A Head for Poisoning

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Geoffrey’s hands fumbled and shook, and he found himself unable to relight the torch. Rohese eased him out of the way.

“Let me do it,” she said. “I am not afraid.”

“I am not afraid, either,” snapped Geoffrey. “Just shocked, that is all.”

“I was afraid at first,” said Rohese, as if he had not spoken. “But not any more. She cannot harm anyone, the poor creature.”

Once again, the cave sprang into light. Geoffrey snatched the torch from Rohese, and went to inspect the thing in the alcove.

It was, without doubt, the severed head of a woman. Geoffrey fought to keep the torch steady, but he found he could not. He swallowed hard, and looked at the leathery skin that stretched across the skull like a mask and the gauzy hair that cascaded around it, and searched for some sign that he was gazing into the face of Enide.

He raised a shaking hand to his mouth, and promptly turned away. Adrian had told him that Enide’s head had never been recovered: Geoffrey now knew that the reason was because someone had hidden it in Godric’s tunnel. Had Godric known it was here? Or had it been put in its niche after Godric had been confined to his bedchamber because poison was eating away at his innards?

He rubbed harder at his eye. Joan’s role in Goodrich’s sordid affairs was beginning to look very suspicious: she knew about the tunnel-and therefore also about Enide’s head-and Rohese had not been able to tell whether a man or a woman had argued with Godric before killing him. Also, severing a head from the shoulders with a sword was something a knight might do-a man such as her husband, Sir Olivier. And finally, it was Malger and Drogo, friends of Olivier, whom Geoffrey had fought in the tunnel. How else could the Earl’s henchmen have found out about the tunnel, other than through Joan?

Geoffrey looked around the chamber properly for the first time. It was roughly rectangular, with a door at each end, both of which stood open. One was the door through which Geoffrey had entered the cavern, while beyond the second was another tunnel, leading, Geoffrey assumed, to the woods, since Drogo and Malger had fled down it. A heap of rags on a low ledge in a corner had apparently been serving as Rohese’s bed, and there was a shelf along one wall. In the middle, displayed with some pride, was Geoffrey’s heavy silver chalice-the one that had been stolen from his saddlebags as he had rescued Barlow from the river.

Bewildered, he picked it up. It was without question the one Tancred had given him-there was a dent in the rim where Tancred had used it to brain the man from whom he had stolen it. Geoffrey stood on tiptoe to see if the shelf held anything else, and reached up to retrieve his Hebrew and Arabic scrolls that had been stolen at the same time. Someone had ripped them in half, perhaps in anger at not being able to decipher them. Saddened, he placed them carefully inside his surcoat, grabbed the cup carelessly by its stem, and turned to Rohese.

“You must be hungry,” he said. “Come on. Let’s go.”

“There was bread and water here,” said Rohese, pointing. “And cheese and some wine.”

“Really?” asked Geoffrey. He bent to inspect Rohese’s bed. He had been wrong when he had assumed it comprised rags: it was actually several warm blankets. Next to them stood a jug and the remains of a loaf of bread. Someone else, apparently, had intended to stay a while in the underground chamber.

“These were here when you arrived?” he asked. “You did not bring them here yourself?”

“Of course not,” said Rohese. “I did not know the tunnel existed until the other night. These things were just here.”

“And have you seen anyone else at all since you arrived?”

“I already told you, no,” she said.

“Did you not consider it curious that someone thought to provide bread and water, when no one knew you were coming to stay?”

“I do not imagine they were put here for me,” said Rohese, looking at him as though he were stupid. “But I have been wondering when someone else might come. I have been ready either to flee up the tunnel to Godric’s chamber or down to the river as soon as I heard someone coming.”

“But you were not fleeing when Malger and Drogo were here,” Geoffrey pointed out. “They had caught you.”

Rohese shuddered. “I ran out of water and had to start drinking the wine instead. It must have made me sleep heavier than I intended. And I was tired. I have not really relaxed much down here.”

Geoffrey could imagine why. Personally, he would rather have taken his chances sleeping in the woods than being locked in the oppressive chamber with only a severed head for company. Rohese, however, seemed quite sanguine over her ordeal. She continued.

“The bread was quite fresh when I arrived, so someone must have put it here very recently.”

“Was it Drogo and Malger who brought the supplies, do you think?” asked Geoffrey, more to himself than to her. “Do you think they might have stayed here from time to time?”

“No,” said Rohese, frowning in thought. “They did not know where they were going when they came in-it was as if they were exploring the tunnel for the first time. By the time I heard them it was too late to run, so I hid under the blankets hoping that they would miss me, and I might escape while they investigated the stairs. But they started prodding at me with their swords. Then you came.”

“But how did they know it was here?” asked Geoffrey. “It is supposed to be a secret.”

Rohese shrugged. “I do not know. And I would not rub your eye like that if I were you. It is already quite red.”

Geoffrey looked around the chamber once more, hunting for a piece of cloth. Finally, he settled for a strip from one of the bed covers, which he hacked off with his sword. Gritting his teeth against a curious gamut of emotions, which included disgust, sorrow, and tenderness, he took the head from its alcove and wrapped it carefully in the blanket.

“Come on, Rohese,” he said. “I have had enough of this place.”

She hesitated.

“You cannot stay here forever,” he said gently. “And Julian is fretting. She thinks the Earl of Shrewsbury has done away with you.”

Reluctantly, Rohese glanced around her sanctuary before following him to the door.

“Which is the quickest way out?” he asked. “Up the stairs or towards the river?”

“To the river,” she replied. “But we cannot go that way. The Earl’s knights might be waiting.”

“I hope they are,” muttered Geoffrey. “Nothing would give me greater pleasure than another encounter with those two. I have some questions I would like to ask them.”

“You would fight them again?” asked Rohese fearfully. “But they might kill you this time!”

“And I might kill them,” said Geoffrey. “Will you take these?”

He handed Rohese the ominous bundle he carried under his arm and the chalice. He would need both hands free if he were to fight Malger and Drogo a second time. He drew his dagger, picked up his sword, and was ready. Clutching the bundle and cup, Rohese followed warily.

To Geoffrey’s profound relief, the tunnel leading to the woods was only a short distance, and then they were out in the fresh air. He motioned for Rohese to remain where she was, while he crept around in the darkness, looking for signs that Malger and Drogo were lying in ambush. He imagined that they would not be expecting him to leave the underground cavern via the woods, but that he would return to the bedchamber so he would not be outside the safety of the castle walls. Therefore he did not really anticipate that they would be waiting, but only a fool would not be cautious.

When he was certain that the Earl’s henchmen were not lurking nearby, he turned his attention to the hole that marked the tunnel’s entrance. Mabel had been right when she said that no one would find it unless they knew where to look. It was buried deep in a hawthorn thicket, and emerged near the riverside path. Taking Rohese by the hand, partly to ensure that she did not lag behind, and partly because she was frightened and it seemed to calm her, Geoffrey strode towards the village. Rohese was soon out of breath from trying to match his rapid pace, but valiantly trotted along beside him.

“What will you do now?” she gasped. “Will you look for the Earl’s men and kill them? Or will you look for the man who murdered your father?”

“How do you know it was a man who murdered him?” asked Geoffrey. “You said you could not tell whether the voice belonged to a man or a woman.”

“I suppose I did,” said Rohese. “But Godric said the person who killed him was one of you. That is all he kept saying. I cannot imagine Joan knifing a man in the stomach, so it must have been Walter, Stephen, or Henry. They are all mean and vicious. Poor Julianna has had to pretend to be a boy to escape their foul attentions, and none of them will pay for the houses to be mended in the village and they are falling about our ears.”

“Can you remember Godric’s exact words?” asked Geoffrey, trying to force himself to be patient with her rambling. He glanced down to ensure that she still held the grisly bundle. “What precisely did he say when he lay dying?”

“I have already told you,” she said. “And he certainly did not say who had rammed the dagger into his bowels-or I would not have assumed it was you, would I?”

“Right,” said Geoffrey, forcing himself not to snap. “But tell me again exactly what he said. There may be something of importance that you might have overlooked.”

She shook her head firmly. “You will be angry if I tell you his precise words.”

“I will not be angry,” said Geoffrey, thinking that he very well might be if she continued to prove so irritating with her tantalising fragments of information.

“Sir Godric said that his whelps had killed him at last,” she said, glancing at him nervously. “He kept calling his children things like his ‘brood,’ and his ‘litter.’ He really was not very polite.”

“I would not be either, if one of them had killed me. Did he mention anyone by name?”

“Yes,” said Rohese, after some serious thought. “He mentioned Walter, Stephen, Henry, Hedwise, Bertrada, Joan, Olivier, and Enide. Oh, and you, of course, but he called you Godfrey. He cursed each one of you in turn.”

“But he did not indicate which one might have killed him?” asked Geoffrey, exasperated.

“I have already told you, no,” said Rohese, with a long-suffering sigh. “He just said his brood had killed him-as though you had all come and done it together. Then he cursed you all, and Norbert the scribe, too. He was just starting on Francis the physician when he died.”

That, Geoffrey realised with disappointment, told him nothing more than that Godric was railing against virtually everyone who had come into contact with him over the past few months. And one thing was clear: his family was unlikely to co-operate over his killing. Their hatreds ran deep enough that it would be only a matter of time before one of them betrayed another in a fit of pique, or because it might give him an advantage over the others. Even though they were united in battling with the Earl of Shrewsbury over Godric’s will, Geoffrey was certain it would not be long before the uneasy truce would be broken.

“But what will you do now?” he asked Rohese, dragging his thoughts away from his kinsmen. “Do you want to return to the castle? Or shall I escort you somewhere else?”

“Will you be at the castle?”

“No,” said Geoffrey. “Not for a while, at least. I want to talk to Helbye.”

“I do not want to be there if you are not,” said Rohese, fearful again. She jumped as an animal rustled among the leaves at the side of the path and Geoffrey raised his sword.

“Then you can stay with Sergeant Helbye tonight,” said Geoffrey. “He will not let anything happen to you.”

“Can I not stay with you?” she said. “I would feel safer. You have rescued me twice now-once from the Earl and once from Malger and Drogo.” She hesitated. “Now that Sir Godric has gone, I could come to you. …”

“Thank you, but I will not be here long,” said Geoffrey quickly.

He was certain he was old enough to be her father, and wondered what Enide could have been thinking of, to thrust a child into the clutches of a man like Godric. But at least Joan had shown some sense over Julian, or Geoffrey realised that he might have been leading two whores to safety, not one.

“But what shall I do?” whispered Rohese. “Sir Godric is dead. Enide is dead. Joan will not have me back after I defied her over the Earl. And I have no trade, other than as a chambermaid. I will not serve that stingy Walter, nor that crafty Stephen.”

“We will see tomorrow. Perhaps there is something you could do at Rwirdin,” said Geoffrey wearily. They had reached the village, and the church was a dark mass at the side of the road. “Do you mind waiting for me for a moment? There is something I need to do.”

She glanced around nervously. “Will you be long?”

“I hope not,” said Geoffrey. “I want Father Adrian to take … I need him to bury it properly, where it belongs.”

Wordlessly, she handed him the bundle containing the head and the chalice, and followed him through the churchyard to Father Adrian’s house. A candle burned within, and Geoffrey thought he could hear voices. It was late, but Geoffrey supposed priests might be called upon at any time of the day or night for spiritual guidance or various other parish emergencies. He knocked softly, hearing the voices suddenly stilled.

“Yes?” called Adrian after a moment. “Who is there?”

“Geoffrey Mappestone from the castle. Will you come out? I need to see you about something.”

There was a short pause, and Adrian opened the door. He looked strained and tired, but stood aside for Geoffrey to enter his house. Rohese closed the door behind them and watched.

Geoffrey put his bundle on the table and stood back. “I have found it,” he said, gesturing for Adrian to unwrap the blanket.

Curiously, Adrian peeled back the covers to reveal the sad object within. He caught his breath in a strangled cry and backed away.

“I am sorry,” said Geoffrey softly. “I did not know how else to tell you. Will you bury it with her body?”

“With whose body?” asked Adrian shakily.

“With Enide’s body, of course,” said Geoffrey, regarding him askance.

“Hardly!” said Adrian, raising a shaking hand to rub his chin. “Unless you do not care with whom she shares a grave. That is not Enide’s head.”

“What?” exclaimed Geoffrey, startled. “But this must be her!”

“It is not Enide!” said Rohese, as startled as was the priest. “You never told me you thought that, Sir Geoffrey, or I would have told you that you were wrong.”

“Well, how many corpses are there at Goodrich missing their heads?” cried Geoffrey, looking from one to the other in confusion.

“I am beginning to wonder the same thing,” said Adrian sombrely, regarding Geoffrey with troubled eyes. “But I can assure you that this not Enide’s.”

“How can you be sure?” asked Geoffrey. “Look again. You must be mistaken.”

“I am not mistaken,” said Adrian. He indicated a figure standing in the shadows holding something carefully in both hands. “Because this man has just brought me Enide’s head.”

Mark Ingram stepped forward importantly and set his bundle on the table next to the one that Geoffrey had brought. With a flourish like something a juggler might have employed, he plucked away the cloth that covered it, and revealed the severed head that lay beneath, setting it upright on the stump that had been its neck when it tipped to one side. Geoffrey sank down onto a bench, and regarded the face about which he had wondered for so long.

Enide had possessed thick brown hair, darker than Geoffrey’s, and the teeth that were bared in a disconcerting grimace were white and strong. But the skin was discoloured and rotten, and Geoffrey could not tell whether she had been beautiful in life or not.

“She looks like you,” said Ingram to Geoffrey, glancing from one to the other.

Adrian silenced him with a glare, while Rohese ran from the house with her hands over her eyes.

“Is it really her?” asked Geoffrey, tearing his eyes from his sister’s face to look at the priest. “Is this really Enide?”

“It is Enide,” said Adrian unsteadily. He came to sit next to Geoffrey on the bench, and they stared at the head together. “I would know her anywhere.”

“But Enide died at the end of last summer,” objected Geoffrey. “It seems to me that this poor woman has not been dead three weeks!”

“You are wrong, Geoffrey,” said Adrian. “This is Enide without question. And she did die last summer. I saw her body, remember?”

“Ask the physician,” said Geoffrey, his thoughts spinning. He had encountered many dead during his life as a soldier and, although no expert, was certainly able to tell whether a person had been dead three weeks or four months. “This is not the head of a person dead since September.”

Adrian looked away. “Please cover her,” he whispered.

When Ingram did not move, Geoffrey snatched the cloth from him, and draped it over the head. Geoffrey saw that the priest was deathly white, and his eyes were hollow with shock. It had been a shock for Geoffrey too-for he had not imagined that he would set eyes on the face of a sister so long in her grave-but he had not known her as Adrian had, and his grief was not so ragged and raw.

“And how do you happen to possess my sister’s head so suddenly, Master Ingram?” Geoffrey asked, thinking that a few days ago, he could never have imagined uttering such a sentence.

Ingram’s eyes glittered. “That is information which will not come free. That silver chalice you seem to have found again will make an acceptable payment.”

Geoffrey was across the room and had the young soldier by the throat almost before he had finished speaking.

“I think I misheard you, Ingram,” he whispered menacingly, holding the soldier up against the wall by his neck so that his feet barely touched the ground.

“Geoffrey, please!” said Adrian, coming to pull at his arm. “I want no violence in my house. It stands on hallowed ground.”

“Not far to go for a burial, then,” said Geoffrey, not relinquishing his vice-like grip on Ingram. “Now, where did you get it?”

“I found it!” squeaked Ingram, the malicious glint in his eyes replaced by fear. “Please! I cannot breathe! Let me go!”

“Let him down, Geoffrey,” said Adrian, tugging harder. “I do not want more filthy murders committed, and I will not stand by and watch one happening under my very nose.”

“Where did you find it?” demanded Geoffrey, ignoring him and giving Ingram a shake.

“In the churchyard,” gasped Ingram. He lashed out in a feeble attempt to escape, but Geoffrey leaned his weight against the struggling soldier to pin down the flailing arms. Ingram shrieked.

Geoffrey felt his dagger hauled from his belt and shoved at his side. He turned to the priest in surprise.

“Enough!” said Adrian, firmly. “There will be no more violence! Let him go, Geoffrey.”

The priest held the knife awkwardly, demonstrating that he had little experience with weapons. Geoffrey turned his attention back to Ingram. “Where in the churchyard did you find it?”

He gasped suddenly as the dagger dug into him, and Ingram went sliding to the floor. Geoffrey gaped at the priest in astonishment.

“I said enough!” shouted Adrian angrily. “I want no more violence!”

“Not so much as to prevent you from stabbing me,” said Geoffrey, holding his side. “God’s teeth, man! That hurt!”

“You were going to strangle him,” raged Adrian. “In my house-on consecrated ground!”

“Whereas you have just knifed me,” retorted Geoffrey. “On consecrated ground! You do not know me very well, priest! I would not have strangled that snivelling little dog, although God knows he deserves it.”

“Your eyes are red with the blood lust of killing!” snapped Adrian, defensively.

“They are red because there is sand in them,” shouted Geoffrey.

“Tell me, Mark,” said Adrian, pushing Geoffrey away and kneeling next to Ingram, who half sat, half lay against the wall, gasping and clutching his throat. “Where did you find it?”

“Go to hell!” Ingram croaked hoarsely. “I will never tell you now! Even if you were to give me that chalice.”

“Please, Mark,” said Adrian. “Look, here is the chalice. Take it. But tell Sir Geoffrey what he would like to know.”

Ingram scrambled to his feet, and snatched the silver cup from Adrian’s hand. Then he spat, straight into the priest’s face, and darted through the door, taking the chalice with him.

“Oh,” said Adrian, looking at the dagger he still held, and wiping his face with his sleeve.

“‘Oh,’ indeed,” said Geoffrey, sinking down on the bench, his hand still to his side. “Now what do you suggest? Shall we chase after him and offer him the church silver if he will answer our so-politely-put questions?”

“I was doing what I thought was right,” said Adrian defensively. He flung Geoffrey’s dagger away from him in sudden disgust, while the knight twisted awkwardly to see if Adrian’s nasty jab had damaged his chain-mail. “I thought he might tell us where he had found her if we treated him with kindness, rather than roughness.”

“Then clearly you do not know him very well, either,” said Geoffrey. “Ingram is absolutely capable of digging up a grave in order to make a profit. He has been ferreting around in the village and asking questions of all sorts of people about Enide, my father’s poisoning, and the death of that drunken servant-Torva. I wondered why. Now it is clear he was bent on extortion.”

“No!” protested Adrian. “His father is my verger, and Mark Ingram himself has been on God’s holy Crusade. He would not do something so despicable.”

“Really?” said Geoffrey. “So you think his demand for my chalice in return for information was so that he could make a donation to the poor, do you?”

“It is possible,” said Adrian. “You are too quick to see the evil in people.”

“And you are too quick to see good that is not there,” snapped Geoffrey. He rubbed his sore side and sighed. “Arguing will get us nowhere. Are you sure that second head belonged to Enide?”

“For God’s sake, yes!” cried Adrian. “How many more times must I tell you? It is my Enide!”

“All right,” said Geoffrey, unnerved by the priest’s sudden display of emotion. He stood. “I must take Rohese to Helbye. Then I need to talk to the physician to ask what he discovered about the bed. And then we will bury Enide and whoever that other poor woman was.”

The priest nodded, fighting to bring himself under control. Geoffrey left him and collected Rohese from where she sat crying softly under a tree. Miserably, she trailed after him along the muddy lane to where Helbye’s house stood. Geoffrey knocked at the door and waited.

Suddenly, the door was wrenched open and Helbye shot out, wielding his sword. Geoffrey, not anticipating that he would be attacked by someone he considered a friend, was completely unprepared to parry the hacking sword as it swept toward him. He saw the glittering blade begin to descend, and knew that he would not be able to move quickly enough to avoid it.

Rohese’s shrill scream ripped through the air, making Helbye falter just long enough to allow Geoffrey to dodge out of the way of the wickedly slicing blade, although it passed so close that he felt the breeze of it on his cheek. He had hauled his own sword from his belt to meet the next blow before his brain had even started to question why his sergeant should be trying to chop him in half.

“Will!” he yelled. “What are you doing, man?”

“Sir Geoffrey!” gasped Helbye in startled horror. He gazed from the knight to the sword in his own hand. “My God! I almost killed you!”

“So I noticed,” said Geoffrey, putting his weapon away. “What has happened to lead you to give friendly visitors this sort of welcome?”

Helbye looked both ways along the lane, and then hauled Geoffrey and Rohese inside, slamming the door behind them.

“Something dreadful is going on in this place,” he said in a whisper.

Geoffrey did not need to be told that the village and its castle were not all a pleasantly prosperous settlement should be. He looked around the house’s single room. Helbye’s wife sat on the floor near the hearth, while in front of her lay the prostrate form of Francis the physician. Despite her most valiant efforts, Francis was bleeding to death from a wound in his side. Geoffrey looked from the dying man to Helbye in confusion.

“Ingram did it,” said Helbye tiredly. “God knows why. I heard a scuffle outside, and went to see what was going on. I found Master Francis clutching his side, and saw Ingram racing away up the lane as though the very hounds of hell were on his heels.”

“They may well be, soon,” said Geoffrey, doubting that the spiteful young soldier would be able to lie and bluff his way out of this mess: even the heroes of the Crusades could not be permitted to swagger around the countryside and kill whosoever they pleased.

Geoffrey knelt next to Francis and addressed Helbye. “Has he said anything?”

At the sound of his voice, Francis opened his eyes and gave a ghastly smile.

“You brought a devil home from the Holy Land, Geoffrey Mappestone. What changed the lad? He was never so vile when he was a boy.”

“Was he not?” asked Geoffrey, unconvinced. “He has been pretty unpleasant ever since I have known him. But why has he done this to you? What could you have said to lead him to murder?”

“Nothing,” breathed Francis, closing his eyes. “He came towards me smiling and then, without the slightest provocation, he plunged his dagger into me. And do not try to tell me that I will live. I am a physician-I know a fatal wound when I see one.”

“He just stabbed you? With no explanation?” Geoffrey was nonplussed. The physician’s shabby robe and dirty clothes clearly indicated that he was not wealthy, and therefore would not be worth robbing. And Geoffrey found it difficult to believe that someone would kill an old man for no reason at all, even the aggressive and cowardly Ingram.

“I was looking for you anyway,” whispered Francis. “I did as you asked-I went to the castle and inspected the mattress. But there was nothing amiss with it. You were wrong: there are no poisons hidden in any part of the bed that I could find.”

“Are you sure?” asked Geoffrey, disappointed. He had been convinced that his deduction had been correct.

“One can never be sure with poisons,” said Francis, a touch of his characteristic smugness back in his voice. “But I am reasonably certain that the mattress is innocent of Godric’s death. It must be something else. The rugs, perhaps.”

“Well, it does not matter,” said Geoffrey, “so you should not tax yourself about it now. Rest.”

“Rest for what?” asked Francis. “So that I can spend longer dying?”

“Will you fetch Father Adrian?” said Geoffrey to Helbye.

“Later,” said Francis as the sergeant rose. I have a while left to me yet.”

“You need to make your confession,” said Helbye. “You do not want to die unshriven.”

“Claptrap!” said the physician. “If I die sorry for my sins, then God will not care whether I have been absolved or not. You must have seen hundreds die unshriven on the field of battle, Will Helbye. Do you think God will not care for them because they did not confess?”

Helbye, very much a man who believed anything the Church told him, pursed his lips and did not deign to reply to such heresy.

“I will ride to Walecford for a physician,” he said stiffly.

“No! That man is a leech and a charlatan,” said Francis. “I want no physicians near me as I die.”

“Now you know how the rest of us feel,” muttered Helbye.

“Can we give you anything?” asked Geoffrey. “What about that potion you were making the day I first met you-the one that binds wounds? Can I fetch that?”

“Thank you, no,” said Francis with a shudder. “I have learned that the shock of having that applied tends to kill a patient in moments.”

His fingers fluttered over one of his pouches and Geoffrey helped him to open it.

“It is poppy powder for the pain,” the physician said weakly, drawing out a small packet. “Enide told me that you can read. Follow the instructions on the outside and make it up for me.”

Geoffrey unwrapped the package, and set about measuring the correct amount of liquid for the powder. He was on the verge of scattering it into a bowl of water when his attention was caught by the handwriting-a firm roundhand with a curiously archaic T. He had seen that writing before-on the parchments he had found hidden in Enide’s room. He stared at it, his thoughts whirling, until a sharp poke from Helbye’s wife brought him to his senses.

“Did you write these?” he asked Francis. “These instructions?”

“I did,” said Francis feebly. “Why? Can you not read them? That is a shame, because the pain has dimmed my eyes, and I cannot see them myself. But never mind, just add the whole packet. It matters not whether I die from the wound or from the medicine. Hurry up, boy! I suffer.”

“I can read it very well,” said Geoffrey, dumping the powder in the bowl and stirring it with his dagger. “Just as I have read other notes and messages written by you of late.”

“What are you talking about?” demanded Helbye’s wife. “Give that to me. He will be dead by the time you finish messing around with it.”

She snatched the bowl from Geoffrey, and helped the physician sip it until it had all been consumed. The lines of agony on Francis’s face eased, and his breathing became less laboured.

“‘Midnight on the fifth day of June,’” said Geoffrey, when Francis opened his eyes again. “‘The first day of August at Brockenhurst.’”

Helbye gave him an odd look, but knew better than to ask questions. His wife, however, did not, and pushed Geoffrey away from the physician roughly.

“Leave him be,” she said. “Make yourself useful and go to fetch Father Adrian.”

“No,” said Francis, as Geoffrey prepared to leave. “Stay with me for a while longer. I can see you have questions to ask, and I am of a mind to answer and make a clean breast of matters before I die.”

“You should do that with Father Adrian,” said Helbye’s wife critically. “Confessing to these two will not save you from the fires of Hell.”

“Neither will Father Adrian,” said Francis. “For my sins are great indeed, and I have something I need to ask of Sir Geoffrey.”

“You do?” asked Geoffrey uneasily.

“Only you are left now, young Geoffrey: Godric is murdered, Enide is murdered, Pernel is murdered. All have gone.”

“Who is Pernel?” asked Geoffrey. “The other woman who lost her head-the one I found in the tunnel?”

Francis looked blankly at him. “I do not understand what you are talking about. But Pernel was your brother Stephen’s wife. You never met her, but I know Norbert wrote to you in the Holy Land to tell you that she had died last year. She was with us.”

“With you?” asked Geoffrey, bewildered. “What do you mean?” He glanced up as Helbye’s wife made a circular motion near her temple with her hand to suggest that the old man might be delirious.

“Pernel was a part of our plan to save England from the vile clutches of that unnatural man,” said the priest. “As were Godric, Enide, and I.”

“Oh, no!” said Geoffrey in horror, as he realised what the old man was saying. “Do not tell me that Father Adrian was right, and that you were all a part of the plot to shoot King William Rufus in the New Forest last year-that you committed regicide!”

Francis gave a red-toothed smile. “We were certainly part of a plot. But that evil beast was slain by the hand of God long before we could put our plan into action.”

“The courtier called Tirel shot Rufus,” said Helbye, looking from Francis to Geoffrey in confusion. “And it was an accident. What are you two talking about?”

“I can only assume that there were others who felt like us,” said Francis, ignoring the sergeant. “And that they decided Rufus could not continue with his acts of debauchery and vice. Tirel killed him before we could take the action that we had planned.”

“Which was what?” asked Geoffrey coldly. He was not sure that there was a great difference between actually committing the crime, and planning a murder that failed only because someone else got there first.

“Rufus was due to spend time hunting in the New Forest later this year, and we intended to kill him there. But Tirel-damn him to Hell-killed him first and far too soon.”

“Too soon for what?” asked Geoffrey. “Too soon for Rufus certainly.”

“Before everything was in place,” said the physician. “People were not ready, and by the time we found out what had happened, it was too late for us to act.”

“But Enide did go to the New Forest,” said Geoffrey slowly. “According to one of the notes you wrote-and assuming that Adrian’s memory regarding the dates is accurate-it seems that she was somewhere nearby when Tirel shot Rufus.”

“She arrived after he died,” said the physician. “The roads were bad and her horse went lame. She did not reach Brockenhurst until three days after Rufus died, and by then Henry was King.”

Geoffrey was uncertain. “It seems odd that she should just happen to decide to make a visit to the New Forest, and that around the same time Tirel should just happen accidentally to shoot Rufus.”

“She went to assess Brockenhurst,” said the physician. “She went to learn the lay of the land, and to observe how that foul beast who called himself King managed his hunting days, so that we could adapt our plan accordingly. But as I said, she arrived too late. Rufus was already dead.”

“But how could you even consider such a dangerous venture?” cried Geoffrey, aghast. “It might have plunged the country into civil war, not to mention what might have happened had you been caught. Who would stand to gain from the cold-blooded murder of Rufus?”

“The whole country stood to gain,” mumbled Francis. “England needed to be rid of his oppressive laws and his evil suppression of the holy Church. And then, when Rufus was dead, we intended that the Duke of Normandy should come to take the throne. The Duke has been on God’s Crusade, so how could He fail to smile upon England’s fortunes with such a man wearing the crown?”

“Crusaders are no angels,” said Geoffrey. “And the will of God was the last thing on their minds as they looted, pillaged, and murdered their way to Jerusalem. But this is all beside the point. What were you thinking of? England was stable under Rufus. His laws might not have suited some people, but they were adequate.”

“He was a pervert!” snapped Francis. “He engaged in unnatural acts with his courtiers. Why do you think he never married? Why do you think he never presented England with an heir or acknowledged illegitimate children?”

“I imagine because he thought he would have time for such things later,” said Geoffrey. “He was only around forty. There was time enough to marry and provide an heir.”

“And we knew he would not have relinquished his hold on Normandy when the Duke returned from the Crusade,” said Francis, as if Geoffrey had not spoken. “Rufus would have kept from the Duke what was rightfully his-just as this present usurper is doing.”

Geoffrey started back in alarm. “Do not tell me that you are planning to kill King Henry, too?”

The physician said nothing. Geoffrey and Helbye exchanged a look of dismay.

“King Henry is due to go to Monmouth soon,” said Helbye in a soft voice. “The constable told me so when we were at Chepstow. Perhaps these plotters mean to strike then, when King Henry goes hunting in the Forest of Dene. King Henry loves to hunt every bit as much as Rufus did.”

Geoffrey took a deep breath and addressed Francis, who was becoming drowsy from the poppy powder. “But you will not kill a second king. You have just said all the plotters are dead. Godric, Enide, Pernel, and you.”

The physician smiled again. “I am dying, and I know that to kill is a terrible sin. But I am willing to risk the fires of eternal damnation by asking you to carry on our work.”

Geoffrey gazed at him in astonishment. “I do hope you are not asking me to kill King Henry for you!” he said, feeling that the request was so outrageous that it was almost laughable.

“He is rambling,” said Helbye in a whisper. “See how his eyes are unfocused? He does not know what he is saying.”

“I am not rambling,” said Francis irritably. “I love my country, and I would serve it any way I can, even as I die. I was glad when Rufus was killed, but I would die happier knowing that the rightful King-the Duke of Normandy-will wear the crown. He is a good and virtuous man, not like this grasping Henry. Please, join us.”

“I will not,” said Geoffrey firmly. “And I will do all in my power to prevent another death.”

Francis sighed. “No matter, then. I am sure the others will manage without you.”

“Others?” asked Geoffrey in horror. “What others? You said they were all dead.”

“I did not,” said Francis in a breathless whisper. “I said that Enide, Godric, Pernel, and I were dead. But there are others who think that the usurper King Henry should be ousted to allow the Duke to accede.”

“But this is a dreadful idea!” cried Geoffrey. “It must be stopped! The Earl of Shrewsbury waits in the wings like a vulture at a kill. If Henry is murdered and the Duke seizes the crown of England, the Earl will gain control of the country for certain. The last person you want ruling your precious England is the Earl of Shrewsbury.”

“The Duke would not permit Shrewsbury so much power,” said Francis weakly. “And anyway, Shrewsbury has his own estates to run in Normandy. He will not bother with England.”

“He is massing his strength in this area so that he will be ready to aid the Duke when he attacks England to seize the throne from Henry,” said Geoffrey. “Shrewsbury admitted as much himself. He claimed that the Duke would appoint him as regent.”

Francis shook his head. “The Duke would not leave England once he had taken the throne, and the country will be ruled by a just and noble leader who will make good laws.”

“But the Duke did not make good laws to rule Normandy before he pawned it so he could go Crusading,” objected Geoffrey. Loyal though he might be to the Duke, he was not blind to the fact that the weak and vacillating Robert of Normandy left a lot to be desired as far as leadership went.

But Geoffrey could see that his arguments were lost on the physician, whose eyes gleamed with the light of fanaticism. He studied the old man. He looked benign, grandfatherly almost, and yet had embarked upon a plot that would not only leave the King dead but that might plunge the country he professed to love into a state of anarchy.

“Is that why Ingram killed you?” he asked. “Because you are involved in a plot to kill King Henry?”

Francis’s eyes closed. “You are a fool, despite what Enide said about you. How could a boy like that know of our plans? We kept our group deliberately small, so that there would be less chance that someone would betray us.”

“So the group comprised my father, Enide, Stephen’s wife, and you,” said Geoffrey. “And who else? Father Adrian?”

Francis’s mouth opened in astonishment, and he gave a wheeze that Geoffrey thought was meant to be a laugh. “Adrian? Just because he was Enide’s lover does not mean that he shared our plans! The man is a weakling.”

Geoffrey’s still-aching side belied Adrian’s reputed aversion to violence. “Who, then? Olivier? He is a kinsman of the Earl of Shrewsbury and would have a good deal to gain.”

“He is an even greater weakling than the priest!” said Francis, with the ghost of a smile. “If you will not join us, you will get nothing more from me.”

“So that is why my father was being poisoned,” said Geoffrey, understanding slowly. “Because someone was trying to prevent him from killing every king foolish enough to take the English crown. And Enide was poisoned for the same reason.”

“Enide was certainly slain because of her involvement,” said Francis. “You see, Pernel was delighted to be a part of the plan that would rid England of Rufus. She was too open with her feelings on the matter, and someone at the castle betrayed her.”

“Stephen’s wife was murdered, too?” asked Geoffrey, confused.

“But Lady Pernel died of a falling sickness,” said Helbye’s wife, shaking her head to Geoffrey to indicate that the physician was speaking nonsense. “I was there. She emerged from the church and fell down dead. Half the village saw it happen.”

“It seems to me that Father Adrian’s masses are dangerous events,” said Geoffrey. “Enide, too, died after attending one of his services.”

“There are poisons that can make a person’s death appear to be a falling sickness,” said Francis. “Perhaps Adrian fed it to her in the Host. He acted most oddly after Enide’s death too-the man was blindly in love with her, and yet his grief was short and shallow.”

Geoffrey stared at him. He thought about what he had been told about Enide’s death. She had emerged from the church and Adrian had found her body shortly afterwards. Adrian had no one to corroborate his story, but no one had thought to disbelieve him. So, had Adrian killed her? But why? Was Adrian not a priest at all but an agent for one of the kings who Enide had plotted to kill? Since King Henry seemed to know that Goodrich was a hotbed of insurrection, it might make sense to place such an agent in it. But Henry had only been King for a few months, and Adrian had been at Goodrich for years. Geoffrey sighed. It made no sense.

“Godric was poisoned for his role in our plot,” Francis continued. “What other reason would there be to kill him?”

“His lands,” said Geoffrey. “Or because Goodrich Castle is stuffed full of his avaricious offspring who are desperate to lay their hands on his money.”

“You might be right,” said Francis, swallowing with difficulty. “Although I would not have credited any of that brood with choosing such a subtle poison that I have never been able to trace it.”

“It was in his room, I am sure,” said Geoffrey, thinking back to what he had reasoned as he sat with Godric’s body. “It was not in the food or the drink. It was not in the mattress.”

But it was certainly in the chamber, because Geoffrey had been ill each time he had slept in it. Geoffrey was a man who generally enjoyed robust good health, and was seldom ill. But he had felt unwell several times since arriving at Goodrich-mostly in the castle, although he had almost thrown up in Francis’s outhouse when he had visited the physician to ask about Godric’s alleged poisoning. Something clicked in Geoffrey’s mind, but Francis had slipped into a semi-conscious doze, and was no longer in a condition to engage in analytical conversation.

Geoffrey rubbed his eyes. “What a mess,” he said to Helbye. “Is there anyone in this godforsaken place who is not a murderer, or who would not like to be? Enide, this Pernel, and my father were aiming to kill Rufus; my father and the physician, cheated of killing Rufus, then set their sights on the death of King Henry. Meanwhile, someone was slowly poisoning my father; two others stabbed him during the night with different knives; there are at least two severed heads circulating; and someone has tried to poison me, and has shot at me twice in the woods. I tell you, Will, the Holy Land is nothing compared to this!”

Helbye raised his shoulders in a shrug. “It looks as though we should plan a visit to Monmouth soon, Sir Geoffrey,” he said stoically.

Early the following morning, long before the sun was up, Geoffrey waited impatiently by the river for Helbye. His horse snorted and pawed at the ground, its breath billowing out in great clouds of white, while his dog snuffled about in the grass. Mist rose from the silent river as it meandered glassily southwards, and the forest was silent and still.

Geoffrey had passed what remained of the night in Helbye’s house, spending most of it talking, for the elderly soldier was as reliable a friend as Geoffrey had in Goodrich. Helbye had listened in silence, not in the least bit unsettled by the devious plots that had been hatched in the castle. The sergeant had heard him sympathetically, and had said little, but the simple act of talking had allowed Geoffrey to clarify in his mind at least some twists and turns of the plot.

Geoffrey tensed as he heard a sound from the woods, and drew his sword in anticipation of a hostile encounter.

“Father Adrian!” he exclaimed, as the priest walked towards him. “Have you buried Enide yet?”

The priest shook his head. “I will do that when we return.”

“Return from where?” asked Geoffrey. “Where are you going?”

“With you,” said Adrian. “To Monmouth.”

“Not a chance,” said Geoffrey. “You would be too slow. And anyway, you might stab me again. Go back to your church and bury your dead.”

The priest looked down the river. “The head you brought to my house last night belonged to a woman who lived in the village, and who died in childbirth some months ago. I cannot imagine how you came to be in possession of it.”

“More to the point,” said Geoffrey, “how did she come to lose it?”

The priest was silent.

“Go and bury them, Father,” said Geoffrey, reluctant to talk to the priest, whose role in the plotting and subterfuge he had uncovered was still far from clear. “You should not leave heads sitting on your kitchen table-someone might find them, and then you would have some explaining to do.”

“I put them in the charnel house,” said Adrian. “I will bury them later, but today, I am coming with you.”

“No,” said Geoffrey. “You will not be able to keep up with us on foot, and anyway there might be some of that violence that you find so abhorrent.”

“I do not understand all this evil,” said Adrian softly. “Francis the physician has just informed me that he and the woman I loved more than life itself have been plotting murders together.”

“Go home,” said Geoffrey. “Francis will be needing you to give him last rites.”

“He is dead,” said Adrian. “It was when I heard his final confession that I knew I had to come with you. Perhaps I can save her yet. I can speak in her defence to King Henry.”

“Save who?” asked Geoffrey, removing his helmet and rubbing at his hair underneath. He wondered what could be keeping Helbye.

“Save Enide,” said Adrian.

“You would do better burying her decently,” said Geoffrey. “It is too late for anything else.”

“She is alive,” said Adrian.

“But you identified her head only last night,” pointed out Geoffrey, wondering if grief had robbed the priest of a few wits. “She cannot be alive without it.”

“I lied about that,” said Adrian, refusing to meet Geoffrey’s eyes. “It was not hers.”

“For God’s sake!” cried Geoffrey in exasperation. “What is going on? You say you saw her body. Then you say you saw her head. Are you now saying that you saw neither?”

“It was not her body outside the chapel,” said Adrian. He looked down at his sandalled feet. “I lied to protect Enide, and only I know that it was not her body in the grave that bears her name.”

Geoffrey gazed at him, the full implications of Adrian’s claim striking home for the first time. “Enide is alive?” he asked in a whisper. “My favourite sister is alive?”

Adrian nodded, more miserably than he should for a bearer of such glad tidings.

“But I saw her grave,” Geoffrey persisted. “And others saw her dead-Henry and Walter.”

Adrian still said nothing.

“How could she do this?” asked Geoffrey, bewildered. “How could she let those who love her believe she was dead?”

He recalled his grief when he had received the note bearing the news, and the emptiness he had felt when he knew the last and only pleasant tie with his family had been severed. He swallowed hard, and regarded Adrian doubtfully. No wonder Francis had noticed that Adrian’s grief for Enide had been brief and shallow. It was doubtless difficult to grieve for someone who was still alive.

“You used that other woman!” he said, the sudden loudness of his voice making his horse start. “Walter and Henry did not see Enide at all: they saw the body of the poor woman who had died in childbirth the day before-who you told me was in the parish coffin waiting to be buried that day! You said you had left the church later than everyone else on the day that Enide was killed, because you had stayed to say a mass for this woman.”

Adrian nodded miserably.

“And you sliced the head from this woman’s shoulders so that no one would be able to identify her,” said Geoffrey. “Why? How could you do such a thing-you who claim to dislike violence? I am not surprised you felt obliged to pray for her after everyone else had gone!”

“I did it for Enide!” protested Adrian. “She came to me in great fear and said that one of her brothers or her sister was going to kill her. The poor lady had already been poisoned-like Godric-and so I had no reason to disbelieve her. She was so frightened that I decided I would do anything to help her. We agreed that we would use the body of the woman who lay in my church to make everyone believe Enide was dead-so that she would be safe.”

“But chopping the head from a corpse!” said Geoffrey in disgust. “The Crusaders could learn a good deal from you!”

“Actually, the decapitation was not part of the arrangement,” said Adrian shakily. “The plan was that I should bury a shroud filled with earth in the other woman’s grave, and then say that I had found Enide’s body in the churchyard. I was immediately to seal ‘Enide’s’ corpse in a coffin-to stop your family from looking at it. My shock was as great as anyone’s when Henry-against my protestations-dragged the lid from the coffin to look inside. Enide told me later that she knew he, or one of the others, would not be prevented from looking, and so she had hacked off the head to hide the fact that the corpse was not hers.”

“And what of Enide’s hand?” asked Geoffrey coldly. “The one that you told me was withered from her childhood accident? Did they not look at that for identification? Or was that a lie too?”

“That was the truth,” said Adrian. “I suppose they were so shocked to see the body headless, that they did not think of such things. Anyway, the corpse was tightly wound in its shroud, and it would have been some effort to undo it.”

“This is horrible!” said Geoffrey, gazing at the priest in distaste. “No wonder you were surprised when I showed you what I had found in the room at the end of the tunnel. It was the head of that poor woman whose body you so callously used for your own devices, was it not?”

Adrian nodded miserably. “I searched the churchyard for that head so that I could bury it decently,” he said. “But Enide refused to tell me what she had done with it.

Geoffrey took a deep breath. The priest seemed genuinely contrite, but how far could Geoffrey trust him? He had already admitted to weaving a fabric of lies around the events leading to Enide’s death, so how did Geoffrey know he had decided to be truthful at last? Francis had suggested that Adrian might have killed both Pernel and Enide at his masses, but now the priest was claiming that Enide still lived and Geoffrey no longer knew what to believe.

He took a deep breath, oddly relieved that the grisly head he had bundled in the blanket had not been Enide’s after all. And the other skull? Geoffrey himself had already suggested that Ingram would not have been loath to dig up a grave to acquire himself a head that he could use to force Geoffrey to pay for information. And that, thought the knight with sudden realisation, was exactly what Ingram had done.

“Mabel, the buttery-steward at the castle, told me that she was leaving Goodrich because her sister’s grave had been desecrated,” he said to Adrian. “She assumed that the Earl of Shrewsbury had done it, because he has such a dreadful reputation. Walter said it was dogs. But we know different, do we not, Father Adrian?”

“The head Ingram brought does look as if it belongs to Mabel’s sister,” admitted Adrian sombrely. “The poor woman died of an ague about three weeks ago.”

“And that is why you allowed Ingram to escape when I asked him where it had come from,” said Geoffrey. “You did not want me to press him to reveal where he unearthed this poor head-because you intended me to believe it was Enide’s. Or did you charge him to dig it up, unaware that I was bringing you a similar gift?”

“No!” cried Adrian, horrified. “Ingram has been fascinated by this whole business from the start. He has been ferreting about and asking questions of just about everybody. He managed to drag out from your father’s food-taster that Enide had been seen leaving my house after she was supposed to have been dead. Ingram has been obsessed with Enide’s death-just like you.”

So that was why the food-taster was so reluctant to speak to anyone, Geoffrey thought. He knew he had stumbled upon a plot that would have been very dangerous to investigate further-and that seemed to involve murdered corpses wandering through the village.

“But Ingram’s unwholesome interest in my affairs still explains nothing,” said Geoffrey coldly.

Adrian sighed. “Ingram presented me with his … find, and asked if it could be Enide. I told him it could, because I wanted him to cease his questioning before someone did it for him. He would not be the first around here to be silenced for his curiosity: I do not think that Godric’s first food-taster drowned in the castle moat by accident.”

Geoffrey was sure he was right.

“Then Ingram told me that he planned to make you pay dearly for the information he had gathered,” said Adrian. “He claims that you sometimes prevented him from looting in the Holy Land, and that he came back poorer than he should have done.”

Geoffrey had forbidden his men to loot on certain occasions-especially when the victims were already on the brink of starvation or he felt that they had suffered enough at the grasping hands of the Crusader army. But he had not realised that his few attempts to instil a sense of compassion and decency in his troops would have such far-reaching consequences.

“Did Ingram tell you what kind of information he had amassed from his enquiries?” he asked.

“No, and I knew he did not have the real truth,” said Adrian. “I was afraid he would make things up that would mislead you, and that would put you in danger when you went to investigate them.”

“So you prevented me from forcing him to admit that he had excavated Mabel’s sister’s grave to get a head,” said Geoffrey. “You did not want me to guess that Enide might still be alive-which I would have done had Ingram told the truth, because there were two severed heads in your kitchen, and yet neither was hers. You would have been exposed as the liar you are, and Enide’s secret would have been out.”

“I was only thinking of you,” said Adrian tiredly. “Believe what you will, but I have been scurrying around trying to make amends for others” evil deeds for weeks now. Of course I wanted to protect Enide, but I did not-do not-want to see you harmed in all this mess. I thought if I could keep the truth from you for a few more days, you would leave anyway.”

“Francis told us that there were others who intended to kill King Henry,” said Geoffrey, thoughtfully. “If Enide is still alive, as you claim, then I think she may well be planning to visit King Henry to demonstrate first-hand her penchant for regicide.”

“You are quite wrong,” said Adrian forcefully. “I spoke with her after you left my house last night. She set off several hours ago to become a nun at Glowecestre Abbey.”

“Enide has already left?” cried Geoffrey aghast.

Adrian nodded. “She often said she was considering taking the veil.”

“The only veil Enide will be considering is the one that will cover King Henry’s corpse!” cried Geoffrey. “How could you believe her after all this lying?”

“You are talking about your sister,” said Adrian coldly. “She cares deeply for you.”

“So she might have done, once,” said Geoffrey. “But a long time has passed, and it seems we are both different people. I thought I knew her from her letters, but you yourself have told me she could not write. I have been living under a false impression of Enide for twenty years. The child I left behind would not have murdered kings, or chopped off the heads of corpses! I neither know nor understand the woman she has become.”

“Then do what you will, but remember that she always said she liked you better than the others.”

“That is probably because I was not here to argue with. But enough of this; here is Helbye. And Barlow with him,” he added in surprise, seeing the two soldiers picking their way along the path on sturdy mounts. “Go home, Adrian. You have done more than enough harm already.”

“I must try to put an end to all this,” said Adrian, grasping the reins of Geoffrey’s horse. “I will come with you, and explain to the King what has been happening.”

“You would be a fool to try,” said Geoffrey. “Do you think he will pat your head and allow you to leave after you admit that you knew of the plot to kill his brother?”

“But I do not believe that Enide was trying to kill Rufus,” objected Adrian. “She went to Brockenhurst to warn him. And she has no intention of harming King Henry. You are wrong!”

“I am not,” said Geoffrey wearily. “And you know it. Francis the physician must have told you what he told me-that his little gang planned to kill Rufus, and now want to kill King Henry.”

“No!” cried Adrian desperately. “Enide would never harm anyone.”

Geoffrey regarded him sombrely. “Really? I think she has already taken someone’s life.”

He hesitated. It was not pleasant to see his cherished memories of his younger sister so brutally shattered, but Enide, it seemed, had been more treacherous and cunning than the rest of the Mappestones put together. Or was he misinterpreting what he had learned, to draw grotesquely inaccurate conclusions?

Adrian was gazing at him. “Who do you think Enide has killed?”

“She told you that she was in fear of her life from one of the family, so you helped her steal and desecrate the corpse of a woman who had considerately timed her death to coincide with Enide’s need for a body.”

The blood drained from Adrian’s face. “I see what you are thinking, but you are wrong! That woman passed away in childbirth.”

“And was Enide present when this woman died?” asked Geoffrey. “Did she help the midwife?”

“Well, yes, she did, actually” said Adrian. “But Enide did do kind things from time to time.”

“I am sure she did,” said Geoffrey bitterly.

“It did not seem such a terrible crime to use the body of one already taken to God to save the life of another,” said Adrian weakly.

“That does not sound like your own logic, Father,” said Geoffrey. “I imagine that is how Enide argued her case. But let us continue. Anyone who has had any dealings with my brother Henry will know that he would not stand by and accept the word of a priest that his sister was dead. He would want to see for himself. Enide knew this perfectly well, and deprived the corpse of its head, secreting it away in a niche in Godric’s secret tunnel-it would not do for it to be found, because then everyone would suspect that Enide was not dead at all. After all, how many decapitated corpses are there around here?”

He and Adrian exchanged a glance that suggested there were rather more than most people imagined. Adrian opened his mouth to speak, but Geoffrey hurried on.

“So Enide was then free to do whatever she pleased. Even her fellow conspirators-my father and Francis-did not know she was still alive, and she allowed her family to grieve without the slightest regret. Now she tells you she is going to Glowecestre to take the veil, and you believe her?”

“Yes, I do,” said Adrian sincerely. “She said that she wants to atone for desecrating the corpse.”

“And then there was Stephen’s wife, Pernel,” said Geoffrey. “Pernel was indiscreet about the plan to kill Rufus, and so she was killed. I wonder who arranged that.”

“But Pernel died of a falling sickness,” said Adrian, startled. “It happened just after mass. Pernel was not a good woman-she was unfaithful to her husband and she was greedy and scheming-and everyone assumed she had died because God had punished her for setting foot in His church.”

“Do you believe that?” asked Geoffrey sceptically. “If so, it does not offer much hope for the rest of us miserable sinners.”

Adrian shook his head, then nodded, then made a gesture of exasperation. “I do not know! I do not understand anything about this business. But if Enide really did embark on all this subterfuge-and I say if-then her reasons would have been purely honourable.”

“Reasons for murder are seldom honourable,” said Geoffrey.

Without waiting for the priest’s reply, he steered his destrier around and headed for the path that led to Monmouth, some six miles distant, with his sergeant and man-at-arms close behind him. He glanced round briefly, jamming his conical helmet on his head. The priest stood dejectedly in the middle of the path, looking like a man who had been through a battle.

‘Barlow insisted on coming,” said Sergeant Helbye, once the track had widened sufficiently to allow him to draw abreast of Geoffrey. “He heard that Ingram has murdered the physician, and I think he wants to prove to you that it had nothing to do with him.”

“I know that,” said Geoffrey. “It was Ingram who was asking all the questions about my family and complaining that I had prevented him from looting, not Barlow.”

“Why were you shouting at the priest?” asked Helbye. “Father Adrian is a gentle man and is greatly loved by the villagers.”

“He is a gentle man who has been party to murder, the desecration of corpses, treachery, and lies and deceit beyond your wildest imaginings,” said Geoffrey wearily, sorry that a man like Adrian should fall victim to Goodrich’s creeping evil. “I should take a torch and burn this whole place to the ground, and rid the world of it! That poor Earl of Shrewsbury does not know what he is letting himself in for!”

“I am sure he will manage,” said Helbye. “But what ails you? Is it your family again?”

“I should say,” said Geoffrey bitterly. “I have just learned from Father Adrian that Enide is alive and well. And I suspect that having failed to slay one king for the simple reason that someone got there before her, she has her murderous sights set on another.”

“Enide?” asked Helbye, giving the matter some serious thought. “Yes, I suppose I could see her doing all that.”

“What?” exclaimed Geoffrey, startled “You believe my accusations so readily?”

“Oh, yes,” said Helbye, as if it were obvious. “You left here a long time ago, while Enide stayed to grow up with your older brothers and sister. So, is it really surprising that she lost the gentleness you remember? By the time she was twenty, she was just as bad as the rest of them for plotting and fighting. She was not downright evil or anything like that, but just like the others-greedy, bitter, and ill-humoured. I always wondered why you singled her out for such affection. Begging your pardon, sir.”

“But she wrote such beautiful things,” said Geoffrey sadly. “She told me about the wildflowers at springtime, and about poetry she had read or ballads she had heard sung. And Father Adrian said she was kind and gentle.”

“You cannot trust letters, lad,” said Helbye sagely. “If you believe her to be some kind of saint on the basis of some silly scrawls on parchment, then you need your wits seeing to. But there is a lot about this that I do not understand. The physician said Enide is going to kill King Henry, but Father Adrian, who is a good and honest man, believes you are wrong.”

“The good and honest Father Adrian still knows more than he is saying,” said Geoffrey. “Either that, or he is one of the most gullible men in the kingdom.”

“So what exactly is happening?” asked Helbye. “Are we off to save the King?”

“I suppose so,” said Geoffrey. “Enide and some others apparently developed a plot to kill Rufus in the New Forest, but someone beat them to it-they intended Rufus to have died this coming summer, when the Duke of Normandy would be ready to take the throne. But Tirel’s shot caught them before they were fully ready, and King Henry seized the crown instead. Now Enide plans to rid England of King Henry, too, to provide the Duke with another chance.”

“But Rufus’s death was an accident,” protested Helbye. “Tirel claims he did not mean to kill him.”

“Actually, Tirel is now claiming that he did not fire the arrow at all,” said Geoffrey. “But whether he did or not is irrelevant, because it seems plans were afoot to kill Rufus anyway. The wrong successor took advantage of the empty throne, and now a second murder is required.”

“Who, other than Enide, is involved in all this?” asked Helbye, accepting the twists and turns of the plot far more stoically than Geoffrey had done.

“According to the physician, the cabal comprised himself, Enide, Stephen’s wife, and my father. There were also others, but he declined to mention more names. I suppose Stephen might be one of the plotters, since his wife was involved.”

“So, what about this poisoning business?” asked Helbye. “Do you think that was done by someone loyal to the King to prevent the plot from hatching?”

“Godric and Enide thought so,” said Geoffrey. “But their alleged poisonings have nothing to do with anything-no one poisoned Godric and no one poisoned Enide.”

“How so?” asked Helbye, bewildered. “Sir Godric was dying from the toxins in his body.”

“I did not say that he was not being poisoned,” said Geoffrey. “I said that no one was responsible. Well, not directly, anyway. Father became ill when he handed the running of the manor to Walter and Stephen. In order to pass the time, he took up painting, using pigments that were made by the physician, who enjoyed playing with different compounds. It was the paint that poisoned father. It made Enide ill too, when she slept in his chamber so that she could take advantage of the secret tunnel for her clandestine meetings.”

“Paint?” queried Helbye. “How? Surely they did not drink it?”

“No, but it must create poisonous miasmas. I felt unwell each time I slept in my father’s chamber. At first, I assumed that I had caught an ague from falling in the river. Later, I thought it was the after-effects of the ergot. But really, it was the paint. Francis told me that he used lead powder in the darkest pigments; perhaps that was responsible. Then I experienced the same nausea in Francis’s laboratory where he was making the stuff, as I did in father’s room.”

That, and the idea of Hedwise’s fish sauce being added to it, he recalled with distaste.

Helbye rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “For a physician, Master Francis was not a healthy man. My wife tells me that it was something of a joke in the village-who wants to go to a medical man who is always ill himself? Anyway, I wonder whether he could have made himself sick with these paints of his, too.”

“He did,” said Geoffrey, as something else clicked in his mind. “He offered me a physic that day because he felt unwell himself and was about to brew something to alleviate the symptoms. And my dog knew-he ran away from Francis’s garden, and even abandoned a stolen ham so that he would not have to stay. He must have smelt the stuff. How could I have been so blind, with these facts staring me in the face all along?”

“It is hardly blindingly obvious, lad,” said Helbye consolingly.

“But it is obvious, Will! The poison could not have been food or drink, because both had been tested by Francis, and either Torva or Ine. Therefore, it had to be something to do with the room itself. It was not the mattress, and there is very little else in the room except the rugs and the chest. There are not that many rugs and it is a large chamber anyway, while Rohese and Mabel both spent some time in the chest without ill-effects. But there are plenty of paintings. Father used every available patch of wall for his art. And he always insisted that the windows remained closed, thus concentrating the fumes.”

“And Enide and Sir Godric both became ill around the time that Sir Godric gave up his manor to Walter and Stephen, so he assumed he was being poisoned because they wanted him out of the way once he had started to delegate his powers,” said Helbye, nodding.

“Quite. He saw that the onset of his illness corresponded with the time he began to relinquish his authority, and drew the conclusion that there was a direct link. The link was actually indirect: the more ill he became, the more responsibilities he needed to delegate to his sons; and the less time he spent running his estate, the more time he spent painting.”

“And the more painting he did, the more sick he became,” finished Helbye. “I see.”

They rode in silence for a while, until Helbye spoke again.

“Actually, I do not see. You told me that Sir Godric painted other chambers, too. Joan was never ill, and neither was Rohese, and everyone in the village knows that their chamber was painted, because Joan was so angry about it.”

“I think that was because only the dark colours contained whatever it was that made father and Enide ill,” said Geoffrey. “Father painted the other chambers in pale greens and yellows, saving the blacks and browns for his own chamber. Rohese never slept in father’s room, because she did not like the paintings-luckily for her, or she might have been dying, too. When Enide insisted that Father make use of her chamber-ostensibly because she was being kind to Rohese, but really so she could use the tunnel-she saved Rohese from being poisoned, but fell victim to it herself.”

“But someone still stabbed Sir Godric, lad,” said Helbye. “Twice, you tell me. And someone put ergot in your wine and broth, and later hid the evidence. And someone went to some trouble to see that you would be found asleep in the chamber where Godric was murdered. Was that Enide, too?”

Geoffrey sighed. “I cannot see how,” he said. “I suppose she might have come up the tunnel while I lay drugged, but I do not see how she could have arranged for me to be drugged in the first place.”

“I expect Stephen did it,” said Helbye. “It was Stephen who gave you the wine, and Stephen who took your dog so it would not bark and wake you when Enide sneaked in to kill Godric.”

It made sense to Geoffrey. Francis had said that Stephen’s wife was involved in the plot to kill Rufus, and Geoffrey could well imagine that his sly second brother might prepare the way for someone else to kill Godric and ensure that Geoffrey was blamed for it.

“That paint caused Walter to lose Goodrich, you know,” mused Helbye. “If Godric had not been so certain he was being poisoned, he would not have informed King Henry and the Earl of Shrewsbury about it. And Shrewsbury would never have come up with his faked wills.”

“The wills were not the only things that were faked,” said Geoffrey. “The documents proclaiming that Walter was illegitimate and that Stephen was no son of Godric’s were written by Norbert, who was not in Godric’s service at those times. With Walter and Stephen out of the picture, and me away on Crusade, Enide would only have had Henry and Joan ahead of her to succeed to Goodrich.”

“Your brother Henry is unpopular in these parts,” said Helbye. “Especially after the murder of Ynys of Lann Martin. He would not live long if he were lord of Goodrich with his violent ways. That only leaves Joan.”

Geoffrey was silent, trying to come to terms with the waves of conflicting emotions that flowed and ebbed through his mind. He had been at Goodrich less than nine full days, during which time he had learned that his favourite sister had been horribly murdered, and then that she was alive and well and happily desecrating corpses; that she was behind a thwarted plot to kill King William Rufus, but planned to try again with King Henry; that no one in the castle or village had the slightest qualms about procuring bodies to suit their needs; and that the real killer of his father, undoubtedly the same person who had intended that Geoffrey should hang for the crime, was still very much at large.

He rubbed his eyes, trying to formulate a plan of action. He would try to speak to the King in Monmouth and warn him of what might be afoot. And then he would leave England forever, and his squabbling family could kill each other or fight as they would. His father was an evil, scheming liar, who had planned to kill a king. Someone else could avenge his murder. And someone else could deal with the treacherous Enide too, because Geoffrey did not want to meet her.