[Roger the Chapman 06] - The Wicked Winter (11 page)

'I have heard of the friar,' Ursula said, raising her head and peering at Simeon. 'His sermons have been the talk of the district for a week or more. But who is this young man with him? Surely, you're the chapman who was at Lynom this morning?'

'I am, Mistress.' I smiled my most ingratiating smile. 'I had the honour to wait upon you and Dame Judith, and you were both kind enough to give me your custom.'
 

'The buttons.' She turned back to Sir Hugh. 'The buttons which Hamon was sent to deliver but which you have not yet received, I purchased from this man.' It seemed to me that she was still extremely ill at ease, talking at random, afraid to be silent. 'I took the liberty of buying them for you, Hugh, not knowing that the pedlar intended to come on to Cederwell. I didn't think you'd mind. Nor Jeanette. We're such old friends, and the buttons are silver, inlaid with mother-of-pearl. Just the sort of thing you like.'
 

'Thank you, my dear. You're very kind.' But his words were accompanied by an almost imperceptible shake of the head, a warning to her to be silent. 'Now, Brother, a moment of your time, if you please. Tell us again the circumstances of how you found... Lady Cederwell's body.'
 

'It was Roger Chapman's persistence which was really responsible for the discovery,' the friar insisted, urging me forward.

So I told the assembled company what I could, but in spite of Sir Hugh's close interrogation, there was nothing new to be added. At some point, one of the maids arrived with a tray bearing a glass of wine and a bowl of broth which Mistress Lynom gratefully accepted, but there were no other interruptions. Everyone listened carefully to what I had to say, and to the muttered corroboration throughout from Simeon.

When the final question had been asked and I had given my answer, there was a pause. Sir Hugh stood staring abstractedly into the fire lost in thought, while the rest of us maintained a respectful silence. At last, however, he roused himself, shook his head as though to clear it of unhappy thoughts and turned to Adela, speaking of more practical matters.

'Will you please supply Mistress Lynom with a nightshift and whatever else she might need. Ursula!' He addressed his guest once more. °When you have been provided for, will you honour me with your company, here in the hall? It's a sad business, and I feel in want of congenial company.' Maurice Cederwell snorted with laughter and gave an ironic bow.

'Thank you, Father. You make it only too plain what you think of your usual nightly companions.'

Sir Hugh shrugged, not bothering to contest the accusation. It was Mistress Lynom's turn to send a swift, upward glance of warning, but he either did not notice or chose to ignore it. In fact he compounded his offence by adding, 'I am sure the rest of you will wish to retire early to be alone with your grief. Phillipa and the maids will lay out the body sometime before morning, when they can do so without.., inflicting any damage. Tomorrow, we must hope that Father Godyer will be able to rise from his sickbed and say the offices for the dead. Has anyone thought to inform him of what has happened?'

It seemed that no one had. The steward was summoned once again and given instructions not only to enlighten the chaplain, but also to see Friar Simeon and myself safely bestowed in some warm corner for the night. Tostig bowed and signalled for us to follow him, but before we could do so, Gerard Empryngham again stepped forward. He spoke loudly and clearly in a voice taut with anger.

'I wish to say that I am not deceived. I know what I know, and although I can prove nothing at this moment, I refuse to keep silent for much longer. We may have had different mothers, but Jeanette was still my sister. The ties of blood are strong.' And he rushed out of the hall.

Adela prepared to go after him, but first she laid a placatory hand on Sir Hugh's sleeve.

'You mustn't take too much notice of Gerard. He's very upset. He was fond of Jeanette from her babyhood onward. He never resented the fact that she was younger and legitimately born.'

Sir Hugh shook off her hand.

'My dear Adela, I am uninterested in your husband's posturings. He will enjoy playing the grief-stricken brother for a week or two, but I should warn you that I am unwilling to go on supporting the pair of you, now that Jeanette is dead. I've had enough of being bled white just because she believed it her Christian duty to provide for her bastard half-brother and his wife.'

Instead of taking offence at these words, as I had expected, Adela smiled and raised her chin.

'You will be doing us both a favour, Hugh. As you are very well aware, I have long maintained that Gerard should get away from here and stand on his own two feet. We should never have left Gloucestershire and come south with Jeanette when you and she were married. He understands sheep, as does everyone who grows up in that part of the country. He would have done better to have sunk his pride and found employment as a shepherd, however poor the wage, rather than live on charity in a house where it was begrudged him. You need not fear that we shall remain to plague you for very long after the funeral. Only until the weather improves, if that is not asking too much.'

She swung on her heel and marched out of the room, head held high, leaving Sir Hugh looking somewhat shamefaced.

Simeon and I followed in her wake with Tostig, just as Phillipa Talke arrived to conduct Mistress Lynom to the guest bedchamber.

As I had surmised, there was indeed a triangular courtyard between the great hall and the main part of the building, the well being sunk in the middle of it. It was bitterly cold and snowing steadily as we crossed to a door on the opposite side, causing us both to huddle deeper into our cloaks. We re-entered the house by a passage which led into the main one and separated buttery from pantry, the pantry lying next door to the kitchen.

'You'll be warm enough in here,' Tostig said, opening the kitchen door and ushering us through. 'Or there's a storeroom beyond, with plenty of empty sacks to use as bedding and full ones to protect you from the draughts.' He was plainly anxious to be gone about more important business. Nevertheless, his conscience suddenly smote him at using a holy man in so offhand a manner. 'I must apologise, Brother, but the men-servants' dormitory is no fit place for one of your calling, especially not tonight with the addition of Mistress Lynom's two grooms. You understand.'
 

'I understand that profanity and lewdness make up the general run of conversation when men are alone together,' Simeon replied austerely, 'and I deplore it. More, I condemn it outright!' He glanced around the now empty kitchen, where the smells of the afternoon's cooking still clung, and at the pile of dirty dishes cluttering the table. 'I shall be happy to sleep here with my friend, the chapman. We have both known worse billets, I'm certain.'

'Far, far worse,' I agreed feelingly, noting that the fire still smouldered on the hearth and that there was a pair of stout bellows handy.

The steward's glance indicated that my opinion was of no concern to him, but reassured about the friar, he hurried away.

I seized the bellows, reignited the glowing embers and threw on some logs from a basket which stood nearby. A comfortable blaze soon gave both light and warmth to the room.

'We shall be cosy enough, as Master Steward says,' I remarked, removing my cloak and sitting down.

It was too early to sleep, but I was bone-weary after the day's events and stretched out among the rushes to ease my aching limbs. My mind, however, was in turmoil as, obviously, was Friar Simeon's. Exhausted as he must have been, he could not settle, but prowled around the kitchen, idly picking up one thing after another and then putting them down again, without even realising what he was doing. I indicated one of the stools we had occupied earlier.

'Come and tell me what's preying on your mind, Brother. It would be better to talk about it, whatever it is.'

He agreed reluctantly but did not immediately sit down, scuffing the rushes with a sandalled foot. His toes, I noticed, were covered with painful-looking chilblains.

'Well?' I encouraged him after a moment or two had passed in silence.

'Why did Lady Cederwell send for me?' he asked at length. 'Why was her message so urgent?' And without expecting an answer he went on, 'There is something wrong in this house!' His narrow chest began to swell and his eyes to flash. 'There is the scent of adultery, can you not smell it? Did you not notice the way Sir Hugh and that Mistress Lynom looked at one another? The way she clung to his hand when she first came in?' Knowing too much, I judged it wisest to say nothing and waited for the friar to continue. 'Adultery,' he repeated. 'And it was against this evil that Lady Cederwell needed my help.' He smote his forehead with a clenched fist. 'I failed her!'

'You know nothing for certain,' I pointed out. 'It might just have been that she had a desire to hear one of your sermons. They have been spoken of everywhere I have been in the past two weeks. Your fame has gone before you.' He slowly shook his head, sinking on to the stool and scratching at his chilblains as the heat began to irritate them.

'No, I don't believe that and neither do you, any more than you believe that Mistress Lynom's groom met your hermit, Ulnoth, on his way here.' He took a deep breath and admitted, not without difficulty, 'I made a mistake in revealing what you'd told me. I should have held my tongue.'

'It... was unfortunate,' I agreed, but diffidently. Simeon was not a man who could lightly be taken to task. 'Yet if you don't believe Hamon's story, what is the truth?'
 

Simeon's expression grew grimmer. 'I think that when he arrived, he saw Lady Cederwell's body lying on the ground. I think it probable that he also saw something or perhaps someone else which sent him chasing back to his mistress instead of rousing the household here and telling them what had happened.'

I moved an inch or two further away from the fire.

'But if,' I objected, 'Hamon was searching for Sir Hugh, as I have good cause to believe that he was, in order to present him with the buttons, he should have approached the house, not wandered down towards the estuary. And furthermore, the body was hidden from view unless you went around to the far side of the tower.'

Simeon's jaw hardened. 'All the same,' he protested obstinately, 'and for whatever reason, he walked to the tower instead of coming straight to the house.'

I stared up into the blackened rafters overhead. 'I'm inclined to agree with you, Brother, although we've not a shred of evidence, and it would therefore be most imprudent for us to make any accusations. Between ourselves, however, I should guess that the groom might have seen someone as he neared the house, and followed him.'
 

Simeon nodded. 'You say "him" and I think you speak truly. It could only have been Sir Hugh, or why otherwise would he have pursued him, rather than keep his course?' This interesting conversation was abruptly brought to a close by the arrival of Martha Grindcobb and Jenny Tonge.

The former was none too pleased to see us already ensconced for the night.

'Some of us still have work to do,' she remarked, crossing to the table and the pile of dirty dishes. 'Jenny, see if there's enough water in the barrel for washing this lot. If not, go to the courtyard and draw some from the well.'

I sprang to my feet. 'Let me go! The child can't go out in this weather.'

Martha Grindcobb shrugged. 'Please yourself. She has to when you're not by. As it happens there's sufficient in the barrel for our present needs, but if you're willing, you could bring up a couple of pailfuls for the morning. Do you know where the well is?'

'In the inner courtyard. We passed it as we crossed from the hall.' And I made for the main kitchen door.

'No need to go that way,' Jenny piped up. She indicated the kitchen storeroom. 'There's a door leads directly into the courtyard from there.'

The storeroom was piled high with sacks of winter supplies; joints of salted meat hung from hooks in the ceiling.

A second door in an adjoining wall opened into the courtyard.

I pulled up the hood of my cloak, turned the key in the well-oiled lock, stepped outside and, within a very few minutes, had raised a pail of water. This, thanks to the well's stout wooden cover which I had first removed, had not frozen over.

As I was about to return with the bucket to the kitchen, a door which I had not previously noticed, but which stood side by side with that of the storeroom, opened and Gerard Empryngham looked out, a lighted candle in his hand.

'Who's that?' he demanded, startled by the sight of my tall, cloaked figure.

I pushed back my hood and stepped forward so that the candlelight played full on my face.

'It's the chapman, Master. I'm fetching water for the cook to refill her barrel. I'll be out again in a moment to draw a second.'

He grunted. 'Very well. But don't forget to replace the well cover when you've finished.'

I reassured him on that point and returned to the kitchen.

Martha and Jenny were waiting for a cauldron of water to heat on the fire, and Simeon was still scratching at his chilblains. I told them of my encounter with Gerard, and Martha Grindcobb nodded.

'It's his bedchamber, his and Mistress Empryngham's,' she sniggered. 'He don't care for it at all, I can tell you, for it's really no more than another storeroom, between the big one and the men-servants' sleeping quarters. He's always considered that he's deserving of something better; one of the bigger, upstairs chambers. But the master has other ideas of what's suitable for a penniless bastard brother and his serving-wench wife.'