A Play of Knaves

by Margaret Frazer

  The bread and cheese were good. So was the thick bean pottage and the cider that came after it. It was simple food but filling, and generously given. While the players were thanking her as generously as she had fed them, the other servants began coming into the kitchen, done with their own meal in the hall. Still saying their thanks, the players retreated out the door and into the yard, not wanting to wait for someone to ask them to perform something more there in the kitchen. Sometimes that was worth their while, but not now when they were already tired and with the walk back to camp waiting for them, although Ellis jibed at Joliffe as they crossed the yard toward the gateway, “A little short on questions in there, weren’t you?”

  “And the ones I asked were only friendly ones,” Joliffe said.

  Ellis snorted his doubt of that.

  They were just out the gateway into the road when raised voices behind them turned them all around. Across the yard Gosyn and Master Ashewell were coming from the hall, and whatever they had been saying before, the first clear words that reached the players were Ashewell’s angry, “So Nicholas can be sacrificed but not your Claire?”

  “That’s not the way of it at all!” Gosyn flung back. “Whatever Medcote was holding over you—”

  Ashewell made a harsh silencing gesture at him, and the players turned hurriedly away, as one in their instinct to be away from trouble that wasn’t theirs, though to be sure of it Ellis and Gil took Joliffe by either arm to help his hurry.

  They were just across the ford when they heard the canter of horses behind them and stepped aside to the road’s grassy verge, out of the Ashewells’ way as their horses splashed through the stream, Mistress Ashewell riding pillion behind her husband, Nicholas on his own horse a little behind them. From what Joliffe could see of their faces in the evening twilight, none of them had the look of folk who had just spent a pleasant evening with friends. Then he and the others were bowing and the Ashewells passed, and after that, with the road to themselves and the first stars coming out in the cloud-wisped, darkening sky, the players walked in silence for a time until Gil said lightly, maybe as a way of shrugging off everything, “I thought we played well enough, but that lot made more work of it than need be, didn’t they?”

  “That they did,” Ellis agreed wearily. “Pulling a laugh out them was like trying to pull my own teeth.” He shifted his shoulders as if they were sore. “I’m telling you, too, that we’re nearly done with that ‘pick up Piers by the belt’ business. He’s getting too big for it.”

  Piers threw back his own shoulders and strutted. Ellis gave him a light clout to the back of his head and growled, “You can stop that. Any fool can grow.”

  Piers staggered forward as if he had been truly hit, clutching the back of his head and whining, “I’m telling Mam!” Not meaning it. And a little farther on, with darkness more around them, he drifted to Ellis’ side and, a little after that, slipped a hand into one of Ellis’ and they walked on together.

  Joliffe, lulled by a full belly, the fresh coins in Ellis’ belt-pouch, and the gathering peaceful night-sounds of settling birds and other unseen things in the hedges and fields around him, let weary contentment much like Piers’ settle on him. The evening’s work had been disappointing, surely. A good player learned early on that the lookers-on were a large share of any performance, and if they could not be drawn into the play—whether through their own fault or the players’—then the whole business became a pushing against a wall with little satisfaction on either side. It had been that way tonight, and not by the players’ fault but all that of the ill feelings and angers seething at Gosyn’s before they ever came there.

  The troubling thing was that neither the angers nor ill feelings seemed to have faded after Hal Medcote had left. Instead, to judge by Ashewell’s and Gosyn’s anger at each other outside the hall, they were now turning on each other despite what Joliffe guessed had been a long friendship. It seemed that John Medcote had thrown some manner of rock into all the lives around him, had set waves spreading outward that might have smoothed and disappeared now that he was dead, except his son looked to be set on following his father’s way.

  Joliffe was sorry to find his contentment slipping from him. His too-much thinking was yet again taking him where he did not need to go. Nothing here was any business of his now. It was Kyping’s and the crowner’s, and what he should be thinking on was hope that one or the other would soon give the players permission to go, to leave everything and everyone here well behind them.

  Yes. That hope was what he needed to think on. Not the rest.

  By the time the players turned through the open gateway into what was become the too-familiar field, the last narrow band of yellow sunset was gone from along the horizon and stars were swathed across the sky. Cart and tent and Tisbe grazing nearby were no more than black shapes in the darkness, but small flames were dancing merrily orange from piled wood in the firepit, showing Basset and Rose sitting beside it, warm light cast up and moving on their faces.

  Ellis called out, “Hai!” and Basset called back, “Ho!” in return. He did not sound as if there had been trouble while they were gone, thank several dozen saints, Joliffe thought. They were all too tired for trouble tonight. Or tomorrow. Or any other time, he added silently. He shivered, suddenly aware of the damp chill that had come with the sun’s going. Piers left Ellis and ran ahead to Rose, who did not rise but held out an arm and, as he tumbled down beside her, gathered him close and asked, “It went well?”

  Piers nodded, his head tucked against her shoulder. “Except Ellis says I’m too big for the carry-by-the-belt.”

  “Oh my,” said Rose, smiling up at Ellis. “Is it you’re too big or he’s too feeble?”

  “Both,” murmured Piers. He cuddled nearer to her, his eyes closed.

  “You’ve eaten?” Rose asked the rest of them as they settled around the fire.

  “Very well,” Gil said. “They paid us, too.”

  Rose held out her free hand to Ellis, who had the coins ready and gave them to her. She looked at them approvingly and then to her father. “Save or share?” she asked.

  “We’ll use them for buying food in the village tomorrow,” Basset said. “There’s no knowing how long we’ll be here, or when we’ll earn more. We’ve fairly well played out the neighborhood.”

  They all nodded understanding and agreement. It was why all players were traveling players—there were no towns, not even London, large enough for a company to make a living all in one place.

  Not that traveling always served that much better. Their own small company was fortunate at present. With their quarter’s pay from Lady Lovell still untouched, they were in no immediate peril of poverty, and just now, all of them settled around the fire, they were content with how things were and silent together for a while, until Basset asked without looking away from the fire, “So, how went it at Gosyn’s?”

  Ellis, Joliffe, and Gil all traded looks among themselves.

  “Ah,” said Basset to their silence. “Like that, was it?”

  Joliffe nodded at Ellis to go ahead and tell whatever he wanted to tell. Ellis did, making short work of it, and at the end, Basset sat considering the fire for a moment more before saying, “So. No fault of ours if things went flat.”

  “No fault of ours,” Ellis echoed.

  “The servants enjoyed it,” Joliffe offered.

  “There’s something,” Basset granted dryly.

  The contented silence came back among them. Piers had slipped down, was lying with his head on his mother’s lap, surely more asleep than awake. Rose was smiling down at him, for once all at ease, her face peaceful as she gently stroked his hair. Ellis was beside them, idly poking the unburned ends of logs into the fire’s heart with a stick. Gil was sitting with his knees drawn up, his arms around them, staring into the flames after thoughts of his own, or maybe not thinking at all, and Basset, too, was still simply sitting, watching the flames.

  Joliffe, watching the fire with the rest of
them, found his weariness was a good weariness. He was glad his blankets were waiting for him, but here and now beside the fire and among the others was too pleasant to leave. With all the wood burning now, Ellis had dropped his stick into the fire and was watching Rose still idly stroking Piers’ hair. Gil now had his head laid on his knees but had turned sideways to go on watching the flames, as Joliffe and Basset still simply were, until Joliffe said out the slow drift of his thoughts when he would have rather they stayed quiet, “If I were Hal Medcote, I think I’d take to watching my back very closely just now.”

  “No one’s asked what you think,” Ellis pointed out without looking away from Rose.

  But Basset granted, eyes still on the fire, “He does look ripe for being murdered next. Unless he’s his father’s murderer, of course.”

  “Even then I’d watch my food and drink,” said Joliffe. “His sister would inherit if he died, wouldn’t she?”

  “Christ’s blessed bones, you’ve a twisting mind,” Ellis said with no particular heat.

  Basset straightened and laid his hands on his knees. “I’m for bed. The rest of you can sit here while the chill creeps in on you if you want.”

  None of them wanted, and when Basset climbed somewhat stiffly to his feet, Joliffe and Gil stood up, too, Joliffe stretching his own stiffened back and legs. Rose waited until Ellis had lifted sleeping Piers from her lap. Then, with Piers on one arm, limp against his shoulder, Ellis held out his other hand to her and she took it, letting him help her up, and hand in hand they went toward the tent, following Basset. Joliffe looked at Gil, who gave a rueful nod that he would stay and bank the fire. Joliffe nodded back and strolled after the others. With Rose and Ellis among them tonight in the tent, they would all at least sleep warm. He just hoped that wasn’t rain he smelled on the small wind beginning to come fitfully from the hills.

  Chapter 16

  The rain came whispering across the tent some time near to dawn. With no need to rise early, the players did not; and when necessity finally forced Joliffe to rise first, he came out into a softly dripping morning, with low gray clouds almost skimming the hedgerows’ tops and the hills vanished as if they had never been. The rain was only misting, though, and the clouds were drifting on a steady wind, well likely to be carried away before the morning was done.

  Too used to weather to make much of it, Joliffe put up his hood and went to see how Tisbe did. She paused in her grazing to shake her head at him, spraying him with rain from her mane. “Very friendly,” he told her, wiping his face. Giving her a squishing slap on her rump, he went to do what he could about rousing the fire with some of the wood that was stacked dry under the cart, so that by the time Rose joined him, wrapped in her own cloak and hood, the little blaze was going well enough to hold its own in the damp morning. “This is your way of saying you’re hoping for a warm breakfast?” she asked. “There’s only what’s left of the bread.”

  “Warm is warm,” said Joliffe easily. “What if I toast the bread?”

  “There’s nothing to go on it,” Rose warned.

  “Cheese?”

  “Not unless you want to go without it later in the day if no one goes into the village.”

  “I’m not going to starve on Medcote’s account. Come what may, I’m going to the village for food today.”

  She gave him something of the look she gave Piers when she doubted she was hearing all the truth from him. Understanding her look perfectly, Joliffe added, grinning, “And there’ll be talk to be had in the village.”

  “Yes. I thought that might be it.” She handed him the bread and cheese and the board to cut them on. “Let it be toasted bread and cheese this morning, then.”

  By midmorning the rain had stopped. The clouds were tattering to show blue sky, and a swathe of sunshine had just passed across the meadow, drifting with the clouds, when Master Kyping and his man rode through the gateway. Tisbe raised her head and stared as if worried there might not be grass enough for three horses here, while the players gathered from whatever tasks they had been doing to beside the fire, facing Kyping as he dismounted, gave his reins to his man, and came toward them, leaving man and horses behind him.

  Judging by his thoroughly rain-darkened cloak, he had been out and about for some hours already this morning, and if he was happy about it, his face did not show it. But there was no way to tell if his displeasure was at them or at life in general, nor did he greet them, only said, “You played at Walter Gosyn’s yesterday.”

  “Four of us did, yes,” Basset said in courteous agreement.

  Ellis, Joliffe, Piers, and Gil each held up a hand, smiling, Ellis saying as courteously as Basset, “We did.” Then, with sudden suspicion, “Has something more happened?” saving Joliffe the trouble of asking.

  “Not yet,” Kyping said. Joliffe eased a little: Kyping’s displeasure seemed general, rather than at them in particular. “You saw Hal Medcote there?”

  “We did,” Ellis said. “He was quarreling with Gosyn.”

  “And with Master Ashewell?” Kyping asked.

  Ellis frowned with thought. “Not so much. It seemed mostly between him and Gosyn. After he left, Gosyn and Master Ashewell quarreled with each other, though.”

  “About what?”

  “About the same thing Hal Medcote and Gosyn had been quarreling over,” Ellis answered. “About the marriages.”

  “Either Gosyn knew before, or else he’d just heard that Medcote wanted Nicholas for Eleanor,” Joliffe said. “Why he and Ashewell were angry at each other about that we never gathered, but Gosyn was angry at Hal Medcote because Hal wants Claire. You’d heard that before.”

  “From you and elsewhere, yes,” Kyping said tersely.

  Before Joliffe could guess why he sounded angry at that or whether he was angry for another reason, Kyping asked Ellis, “You agree Hal Medcote and Gosyn were quarreling because now Hal wants to marry Claire, yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “Does it seem Hal still means for his sister to marry Nicholas Ashewell?”

  “Yes,” Ellis said again.

  Maybe deciding that too many words was better than too few, Kyping asked Joliffe, “You’ve no thought of why Gosyn and Master Ashewell quarreled?”

  “It seemed to be because Gosyn was set and certain he won’t marry Claire to Hal, and somehow Master Ashewell took offense,” Joliffe said readily. “Maybe because he had some hope of having Nicholas free from marrying Eleanor now Medcote is dead, and he was out of humour at finding Hal means to hold him to it. Which means Hal must know whatever it is his father was holding against Ashewell and must be holding it, too.”

  Joliffe waited, hoping Kyping would say something about that.

  Kyping looked at him, giving nothing away.

  Joliffe prodded, “You’ve not found out what it is, have you?”

  “No.”

  “Have you asked Hal Medcote about it?”

  “Yes.”

  “And Master Ashewell?”

  “Yes.”

  Kyping was becoming as miserly with words as Ellis had been. Hoping to loosen him, Joliffe tried, as if the thought had only just now come to him, “In their way, both marriages make sense. It’s a reasonable joining of lands to everyone’s good in the longer run, I’d say.”

  Sharp with dislike, Kyping answered, “I’d not wish Hal Medcote on any daughter of mine for any reason, and Eleanor Medcote deserves better than some stripling who doesn’t want her.”

  Interested in how much Kyping had betrayed with that, Joliffe went altogether another way, asking, “What about Jack Hammond? Have you questioned him?”

  “Yesterday. To give him a better fright I had him brought to me under guard as if I was about to arrest him. He talked very willingly.”

  “To any use?” Joliffe asked.

  “He claims he was at his uncle’s overnight. That they went together from the church ale and Jack stayed the night with him, trying to talk out his anger and to borrow money. Claims he started home as
soon as there was light enough to see his way. ‘To be in time for his god-bedamned boon-work for the god-bedamned priest,’ was the way he put it.”

  “Seems he didn’t talk out much of his anger,” Joliffe said dryly.

  “Nor he didn’t get any money out of his uncle either.”

  “Who, I suppose, lives in a direction that makes it reasonable Hammond should be going home by way of here,” Joliffe said.

  “He does, and though I’m sure I got to him before any word passed between him and Jack, he tells the same tale and I have to think he’s told me straight.”

  “Pity,” muttered Ellis.

  Kyping’s somewhat bitter smile agreed with him. So, silently, did Joliffe. Jack Hammond as Medcote’s murderer would save everyone a deal of trouble. But aloud he only said, “And I suppose Jack saw neither Medcote’s body or even his horse as he passed, what with the heavy mist and all.”

  “He did not,” Kyping said resignedly. “Nor is it likely he would have raised the hue-and-cry if he had.” Because few men wanted to be first-finder of a dead body and have all the irk of duties that came with it. Kyping shrugged. “Ah, well. There’s still others I’m asking questions after.”

  “Including Master Ashewell and Gosyn?” Joliffe asked.

  “And you lot,” Kyping said. “There’s only your word for each other that none of you left camp that night.”

  Joliffe acknowledged that with a small bow of his head. “True. But if it wasn’t one of us, then isn’t it likely the murder was not by someone coming on Medcote by chance but done deliberately by someone who followed him there? Or knew he would be there? You’ve asked to find who from his manor went anywhere that night?”

  “Servants seen talking in the village, you mean. Someone who said too much to the wrong person,” Kyping returned.

  “Or a servant who claims he was in the village or somewhere, but no one remembers seeing him there.”

  “I’ve been asking those questions, yes, but going at it the other way, too—trying to sort out who couldn’t have killed Medcote, no matter how much they may have wanted to, from all those who disliked Medcote enough to maybe do it.”