The Wicked Winter

Chapter Eighteen

Audrey looked at me with a mixture of respect and concern for my foolhardiness. An itinerant pedlar did not usually speak so lightly of questioning someone of Ursula Lynom's importance.

'She's probably still in the guest chamber. She was served her dinner there. Ethelwynne was grumbling about it, saying what a deal of extra work it throws upon her and the rest of them, especially with Father Godyer still abed. Mistress Empryngham's none too pleased about it either, for she can't use her own room while Master Gerard's body remains there, and has to sleep in the common dormitory with the rest of us women.'

'Then the guest chamber is where I shall look for Mistress Lynom,' I said. 'And if she's not to be found, I shall search elsewhere. She must surely still be within the manor pale, for I don't think her ready to leave just yet. The thaw isn't sufficiently advanced to make travelling anything but hazardous for the present. Tomorrow may well be a different story. Indeed, I think another twenty-four hours will see Sir Hugh left in peace to make arrangements to bury his dead and consider the life ahead of him, now that he's a widower once again.'

'But what of your suspicions concerning my lady?' Audrey Lambspringe asked reproachfully as I rose from the bench. 'Do you intend to quit Cederwell without finding her murderer?'

'I believe I already know who it is,' I replied. 'In my own mind I'm certain, but whether or not I can persuade others is somewhat doubtful.'

'Who is it?' she demanded. 'Only tell me his name and I will take a knife to him myself.'

I grinned at her. 'Well, well! What a bloodthirsty little creature lurks behind that timid face. All the better if you don't know, I fancy. You'd best leave matters in my hands, for as yet there are still one or two questions to be answered. Which is why I must speak to Mistress Lynom, and perhaps once again to Father Godyer.'

'And what will you do when you have the answers?' The soft lower lip stuck out belligerently. 'Will you then be able to convince the rest of us of what you say?'

'How can I tell? The outcome is in God's hands. It is for Him to decide what happens next. He has brought me here. He has laid the facts before me. When the time comes to confront my villain, I must be guided by His wisdom and hope that He will put it into my head what to do.' I stooped and kissed her cheek. 'Now, I must be on my way and seek out Mistress Lynom.'

I descended the stairs and crept as silently as I could past the half-closed kitchen door, where the clash of dishes and the hiss of steam told of work in progress; of dirty plates being washed and of the preparation of food for the evening meal, still several hours away. I had no wish to be confronted by an irate Martha Grindcobb demanding to know where I was bound or what I was doing.

Out of doors, the noonday sun revealed a rapidly changing landscape. The magical white world of faerie was slowly being transformed into mundane winter browns and greys.

Roof slates showed patchily beneath their frosty covering and distant trees thrust twisted, disfigured limbs through the concealing bandages of snow. The ground was still unyielding, but the steps leading to the covered gallery were wet and slippery with melting ice. I trod carefully. I could ill afford another accident.

The platform was also showing signs of the impending thaw, with little puddles of water collecting here and there in the shallow depressions of the boards. The doors to both the guest chamber and the women's dormitory were tightly shut against the cold, and no sound came from within either room.

I paused outside the first, hand raised to knock, listening intently, but all was as quiet as the grave. My heart beat faster, anticipating another tragedy, yet another death. Then someone coughed and I heard the faintest sound of movement, breathed freely again and tapped with my knuckles on the wood.

The rustling noises ceased abruptly and there was silence.

Then a woman's voice called, 'Come in.'

I opened the door and stood respectfully on the threshold.

Mistress Lynom looked astonished at the sight of me.

'Chapman? What are you doing here? What do you want?' There was an edge to her tone which suggested fear as well as annoyance.

'I've come to beg a moment of your time, Mistress Lynom. It won't take long, I promise, but there is a question to which you might know the answer.' I made no attempt to advance any further.

She took a step backwards, her eyes still wary. I guessed that despite the accusation I had overheard her make, she was not absolutely convinced of her lover's guilt in the matter of Lady Cederwell's death, nor did she believe that death to be either accident or suicide. I also concluded that if she were not a clever dissembler, she was innocent of contriving the murder herself, for she seemed ready to be suspicious of almost anyone on the manor.

'What question?' she asked, and flung out a hand. 'No! Remain where you are.'

'I had no intention of entering without your permission,' I answered placidly. 'But you have no reason to fear me, I do assure you. Lady Cederwell was dead by the time Brother Simeon and I reached here on Tuesday. We found her body together.'

Mistress Lynom drew in a deep breath and then released it on a long, drawn-out sigh.

'So you did. I recollect now.' She shivered. 'Very well! You may come in, but you are to leave the door ajar.' She still did not trust me completely.

I did as I was bidden. The room within was almost as bleak as the women's dormitory, but some attempt had been made to render it more habitable. The bed was covered by a rubbed and faded red velvet coverlet which matched the equally worn bed curtains, and another piece of the same material was thrown across the clothes chest, draping it to the floor. An ornately carved armchair, adorned with a pair of embroidered cushions, offered what little extra comfort there was apart from a tapestry, depicting the story of Tobias and the Angel, which hung against one wall. I wondered what Ursula Lynom thought of her accommodation, and whether or not she shared her lover's niggardly approach to the luxuries of life. Moreover, what would the redoubtable Dame Judith make of it all if she were forced to live at Cederwell with her daughter-in-law?

'Well?' inquired Mistress Lynom. 'What is it that you wish to ask me?'

I hesitated, knowing that she would find my question odd, then plunged.

'Who are your nearest neighbours to Lynom Hall?' She blinked once or twice, as though she had not properly understood me, then shook her head as if to clear it.

'Who are my nearest neighbours?'

I nodded. 'It may sound strange, but I should be grateful for an answer without being forced to give my reasons.' She continued to stare at me for several seconds before sitting down in the armchair, her lips thinning to a narrow line. She was no fool, and was immediately able to add two and two and reach the correct conclusion.

'What do you know?' she demanded bluntly. 'Or what do you think you know?'

We eyed one another cautiously while the silence stretched between us. At last, however, I decided to be as frank with her as I could.

'Whatever my suspicions, they have absolutely nothing to do with Sir Hugh. You have my word on that.' I did not pause to consider if the word of a common pedlar had any meaning for her or no.

She returned my gaze steadily. Then, obviously coming to a decision, she determined to be equally plain with me.

'My groom, Hamon, whom I dispatched after Sir Hugh with the buttons I bought from your pack, saw him bending over Jeanette's body outside the tower.'

'And rode back as fast as he could to Lynom Hall to tell you what he had seen. But that was very little. So why, with respect, did you reach the conclusion that Sir Hugh had probably murdered his wife?'

She got up and began to walk up and down the tiny room.

In her relief at finally being able to talk openly to someone, she forgot to whom she was speaking.

'It was only that very morning, at Lynom, that we had discussed the hopelessness of our situation.' She grimaced wryly. 'Neither of us is young, and growing older with every day that passes, whereas Jeanette — Lady Cederwell — is — ' she caught her breath for a moment ' — or rather was, only twenty-one. We could see no solution to our problem, and Hugh in particular was growing desperate.' The knotted fist of her right hand drove deeply into the palm of her left as she turned with a swirl of her gown and began pacing in the opposite direction. 'To add to his woes, he knew from her own lips that she had sent for this Brother Simeon in order to make allegations not only against Hugh, but also against other members of his household. For his own sake, he did not really care. He has a broad back and is perfectly capable of facing up to some strange friar's hectoring and reproaches. But…' She broke off abruptly, on the brink, I fancied, of recollecting my lowly status.

'You refer to Maurice Cederwell and Fulk Disney,' I said swiftly. 'To the love that exists between them.'

Mistress Lynom's eyes widened. 'You waste no time, Chapman,' she accused me angrily, 'in ferreting out other people's secrets.'

I shrugged. 'There's precious little secrecy about it, Mistress. Even an innocent like Audrey Lambspringe knows what they are to one another.' I smiled at her look of horror.

'It's impossible to keep such a thing private in an enclosed community such as this one. Servants will always gossip.'

'And not only servants,' she retorted sharply, thinking, I had no doubt, of Dame Judith. 'So,' she went on after a moment, 'I have no need to explain to you Sir Hugh's concern on behalf of his son. This friar's reputation had preceded him. His mission, it seems, is to punish immorality wherever and whenever he finds it.'

'So I believe.'

'Very well! You can understand, therefore, why, although I was loath to believe it, my interpretation of what Hamon had seen was that Sir Hugh, in a fit of frustrated rage, had thrown Jeanette down from the tower.' She took another brief turn about the room. 'I waited all day in increasing anxiety for him to send me news of the "accident", as he would obviously pretend her death to be, but nothing happened. At last, in spite of the darkness and the snow, I set forward for Cederwell with Hamon and Jasper in attendance. The rest you know for yourself, how I nearly gave everything away.' She sat down again, her fingers drumming restlessly on the arms of the chair.

Now came the hardest part of my inquisition, as I had to feign ignorance of what had passed between her and Sir Hugh.

'And what was Sir Hugh's explanation of his omission in sending to you with the news?'

Mistress Lynom's bosom swelled indignantly and her jaw hardened.

'As you must recall, he pretended to know nothing of Jeanette's death until informed of it by you and the friar. When he realised that I knew the truth, he had the gall to plead that he was protecting me! Me! He accused me of sending my groom to kill Jeanette, and even made up a story that in her dying moments, she had whispered Hamon's name.'

Her initial anger, which by now had lost its spark, was suddenly rekindled and she was on her feet once more, kicking the heavy chair aside with a vigorous movement of one foot.

A strong woman in every sense, Ursula Lynom. She would rule Sir Hugh and his household with a rod of iron, but it was very possible that they might all be grateful for it. It would bring back some semblance of order and calm into their disrupted lives.

I said quietly, 'I think you will find, Mistress, that in this instance Sir Hugh was not lying; that he did indeed believe you responsible for Lady Cederwell's murder and was trying to protect you. After discovering his wife's body, he returned to the house and said nothing either of what he had found or of having seen Hamon. The longer the body lay undiscovered, the less chance there was of any blame being attached to you or your messenger. The fact that such an accusation was extremely unlikely to be brought against you, that in the prevailing circumstances his wife's fall would most probably be considered an accident, did not occur to him, so anxious was he to ensure your safety.'

She gave me a sharp glance and then her rather heavy features lifted with the beginnings of a smile. Just for a moment, I could see the handsome young girl she had once been, when Sir Hugh had first fallen in love with her and she, foolishly and wantonly, had denied her heart and married his friend.

'How can you be sure of that?' she asked scornfully, willing me nonetheless to produce a reason.

'Because, Mistress, I think I know who killed Lady Cederwell, and why. However, for now you'll simply have to take my word for that. But if I'm right, Sir Hugh's actions allow of no other explanation. Whether or not you can forgive him for imagining you capable of murder is another matter, and one you'll have to decide for yourself.'

The half-smile deepened. 'I thought him guilty of the same crime, so we must beg pardon of one another. I don't doubt we shall each offer and receive forgiveness.' She sat silent for a moment or two, contemplating a suddenly much rosier future than any she had foreseen for many years past. But then her expression sobered. 'You are certain that you have stumbled on the truth?'

If I resented the word 'stumbled', I was careful not to show it. I nodded reassuringly, but then reminded her that she had not yet answered my original question.

'I have forgotten what it was,' she confessed, stating at me with a puzzled frown, as though suddenly becoming aware to whom she had been speaking, unburdening her innermost thoughts and fears. She gave her head another shake as if to make sure that she had not dreamed the whole.

'I asked who are your nearest neighbours to Lynom Hall. I know you have none to the north along the Woodspring road, for I've walked that way myself. But to the south, now! Is there a farm or homestead easily accessible from the main track?'

It was plain that she would dearly have loved to know the reason behind my question, but after struggling for several seconds with the temptation to demand an answer, she said merely, 'There is indeed a farm some three to three-and-ahalf miles south-west of the Hall, land which belongs to a good yeoman named John Armstrong. Is that what you wish to know?'

'Is the farm moated? Or do its buildings lie open to the road?'

The widow pressed a hand to her forehead, trying to picture a holding which she must have passed many times in her life, but of which she had taken little particular notice. It so often happens that the most familiar objects are the least regarded.

'It is moated,' she said at last, 'but I think… No, no, I'm sure that there are at least two outhouses which stand beyond the pale, on open ground. They lie southerly again from the main enclosure.'

I gave a brief bow. 'I thank your ladyship.' She rose to her feet, eyeing me severely, and smoothed down the skirt of her gown.

'I'm not her ladyship yet as you're very well aware. You're a plausible rascal who knows how to make himself agreeable, especially to women. But even so, how you've managed to get me to open up my heart to you, I've no idea.' She sighed.

'If I were only twenty years younger… but no, I'm too old for those kind of thoughts. Get along before I embarrass you and do anything I shall later regret. I must find Sir Hugh. Have I your permission to repeat our conversation to him?' I hesitated, then nodded. 'But I should be grateful if you would tell no one else for now. Keep what has passed between us to your two selves until I am ready.'

'Very well. I shall ensure Sir Hugh's silence. What other proof are you seeking?'

'I am going to speak once more to Father Godyer. After that, I shall have to make up my mind whether to speak or hold my peace. I would not accuse any person unless I were sure of making my accusation stick.'

The chaplain was looking even healthier than when I had seen him earlier. He was still, as Ethelwynne had complained, in bed, but his face was less pinched, and his more vigorous speech suggested that he might be able to resume his duties within the next few days.

'You're feeling much better than this morning,' I said, and he nodded, smiling. He shifted his legs to one side of the pallet so that I could once again sit on the opposite edge.

'Much better, God be praised, and no worse for seeing you a second time. A man gets very bored tucked away up here with no one to talk to.' He sighed. 'But there! I have no right to complain. I am of little importance to anyone in the household now that my lady has gone.' Tears welled up and trickled down his cheeks. 'I came here with her from Campden, and had known and loved her as a girl.'

'Indeed, you've already told me so,' I answered heartily. 'And a very interesting story it is, Father. How could you not love her when you knew all that she had suffered in her youth? Of the terrible experience which had warped her mind.'

His head reared up at that. 'Who said her mind was warped? Not I, Chapman! That's your interpretation of my words, and a very wrong one! She bore even that adversity as she bore all the rest, with an unshakeable belief in God.'

'I beg your pardon,' I said. 'Perhaps I expressed myself badly. Yet to know that her attacker escaped the full rigour of the law must surely have embittered her beyond reason.'

'There you go again!' he exclaimed angrily. 'Trying to make out that she was on the fringe of madness.'

'Wasn't she? Forgive me, Father, but surely a pretty young woman should have wanted more from life than prayer and meditation.'

'It is obvious that you have never perused the lives of the saints,' the priest chided me austerely. 'Saint Leocadia, Saint Lucy, Saint Eulalia, all were young women willing to sacrifice life itself for their faith. Do you suggest that they, too, were insane?' I shook my head meekly and he continued, 'They never saw their persecutors brought to justice, either, and at least my darling girl knew what had befallen her despoiler. She came herself to look upon his mangled body when it was carried back to her father's house.'

'A young girl could calmly gaze upon a man with his head crushed in? Father, even someone as partial as you must admit that there is something not… not quite… quite normal in such an action.'

He shifted his legs once more to the middle of the bed, leaned back against his pillows and closed his eyes, indicating that our conversation was at an end. I did not move immediately, however, but sat observing that pallid face and narrow skull, wondering what was going on inside it. There was now no doubt in my mind that Father Godyer had loved Jeanette Empryngham with a carnal as well as a spiritual love, but he had suppressed it, convincing himself that it was a paternal affection he entertained for her. Had Gerard Empryngham, I wondered, suspected the priest's true feelings?

I stood up, 'I shall be leaving here tomorrow,' I said. 'The snow is beginning to melt and the roads should be passable again.'

He made no answer until I was almost out of the door.

Then he demanded, 'Well? Have you got what you came for?'

'I… I just came to see how you were,' I stuttered, surprised by his unexpected shrewdness.

The priest snorted with disbelief. 'So I thought at first.'

'So what's made you change your mind?' His pale eyes opened slowly to fix me with a long, silent stare.

'I don't know,' he confessed at last. 'Just an ache in the bones, a warning bell in the head. So,' he persisted, 'am I right, and have you discovered whatever it was you were seeking from me?'

'Yes. Thank you. I. . I shall see you again, I hope, before I leave.'

The bloodless lips sketched the ghost of a smile. 'That rather depends on you, I imagine. I shall be here, certainly. I have no plans, for the present, to go elsewhere.' And the eyes closed again, blotting me from his sight.

I hesitated for a moment, opened my mouth to say something more, then thought better of it. I shut the chamber door quietly behind me and descended the stairs. Fulk Disney was waiting for me at the bottom. Insolently, he looked me up and down.

'Ah! There you are! Well met! I've been searching for you everywhere. I was just about to seek you in the chapel.' 'I've been visiting Father Godyer,' I answered shortly.

'What is it you wish to say?'

'Father Godyer, eh?' His eyes flickered slightly. 'You know, I used to wonder about that man and our pious lady.' A prurient smile lifted the corners of his mouth.

'Why do you want me?' I insisted.

'Mmm, now why do I want you?' he mused. He disliked me and was trying to make me angry. When he found he could not succeed, he merely shrugged. 'Ah yes! I have a message for you from Brother Simeon.'