A Play of Isaac

by Margaret Frazer

  Pretending more interest than he actually had in the rein he was oiling, Joliffe asked, “He was your friend, along with Master Penteney and his brother?”

  “Walter? He was more just there than actually our friend. A few years younger and following along with what we did. You know how it goes.”

  “Taken up with lollardy like the rest of you were, was he?” Joliffe asked carefully.

  Not carefully enough. Basset worked at the strap for a silent moment before, still working, he answered, “Pretty much.”

  “Or more taken up,” Joliffe pressed. “The way Master Penteney’s brother was?”

  Basset gave up on the strap, gave Joliffe a long look, and said, “He shied off when the rest of us did. That’s what I remember.”

  “Did he? Shy off, I mean.”

  For a long moment the twitter and flit of sparrows among the far rafters was the only sound in the barn, until Basset said, “You think maybe he didn’t?”

  “The way he talked just now, he sounded near to blaming Master Penteney for prospering at his brother’s expense. As if Penteney were at fault for gaining everything that his brother lost.”

  “I suppose,” Basset said slowly, “that if I had ever been asked, I would have said Walter followed closer on Roger’s heels than on Hal’s or mine in those days.”

  “Not so close as to follow him into exile, though.”

  “Not that close, no. But close enough that maybe, yes, he might resent Penteney had all the gain and his brother all the loss.”

  “And yet he works for Penteney to this day.”

  “Works for him,” Basset said, “when he was apprenticed to be a victualler in his own right someday. Something went wrong somewhere, for him to be only a hired man instead of his own master.”

  “Master Penteney hasn’t said anything about him when you’ve talked, though?”

  “Not a word. Joliffe, what are you aiming at?”

  “A target I’m just starting to guess,” Joliffe said. He put aside the piece of harness and the rag and stood up, frowning not at Basset but at his own thoughts. “I have to go somewhere. I’ll be back.”

  “I trust so,” Basset said.

  Master Barentyne was more easily found than Joliffe had feared he might be. The servant standing watch outside the Penteneys’ streetward gate—whether to greet anyone coming to offer sympathy or on guard against the curious, Joliffe could not tell—was able to tell him Master Barentyne was staying at a cousin’s house near the Guildhall, and as fortune would have it, Master Barentyne was in, rather than holidaying somewhere in the streets. The servant who met Joliffe at the door there was unwilling to admit that until Joliffe said he had come about “the Penteney trouble.” That got him in but did not make him welcome; he was left standing just inside the door while the servant went in search of Master Barentyne, who came himself, rather than having Joliffe brought to him, asking without other greeting, “Is there new trouble?”

  “Just the old,” Joliffe said. “It’s about this Hubert Leonard and his lollardy and maybe Master Penteney’s brother.”

  “Shall I guess here isn’t the best place to talk about this?”

  “A fair guess, yes,” Joliffe granted, and Master Barentyne led him inside, into the house’s hall. Like the house itself, it was an altogether more modest place than the Penteneys’ but large enough that when Master Barentyne stopped in its middle and faced around to him, they were enough away from any doors to be safe from being overheard so long as they kept their voices down.

  “What about Leonard?” Master Barentyne asked. “You’re not thinking he was Penteney’s brother, are you? Because he wasn’t, worse luck. He’s been named for certain by two men from Abingdon, come to Oxford with their families for Corpus Christi and to visit relatives.”

  “You’ve no reason to doubt them?”

  “One is the abbot’s bailiff there and the other a well-known merchant. They both say they’ve known this Leonard off and on since boyhood. He’s been gone more than not these past years. ‘In foreign parts,’ one of them said. But they knew him well enough when they saw him. Neither of them seemed to mind much he was dead. I gather that had nothing to do with him being a Lollard, if that’s what he was. They just didn’t like him. So, no, he’s not Penteney’s brother.”

  “There was never much likelihood he was. What I really came to ask was how much you do truly know about Master Penteney’s brother.”

  “What Master Penteney told us, and the talk that’s come up about him since this started, the way talk does. That he was a Lollard and some way a troublemaker and he’s long gone and probably dead. Why?”

  “Had you heard about this brother before now? Not from Master Penteney, but from anyone?” Joliffe insisted.

  “From what my cousin’s wife says, the scandal is stale by twenty years and more. Even she couldn’t squeeze much juice out of it. It’s only the murder, with talk the dead man was a Lollard, has briefly freshened memory of it, that’s all.” Master Barentyne sharpened to a demand. “Why?”

  Again, Joliffe slid away from answering directly, saying instead, “I went out today to check on our horse. She’s being kept in Master Penteney’s pasturage north from town. I fell into talk with Master Penteney’s man there. Walter Glover.”

  “I don’t know him.”

  “He was apprenticed to Master Penteney’s father years and years ago, but never became his own master and works as a steward of sorts for Master Penteney now.”

  Master Barentyne was waiting for the point of this, but Joliffe made no haste about it, wanting to say the thing right, to see what Master Barentyne would make of it before he said his own full suspicion outright. “We didn’t talk long, but Glover managed to mention Master Penteney and Lollards in the same breath a good many times. He made a point of linking last night’s poisoning to Lollards, then said how Master Penteney should expect trouble if he has to do with Lollards, and that he must have to do with Lollards because why else had that man Leonard been to see him.”

  “The disloyal cur,” Master Barentyne said. “He can make deep trouble for Penteney if he goes on like that.”

  “Then he saw fit to tell me about Master Penteney’s brother. He said ‘everyone knows’ Penteney’s brother is ‘one of the worst’ Lollards and lives ‘off overseas’ with the ‘arch-heretic Payne’.”

  “That’s more than my cousin’s wife knows,” Barentyne scoffed. “And she knows every morsel of talk to be had in Oxford. She . . .” He stopped, his brow creased with mingled frown and thought. He met Joliffe’s waiting look and went on slowly. “She knows every morsel of talk and never stops repeating it. But she’s never said anything about Penteney’s brother being alive. The way she has heard and tells it, he’s long gone and long dead.”

  “I’ve asked elsewhere,” Joliffe said. “It seems to be what’s generally said. Except by Glover.”

  They went on looking at each other a long moment more before Master Barentyne said, still slowly, “Since Master Glover seems to know more than anyone else does about this Lollard brother who may or may not have part in this Leonard’s death, it’s maybe time I talk a while with him.”

  “It isn’t much,” Joliffe said, willing to be cautious now that someone else besides himself had suspicion.

  “A little is better than the nothing I presently have.” Master Barentyne was giving way to open pleasure at thought of something to do, saying as he began to turn away, “I’ll find some of my men to send out to bring him in.”

  Quickly Joliffe said, “I wanted to ask you about Lewis Fairfield’s death, too.”

  Master Barentyne paused. “Are you going to say you think Glover had something to do with the poisoning?”

  “I don’t see how he could have. No. What I was wondering was if you knew any more about what was used to taint the sweetmeats. If it wasn’t a chance spoilage.”

  “I’ve talked to the baker. He swears everything was fresh and that no one he doesn’t know could have come at
them while they were at his place. From what I know of Master Wymund, I lean toward believing him.”

  “But if wasn’t chance spoilage, either at the baker’s or the Penteneys’, wouldn’t it have taken a goodly amount of whatever was used—supposing something was used—to make that many people that sick? More of a poison than someone would likely have on hand?”

  “It would. Yes.” Master Barentyne was grimly certain about that. “That’s why I have one of my men going around right now to every apothecary and herbwife in town to ask if anyone has lately bought much of any of the things the doctor mentioned. I’m hoping he finds out nothing. Then we can safely put all of it down to no more than ill-chance. Although,” he added somewhat wishfully, “it would ease things if it turned out this Master Glover had been buying some such stuff of late.”

  Joliffe laughed. “It would, at that.” He bowed respectfully. “I leave you to your business then.”

  Master Barentyne bent his head in return and again started to turn away. To his back Joliffe offered, “There’s several sheds at the pasturage where carts are probably kept, and behind the house there’s a muddy edge of marsh along one of the pastures. You’ll maybe want your men to see if anything has been lying among the reeds there lately. And have a close look at any carts?”

  Master Barentyne grinned over his shoulder at him. “A marsh and carts. Yes, those will bear looking at, thank you.”

  “And you might want to ask about the bay horse with the two white forefeet that wasn’t in the pasture three days ago.”

  Master Barentyne’s smile grew. He bent his head respectfully to Joliffe, then went on his way, leaving Joliffe to find his own way out, which Joliffe did, moving rather more quickly than was easy through the holidaying crowd. The afternoon was well along but there was no noticeable slackening of merriment. For most folks the roistering would likely go on until curfew and, for some, beyond curfew, but Joliffe’s own sense of holiday was long gone. He was glad he did not happen on Rose and Piers and Ellis, but as he crossed the Penteneys’ yard toward the barn he realized he did not much want to see Basset either. What he wanted now was chance to think and he didn’t know how much time he had for it. Master Barentyne would learn whatever there was to learn about Glover. If it proved to amount to what Joliffe thought it might—if all the wrong notes Glover had hit in their talking together sang the song Joliffe thought they would—then Leonard’s murder was taken care of. That left the poisoning and Lewis’s death, and he had thoughts there that he wanted to lay out and look at, to see if they took the shape he feared they would.

  But if they did, then his time was nearly gone, and with a quick glance to check that there seemed to be nobody to see him, he turned away from the barn, into the narrow alleyway to the garden gate. If someone were in the garden, he would simply stay out of sight in the alley, lean against the wall, and think there; but when he looked through the gap around the gate and saw Kathryn alone, sitting on the bench in the little group of birch trees across the garden otherwise empty in the afternoon sunlight, he only hesitated, then went through the gateway and across the grass toward her.

  Head bowed, she did not notice him until he was almost to the trees. Even then she did not startle, merely raised her head and looked at him, her face a pale oval in the young birch leaves’ dappling shadows. She was not crying but she had been; her eyes were a little red and there were tears under her voice as she said, “Master Joliffe.”

  Joliffe made her a bow and said, “Pardon me, my lady. Would you rather I left you alone?”

  “Please,” she said, lifting one hand toward him. “Please stay.”

  Joliffe stayed but came no nearer, warning gently, “It’s hardly seemly for you to be here alone with me, my lady.”

  “Simon will be here soon. He said he’d come when they finished talking. They must be done by now. They’re deciding about Lewis’s burial and . . . afterward.”

  “Afterward,” Joliffe repeated. “When you marry Simon.”

  He wanted to see how she would answer that, said out so plainly. She merely drew a long, trembling breath, let it out on a heavy sigh, and said unevenly, “Yes.”

  “You’ll like that better than marrying Lewis, surely,” he tried, still gently.

  She fixed her eyes on him, wide and maybe a little frightened. “Much better, I think. How wrong is it of me to feel that way so soon after Lewis’s death?”

  That was very probably something she would have said to no one of her family. Only because he was almost a stranger, someone who merely happened to be there, was she that open, and he answered carefully, “It’s not wrong at all. You’re brave to face that truth so honestly. You don’t mourn for Lewis any the less because of it, do you?”

  “I’ve been crying for him,” she said. “He was sweetness itself. But . . .” Tears welled up in her voice again. “I’m so glad I don’t have to marry him!”

  So when she had talked a few days ago about how she did not mind marrying him, she had been no more than putting a brave front on something expected of her, not her own choice.

  “It will be much better to marry Simon,” Joliffe agreed evenly. “Especially since you love Simon better.”

  Kathryn stared at him a silent while, her mouth twisted tightly against more tears, before she finally said faintly, maybe trying out the words aloud for the first time but certain of them, “Especially since I love Simon better.”

  She looked past Joliffe then, and by her gladdened face he knew even before he turned to see for himself that Simon was coming.

  Like Kathryn and everyone else in the family, Simon was garbed in black, but it was more than that made him look older than he had yesterday. Since yesterday he had seen death close up and had everything come into his hands that, all his life, had been just beyond his reach because he was the younger brother. Property and wealth and a firm place in the world—and Kathryn, who otherwise would have been lost to him forever.

  She rose to meet him as he reached them, holding out her hands for his while asking, “It’s settled?”

  Taking her hands, Simon said, “Lewis will be buried tomorrow.” He sounded tired as well as older. “Then, on Sunday before Lord and Lady Lovell leave, we’re to be betrothed. You and I.”

  Kathryn sighed and closed her eyes. Simon took a step closer to her and leaned his forehead against hers. They both looked as if some great fear had gone out of them and left them too tired to feel, for now, anything but relief.

  Regretting the need, Joliffe asked “Has anything more been heard from the crowner about the sweetmeats? Whether they were poisoned or not?”

  Simon and Kathryn drew a little apart, each letting one hand go but keeping the other tightly held as Kathryn warned, “You’re not to say ‘poisoned’. Mother says it can’t have been that. She’s sorry she said ‘poisoned’ last night. They just spoiled, that’s all. She says it’s her fault for not keeping them well, and everyone is to know Master Wymond isn’t to blame at all.”

  “So no one thinks it was Lollards anymore?” Joliffe prodded.

  “No,” Kathryn said firmly and with a little scorn.

  But Simon, looking troubled, said, “Some people do. Father Francis was just here, telling Master Penteney that Master Wymond is going to be questioned by Master Gascoigne and some others of the university to see what he has to say.”

  “You mean to see if maybe he’s a Lollard?” Kathryn asked, horrified. “He never would be!”

  “His men are to be questioned, too,” Simon said. “And all of our servants here.”

  “But why?” Kathryn cried in distress. “We’re not any of us Lollards. Why would Lollards want to make trouble for Father anyway? He’s never had aught to do with Lollards.”

  “It’s because of the dead man the other morning,” Simon said.

  “That still doesn’t have anything to do with Father!”

  From the house door, Mistress Penteney called, “Kathryn, come in, please.”

  “Bother,” Kathr
yn said but immediately let go of Simon and went. Simon made to go with her, but Joliffe said quickly, low enough for Kathryn not to hear, “Please ask Mistress and Master Penteney to see me here, now, if they will. Both of them. I’ve heard something about that dead man that they maybe should know and soon.”

  Simon paused, opened his mouth to ask something, decided against it, nodded, and followed Kathryn toward the house. Joliffe saw him stop in the doorway to say something to Mistress Penteney, who looked across the grass to Joliffe. He slightly bowed, then stood in a way that said he would wait. She gave him a brief nod and went indoors.

  What, he asked himself, had he just done? Besides robbing himself of any time for thinking, he had just committed himself to something he very possibly should not be doing. But maybe Master and Mistress Penteney would not come out. Or not come out in time. If they didn’t come soon, would he go in and demand to see them? Or would he just stay aside and let things fall out as they would?

  He was spared finding that out by Master and Mistress Penteney coming together into the garden. As fitted their place in the world and his, they stopped on the path there, waiting for him to come to them and he did; but after his respectful bow, he stopped the beginning of a question from Master Penteney by making a small gesture that suggested they move farther away from the house, saying, “The better not to be overheard.”

  Master Penteney’s questioning look deepened but he held out his hand for his wife, showing he was ready to follow Joliffe. Mistress Penteney had turned a little aside to pluck a stalk of lavender leaves from the tall plant beside the door. Twirling it in the fingers of one hand, she laid the other on her husband’s and went with him as Joliffe led them back to the birches. There Master Penteney seated his wife on the bench and said to Joliffe, “Master Fairfield said you’ve heard something new about the dead man.”

  Master Fairfield was Simon now. Joliffe made that shift in his mind while saying, “I happened to meet Master Barentyne a little while ago. He was about to send some of his men to bring Walter Glover to him for questioning.”