A Play of Treachery (32 page)

Perversely, that made Joliffe think the murder could not have been planned. In life, plans seemed to go awry more often than not. Therefore, given how much seemed to have gone in the murderer’s favor, this murder had to have been unplanned.

Joliffe was pursuing that doubtful logic when his un-tended pen splotted ink across his writing. He sat back, startled into looking at his work, and found the ink had only finished marring what he had already done badly.

Pierres, just come in with papers in his hand. said disgustedly, seeing the mess, “You’re useless today, Ripon. Go lie down or something. Just don’t go out again or you’ll be in worse trouble.”

Joliffe muttered John Ripon’s shamed thanks, went on muttering with self-pitying misery while he wiped his pen and closed his inkpot and gave a pointless shuffle to his papers, sure by the time he finally left that he had made everyone glad to see him go.

T
he trouble was that-r eleased from his desk-w here was he to go? Given that he had no overt authority to be wandering through the
hôtel
asking questions, he decided to do, first, simply as Pierres had said. He wanted time to think more. The dorter’s long space under the roof seemed still as deserted as it should be at this hour of the day. Joliffe heard no sound of anyone else, anyway, as he went to his stall, pushed his pillow against the wall at the head of his bed and sat, wrapped in his cloak and not particularly comfortable but glad to give over being John Ripon for a time.

Not for the first time, he wondered how much longer he would be kept at this pretence. How much more was he to learn before being loosed from the household?

On the face of it, the desire to be done here and away seemed unreasonable, if not downright foolish. He was presently living far softer than ever anywhere else in his life, with even Lent’s penances and fasting eased by wealth and skilled cooks. And yet—

Joliffe had learned to be wary when his mind threw up “and yet.” It meant, usually, that he was about to make more of some matter than he wished he would.

And yet—despite the ease of the rich life in Joyeux Repos inside the strong circle of Rouen’s walls, he was never truly at ease. He was too aware there were reasons why Rouen’s castle kept a full garrison overlooking the town—why there were so many men-at-arms to be seen in Rouen’s streets—why nobles and gentlemen of the household had ridden out armed and armored and hoping for brigands to hunt. The peace and safety of Joyeux Repos were real enough, but beyond Rouen’s walls was war. The raw warfare that had been tearing France and Normandy to bleeding pieces for more than a generation, with no surety that sometime, anytime, even soon, that warfare would not break through into Rouen, into Joyeux Repos.

Or perhaps, with Alizon’s murder, it had already, given Durevis was Burgundy’s man.

Except murder was murder, a thing apart from warfare.

Unless the killing that came with warfare was looked at for what it was—murder claimed as a virtue because men did it at the behest of those over them rather than by their own wills.

Although it was by their own wills that they chose to obey and kill.

And the dead were just as dead when it was done.

Was it that their being dead was held not to matter so much? That killing in quantity in a war was a different matter from killing one by one in “peaceful” murders?

Yet each death was a separate death for the person who died.

As near as Joliffe could sort it out, there seemed to be a severance between parts of a man’s mind, with no link between them, if he could see single killing as a sin but killing in quantity a virtue so long as your lord or your fellows told you to do it. He hoped that was a severance he would never make.

But none of that brought him nearer to knowing why Alizon had been murdered. Even the how was not firmly determined yet. Stabbed, yes, but beyond that, what was sure? That she had gone to the garden and been killed there by someone before Durevis came, and that that someone then had waited—dangerous though the waiting was—and tried to kill Durevis.

But had this someone gone with her to the garden? Surely not. He—for likelihood’s sake, let it be “he” for now—must have followed her. Or he could have been in the garden already, waiting for her. No. If he had been waiting for her, she would not have unlocked the door.

But he could have unlocked it himself after she was dead. Supposing she had told him she was there to meet someone. Although that might be something he had already known.

Or he might have come through the door after she unlocked it for Durevis.

Or over the wall at any time.

And there was always the chance that it was Durevis he had foremost intended to kill, and Alizon been killed simply to have her out of the way. That was something Joliffe had not considered until now—that someone, knowing Alizon was going to meet Durevis, had followed her, killed her to have her out of his way, and then waited for Durevis to come.

But if that was the way of it, why hadn’t he made sure of Durevis before running away? Besides, there had to be far better places to waylay Durevis than in the
hôtel
’s garden.

Unless here was the one place the murderer could be sure of finding him.

That gave two clear questions: Who could have been waiting for Alizon in the garden? Or else who could have followed her there?

Or rather, three questions. Had she indeed had secrets she meant to tell Durevis?

Or maybe it was four questions: supposing she had secrets to tell, who would know it?

Or—

Joliffe swung sideways and stood up from the bed, not to escape the increasing questions but because someone was coming along the dorter between the sleeping cells. That in itself was not unreasonable—unusual at this hour, but not unreasonable. After all, Joliffe himself was here. But someone in this
hôtel
was a murderer, and he had not known how deep-set was his unease at that until now, when his instant response to being found here alone was sharp wariness.

It was only with an effort that he made himself sit down again, now on the bed’s edge. After all, among Master Doncaster’s lessons was how to defend and how to attack from sitting; and he shifted his clerk’s robe to clear his dagger, propped his elbows on his knees, and sank his head onto his hands in the seeming that John Ripon might well have just now, but all in a way that kept a clear view of the curtain closing his stall.

Whoever had come along the dorter stopped, shook his curtain, and asked, “Ripon, are you in there?”

Relieved, knowing Foulke’s voice, he raised his head. “Yes.”

Foulke pushed the curtain aside. Usually a sober-faced man, he was more sober-faced than usual and doubtful as he said, “You weren’t at your work. My lady says you’re to come to her. But if you’re ill . . .”

Joliffe stood up. “I’m not ill. I had a bad night. Yesterday and all. How are you today?”

Foulke went from sober-faced to grim. “Well enough. It’s my lady and the others need their minds eased. Are you fit to read to them? M’dame thought it could help.”

Joliffe straightened his shoulders and ran his hands backward through his hair. “Do I look fit enough?”

Foulke eyed him with no great approval but said, “You’ll do.” And added as they went toward the stairs, “They say you’re overset by what we saw yesterday.”

Tired though he was with John Ripon, Joliffe answered with something of Ripon’s whine, “It was the blood and seeing her dead that way. I’ve never seen anyone dead like that. With blood and all.”

“You’ve not been in France long enough, then,” Foulke said without sympathy.

“I don’t want to be here long enough for that. And this is Rouen. There shouldn’t be killing
here.
”

“ ‘Shouldn’t’ isn’t the same as ‘won’t be,’ ” Foulke said over his shoulder as they went down the stairs. “Who would have thought, a year ago this time, that we’d be on the edge of losing Paris. We ‘shouldn’t’ be.” He dropped his voice as they came off the stairs and started along the gallery. “But we are.”

His own voice as low, Joliffe made Ripon protest, “We can’t be. If we lose Paris, what happens to the rest of France?”

“It will probably go, too. For now, anyway. Normandy is otherwise, if that’s any comfort to you. Normandy we’ll hang onto by tooth and toenail for as long as there’s still among us those who think this war is worth the winning.”

“Worth the winning? Don’t you think it’s worth the winning?”

“Oh, I think it’s worth the winning,” Foulke assured him. “Whether it can be, now Burgundy has turned—” He shrugged.

“Is that what the duke of Bedford thought, too?”

“Bedford?” Foulke’s voice warmed, as Joliffe had noted most people’s did when speaking of Bedford. “His brother gave him Normandy and France to keep for the young king until the young king could keep it for himself. That was what mattered to Bedford—keeping faith with his brother. He did it, too. Better than any other man could have.” Foulke’s voice took on a bitter edge. “The trouble was that others didn’t keep faith with him. Now it’s time for young King Henry to get himself here and take up what’s his to have. Only I don’t see him making any move to come. If he doesn’t—” Foulke shrugged. “Who knows what will come of it all?”

Foulke might not
know
, but what he
thought
would come was plain enough, and Joliffe’s layers of unease thickened.

At Lady Jacquetta’s parlor they found that Bishop Louys and one of the household priests had come to discuss Alizon’s funeral and were withdrawn with Lady Jacquetta, Guillemete, and M’dame into the bedchamber to talk privately, leaving the other demoiselles to each other’s company and—to judge by the reddened eyes among them—shared tears.

“You’re to wait, though, Master Ripon,” Ydoine said. As tear-marked as the others, she was at least calm-voiced.

Michielle added on a hopeful, tear-edged sniff, “You could read to us meanwhile.”

“No,” Ydoine said. “We wait for my lady. Would you have some wine while you wait, Master Ripon?”

Joliffe said that he would; was wondering how he could best use this chance to ask questions here without bringing on more tears, when Ydoine came to it first, asking as she handed a filled goblet to him, “Where were you when it happened?”

Startled, Joliffe echoed, “Where was I?”

“It’s what we’re all asking ourselves,” Blanche said from where she sat at the window with Isabelle. “Where . . . what . . .”

She broke off, her tears flowing again, and Ydoine finished for her, “Where were we, what were we doing when Alizon died. All unknowing, what were we doing?”

“Weren’t you all here?” Joliffe asked.

“I was gone out with M’dame,” said Ydoine.

Marie from where she sat on a cushion on the floor with one of Lady Jacquetta’s little dogs clutched to her breast said, “Michielle and I were with my lady in the chapel. She was praying.”

Joliffe supposed she would be, there being little other reason to be in the chapel, but he nodded with solemn approval of that before asking, somewhat with mischief, “Weren’t you and Michielle praying, too?”

Marie gave him an unexpectedly stricken—guilty?—look and hid her face against the top of the dog’s furry head, while Michielle gave a soft, sobbing gasp and said, “No. We were talking with one of the priests there.”

Marie raised her head. “Just outside the chapel,” she said in quick defense. “Not inside while my lady was praying.” She pressed her face to the dog’s head again, muffling, “We shouldn’t have been.”

“We knew him from when we did the play. There wasn’t any reason we couldn’t talk with him. We didn’t know!” Michielle wailed.

Isabelle at the window said miserably, “You didn’t do anything amiss. It’s Blanche and I who let her go. We just sat here and let her go. If we hadn’t . . .” She broke off and turned her head away, to look out over the gardens.

“You were sitting there?” Joliffe asked, very carefully even-voiced. “At the window?”

Blanche and Isabelle nodded, Blanche gulping on a sob. Joliffe crossed the chamber to stand between them, looking out over the gardens. The little grove of slender trees at the greensward’s end obscured the gateway to the enclosed garden, and its walls were too high to see over, even from here, just as he had thought.

“If we had looked we might have seen her going,” Blanche mourned. “And seen whoever was with her. Then we’d know who . . . who . . .”

“We would have seen nothing,” Isabelle returned, desperately defensive. “They surely went by way of the arbor walk. Even if we had looked, we would not have seen her.” Which was true enough, Joliffe saw. The near end of the arbor walk was out of sight of this window and probably most windows of the
hôtel
, and once into the walk Alizon and whoever else would have gone unseen to the enclosed garden. And, in the murderer’s case, come back equally concealed.

“It isn’t our fault she went!” Blanche wailed softly and covered her face, well-used handkerchief in hand.

“Of course it is not your fault,” Ydoine said with the touch of impatience that told she had said it some several times before now. “Why should you think she’d gone to the garden? You had no reason to think it.”

Marie gave an unexpected giggle. “Well—”

“Yes,” Ydoine said sharply. “But now it is nothing to laugh at, is it?”

Sudden and stark-sober silence answered that from everyone, until Michielle said in a small voice, “Has anyone found him?”

The women’s and girls’ heads turned to Foulke still standing at the door. He shook his head. “Not that I have heard, no.”

“Who?” Joliffe asked.

“Remon Durevis,” Ydoine said with a quelling look at Michielle, as if angry at having to mention his name.

“Master Durevis?” Joliffe echoed, feigning the ignorance people found so hard not to answer if they could.