The Riddle Of St Leonard's

Twenty

As evening shadows spread in the garden, Lucie put aside her work, drew Owen outside. ‘I cannot bear the silence. Come. Walk with me and tell me what you learned today about the child and the altar cloth.’ She led him down the path between the lavender and the santolina.

But the beauty of the garden was lost on Owen at that moment. He, too, found the evenings too quiet. He put his arm round Lucie, pulled her close. ‘Shall we send for the children?’

Lucie pressed her head against his shoulder for a moment. ‘How lovely if it were that simple. But three children died in the city today. And they say animals are falling in the fields round us. It is not yet time to bring Gwenllian and Hugh home.’

‘I had not heard about the beasts.’

‘Tell me of your day. Speak of anything but the sickness.’

Owen began with Alisoun and continued with the treasures in Walter’s garden. ‘Saurian the physician is often at the hospital, is he not?’

‘Yes. And he is a gossip. He would be delighted to tell you all he knew were he in the city. But he accompanied the master of Davy Hall to his manor when the pestilence reached the city.’

A convenient escape, and perhaps for more than the obvious reason. ‘How is his business?’

‘His-’ Lucie suddenly stopped, turned to Owen. ‘You think he might be the thief?’

‘Is it possible?’

A little laugh. ‘Only if he is remarkably greedy and stupid. What of the Yorkshire family who sponsored Judith Ffulford? Is there truly no record of their name?’

‘They paid well for their anonymity.’

‘They could not be from York then. Someone would remember them.’

‘I have not asked all at the hospital.’

Lucie bent to pet Melisende. ‘I would not bother. Doubtless the children were moved far from their home because they were an embarrassment.’

That left Owen with something to ponder.

This time Alisoun knew in her dream that she must awaken, that it was not her mother leaning over her. Her heart racing, she woke. The figure stood at the foot of her pallet. Alisoun lay very still, trying to hold her breath. Was it him? The figure wavered because a wind had the night sister’s light flickering. Alisoun could see only that it was a tall figure in a dark hooded gown. It might be almost anyone at the spital — a canon or lay brother, a sister or lay sister. Or the man from the farm might have crept in in disguise, which seemed most likely to Alisoun. Who else had reason to frighten her? He meant to hurt her as she had hurt him. And he was looking for the treasures she had buried.

Alisoun closed her eyes, then opened them just enough to catch any movement through her lashes.

While she waited she prayed.

At last the watcher moved. Alisoun opened her eyes. He had his back to her. She slipped on to the floor and began to crawl after him. It was difficult watching him and picking her way carefully among the pallets. She lost sight of him. He must have made it to the doorway to the chapel stairs. She rose to a crouch and hurried towards the doorway, heard footsteps above her, started up the uneven stone steps, tripped on her hem.

Owen was still lingering over his early morning bread and cheese when Kate opened the door to a messenger from St Leonard’s. Owen heard the lad asking for him. Fearing it was bad news, he hurried over.

‘God go with you, Captain. Dame Beatrice prays you to come to her as soon as you are able. Alisoun Ffulford has been injured.’

‘What has that to do with me?’

‘Dame Beatrice begs you to hurry.’

Owen arrived to chaos. A child had fainted in the midst of play and though they had hurried him off to the infirmary it had frightened the rest of the children who cried and clung to the skirts of the sisters. Dame Beatrice had a cluster of children about her.

‘Benedicte, Captain,’ she gasped. ‘I pray you, go to the room by the chapel. The child awaits you there.’ She bent down to the children clutching at her skirts.

Don Cuthbert hurried from the room to greet Owen.

‘What are you doing here?’ Owen asked.

‘The sisters are busy with the children and the sick. But after what happened last night Dame Beatrice rightly thought the child should be guarded.’

Alisoun sat in the middle of the room, head down, hugging herself. She showed no sign of injury.

‘What happened? What did Alisoun do?’

Cuthbert glanced back at the child. ‘That is for her to tell you, Captain. I know only that she was found at the bottom of the chapel steps just before dawn with a swelling behind her ear that was first feared to be a boil.’ He crossed himself. ‘But it is merely a bruise, thanks be to God. The child says she tried to follow someone who had awakened her and she tripped in her haste on the stairs.’

‘Someone awakened her?’

‘She says they stood over her as she slept, and when she woke they ran — a fantastic story.’

‘A child telling tales. Why was I sent for?’

‘The child asked for you.’

Owen wondered for what sin he was being punished. ‘I suppose you must leave us alone.’

Cuthbert began to leave the room.

‘Stay just without, if you will,’ Owen requested. ‘I want no one to overhear.’

‘Gladly.’

Owen walked over to the child, who had not looked up from her examination of the floor since he’d arrived. ‘Alisoun?’

Still looking down at the floor, the child said sullenly, ‘Dame Beatrice says I should trust you.’

‘I see.’ Pulling a bench over so that he might sit opposite her, Owen sank down, crossed his arms. Still she stared at the floor. ‘Are you likely to listen to her?’

A deep breath. ‘I wounded the man who stole my horse.’

‘Ah. What else might you tell me?’

As if a dam had been opened, the child told Owen of the night she had run from her uncle’s house and found the man in the barn. ‘I shot him in the arm and the leg, I think.’

‘With your bow?’

Alisoun nodded. ‘Then I ran.’

Owen did not speak at once, thinking what might have happened to the child had she been a poor aim. But what had this to do with her accident?

His silence drew her eyes up to his. ‘Yesterday you were full of questions.’

It was his first view of a bruised eye. ‘What happened last night?’

‘I tripped on the steps.’

‘But your eye.’

‘I fell forward, didn’t I?’

‘Someone watched you?’

‘He wants revenge.’

‘Are you saying the man you injured was here last night?’

‘And the night before. I hate him.’

Hatred took time to develop. ‘You have seen him before.’

‘Did the Riverwoman tell him I was here?’

‘I am certain that she did not.’

The child sighed, looked down at her hands which were twisting a handful of the fabric of her skirt. ‘He took my bag.’

The one Dame Beatrice said she would not let out of her sight? ‘When?’

‘The night before last. I had it under my feet. He got it while I was sleeping. Then he stood there watching me. He came back last night.’

‘Did you wake the others?’

‘No.’

‘Why not?’

‘The treasure was my secret.’

He would come back to that. ‘You did not cry out?’

‘I thought it was my mother at first. And last night I tried to follow him.’

‘Tried to?’

She bent her head, lifted her hair to show him a knob behind her ear, on the same side as her bruised eye. ‘I told you I fell.’

‘Are you certain it was him?’ Where was he hiding? Owen would have liked to have begun a search, but he deemed it wise to try first to ascertain whether the child was telling the truth. She might have walked in a dream. One of her comments had given him an idea … ‘Your treasure. What was it?’

‘A silver missal cover.’

‘How did you come to possess such a thing?’

The sullen child dropped her head. ‘It was one of the treasures my mother hid in a chest in the barn.’

Owen remembered their first meeting — she had been guarding the barn, not hiding from them. ‘Hid? From whom did your mother hide these treasures?’

‘From folk who would steal them.’

‘Were they gifts from your father?’

Alisoun shook her head.

‘Tell me about these treasures. What were they?’

Alisoun described many of the items missing from the hospital: silver candlesticks, tapestries, the golden chalice, the pearl and silver cross, the missal cover, the saddle.

‘Sweet Jesu!’

‘I buried everything but the tapestries and the saddle before I went to my uncle.’

‘And the embroidered altar cloth?’

‘That was in the pack. I used it for a pillow.’

‘The pack also contained the tapestries and saddle?’

Alisoun shook her head. ‘Just the missal cover.’

‘Where are the tapestries, the saddle?’

‘The man who stole my pack stole them, too.’

‘You had them with you at St Leonard’s? Dame Beatrice mentioned nothing but the pack.’

‘He stole them at the farm.’

‘When you injured him?’

The child squirmed. ‘Yes.’

‘Who is he?’

Alisoun dug at the floor with the toe of her soft shoe. ‘I do not know his name.’

‘Whence came these treasures?’

‘I do not know.’

‘How did your mother come to have them?’

‘I do not know.’

‘Then how do you know they were not from your father?’

‘I think she hid them from him.’

‘But she let you see them?’

Alisoun shook her head.

‘I see.’ Owen wondered whether she knew all the treasures had been stolen from the hospital. He decided not to mention it. ‘Why would she hide things from your father?’

‘He called mother a liar when she spoke of her father.’

‘No doubt because she had been abandoned at the hospital.’

‘It was her mother abandoned her.’

It was an odd logic that only the mother abandoned her. ‘How did she know of her father?’

‘She never said.’

‘And you never asked?’ Owen found that unlikely. ‘What did she say of him?’

‘He was a rich man. She had been born to a better life than the farm.’

‘Did your mother ever mention her father’s name? His family name?’

Alisoun shook her head.

Perhaps the tale had been meant to enchant the child. But if so, whence came the items? ‘Why did you have the missal cover in the pack?’

‘I thought they might want something for my keep at St Leonard’s.’

‘Has anyone spoken to you of items missing from the hospital?’

‘You mean he stole other things? Not just my pack?’

‘How much of what you have told me is true?’

‘All of it.’

Owen shook his head. ‘What am I to think of a farmer’s wife possessing such a hoard, child?’

‘They are my grandsire’s treasures and that man wants them.’

‘How did he know of them?’

Alisoun wiped her nose, lifted one shoulder, let it drop.

‘You tell an odd tale, child.’

‘You will believe it when he’s killed me.’ She glowered at him.

‘No doubt. You say you buried the treasures. Will you tell me where?’

‘You would dig them up.’

‘Does that not seem a wise thing to do?’

‘They are mine.’

‘Perhaps not.’

‘My mother was not a thief.’

‘Doubtless she was a good woman, Alisoun.’

‘I hate all of you.’

Owen rose. The child would tell him no more today. Best to let her think about it. ‘We shall search the hospital for the man. Meanwhile, a sister must be near you at all times.’

‘Let Anneys stay with me. She is nice to me.’

Ravenser’s clerk had taken Cuthbert’s place outside the room.

‘The cellarer was too busy to wait?’

‘I offered to relieve him, Captain. I have learned something that might help you.’ Douglas looked pleased with himself as he handed Owen a parchment.

It was a deed of gifts to St Leonard’s. Owen glanced at the bottom. Signed by Laurence de Warrene and Julian Taverner.

‘Read the list, Captain.’

Amongst other items were the majority of the goods lately missing from the hospital. ‘This must be significant. How did you discover this?’

‘A speck of memory. Something Sir Richard once said in jest when Master Warrene won a game. “And why would you not play chess well on your own board, with your own pieces?” They played, you see, on Master Warrene’s board, which he had given to the hospital.’ Douglas looked smug. ‘It seemed of little import, but I thought it worth searching to see if other gifts had also been bequeathed by Master Warrene. And I came across this list.’

But what did it mean? ‘Why did Sir Richard not tell me of these gifts?’

‘I doubt he knew.’

‘He knew of the chess board.’

‘He played chess with Master Warrene is why. But this deed was written before Sir Richard was master.’