I have prayed the Lord Christ to ease my affliction, and the saints, also, but as with St. Paul’s ‘thorn in the flesh,’ He has chosen not to do so.”

  “Some afflictions,” the porter said, “serve to bring us to God. As we suffer now, He will requite it of us in purgatory. Brother Theodore’s suffering will release him from years of misery to come. And Brother Bartholomew possesses much knowledge and skill. If he cannot deal with Brother Theodore’s complaint, ’tis sure no other can.”

  Arthur rolled his eyes, shrugged, but remained silent. He recognized that the porter was not a man who suffered lightly any contradiction, especially from the commons. The monk, however, saw no need to agree with the porter.

  “You made a man’s broken head whole again?”

  “Aye.”

  “An’ he walks now near as good as ever,” Arthur found his voice again.

  “Do you have salves which might help me, some ointment Brother Bartholomew does not know of?”

  “Nay, no ointment will remedy your hurt.”

  “See,” the porter said, “there is nothing to be done if Brother Bartholomew cannot work a cure.”

  Brother Theodore turned to me and said, “Is this so?”

  “Nay. Such a fistula can be repaired. I saw it done in Paris.”

  “Paris?”

  “Aye,” Arthur said. “Master Hugh studied surgery in Paris.”

  The monk looked from me to the porter, then slowly dropped the linen cloth which had covered his disfigurement.

  “Can you deal with this?” he asked.

  The fistula was between his nose and his right eye. I believe it had vexed the man for many months, perhaps even years, for it was of great size and oozed constantly a fluid of pus and blood.

  I approached close to the sufferer and studied the lesion carefully before I made reply. “Aye, I can. I must tell you, however, that such surgery as I must do to mend you will be painful.”

  “But after the pain I will have relief?”

  “Aye, I believe so. An unsightly scar will remain.”

  “No more unsightly than this wound I now bear.”

  “Nay, not so bad as now.”

  “When can you deal with this affliction?”

  “I have no instruments with me. I must return to Bampton for them. While I do so you and the infirmarer may find a chamber for a woman who needs a place of safety for herself and her children. Felons who have done theft and murder may seek her out to do more villainy.”

  “I am Brother Theodore,” the monk said. “Hosteler to the abbey. Brother Bartholomew and I will see that the woman is safe in the hospital.”

  I left the abbey pleased that I would be able to help a troubled man, and pleased also that when I did so, I would have a friend inside the abbey walls.

  Chapter 6

  So it was that the infirmarer of St. John’s Hospital, Abingdon, was pleased to find a place for Amice Thatcher and her children. Perhaps the porter, had he some infirmity I might have mended, would also have been willing to see Amice sheltered there. As it was, he showed his displeasure with a scowl and in every way but by words.

  Arthur and I left the abbey and returned to the crowded alleys of the bury. Amice Thatcher’s door was open for custom, and a bushel was raised upon a pole above her door, to tell all that here was fresh-brewed ale. The narrow lane was swarming with residents, both adult and children. Their numbers would keep Amice safe in the day, but for the dark of night I was well pleased that she would be within St. John’s Hospital.

  I saw fright in Amice’s eyes as my shadow darkened her door. She was, I think, unwilling to shut out customers, but fearful of those who did enter her ale house. I told her of the sanctuary provided her at the hospital and saw her features relax.

  “I brewed five gallons of ale fresh yesterday,” she said, “and have sold but a gallon this day. It will go stale. Must I remain long at the abbey, you think?”

  “Perhaps the hosteler will have need of fresh ale for the guest hall. I will ask it of him.”

  I was confident that, to retain my good will, Brother Theodore would purchase four gallons of ale. He did, and offered six pence (which price Amice was much pleased to accept), and sent a lay brother following Amice’s directions to fetch the cask and bring the ale to the abbey.

  When the sacrist rang the abbey church bell for nones Amice Thatcher and her children were safe within St. John’s hospital. So I did believe.

  In my travels about Abingdon I had seen several blacksmith’s forges. There was yet nearly three hours till dark, so I set out with Arthur to learn if any smith had recently plied his trade upon a horse with a broken shoe. None had, but I left each smith with a promise that, should he do so, and then report the labor to me at the New Inn, he would be rewarded.

  Next day Arthur and I, after a dinner of stockfish and wheaten loaves, wandered the town searching the streets for the mark of a broken horseshoe. We saw none.

  Thursday morn, after a pint of ale at the ale house across the marketplace from the inn, Arthur and I started for Bampton. There was little more to learn of John Thrale in Abingdon, and the sooner I could apply my skills to the hosteler’s fistula the sooner I would have a friend in the abbey.

  I must learn to be more observant. We had crossed the Thames at Newbridge, more than halfway to Bampton, before I looked to the muddy road under Bruce’s hooves and saw that we followed the track of a horse with a broken shoe. I called to Arthur to bring his palfrey to a halt, dismounted, and squatted in the road to see better if the marks there seemed to be the same as those made by the beast which carried a man who had threatened my Bessie. They were, and Arthur, peering over my shoulder, was able to see clearly now the imprint he had before known only by my description.

  “Not likely to forget that,” he said after his inspection. “That horse’ll soon be lame, I think, does his owner not see to him.”

  I am not skilled in the care of horses, so I could not judge the accuracy of Arthur’s assertion, but it seemed to me I sought some gentleman who suffered from financial misfortune. The fellow had wealth enough that he could own a horse, but not enough to care for the beast properly, and he was willing to beat and murder another to gain what that other man possessed.

  My next thought was that the man was headed toward Bampton. Kate and Bessie were safe within the wall of Bampton Castle, so I had no fear for them, but I wondered what other mischief the fellow might be about, or what he sought.

  Had we followed the track since leaving Abingdon? Had I been more observant, I might have had answer to that question. The day was yet young. An extra hour or two backtracking to see where the broken-shoed horse had entered the road would not much delay our journey.

  The nearer we approached to Abingdon the more folk had been upon the road, and the marks of their passage began to obliterate the track we followed. At one place, where for many paces we saw no mark of a broken horseshoe, Arthur dismounted and led his palfrey, studying the road before us for a resumption of our trail. He found it, briefly, at a place where the tower of the abbey church looked down upon us through an opening in a wood through which the road passed. But
a hundred paces beyond, the mark we followed was again obscured by the passage of men and beasts, and this time, search as we would, we could not recover the track.

  Before us was a crossroad. We went so far as to examine this lane, where a track would be easy to follow, for fewer travelers went there. We did not find the mark we sought.

  I called to Arthur — who had explored the crossing path to the south, while I searched to the north — to give up the hunt. We resumed our interrupted journey to Bampton, followed again the track of a broken horseshoe to Newbridge, and this time searched for where our quarry went, rather than whence he had come.

  A mile past Newbridge, nearly to Standlake, Arthur shouted, “Look there!” and drew his palfrey to a halt. He rode to my right, so when the hoof-print we followed broke from the road to a narrow track which led to the right, he saw it first.

  Two horses had recently turned into this narrow lane, one well shod, the other the beast we followed. The path soon became so narrow and overgrown that we were forced to dismount, and at the place we did so the mark of a broken-shoed horse also disappeared. So few travelers had passed this way that grass and fallen leaves had covered the path, and no rider would gallop his horse here to throw clods of turf, where trees grew close over the way and a low limb might unseat him.

  We tied Bruce and the palfrey to saplings and made our way afoot into the wood. Where this trail led I could not guess, for the forest soon closed in upon us. Where the mud gave way to turf we had seen the tracks of horses entering this overgrown lane, but there were no marks of any horses leaving it. This was a puzzle. Arthur and I had left our beasts behind, so overgrown was the path. If a man entered this forest track with his horse, he must do so afoot, leading with his beast behind. But where would he go that he would not return the way he came?

  The path became so overgrown that I was required to push foliage aside to make a way through. At several places I saw where others had done so also. Twigs and small branches were snapped off, and recently — the breaks showing white and fresh. This was not a silent business, and it occurred to me that the felons I sought might be hidden in the forest, warned of our approach and waiting in ambush. I turned to Arthur, put a finger to my lips, then proceeded with new caution.

  There was no need for this vigilance. A hundred or more paces from the road the path entered a clearing in the wood, edged with blackberry thorns. This opening was much like the clearing to the east of St. Andrew’s Chapel where I had discovered John Thrale’s cart. Was this another place where he had sought solitude for a night’s rest? Surely the way from the road to this place was not wide enough for his cart. But when he traveled harnessed to his small cart, might he then have penetrated to this quiet spot?

  The forest opening was no more than twenty paces across, and when I studied the opposite side I saw a place where men and horses might have gone. I pointed, motioned to Arthur, and silently he followed me across the clearing to where another overgrown path led into the forest. Where the forest and a tangle of blackthorn met I noticed a strange thing. Several strange things. Spaced little more than one pace apart were hummocks rising from a large depression in the leafy mold. I counted four in one direction, and six in another, so that there were twenty-four of these mounds, identical in size and shape, in an orderly pattern where forest and clearing met.

  My curiosity was aroused. I knelt beside one of the mounds, which rose to a height nearly to my knee, and with the point of my dagger prodded the lump to see what might lie in such orderly rows, under the decay of a forest floor. Arthur peered intently over my shoulder as I did so.

  Masonry was there. The blade of my dagger struck something hard before I had poked it in the length of my little finger. I did not at first know what I had found, but a few moments with dagger and fingers cleared the moss and overgrowth from the pile enough that a short column of what appeared to be tiles and mortar became visible. These tiles were not a random assembly. They had been cut square and carefully stacked, and there were twenty-three more mounds like the one I had uncovered. What men had done this, and what these short pillars were to do, I could not tell.

  I stood and scratched the back of my head in puzzlement. Why would the felons who beat John Thrale to his death seek this place? As the question entered my mind, so did the answer. Here was a place where men had lived long ago. Perhaps those men had buried their wealth somewhere near to conceal it from brigands.

  Arthur was as perplexed as I. “What is here?” he finally asked.

  “Many years past men built here a house, I think, and these columns supported it. The murdered chapman may have found the place, and somehow discovered a buried hoard. The men who slew him knew he visited this place, and now seek the treasure.

  Arthur frowned, looked about him, and placed a hand upon the hilt of his dagger.

  “They are not here,” I said. “We made noise along that track. They would have heard us coming and fled.”

  “Fled? Would they not fight for riches?”

  “Perhaps, if pressed, but they would sooner flee, so as not to give suspicion that there is anything here worth fighting for. Let’s see what may be here… Go about the other side of these hillocks and see what may be found.”

  Arthur frowned in puzzlement. “What am I to seek?”

  “Anything which seems out of place in a forest. Some hole, perhaps, recently dug. Leaves will cover it, so search carefully. I will examine the ground this side of the mounds.”

  Arthur disappeared into the forest so that all I knew of his progress was the occasional snapping of a twig. Meanwhile I walked the length of the stubby columns but saw no place where any man had made a trench in the earth.

  I explored the forest five or six paces beyond the columns and there appeared three declivities in the earth before me. At the moment I saw them I heard Arthur speak through the wood. “Here is a hole… nay, two.”

  “Stay where you are,” I replied, and wound my way through the trees until I saw his blue-and-black livery through the forest. He stood between two leaf-covered depressions, each about three paces across and knee deep.

  These holes were fresh. Whoso dug them had piled the dirt nearby, and the mounds and holes had but a thin layer of fallen leaves as cover. I took a broken limb, stepped into one of the holes, and scraped away the leaves. I found nothing.

  “There are three hollows much like this over yonder,” I said.

  “Five holes? Them fellows find that much treasure, you think?”

  “Nay. I think they found none.”

  “None. Why so much labor, then?”

  “Aye, why dig in so many places if you knew where you must search? They dug, found nothing, and dug again.”

  “An’ gave up after five holes?”

  “Aye.”

  “What if they found what they sought in the fifth hole?”

  “Mayhap,” I said. “We must hope they did not.”

  “An’ why dig in these five places? Why choose here?” He pointed to the excavation before us. “Why not over there?” He pointed to an untouched opening between two great beech trees to our left.

  “I cannot tell,” I shrugged. “There may have been some sign which the felons thought might tell of riches below the ground. Perhaps their digging obliterated it? When we find them I will ask it of them.

  “For now, let’s follow the track beyond the clearing and see where it leads. There may be other ruins nearby, and other holes.”

  There were not. The overgrown trail began to bend to the left, and perhaps a quarter of a mile beyond the five holes the path rejoined the road. To the right was Standlake, a half-mile distant. To the left, no more than two hundred paces off, was the place where we had left the road, following the track of a broken horseshoe.

  I looked down at the road where I stood, and saw there the mark of the ill-shod horse we had followed into the forest. We had trailed the beast back to the road. Arthur followed my eyes and studied the mud at our feet.

  “Them
fellows didn’t return the way they come,” he said. “Nay. Had they found treasure in the forest, they would return home, but the track leads on toward Standlake… unless that is near their home. We’ll retrieve the horses and see where these men may lead us.”

  Past Standlake the roads diverge, one way leading north, to Witney, the other west, to Bampton. I considered as we passed through Standlake what I should do if the trail led north.

  I was spared the decision. The mark of a broken horseshoe traveled toward Bampton.

  We followed, watching closely for any place where the horse had left the road.

  Through Aston and Cote we saw no such trail, and at Cote rain began to fall, soaking us thoroughly and slowly obliterating the track we followed.

  The deluge had nearly blotted out the trace of a broken horseshoe when we came to the place near to St. Andrew’s Chapel where John Thrale had been beaten to his death. Here the horse we followed again departed the road, and went along the same path which led to the clearing where I had found the chapman’s horse and cart.

  I turned Bruce from the road, and Arthur followed. We were already soaked through, wet and cold. What matter if we became colder and wetter?

  It was not necessary to dismount to follow this path. I knew the way, and I thought I knew where it would lead. I discovered soon enough that my knowledge was incomplete.

  We came to the clearing where John Kellet and I had found Thrale’s horse and cart, and here I dismounted to inspect the surrounding forest for cavities made by those who sought the chapman’s hoard. No such digging was visible, but two wicked men had recently come to this place for some reason. It was not to enjoy the solitude of a peaceful autumn wood.

  I told Arthur to circle about the clearing to the right, and I would do the same to the left. No more than ten paces from the clearing I found a duplicate of the ruins we found near Standlake. Here there were twenty leaf-and-mold-covered columns, four across and five in length, standing in a shallow declivity, as in the first discovery. Here was a place where ancient men had once lived, but a half-mile from Bampton, yet so far as I knew, no man of Bampton knew of the place. Perhaps some swineherd had passed by, or men seeking downed limbs for winter firewood, but if they saw the lumps in the forest they thought little of them. I was sure I would find holes dug into the earth nearby, and soon did so; four of them.