“Did Bardolph have any close friends or even a woman with whom he spent his time? I wish to seek information that only such people would know and might help my prioress chase away this vile imp.”
“Although none of us hated Bardolph, we believed that he and Death stood too close together. We did not want to be any nearer mortality than a man must and thus avoided him.” His smile twitched and faded. “As for a woman, there was one with whom he shared the bed.” He pointed to a nearby house. “Mistress Maud lives there. We have no official whorehouse here, but she keeps a few girls in case they are needed by unmarried lads.” He laughed. “A few of the women even leave when some of the virginal boys fall in love.” He suddenly coughed. “Forgive me if I have offended by my sinful mirth…”
“You have not offended. This a small place, and I assume most of the women come from families all know. Might a few of those marriages even be blessed by both God and family?” Thomas hardly needed to ask. Just as the longtime bedfellow of the local village priest was often accepted as if she were his wife, the occasional local whore could be welcomed as a bride if the family ties were strong enough.
“Some,” the man responded sheepishly.
Thomas briefly wondered if he had been one of those virginal lads, and then continued. “The founder of our Order, Robert of Arbrissel, often went to whorehouses to preach to the women there,” he said. “I feel no fear or shame in following his example when there is a holy purpose at stake.”
With that, he thanked the merchant, gave him a blessing, and went to the brothel. In truth, Mistress Maud’s establishment offered him far less temptation than a walk down a dark passageway with a merchant who sold spices.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
It had been a long and sleepless night for others in the lodge. Eleanor and Sister Anne had taken turns sitting by the patient’s side. Although the prioress trusted Sister Anne’s judgment, she knew how perilous childbirth was for all women. Her own mother had died in bloody agony. If God wished a soul, He would take it.
As she bathed her sister-in-law’s face and kept her shivering body well-wrapped that night, she prayed that this would not be the time for death. Her brother had found joy in his wife, and their babes were healthy. Eleanor prayed the children could grow up in the loving arms of the mother who bore them. Although her aunt, Sister Beatrice, had raised her with warmth and care, she mourned her mother’s death even now and wished she had kept her just a little longer.
In the morning, however, the fever seemed to have broken. Elizabeth woke up, recognized those around her, and managed a smile.
Robert fell to his knees and wept with happiness.
Sister Anne was cautiously pleased and told her friend it was safe to leave Elizabeth’s side. A servant could take her place. Eleanor finally agreed when her sister-in-law jested that her appetite had returned with such force that she might match her babe’s eagerness for food.
Robert, however, decided that the local wet-nurse must be retained. If his wife’s health required it, the woman would stay as long as the babe suckled. Sister Anne argued well that Elizabeth, who wanted to nurse, should not do so. Not only was there the danger of contagion but nursing might further weaken the mother.
Elizabeth, although her desire to nurse was stronger than her body, knew they were right and conceded.
* * *
Eleanor stepped outside and looked for the position of the sun amongst the drifting clouds. It was about the same time Eluned had gone to the abbey church each of the two days she had seen her. With luck, the woman would follow the same pattern today.
Since Brother Thomas was not here, presumably off to seek Bardolph’s friends or a mistress, the prioress knew she could not stay idle. Weary as she was from the night of fear and vigilance, every part of her twitched. Sleep would be impossible.
Briefly returning to the solar, she told Sister Anne that she would be at the abbey church for a while and then return. It was understood that she must be summoned immediately if Elizabeth worsened.
* * *
Looking over her shoulder, she smiled pleasantly at the servant she had asked to accompany her. The woman’s expression was humble and did not betray any reluctance to postpone her usual tasks in order to provide proper attendance to this baron’s sister who had taken vows.
Eleanor hoped she was just as prudent. She did not want the servant to know how unhappy she was to have a stranger with her when she might be forced to conduct an unpleasant interrogation. But with neither her monk nor sub-infirmarian able to go with her, she had no choice.
The pair set off toward the village, the servant trailing a little behind. Across the bridge, Eleanor turned onto the path leading to the abbey church.
* * *
Walking inside, the prioress saw that there was only one other person there, a young man whose dress suggested he was a merchant of some wealth. Was this Lambard? She had not met the man, but she decided it was noteworthy if his visit once again coincided with Eluned’s.
She whispered to the servant that she must pray alone and suggested the woman remain outside to enjoy the warmer sun. Then Eleanor chose a spot sufficiently distant from the man for propriety’s sake and in a shadowy area where she could watch the entry.
Eleanor knelt. First, she apologized to God for not giving Him her full attention. Since He found so many murders for her to solve, she felt some confidence that He understood why her prayers were not always as dutiful as those uttered by other women of her vocation. With due reverence, she then bowed her head and begged Him to forgive her myriad other faults and pleaded with Him to grant mercy to Elizabeth, her children, and her husband.
Eluned walked into the church.
Eleanor heard the footsteps, glanced to the side, and saw the maid framed by the doorway. Keeping her head down, she willed herself not to move. Fortunately, she had been inside long enough for her eyes to grow accustomed to the gloom. Lady Mary’s maid would still be blinded by the outside sun and would be unable to see the prioress in the deep shadows.
Eluned walked slowly along the wall to the left of the altar, stopped, looked slowly around, and then vanished into the dark passage behind the sanctuary.
Rising, Eleanor cautiously followed, but, when she turned into the area, the maid was nowhere in sight.
Perplexed, the prioress turned back, yet knelt close to where Eluned had entered and waited for the woman to emerge. With the other penitent so close, she did not want to bring attention to herself or her purpose by searching the area.
Time crawled.
The penitent merchant remained on his knees.
Eleanor grew impatient. Unfortunately, her attending servant had clearly wandered an area very familiar to her as much as she could bear and was now waiting just outside the entrance to the church.
Finally, Eluned emerged.
Eleanor rose and walked toward her. “I see you have need to petition God as well as I,” she whispered.
Putting a hand to her mouth, the maid bit back a cry.
With interest, the prioress noted that the maid held nothing in her hands. Then she realized she had not seen whether she did when she had first arrived.
“Please, my lady! Say nothing to my mistress or master about this!” Her voice, also lowered, shook.
Eleanor directed the woman deeper into the side passage for greater privacy, and then tilted her head as if confused by the plea. “Why should you fear disclosure? Surely you cannot have come here for any evil purpose.”
“I pray daily for the souls of Hywel and his dead wife.”
“That is no sin.”
“It is if Sir William decided my orisons suggested I was disloyal to the king.” She continued to whisper, but her speech had lost its tremor.
Unfortunately, the prioress thought, the woman has recovered herself. “Prayers for the Welshman’s dead wife need
no excuse. Perhaps prayers for him need not either. He was hanged, but you knew him before his crime was committed. Thus you must have reason to offer his soul kindness after he was condemned for his vile treachery. If he is in Purgatory, he will be comforted. If he is in Hell, I fear the Devil will simply laugh at your compassion.”
“He was known to be a virtuous man until then, my lady. Even if his soul is in Hell, I cannot imagine his spirit would beg leave of the Devil to come back and torment the village. He had no quarrels with anyone here, not even Bardolph or Father Payn. I know the one hanged him and the other refused to accept his plea for forgiveness, but…” She hesitated as if she could not find the words to explain further.
“Since you are also of Welsh ancestry, might you feel some obligation to another Welshman’s soul? Is that what you fear most? That your loyalty will be doubted because you pray for a man condemned for killing Englishmen?”
Eluned nodded with marked trepidation.
“Yet all you need say, should you be asked by either lord or lady, is that you come to pray for your dead friend. You need not add that you do so as well for her husband.”
Eleanor did not fully accept the reason given for the maid’s fear of discovery. Eluned was clever enough to dissemble to her mistress over such a simple matter. As her deep fatigue seeped into her, Eleanor’s patience with lies thinned, and she longed to resolve this matter swiftly. The sooner it was done, the sooner she could concentrate on the needs of her sister-in-law so they all might travel further from the dangers of war.
Forcing her irritation aside, she said, “I think there is another reason why you do not want them to know you are here.”
Behind her, Eleanor heard a rustling and saw the penitent merchant rise. He gave the two women a long look and then left the church.
Eleanor wondered if he had meant to convey a message to the maid.
She looked back at Eluned and caught her newly determined expression.
“Do not hesitate to speak honestly, for I am weary of deceit.” This time, Eleanor did not blunt her sharp tone.
Eluned took a deep breath. “Sir William and Lady Mary do not know that I had asked someone to allow the two brothers to use his property to prepare Hywel’s body for burial. The night before the execution, I told the men to take his corpse there.”
“Nor is that a crime, at least in God’s eyes.”
“The village would not agree, my lady, and so I kept silent. I did it for his dead wife, but few would understand. They would have preferred that his body be torn in pieces and fed to the wolves.”
“That still does not explain why you come here daily.” Eleanor dismissed the idea that the maid was leaving a bribe of money for whoever had let his land be used to cleanse a corpse. No maid had such wealth, and any stolen coin would be discovered by Lady Mary or Sir William.
Eluned bowed her head. “I visit his wife’s grave. I vowed to do so because I know how her soul must grieve over her husband.”
A blatant lie, the prioress thought and she retorted with rare mockery. “That is no sin, as you well know. Or did you find a way to bury him, unshriven though he was, with his wife in sanctified ground and now wish to do what you can to hide the evidence?”
The maid swiftly turned her head away. “I would not beg anyone to commit such a sin after Father Payn refused to accept Hywel’s confession.”
Spoken as if she hoped I would conclude she had done just that, Eleanor thought ruefully, nor would the brothers have needed begging to do it. Yet Eleanor had lost her advantage. She was flailing, and her suggestion about the grave was absurd.
“Please, my lady, let me return to my mistress before she decides I have been gone too long. If I bring attention to my absences, she will forbid me in the future to leave without knowing exactly what I am doing. I cannot betray my vow to my friend to pray for her…and Hywel.”
“Go then,” Eleanor said and watched the maid hurry away.
Her anger with herself for such incompetence was unquenchable. Yet she had no right to detain the maid and had no evidence of any crime, other than her certain suspicion that something indefinable was amiss.
* * *
After waiting until Eluned was well on her way to the sheriff’s house, Eleanor went to the graveyard, grimly hoping her odd suggestion about a secret burial might hold merit after all, and sought any indication that a new grave had been dug—other than the expected one holding Bardolph. One other was clearly that of a child. Father Payn would have been buried in the abbey. Nowhere else could she see any signs of newly disturbed earth.
“A poor theory proven as foolish as it sounded,” Eleanor muttered to herself as she hurried back into the church.
The confused servant bowed her head when the Prioress of Tyndal stormed past her.
This time Eleanor went into the area behind the sanctuary to seek answers. She found a side door made of wood that was rotting. It was locked, but the thing squealed like an outraged rat when she pushed on it. Even if the maid had had a key, she could not have gone through the door without Eleanor hearing the noise.
Close by was another, thick and sturdier wooden door, also locked. Eleanor suspected it led to a burial crypt but found no way the door could be opened without a key.
Annoyed and frustrated, the prioress marched out of the church and told the baffled but still respectful servant that they were returning to the lodge. As soon as possible, she would come back with Brother Thomas to examine this area more thoroughly.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Maud the Bawd was as round as an apple and as pink as a gillyflower, a woman more like a baker’s wife than the mistress of a whorehouse. Her expression resembled a brokenhearted widow, not a businesswoman grieving the loss of a steady customer who always paid his bills.
“Bardolph was a sweet and loving man,” she sniffed and raised a plump hand to pat the corner of her eyes. A waft of lavender filled the room. “I shall never find his like again.”
As a man who understood how often common assumptions about people are in error, Thomas bowed his head in respect for the evident depth of her grief.
She looked away, squeezed her eyes shut, and clenched her fists. When she faced the monk again, it was with fury and determination. “I want justice,” she hissed, but even in anger her dimples charmed.
“So does Prioress Eleanor,” the monk murmured.
Mistress Maud gestured to a nearby chair. “Forgive my discourtesy, Brother. Please sit and let me pour you some wine. The air is cruel with damp, and your walk from the lodge must have chilled you.”
Smiling acceptance, he sat, and Maud gracefully handed him a cup of dark wine. When he tasted it, he was surprised at the quality. Instinctively, he pressed his hand against his heart as melancholy twisted a sharp dagger deep. Gritting his teeth, he drove the image of Durant, the wine merchant, back into the shadows.
“I know you came with questions,” she said, “and I am sure someone in the village told you that Bardolph shared a bed with me for many years. Had he not been the hangman, and I a whore, we would have married.” She smiled, her eyes looking into the distance as if seeing a happier day.
Thomas noted with surprise that she owned all her front teeth and they were as white as those of a far younger woman.
“He was concerned that I would suffer greater rejection than he in marriage. Men accept a bawd more than they do the town executioner. Despite all the promises our priests give us, Brother, death is rarely contemplated with joy. Sin often is, or at least until we know we must imminently face God. Otherwise, we would never delight so much in it. As for any mockery that I would daily put horns on his head, my beloved Bardolph knew I had been faithful to him since the day I owned my first house.” She lowered her eyes, and then whispered, “As I shall remain until our souls are reunited in Heaven or Hell.”
With gentle sincerity, the monk repl
ied, “Then he was a man of rare understanding.”
Her blue eyes sparkled. “And you are a rare monk to say so, Brother.”
“We are all sinners, despite the likeness to God we may own,” he said with a smile. “I fear men make too much of the resemblance and too little of our differences.”
Her tears drying and a merry look teasing her lips, she refilled his cup. “What do you wish to know?”
He noticed that she did not drink herself. “Did Bardolph have enemies?”
“No more than any other mortal. Although he was not loved, neither was he hated.”
“Then you have no suspicions about who might have done this deed.”
She took a moment to reply, taking a deep breath and turning her face away to compose herself. “Definitely not some ghost. Hywel may have been hanged as a Welsh raider, but I knew him, not as a customer but as a stonemason who did repairs for me. He was one of the few who ever spoke to Bardolph when passing in the square. Welshman though Hywel was, he was kind and not the sort to return with the Devil’s blessing to seek revenge. I would not say this to any of my neighbors, Brother, but I never believed Hywel was guilty of the crime for which he was executed. Neither, in truth, did Bardolph.”
An interesting observation by a woman of good wits, Thomas thought. “This crime was not committed by any spirit,” he said. “Of that, I feel certain.”
She pressed a hand against her mouth, silencing any cry and banning further tears. “May this monster, who killed my Bardolph, be hanged himself with less kindness than my dear one granted those he was commanded to execute.”
Thomas waited.
“You do not preach how we must forgive those who trespass against us?”
Although she gazed into his eyes with penetrating intensity, and he trembled at what she might see in his scorched soul, he felt only an intense longing in her look and no malice. He chose to reply with a simple shake of his head as one frail mortal to another.
Reaching out to briefly touch the sleeve of his robe, her reply was surprisingly tender. “Thank you for your kindness, Brother, and I beg your forgiveness. You came for information to lead you to the killer, and I have distracted you. Please continue. I shall respond as best I can.”
The Twice-Hanged Man Page 14