The Butcher of Avignon (Hildegard of Meaux medieval crime series Book 6)

by Cassandra Clark

  ‘Worse?’ Grizac rallied. ‘I fear you overstate the case. And besides, the lad is dead.’

  ‘Quite so.’ Athanasius folded his hands on his chest and smiled with contentment. ‘A just reward, my friend. A just reward.’

  **

  ‘Your eminence?’ Hildegard hurried to catch up with Grizac after they left at the bell for nones and he had reached a corner of the passage before he swung round to face her.

  ‘Don’t try to catch me saying something when he could not,’ he grated.

  They stared each other, poised at the top of the steps. Hildegard was stunned by the transformation in Grizac’s manner. His antagonism made her falter for an instant.

  He pushed his face forward into hers. ‘Tell your mentor I know who the guilty man is and I know who his master is! Tell him that if you wish!’ He turned in a crackle of stiff brocade and made off down the stairs.

  They were the same Stairs of Honour where she had first encountered Hubert and his two supporters and now she went to the arch in the brickwork and watched Grizac descend all the way to the bottom, robes billowing, without slackening speed.

  **

  He knew who had killed Maurice? As much at a loss as before Hildegard went up to her chamber to rest. She had some planning of her own to do. But Grizac knew who the killer was and would not name him? Did he also know why Maurice had gone to the treasury? He must do. He had strenuously denied knowing anything about it. But he must be lying. Do not trust him.

  She wondered if it was a bluff. Athanasius blamed him for sending Maurice into the treasury. That must wrankle. Yet, as he had pointed out, he had no need of riches. Nor did he have a reason to interfere in the pope’s barter with Woodstock. He was a Clementist. What Clement wanted he must want.

  If pushed, would he have named the man behind it all? He could not know it. If so, someone would be in custody by now.

  Thoughtfully she checked the contents of her scrip. Earlier she had seen Carlotta and Fondi with their little daughter sitting on his shoulders going into an apartment further along. She had been appalled. Her suspicions ran amok. So close to her own chamber. Too close for comfort. How had Carlotta managed that? What did it mean?

  Feeling trapped she decided she would have to be on her guard every minute of every night and every day if she didn’t want to finish up like the Scottish nun.

  **

  Later, sometime before vespers, she heard a noise outside and went to the window to look down into the garden. She saw Carlotta and Flora with a few servants entering through the wooden door in the wall. Carlotta went to drape herself languorously on the low wall that encircled the spring while Flora played with a ball.

  Deciding to go down, attack being a better sort of defence than cringing here in her chamber, she soon found the stairs that led to the garden.

  Carlotta greeted her suspiciously and at once demanded to know if she expected to find Hubert here.

  ‘I hadn’t given him a thought,’ Hildegard replied. That was true anyway, her mind was full of other things at present. Uppermost at present was how she was going to find out whether Fondi and Carlotta had visited her chamber.

  She offered Flora some sugared almonds she happened to have with her. Bel Pierre, half asleep in a basket, managed to eat his fill, and the time passed until the bell tolled and it was time to go up for the evening office.

  Everyone began to move off in Carlotta’s wake, one of the maids carrying the squirrel in his basket while Flora skipped ahead.

  Suddenly the maid let out a cry. Bel Pierre had woken up, jumped out of the basket and vanished up the stairs. Everyone ran after him except for Carlotta who yawned and carried on towards her apartment.

  ‘Leave the filthy animal,’ she called down when she saw everyone scurrying around in vain. ‘He’ll soon appear when he wants feeding.’

  Flora was in tears.

  ‘He must have hidden himself behind one of the tapestries,’ Hildegard suggested. ‘We’ll soon find the little fellow.’

  The servants searched with care but he was nowhere to be found. A man with a broom was summoned and banged it into corners they could not reach but with no more success.

  ‘Go up, Flora, and we’ll continue the search,’ Hildegard told the weeping child. ‘We’ll soon find him. He can’t have gone far. Leave the basket with me and I’ll bring the naughty little fellow to you as soon as we find him.’

  ‘It’s my bedtime,’ sobbed Flora. ‘I want him. I want Bel Pierre. I can’t sleep without him.’

  ‘You might have to, just this once. I promise by the time you wake up in the morning he’ll be safe and sound beside you.’

  The howling child was taken upstairs by her maid and after a fruitless search the servants followed one by one. Hildegard stood in puzzlement. The squirrel must have gone up into the guest apartments. She was just about to go up there herself when she noticed a small shadow on the stair where they had already looked ten times over. But there he was, as large as life. With the enticement of one of the remaining sugared almonds she managed to get him into the basket and drop the lid.

  It was then an idea came to her. She almost laughed aloud. But no, it was surely impossible. Nevertheless, she returned to her chamber thinking, Bel Pierre, you may have saved the King of England.

  **

  Vespers came and went. The lamps were lit. Then compline, night prayers, and the swell of constant crowds subsided, leaving the passages and public chambers empty, giving way to a gradual shutting down of the household until only the slippered night servants sat around in quiet groups waiting to be summoned by insomniacs waiting for the midnight office to begin.

  The stair well leading down to the lower floor was as black as pitch. She had to feel her way along the passage with one hand scraping along the wall while holding onto the squirrel’s basket with the other. Her scrip was buckled to her belt and weighed heavily against her as she moved.

  The floor levelled out. Now it was only a few paces down a short corridor to the apothecary’s workshop. Guided by the strong scent of his elixirs she paused when she reached the door then, ears pricked, she cautiously turned the ring. The door slid open and she stepped through.

  A heavy, aromatic silence greeted her. Pausing for a moment to get her bearings she was eventually able to make out hundreds of bunches of dried herbs hanging from the beams above her head. Like bats, she thought with a shiver. Nothing stirred.

  Over by the bench where the cures were dispensed were a few jars and wooden utensils, a pestle and mortar, a set of scales, and a rack of knives. Not wasting time here she stepped carefully over to the far door. If it was locked she would have trouble prising it open with her knife but to her joy it opened at her touch and she stepped inside.

  It would be too much to hope that the poison that had already by its mere existence caused three deaths would be openly displayed and yet, with the apothecary’s oblique character in mind she could see him doing such a thing, amused by his own secret knowledge, flaunting it in the face of his unsuspecting customers.

  With the open shelves as her first search, then, before she tried the aumbry where he had kept the silver talisman, she stepped close up, lit the taper she had brought, and began to read the labels.

  Two rows of clay pots with wax stoppers were arranged precisely on the shelves along with glass demijohns and a shelf of small glass phials with wax lids. Everything was labelled with the names of ingredients she recognised. Sometimes the lettering was difficult to make out but all of it made eventual sense.

  Nothing suspicious here.

  The end of the third shelf was reached without anything unexpected being found either. Then she started on the fourth shelf at eye level. It was quite soon, in among the wolf bane and the hemlocks, that she saw something she did not recognise. Urb.Md.

  Abbreviated as most were, the label bore similar lettering to the others. There was nothing to mark it out as different except for the meaning of the letters. She knew the latter half
could stand for mandragora, only lethal in concentrated amounts. But Urb? Latin for town. Or did it indicate the town of Urbino? Certainly it was something she had never come across before.

  Mandragora from Urbino? A shiver went through her as another piece of the puzzle seemed about to fall into place.

  Everyone knew where Fondi hailed from. His break with the Duke of Urbino, a staunch supporter of Pope Urban, had been very public and caused a scandal that echoed round the monastic world.

  The reason the paw marks of a squirrel had been found in her bed chamber the other day was still unexplained.

  Fondi.

  Was he the answer?

  Fingers trembling she took out her own clay pot containing nothing more than a digestive tincture and then, nerves stretched for any sound from the workshop, took down the similar pot with its ambiguous label. Even by the flickering light of her taper the replacement seemed to scream its difference. Anybody who knew anything about herbal cures would notice the substitution at once. She would never get away with it.

  She glanced towards the basket and its contents. Bel Pierre? It was an absurd idea. The risk was too great.

  With the feeling that she should try another approach and make better use of her time now she was here she lifted the pot from off the shelf and took both through into the workshop.

  By the light of the taper she found the basin of water the apothecary kept on his work bench, dipped the sealed pot with its lethal contents into it and began to peel the label off. It was stuck on with fish glue and came away easily. Using the remains of the wet glue she stuck the label carefully over the one on the pot she had brought with her containing the harmless tincture, returned to the store room, and stood the pot neatly on the shelf with the others. Now it looked no different in the flickering light.

  Her plan had been to let Bel Pierre loose among the pots after first knocking a few of them down in silence. The subsequent mess would be blamed on the rampaging squirrel and a few discrepancies in labelling would not be noticed. Now she wondered if that should be the finishing touch after all. The substitute looked convincing enough, however, and she began to gather her things together by the cone of light from the taper.

  After fumbling around to make sure she had left nothing behind, she picked up the basket with the squirrel in it and felt her way towards the outer door.

  Before she had gone even half way across, the whisper of leather on stone came to her.

  Someone was approaching, moving inexorably and without haste. She wished she had closed the door to the workshop but it was too late to do more than slide hastily back into the store room.

  The footsteps came to a halt outside the door. She heard a grunt of surprise.

  Bel Pierre made a small scratching sound in the basket on her arm, no more than a single claw against the woven willow but it sounded as loud as a drum beat. She held her breath.

  A paler shade in the darkness flowed into the workshop. Someone had entered.

  Scarcely daring to breathe she melted further back into the store room and, peering through a crack in the door, watched a light illuminate the apothecary’s face and hands as he lit a taper and stuck it into a holder. Then he went to a shelf and with practised ease ran his fingers along it until they recognised what they wanted. They closed round one of the phials.

  Unstopping it he sniffed it with a sigh of appreciation. Then she watched as he poured a little into a beaker, tipped something else into it, swirled it three times then sipped the mixture, sighing again as he did so.

  Bel Pierre changed position in his basket with a little creak.

  The apothecary stood looking up at the bundles of herbs hanging from the roof beam with a faraway expression on his face. Then, holding the taper in one hand, he made his way back towards the door. His light briefly lit up the passage outside.

  Then the door closed behind him.

  The scene cut to black.

  Forcing herself to wait for what seemed an age Hildegard eventually risked going to the door and cautiously turning the ring. When it was wide enough to look out she saw with relief that the passage was empty. Realising she had better get out before the place was filled with domestic staff crowding in to matins, she fled like a shadow to safety.

  **

  I have it. Whatever it is, I have it. She would take it back to England. She would get it analysed by one of the royal apothecaries.

  Then she would tell the whole story to Mr Medford. As head of the King’s Signet Office he would need to know everything about this latest move against King Richard.

  Only a few people were aware of Medford’s other more secret role as the king’s chief intelligencer and he was the only one she could trust with something like this.

  **

  Medford. When she had first met him at Westminster she had seen him as no more than a tall child in adult clothing. A pretender to power. It was only later she had discovered how dangerous he was, dangerous to King Richard’s enemies, that is. She thanked god for his vigilance and ruthless nature. He would certainly want to know where the poison had come from, who had tried to steal it before Fitzjohn could get his hands on it. And why.

  He was one of those people who believe that every organisation is like a sieve with secrets that will fall into his hands by means of observation, logic, gold, or more physical methods. He was unshakable in this. He would have no sympathy for the fact that Cardinal Grizac was threatened by the wrath of Pope Clement.

  He might be interested in the reason why, of course, as did Hildegard.

  Medford, however, would not think much of anybody’s feelings on the matter. That she was shocked at the change in Grizac’s manner as soon as he left the cell after Athanasius's taunting would not be taken into account in his logical analysis. He would see it as a failure of her perception of the situation. Being one of those deadly quiet men with no more feelings than a butcher for the animal he slaughters he was like Clement. Like Athanasius. And perhaps like Fondi.

  This coldness was the reason he was the chief of Richard’s spies and the best of a powerful crew.

  His saving grace was that he was totally loyal to the king.

  **

  Prime. A spreading, barely perceptible glimmer of pink in the sky.

  While the bell was still tolling Hildegard hurried along to the Fondi’s apartment with Bel Pierre in his basket. She had promised Flora he would be beside her when she awoke. Ushered inside the heavily draped chambers by a servant she was led through to where the child slept under a canopy of white lace and placed the basket beside her just as she was waking up.

  ‘And here he is to greet you good morning, Flora. Have a look.’ She opened the lid.

  Flora’s cries of delight were her reward but the child could not thank her enough. ‘Lady, my mother, look!’ She ran through into the adjoining chamber with the basket and scolds were heard at once in complaint about the dirty thing and to take it away. Flora returned, still full of smiles. ‘She is delighted in her heart,’ she explained.

  Fondi, his tall frame in a long night robe, was dragging on a wool cloak as he came through. ‘That is most kind, domina. I trust you weren’t searching for him all night?’

  ‘Not at all.’

  ‘Where was the little devil?’

  ‘On the stairs where we had already been searching. He must have hidden somewhere then crept out when he thought everyone had gone.’

  Fondi reached out and stroked the squirrel’s smooth head. ‘We must let him sleep. It’s his season for sleeping. There’s a time to sleep, a time to dance, all that, so very wise.’ He registered the bell. ‘And a time for going to prime which I fear we shall miss. Flora, go and eat something and take Bel Pierre with you.’

  He turned to Hildegard when she had gone. He too was one of those dark, quiet men - but not deadly, surely? She recalled Hubert’s proposition that the murderer of all three victims was a professional assassin. A man with a cool nerve and the ability to simulate friendship.
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br />   Fondi had been in the pope’s private chapel on the night of Maurice’s murder but who would say he had not left for the few minutes it takes to run a knife over a youth’s throat?

  At the crossing of the bridge he might have gone on ahead of Hubert and the others, unseen in the darkness and noise of the storm, one moment and a life ended.

  And the Scottish nun, with the paw marks in the dust under her bed.

  Urb.Md.

  The cardinal from Urbino.

  He was smiling at her now with something apologetic in his manner. Light filtered through the roughly closed shutters and lay in bars across the floor, across his cloak, across his face.

  He was offering her something to drink. She saw him go to a stand with a carafe and goblets on it, watched him take up a small clay jug, heard him call for more wine, and pour something into one of the goblets, turn, offer it. A servant entered with another flagon.

  ‘Forgive Carlotta,’ he remarked as she took the goblet from him. ‘I believe she resents Hubert’s affection for you.’

  ‘Tell her she has no need. Our vows are firm.’ She did not intend it to sound like a reproof.

  He did not take it as such. ‘Vows do not obliterate the feeling. She’s jealous, a hard life before she met me, a furiously passionate woman. She can’t help herself.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear she has had a hard life.’

  ‘So be it.’

  ‘I have one question only.’ She gave him a look that should have extracted every nuance of truth from him but met only his handsome, bland, concerned stare. ‘I noticed something odd in my cell when I returned after the nun had been murdered there.’

  His brows came together.

  ‘It was something so small as to be almost negligible but what it means is of far greater consequence.’

  His frown deepened.

  ‘It was the paw marks of a squirrel - and its droppings,’ she added in case he should brush aside her words.