Ashes of the Elements

Chapter Twenty

Helewise, watching Josse as he waited with ill-concealed impatience for his horse to be brought, thought that he did not seem any more fit for a fairly long ride with, at journey’s end, a serious problem to face, than she was herself.

‘Will you not rest for this night, and set out in the morning?’ she suggested, knowing he would say no but unable to let that prevent her from asking. ‘You and I both inhaled that wretched smoke, we are both, I am quite certain, still suffering from the after effects of whatever narcotic was in it.’

He looked down at her. ‘I am grateful for your consideration. Helewise, but-’ He looked away. Then, as if he had remembered where they were, and that, back in the Abbey, the informality which had relaxed their relationship out in the wild forest must be forgotten as if it had never been, he said, ‘I am perfectly well, thank you, Abbess. And it is my duty to go when I am summoned.’

‘Very well.’ She stood back, feeling the twin emotions of being grateful for his courtesy and his consideration, while, at the same time, missing his warm friendliness.

Sister Martha at last led Horace out of the stables; the horse’s coat shone as if she had spent all afternoon grooming him. She handed the reins to Josse, and he swung up into the saddle.

Helewise went to stand at his stirrup. ‘Send me word,’ she said softly.

His eyes met hers, and, as if he understood her anxiety, smiled. ‘Aye,’ he said. ‘That I will. That, or I’ll return and tell you myself.’

Then, kicking Horace into a trot he set off out through the Abbey gates.

* * *

The messenger had gone on ahead to say that Josse was on his way. Riding swiftly, his mind busy with conjecture, the long miles of the journey passed by scarcely noticed.

He rode into the walled and well-tended courtyard of Tobias and Petronilla Durand’s fine house. This time, it was not the master who greeted him, but the manservant, Paul.

Solemn-faced, eyes dulled with some wearying emotion, he said in a low voice, ‘This way, Sir Josse. The body lies where it fell.’

The messenger, appearing from the stables, rushed over to take Josse’s horse. Josse, straightening his tunic with a determined tug, followed Paul up the steps and into the house.

After the sunshine, the light within seemed very dim, and it took Josse a moment or two to make out clearly the scene that awaited him.

Then, as his eyes adjusted, he saw what they had called him to see.

Stretched out at the foot of the short flight of steps that led from the dais, where the dining table stood, down into the main area of the hall, lay a body.

A long body, dressed in the best, the rich colours of the fabrics glowing in the soft light. The corpse lay face down, and, from the blood staining the stone slabs beneath, it appeared that death had come as a result of some catastrophic injury to the front of the head.

Josse said quietly, ‘When did it happen?’

‘This morning,’ Paul replied mournfully. ‘Just this morning,’ he repeated, as if he could hardly believe his own words. ‘They hadn’t even sat down to breakfast.’

As Paul crossed himself and muttered a prayer, Josse knelt down and put his hand on the already-cold temple of Tobias Durand.

Moving his hand so that his palm cupped the forehead, gently he raised up the head. The abundant hair, glossy with health, fell forward over the dead face, and Josse had to push it aside before he could see the wound.

The damage was terrible. The wound, deep, and shaped almost like a pyramid, must, Josse thought, have been caused by a hard point of some sort … Looking down at where Tobias’s face had lain, he saw the edge of the bottom step. Newly constructed, presumably as part of the renovations which had been carried out following Petronilla and Tobias’s marriage, the step was sharp-edged and unworn, and the riser, tread and side came together to form the corner of a perfect right-angled cube.

‘The lady Petronilla said he tripped over his hound,’ Paul said, his voice breaking. ‘He — the master — was larking about, she said, jumping down from the dais to take her hand and lead her to table, and the hound, excited by all the fun and games, started barking, then it bounded up and tangled itself in the master’s legs.’ He sniffed, wiping his nose with his sleeve. ‘I heard voices, I heard the barking, then there was the sound of something heavy falling. Then there was this terrible silence.’ He sniffed again.

‘And you came hurrying into the hall and found him lying here?’ Josse asked gently.

‘Aye.’ Weeping openly now, Paul said, ‘My lady is heartbroken, sir. She sets such a store by him, I don’t know how she’ll manage without him, truly I don’t.’

And what of you? Josse thought. Whatever she decides to do, will the lady Petronilla still have need of her faithful manservant? Or will she, like so many widows above a certain age, decide that she has had enough of the world and retire behind the walls of some tranquil, welcoming convent?

Now was definitely not the time for such questions, even in the privacy of his thoughts. Judging that it was probably a good idea for Paul to have something to do, Josse began, ‘Paul, this death comes as the most dire shock, to you and the household, indeed, to us all.’ His eyes returned to the long, elegantly clad body, which, death having so recently come, still bore the outward semblance of life.

Death. So final. So terribly final.

Josse recovered himself, not without effort, and turned back to the grieving manservant. ‘The rest of the staff must be almost as upset as you,’ he said gently. ‘Could you, do you think, organise them into doing some sort of work?’ He cast round in his mind for a suitable task. ‘What does Tobias usually do in the afternoons?’

Paul scratched his head. ‘I don’t rightly know, sir. He’s often from home. He does take his hounds out sometimes, that I can tell you.’

‘Well, that’s one thing, then.’ Josse tried an encouraging smile. ‘And there’s his horse, presumably, needing exercise and then a good rub-down. And, even in this grief-stricken house, there will be need of food. Could you ask the household servants to prepare a meal?’

Paul drew himself up, as if, regretting his lapse, he was concerned to show that he had now resumed the mantle of his authority. ‘I shall do all that you ask, sir.’ With a formal little bow that briefly wrung Josse’s heart, Paul walked stiffly away.

Alone with the dead man, Josse felt all round the head for any sign of further injury. No. There was nothing.

But wait! What-

‘You have come, Sir Josse,’ said a quiet voice behind him. ‘I thank you for answering my summons.’

Spinning round, he saw Petronilla Durand, standing not two paces off and looking down at him.

She was already dressed in some flowing, dark mourning garment, which served to remove the last vestige of colour from her normally pale cheeks. Her eyes were red-rimmed, the lids swollen. Her headdress of starched white had been tightly fastened, and over it she wore a thin black veil. The flesh of her jaw and chin, in cruel contrast to the smooth linen of the barbette, was sagging and faintly yellow-looking, like that of a recently plucked chicken. Her thin-lipped mouth had taken on a deep downward curve, on either side of which were heavily marked semicircular creases which, Josse was almost sure, hadn’t been there before.

She had aged ten years.

Josse stood up, moved across to her and, kneeling once more, took her icy hand in his and kissed it. ‘My lady, my deepest condolences on your loss,’ he said. ‘If there is anything I can do, you have but to name it.’

She took her hand out of his grasp. Turning away so that he could no longer see the ruined face, she said, with a moan, ‘Bring him back!’

Josse moved to her side. Had she lost her wits? He said gently, ‘That I cannot do, lady.’

She shook her head. ‘I know, Sir Knight. I know.’ She sighed.

‘Console yourself with the knowledge that he can have felt little pain,’ Josse said. It wasn’t much, he knew, but grieving widows had been comforted by such remarks in the past; he had uttered the facile comment many times himself. ‘The wound is deep, and death would have been instantaneous.’ He couldn’t be sure — not as sure as he was pretending to be — but, if it helped her, then it scarcely seemed important.

‘Little pain,’ she repeated. There was a moment of silence, then she said, ‘How poorly you understand.’

Ah.

‘My lady?’ Josse said.

The pink-rimmed eyes turned to meet his. ‘This house has ever been filled with pain,’ she murmured. ‘And, for all that my husband lies dead, that pain will never cease.’

It was a strange thing for a widow to say. Did she mean that Tobias’s death had caused the pain? Perhaps, Josse thought, perplexed, but it hadn’t sounded that way. It had sounded as if Petronilla was referring to some deep distress, ongoing, something that had been a constant element in her life.

Trying to console her — the most hard-hearted man in the world would surely have wanted to bring comfort to that deadly pale, ravaged woman, with her destroyed face — Josse said, ‘Lady, there was joy in this house! Why, I saw with my own eyes the love that was between you and Tobias. Why do you speak of pain?’

As if Petronilla were regretting her words, she made a visible attempt to undermine them. With a ghastly smile that looked more dreadful on her face than her expression of misery, she said, ‘How right you are, Sir Josse! Indeed, Tobias and I were happy. The pain is in his-’ She glanced briefly at her husband’s body, screwed her eyes shut, and whispered, ‘The pain lies here, at our feet.’

Josse was very nearly convinced. He would have believed her, thought no more about her odd remark, had a certain line of thought not suddenly arisen in his mind. Looking carefully around to make sure that they were alone, he said quietly, ‘Petronilla, I believe that, when last we met, you may have told me not the truth, but what you would have liked to be the truth.’ No answer. ‘Lady?’ he prompted. ‘Would it not be a relief to unburden yourself?’

She lowered her head. In a muffled voice, she said, ‘Sir Knight, what can you mean?’

If she wasn’t prepared to bring it out into the open, then he was. ‘You told me,’ he said, careful to keep his voice down, ‘that Tobias had put aside the ways of his misspent youth. That his side of the bargain which you struck was that he would be a model husband, as respectable as a man married to a lady such as yourself ought to be. And that, my lady, was a lie.’ Again, she kept her silence. ‘Wasn’t it?’ he hissed.

She rounded on him. ‘All right, yes!’ she hissed back. ‘Are you satisfied now? Do you wish to witness my humiliation as well as my grief? For shame, Sir Knight! For shame!’

Humiliation was not the word he would have used; intent only on finding out all that there was to find out, he probed on. ‘I know that he was in the habit of visiting the Great Forest,’ he said, ‘because I saw him there, on two occasions. Indeed, he made no secret of his preference for the forest fringes as a fine place to fly his falcon. But that was merely a cover, wasn’t it?’ He wanted to take hold of her, give her the comfort of his touch even as he interrogated her. ‘He was in league with Hamm Robinson, wasn’t he? Hamm, and his fellow thieves Ewen Asher and Seth Miller. The three of them took the risks and did the dirty work, and passed on the valuable objects they found for Tobias to sell. Isn’t that right, Petronilla?’

She had been watching him as he spoke, mouth opening in a silent gasp. She was going to deny it all, he thought grimly, tell him he was mistaken. What would he do then?

In tones of ice, she said, ‘I have never heard of any of those men.’

Well, there was no reason for Tobias to have mentioned their names. But, on the other hand, she sounded so convincing! Josse would have sworn she was telling the truth! With the distinct feeling that he was racing off down a dead end, he said, ‘Maybe not, but all the same, lady, it’s my belief that Tobias knew them, nevertheless.’ Frustration surging through him, he said, ‘I could have proved it, I know I could! I still can, maybe, there must be a way to trace the things they took from the forest, and-’

She did not let him go on. Disdain making her voice harsh, she said, ‘My husband had no dealings with petty thieves.’ Fixing Josse with a furious stare, she went on: ‘In God’s name, Sir Knight, he married a rich woman! What need had he to go peddling trinkets?’

It was a good question. Frowning, Josse began, ‘Well, I would scarcely call them trinkets, and-’

Again, she interrupted. ‘How can you!’ she cried, her thin hands twisting together in her distress. ‘My husband’s body is scarcely cold, and here you stand, accusing him of some crime more suited to forest peasants than to the gracious, noble man that he was!’

Josse bowed his head. Poor woman, he thought, she is in shock. The terrible events of this morning still overwhelm her, and here I am with my small accusations, pursuing a matter which, to anybody but me, must appear trivial by comparison. Guilt flooding through him, he raised his eyes and said, ‘Lady, forgive me. My remarks are inappropriate. This business can wait until a later-’ No. He must not even say that. Putting all the sincerity he could muster into his voice, he said gently, ‘Petronilla, I came to help you. Tell me, if you will, how I may.’

She was staring at him, and, in the light from the open door, he could see her face clearly. The angry, offended expression slowly cleared, and for a moment she looked the proud, haughty noblewoman bearing her pain with dignity. ‘I thank you, Sir Knight,’ she began, ‘there will be matters to attend to, decisions to be made as to…’

Slowly she trailed, to a halt. As if drawn by some force she could not resist, her eyes returned to Tobias’s body. With a tiny whimper, she knelt down, her full skirts pooling around her, and, with the tender touch of a mother on the face of a sleeping child, she smoothed the thick hair back from the ruined forehead.

‘He is dead,’ she whispered. ‘Dead.’

Then, bending low over the corpse, she began to sob.

Josse stood the heartbreaking sounds for a moment, then, leaning down, took firm hold of Petronilla’s shoulders and raised her to her feet. ‘Lady, you must be brave,’ he said. ‘Come, sit with me, and we shall send for some heartening drink, something to give you the strength to cope with what you must endure.’

She allowed herself to be led only a few paces away from the steps where Tobias lay. Then, turning back, she murmured, ‘I do not want to leave him.’

‘You need not, lady,’ Josse said, ‘for now, we shall remain close by him, and-’

As if she had not heard, Petronilla said, ‘He cannot leave me now. He must stay here, in my hall, and I shall have his bright company all the time.’

A shock ran through Josse, the frightening sense that, suddenly, he was in the presence of madness. ‘He must be tended to properly, Petronilla,’ he said gently. ‘He cannot remain here long. It is not-’ He searched for a word with sufficient weight, gave up and ended weakly, ‘It is not fitting.’

She was still staring at Tobias. Crooning gently, a faint smile crossed her face.

‘Come, we’ll plan together where he is to be buried,’ Josse suggested. ‘Somewhere close, think you, so that you may often go to visit the place, and recall your happy times? Or-’

She had spun round, and now her attention was fully on Josse. ‘Happy times?’ she echoed. Some violent inner struggle evident in her face, she began to speak, then stopped. But, as emotion seared through her again, the words she was trying to hold in burst out of her.

‘There was pain in this house!’ she cried. ‘I told you that! Pushing her face close to his, her terrible anguish as readable as an illuminated script, she said, ‘You said you knew my husband visited the Great Forest, and you asked me why. Do you want to know? Do you?’ She was all but spitting at him. ‘Well, Sir Knight, you shall know! I will tell you what he did in the forest.’

She paused, drawing in a sudden sharp breath. As if bracing herself, she briefly shut her eyes, clasping her hands on her breast as if in silent prayer.

Then, quite calmly, she said, ‘He lay with a woman. A young and vivacious woman whose soft flesh yielded to his caresses, whose moist body opened to his, whose full lips kissed his eager mouth.’ A violent sob broke out of her, shaking the thin frame. She added, her voice a mere whisper, ‘A beautiful woman, who could give him all the passion he wouldn’t take from me.’

Josse was shaken to his very core. Was she right? Could she possibly know, for sure? He said, ‘How can you be certain of this?’

Her face took on a look of cunning. ‘You forget,’ she said. ‘You asked me did I still have him followed, and I said-’

‘You said, rarely.’ Josse concluded for her.

Dear God. Poor, miserable soul! Was it the womanising that she had suspected, all along? Had it only been Josse’s prejudiced view, already branding Tobias as being in league with Hamm Robinson, that had led him to misread her comments? To believe that she meant her husband had been a thief, when in fact, handsome and comely man that he was, his offence was that he had been unable to resist a pretty face?

I was wrong, Josse thought, guilt flooding through him. And, because I was wrong, a man lies dead in his own hall. He shot a glance at Petronilla. If I had guessed earlier, he berated himself, then maybe I could have spoken to Tobias. Persuaded him that it was folly to persist in what he was doing. Tell him that he must make a clean break from the loving bonds that held him, and be true to his wife. True to his promise to her.

But I didn’t.

He said, although it was not really relevant, ‘Whom did he meet?’

Petronilla looked surprised. ‘You ask me that, Sir Knight? For all your cleverness, you have not worked it out?’

He shook his head. ‘No.’

A faint smile briefly quirked the thin lips. ‘I told you, did I not, that Tobias was raised by his old aunt?’

‘Aye.’

‘Yes. Well, the aunt lived a mean and penny-pinching life, but the one thing that shone like a jewel in her household was her maidservant. A jewel, indeed, that the old woman must herself have much appreciated. The girl was young and joyful, and she used to sing as she went about her work, even though, given that her days were long, the labour was hard, and the old woman gave never a word of praise, one would have thought she had little to sing about.’ A soft sigh. ‘She was irresistible to Tobias, naturally, and he to her. They fell for one another and they became lovers. In time, the old aunt fell sick, and, possibly in some gesture of repentance for her unkind ways, she demanded to go on a pilgrimage to take the holy waters. The girl took her off to Hawkenlye Abbey, where, in the Lord’s good time, He took her to himself.’ Another brief smile. ‘No doubt everyone was pleased to see the back of her, although the kind thoughts any good soul might have had about her would soon have flown out of the window when her will was read, since she left not a sou to Tobias, or to anyone else who had cared for her. She left the lot to that wretched Abbey.’

But Josse was hardly listening. He was thinking, remembering. In his head he heard the Abbess Helewise’s voice … She arrived with her late mistress, who died when she was with us.

Esyllt was left with nowhere to go.

‘He was in love with Esyllt!’ he said. ‘It was she who had been the old aunt’s servant, wasn’t it? And it was to visit her, the love of his youth whom he couldn’t forget, that Tobias kept going up to the forest!’

Carried away by the lovely, romantic picture, he hadn’t paused to think that it would scarcely appear lovely to Petronilla. Hastily he said, ‘Lady, forgive me, I forgot, for the instant, that it was of your husband that we speak. He was, of course, false to you, an adulterer and a liar. And that was a sin, a grave sin, both against holy law and against you, madam.’

But she wasn’t listening. She was humming to herself, an incongruously bright little tune which Josse thought he recognised, although the good Lord alone knew from where.

‘“It is love he doth bring, And the sweet birds do sing, And my love he loves me in the spring,”’ the faint, reedy voice sang. Petronilla’s eyes turned to Josse. ‘She sang that to him, you know, and I would hear him singing it when he thought I couldn’t hear. But I could. Then I knew he had been with her again.’ Tears were running down the ashen face. ‘He promised,’ she whispered. ‘After the last time, he promised.’ She grasped Josse’s sleeve. ‘He did love me, you see, really he did, and, when I said he must stop seeing her or else I would turn him out, he promised that he would.’ Her face softened suddenly. ‘I couldn’t have turned him out, though. I loved him far too much.’

Josse patted the hand knotted tightly in his sleeve. ‘I understand, lady.’ He did, all too clearly. The elderly wife, knowing her husband’s nature, trying to pen him into a bargain, only to find he was unable to keep to its terms. Reneging, being found out, promising to do better, tempted back again to the sweet and joyous young woman waiting for him.

Had Tobias really loved Petronilla? Seen her as a woman — a wife, indeed — and not just as a wealthy provider?

It seemed as unlikely as it had always done.

But then Josse recalled the young man’s face as he had looked at his wife, smiling at her so affectionately as he spoke of how he had comforted her when her father had died, how, together, the two of them were having such a grand time improving her late father’s house.

I don’t know, he confessed to himself. I just don’t know.

‘He told me this morning that he had been with her again,’ Petronilla said softly. ‘He had just come in, and I imagined he had been out riding in the cool of the early morning. He summoned me to the breakfast table, and I remarked on the glow in his face.’ She sobbed, choked on her emotion, then, after a pause, went on. ‘A terrible dread took me, and I said, oh, Tobias, tell me it isn’t true! Tell me I’m wrong, and that you haven’t been back to her! And, at first, he swore he hadn’t, and I believed him, believed all was well, so I threw myself into his arms and hugged him, and — oh — and I — he-’

For a moment, she couldn’t go on. Then, as if she knew she must, she said, with a touching dignity, ‘He did not return my embrace. He tried to, but his arms were so stiff, and he held his beautiful body away from me. As if, despite his best efforts, he couldn’t help but compare my thin bones with the luxury of her warm, soft flesh. And, finding me wanting, be unable to hold me to him as he had done her. And then I knew.’

The tears were now drenching the breast of her dark gown, but she did not try to mop them up. And, Josse thought, she could no more have stopped them than flown through the air.

‘My lady, I am so sorry,’ he murmured.

She looked at him. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘It is, I dare say, a matter for sorrow.’ She sighed. ‘I could not stop myself, Sir Knight. All those broken promises, all those times when he had sought his joy with her, and now — oh! now! — he was turning away from me.’ Belatedly she drew a tiny, embroidered handkerchief from her sleeve and, although it was clearly inadequate for the task, began to wipe her eyes, her nose and her wet face. ‘I picked up the footstool that stood beneath table, and, as he moved out of my arms and went to go down the steps, I hit him with it.’

‘Caught him right on the back of his head,’ Josse murmured. ‘Aye, lady. I know.’

She eyed him steadily. ‘I killed him,’ she said. ‘Did I not, Sir Knight? I killed the love of my life, because he could not be true.’

There was a long silence between them. Josse stared down at the dead man lying at their feet, then, furtively, up at the wrecked face of the man’s widow.

She had suffered, poor soul. Would go on suffering, bereft as she was of her handsome young husband, left alone to grieve. And, combined with the grief, the guilt. The blow to the back of the head might not have been the one which killed him, but it had led to that terrible fall on to the corner of the step. Enough reason, surely, to give rise to a guilt powerful enough to eat away at mind, soul, and, eventually, body.

Surely that was punishment enough.

Briefly he allowed himself to imagine what would lie ahead for her, if he did as he ought and summoned a sheriff. Arrest, imprisonment, trial. And, after a terrible time in some foul jail, she would, if they found her guilty, be led out one bright morning and hanged.

No.

It was unthinkable. And, besides, it wouldn’t bring Tobias back.

Josse had, throughout Petronilla’s quietly spoken confidences, been standing on her left side. Now, with growing ostentation, he began tweaking at his right ear.

‘Dear me,’ he said, quite loudly ‘this ear of mine!’

After some time, she turned to look at him. ‘What ails you, Sir Knight?’

He met her eyes, held the gaze. Would not let her look away. Then, very carefully, he said, ‘It’s funny, but I just don’t seem to hear well on my right side. Do you know, lady, I haven’t picked up a word you’ve said, not since you entered the hall and thanked me for coming.’

She looked astonished. ‘But-’ she began.

He held up his hand. ‘No,’ he said softly. ‘Lady, let it be.’

For a moment, the grief, the shock and the horror left her face, and she looked as she must have done long ago, before the doomed love for Tobias had awakened in her. She whispered, ‘Oh, Sir Josse. There is still some kindness in this world.’

Leaning forward, she put a light kiss on Josse’s cheek.

Then, straight-backed and dignified, she turned, crossed the hall and disappeared through the doorway that led to her chamber.

* * *

He stood in the hall for a long time after she had gone, staring down at Tobias.

Then, abruptly, he, too, left.

Going out into the soft, late sunshine of evening, he called for Paul, and, when he arrived at the foot of the steps, told him that Tobias had died as a result of his fall down the steps, and that, in the summer heat, Paul should now make all haste to have the body coffined and buried.

Advanced though the hour was, Josse decided to set out for Hawkenlye. He was tired, hungry, and faced a long ride, but that, he thought, was preferable to the alternative.

He would have endured far worse, in order to escape from the corpse and the desolate widow he had just left behind.