A Deadly Penance (21 page)
Willi had then gone into two of the nearby alehouses, covertly peering at the faces of each customer, hoping to find the familiar visage of his father. But none of them had been his da and, when Willi asked the keeper in the second alehouse if he had seen his father recently, the man had shaken his head and gruffly told the boy to leave.
It had been as he was leaving the alehouse that Willi had seen two mounted men coming towards him. One of them he recognised as the grizzled serjeant from the castle and the other was the groom that had driven the small party of foundlings to Riseholme. Sheltering in a doorway, he heard the serjeant ask a passerby if he had seen a boy of Willi’s description, mentioning that he had a head of carrot-coloured hair. The boy had not waited to hear the man’s reply; he scooted as fast as he could down the street away from the alehouse and, seeing the water barrel down a side turning, had hidden behind it. Now he watched anxiously to see if either the serjeant or the groom had spotted him.
They must be looking for him because he had stolen the blanket, he decided, clutching the rolled up swathe of rough wool closer to his chest. He had carried it all the way from Riseholme for use when night fell, but now he cursed the fact that he had taken it. If he had not, they wouldn’t be trying to find him. He shivered as he thought of what might happen if they caught him. Thieves were often punished by having their noses slit or one of their fingers cut off. His lip began to tremble as he thought of the pain he would endure. He didn’t know what to do. If he left the town, he would never find his da but, if he did not, it was certain the castellan’s servants would eventually find him.
Then he saw Ernulf and the groom ride their horses past the end of the turning and continue on down the street. He gave a sigh of relief and, unrolling the blanket, draped a fold of it over the brightness of hair and wrapped the rest around his body, tying the corners at his waist. The food he had brought with him from Riseholme was already gone; the walk into town had made him hungry and he had eaten it on the way but, with good fortune, he would find his da soon and was, for the moment at least, safe from discovery.
I
T WAS ALMOST TIME FOR THE MIDDAY MEAL WHEN BASCOT and Gianni returned to the ward. When they went into the hall, tables were being set up and they threaded their way through the servants engaged in the task, making their way to the corner tower of the keep where Nicolaa’s solar was located. There they found Petronille, Richard and Alinor with the castellan, sharing a flagon of wine as they discussed Willi’s disappearance and the dire consequences that could befall him. At the far end of the chamber, Alinor’s maid, Elise, sat with Margaret, Petronille’s sempstress, engaged in repairing a tear in one of her mistress’ kirtles. For once Elise’s merry smile was absent and Margaret’s countenance was even more sober than usual.
T WAS ALMOST TIME FOR THE MIDDAY MEAL WHEN BASCOT and Gianni returned to the ward. When they went into the hall, tables were being set up and they threaded their way through the servants engaged in the task, making their way to the corner tower of the keep where Nicolaa’s solar was located. There they found Petronille, Richard and Alinor with the castellan, sharing a flagon of wine as they discussed Willi’s disappearance and the dire consequences that could befall him. At the far end of the chamber, Alinor’s maid, Elise, sat with Margaret, Petronille’s sempstress, engaged in repairing a tear in one of her mistress’ kirtles. For once Elise’s merry smile was absent and Margaret’s countenance was even more sober than usual.
Bascot was offered a cup of wine and, while he drank it, was quickly brought up to date on how Willi had run away from the foundling home and that one of the other children said the boy had seen the person who murdered Aubrey Tercel. “Did he recognise him?” the Templar asked.
“Of that we are not certain,” Nicolaa replied. “Willi told the other boy very little beyond claiming he had seen him, not even whether the villain was a vilhen theyman or a woman—I wish he had. At least then we would know the gender of the person. As it is, we can only hope that we find Willi first, or that the boy did not, in fact, see the murderer but allowed his childish imagination to manufacture a killer from a brief glimpse of a servant innocently crossing the ward.”
After Bascot told her of his visit to the two barber-surgeons and added that, according to Gildas, it did not seem possible that Simon Adgate’s first wife had been Tercel’s mother, Alinor’s face fell and she reluctantly admitted she might be wrong about the furrier.
“If Ernulf finds the boy, and the child can identify the person that murdered the cofferer, further enquiries will be unnecessary,” Nicolaa said.
“Let us hope that turns out to be so, lady,” Bascot replied and stood up. After thanking her for the wine, he said he would not return to the preceptory until the morrow. “There is not much more that can be done until Ernulf has completed his search for the boy.”
Nicolaa nodded. “We must pray he will be successful,” she said.
W
HEN BASCOT RETURNED TO THE PRECEPTORY, DUSK WAS closing in and it was almost time for the service at Compline. He went into the office where he was accustomed to do the Order’s paperwork and found Everard d’Arderon seated at the desk, poring over an inventory of weapons in the armoury.
HEN BASCOT RETURNED TO THE PRECEPTORY, DUSK WAS closing in and it was almost time for the service at Compline. He went into the office where he was accustomed to do the Order’s paperwork and found Everard d’Arderon seated at the desk, poring over an inventory of weapons in the armoury.
When the preceptor saw the disheartened look on Bascot’s face, he laid the list aside and asked what was amiss. “A boy we believe can identify the person who murdered Tercel has gone missing,” Bascot replied. “If the lad is not found, it is feared he might be the next victim.”
D’Arderon listened with grave attention as Bascot explained the details of Willi’s flight from Riseholme and how attempts were being made to find him. The preceptor was well aware of Bascot’s strong propensity for protecting those less fortunate than himself; it was an admirable trait and one of the prime directives of the Order, but d’Arderon also knew, from his long experience of the evils of mankind, that such an aim could often be unattainable. He cast about in his mind for some way to ease Bascot’s apprehension.
“There is nothing more distressing than fearing that a child’s life may be in danger,” he said finally. “I remember a similar situation once, when I was with a cohort of brothers travelling from Jaffa to Arsuf in the Holy Land, and we stopped to make camp at a native village near an oasis. The little daughter of one of the villagers had gone missing and we offered to help search for her, for it was thought that she might have wandered out into the desert and been taken by a jackal or some other predator. With the men from the village, we combed the area all around, but there was no sign of her. Just as it was coming up to nightfall, and the worst was feared, she was discovered, not by one of those who had been searching for her, but by her older sister. It seems the little girl had stolen some honey from her mother’s kitchen and, fearing to be punished, had hidden underneath a pile of wicker baskets. All the time we had been looking for her, she had been only a few feet away from the center of the village. The older sister, who was not much more than a child herself, had remembered how she and her younger sibling had often played a game of hiding and seeking, and that the spot under the baskets was one of the missing child’s favourite places to hide.”
D’Arderon smiled ruefully. “I can still remember the
relief we all felt to find that she was safe. Even though the child and her parents were unknown to us, there ito mils something about the vulnerability of the young that strikes a common chord in all men and women. I hope, de Marins, that there will be a similar success with the missing boy.”
relief we all felt to find that she was safe. Even though the child and her parents were unknown to us, there ito mils something about the vulnerability of the young that strikes a common chord in all men and women. I hope, de Marins, that there will be a similar success with the missing boy.”
It was not often that the preceptor spoke of any of his personal experiences, usually confining conversations to talk of military situations or the daily routine, and Bascot knew that d’Arderon had done so in this instance to hearten him. The preceptor’s description of the search for the missing girl had, however, given him a notion of a way in which, if Willi had still not been found by the time he went to the castle in the morning, the boy might be located.
Twenty-two
W
HEN BASCOT ARRIVED AT THE CASTLE THE NEXT MORNING, he saw Ernulf coming towards the gate, the groom who had been aiding him in the search for the boy trailing behind, leading two horses. The serjeant’s stocky shoulders were slumped in dejection and, without even needing to ask, the Templar knew Willi had not been found.
HEN BASCOT ARRIVED AT THE CASTLE THE NEXT MORNING, he saw Ernulf coming towards the gate, the groom who had been aiding him in the search for the boy trailing behind, leading two horses. The serjeant’s stocky shoulders were slumped in dejection and, without even needing to ask, the Templar knew Willi had not been found.
With a shake of his grizzled head, Ernulf said, “We searched the town high and low and, except for an alehouse keeper who said the boy had been in earlier in the day asking for his father, there was nary sight nor sound of him. We looked last night until it was almost time for curfew, but wherever the little scamp is, he’s found himself a good hiding place.”
Ernulf’s face was laden with worry. “The more time goes by, the more I fear that when we do find him, it’ll be his corpse instead of his living body.”
At that moment the Templar saw Gianni running across the bail. After greeting his former servant, Bascot asked the boy if he had seen Willi while the foundling had been in the castle.
Gianni responded by pointing to his eyes and then making a scissor of his first two fingers and moving them to simulate walking and motioned to the keep, meaning he had seen Willi and the other children when they had been brought into the hall on the night of the feast.
“Would you know him if you saw him again?” the Templar asked and the boy responded with a vigorous nod.
Bascot turned to Ernulf. “Take Gianni with you on your search today,” he said, his advice prompted by what d’Arderon had told him the night before about how the little girl in the Holy Land had been found by her sister. “If anyone can ferret out the places where Willi is hiding, it will be someone who has been in a similar situation and Gianni, as you know, was living on the streets when I found him.”
Ernulf brightened at the notion, and saw the sense in it. “Aye, I reckon you’re right,” he replied.
After Gianni had clambered up to ride pillion behind the serjeant and they had clattered out of the ward, Bascot remounted his own horse and followed them, guiding his mount along Ermine Street, through Bailgate and down Steep Hill into the town. Last night, after he had lain down on his pallet in the enclave’s dormitory, he had reviewed the few facts that had been unearthed about the murdered man. They were scant. No other lover except for Clarice Adgate had been located and it did not seem likely that any of the women who had attended the feast could be his mother. The only tiny clue left was the cofferer’s mention of wine to both Clarice Adgate and the barber, Hacher. And it was just possible, if only barely so, that Tercel’s love of wine, and the purchase of it, had led him into a liaison with anotherwidthet o woman besides Clarice Adgate, perhaps the wife or daughter of a wine merchant. Alternatively, there was even a chance that he may have asked questions about his missing mother during a visit to a wine shop and alerted her, or her family, to his search. The Templar knew he was stretching credulity in posing such possibilities, but he had learned, in the course of investigations into previous cases of secret murder, that it is often the trail that seems most obscure that leads to the quarry. Until the boy was found, he could do no worse that follow it and, as it happened, Bascot had been closely involved with one of the more influential wine merchants in Lincoln when a poisoner that had been plaguing the citizens of the town had attempted to kill the merchant and his family. If there was any link between Tercel’s death and his penchant for fine wine, Reinbald of Hungate might be able to help discover it.
I
N THE CASTLE KEEP, ELISE WAS HUMMING AN AIR SHE HAD heard played by the jongleur Lady Nicolaa had hired on the night of the feast as she placed a
couvre-chef
over her head and threw a cloak about her shoulders. She had been given permission by Lady Alinor to accompany Margaret into Lincoln while the sempstress went to purchase a supply of thread. She would be glad to get away from the castle for, since Margaret had voiced her warning that she might be in danger, Elise had not been easy inside the walls of the keep. Even though she had taken the precaution of moving her pallet to lay across the inside of the door leading into the bedchamber she shared with her mistress, and slept with her small eating knife secreted under her pillow, her rest had been disturbed and filled with nightmares. And, during her waking hours, she found she had fallen into the habit of avoiding close contact with the women on Lady Nicolaa’s staff, lest one of them be the jealous lover Margaret had warned her about. It had all been very unsettling and the thought of a few hours in the town promised to be distracting. Adding to her anticipation was the fact that one of the grooms from the castle stable was to accompany her and the sempstress as an escort. His name was Nicholas and he was a young man about her own age with a handsome ruddy face and a gentle manner. They had spoken once or twice since she had first arrived in the castle and Elise had found him both courteous and attractive. She picked up a small polished silver mirror that Alinor used and regarded her reflection in the surface. She had braided her thick hair and fastened it into two coils over her ears and, even though her head was completely covered by the
couvre-chef
, it was made of a gauze so filmy that the outline of her plaits could be seen through the material. She knew she had lovely hair and was satisfied that the manner in which she had dressed it made her look attractive. She hoped Nicholas would think so, too, and was looking forward to spending the morning in his company.
N THE CASTLE KEEP, ELISE WAS HUMMING AN AIR SHE HAD heard played by the jongleur Lady Nicolaa had hired on the night of the feast as she placed a
couvre-chef
over her head and threw a cloak about her shoulders. She had been given permission by Lady Alinor to accompany Margaret into Lincoln while the sempstress went to purchase a supply of thread. She would be glad to get away from the castle for, since Margaret had voiced her warning that she might be in danger, Elise had not been easy inside the walls of the keep. Even though she had taken the precaution of moving her pallet to lay across the inside of the door leading into the bedchamber she shared with her mistress, and slept with her small eating knife secreted under her pillow, her rest had been disturbed and filled with nightmares. And, during her waking hours, she found she had fallen into the habit of avoiding close contact with the women on Lady Nicolaa’s staff, lest one of them be the jealous lover Margaret had warned her about. It had all been very unsettling and the thought of a few hours in the town promised to be distracting. Adding to her anticipation was the fact that one of the grooms from the castle stable was to accompany her and the sempstress as an escort. His name was Nicholas and he was a young man about her own age with a handsome ruddy face and a gentle manner. They had spoken once or twice since she had first arrived in the castle and Elise had found him both courteous and attractive. She picked up a small polished silver mirror that Alinor used and regarded her reflection in the surface. She had braided her thick hair and fastened it into two coils over her ears and, even though her head was completely covered by the
couvre-chef
, it was made of a gauze so filmy that the outline of her plaits could be seen through the material. She knew she had lovely hair and was satisfied that the manner in which she had dressed it made her look attractive. She hoped Nicholas would think so, too, and was looking forward to spending the morning in his company.
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