A Play of Isaac

by Margaret Frazer

  Piers had left the cart, unnoticed until now he sidled to Joliffe’s side and said, very low, “Her right one.”

  “What?” Joliffe asked, stooping to hear him better.

  “Her right sleeve,” Piers all but whispered. “The packet Mistress Penteney showed the doctor last night. She took it from her right sleeve.”

  “You’re certain?”

  “After I thought about it, where she was standing and all, yes.”

  “Did you see where she put the packet she emptied into Lewis’s wine?”

  “No. But she took it out of her left sleeve and wouldn’t she most likely put it back there? It was in her right hand the last time I remember it.”

  That was what Joliffe remembered, too; and Mistress Penteney was right-handed. How likely was she to have put the packet, left-handed, up her right sleeve? Not very, he thought.

  “Piers, come away from him,” Ellis snapped, so sharply that Piers actually took a step backward.

  But before he altogether went he whispered to his grandfather and Joliffe, “I like Mistress Penteney.”

  “So do I,” Joliffe whispered back.

  Piers hesitated, then said, “But if she killed Lewis, she shouldn’t have.”

  “No,” Joliffe agreed. “She shouldn’t have.”

  “Piers!” Ellis ordered and Piers went away to him, scuffling and ungracious.

  Basset and Joliffe looked at each other—a long, assessing look, with neither of them very happy, until Basset finally said, tersely, “Why don’t you go for a walk, Joliffe?”

  It was an order more than a question and Joliffe took it, because Basset was right: they would all be easier if he was somewhere else just now.

  Once outside the barn, though, he realized that where else he could go was a problem. Not into town. He was not in the humour for holiday crowds. Nor hanging about the yard. He would rather not have people here thinking about the players if it could be helped, or have to talk to anyone here. With little other choice, he went out the back gate to the lane. If nothing else, he could see how Tisbe did.

  It was a solitary walk, which suited him well. Summer was coming into its greenest glory and he had the lane to himself, everyone probably gone to holiday in town. Almost he could lose himself in the pleasure of the sun warm on his back, the sky blue-shining overhead, the flirt of birdsong around him in the hedgerows . . .

  Almost, but not enough.

  Tisbe was doing well, though, he saw when he came to lean on the gate to the horse pasture. Even from a distance, grazing among the other horses, she looked sleek-sided, and when he whistled and she threw up her head and came to him, it was with a certain jauntiness, her days of rest and plentiful food having plainly been good for her. She even eyed him to see if he were carrying halter or rope before she quite came in his reach, and he chided her, “Grown fond of laziness, have you, girl? You’ve a few more days of it, by the look of things.”

  She put her forehead against his shoulder and shoved, telling him to make himself useful and scratch behind her ears. He obliged and they stood in silent, mutual satisfaction for a while, Joliffe letting himself ease into a quietmindedness that matched Tisbe’s half-closed eyes and the drowse of flies around them, until the sound of a door across the yard behind him brought him to look over his shoulder and see Master Glover coming his way.

  So not everyone was gone to holiday in town, Joliffe thought regretfully. He was more regretful when Master Glover joined him at the gate with a brief greeting and asked, “What’s all this about trouble at Master Penteney’s feast last night? Is it true the idiot is dead?”

  “He’s dead, yes,” Joliffe said, succeeding at keeping his voice easy. He didn’t know when he had stopped thinking of Lewis as anyone but Lewis, was surprised to find that he had, and more surprised by his flare of anger as Master Glover went on lightly, “Well, that’s God’s mercy on everyone, including the idiot. What happened at the feast anyway? Poison, I’ve heard.”

  “You’ve heard as much as me,” Joliffe said. He was giving more heed to scratching the long hollow under Tisbe’s chin now than to Master Glover, hoping he would go away.

  But Master Glover persisted, “I heard you players were there.”

  Word spreads fast, Joliffe thought while answering, “The others were. I was in the garden, keeping the children busy.”

  “Ah. I thought you looked over-well for someone who’d been poisoned. If you weren’t, that explains it.”

  “I wasn’t,” Joliffe agreed. “Nobody was. Not of a purpose. It just seems to have been some food gone off.”

  “Is that what they’re saying?”

  “It’s what the crowner is saying, anyway.” Joliffe looked at him. “Why? What have you heard?”

  Master Glover shrugged. “Lollards are what I’ve heard. Lollards taking revenge on Master Penteney for that Lollard found dead at his place the other day.”

  “How did you come to hear that?”

  “You know how it is. People talk.”

  They surely did, but how had Master Glover heard so much, complete with flourishes and Lollards, all the way out here in the not over-long while since it all happened?

  “You’ve been into town to the holidaying?” Joliffe asked.

  “I’ve not, no. I don’t hold with . . .” He seemed to think better of what he had been going to say and said instead, “I’ve let my men go in but stayed here myself. Everyone being gone is what thieves count on at holiday time. Mind you, Deykus is going to hear about only Dav making it back here last night, leaving all the morning work to the two of us.”

  “Dav is who told you about the trouble at the Penteneys.”

  “He did.” Master Glover reached out and stroked Tisbe’s neck. “He’s courting one of the kitchenmaids, the poor fool. Was even helping at the feast, so knew about it all far better than he wanted to.”

  “How did he come to hear it was being said Lollards did the poisoning?” Joliffe asked.

  “She has a carrying voice, does Mistress Penteney.”

  And of course there would have been servants listening as near the parlor’s door as they could get. Joliffe realized he should have thought of that.

  “But like I said to Dav this morning,” Master Glover went on, “a man that has to do with Lollards, he should expect trouble from it, shouldn’t he?”

  “Master Penteney doesn’t have to do with Lollards, does he?” Joliffe asked.

  “He must. That Lollard was there to see him the other day and that wasn’t by chance, I’ll warrant you. His brother is a Lollard, you see. Master Penteney’s brother. One of the worst, I’ve heard tell. He’s off somewhere overseas with that arch-heretic Payne.”

  “I hadn’t heard that,” Joliffe said, lying with encouraging interest.

  “Oh, yes. It’s something everyone knows. They just don’t talk about it to Master Penteney’s face. Not that anyone thinks he’s a Lollard, mind you, and good luck for him that he isn’t, since everything his brother lost for being one Master Penteney gained, and every time Master Penteney gets richer, his brother is remembered.”

  There was an undercurrent to Master Glover’s words, an edge that a satisfied man shouldn’t have towards his master, but as if he had not heard it, Joliffe asked, “Do you think Master Penteney has dealings with Lollards? Besides with the dead man, I mean.”

  “Not likely, no. That fellow found dead at his place was probably just a useless troublemaker who ran into more trouble than he counted on in some back alley and only happened to be a Lollard.”

  “And only happened to be dumped in Master Penteney’s yard?”

  “Maybe. Or maybe somebody wanted to make trouble for Master Penteney.” Glover left off stroking Tisbe’s neck. “He didn’t get rich as he is without making some people unhappy at him, whether they can do anything about it or not.”

  “So maybe one of them found a way to ruin his feast last night.”

  “Could be. Could be. Ended by doing him a favor though, didn’t
they? Killing off the idiot that way. I suppose they’ll marry the girl to that Simon now.”

  “Very like,” Joliffe said. He gave Tisbe a final scratch between the eyes, made his farewell to Glover, and left, making it seem he went in no great haste despite how much he wanted to be away from the man. It seemed that, like too many people, other people’s trouble was meat and drink to Glover, and just now Joliffe was on a fast. Once away from the pasturage, though, he slowed his pace, matching it to the slow turn of his thoughts, and instead of returning to the barn, followed the lane past the Penteneys’ back gate, took a side alley that let him wend back to outside the North Gate with his mind made up to something. Joining the happy crowds, he went through the gateway into the town and purposefully by the shortest way to Queen’s Lane and St. Edmund Hall.

  The porter, undoubtedly reconciled by the large pitcher of ale and plate of cakes on a stool beside him to staying where he was while others holidayed, grudgingly admitted that Master Thamys was not gone out today, was probably in his chamber if someone wanted to see him. After that, it took two farthings to convince him to call out a servant—who was grumpily less resigned to his day’s duties—and send him to see if Master Thamys would see . . . The porter cocked a questioning eye at Joliffe, apparently not impressed by what he saw.

  “Master Joliffe of Gloucester Abbey,” Joliffe said.

  The porter looked as if he doubted that—rightly, as it happened—but he sent the servant anyway, and the man came back soon enough with word that Master Thamys would see Master Joliffe if it pleased him to come up. Joliffe granted that it pleased him well and followed the man into the passageway beyond the door and into a long yard, went slantwise across that to a door to a narrow stairway up to a well-windowed room, not over-large and sparsely furnished with several plain-backed chairs, two wall-shelves laden with books, a small fireplace, and a large desk with a slanted lectern for reading. Except for the books and fireplace, the white-washed walls were plain, like the scrubbed-boarded floor, but the desk from which John Thamys was rising was laid out with carefully stacked papers, pens laid in a wooden holder, and an ink bottle that Thamys was stoppering as he said, “Master Joliffe, how good to see you. Thank you, Henry. If you could bring some ale, please.”

  Henry took himself away and Joliffe said, looking around the room, “Very good. And a separate bedroom, too.” He nodded toward the closed door at the room’s other end. “This isn’t bad at all.”

  “And someone to light a fire for me on cold mornings and a roof that keeps off the rain,” Thamys said. “Not bad at all, I find.”

  “And books.” Joliffe had crossed to the shelves and was looking at what Thamys had there.

  “You could have done as well, you know, ‘Master’ Joliffe.”

  “I couldn’t have,” Joliffe said, turning from the shelves to face him. They were both smiling. “My sense of jest would have come in the way.” Over the years he had grown at ease with that certainty. Equally easily, he added, “But don’t ‘master’ me in that tone of voice. I’m a master of my craft as surely as any smith or merchant.”

  “You assuredly are,” Thamys agreed. “I neglected to tell you how much I admired The Pride of Life, and I’ve rarely been so moved as I was by your Abraham and Isaac yesterday. I could even forget it was you who were the Angel.”

  Joliffe bowed slightly. “Thank you.”

  “But ‘of Gloucester Abbey’?”

  “It seemed the easiest way to get in here.”

  Henry returned with a pitcher of ale, fetched two tankards from the other room, and poured while Joliffe and Thamys went to stand near the window overlooking the courtyard, making slight talk about the good weather and how Thamys was taking the chance of a quiet day to get on with his work instead of holidaying. Only when Henry had gone out and down the stairs did Thamys say, “I was sorry to hear about the trouble at the Penteneys and the boy’s death. Were you sick along with the rest? You look well enough now.”

  Joliffe explained how he and the other players had stayed well and asked, “How do you come to know about it so quickly, shut up here with your work?”

  “Henry and Cobbe at the gate are unceasing fountains of news of every kind. Word of Oxford’s latest doings outside and inside scholarly walls comes along with every meal Henry brings me and sometimes between whiles if it’s news enough to warrant it.”

  “Have you heard Lollards mentioned as part of last night’s trouble?”

  Thamys sobered. “I have and it doesn’t make good hearing. Do you think it’s likely?”

  “No.”

  Joliffe’s flat certainty of that surprised himself as well as Thamys, who asked, “You don’t think at all it might have been Lollards taking some kind of revenge on Master Penteney?”

  “For what?”

  “For that man’s death the other night?” Thamys said doubtfully. “Despite what the crowner seems to think?”

  “That’s a long stretch,” Joliffe said. “Unless someone knows more than has been said about Master Penteney and Lollards. Or more than I’ve heard, anyway. Have you heard anything that way? Talk about Master Penteney and Lollards together? Before now, I mean.”

  “Until now, I’ve never heard aught but good about Master Penteney.”

  “Not even from nasty Gascoigne? If there’s anything bad to say about someone, he surely would say it.”

  “You took a deep dislike to him, didn’t you?” Thamys grinned.

  “I did, and fairly enough, I think. He dislikes me and my kind for no good reason at all. Therefore, I feel free, for that very good reason, to dislike him in return.”

  “I suspect there’s a severe flaw in that reasoning, on grounds of Christian charity if nothing else,” Thamys said, “but I’m not minded to challenge you on it. What in particular are you wondering if I’ve heard?”

  “About Master Penteney’s Lollard brother.”

  “His Lollard brother? I’ve heard about him yes.” Thamys seemed both surprised and puzzled. “But not until this week, as it happens.”

  “Not until after the dead Lollard was found?” Joliffe asked. “Nothing before then?”

  “Before then, nothing.”

  “What exactly is being said? About him and against Master Penteney?”

  Thamys paused, searching his mind before saying, “Nothing against Master Penteney, really. The talk that I’ve heard is merely that he had a brother who went to the bad, is long gone from Oxford and probably dead. All old news, but old news is still news when folk can’t find anything else to say.”

  “But until now there’s been no talk of him, this missing brother? Even by Gascoigne?”

  “Even by Gascoigne,” Thamys said soothingly. “I’d guess the matter was so forgotten it took a dead Lollard on Master Penteney’s doorstep to drag it out of the depths of someone’s memory and set the talk going. What are you up to, Joliffe?”

  Realizing he was frowning with thought, Joliffe smoothed his face and asked blandly, “What about Master Wymond the baker? What’s the talk about him?”

  “You mean, is he a Lollard?” Thamys said dryly. “I haven’t heard anything at all that way, and I’ll thank you to start none. He makes the best apple tarts in Oxford.”

  “I mean is he well known for often being late with things ordered from him?”

  “Master Wymond? Never at all. How long would he have anyone’s business and a shop in the High Street if he couldn’t be depended on? We use him ourselves here at St. Edmund. What are you about?”

  Joliffe looked elaborately innocent. “About? I’m just asking questions is all.”

  “When a scholar asks a string of questions, it’s because he’s looking for an answer at the end of them.”

  “Ah, but I’m not a scholar, remember. Just a poor, wandering player without two wits to rub together,” Joliffe said cheerfully.

  Equally cheerfully, Thamys answered, “You’re such a liar.”

  “I’m not!” Joliffe protested. “Some people make
sport with quoits or balls of dice. You make sport with ideas. I make sport with questions. To each their own.”

  “I know you’re not half the rascal you’d have me think,” Thamys returned.

  Joliffe laid a finger to his lips. “Let that be our secret.” He moved away. “I’d best go now, but my thanks for the ale and talk.”

  “You’re very welcome.” Thamys followed him toward the door. “But only on condition you tell me later what you’re at with all these questions.”

  “I will,” Joliffe said, “if only to give you a goodly laugh at what a fool I’m being.”

  But if he was not being a fool, then something doubly dire was going on; and he left Thamys and went rapidly down the stairs because time might well be getting thin between now and worse.

  Chapter 18

  At the barn again, Joliffe found only Basset, sitting alone beside the cart, oiling a piece of Tisbe’s harness. As Joliffe crossed toward him he looked up and said, “Rose and Ellis have taken Piers out and about. Better than moping here, they thought. Where did you go?”

  “Out to see Tisbe.” Joliffe sat down where he could reach oil and a rag and another piece of the harness. He had returned to the barn to try some of his thoughts against Basset’s sharpness before he went further and was glad the others were gone. “I talked a while with Master Penteney’s man there. Walter Glover. He . . .”

  “Walter Glover?” Basset echoed, pausing at his work. “About my age? Thick sandy hair?”

  “About your age, yes, and he has sandy hair, right enough,” Joliffe said, surprised. “Not what I’d call thick, though. Especially on top.”

  “It could well be thin by now,” Basset said complacently. He took open pleasure in his own barely withdrawn hairline.

  “You know him.”

  “He sounds like the Walter Glover apprenticed to old Master Penteney when I was. What did you say he’s doing?”

  “He sees to Master Penteney’s pasturing north of town.”

  “Huh,” Basset said, taking up his work again. “Who would have thought it. I’d have supposed he’d be a victualler in his own right by now, if I’d thought about it at all. He was shaping toward it well enough when I left. Had a busy brain, he did.”