The Templar, the Queen and Her Lover

Chapter Twenty-Three

Back at the Queen’s chamber, Baldwin took little time to explain what had happened. ‘So if you see a tatty little churl from the far south, carrying a poker and clad in worn red hosen and old leather jack, stab first and question him later,’ he said lightly.

The Queen nodded and showed relief. ‘For a moment I wondered whether there was something a lot worse.’

She was sitting in a high-backed chair. There were no other chairs or stools in the room, so Cromwell and Baldwin were standing before her.

Lord John glanced at her. ‘You thought the peasants had risen?’

‘It is not unheard of, but no — my fear was another fire. Sir Baldwin, that reminds me. How are your burns?’

‘Much better since I’ve been using the salve you kindly sent me,’ he said with a bow.

‘A curious thing, that,’ Lord John said. ‘I have found no one who can tell why someone should have wished to have de Foix killed. He was pretty universally liked.’

‘Except by me, I fear,’ Baldwin said. He caught Cromwell’s eye, and shook his head very slightly. ‘But it is probable that this was just a chance encounter. Someone intended to set off the charge there to tempt men from their tents so that he could enter to rob them, and the Comte happened to catch him in the act. I dare say it was nothing more than that. The main thing is, there was no threat to the Queen, and that is all that matters.’

‘It was,’ Cromwell said. ‘But now we’ve had two murders in the space of as many weeks. Surely that is too many for coincidence.’

‘I do not see how the Comte de Foix and an ageing prison guard could be related,’ Baldwin said. ‘They must have been unconnected.’

‘The Comte de Foix, you say?’ the Queen mused. ‘His territories are in the far south of France, are they not?’

‘Yes, I believe so,’ Cromwell said.

‘Which is where this little tatty guard came from, I think you said, Sir Baldwin?’

Baldwin nodded.

‘So perhaps the same man was responsible for both deaths? What of the dead guard — did you learn anything about him?’

‘Only that he was a guard in a prison-castle in Normandy, near the borders. The Château Gaillard. The man who killed him was from the same garrison.’

‘That place!’ the Queen hissed, and looked into the fire’s flames. ‘I would have you leave me, my lord, Sir Baldwin. I am tired.’

‘What do you think she meant by that?’ Simon asked a little later.

He had risen on hearing the noise, but he didn’t know the palace well enough to go haring about the place. Confident that he’d get lost if he tried to find the Queen’s quarters, he took the sensible option of remaining in his room with his sword unsheathed. After all, guards would be pelting up and down passages seeking the source of those screams, and a foreigner with an odd accent would be an easy target. Better by far to remain safely out of the way. It was a relief to hear Baldwin return.

‘There was something about the castle which upset her, I think. I do not know why,’ Baldwin admitted.

‘And meanwhile there is this strange, scruffy churl wandering the place. Do you think he was there on the night the Comte died?’

‘It is possible. There were a lot of strange men and women on the journey here, weren’t there? The hangers-on formed a large train at the rear of the column, and there were all the knights and nobles. He could have been attached to any of their parties.’

‘And this other man, the one he killed. He was in the room with Robert de Chatillon? Curious that people near that Robert seem to keep dying. First his Comte, now this guard.’

‘I want to learn more about the Château Gaillard. There must be some reason for the two guards to have had a dispute.’

‘We could always try to speak to Robert again, I suppose,’ Simon said. He was doubtful. ‘He was not overly keen to discuss affairs with us last time we spoke, though. Do you think he has given up any thoughts that you could have been responsible for the murder of his master?’

‘Oh, I think so. I think my inane playing with the black powder was enough to convince him of that.’

‘Maybe he thought you were so incompetent that you’d be likely to burn yourself out in the wild at night?’ Simon guessed with a mischievous smile. ‘Just as you did!’

Paul had passed up the road twice before he decided to give up on the search for now and find a small wine shop.

The nearest was a scruffy little building that suited his mood nicely. He entered and ordered a jug of the local wine. It was the peasant drink, rough and potent, but that was how he liked his wine. The smooth, sweeter wines on offer in the palace were no doubt more expensive, but he preferred a harsher variety.

He’d always liked France, since the first time he’d come here with Sir Charles three years ago. That journey was curtailed after they had got into a fight with some locals and killed them all, but it hadn’t affected his feeling for the country. Only for some of the peasants. They were as rude as any others.

That attack and the consequent flight from France had been exciting, but much of his life had been like that. At first, with Sir Charles in Lancaster, he had only ever been on the right side of the law, but as soon as they found themselves declared outlaw everything changed. They were forced to run from the country and seek refuge in France, where for a while they had survived on the proceeds of Sir Charles’s store of silver and pewter, but all too soon that was expended, and they had decided to try their luck with the Germans. It was said that the colonies in Lithuania were lucrative. Teutonic knights were overrunning the heathen eastern lands and turning them into productive Christian territories, apparently. Except they’d never made it there.

Instead they had travelled back to England with Simon and Baldwin. They had endured enough wandering by then, and it was to be hoped that the King’s rage against all those who had been loyal to Lancaster would have burned itself out.

Returning had been a strange experience. At first Paul had reckoned that they would suffer the fate of so many others, and be hanged for their treachery, but they had been fortunate. Apparently only a short while before their return the reign of terror had come to an end. Many said it was the Queen who intervened. She was certainly a kind, gracious lady, so it would be no surprise, Paul thought. Sir Charles reckoned that the King had sated his desire for blood, and one morning awoke to realise what horror he had inflicted on the kingdom. For his part, Paul doubted it. He had enough experience of warriors and rulers to know that those who wielded immense power tended to believe in their right to use it to the exclusion of all other considerations.

Anyway, they had managed to find themselves billeted in the King’s household at last. Along with many others who had dubious pasts, they had been accepted, and their crimes forgiven. Not that they’d been guilty of many crimes in England. Most of them had been committed in France.

Which was why he was still a little nervous as he walked the lanes about here. It was near enough to Paris for him to feel that sense of wild danger, as though someone was watching them constantly, ready to call the hue and cry to arrest them both, or kill them. Even though he knew that they should be perfectly safe here, his eyes kept flitting over the crowds walking past.

No sign of Sir Charles. He would be farther up, nearer the river, if he had kept on walking. Paul hoped he was all right.

It was a strange thought, but one which had returned to him more regularly recently: if it was bad enough to lose Earl Lancaster, what would he do if Sir Charles were to die? Without his master, he would be as lost as a cork bobbing about on the sea. Sir Charles gave him purpose, his life meaning. Without Sir Charles, he didn’t know what he could do. He was no farmer, and he had no trade. Perhaps, he considered, glancing about him idly, he could start up a wine shop, or take on a tavern in England? There were always people who wanted a drink, and provided he didn’t fall foul of the ale-measurers, it was safe business, too.

A flash, nothing more, just a brief glimpse of a cloak, and his attention was focused again. He stood slowly, drinking from his cup, eyeing the figure. It was a tall man, with the build of a rich one. Not someone who looked as though he’d ever been forced to go hungry.

Paul drained the cup, regretfully left the remains of the wine in the jug, and hurried off after his quarry.

Robert de Chatillon groaned as he levered himself up from his seat. Painfully, grimacing, he hobbled over to the sideboard.

If anything, the pain was worse now. It felt as though his back was turned against his body slightly, like a bar of steel that was bent out of true. Standing and walking were difficult, and even when he lay in his bed of an evening, matters were not improved. The dull pain would always be there, and no matter how he turned or rolled, he would be aware of it. Somehow the fact that it was unchanging seemed to make it more unendurable.

He poured more wine, hoping it might make a little difference. The knock, when it came, was welcome as a distraction. ‘Yes?’

‘Do you remember me, my son?’ Père Pierre Clergue asked as he stepped quietly into the room. ‘Our friends are anxious that our plans appear to have gone astray.’

Roger Mortimer kept a smile on his face as he walked quickly along the cobbles. He had to be cautious, aware always that any eyes with black suspicion in them might belong to his enemy’s men. There were so many who’d be prepared to slay him and carry his body back to Despenser for a reward — and he had no doubt that the reward would be large. Despenser hated him enough to share his wealth with any man who destroyed him.

The King, too, was keen to see him dead. It was terrible, that. The man whom he had served devotedly all his life was now seeking to have him killed. All because of the poison that evil whelp Despenser was pissing in his ear the whole time. Mortimer had made it very clear that he wanted to remove Despenser, but that was no more than common necessity. The thieving bastard was ruining the country with his avarice and ruthlessness. Trouble was, just as before with Piers damned Gaveston, the King was blind. He was in love, and nothing his lover did could be wrong in his eyes.

And therein lay the problem. If only the King would pick suitable advisers. He always selected the pretty men, the ones with the ready charm — for him — and the same love of high fashion and clothing. A man who was merely obedient and honourable didn’t rank nearly so highly in the King’s esteem.

What was truly insulting was the King’s love of play-acting and peasants. He would much prefer to join a group of churls laying a hedge than get involved in a good boar hunt. He had been known to go swimming, in God’s name, when his knights were off after venison. What sort of example was that?

There was a figure in a doorway, and Mortimer turned his head just a little, so that as he passed he could still see it from the corner of his eye, but there was no movement to show that the man left his shelter to follow him. No, he was still secure.

His conversation with de Bouden had been fruitful. It was good to know that the Queen herself was as keen to see him as he was to meet her. How they might manage it was a different matter, of course. It was hard to see what they could do, with so many about the palace. Perhaps they could simply stick to using de Bouden as a go-between? Mortimer was not very keen to do so, since de Bouden had been put in his place by the King. In the past he had been in the Queen’s household, but now he had been reinstated by others, and that made his motives suspect in Mortimer’s eye. You didn’t stay alive in this environment without being very cautious indeed.

There was a step behind him that appeared to be hurrying. Mortimer slowed his own pace, and the pattering of boots also slowed. He stopped to tie a lace, and the steps stopped too.

‘Shite,’ he muttered. Very well. He must remove another obstacle. Without glancing round, he set off again, back towards the palace grounds. He knew where he could go safely.

With Paul’s footsteps echoing behind him, he marched quickly to the palace gate, then inside. There were extensive stables and guard quarters over to the left, and he made for them, opening a door and peering inside. A ladder was leaning up against the hayloft in there, and he shinned up it quickly. There was a window for ventilation at the farther end. He went to it and peered down. It was a long way to fall. Instead he darted back to the ladder inside, pulled it up, carried it through to the window and waited.

As he had hoped, soon he heard steps in the chamber below. Smiling, he thrust the ladder through the window, careless of the noise. The man below began to run about the place, as Mortimer let the ladder out, and carefully clambered onto the upper rungs.

At the bottom, he looked at the thick wall that encircled this little orchard and smiled to himself before sauntering away towards the rooms he was renting.

After all, even a man hunting him for a bounty would find it hard to persuade the hard-faced guards installed here by his son Geoffrey to let them past. There were advantages to having money.