“Is it?” asked Helbye doubtfully. “Well, I would not give much for it, and neither would anyone else I know. Will you sell it to some abbey somewhere?”
“Never,” said Geoffrey, taking it from his bag, and running his hands over the soft leather of its bindings. “It is a work of art. Just look at these decorated capitals.”
“Very pretty,” said Helbye, glancing over his shoulder. “But we should not be standing around here in the cold, with everyone soaked to the skin and robbers lurking in the area. They might be back for more, since they failed to get much from you.”
Barlow and Ingram needed no second bidding, and had their bags secured on Ingram’s still skittish mount in an instant. When Geoffrey was slower, cold hands fumbling with the slashed straps, Helbye elbowed him out of the way to do it for him. While the sergeant cursed the damage, Ingram retold the tale in which he was now outnumbered thirty to one in the contest for Geoffrey’s books. Meanwhile, Geoffrey removed his boots and poured out the water.
“Perhaps the thieves stole your foreign scrolls because they thought they might be able to sell the vellum for reuse,” suggested Barlow as he waited. “They might get a few pennies for them, if it is of good quality. It would be much more difficult to use a book so.”
Geoffrey supposed Barlow might be right, although he could not imagine that there was a thriving market in used vellum on the Welsh border. He let the matter drop, just grateful that his books were now back in his loving care.
“Do you still want my treasure now that you have most of yours back?” asked Barlow guilelessly. Geoffrey had forgotten Barlow’s generous gesture. Despite the fact that he was still angry with him and Ingram for disregarding his advice about overloading the horse and landing them in such a dangerous situation, he could not help but smile at Barlow’s transparent acquisitiveness. Barlow grinned back at him, and went to secure his returned loot on Ingram’s long-suffering horse.
Geoffrey’s saddle was beyond any repairs Helbye could effect without proper tools, but Geoffrey, shivering from the cold, decided he would be warmer walking anyway. Helbye was horrified.
“Take my saddle,” he insisted. “You cannot make an appearance at your home after twenty years leading your own horse! You are one of the most respected knights to return from the Holy Land alive! Think of appearances.”
“I do not care about appearances,” said Geoffrey tiredly. “I will take a solitary chair near a blazing fire over any glorious welcome my family might give me. Anyway, it will be dark when we arrive. They will probably be asleep and will refuse to answer the door. I might have to beg a bed from you for the night, and try again in the morning.”
“They will let you in!” said Helbye, shocked. “For one thing, they will imagine you have come laden with riches, and will want to secure your good will.”
That was certainly true, thought Geoffrey. “Then it will not matter whether I gallop into their bailey on a battle-hungry war-horse, or walk in soaking wet. My welcome will be the same.”
Helbye accepted his logic, but not happily, and mounted his own horse to follow Geoffrey along the path that led away from the river.
In front of him, Geoffrey was lost in thought. He realised he had committed several grave errors of judgment that might have cost them their lives: he should have insisted that Barlow ford the river on foot; he should have made Ingram follow the route Helbye had chosen across the water, instead of allowing him to select his own path; he should have paid heed to the dog’s barking when they had reached the far bank—it was likely the animal had sensed the presence of strangers; and he should not have abandoned his destrier to Ingram’s care while he tore off after Barlow—he was lucky he still had it. Such mistakes in the Holy Land might have been fatal. He wondered whether the dampness and cold were affecting his brain, or whether he was losing the skills he had acquired through years of painful trial and error.
Behind him, Ingram was still defensive about his passive role in the theft, while Barlow was full of curiosity as to who would have risked stealing from a knight.
“It must have been that Caerdig,” said Barlow to Ingram.
“It was not him, but he might have sent his men,” said Ingram, eager to find a culprit. “After all, he commented on our treasure while he rode with us, so he knew we had some. And he must have been aware that the ford was not safe and that we would run into difficulties crossing it.”
“The ford would have been perfectly safe, if you two had listened to Sir Geoffrey,” said Helbye. The two young soldiers exchanged furtively guilty glances.
“And of course, Caerdig has good reason for killing a Mappestone,” said Barlow a moment later, reluctant to let the subject drop. “Bearing in mind Enide and all that.”
“Barlow!” said Helbye in a low voice. “Take care what you say.”
“Sorry,” muttered Barlow, genuinely contrite.
“Ah, yes!” said Ingram, pretending not to hear Helbye’s warning. “Enide.”
Geoffrey had not been paying much attention to his men’s speculations—he was still berating himself for his poor control over them at the ford—but their curious exchange caught his interest.
“Enide?” he asked, looking round at Barlow. “My younger sister Enide?”
“We are just blathering,” said Helbye before Ingram could respond. He leaned forward to stroke his horse’s mane. “I wonder what my wife will have cooked to welcome me home.”
“Probably nothing,” said Barlow, clearly relieved to be talking about something else. “She does not know exactly when you will arrive. And who is to say that the letters Sir Geoffrey wrote ever reached her?”
“I sent her no letters,” said Helbye, his voice thick with disapproval at the very notion. “I sent word with Eudo of Rosse.”
“What were you going to say?” asked Geoffrey of Barlow, refusing to be distracted by Helbye’s clumsy attempts to side-track him. “What has Enide to do with Caerdig?”
“They were lovers,” said Ingram with relish, ignoring Helbye’s warning glower.
“Ingram! You have no proof to claim such a thing,” said Helbye angrily. “So shut up before you say something for which you will later be sorry.”
“I have proof,” said Ingram, smugly confident. “We heard all about it from a soldier at Chepstow who had spent time at Goodrich last summer.”
“That was nothing but gossip,” snapped Helbye. “How could you trust someone like that?”
“What did you hear?” asked Geoffrey, confused by the exchange.
“Caerdig wanted to marry Enide,” said Ingram quickly, before Helbye could stop him. “But her father and Ynys of Lann Martin prevented the match—”
“That is enough, Ingram!” said Helbye sharply. “This is all speculation. You have no evidence to be saying any of this.”
“Enide did have a lover,” mused Geoffrey, more to himself than to the others. “She wrote to me about him often, although she never mentioned his name. Was that who it was? Caerdig?”
“No,” said Helbye firmly. “Caerdig did ask for her hand in marriage, apparently, but there is nothing to say that they were lovers—whatever nasty rumours were spread around about her. Caerdig was probably trying to put an end to the feud between the two manors—a marriage of convenience.”
“I knew nothing of this,” said Geoffrey. “Although I suppose there is no reason why I should.”
“There is nothing to know,” said Helbye. “Except vicious rumours and nasty lies.” He glared at Ingram and then at Barlow.
“But you might have said something, Will,” Geoffrey said reproachfully to his sergeant. “You know Enide was the only one for whom I really cared. If you knew something about her, you should have told me.”
“I saw no point in talking about her when you would get the entire terrible story on your arrival home,” said Helbye primly.
“An affair between Enide and Caerdig is not so terrible,” said Geoffrey, amused.
“The affair was not the e
nd of the matter, though, was it?” said Ingram spitefully. “What Helbye has been keeping from you is the fact that Caerdig met Enide secretly for mass one day—”
“Ingram!” barked Helbye. He dismounted, and tried to grab the young soldier, who dodged behind Barlow. “Stop this immediately!”
“Ynys and Godric had agreed not to allow the marriage between Caerdig and Enide—” said Ingram, wickedly allowing the older man to grab the merest pinch of his tunic before slithering away.
“Ingram!” yelled Helbye, making another ineffectual lunge at the grinning soldier. “Desist, or I will—”
“Or you will what, Helbye?” Ingram sneered. “We are a mile from home, and you no longer have an excuse to bully me. I will say what I like to whom I like, and you can do nothing to stop me!”
Helbye stopped dead in his tracks, and Geoffrey wondered how long Ingram had been harbouring such bitter resentment against the old sergeant. He had always been under the impression that Helbye was popular with the young men under his command. It was at Helbye’s request that Geoffrey had brought Ingram home with him, although he had been under no obligation to do so. Geoffrey had done what the sergeant had asked because he liked Helbye—because he certainly did not like the malcontented, bitterly morose Ingram.
Ingram turned on Geoffrey, his eyes blazing. “The story is that Caerdig decided that if he could not have Enide as his wife, then no man should have her, and so while she was at church—”
“Ingram!” pleaded Barlow, glancing nervously at Geoffrey. “Sir Geoffrey has been good to us, and there is no need to anger him. Say no more.”
Ingram ignored him, still gazing at the bemused Geoffrey with malicious defiance.
“While Enide was at mass,” he continued, “Caerdig waited for her until she came out of the church, and he chopped off her head!”
Geoffrey could think of nothing to say in response to Ingram’s preposterous revelation, so he turned away without giving the young soldier the satisfaction of a reply. He heard Barlow berating his friend in low tones, while Helbye was silent. Pulling gently on the reins, Geoffrey led his destrier along the grassy path towards Goodrich Castle and the small village that clustered outside its stocky wooden palisades.
Was there any truth in the story that Ingram had learned from the soldiers at Chepstow Castle? Geoffrey tried to recall what Enide had written of her lover in her letters to him, but he remembered thinking at the time that she had been remarkably miserly with the details, considering that she claimed the man was so important to her. When he had first learned of her affection, he had tried to imagine which of Godric Mappestone’s unsavoury neighbours could have attracted the interest of a woman of Enide’s intelligence. But his efforts at deduction had been unsuccessful then, as they were unsuccessful now.
He sighed, and turned his thoughts from the informative and affectionate letters sent by his sister to the terse messages from his father—the object of Geoffrey’s long journey from the Holy Land. During the twenty years since Geoffrey had been away Godric had sent his youngest son only three letters, each one addressed to “Godfrey.”
The first letter was sent a few weeks after Geoffrey had left, perhaps to ease a nagging conscience because Geoffrey had not wanted to become a warrior. His ambition had been to attend the University in Paris, and become versed in the philosophies and law. His father had regarded him in horror, and promptly booked him a passage to the Duke of Normandy on the next available ship. Geoffrey had gone happily, thinking that Paris would be easier to reach from Normandy than England, and had planned to desert his enforced duties as soon as he could. But even the best plans are fallible, and Geoffrey’s repeated, but unsuccessful, bids for freedom led the exasperated Duke to pass his rebellious squire to a kinsman in Italy, where Geoffrey came into the service of Tancred de Hauteville. It was Tancred who had taken Geoffrey on the Crusade.
The second letter came the previous year, after rumours had filtered back to England that the Crusaders who had sacked Jerusalem were wealthy beyond their wildest dreams. Geoffrey’s father had written a blunt demand for funds, and casually informed him that a sister-in-law had died, although he had failed to specify which one. But it was the third letter that Geoffrey remembered most clearly, even though he had read it only once before he had crumpled it into a ball and flung it into the fire.
“To Godfrey, son of Godric Mappestone of the County of Hereford. The new sheep at the manor of Rwirdin are doing well, and made four pounds and four shillings this year. These funds have been used to build a new palisade on the north edge of the outer ward of Goodrich Castle. Your sister Enide died on a Sunday at mass. Our bulls have sired sixteen calves this spring.”
Given the brisk contents of the message, Geoffrey had been given no reason to assume that her death had been anything but natural—perhaps due to a fever.
He glanced back at Ingram, and saw the young soldier’s eyes fixed on him defiantly. During the four years in which Geoffrey had been granted the doubtful pleasure of his acquaintance, Ingram had never been congenial company, but at least he was obedient—Geoffrey would not have countenanced taking the man into his service had he not been. He wondered what could have caused this sudden streak of rebelliousness and malice so near home. Then the truth struck him, so obvious that he smiled.
He paused when he saw that the path divided, one branch leading off to the left, and the other disappearing into a thick clump of trees straight ahead.
“Left, go left,” said Helbye, pushing his way forward.
“No, straight,” said Ingram impatiently.
Geoffrey was too tired to argue and too cold to stand around while the others debated. He took the left hand track, but it degenerated almost immediately into a morass of sucking mud and began to wind back on itself.
“I told you so!” gloated Ingram, tugging his horse’s head viciously to turn it. “Stupid old man!”
“You keep a civil tongue in your head, or else!” growled Helbye, embarrassed that he had been wrong yet again.
“Or else what, Helbye?” Ingram sneered regarding his sergeant insolently. “What can you do to me now? We are nearly home, where I will be free from you.”
“Or else I will tell everyone I meet that you ran away before the fall of Antioch,” said Geoffrey mildly, fixing Ingram with a steady gaze from his clear green eyes. “And that you were nowhere to be seen during the capture of Jerusalem, although you appeared in plenty of time to join in the looting.”
With grim satisfaction, Geoffrey saw the gloating fade from Ingram’s face. His intuitive guess was right: Ingram’s recent unpleasantness stemmed from the fear that the knight might well reveal his cowardice in battle to the family who were about to welcome him as a hero—Ingram’s story about Enide was to ensure that Geoffrey went thundering off to the castle immediately, so that he would not spend time in the village until Ingram had told his story the way he wanted it to be heard.
“You would not do that,” whispered Ingram aghast. “You would not spread lies about me!”
“Lies, no,” said Geoffrey. “But who is lying?”
“You never said anything to me about this,” said Helbye with a frown. “He was supposed to be your arms-bearer both times.”
As it happened, Geoffrey had not mentioned Ingram’s timely absences to anyone. Both occasions had been brutal and terrifying, and Geoffrey had not blamed the young soldier for declining to follow him into the thick of it. Indeed, since the lad had been so clearly petrified, Geoffrey had much rather Ingram had run away and hidden, rather than force Geoffrey into a position where he would have been fighting to protect both of them.
“It seems that there are a number of things we have not told each other,” said Geoffrey, thinking about the gossip regarding Enide. Helbye looked away guilty.
“The track divides yet again,” said Barlow, keen to change the subject. His own role in the two battles had not been exactly glorious either—to keep his promise to the lad’s father, Helbye had give
n him duties guarding the baggage train. “Left or right?”
“Right,” said Helbye, after a moment of consideration.
“Left it is, then,” said Geoffrey, throwing him a grin of devilment, before making his way down the dark path. It was almost pitch-black, and the thick clouds allowed no light from the moon to penetrate. Geoffrey’s hand went to his sword when the wind blew in the trees, making the wood groan and creak, and Barlow and Ingram were growing nervous.
“The soldiers at Chepstow said that outlaws live around here,” said Barlow, casting a fearful glance behind him. “They come out at night and murder travellers.”
“Especially ones carrying treasure, like us,” said Ingram forcefully.
“Perhaps you might care to say that a little louder, Ingram,” said Geoffrey. “The robbers at the far end of the woods might not have caught everything you said.”
Barlow’s laughter turned into a shriek of horror as something brushed past his face with a screech of its own. Geoffrey spun round, his sword already drawn, but then relaxed when he saw an owl flit away through the darkness.
“We are nearly there,” he said, sheathing his weapon. “I recognise this path. Over to the left is the woodsman’s cottage, and that path there leads back to Penncreic. And there,” he announced with relief, seeing the familiar square shadow of the church looming in the darkness, “is Goodrich. Those lights seem to be coming from your house, Will.”
“So they are,” said Helbye apprehensively, peering through the gloom at the huddle of houses on the opposite hill. “It is late. I wonder what she can be thinking of.”
“She must be preparing you dinner,” said Barlow. “And speaking of food, I am starving! Come on, Ingram! I will race you! I wager I can get there faster on foot than you can ride.”
A Head for Poisoning Page 8