The Tavern in the Morning

Chapter Eighteen

He awoke to find himself lying quite comfortably on the floor in front of the fire. Joanna was sitting in his chair, looking quite composed, hands folded in her lap.

He turned his head a little, enough to look at the place where de Courtenay had fallen.

The body was no longer there.

Relaxing — had he dreamt the whole thing, after all? — he closed his eyes and did a quick tally of his wounds.

The great slice into his right arm felt hot, but numb. Whatever Joanna had done had dulled the pain and he thanked God for her skills. If you’ve got to earn yourself a deep wound, he thought vaguely, then what better time than when you have an apprentice wise woman under your roof?

The main pain came from his neck, where, it seemed, one of de Courtenay’s dagger pricks had gone in more deeply. The wound was throbbing in time to his heartbeat. Throb … throb … throb …

From somewhere nearby, a voice said softly, ‘Don’t fight to stay awake, Josse. All is well. Sleep now, and you will heal the quicker.’

It made sense.

Relaxing, giving in to the drowsiness, he let himself drift off.

* * *

When next he awoke, it was almost totally dark. The hall was lit by a solitary candle, and someone — Joanna — had covered him warmly with a fur rug.

He was, he realised, terribly thirsty.

Opening parched lips — he experienced a dry, cracking sensation as he did so — he whispered, ‘I need to drink.’

Instantly she was there, swooping down beside him, one hand behind his head to support him while, with the other hand, she held a cup to his lips.

‘There — gently now! Not too much!’

The cool, refreshing water slid into his mouth. He swallowed, and she let him take another sip. Then she took the cup away.

‘More!’ he protested.

She was wiping his mouth with a cold, damp cloth, and he licked his lips to take in the moisture. ‘No more for now,’ she said. ‘Soon, another couple of sips.’

He relaxed against the cushions under his head. ‘Thank you.’

‘How do you feel?’

‘Sleepy.’ Then: ‘It’s dark. Is it night?’

‘Yes. Are you in pain?’

He did his inventory again. ‘My neck hurts.’

‘Where?’

He raised a hand that felt as heavy as a boulder and indicated.

‘I see.’

He sensed her move away. Quite soon she came back, and he felt something cool press against the throbbing wound in his neck. It stung at first, but then that stopped. And so did the pain.

‘You,’ he murmured, ‘are a goddess.’

‘No!’ she cried instantly. Then she muttered, ‘Ah, but he’s joking, not blaspheming.’ She said, in her normal tone, ‘It’s just something Mag taught me.’

‘An apprentice wise woman,’ he murmured. ‘Just what I thought.’

‘What’s that?’ She sounded wary.

‘Nothing, my love.’ He shifted his weight slightly, making himself more comfortable. ‘Just a thought I had earlier, when I woke up and realised my arm didn’t hurt.’

‘It is a deep wound,’ she said sombrely. ‘I’ve stitched it together, but we must watch carefully for any signs of infection.’

‘Stitched it together.’ He felt slightly sick again.

‘Yes. Don’t worry, Josse, Mag taught me well.’

‘Aye, I’m sure.’ He fought with the sickness which seemed determined to rise. To take his mind off thoughts of her handiwork, he asked, ‘Where is de Courtenay? He was lying just there, and now he isn’t.’

‘Don’t worry about that, either. He’s taken care of,’ she said soothingly.

‘You didn’t manage that, all on your own!’ He’d noticed she was strong, but not that strong, surely! De Courtenay had been no weakling, no lightweight.

‘No, no,’ she was saying. ‘Josse, I’m not the only one with loyal friends. Your Will, now, would, I warrant, do anything for you.’

‘Will?’

‘Yes. Will. He and I took de Courtenay outside — we wanted to act now, under cover of night — and Will is burying the body in a ditch.’

‘Burying him?’

‘He is dead. You realise that?’

‘Of course! But-’

But what? But we must send for the Sheriff, report the murder, describe the circumstances, hope that, by so doing, we convince them that it was sell-defence?

And supposing they don’t agree? What then?

Then I, Josse thought — for no part of him could even contemplate letting Joanna take the blame — then I would go on trial for murder. And I might very well hang.

But to bury de Courtenay in a New Winnowlands ditch! Not even to bury the corpse himself, but to have Will do it!

Could his conscience ever rest easy again, bearing the stain of all that?

His conscience was, he quickly realised, going to have to do its best. The alternative was unthinkable.

He said, ‘Joanna, would you fetch Will?’

‘Of course.’

She came back quite quickly — presumably Will’s ditch was not far distant — and Will, looming behind her, said, ‘Sir? I hope I’ve done as you’d wish, but I’ve put him right at the bottom of that long trench I was digging down at the end of the orchard, where we was worrying about the tendency for that corner to flood. He’s down deep, sir, won’t nobody find him, leastways, not if they don’t know where to look.’

Will’s earnest face touched Josse deeply. He reached out his hand, and, after a small hesitation. Will put out his too and grasped it.

‘Thank you, Will,’ Josse said. ‘It’s more than I have any right to ask of you, but thank you.’

‘You didn’t ask.’ Will grinned briefly. ‘You wasn’t in no state to ask aught of anybody, sir.’ He glanced at Joanna. ‘And I couldn’t stand by and see the young lady here struggling all by herself with such a task, now, could I?’

‘But, Will, if there should ever be investigations about him, if anybody should ask you directly what you knew…’

Will waited courteously to see if he were going to finish. When he didn’t, Will said, ‘If anybody should ask about a body, I should say, body? What body?’

‘De Courtenay’s body!’ Josse said, beginning to feel fuddled again.

And Will, adopting a convincing expression of bovine dullness, said, ‘Eh? Who? Never heard of him.’

‘I won’t forget this, Will,’ Josse said.

Will was getting up. ‘I know that, sir. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a trench to finish backfilling.’

* * *

Alone again with Joanna, Josse said, ‘Is it safe? Do you think he’ll ever be found?’

She shrugged. ‘Who can say? But I doubt it. For one thing, Will has, as he said, buried him deep. For another, what is there to connect Denys de Courtenay with you or New Winnow-lands? I think we can safely discount the peasant who came here to summon you into Denys’s trap — it’s not likely that a wretch like him would speak out against a knight. What would be the point? Anything he said would be instantly dismissed.’

‘He wasn’t the only one,’ Josse murmured. ‘De Courtenay had another two outside with him.’

Joanna shrugged. ‘The same applies to them. Apart from them, who else but you and I know that Denys followed you here?’

‘Brother Saul,’ Josse murmured, ‘and the Abbess Helewise.’

‘Both of whom are your true and loving friends,’ she countered quickly, ‘and who, if you tell them the truth, will understand that this death is not on your conscience. That you fought bravely, but were overcome. That, holding out against threatened torture, your courage cannot be faulted.’ She paused, took a deep breath and said, ‘That another hand killed Denys de Courtenay.’

He said softly, ‘Never admit that again. Not to me, not to anybody.’

She stared deep into his eyes. And, after a pause, whispered, ‘No. I won’t.’

‘I will tell the Abbess,’ he announced presently, ‘that de Courtenay was stricken as we fought. That it was by pure mischance that he fell on to my blade-’

‘- which just happened to pierce his heart,’ she finished. There was a wry humour in her voice. ‘Josse, you won’t do that. Whatever explanation you choose to give, I should, if I might suggest, keep it brief.’

‘But she’ll want to know,’ he protested. ‘I’ll have to tell her something!’

Joanna put her hand on his brow, smoothing out the frown. ‘Dear Josse,’ she murmured. ‘You can’t bear to think of lying to those you love, can you?’

‘I-’ He stopped. She was right, it was something he could not contemplate. Helewise’s face sprang into his mind, frowning as she worried over some matter he had taken to lay at her feet, willingly putting all her intelligence and her experience at his disposal. Which, considering everything else constantly clamouring for her attention, was a gift indeed.

‘She’s-’ he began. ‘She’s a woman who-’

But he was attempting to explain Helewise to Joanna. And that, he realised, was something he would find difficult, even were he not suffering from a grievous wound.

‘It’s all right,’ Joanna said soothingly. ‘I understand.’

And, light-headed as he was, possibly seeing with a greater clarity than when he was fully himself, he knew that she did.

* * *

It was only when he woke the next morning that he remembered Brother Saul was also under his roof. Also under the care of Joanna.

He said, as soon as she appeared with a drink and a light breakfast of a bowl of thin gruel, ‘How is Brother Saul?’

She smiled. ‘Brother Saul is quite well. So well, in fact, that he left us soon after first light and is even now riding back to Hawkenlye to put his Abbess’s mind at rest.’

‘What’s he going to tell her?’ Josse struggled to sit up.

‘Don’t worry!’ She put out a restraining hand. ‘He will tell her the truth, but the truth as he has been told it.’

‘Which is?’

Her eyes widened into an expression of innocence. ‘Don’t you remember? Oh, dear, it must be because you’re still not yourself! Listen well, then, and I will tell you. There was a fight, between you and Denys, and you drew your dagger to defend yourself, and he fell against it when he tripped.’

He held her eyes. ‘That’s the truth?’

‘It is,’ she said firmly.

‘Can you live with that?’ he whispered.

And, raising her chin, she replied, ‘I can.’

* * *

It was two days before she would let him ride, and, even then, she told him crossly that he was daft even to think of it, and he ought to be abed still, building up his strength. By the time he was a third of the way to Hawkenlye, he was beginning to agree with her.

He had resisted her attempts to persuade him to let her go too. If he were going to have to lie to Abbess Helewise — which he knew he was — then it would be marginally better not to have a witness. Particularly if that witness were Joanna.

He made himself ignore his weakness. He urged Horace on, infected now with a sense of urgency. Even though he knew Brother Saul would have told the Abbess what had happened — the version he had been given, that was — still Josse longed to reassure her himself.

Clinging on as Horace increased his pace to a sprightly canter, Josse gritted his teeth and tried to work out what he was going to say.

* * *

Helewise had spent an awful few days.

Brother Saul’s return mid-way through the morning two days ago had given her the blessed relief of knowing he was alive and well, and apparently none the worse for his ordeal.

‘But you were attacked!’ she had protested after listening to his tale. ‘Saul, you must let Sister Euphemia attend to your hurts!’

‘What hurts I received were mild,’ he reassured her. ‘And Joanna looked after me — she has a gentle hand and a sound knowledge of remedies.’

Helewise had observed, with interest, the distinct softening of Brother Saul’s features as he spoke of Joanna.

‘Well, it’s wonderful to have you safely home, Saul,’ she said, ‘an answer to my prayers.’

His face clouded. ‘Abbess, you may not be so glad when I relay to you the news I bring.’

He had then told her about Denys de Courtenay’s attack on Josse, the fight between the two men and de Courtenay’s death.

‘And they buried him out there at New Winnowlands?’ she repeated, astounded. ‘But why-’

She made herself stop. Brother Saul was not the person to whom she should address that question.

Thanking him, telling him again how grateful she was for his safe return, she dismissed him. And began her long wait for the arrival of Josse.

* * *

He came into her room two days later. She could see at once that he had been hurt; his face was deathly pale and he held his right wrist supported in his left hand. There were small cuts on his throat, neck and left cheek.

‘Sir Josse!’ she cried. ‘Oh, but you’ve been wounded!’

‘I’m all right,’ he said instantly and unconvincingly; he was, she could see, swaying on his feet. She rushed round from behind her table, took him by the left arm and guided him to her chair, carefully sitting him down and hovering anxiously over him.

‘Do you feel faint?’

‘I’m all right!’

She tutted under her breath, then went outside into the cloister and summoned a passing nun to go and find Sister Euphemia. ‘Ask her, please, Sister Beata, to prepare a heartening draught, and bring it back with you for our visitor. Quick as you can, please!’

Then she returned to Josse.

‘I’m honoured,’ he said, looking up at her with a faint smile, ‘to be allowed to sit in your seat.’

‘I shall not make a habit of permitting it,’ she replied, trying to match his attempt at levity. ‘But today you look as if you need it.’

‘Aye, I do.’ He moved his arm a little, wincing as he did so.

‘A relic of your fight with Denys de Courtenay?’ she asked softly.

‘Aye.’

‘And he tripped and fell on to your dagger, and suffered a fatal wound, Brother Saul tells me.’

‘Aye.’

She noticed that he did not meet her eye. She knew straight away that he was lying; the perplexing question was, why?

She walked slowly back to the door, opening it to see if there were any sign of Sister Beata. If Josse killed Denys de Courtenay during a fight in which Denys was the instigator, she reasoned to herself, then that was surely self-defence and no crime has been committed. And there are witnesses to swear that Denys was indeed the instigator of the fight.

Why, then, would Josse …

Her thoughts trailed to a stop.

Yes. Of course.

Sister Beata was hurrying across the cloister, bearing a stoppered flask and a mug. ‘Sister Euphemia says he can have as much of this as he wants, it’s quite mild, and that if you need her, say so, except that could it wait a while as she’s just setting a broken wrist and can’t come right away unless it’s terribly urgent,’ she said, all in one breath. Helewise had the impression that Sister Beata was repeating the infirmarer’s exact words, and wanted to say them quickly before she forgot any of them.

She took the flask and mug from Sister Beata. ‘Thank you, Sister. Please tell Sister Euphemia that, for the present, there is no need for her to come. I will let her know if the situation changes.’

Sister Beata, knowing herself to be dismissed, made a bow and walked slowly away.

Helewise gave Josse a long drink of the infirmarer’s restorative. A little colour returned to his face. With a deep sigh, he put the mug down on the table.

He said, without any preliminaries, ‘Ninian is the child of Henry of England.’

Helewise felt her mouth drop open. ‘The late King?’

‘Himself.’

‘This was one of the unfortunate things you referred to, when you spoke of Joanna’s past?’ she asked gently.

‘Er — aye.’ He leaned towards her, his face intent. ‘That rat of a cousin took her to court one Christmas, paraded her before the King and, when the King took a fancy to her, made quite certain he got her. De Courtenay himself led her to the King’s bed, held her down while the King took her. He-’

‘Sir Josse, I don’t need to hear any more,’ she interrupted, laying her hand briefly on his shoulder. ‘I had surmised, from what little you told me before, that something of this nature had occurred. I had not, however, imagined a seducer of such exalted rank.’ She paused, biting her lip as she thought deeply. ‘And de Courtenay wanted to make a bid to put the boy on the throne?’

‘He did.’

‘Which Joanna, obviously, didn’t want.’

‘Why is that obvious?’ Josse demanded. ‘I’d been taking it for granted until just now, riding over here, when it suddenly occurred to me to ask just why she’s so set against the idea.’

‘Oh, Sir Josse, think!’ Helewise was quite surprised he should ask that. ‘What good impressions can Joanna de Courtenay possibly have of Plantagenet court life? Seduced and impregnated by the King of England, then, when she became an inconvenience, married off to some Breton knight to get her out of the way. Would any woman want to introduce her beloved only son into such a world? I know I should not, in her place.’

‘But the power and the riches!’ he protested. ‘The world would lie at the boy’s feet, were he King!’

‘Only part of the world,’ she pointed out. ‘And it would by no means be a foregone conclusion that he would ever be King, since there are several other contenders for the throne, even assuming King Richard no longer sat upon it. And just imagine the danger to Ninian, once his identity had been revealed! Why, every other faction with its eyes on the throne would be after his blood! No, Sir Josse, The reason for Joanna’s reluctance is perfectly obvious to me.’

‘Hmm.’ He was frowning, his face creased in lines of anxiety. And also, she thought, studying him closely, of sorrow.

‘Sir Josse?’ she asked. ‘What is it?’

He raised his head and turned mournful eyes on her. ‘She didn’t tell me,’ he said quietly.

‘Didn’t tell you what?’

‘Who the lad’s father was. She told me everything else — oh, I had all the sordid details — but not that.’

‘Perhaps she didn’t know?’ It seemed unlikely and Helewise knew she was clutching at straws.

‘She must have done. Anyway, if she didn’t, it makes a nonsense of her elaborate plan to keep Ninian out of de Courtenay’s reach. That was why she agreed to his coming here while I took her off to New Winnowlands — she was leading de Courtenay away from him.’

‘Yes, that makes sense,’ Helewise agreed.

‘So why didn’t she tell me?’ he demanded. ‘She didn’t trust me, did she?’

Helewise’s heart hurt to see the pain in his face. Oh, dear Lord, but she’s got under his skin! she thought. ‘Josse, I’m not sure that it’s possible for anybody but another mother to understand the protective instinct which a woman has for her child,’ she said, her hand once more resting on his shoulder. ‘I know, from my own experience, that, once a baby is born, he becomes, to begin with, the whole world to his mother, and, although that intensity lessens as he grows up and steadily becomes more independent, you never lose it entirely. Indeed, it’s quite common for husbands to resent the children they have fathered, because the act of childbirth changes a wife into a mother, and there is no going back.’ She paused. We speak of Joanna, she reminded herself firmly, not of me.

‘In a loveless marriage, Ninian would have been even more precious to Joanna,’ she went on, ‘and the bonds between them would have strengthened as he grew older. So that, when she sensed the threat from Denys de Courtenay, she would have done anything — whatever it took — to keep her child safe. Josse, my dear, do you not see that, even though she probably longed to reveal the secret of the boy’s parenthood, she just didn’t dare?’

‘She didn’t trust me,’ he repeated stubbornly.

‘She couldn’t trust you,’ Helewise corrected. ‘It wasn’t Joanna who would be in danger if the secret came out, but Ninian.’

He did not reply. Watching him closely, she saw him pass his hand across his face a couple of times. Then he said, ‘Aye. Aye, you’re right. And I’m being foolish. It’s just that we’ve grown so close, Joanna and I, and-’

He stopped.

This time, the silence was rather longer.

Helewise moved away, and stood with her back to him on the other side of her table. After some time, hoping her voice would sound quite normal, she said, ‘Which of them, Joanna or Mag Hobson, do you think put the poison in the pie meant for de Courtenay?’

He began to say something, but his voice broke. Clearing his throat, he started again. ‘I think probably Mag Hobson. She certainly would have prepared the dose — she’s skilled in plant lore and, until her death, had been teaching Joanna. Mag would have been far less conspicuous — there are always a few old men and women hanging around the kitchen courtyard at the inn in Tonbridge, Goody Anne is generous with leftovers. They were busy that day, we know that, and with Goody Anne, Tilly and the serving boy all occupied with tending to people’s needs in the tap room, it can’t have been difficult for Mag to slip into the kitchen when nobody was looking.’

‘How did she know what Denys had ordered?’ Helewise asked.

‘I’ve thought about that. She must have followed him into the tap room — he’d never met her, not then, and so he wouldn’t have known what she looked like — and listened while he told Tilly what he wanted to eat. Then she must have got round to the kitchen before Tilly did and slipped the poison in Denys’s pie.’

‘Would that be possible? For her to reach the kitchen before Tilly?’

‘Aye. If you went out through the main door and slipped along the side passage, you could do it easily.’

‘I see.’

He was shifting in the chair, apparently about to get up. ‘I must go back home,’ he said. ‘I promised Joanna I’d speak to Ninian, see how he is, take any message he may have for her. Can I see him?’

‘Of course. Doesn’t she want to have him back with her?’

‘No,’ he said shortly. ‘Not yet.’

Why? Helewise wondered. Now that the danger was past, why should mother and son not be reunited?

But, sensing Josse didn’t want to talk about it, she merely said, ‘I will take you to him. You can reassure his mother that he’s quite all right. He seems happy, he likes Sister Caliste, and he’s eating like a horse.’

Josse grinned, very briefly. ‘Can’t be too much wrong with him, then.’

They were halfway across to the infirmary when Helewise stopped him. I have to speak, she thought, I can’t let there be an untruth between us.

‘What is it?’ he asked, glancing down at her detaining hand on his sleeve, ‘Why have we stopped?’

She looked round to make sure they were alone. Then, summoning her courage and taking a deep breath, she said, ‘Josse, I know that the story which Brother Saul brought back, the story you have just repeated to me, is not true.’ She noticed he was glaring at her, heavy eyebrows drawn down over his angry brown eyes. Go on! she ordered herself. You must! ‘I cannot believe that a man just happens to fall on a dagger point which pierces him to the heart,’ she hurried on, ‘it’s too convenient. And had you killed him as you fought, it would be self-defence and no crime, either in God’s eyes or under the law of the land. The only other person who could have killed him is Joanna.’

He had hold of her by the shoulders, and he could not have realised, she thought, how hard he was gripping her. She held his eyes steadily, and, after a moment, he loosened his hands.

He said nothing.

She took his silence as an acknowledgement that she was right.

She was tempted to assure him, to swear that the secret was quite safe with her.

But she didn’t really think there was any need.