The Mammoth Book of Historical Whodunnits Volume 2 (The Mammoth Book Series)

by Mike Ashley

  “Oh, saints and devils!” Mandeville said, exasperated. “I can’t suppose your maiden-tender conscience still troubles you – Martin.”

  “No. Na’theless, if we do nothing we leave the affair unsettled.”

  “It’s not for us to settle, lad. Even the law can do nothing to settle it. Remember, Lord Winchlade is the law in Marlborough, and I wish to find a place with him, not be a witness before his bailiff. And neither do you!” Mandeville lowered his voice. “Are you still mindful of all you have to hide?”

  “I cannot spend the rest of my life hiding it!”

  “This is scarcely the time or the place to disclose.”

  “No, to be sure not. Then what are we to do?”

  “Bury that accursed axe and be rid of the thing. It’s a nasty reminder.”

  Anne knew he meant to be rid of it. But not to bury it. Mandeville recovered the axe from one of the pack-horses and walked briskly to the nearby riverbank. Anne accompanied him, one hand close to the hilt of her knife. Although she had a sling, too, and could use it with practised skill, it would be of no use among the willows and alders fringing the Kennet’s banks. She kept sharp watch while Mandeville began cutting a long narrow hole in the riverside earth with the axe itself. She had no wish to be surprised by the sort of men they were dealing with.

  She was, however. A weed-covered head rose out of the water by a mass of twisted willow roots, and a large hand gripped her ankle. Anne’s heart nearly sprang out of her mouth.

  “That’s no way to treat a good axe,” the man growled. “Cease.”

  Anne cursed heatedly and pulled out her knife. “Hands off, you! I’ve had a bellyful of your tricks.”

  The man heaved her into the stream and ducked her. With water in her nose, Anne sought to slash him, not sure how harmful the man’s intentions might be, and less than eager to learn. He caught her wrist and twisted her arm behind her back. Finding his footing again, he hauled her above the surface.

  Mandeville met them at the bank, the axe lifted in his short but hard-muscled arms.

  “Let Martin go, or I split your skull, you lurden,” he barked. “I’ve no great quarrel with you. Yet. Do not make one.”

  The man hauled himself out of the river, streaming and dripping. Even naked, he looked formidable, with his great raw-boned limbs and scowling brows. He fumbled among the willow roots and produced a heavy quarter-staff. It would crack a head as well as the axe.

  “You know then. How? And who else knows? I went to much trouble wi’ this plan.”

  “Where are your friends?” Mandeville countered. “The pair who pretended to murder you?”

  Ainslie snorted. “Yokels I met at Newbury. Paid ’em my last coin. Likely they have blabbed the tale all over the town by now, but I’m not returning there and nor is the chaplain, so I care not. But you? You’re a different matter.” He glowered, looking ugly and dangerous. “I thought you knew. I ask again. How?”

  “Sit yourself down, and I’ll tell you.”

  Ainslie, still glaring, did so. To avoid being recognized, no doubt, he had shaved himself clean and chopped his hair to the nape, which somewhat lessened his wild appearance, though not wholly. Anne could believe he had gone to much trouble to produce his plan. He didn’t seem very clever. She wondered if he was even right in the head. Still, he had fooled her. She granted that.

  “The first thing was the blood,” Mandeville said, like a scholar enunciating points in an argument. “When I looked closely, I saw it was dark and stale. Hours old, my friend. Ergo, it was not yours, even though I had seen it spurt out of your body! You had it in a bladder under your jerkin, eh?”

  Ainslie gave a sullen nod. “Mixed it with wine so that it wouldn’t clot too soon. It came from an old woman’s pig.”

  “I remembered. She had come traipsing down the road that same morn to complain of’t. She was much displeased – and yea, I smelled the wine. Then, within the wood, I saw three footprints in a patch of loam, two of them marking a full stride. The long stride of a tall man. Taller, it seemed to me, than either of your assailants – tall enough for you. Few men stride when they are dead.”

  “Huh.” Ainslie ruminated, worried. “So you knew from that first day?”

  “I was certain when two other things struck me. If they were brigands and that was a real murder, they were foolish to assail you in the open where we could all witness. And having been seen, why did they go to the labour and risk of dragging your body away?”

  “Because you wanted us to believe you had been murdered,” Anne interjected, “and because you could not have us learning that you were alive.”

  “I haven’t spoken to you, boy,” Ainslie snarled. “You’ve had little to say for yourself until now. Keep it so.”

  “Manners,” Mandeville said sharply. “And tell me this. Why wish to be thought a dead man? To deceive the chaplain, yes, but what good is’t to deceive him?”

  “I know the dog. He doesn’t wish to face the dangers of pilgrimage! He’d leave the road, flee, stay in England even if it means outlawry, and find service with some other robber-lord – if he sees his chance. I wish him to think he has that chance. Then he’ll break the terms of his sentence, and I shall have him.”

  The bitter words hummed with menace.

  “All within the law,” Mandeville said on a note of marvel. “I will not say that he isn’t deserving. We have not warned him, and all I came to do was give back your axe.”

  He tossed it down by the willow tree with a thump. Ainslie, staring, did not seize it at once. He said on an almost placating note, “He slew my sister’s son. But I’ll not touch him unless he forfeits the protection of law and Church. I’m an honest man.”

  Mandeville supposed he was. He still scrambled up the river bank in some haste to put distance between them, gripping Anne’s arm to assist her. She shivered a little.

  “If the chaplain breaks the terms of his sentence –”

  “If, instead, he takes ship from Bristol,” Mandeville reminded her, “he will live.”

  The Pilgrim’s Tale

  Cherith Baldry

  Cherith Baldry (b. 1947) is a former teacher and librarian who has written a number of children’s books as well as several Arthurian fantasies, of which the most recent is Exiled from Camelot (2001). In “The Friar’s Tale” in Royal Whodunnits, Cherith introduced Geoffrey Chaucer (1340–1400) as spy and crime-solver. Chaucer returns here in a new mystery.

  A north wind was whipping off the sea with a sharp sting of sleet. It might have come, thought Sir John Burley, straight from Ultima Thule, across the marshes and sand dunes, until it battered the harbour walls at Calais and any poor fools doomed to be standing there. He turned his back on it, and on his two men-at-arms, who were grumbling quietly together, pulled his cloak of good English wool more tightly around him, and peered out over the tossing waves.

  A ship – the Maudeleyne by the cut of its sails and its unhandy wallowing – was working its way through the harbour mouth. Sir John waited, stamping his feet and blowing on freezing fingers, until it dropped anchor and a small boat put out from the side.

  He had been requested to give all assistance to the King’s emissary – or, given the King’s dotage, to the Duke of Lancaster’s emissary. The two were not the same.

  Besides, by all reports, the man they were sending had little knowledge of war, or the weighty matters that divided France and England. A wool clerk, a jumped-up scrivener, and – God save the mark! – a poet. Sir John had been a King’s man since Edward took Calais for the English, and he was too old to change now. He would do his duty as best he could; no one said he had to like it.

  He watched the progress of the small boat bucketing over the waves, and strode to the edge of the quay as it tied up and its passenger stepped out. He held out a hand. “Sir John Burley, Captain of Calais. You’re Master Chaucer?”

  The newcomer nodded. He was a small man, with sandy hair and beard, dressed in a russet cloak and hood over
a tight-fitting cote-hardie and woollen hose. Not the court popinjay Sir John had feared; nevertheless, the Captain eyed him warily, half expecting him to break into verse.

  “I’ll take you up to the castle,” he said brusquely, gesturing to his men-at-arms to fall in behind him.

  Master Chaucer inclined his head. “My thanks, Sir John,” he said, and added, “It’s wild weather for a crossing.”

  Sir John grunted agreement. He had seen hardened soldiers green and vomiting when the sea ran high; to do this fellow justice he was bright of eye and brisk of step as he hurried along the quay at Burley’s side.

  “And . . . the man I am to meet?” Chaucer inquired delicately.

  “I sent a courier to the French king. His envoy should be with us shortly.” Pausing in his swift progress along the quayside, he added, “This city is my responsibility. Am I allowed to know what your business is?”

  He was prepared for a rebuff, but Chaucer met his eyes steadily. “The Black Prince is dead, God rest him,” he said. “His father cannot live much longer, and his heir is no more than a child. There must be . . . accommodations with the French.”

  “You seek for peace, then?” Sir John said.

  Chaucer nodded. “And that may not be popular. Too many men cry ‘War!’ when they know nothing of what war means.”

  “True.” Perhaps, Sir John thought, there was more to this poet than met the eye. “You’ll not find a soldier to disagree with that.”

  He was turning off the quayside, leading the way to the castle, when he heard a commotion coming from a little way up the street. Something crashed over, there was the sound of trampling feet, and voices raised in anger.

  Burley paused, and jerked his head towards his men-at-arms. “Go and see what that is.”

  The two men quickened their pace, and disappeared through the archway that led into the yard of the Three Feathers. Seconds later, the noise died.

  When Sir John approached the archway, with Chaucer hard at his heels, he saw his two men holding a prisoner, who stood quietly between them, breathing hard. He was a squat, toadlike fellow with a flat nose and dark hair grizzled like a badger’s. He wore a leather jerkin with a crossbow slung over one shoulder and a short sword in a scabbard at his belt.

  “Your pardon, Master Chaucer,” Sir John said as he strode into the yard. “I’m responsible for good order here. I’ll not keep you waiting more than need. Well?” he barked at his men. “What’s all this?”

  “Murder, Captain,” one of the soldiers said. “And this here’s the murderer.”

  The prisoner said nothing, but his eyes flashed anger.

  “And who’s dead?” Burley asked.

  At the other side of the yard, huddled beside the main door of the inn, was a small group of men and women. One of them broke away from the others and hurried across the yard in time to hear Sir John’s question: Thomas Marley, host of the Three Feathers.

  “One of my guests, sir,” he said. His broad face was red with agitation. “A decent young fellow, on his way home from pilgrimage. Strangled, with a crossbow string.”

  “And this fellow did it?” Sir John looked the prisoner up and down. In the cross-bow case, he knew, would be several spare strings. A crossbowman risked garrotting himself if his bowstring snapped under strain.

  “Who are you, fellow?” Sir John demanded. “What’s your business?”

  “My name is Bertrand,” the prisoner replied, speaking English in a gravelled voice with an execrable French accent. “And my business is not to be spoken of here.”

  “He’s one of these damned rutters.” Sir John flung the words over his shoulder at Master Chaucer, who was staring at the prisoner in shock. “Soldiers they call themselves; bandits is closer to the mark. Any of them would kill his own grandmother for a groat.” He nodded to his men-at-arms. “Take him away.” He added, muttering to himself, “He’ll hang for this.”

  As the men started to drag their prisoner away, Chaucer laid a hand on Sir John’s arm and said, “No, wait.”

  There was such quiet authority in his voice that Sir John’s men hesitated, glancing uneasily at their Captain as if they were not sure whom they should obey.

  Sir John was taking breath for a blistering curse when Chaucer added, “We have no evidence that he is guilty.”

  “Evidence? He’s a damned Frenchman, what more evidence do you want?”

  “To be accurate, mon ami,” said Bertrand, “I am a Breton.”

  There was a gleam in his dark eyes; if Burley had not known it was impossible, he would have said the fellow was amused.

  “Frenchman, Breton, what’s that to me?” Sir John turned on Chaucer. “It’s clear what happened. He strangled this fellow for his purse. Why isn’t that enough for you?”

  Chaucer’s shock at the sight of the Breton mercenary was ebbing away, leaving behind an air of calm good sense. “Is he carrying a stolen purse?” he asked.

  At Sir John’s order, the men at arms began to search, pulling roughly at the prisoner’s jerkin. Bertrand stood still, with an exaggerated air of patience.

  “You observe, Sir John,” Chaucer murmured, “that he carries crossbow, sword and belt knife. Why would he choose such a comparatively complicated way to kill someone as strangling him with a bowstring?”

  “How do I know why a damned Frenchman does anything?” Sir John growled.

  The men finished the search. One of them held out a shabby leather purse, too flat to contain much coin.

  “That is my own,” Bertrand said.

  “It’s true, sir,” said Master Marley. “He paid for wine from it, before ever Master Buckton was found dead.”

  “Then whether he killed or no,” Chaucer said, “he did not steal.”

  Sir John let out a curse. Irritably he reflected that if he had not been saddled with this poet, he could have finished this matter without trouble, and no one would have been a penny the worse. Except for Bertrand the Breton mercenary, he reminded himself.

  “Master Marley,” he said. “Show my men a store room with a good stout lock. We’ll keep this fellow safe while I try the matter further.” To the soldiers, he added, “Keep him well guarded, or I’ll slit your noses with my own dagger.”

  He pulled Bertrand’s sword and belt knife from their sheaths, and his crossbow from the case on his shoulder. Bertrand did not try to resist, only saying, “Take good care of my weapons, English Captain. I shall require them of you later.”

  His eyes met Sir John’s with that same impudent, amused look.

  “You may yet require a gallows, Breton,” Sir John snarled, and strode off across the yard.

  The group of people beside the inn door stood back to let Sir John and Chaucer enter, and then crowded in behind them.

  The door led into the common room of the inn. Opposite, near the fire, a woman was sitting, her body shaken with sobs. On one side a young man was trying to persuade her to drink from a cup he held, while on the other side an elderly nun clasped her hand and murmured words of comfort.

  The woman was young and pretty, with dishevelled chestnut hair. The lacing of her kirtle was open, and the reek of burnt feathers suggested that someone had recovered her from a faint.

  More people were seated in little huddles all round the common room. The usual group of pilgrims, Sir John observed: a couple of priests, a friar in a grey habit, several men in the solid finery of merchants, and one young sprig of the nobility, lounging in the window seat and fitting a new string to his lute.

  They all broke off low-voiced conversations as Sir John entered and turned their faces towards him.

  “I am Sir John Burley, Captain of Calais,” Sir John announced, planting himself in the middle of the room. “Who can tell me what happened?”

  A chorus of voices answered; Burley cut them off with a movement of the hand, and pointed at the nearest man. “You.”

  The man he spoke to was tall, dark-haired and dressed in good but unfashionable clothing. He had an air of comp
etence about him that Sir John liked.

  “We’re all pilgrims, sir,” he began. “We met on the road to the shrine of St James, and we travelled home together.” He half smiled. “It’s good to hear your own tongue in a foreign land. We’ve been here two days,” he went on, “waiting for a ship to take us home to England.”

  “And then, Master . . . ?”

  “Henshawe, sir, Nicholas Henshawe. I’m steward of a manor near Ashurst in Kent. We were waiting for Master Marley to call us to dinner. Mistress Buckton –” he indicated the weeping woman by the fire – “went to bring her husband down from the bedroom. We heard her screaming, sir, and when we went up there we found Master Buckton dead.”

  “And when did you last see him alive?” Chaucer asked.

  Master Henshawe looked slightly startled at the change of questioner, but he answered readily enough. “At morning Mass, sir. Afterwards, when we broke our fast, he complained of heaviness, and went upstairs to rest.”

  Chaucer nodded, and said to Sir John, “Perhaps we had better see Master Buckton for ourselves.”

  “I’ll take you.” Master Marley led the way through another door on the far side of the common room, and up a flight of stairs. On the landing the first door stood open, and Marley gestured for them to go in.

  Inside the room were several beds. On the nearest, a man was lying; bending over him was a hugely fat woman, who turned as they came in and gave them a wide, gaptoothed smile. “I’m laying him out, sir, and doing all that’s proper.” She dipped in a ponderous curtsey in front of Sir John, and added, “Margery Bolton, sir. I’m a midwife by trade. I bring ’em into the world, and I see ’em out.”

  She would have continued with her work, but Sir John said to her, “Thank you, mistress. We won’t trouble you further.”