The Nun's Tale: An Owen Archer Mystery

by Candace Robb

  They all tilted their faces towards the stars and let the night air cool them.

  Down below, in Lancaster’s private parlour, Thoresby and the Duke shared brandywine before retiring.

  ‘Your man Archer is worth his weight in gold, Chancellor. I regret having lost him to you.’

  ‘Sometimes I think he regrets choosing me, my lord Duke.’

  ‘A man like him chafes at any authority, I should think.’

  Thoresby felt the Duke studying him. ‘What is it?’

  ‘You do not seem pleased with the outcome of this investigation.’

  ‘Dissatisfied. Not displeased.’

  ‘Because there is no one to punish?’

  ‘God makes us such slaves to our passions. It seems a cruel twist to our natures.’

  Lancaster shrugged. ‘Well, I am most pleased and satisfied. You have been generous with your assistance, Chancellor. I must repay you in equal measure.’

  Thoresby sat back, studied Lancaster over the rim of his cup. A golden lion of a man, like his father Edward in his prime. And almost as powerful as his father at this age. He might not be King of England and Wales, but he was Duke of Lancaster, an inheritance possibly worth more coin than that of the King. So young to be so powerful. He might do a lot for Thoresby. ‘You know my desire, my lord Duke. Alice Perrers out of your father’s bedchamber. Any spur you might give to that exile will be most appreciated.’ He would not be greedy, not with so much at stake.

  Lancaster swirled the brandywine in his cup and stared down into the whirlpool. ‘Mistress Alice. I had heard of your mutual dislike. But since then I have heard she admires you.’

  That disturbed Thoresby. What was the bitch up to? ‘A new ploy, my lord Duke, nothing more, you can be certain.’

  ‘I confess I find her vulgar and unlovely, but she has a quick wit and a knack for cheering the Queen – that, I should think, would endear her to you.’

  ‘She cheers the Queen while she plots to usurp her.’

  Lancaster pressed his middle and forefinger to the bridge of his nose. ‘Death shall do that for her soon enough.’

  Thoresby regretted having brought up the subject. ‘Perhaps we should speak of Mistress Alice another time.’

  Lancaster waved away the suggestion. ‘Do not mind me. Too much food and drink often puts me in a grim temper. Mistress Alice also has a clear head when it comes to business matters. I believe she has counselled the King wisely in financial matters pertaining to the household.’

  ‘She hopes to keep the coffers full so that she might expect more gifts, no doubt.’

  The blue eyes bored into Thoresby. ‘What is your stake in this, Chancellor? Why do you take such a personal interest in Alice Perrers?’

  How could Thoresby possibly explain when he did not fully understand the intensity of his dislike himself? ‘I am devoted to your Mother the Queen. She has been a friend to me since I came to court years ago. Mistress Alice offends your Mother with every breath she takes. That is the passion that drives me in this, my lord Duke.’

  Lancaster relaxed. ‘My Mother speaks very highly of you.’

  Now that Thoresby had neatly side-stepped that unpleasant topic, he must move the conversation away from the despicable Alice. ‘I understand the King favours William of Wykeham for the seat of Winchester.’

  The comment brought Lancaster’s head up with a jerk. Now the blue eyes were cold. ‘Wykeham. There’s one I should like to separate from court.’

  Interesting. Thoresby wished to hear more. ‘He seems an intelligent man, and talented,’ he suggested, ‘though low-born.’

  Lancaster dropped his head back, closed his eyes. ‘I care nothing of Wykeham’s birth but that it was one of the more unfortunate dates in my history.’ He raised his head, fixed his eyes on Thoresby. ‘It is nothing I can point to and say, “Thus he means to destroy me”, but mark me, Chancellor, the man will do it. There is a look in his eye when he gazes on me.’

  Thoresby could not think how anyone but the King could destroy the Duke of Lancaster. He fingered the chain of office round his neck. ‘You believe as I do that Wykeham is next in line for this?’

  ‘I should not let it out of sight if I were you.’ Lancaster leaned over, poured himself more brandywine, sipped, suddenly laughed out loud, ‘Now I remember. It was at Easter. Mistress Alice sat at the high table with the most extraordinary jewellery. You know how low her bodices tend to be. On the swelling of her left breast she had pearls pasted in a pattern meant to mimic tooth marks. As if someone had bitten her there and left their pearly teeth embedded. And to my amazement, she claimed that you, my lord Chancellor, had been her inspiration. With coy smile she did swear she could say no more. What was that about, eh? It had that bastard Wykeham quite red in the face – much as you are now. What is it? Some water? Would that help?’

  Still choking, Thoresby poured water, drank deeply. Sweet Heaven, she had almost killed him with that one. What a clever solution to that troublesome wound he had inflicted on her. How damnably clever. He hated her. ‘I cannot imagine what Mistress Alice meant by calling me her inspiration. But she would know that to suggest I approved of her brazen style would embarrass me and my friends.’

  Lancaster nodded. ‘She wore it for quite a while, so I am told, then tired of it. But the paste had been an unfortunate idea. The pearls left scars. Pale, but unmistakable. So like tooth marks. But too perfect, actually. Who has such perfect teeth?’

  ‘You do, my lord Duke,’ Thoresby said, feeling mischievous.

  Lancaster gave Thoresby an odd smile. ‘So do you, my lord Chancellor.’ He chuckled at Thoresby’s confusion. ‘So. What is your next move?’

  Did he know? How could he? Thoresby kept his face blank. ‘I am not yet certain.’

  ‘If I am to do aught before I take ship for Castile, you must approach me soon.’

  Thoresby nodded.

  ‘But I am about to ask you another favour. I intend to put my weight behind the opposition to Wykeham’s appointment to the seat of Winchester. When the time comes, I hope you will assist me.’

  Thoresby gave a little bow. ‘We are confederates, my lord Duke.’

  Epilogue

  On the tenth of October, the feast of Paulinus of York, Lucie went into labour at last. Magda had assured Lucie and Owen that it was not unusual for a child to be hesitant to leave the womb, but they had worried anyway, spending many sleepless nights pretending to sleep so as not to worry the other. But at last, at dawn, Lucie had announced it was time.

  Bess, Magda, and Lucie’s Aunt Phillippa were all in attendance. Owen and Jasper paced down below. It was proving to be a long wait. Magda had called down for them to open all doors, windows, and drawers to encourage the child to come forth. When hours passed and they still heard no cries, Jasper suggested that they open all the jars in the shop, too. The task was soon complete, and still the two paced to Lucie’s cries, not the babe’s.

  At midday, Tom Merchet dragged them out of the house. ‘Come to tavern. ’Tis an old North Country custom to tempt the child forth by drinking to its health and long life.’

  Owen was almost certain Tom made it up – he saw the twinkle in his eye – but he was weary of pacing, and the shop was closed for the event. There was no point in refusing.

  ‘Boy or girl, what think you, Owen?’ Tom asked as he filled three tankards.

  ‘Perhaps a smaller cup for the lad,’ Owen suggested.

  ‘On such a day as this?’ Tom shook his head and kept pouring.

  ‘Boy or girl?’ Tom repeated, joining them at the table.

  Owen shrugged. ‘’Tis unlucky to predict, Tom.’

  ‘Well, I’m hoping for a fine lad. Then Tom gets to be second godfather to ’im. But if a girl, it’s Bess will have the honour of joining your family before I do. She’ll brag about it till the end of time. Worse yet, she’s said ’tis a girl from the first.’ Tom took a long drink.

  ‘What will I be to the baby?’ Jasper asked quietly.

>   Owen nodded. He and Lucie had wondered about that, too. The boy was not their son, yet they thought of him as such. They had decided to leave the matter up to him. ‘Brother to Gwenllian or John would suit us, but ’tis your decision, lad.’

  In the end, it was Magda Digby, the Riverwoman, who decided the issue. She burst into the tavern beaming right at Jasper. ‘Well, lad, the gods have brought thee a sister to protect. Art thou man enough for it?’

  Owen was out the door before Jasper could get the answer out.

  Tom Merchet shook his head and sighed. ‘The wife has won again.’

  Author’s Note

  The action of this tale unfolds against the broad backdrop of the Spanish intervention: King Edward’s sons are preparing to march on Castile and restore Don Pedro the Cruel to the throne. The incident affords a glimpse into the medieval economic machinery of war. The intermittent fighting of the Hundred Years War took place on French soil, and the common soldiers involved were not members of a standing army, salaried in war and peace, nor were they all English; they were essentially mercenaries, paid only during active campaigns. When the English retreated, many of these soldiers were left behind to find their way back to their homelands as they might. Some of them, who faced poverty or serfdom back home or had developed a taste for living off the land in the harrying companies of the Black Prince, chose to stay on the continent. They formed organised companies of routiers, called Free Companies, and roamed over the French countryside seizing fortresses and running protection rackets, moving on when they had exhausted the resources in the area. Though they were Englishmen, Bretons, Spaniards, Germans, and Gascons, their captains tended to be English.1 And young Englishmen, hearing of the fortunes and reputations made in the companies, saw career potential, as Hugh does in this novel.

  Even some who later became heroes of France were drawn to these companies early in their careers. The Breton Bertrand du Guesclin honed his guerrilla skills among the routiers.

  Understandably, the people of France wanted their king to rid them of the routiers, who terrorised the countryside. And in 1365 King Charles of France saw a way. Enrique de Trastamare asked King Charles to assist him in a popular uprising against his half-brother Don Pedro the Cruel of Castile, as tyrant whose preferred method of persuasion was murder. Charles was predisposed against Pedro, as it was said he had arranged for the murder of his wife, a French princess, shortly after he had cast her aside. The Pope had excommunicated Pedro as an oppressor of the Church; it did not help that he had befriended the Moorish king of Grenada. Thus, encouraged by the Pope, King Charles asked Bertrand du Guesclin, by now a knight, to round up the Free Companies and lead them over the Pyrenees to oust Pedro and replace him with Trastamare. The engagement was a success.

  But Pedro had no intention of quietly accepting defeat; he turned to England, seeking the help of the Black Prince in winning back his crown, offering him lavish payment. The English were highly motivated to keep the powerful Castilian navy as their ally.

  The Black Prince readied himself in the Aquitaine, and John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, began gathering an army of soldiers and archers to support the venture. In the novel, Owen works with his old comrades Lief and Gaspare to develop an efficient method for training the archers Gaunt needed.

  The extent of Chaucer’s espionage work is unknown; in the early 1360s he studied law and finance at the Inns of Court and perhaps also served for a time in Lionel’s army in Ireland. By 1367 he was Esquire of the Royal Household; late in that year the death of Blanche of Lancaster inspired Chaucer’s first great poem, The Book of the Duchess. For Chaucer’s mission to Navarre, I use Donald R. Howard’s interpretation of a safe conduct preserved in the archives in Pamplona, allowing the poet to ‘enter, stay, move about, turn around and go back’.2

  Whence came Joanna? In The History of Clementhorpe Nunnery3 is the following item:

  In 1318 there is mention of [an] apostate, Joanna of Leeds. Archbishop Melton ordered the dean of Beverley to return the nun to her convent … Apparently Joanna had defected from her religious order and left the nunnery. However, in order to make her defection credible, she had fabricated her death at Beverley and, with the aid of accomplices, even staged her own funeral there. The archbishop was prepared to take a lenient view of these excesses. He directed the dean of Beverley to warn Joanna of the nature of her sins and, if she recanted them within eight days, to allow her to return to Clementhorpe to undergo a penance. Melton further urged the dean to undertake a thorough investigation of the case, and to discover the names of Joanna’s accomplices so that he might then take suitable action.

  The story intrigued me. Was Joanna discovered, betrayed, or did she request to return to St Clement’s Nunnery? If it was her choice, why make such an about-face? She had gone to great lengths to escape and make it permanent.

  I moved the incident to 1365–66, putting it in Archbishop Thoresby’s time, which provided me with a serendipitous relationship – Thoresby’s nephew, Richard de Ravenser, was a canon of Beverley at this time, as was William of Wykeham. Nicholas de Louth is also a real person. Because I moved Joanna’s story in time, none of the participants in the book had anything to do with the real story of Joanna of Leeds.

  From the first, I envisioned Joanna to be an ambiguous character such as Mary Magdalen. As Susan Haskins describes in Mary Magdalen: Myth and Metaphor,4 the saint had evolved from Christ’s disciple and friend to a penitent prostitute who endured a long penance as a hermit in the desert: in fact, by the fourteenth century the biblical references to Mary Magdalen, Mary of Martha and Mary, and the prostitute who washes Christ’s feet had been combined into one symbol, and the fifth-century Mary of Egypt was also folded into the mixture. And thus the Magdalen medal that Joanna loses in the first scene, a gift from the brother she adores.

  The medal is a talisman, a good-luck charm. It serves as a reminder that a character such as Joanna cannot be analysed in modern terms; her belief in the protective power of the medal is part of her faith. So too is Joanna’s remorse about stealing a portion of the Virgin’s milk from the nunnery. St Clement’s did boast such a relic, a popular one in a time of great devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary, and people believed in the power of such relics, going on pilgrimages to receive grace through homage to them.

  In the book, Joanna refuses to discard the belief that her mantle is a gift from the Blessed Virgin, even when Edmund, who had originally told her it was Our Lady’s mantle, admits to her that it is not. Joanna truly believes that Our Lady appeared to her and helped her return to St Clement’s. The mantle also causes a stir at the nunnery – and when the cook believes the mantle has cured her skin ailment, Dame Isobel sees trouble ahead in trying to silence the rumour of a miracle. Indeed, she wonders whether she actually should silence it – such a relic could attract more pilgrims to fill the nunnery’s coffers. Consider what P. J. Geary has to say about determining the authenticity of relics: ‘The most effective means available was in reality a very pragmatic one: if the relics performed as relics – that is to say, if they worked miracles, inspired the faithful, and increased the prestige of the community in which they were placed – they had to be genuine.’5 Joanna’s madness does not lie in her beliefs.

  Why did Joanna choose the convent? As the daughter of a wealthy merchant and a high-born mother, her most acceptable roles would be those of either wife or nun. In late fourteenth-century England, women were making inroads into middle-class occupations in the cities, but, then as now, not everyone can succeed in business. Joanna is not an entrepreneur like Bess Merchet, nor has she been trained in a profession like Lucie Wilton. She considers the nunnery a safe haven until she comes up with a better plan. The life of a nun was seen as a respectable career; not all who took the veil had religious vocations, and convent life could be quite comfortable. The number of documents reiterating the rule of enclosure (that a nun’s place was in the cloister, not outside in the world) and admonishing sisters for wearing finery and
keeping pets suggest less rigid establishments than we might imagine. And although St Clement’s was considered a small, poor nunnery, the description is relative; it could boast neither the size nor the wealth of Shaftesbury or Barking, but it was the third wealthiest of the Yorkshire nunneries and held considerably property. Joanna might have lived out her life in quiet contentment at St Clement’s – and perhaps the real Joanna of Leeds did.

  1 Desmond Seward, The Hundred Years War: the English in France, 1337–1453 (New York: Atheneum, 1978), pp. 105–106.

  2 Chaucer: His Life, His Works, His World (New York: Dutton, 1987), p. 115.

  3 R. B. Dobson and Sara Donaghey, York Archaeological Trust for Excavation and Research, 1984, p. 15.

  4 Mary Magdalen: Myth and Metaphor (New York: Harcourt Brace and Company, 1994).

  5 Furta Sacra: Thefts of Relics in the Central Middle Ages (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1980) p. 54.