The False Virgin (6 page)

‘This cannot continue,’ he said testily. ‘We lost another cow last night, and we shall have no herd left if you do not stop these villains.’

‘They are well organised,’ said Cole, a little defensively. ‘One group distracts us while the others strike. Yet if I divide my men, we are stretched too thin.’

‘Then you will have to catch them by cunning. Ask your wife for ideas.’

Cole smiled. Gwenllian was by far the cleverest person he knew, and while other men might have bristled at the implication that their spouses were more intelligent than they, Cole was
inordinately proud of his, and was always pleased when her skills were acknowledged.

‘Much has happened since you left,’ Kediour went on. ‘You have visitors.’

‘From the King?’ asked Cole uneasily.

John had been crowned the previous year, following the death of Richard the Lionheart. He was a weak, vacillating, deceitful man, and Cole, plain-speaking and honest, had been unable to shower
him with the flowery compliments John felt he deserved. The silence had been noted, and Cole had acquired an implacable enemy. Cole’s marriage meant he had a lot of in-laws who would fight if
he was dismissed without good cause, so John was busy looking for one, and a veritable flood of emissaries came to assess his accounts, watch the way he built his castle, and monitor his rule.
Gwenllian was determined they should not succeed, and had managed to send each one away empty-handed. So far.

‘Nicholas Avenel,’ replied Kediour. ‘The new Sheriff of Pembroke. He has an evil reputation, and is accused of despoiling churches and kidnapping wealthy burgesses for ransom.
His henchman William Fitzmartin comes with him.’

‘I do not know either.’

‘John’s creatures,’ said Kediour disapprovingly. ‘Here to find fault. They have not managed yet, but there are those in the town who aim to help them.’

‘Adam de Rupe,’ sighed Cole, knowing who he meant. ‘The mayor.’

Kediour nodded. ‘You exposed him as corrupt, which means he will not be re-elected next month. And his servants Gunbald and Ernebald hate you for gaoling them last year.’

‘But they stole from the church,’ protested Cole. ‘They were caught red-handed.’

‘Yes, but all three think they were misused regardless. And then there are Miles de Cogan and Philip de Barri. I do not trust either, despite your kindness towards them.’

‘Miles is my deputy. He is not an enemy!’

‘He is jealous of what you have – namely Gwenllian. He is in love with her.’

Cole gaped at him. ‘He is not!’

‘He is, and everyone knows it. However, Philip worries me more.’

Cole made an impatient sound. ‘He is Gwen’s cousin – family. Besides, if I am ousted from Carmarthen, he will lose his post as chaplain.’

‘Just be careful,’ warned Kediour. ‘However, they and the raiders are not the only problem you need to solve. Come to the Market Square, and I shall show you
another.’

Cole would rather have gone straight to Gwenllian and the children, but he dutifully followed the prior into the town centre. A crowd had gathered, and there was an atmosphere
of excited anticipation, all centred on two young men in Benedictine habits.

‘They claim they are taking a holy relic to Whitland Abbey,’ explained Kediour with obvious disapproval. ‘The hand of a saint named Beornwyn, no less. But they are Benedictines
and Whitland is Cistercian. Why would one Order bestow such a favour on another?’

‘I suppose it is odd,’ said Cole. ‘But hardly my business.’

‘Oh, yes, it is,’ said Kediour firmly. ‘They announced earlier that Beornwyn grants most prayers if her palm is crossed with silver, and several people plan to invest in a
boon. However, I have never heard of this saint, and I suspect they are charlatans.’

‘Damn!’ muttered Cole. He hated problems where religion was involved.

‘I shall look her up in my library this evening. However, even if she does transpire to be genuine, I do not see why scruffy lads like these should have been entrusted with her.’

‘I will speak to them tomorrow and suggest they leave.’ Cole glanced towards the castle and wished he was in it. Not only was he acutely uncomfortable standing in the sun in full
armour, but he objected to being kept from his family.

‘They have offered to end the drought for a shilling,’ said Kediour, scowling at both the monks and the crowd they had attracted. ‘Mayor Rupe thinks we should pay.’

‘Perhaps we should,’ said Cole, squinting up at the cloudless sky. ‘We are desperate for rain, and I am sure no Benedictine would cheat us.’

Kediour regarded him askance. The constable had a reckless habit of taking people at their word, a facet of his character that often stunned the prior. ‘Do you really believe that everyone
who wears a habit is a good man?’

Cole considered the question carefully, although it had been rhetorical. ‘Yes, generally. I may not like them, but God does or He would not have called them to serve Him.’

Kediour gaped his disbelief, but was spared the need to reply by the appearance of Cole’s family – Gwenllian, raven-haired and lovely; his little son, Meurig; and the gurgling bundle
that was baby Alys. Even Kediour’s stern visage relaxed into a smile as he watched the unbridled joy of their reunion.

Gwenllian was relieved to have her husband home. Despite the recent appointment of a deputy, everyone knew it was really she who was in charge when Cole was away, and she had
found the responsibility burdensome. Not only was it difficult to keep Sheriff Avenel and his unsavoury companion, Fitzmartin, entertained, but the unrelenting heat was driving even the mildest of
men to ill-tempered spats. Moreover, there was a decision about the new tower that only Cole could make, and people were beginning to fear that drought and the cattle thieves would see them all
starve that winter.

As soon as she could, she sent the children home with their nurse, and pulled Cole into the shop owned by Odo and his wife, Hilde, knowing the couple would leave them to talk undisturbed. Odo
and Hilde sold cloth, and had been Gwenllian’s friends for years, although Cole was lukewarm about Odo’s gentle manners and unmanly fondness for the arts.

‘There is trouble,’ she began. ‘Avenel and Fitzmartin arrived shortly after you left, and have been prying into every aspect of our lives ever since. They have a letter from
the King, giving them leave to do whatever they like here.’

Cole sighed wearily. ‘Perhaps I should resign and retire to my estates in Normandy. John will win in the end and I am tired of trying to outwit him.’

‘No,’ said Gwenllian firmly. ‘I will not allow him to oust us from our home. You have been constable here for years, and—’

‘Quite. Perhaps it is time for a change. It was never intended to be a permanent post – not by King Henry, who put me here, or by King Richard, who confirmed the
appointment.’

‘If we go,’ said Gwenllian, drawing herself up to her full height with all the dignity of a princess of Wales, ‘it will be because
we
decide to leave. It will not be
on the whim of a spiteful monarch who does not know how to rule what he has inherited.’

Cole did not have the energy to argue. Instead, he suggested they go to the castle and inspect progress on the new tower. As they aimed for the door, Hilde and Odo approached.

‘What shall we do about these monks and their saint, Cole?’ asked Odo. He had one hand to his back as usual; a lifetime of lifting heavy bales had taken its toll. ‘Shall we pay
them to pray for a miracle? Bad luck has dogged us all summer, so we could certainly do with one.’

‘He will decide tomorrow,’ said Gwenllian, to spare Symon the need to make a decision there and then. She smiled at her friends. ‘The monks told me that they plan to stay for a
few days, so there is no immediate hurry.’

She led Cole back into the blasting heat of the Market Square, where the Benedictines had finished their performance and were packing the reliquary away. Two men watched: Sheriff Avenel was a
tall, bald man with the haughty bearing of the professional warrior; Fitzmartin was younger and smaller, but cast in the same mould.

‘Constable Cole?’ asked Avenel, coming to intercept them. ‘You have been gone a long time. Can a few miserable thieves really take so long to track down?’

‘He has not tracked them down,’ said Fitzmartin slyly. ‘They remain at large – I heard his sergeant make the announcement just now. Perhaps he would like us to help. I am
sure the King will not mind us abandoning our more important duties to oblige.’

‘Thank you,’ said Cole amiably. He was not very good at recognising sarcasm and often wrong-footed people by taking acerbic comments at face value. ‘Shall we try
tomorrow?’

‘No,’ said Avenel, once he realised that Cole was not being impertinent. ‘We have more pressing matters to concern us. And now you are home, I want to discuss them with you.
Not with your wife.’

Cole bridled at his tone, and Gwenllian rested a calming hand on his arm. She had not endured the sheriff and his creature for three trying weeks just to have Cole destroy the fragile bridges
she had built with an imprudent remark.

‘You must excuse us, Sheriff,’ she said politely. ‘We have castle business to attend.’

Avenel bowed in a manner that was more insult than compliment, and stepped away, although neither he nor Fitzmartin went far.

Cole leaned down to whisper in Gwenllian’s ear, ‘Kediour tells me they are accused of despoiling churches. Is it true?’

‘They are John’s men, so it is possible.’ Her attention was caught by the monks. ‘Odo had a good question: what will you do about them? We do need a miracle, but I am not
sure they are the ones to bring it about. Oh, no! Here comes Mayor Rupe!’

Rupe was an overweight, slovenly man who hailed from nearby Dinefwr, a fact of which he was so proud that he always wore the curious conical hat for which its residents were famous. He had been
greasily obsequious before Cole had caught him misusing public monies, but was now a bitter and intractable opponent. He had insisted on holding meetings to discuss how best to catch the thieves,
which he had used as opportunities to make Cole look inept and foolish in front of the town’s other worthies. He was flanked by his two henchmen, an unsavoury father and son named Ernebald
and Gunbald.

‘It is your fault we are short of water, Cole,’ he snarled without preamble. ‘You should have built cisterns, not squandered our taxes on beautifying your castle. And you
accuse
me
of dealing corruptly!’

‘The King told him to do it,’ came a voice from behind. It was Deputy Miles, a gloriously handsome man with golden hair. ‘Would you have him flout a royal order?’

‘The town should come first,’ said Rupe stubbornly. ‘And if Cole does not think so, he should resign and let a better man take the post. Such as you, perhaps, Miles.’

The deputy bowed. ‘You are kind, but I should need a Lady Gwenllian at my side, and there is only one of her. Thus the post of Constable of Carmarthen is not for me. But do not despair for
water, Rupe. I have a plan – if the fair lady will permit me to explain.’

Cole was not a perceptive man, but even he could not fail to notice the look of passionate longing that Miles directed at Gwenllian. He scowled, an expression that did not suit his naturally
amiable face.

‘What plan?’ he demanded, before she could answer for herself. Avenel and Fitzmartin, aware that a possible altercation was in the offing, eased forward to listen.

‘I believe I have located a hidden stream,’ replied Miles, his eyes still fixed on Gwenllian. ‘I did it by holding hazel twigs in a certain way and—’

‘Witchery?’ interrupted Avenel in rank disdain, not caring that he was interrupting a discussion in which he had not been invited to take part.

Miles continued to address Gwenllian, much to her increasing mortification. ‘No, of course not. It is a skill my mother taught me. She saved our village from drought many times. I have
been surveying Carmarthen, and there is an underground stream between the town and the priory – it lies beneath the woods on Mayor Rupe’s land.’

‘An underground stream?’ scoffed Avenel. ‘What nonsense is this?’

‘Not nonsense, Sheriff,’ said Miles earnestly. ‘It is there, I assure you.’

‘You are mad,’ sneered Fitzmartin. ‘There is no such thing as an underground stream.’

‘Bring your report to Symon tomorrow,’ said Gwenllian briskly to Miles, ending the conversation before there was trouble. ‘He will discuss it with you then.’

Miles was visibly crestfallen, and she was aware of Avenel and Fitzmartin chortling as they and the mayor walked away together, amused by the deputy’s unseemly infatuation. Cole turned
angrily to Miles, and Gwenllian was relieved when he was prevented from rebuking him by the arrival of Philip de Barri, the castle chaplain.

Philip was Gwenllian’s cousin, although she could not bring herself to like him. He was an unprepossessing soul, with a wealth of irritating habits. She had not wanted him as chaplain, but
there had been a vacancy when he had arrived begging for employment, and it would have been churlish to refuse. She tried not to let her antipathy show as he approached, bringing the two visiting
monks with him.

She regarded them with interest. They were both young, and had clearly not enjoyed an easy journey – their habits were threadbare and dirty, and their sandals badly in need of repair. If
they were charlatans, she thought, then they were not very good at plying their trade, or they would have been better attired. The larger of the pair, who introduced himself as Frossard, had a
black eye.

‘A misunderstanding with a smith in Llandeilo,’ he explained, raising a tentative hand to touch it. ‘He thought I was going to steal a dagger.’

‘Why would you want a dagger?’ asked Cole, puzzled. ‘You are a monk.’

‘I did not
want
it,’ objected Frossard stiffly. ‘I was just looking. But since you ask, your domain is dangerous. Only yesterday we were obliged to watch a very
desperate band of villains making off with sheep.’

‘Were you close enough to see their faces?’ asked Cole eagerly. The raiders tended to keep out of sight, and very few had witnessed them in action.