The Alehouse Murders tk-1

by Maureen Ash

  Anselm had been the first to be told of the bodies in the alehouse, by Agnes, the alewife. The day had passed, during which he and Gianni had discovered that the bodies of the four dead had been brought there in the casks that were used to transport the ale. The priest had been alone and unharmed before Vespers, when Bascot had gone to the church and asked where Agnes could be found. Then, but a short while later, he had been stabbed, and Bascot had gone back to the church where he had met Roget and the alewife had told a little more of the truth she had been withholding. He had felt extremely angry, Bascot remembered, at having to order the screeching woman dragged back to the church in the rain.

  The rain. Ermingard had said the cloak she had seen was wet. Whoever had attacked Anselm would have been caught in the downpour as he left the church. And the elderly knight he had sat with at table had advised Bascot to look for a woman. Could the offhand remark be right?

  Ermingard had said the woman of whom she spoke was with child. Perhaps he should be looking for a pregnant woman. If Anselm was a lecher, had he made one of his flock pregnant? Then been killed by an irate male relative of the girl? But, if that were so, what connection would there be with the other murders? It was only his own instincts that made him think there was such a connection. And between Anselm and Brunner? The dead girl in the alehouse had been pregnant. Perhaps if she hadn’t been there would not have been such haste to kill her. But once she was dead, and the baby with her, then why the urgency for the bodies to be found?

  The view of Lincoln faded from Bascot’s awareness as a new thought formed. Perhaps the haste had been not to kill Hugo’s pregnant wife before their baby was born, but to have them dead before it was time for another woman to be brought to her birthing. He had been looking for the murderer amongst those who would benefit by becoming de Kyme’s heir, but what if that heir had yet to be born?

  His thoughts chased up and down like Gianni’s hand in the stone game. That day in the solar, when Ermingard had become distressed-where had she been looking when she had become so insistent about the wrong colour? It had been suggested that it was the tapestry about which she had been rambling, but perhaps it had not been the bright colour of red depicted in the embroidered picture. Perhaps the person she would not, or could not, name had been present. Who had been there? Bascot thrust his mind back to that morning-his own embarrassment, the air of tension. Following that line of reasoning, the motive for the murders took on a different slant, and he juggled the people that he and Hilde had suspected with others hitherto dismissed as of no importance. The shadow cast by the sun on the stone of the parapet had moved a good measure before he suddenly threw up his head and took a deep breath of air. He had found the connection he had been looking for.

  Twenty-five

  Hilde listened intently as Bascot explained who he believed had committed the murders and his reasons for thinking so. When he had finished, she nodded. “Yes, Templar. It all fits. Like a rotten plum hidden deep in a basket, hard to find until one tastes it and knows it to be rank.”

  They were sitting in Hilde’s chamber, alone. Gianni had been left in Bascot’s room and admonished to keep practising his letters while Hilde’s servant, Freyda, had been sent to keep watch outside the door while her mistress and Bascot talked together. The old lady had herself poured the wine they were drinking from a pair of small cups decorated with silver gilt.

  “Will you go to the sheriff with your findings?” Hilde asked.

  “I cannot, not yet,” Bascot replied. “First I must have proof. Even if Camville agrees with me, he must have some evidence to lay a charge.”

  Hilde held out her cup for Bascot to refill. “Such proof will be hard to find,” she said.

  “Unless we devise some,” Bascot answered quietly.

  Hilde’s bright blue eyes regarded him. “You have thought of a means of doing that?” she asked disbelievingly.

  “If my instinct is true and the stabbing of Father Anselm is connected to the other murders-for something he may have unwittingly seen or heard that constituted a threat-then I think I have. But I shall need your help to make it convincing, if you are willing.”

  “You shall have every assistance I can give you, Templar,” Hilde assured him. She leaned forward. “Now, tell me what it is that I must do.”

  The great hall was crowded that night, full almost beyond capacity, just as it had been on the eve of the fair. All those who had been deemed to have any connection with the murders were present, even Philip de Kyme, who had been persuaded to join the company by Gerard Camville with the promise that his wife and stepson would be seated well away from him and warned not to approach the baron under any circumstances. Outside there had been a light shower of rain, not sufficient to threaten the tourney that was to take place on the morrow, but heavy enough to lessen the heat that had gathered by the end of the day. Once the meal was over, the trestle tables were cleared from the middle of the huge room and minstrels were summoned to play while members of the company danced or just listened to the music. Nicolaa and her husband presided over the company, making a point of moving about amongst their guests and engaging most of them in conversation.

  Hilde was there also, leaning heavily on the arm of her great-nephew, Conal, as she walked about the room. Finally she asked him to seat her with a group of guests still sitting at a small side table, lingering over their wine in a desultory fashion. Hilde was unusually affable, leaning across to ask a question of one or the other of her companions, or to pay a compliment.

  She sat for some little time in this manner, before leaning back and, under cover of the flow of conversation and the strains of the music, said in a low voice to the person who sat beside her, “I have much cause to rejoice this night. Conal and his mother have been proved innocent, and the identity of the true murderer discovered.”

  Furrows appeared between the brows of her companion, but Hilde made it appear that she had not noticed and blithely continued speaking. “It seems that the Templar was with Father Anselm just before he died, and the priest told him who it was that had stabbed him. De Marins believes that it was the same person that killed de Kyme’s son and his wife, and says he has proof to support it. He told me privately that the innocence of my relatives is now not in question, although he would add nothing further. Of course, the Templar is a monk and must consider whether he can reveal what Anselm told him in such extreme conditions, but since he is not a priest he is not bound by the oath of the confessional. I am confident that by morning he will tell what he knows to Sheriff Camville and the murderer will be arrested.”

  Hilde paused to let her gaze roam over the company before adding, with a smile of satisfaction, “Yes, even now, de Marins is preparing to spend the night in a solitary vigil before the altar of St. Clement’s. God will guide him aright, I am sure of it. By this time tomorrow, Conal and Sybil will be free of the charge against them.”

  Just before midnight, Bascot put on the Templar surcoat he had not worn since he had come to Lincoln. The red cross emblazoned on the pristine white cloth of the coat settled comfortably over his heart. He had not donned a shirt of mail underneath, fearing it might warn the murderer he was expecting to be attacked and had, instead, chosen to wear a well-padded gambeson under his dark-sleeved tunic. With any luck it would provide as much, or more, protection as the hair shirt Father Anselm had worn. Finally he smoothed his fingers through his hair and beard, adjusted his eye patch and left the room. The only weapon he carried was the short-bladed knife at his belt.

  The sounds of revelry from the hall could be heard as he crossed the bail. The outbuildings were all but deserted, the servants of the castle either in attendance on the guests in the keep or asleep in their beds. Shortly before midnight Bascot let himself through the postern gate in the north wall and walked along the cobbled path that led to the small church of St. Clement. Near the entrance he could see two shadowy figures waiting for him. D’Arderon and a Templar priest.

  As Bascot appro
ached, the preceptor came forward and spoke quietly. “We are here, de Marins, as you asked. Where shall we keep watch?”

  “The sacristy,” Bascot replied. “The door is in the shadows. You can see out, but none can see in.”

  They went inside the church and d’Arderon and the priest crossed the nave, going to a small door near the altar. Just before he slipped inside d’Arderon turned and whispered a benediction. “God be with you, de Marins. And with this venture.”

  Once they were out of sight, Bascot knelt at the low rail in front of the altar, crossing himself and murmuring a prayer as he did so. The darkness inside the building was relieved only by the small glimmer of the sanctuary lamp and the larger brightness of one fat beeswax candle. Above the altar hung a wooden crucifix carved with the tortured body of Christ, the candle’s light accentuating the hollows of the face and glistening upon the nails thrust cruelly through the hands. With one last plea for heavenly aid, Bascot stretched himself out full-length on the stones of the floor, face down and arms extended so that his body formed an imitation of the cross that hung above him.

  As Bascot’s cheek touched the coldness of the stone, he was reminded of the night before he had taken his vow to become a Templar, when he had lain in just such a fashion. But then there had been gladness and joy in his heart, not stealth. This time, instead of meditating upon God and contemplating a future in His service, Bascot was laying his back open to an assassin’s knife, hoping that the murderer of Hugo and the others would be tempted to try to silence him before he had a chance to reveal the name that Anselm had supposedly whispered on his deathbed. It was a wild scheme, as d’Arderon had said, but Bascot hoped it would work.

  There was no sound from the sacristy, but Bascot could feel d’Arderon’s presence as surely as if the preceptor were kneeling beside him. Since the laws of old King Henry stated that, other than a close relative, only a witness to the act of murder or attempted murder could lay a charge against the assailant, Bascot had asked the Temple for help in providing one. D’Arderon, on learning of the danger Bascot proposed to put himself in, had insisted on coming himself. He had brought a priest with him in case his services should be needed. Bascot fervently hoped they would not.

  The stones beneath him smelled faintly of incense, along with a trace of the gritty aroma of leather and oil, a reminder that this chapel was used mainly by the castle garrison. Many a knee encased in mail must have bent in genuflection where Bascot now lay. It was a comforting thought. As the moments went by, the silence in the chapel became complete. Not the rustle of a mouse or the squeak of a bat could be heard. Only the faint exhalation of his own breath sounded in Bascot’s ears, and the beating of his heart.

  The stillness dragged on. If the murderer came at all, it would be in the darkest part of the night, after all the guests and residents of the castle were asleep, but it had been necessary to come well before that time to make the vigil seem genuine. Bascot felt tension gather in his injured leg and tried to relax his muscles to ease it, thankful for the leather eye patch that shielded his cheek from the stone beneath. He would have an hour or two yet to wait.

  Slowly his mind drifted, returning to thoughts of his long imprisonment. Was the capture of this murderer the reason he had been spared for all those years? He thought of the cell he had first been incarcerated in, the dust, the heat, the constant drone of flies, the evil smirking face of his gaoler when he threw him, twice a day, a mouldy lump of some hard bread-like substance. He remembered the day he had been herded out of his cell, lined up with other prisoners, not a Christian amongst them, and been inspected by a Saracen noble on a prancing white horse. Then the whip that had lashed across his shoulders as he was driven forward with a few others to become a slave in an infidel household. The Muslim overseer into whose care he and the other slaves had been entrusted had taken delight in finding the most menial and degrading tasks for the Christian captive to perform. Bascot had been unable to contain the humiliation and rage that had engulfed him.

  It had been for insolence that his eye had been put out and the same reason, later, had prompted his sale, and that of Benjamin’s, to the captain of a pirate ship. He could still recall the monotonous rhythm of the ship’s drum as he and forty others pushed and pulled the huge oars to its beat, their feet chained into place, terror in their hearts when the ship of a trader was attacked and they were locked in place, defenceless while the battle between the pirates and their prey raged around them.

  It had been during a storm that he had escaped, one of the sudden forceful tempests that were common in the sea south of the island of Cyprus. For the better part of a morning, rain and wind had lashed them, the waves of the ocean boiling and foaming as though they were afloat in a huge cauldron. Finally the flimsy planks of the boat, long past need of caulking, had given way, letting the sea rush in to batter captors and slaves alike. Bascot remembered how the mast had come crashing down to where he and Benjamin, along with two others, were chained, knocking free the hasp that held their leg irons in place. As it slid loose, the mast had suddenly tilted, trapping Bascot’s leg beneath it. Benjamin, already on his feet and preparing to dive overboard to freedom, had hesitated when he saw that Bascot could not move. Then the Jewish boy had turned and, putting all his weight to the mast, had freed Bascot’s trapped limb. It had been at that moment that one of the Saracen pirates had stumbled across them and, raising his sword, had cleaved Benjamin’s neck where it joined his shoulder. Amongst the struggling, howling mass of slaves and pirates, his leg useless, Bascot had found the strength to drag the guard down beside him and wrench the scimitar from the man’s grasp. With one swift stroke he had disembowelled him. But when he turned to Benjamin, the Jewish boy was almost dead, the bright blood pumping out of his throat like a geyser, mixing with the slicing drops of rain and covering his body in a mantle of red.

  Bascot had tried, with difficulty, to raise Benjamin up, but the boy had looked at him with his soft brown eyes, moved his lips once in an attempt to speak and died. A moment later the pirate vessel was pitching and tossing in its own death throes and Bascot was thrown into the raging torrent of the sea. He remembered no more until the next day, when he found himself on an empty strand of shore, his body lying half-in and half-out of the receding waves. Like flotsam he had been thrown up on the beach with other bits of wreckage from the pirate ship. It had been there, his ankle smashed and his lungs full of seawater, that some fishermen had found him and taken him to their village. They cared for him until he could be removed to the Templar hospital on the island of Cyprus. The following months were misty in his memory, a blur of pain and fevered images, but he had not forgotten Benjamin, or the look on his face as he had died.

  Bascot saw that look now, in his mind’s eye, and murmured a prayer for the soul of the dead Jew. It might be blasphemy to do so, but if Benjamin had not freed his leg, at the cost of his own life, Bascot would not be alive now. He pushed his face into the stone. If he had been spared it must have been for a purpose. Was it for this night’s vigil, this catching of a killer? Would the murderer even come? Had he been wrong in his assumptions, was the person he believed responsible for all those deaths innocent of it all? Was it another, even now sleeping the untroubled sleep of those without a conscience?

  And, if he was correct, and the murderer appeared and succeeded in his attempt on Bascot’s life, what would happen to Gianni? Hilde had assured him she would care for the boy and Bascot knew she would keep strictly to her promise, but how would the boy react? Would he go on as he had been, growing up strong and straight, happy in his studies? Or would he run away and revert to the urchin he had been when Bascot had found him, trusting no one, scrabbling with the rats for food?

  Silently he repeated a paternoster and prayed to God for guidance and help.

  In the keep, all of the revellers and servants were asleep. Except for one. A shadowy form rose from the dark confines of a chamber and stepped lightly and quietly through the snores and slumbe
r-deep breathing of the other occupants of the chamber. The door creaked slightly when it was opened but, thanks be to God, no one was sleeping across the threshold.

  Outside, in the hallway, by the light of a guttering torch, a knife was pulled from its sheath, checked for sharpness and replaced. Then its owner crept down the stairs and out of the building.

  Overhead moon and stars twinkled in a heaven devoid of cloud. It should be a fine day tomorrow and would have been an even better one had it not been for Hilde’s carelessly imparted tidbit of information. Damn the Templar! Tonight’s excursion would not be necessary were it not for his incessant poking and prying into matters that were none of his concern. Ah, well, he would not be a threat much longer. Soon he would join the others, join them in paradise-or hell.

  The candle was burning low in its holder when Bascot heard the first sound. A tiny scrape as the door to the chapel was eased open, quickly stilled as the intruder must have paused to see if the sound had been detected. Bascot tensed his muscles, straining his ears and forcing himself to lie still as he heard the soft brush of one footstep, then another, then a pause. The intruder seemed to be still some feet away from him. Was it the person they sought, or merely one of the castle guests, sleepless and come to seek the solace of prayer in the hours before dawn?

  Seconds passed like hours, then the footsteps again began their slow approach. If it had been a guest, they would have retreated at the sight of Bascot on the chapel floor in apparent communion with God. This was the one they had been waiting for, the person who had wantonly killed six people and would, without compunction, kill again. Bascot felt the muscles in his back twitch in protest at their vulnerability. He knew he must wait, wait until an attack was made, else the murderer would deny any intent of violence, claiming only an accidental intrusion into the chapel precincts. Wait, Bascot said to himself, wait. Ah, God, it was hard to do. He held his breath, heard the footsteps move again, bolder now, and quicker as they came nearer. He heard the swish of a blade being drawn from a scabbard, felt, as though it were his own, the sudden intake of breath as his attacker steeled himself to strike…