Veil of Lies (17 page)

14

Crispin and Philippa approached the solar and she dropped her stride, slowing as they neared it. “The solar?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“But he is still there.”

“Walcote? When will you bury the man?”

“The funeral is tomorrow. The guild, the servants—there was so much to be done. I-I had to do it all myself and I wasn’t certain of—Believe me, I wanted it much sooner!”

“I do believe you.” Crispin entered the room and grimaced at the smell. All the rosemary and spices in the world could not mask the odor of decay. Only two candles were lit and the sheet was drawn up over the shrunken features of the dead merchant. Burial tomorrow would not come soon enough.

Crispin turned toward the wall. Movement. A figure lurking in the shadows. Crispin pulled his dagger and regretted for the thousandth time that he no longer carried a sword.

“You there! I see you! Make yourself known!”

Candlelight cast a wan glow on the man’s features.

“Put your weapon away, friend Crispin,” said John Hoode, his voice trembling. He put his hand back up to his face, covering nose and mouth from the smell.

Crispin’s heart started again and he slammed the blade in its sheath. “You frightened the wits out of me,” he said and wiped the sweat away from his upper lip. “What are you doing here?”

“There’s the burial tomorrow. I thought—”

Crispin’s agitation melted and he reached out and patted Hoode’s shoulder. Crispin nodded and glanced back toward Philippa in the doorway. He leaned in toward Hoode and asked softly, “What’s the news from the kitchens?”

“The kitchens? That’s not my—”

Hoode stopped and stared at Crispin. His gaze made a quick circuit of the room, caught Philippa in the doorway, and finally lit on Crispin again. His lips turned up in a frightened smile. “I must go.”

Crispin followed him out past Philippa and caught up with him on the gallery. Hoode glanced at his mistress’s back nervously.

“What is it, John? Anything to report to me?”

Hoode looked again at Philippa and Crispin edged him further away from her. “I did not wish to speak before her,” he said. “But it’s that Adam Becton again. Verily, he can get himself into a rage.”

“I think that Becton is”—he glanced once at Philippa—“preoccupied.”

“I think he is unstable. Mark me. He’s going to hurt someone. I hope it won’t be me.” He raised his smooth fingers to his lips.

“Don’t worry. Stay out of his way. I hope to conclude this soon.” He patted Hoode’s shoulder again, and sent him on his way. He made an apologetic lilt to his shoulders to Philippa and steered her back toward the solar.

“Who was that peculiar fellow?” she asked.

“He’s one of your servants. I asked him to keep an eye on things.”

“
He’s
going to protect me?”

“He’s my sentinel only. I was to be called immediately.”

She vaguely nodded and made no move to enter the room.

“Philippa, you must come in.”

“Must I?”

He glanced at Walcote on his bier. “He is covered.”

She breathed a trembling sigh and crossed the threshold, averting her gaze from the body. “It can’t be in here. I searched it myself.”

“Yet it is.”

“Where?”

He walked to the far wall adjacent to the window. Dark blue drapery hung from mid-height along the walls of the entire room, covering the lime-washed plaster. He slipped his hand beneath the cloth, pushing it aside as best he could, and ran his hands along the plaster surface. “Fetch me a candle.”

Philippa pressed her lips together and grasped enough courage to take one of the fat candles at Walcote’s head. She brought it to Crispin and held it for him. “What are you looking for?”

“A way in.”

“What do you mean ‘a way in’?”

“There is a secret door to a secret room.”

She stared at him. The candlelight warmed her face, beautiful even in its perplexity. “How do you know?”

“Have you ever been to the Tower of London?”

“Of course not.”

“If you had, you would know that there is a level of false windows in the White Tower.”

“False windows? Why?”

“To confuse the enemy. An attacking force would believe there is another level. More men, more defenses.”

“What has this to do with—”

“I noticed a window on the outside wall quite close to this one. Too close. When I investigated inside and paced it off, the windows I saw inside did not correspond to the windows I saw outside. Thicker walls where there should not be. Ergo, secret room.”

She shook her head. “If this wall opens, I shall pay you twice what I owe you.”

“When this wall opens I will have earned it.”

Crispin’s fingers searched along the way under the heavy blue cloth. But the drapery was proving to be an impediment to his progress and he almost tore it down in his frustration. Instead, he carefully unhooked it from the pegs set in the wall and laid it down upon the wooden floor, fold on fold. He stepped over the bunched cloth and continued his slow examination of the solar’s north wall. Philippa followed as he inched along, holding the candle for him with trembling fingers. The yellow glow cast a slanted halo across the smooth plane.

Crispin knocked on the wall with his knuckles, cocking his head to listen for a change in tone. He had been at it a long time. What if he were wrong? He certainly didn’t relish appearing the fool in front of the woman, especially after his bravado about knowing where the damned cloth was.

He slid his fingers toward the corner and felt nothing but the same even plaster. His disappointment was almost keener than his embarrassment. If this secret door was not so, then he had no idea where this cloth could be. And he hated to be wrong, particularly where his fee was concerned.

Just as he was about to give up, his fingertips encountered a seam by the corner timber. “Ah!” Relief and a renewed wave of confidence made him chuckle. He drew his dagger and worked it into the crack. It widened. What appeared to be an ordinary plaster wall, was instead a clever door.

A click and creaking wood. A portion of the wall eased aside. A dark, narrow gap appeared at the corner nearest the window and the smell of mold and mildew tumbled out with a sighing puff of air. The door opened only a shoulder’s width, but it was enough for a man to squeeze through.

“The candle.” He put out his hand. Philippa’s excited breath gusted on his neck. His hand closed over the thick column of wax as she thrust the candle into his palm. The flame wavered from his own excitement and he gingerly pushed the candle through the opening.

Immediately the small space jumped into view. He was surprised by what he saw. Certainly he had seen similar passages in palaces and castles, but nothing like this in a manor house. It made him wonder if his own long-lost manor had such spaces.

A thick layer of dust covered the walls and floor. His eyes ran over the textures of stone alcoves and carved pillars. No hasty room this. This was created when the house was built. God only knew why.

Crispin lowered the candle, dripping some wax on his boot as he tilted the wax pillar for better light. A set of scrambled footprints on the floor mingled with drops of dried blood. He knelt on one knee and studied the scene.

“Did you find the cloth?” Philippa’s hushed voice came from the doorway.

“Not yet. But I did find how the murderer entered and exited the solar.”

Her head appeared at the edge and she strained to look. He pointed to the footprints and the dark drops among them. When he lifted the candle, the light illumined a small area, but he saw that the passage went farther. “This is not a room only. It is a passage.”

“Nicholas never mentioned this.”

“No, I don’t imagine he would have done.” Crispin walked down the narrow corridor, moving the candle above and below. A stone staircase trailing downward fell away in the gloom.

“Don’t go!” Philippa’s whispered echo skipped along the narrow walls.

He turned. She was lit by the sliver of the doorway where the candlelight and a rushlight outside the solar cast her in a ghostly glow. “Will you not have me search?”

“I don’t know.”

“I will be gone for only a few moments. This passage may not go very far.”

Maneuvering carefully down the steps, he made certain to keep one hand on the wall. Should the flame go out, his touch with the wall might be his only hope of finding his way back through the suffocating darkness.

The steps curved in a long, easy spiral, descending for what seemed like a long time. The walls muffled the sounds of servants, and he smelled vague odors. The kitchens?

Other than the ethereal resonances behind the thick timbers and daub, Crispin’s footsteps were his only company save for the secret noises of a rat close by gnawing on its dinner.

Crispin continued until his echoing steps changed to flat splashes. He lowered the candle’s light toward the floor and it reflected back at him.

Water. And rising. It smelled stagnant of mildew. By the echoing sound of his steps, he sensed a wall blocking his progress. When he neared, the candle’s light confirmed it. Ahead he saw the faint outline of a door.

He set the candle down in the ankle-deep water and used both hands to feel along the wall’s edges. He pushed and pried but nothing budged. “Open, dammit!” and he slammed the corner with his fist. The stone groaned and opened. Cold, wet air whooshed in, snuffing the candle.

The soft outside light more than filled the small space—until the door jammed, open only a cubit wide.

Crispin looked at the candle with its wisp of evaporating smoke and then back up the blackened passage. He sighed. He did not savor feeling his way blindly back to the solar. He turned to the opening and decided to go that way. Wherever that led. He only hoped he could fit through the crack.

He shoved his shoulder in, closed his eyes, and tried to relax. Easing forward, he scraped both sides of his body squeezing through.
Now I know what wheat feels like ground between millstones.
He winced. His dagger hilt screeched along the rock. The door never budged, and he breathed evenly, trying not to think about getting stuck. And just as the thought lifted into the ether, he could move no further.

Damn.
His head aimed toward the opening. No chance to look behind him for any kind of assistance. He tried to ease back. No good. Just as stuck that way, too.

His predicament was much like this investigation. Caught between two opposing forces, he moved blindly. Either way could stop him in his tracks.

He pulled in his gut and pushed as hard as he could, grunting with the effort, but he was stuck fast. Philippa knew where he was, but it might be some time before she sent someone to look for him. He pushed again with a great exhaled groan and his body suddenly slipped. He could move again!

Inching forward, he felt cold ahead. His hand touched something wet but he dared not yank the hand back. The shoulder freed and he popped his head out. Green and brown stippled light cascaded around him, and then he realized he stood along a wall of dead ivy. He pulled himself out the rest of the way and stood on the gravel path, feeling a bit as if he were birthed from the wall.

The garden. The hidden passage meandered around and down again toward the back courtyard garden. He looked up at the solar’s window some fifteen feet up and then at the false one beside it. Looking down at his coat, he straightened his belt that was wrenched halfway around him and then wiped away the granite dust from his chest. He walked to the part of the garden wall he had scaled before with Jack, and climbed.

He lighted on the other side and strode around the wall to the front entrance. Adam Becton answered his knock and opened the door. The steward looked surprised but said nothing, and stepped aside to let Crispin through. Crispin took the stairs two at a time, crossed the solar’s threshold, and stood noiselessly behind Philippa whose head and shoulders were lost within the passage’s gloom.

“Lose something?”

It was worth it to see her jump. She spun so quickly she nearly lost her balance.