The Cross Legged Knight

Fourteen

Out in Patrick Pool, Lucie found herself uncertain whether to return home or continue on to Emma’s house. She was anxious to see how her friend was taking the news of her boys’ transgression. But she was worried she would be tempted to show Emma the gloves and she was not yet convinced it was the time to do so. It was best that Owen saw them before she showed them to anyone else. She dreaded telling him that Eudo had seen them.

Yet she had learned much from Eudo’s comments, and Emma and Lady Pagnell knew far more about fine clothes such as the gloves than Lucie did. It would be helpful to Owen if they identified the glover or the former owner.

And if the gloves had belonged to Emma or her mother? There was the rub.

She turned down the street, heading for the Staithe. Watching the river might quiet her mind enough to think more clearly.

*

The rear door of the palace kitchen was wide open to the sunshine and what had calmed to a pleasant breeze. Inside, Owen found Maeve bent over a small brazier as she stirred a sauce and spoke in quiet tones to a maidservant who was cracking nuts and digging out the meats. They seemed absorbed in their work and Owen thought he might reach the screened corner unnoticed.

But he had not taken two steps when Maeve cried out, ‘Captain! Did you mean to pass through without so much as a greeting?’ Instructing the maidservant to take over the stirring, the cook hastened towards Owen while wiping her hands on her apron.

‘I did not mean to take you from your work,’ he said. ‘You have a large household to feed.’

‘That is the least of my worries, Captain.’ Her rosy face was pulled together in a troubled frown. She leaned close and whispered, ‘I do not like what is ado in my kitchen. The devil is in that poor man who lies beyond that screen, mark me, I am right about that, and the Riverwoman sees naught amiss in it — indeed, she encourages him in his evil confusion.’

Owen began to ask her what she meant, but she put a finger to her lips and motioned for him to follow her to the screen, then stayed him with an imperious hand while she peered round it. Drawing back, she whispered, ‘Look you, and hark what they say as well.’ With a last glance towards the screen, she crossed herself and left him to his spying.

He heard Magda’s voice. She spoke softly, with immense calm. He felt a humid warmth even before he spied a small brazier with a pot of water simmering on the top, caught the scent of lavender and mint. The elderly healer was gently unwrapping Poins’s stump while coaxing him to stretch out his fingers, ease the cramp in his hand. The stump moved a little. Poins groaned. As Magda turned to dip the cloth in the simmering water, she nodded to Owen. With a stick she stirred the cloth through the water so that it might soak in heat, then lifted it and held it dripping over the water to cool a little before wringing it out.

‘Rest a moment,’ she said over her shoulder to Poins. ‘When thy shoulder is warm again it will be easier to move thine arm.’ She regarded Owen. ‘Thou knowest this pain, Magda thinks. Thy friend Martin Wirthir suffered it when his hand was severed.’

‘Aye, his thumb it was that woke him in the night. It does so still, so he says. And if he hits his right elbow, he swears the fingers tingle.’

So this was the devil work Maeve feared, that Magda accepted Poins’s claim of pain in the severed arm.

‘I witnessed this in the camps as well, after a limb was severed,’ Owen added. ‘Not all suffer so. I never understood the cause.’

‘Neither does Magda, but the pain is real, thou canst be certain of it.’ She wrung out the warmed cloth, laid it gently on the stump.

Owen sat down on a bench and stretched his legs. Noticing the injured man regarding him from the depth of his bandages, he said, ‘Good-day to you, Poins. I pray God you make a full recovery.’

Poins turned away.

‘Does that ease it?’ Magda asked.

When Poins nodded, Owen rose and approached him. ‘Are you able to talk?’

Poins glanced towards him, then closed his eyes.

Owen wished there were a way to trick him into talking. But though he could think of ways to elicit a scream or a shout, he doubted he could make the man actually communicate until he so chose.

‘Would you walk out into the sunlight with me, Magda?’

‘Aye.’ Magda eased herself to her feet, whispering to Poins that she would return, then headed for the closed door. ‘Best not to pass through the kitchen. Maeve has much to say and none of it what thou seekest to know.’

On the sunlit path between the kitchen and the great hall Magda paused, blinking in the brightness, then headed to the cool shadows behind the hall. ‘He has not spoken again since that first night,’ she said.

Owen noted that she looked pale. ‘Have you left his side since then?’

Magda wagged her head. ‘Now and then. But Poins is thy concern, not Magda.’ She glanced away, summoning her thoughts. When she spoke again her tone was quiet, as if even out here the patient might be affected by her words. ‘His body will mend, but the burns will leave terrible scars, flesh that will pucker and misshape him even with daily salves. And the lack of an arm — ’ She touched her right shoulder with a vein-patterned, wrinkled hand. ‘As he heals, worries will gnaw at his heart. What occupation can he have, a man who has been a servant, fetching and carrying, helping his master to dress? What woman will wed him?’

‘Aye.’ Owen remembered his own awakening to the change the knife of the jongleur’s leman had made in his life. He felt again the upwelling of anger that had carried him along for a time, and eased only to leave a void more terrible than either the anger or the physical pain. Death had beckoned, and he had decided to pursue it by sailing to the Continent to take up the life of a mercenary. Thoresby had offered him an alternative just in time.

‘Thou art deep in thy past,’ Magda said, settling down on the ground beside the hedge, where the afternoon shadows had lengthened.

Owen crouched down beside her, noticed how straight her fingers were, despite the age of her hands. ‘I would talk to Poins, hear his tale of the fire.’

‘Aye, Magda knows what thou needst. Thou wilt be called at once when he is ready.’

‘So he truly has not spoken?’

‘Thou knowest well that Magda does not lie.’

‘Is it that he cannot, or that he will not?’

‘To Magda, there is no difference between the two, not in speech.’

‘Would that were true of sight as well.’

Magda tilted her head to study him. ‘Dost thou so wish? And what wouldst thou do? Take up thy bow and fight for Lancaster? The crow thou dost serve needs no captain of archers.’

‘I may have erred in valuing the archbishop above the new duke, but I made the choice, my life is here now.’ Owen had been devoted to the former Duke of Lancaster, Henry of Grosmont. He had gladly followed him into Normandy and fought with confidence that his was a righteous cause. But the present duke was not Henry’s son; he was the son of King Edward, son-in-law to the old duke, and far from his equal. Over time, Owen had grown to respect him despite his shortcomings. How Thoresby had guessed his change of heart he did not know.

‘Thou didst not trust thy aim, that is truly why thou didst not stay with Lancaster. If thou couldst use thy left eye, what then?’

‘I would change nothing in my life.’

Magda wagged her head. ‘Easily said, Bird-eye.’

Her teasing unsettled him. ‘Have you changed your mind about my eye? Do you think I might yet have the use of it?’

Magda chuckled. ‘Would Magda not tell thee?’

‘I wish I knew.’

‘Thou wouldst do well to search thy heart before wishing for what thou hast lost.’

Owen’s knees ached. He rose slowly, silently cursing his weariness. ‘I have much to do. When should I come again to talk to Poins?’

Magda reached up a hand. Owen took it and helped her rise, wincing at the strength of her grip.

‘Come tomorrow,’ she said. ‘Whether he will talk or keep his silence, that Magda cannot prophesy.’

The gentle breeze and plentiful sunshine lifted Lucie’s mood a little as she neared the river. Though she had hoped the walk would quiet her mind, instead she worked on the problem of how she might present the gloves to Emma and Lady Pagnell. Little by little, she pieced together a lie that might work quite well with two women so devoted to elegant dress. Checking her steps, she headed back up Ousegate to Hosier Lane.

A servant greeted Lucie at the door and led her through the hall. John and Ivo barely glanced up from their lessons as she passed the table. Their tutor took more note of her, but when she caught his eye he nodded curtly and went back to the lesson. Ever since the family had received word of Sir Ranulf’s imprisonment there had been a pall over the house, but never so thick and soul-dampening as this.

Emma sat alone beneath an apple tree, paternoster beads in her hands. The old tree shone golden in the sun and a quince glowed a fiery red. Catching sight of her visitor, Emma kissed the beads, laid them aside and came forward, arms outspread. ‘Oh, my friend, it is good of you to come.’

The warm greeting heartened Lucie, but Emma’s bloodshot eyes and poor colour concerned her. ‘The sleep draught is not helping?’

Emma shook her head. ‘But your physick is not to blame. Even the most potent elixir would not have helped me sleep last night, not after learning that my sons kept such a secret from me.’ She pressed her square hands to her cheeks. ‘What are we to do? What will Wykeham do? Has Owen spoken to him?’

‘I have not heard.’

Emma drew herself up, motioned Lucie to join her on the bench where she had been sitting in the shade of the apple tree. ‘Come, sit down, do. Are you thirsty?’

‘No. And I should not stay long. I have left Jasper alone in the shop too much of late.’ Only as she settled beside Emma did Lucie realize how tired she was, and she sighed with the relief of being received with affection by her friend.

‘Whatever time you can spare, I thank God for it,’ Emma said. ‘I had not thought to see you today and I am sorely in need of your counsel.’

Lucie felt uneasy, coming there as she did with the gloves, and the dread that they might link Cisotta with Emma or Lady Pagnell. ‘My counsel? I do not know the Bishop of Winchester, not in the way you need. I do not see how I might guide you.’

‘We slept little last night. Peter believes that John is frightened about something greater than what we learned of. He has been so quiet of late, and has no appetite.’

‘He was so fond of Sir Ranulf. Could it not be that?’

‘I believe so. John wept most bitterly when Father departed for France. And when word came of his imprisonment, both he and Ivo spent many hours at St Crux praying for Father’s safe release. That must be what tears at his heart. And that he almost injured Wykeham — he understands the damage this will cause to our name if it becomes widely known.’

‘Ivo is not so disturbed?’

‘He is a child of quick moods. It is his nature. John is different, stolid, unflinching.’ Emma pressed a hand to her forehead for a moment. ‘Perhaps there is more to it — I cannot understand their not telling us. It has made it all so much more serious. I pray that Wykeham is wiser in this than he was with my father’s ransom.’

‘You can be assured that Owen will speak well of the boys.’

‘I am grateful for that.’

Emma shifted on the bench and in doing so knocked the Paternoster beads to the ground. She was retrieving them when Matthew the steward stepped into the garden. Seeing Lucie, he bowed curtly and began to withdraw, but paused when Emma straightened.

‘So you have returned?’ Emma said with such an edge to her voice that Lucie glanced at her. ‘Surely by now you have covered all the properties under consideration, walked every bit of ground, climbed every tree. It seems to me the choice should be left to our neighbour, as it is he who must be pleased with the trade.’

Expressionless, Matthew bowed deeply to her. ‘My lady has entrusted me with this task, Mistress Ferriby, and I mean to be thorough, weighing all with care, in the hope that Master Tewksby will be pleased with the first offering. Is my lady above?’

‘She is not to be disturbed.’ Emma dropped her attention to the beads, wrapping them round her wrist.

Matthew bowed once more to her bent head and withdrew to the hall.

‘He is a worm,’ Emma said.

‘He works hard for Lady Pagnell. And your father never had complaint.’

‘The worm turned upon Father’s death — he plots to gain by Mother’s widowhood, I am certain of it.’

‘What has he done?’

‘Last night he argued with Mother, insisting that she take the boys away to the countryside, save them from the gossip.’

‘Some would consider that good counsel.’

Emma leaned closer, grasping Lucie’s hand as if to ensure her attention. ‘He spoke as if he were her equal, Lucie. As if Mother were bound to heed his words.’

Lucie could see that Emma expected her now to comprehend the nature of Matthew’s transgression. Perhaps the steward had overstepped his position, but she did not see anything improper in his suggestion. ‘The boys are yet here, so Lady Pagnell must have stood her ground.’

‘Not without some effort to appease him with gentle words. But yes, she did stand firm. “A Pagnell never runs away,” that is what she told him, and she would not be moved by anything further that he said.’

‘Then what is your worry?’

Emma let go of Lucie’s hand as she rose and walked a few steps away from the bench, hugging herself. ‘I do not know why I fret so about her. She never has a civil word for me.’

Nor did Emma for her mother. But Lucie kept her counsel. ‘I came on a trifling errand,’ she said. ‘Seeing your distress, I am almost embarrassed to bring it up. But perhaps it will distract you.’

Emma sat down on the bench once more. ‘Something to do with the garden?’

‘No, the matter is a pair of fine gloves.’

‘Do you require a good glover?’

‘I hope to find a specific one. Aunt Phillippa had a pair of my mother’s gloves in her chest. I should love to have a pair like them, and I thought you might recognize the glover’s mark or the workmanship.’ Lucie drew the gloves from her scrip.

‘How beautiful they are,’ Emma breathed, holding them in her outstretched hands as if they were made of the most delicate lace. ‘Do they not fit you?’

‘Not as I would like.’

‘What a pity. To wear them would be like slipping your hands in hers, I’d think.’

Her words made Lucie ashamed of her deception. But she could not undo it now. ‘I don’t want to risk damaging them. I have so little that was hers.’

Now Emma began to examine them, turning up the edges, holding the underside to the light searching for a mark.

‘I recall some cut-work like this at the wrists, but I do not think the gloves had been made by a York glover. And the mark is not familiar. Might your mother have brought them from Normandy?’

If they had truly been her mother’s that was possible, indeed. But the suggestion would not help Lucie. ‘What about the cut-work?’ she asked.

Emma ran her fingers beneath the scalloped wrists, each outward curve containing a small cut-out diamond shape. ‘Your mother took care not to pull the gloves on by the wrist, or this delicate edge would have stretched and eventually torn. Ah — that is it. I have seen gloves such as these that were not so well cared for.’

‘Who wore them?’

Emma shook her head. ‘I cannot remember. But do not despair, it may come to me.’

‘Might Lady Pagnell recognize them?’

‘She is not to be disturbed this afternoon. The trouble with John and Ivo has kept her in bed with a dizziness.’ Emma looked again at the glover’s mark. ‘I’ll describe the gloves and the mark to Mother when she wakes. If we remember anything, we’ll let you know.’

It must be enough for now. Lucie was making her excuses when she remembered what Eudo had said about who sold the type of hide for gloves like these. She had not considered how that would work with her lie, but perhaps it need not. ‘If I find a glover who might make a pair like this, where would I find such a hide? Might Peter find one for me?’

‘I am certain he could, though I confess I buy hides elsewhere if I see ones I like. It is not a great part of his trade, and he does not always fight for the best. But you must not tell him that I said so!’ She handed Lucie the gloves. ‘I am cheered to see you thinking of such a gift for yourself.’

Lucie needed to escape before she admitted her deception. It felt wrong to lie to her good friend. But in so doing she had been comforted — it was plain the gloves meant nothing to Emma. With Jasper as her excuse, Lucie soon departed.

The breeze strengthened around the soaring bulk of St Crux Church. Lucie held on to her veil with one hand to keep it from blinding her as it caught the wind, and with the other hand she lifted her skirts to keep them from tripping her. She had so dreaded a look of recognition on Emma’s face, or worse, a withdrawal, a lie. Over the past few years Emma’s friendship had become dear to Lucie. She had never had a close friend of her own age and station — Bess Merchet played more the role of an adviser than a confidante, and she did not understand the tensions Lucie experienced as a knight’s daughter married first to an apothecary, then a steward and captain of the archbishop’s retainers. Sometimes Lucie felt neither here nor there, and so some folk treated her. Emma knew all this without Lucie needing to explain. They were easy with one another. Had Emma turned out to be hiding something from Lucie … She could not complete the thought, for it brought the mirror up to her own behaviour in lying to Emma.

The door to St Crux stood open and the scent of incense and candle wax beckoned Lucie into its dim, echoing nave. She had spent much time in churches recently, praying for her children, both living and dead. Several people stood near the door, talking in low voices. A baby played noisily with a rattle while his nurse or mother knelt with her paternoster beads. Lucie headed towards the altar of the Virgin Mary, but saw that someone already knelt on the prie-dieu before it. She knelt on the stones nearby and, bowing her head, prayed for her children, Cisotta, the Ferribys, Phillippa, Poins. She prayed that Emma would forgive her deception, would understand. The lie had served its purpose, but eventually Emma would know of her friend’s falseness. Lucie should have taken more time to plan what she meant to say. And already she regretted having left so soon, without seeing Lady Pagnell.

But Lucie’s place was at home this afternoon. Alisoun was with Gwenllian and Hugh for the first time, and Kate might be caught up in easing Phillippa’s confusion.

Having thought of that, Lucie grew anxious about the children. Her quickest way to St Helen’s Square from St Crux was through the Shambles, the street in which the butchers lived and worked. She hurried from the church and crossed the yard to the Shambles, only to find a crowd all but blocking the street. ‘What has happened?’ she asked a tall man whose eyes seemed caught by something far ahead.

‘Harry Flesher caught a lad thieving, held him up off the ground by his collar and belt, and a customer said Harry was a cruel man, there was no cause for him to lay hands on the lad. They’re calling each other such names!’ He chuckled and rose on the balls of his feet.

Lucie gathered her skirts and pushed her way past several people. As she moved deeper into the crowd she was jostled and pricked by packages and pins. She paused for a moment, lifting her chin in search of some air, then plunged ahead.

‘A dog took the meat!’ a woman near her shouted.

The pitch of the crowd grew louder, the pushing and shoving more brutal. Something tugged at Lucie’s girdle. She reached for it, thinking it had caught on something, but drew her hand back in pain. Blood bloomed along a gash on the back of her hand, and she felt the girdle slipping away, scrip and all. She turned and heard a woman a few people away shout as she was pushed aside. For a moment, as folk shifted in the thief’s wake, Lucie caught sight of cropped blond hair and a rusty brown cap.

‘Thief!’ Lucie shouted, trying to lunge after him. ‘Stop him!’ She elbowed her way towards the disturbance in the crowd, her fury lending her strength.

‘You’ll never catch him,’ a man muttered as he tried to make room for her, but failed.

Another growled to her to be quiet.

A woman offered Lucie a cloth in which to wrap her hand. ‘It’s bleeding all over you. You’ve ruined your gown.’

‘I’ve lost sight of him. I’ve lost …’

‘Come, give me your hand.’

As Lucie lifted her right hand, she saw that blood had soaked her sleeve to the elbow. ‘God help me,’ she whispered.

‘I’d say he’s the one started the fight, or the comrade of the one,’ said the woman as she wrapped. ‘Then it’s easy pickings.’ She looked up at Lucie. ‘You’re Mistress Wilton the apothecary, aren’t you? Well, you’ll know what to do with this hand when you reach home. Folk are moving away now, the play is over. Can you make it home?’

‘Yes,’ Lucie said, though she had begun to tremble so badly it had been difficult to keep her hand still, and there was a roaring in her ears that made her unsure of her balance. ‘Did you see the thief’s face?’

‘Young one, he was. I’ve seen him before, always watching for a chance at a purse.’

Lucie began to move away, shielding herself from the shifting crowd with her left arm. Someone bumped her wounded hand as they passed and she almost crumbled to the ground in pain, but with a deep breath she kept going. Something was wrong at home, she felt the prick of fear. She must get home.

Having failed to change Maeve’s belief that Magda was encouraging the devil’s work, Owen made his way home, where he found Phillippa napping in the kitchen and Alisoun Ffulford in the garden working on an embroidery while Gwenllian and Hugh slept on a blanket beneath the fruit trees. Kate was tidying the apothecary workroom.

‘Is your mistress in the shop?’

‘No, Captain. She has not yet returned.’

Through the beaded curtain Owen peeked into the shop. Jasper was seeing to Master Saurian, a physician with a loose tongue. Wishing to give him no new gossip, Owen departed through the workroom door and took the side pathway out of the gate and round to the York Tavern.

Tom Merchet greeted him from the doorway. ‘Wind is rising again. Rain by nightfall.’

Owen paused, torn between asking for Bess so he might gather some information and sitting down to talk with Tom about Lucie and the household. Bess won out.

‘Wife is up above, searching for a cushion that has vanished.’ Tom shook his head. ‘Her efforts will come to naught, I trow. But she will not believe one of our best customers would steal a cushion. Ruined it and hid the damage, that is what I think.’

Owen mounted the steps, following the sound of furniture being dragged across creaking floorboards. Finding Bess struggling to move a heavy chest, he hurried to her aid, lifting one end. And there lay the ruined pillow, torn and spilling its down and straw.

‘Bless you, Owen.’ Bess crouched to the mess. ‘It can be mended. In truth, the straw needed changing. But the coward who put me through this will pay, I promise you. He will learn to face up to the damage he does sleeping with a knife beneath his pillow.’ She sat down on the bed, dabbed her forehead with the cloth wrapped round her sleeve, protecting it. ‘God bless you for lifting the chest. Did Tom fetch you, or are you God’s blessing?’

‘The latter, though I do not feel I am God’s chosen today.’ Owen moved to replace the chest.

‘No, leave it where it is for now, I pray you. Look at the dust beneath it.’ She fanned herself. ‘I pray it isn’t Lucie who cast such a pall over you. Is she unwell?’

‘She seemed much improved this morning, though Dame Phillippa gave her a difficult night.’

‘Walking in her dreams again?’ Bess tsked when Owen nodded. ‘And you’ve not found the man who used that belt on Cisotta?’

‘No. I came to ask where I might find the midwife Margaret Dubber.’

‘Why?’

He told her of the group of midwives who had stood outside St Sampson’s churchyard. ‘I thought she might tell me things about Cisotta that a fellow midwife might know. Though why should anyone confide in me, eh? Do I look trustworthy?’

‘In my eyes you look as tasty as sin itself.’ Bess smiled as she regarded him. ‘Trustworthy is another matter. But John Thoresby would not retain you had he any doubt of your talents, my friend. You’ve been his salvation many a time. You are weary, that I can see, and no wonder. Let me think now. Margaret lives in Lady Row, the second door in the row.’ She lifted her chin, sniffed the air. ‘That man will burn down the kitchen one of these days.’ She groaned and held the small of her back as she rose from the low bed. ‘Good fortune walk with you, my friend.’ As she departed she was muttering, ‘I have never known a cook so bemused by drafts.’

Owen lingered in the room, caught in the memory of his sojourn long ago at the inn, when he was still adjusting to the loss of his eye, restless with the physical idleness of his new life as Thoresby’s spy. He had been quick to tell Magda yesterday that he would change nothing in his life, but sometimes he missed his soldiering days, when women delighted and confounded him but never let him see their devils. He remembered how beautiful Lucie had been, and how exciting, untouchable. Cursing himself for yearning for the past, he abandoned the room.

As he descended the steps he could not only smell but see the smoke wafting from the kitchen, where Tom’s voice roared in uncharacteristic anger. He went quickly to assist, but saw from the doorway that the fire had been dowsed. He judged it best to leave them alone to deal with the offender. Besides, he had enough on his mind.

He would see Margaret Dubber in what was left of his day, then relieve Lucie in the shop so she might have time to talk to Alisoun. Jasper would appreciate time away from the counter, too. They all needed some semblance of life as usual.

He made his way from Petergate to Goodramgate via an alley between the buildings that crossed over one of the great ditches of the city. The water was clearer than usual thanks to the run-off from the buckets thrown on the blaze a few nights before.

Margaret Dubber was sitting in her doorway, stretching a stained fustian tunic between her hands. It had a ragged hem and as she held it up to the light several slashes round the middle were apparent. She nodded to Owen. ‘To be mended,’ she said, dropping it on to a small pile. ‘My nephew the dubber pays me a pittance for my sorting of what are truly rags from what might be mended and given to the poor. He is of late concerned for his soul.’ She rolled her shoulders about, stretched her back. ‘You are here about my presence at the funeral today, I’d wager.’

‘I am.’

She lifted another piece of cloth, frayed and thin, dropped it on to the larger pile beyond the mendables. ‘Rag.’ Then she folded her hands on her lap and raised her fleshy face, veiny cheeks and nose flushed, the late afternoon sun silvering her eyes. ‘We thought to pay our respects to one of our own, but the looks we received from some made it plain we were not welcome. We are not the ones spreading rumours of her charm weaving, Captain. Others may be, but not my companions of the morning.’