The Templar, the Queen and Her Lover: (Knights Templar 24) Page 7

  Isabella had learned how to dissemble and pretend to be a play-actor. She gave a fleeting grin, but then glanced at Alicia with a cold, outraged demeanour, and imperiously held out her hand for the papers. She did not so much as glance in the direction of the other women in the room.

  They were all the spies of Despenser.

  3rd day of Lent6

  Alehouse at gateway to Palace Yard, Westminster

  They were all nervous as they marched under the entrance gate to the great palace complex of Westminster on Thorney Island. Charlie, in Ricard’s arms, buried his head in Ricard’s neck. It was odd – just that little proof of the lad’s sense of vulnerability was enough to make Ricard’s breast swell. He felt as if he could kill dragons to protect him. And then they fell under the shadow of the gatehouse, and his courage cooled. The mere sight of the huge belfry at the abbey next door made him duck his own head down. There was too much money and magnificence here for them. And of course they were here to do the bidding of someone else and spy on the Queen.

  ‘One thing I still don’t understand is,’ Janin had said as he scuffed his boots along the road to the palace, ‘why they want us so badly. There must be some good reason why they want a motley band of brothers like us to be near the Queen.’

  ‘Maybe that’s it?’ Philip said. ‘They think we’re so motley, no one would suspect us of any deviousness.’

  ‘Well, naturally they’d respect our position. Perhaps it’s just that. They know that a Queen’s Musician is likely to be able to keep close to her, eh?’ Ricard grunted.

  They were no nearer an answer when they reached the alehouse inside the gateway. It was here that they were supposed to meet their companion Peter. He was to introduce them to the Queen’s Comptroller, but when they gave their names to the guard at the door, they were told to wait and someone would be sent to find their companion.

  ‘He’s a musician, you say?’

  The man’s suspicion was not hidden, but few in these troubled times were not distrustful of strangers, and no one was more wary than a king’s guard. There had been attempts to assassinate the King and his friend since Mortimer the Traitor had escaped from the Tower.

  Ricard answered for them all. ‘Peter Waferer – he plays the tabor. He ought to be up and about by now.’

  ‘Wait here.’

  They were forced to hang around for a long while. It was soon apparent that no one had seen Peter that morning so far, and as the sun climbed in the sky the guard quickly grew bored with their presence. He called a lad over and asked whether the musicians could be taken to the Queen’s Comptroller. Soon they were being escorted over the great yard towards the exchequer buildings, two extensions added to the massive hall built by William II more than two hundred years ago.

  The main exchequer chambers were full of black-garbed clerks working on numbers, and there was a large table with a chequered cloth on it, although all the men seemed to be scrawling on parchments or in books rather than looking at the money on it. And there was a lot of money, enough to make Ricard salivate, almost. There was no sign of the man they must see, though, so they were taken out through a small door into the great hall itself. Here there were several courts hearing cases, the judges sitting in attitudes of either boredom or keen attention. They followed their guide down behind the court of Common Pleas and King’s bench, past a massive marble table which was, so Ricard was told in a hushed tone, the Chancery, before being led out through the rear of the hall into a small chamber nearer the river. At last they met William de Bouden.

  ‘Who in God’s name are you lot? What’s that brat doing in here?’

  The bawled demand was enough to make all of them drop their heads, and their guide respectfully bowed and apologised.

  ‘My lord, these are the musicians for the Queen. They’re here to join her on her journey, if it pleases you.’

  ‘No, it bloody doesn’t. Scruffy-looking bunch of tatterdemalions! Where in hell did you find them, eh?’

  The guide was sensibly silent at that question, but Ricard felt that somebody ought to speak, so he pulled off his hat respectfully and cleared his throat.

  ‘You hawk and spit in here, man, and you’ll spend the next year in the King’s gaol!’

  ‘My lord, I was only going to say that we played for the Queen some while ago, and she remembers us. Perhaps she wanted us to join her when she rides off to wherever she’s going. Where is it? York? Lincoln?’

  ‘Bloody York? Lincoln? Christ’s bones, man, she’d hardly need musicians for a local journey like that. No, she’s off into danger in France, and some of us are going with her. Sweet Mother of God, though, these bastards stink! She will want nothing to do with them.’

  The guide bent his head. ‘Earl Edmund himself has asked that you take them. The embassy is to be as flattering to her honour as possible. The Earl respectfully asked that you find some money for them, so that she has her full dignity during her embassy. No ambassador would think of travelling so far to meet so prestigious a ruler without some form of musician, and Earl Edmund is assured that these are actually very good players.’

  ‘Earl Edmund said that? Dear heaven! When someone with his intellect sinks to selecting musicians, there’s no telling what sort of man he may find.’ He curled his lip at them. ‘Well, you can’t put them in front of her looking and smelling like that. Take them to the wash house and see that they’re made presentable. Throw away those rags of theirs, and give them some more suitable clothes. The Queen’s own colours, mind. You’ll all get the usual fare: food and drink with the rest of the senior servants, two tunics a year, and occasional tips when you play well. All right? The boy can’t come, though.’

  ‘He’s mine!’ Ricard heard himself say. Shite! Why’d I say that?

  ‘Where’s his mother? No. Don’t answer that. Well, don’t let the little devil steal anything. He’ll get what he deserves if he does,’ de Bouden said disdainfully, looking at the overawed Charlie. ‘Good. Now piss off, the lot of you. As if I didn’t have enough to deal with already.’

  In no time, so it seemed, they were all back out in the great yard, and as their guide left them, muttering about finding them new clothing, they exchanged looks.

  ‘Who’s this Earl Edmund?’ Philip demanded.

  ‘Don’t you remember anything?’ Ricard said. ‘He’s the King’s brother.’

  ‘What’s he worried about the Queen’s musicians for, then?’

  ‘Perhaps he wants her to be shown in the best light. She is his sister-in-law.’

  ‘I don’t like it,’ Philip said. ‘Why should he be so keen to see us go there with the Queen? I’ve never seen him.’

  ‘We are to have money, clothing, food and drink,’ Janin breathed.

  ‘But we have to throw out our old clothes,’ Adam muttered.

  ‘For a guaranteed allowance of food and drink, I can live with that,’ Ricard said.

  ‘And me, I suppose,’ Philip said, although he still looked doubtful.

  ‘Where is Peter, though?’ Janin wondered.

  ‘He’ll show up,’ Ricard said. ‘He always does.’

  City ditch, near Ludgate

  Simon Corp had known better days. He shuffled along with a stick, peering into the ditch, hoping to see something that might help pay for a little food or a mug of warmed ale. Sometimes a man could see a coin in the filth, or a small knife that had been accidentally thrown out with the rubbish that householders hurled into the ditch here. It smelled evil, both from rotting food and from the excrement with which it had been mingled, and Simon had to hold a shred of cloth over his nose to ward off the offending odour. The tanners worked all along here, and they threw much of their waste into the ditch, a repugnant combination of urine and dog’s turds, just to add to the stench.

  In the past he had been quite well off, and with his lad John he had hoped to start to have an easier life. Of course, it had been hard when his wife grew ill, but at least when she died she stopped being a drain on the
ir resources. Until then, Simon and John had had to share the task of looking after her. Some women from the parish did try to help, but there was little enough anyone could do. She was dying; they all knew it.

  A month ago, now. Just when the weather changed. That was when she’d gone. A rattle in her throat, that was all he’d heard. Just a rattle. Then there was the soft slump as her spirit left her, poor Joan. And she was gone.

  Yes, he’d hoped that after that he and his lad would be able to keep more of the money they laboured for, but before he knew what was happening, God save him if his thick as pigshit son didn’t get into a fight. Trying to steal a horse, so they said, although it wasn’t proved yet. Had to wait for the justices to hear the case. But there were enough men who believed it. Well, the bastards would believe anything of anyone who was poor. A poor man is a thief, someone said in Simon’s earshot. He would have attacked the speaker, except he wasn’t sure who it was. His hearing was less good than it had been.

  Aye, well, if there’d been money in his purse, he’d have fought the damned lot of them. They were passing unfair judgement on his boy, and any man who repeated that kind of slander was deserving of a buffet on the head, rot their souls. His little John was as good as any young lad. He was a reliable, honest fellow. Better than most of them who lied about him.

  John. He was in the gaol now, just up there, over the wall inside the city. God knew what would happen to him. They said he had an evil reputation, but that wasn’t the boy’s fault. God knew he’d tried to get along without upsetting people, but when a fellow had nothing, and he saw the wealthy strolling past, caring not a whit for anyone else, money in their purses, rich clothes on their backs, the sort of people who never had to work, who’d never felt the cold, who hadn’t experienced the way that fingers would crack in the brutal chill while one was working out in the ditches … people like that were all too keen to condemn a fellow just because he knocked a man on the head in desperation. It wasn’t fair!

  He prodded away with his stick, and then, heaven be praised, he saw it! A distinct gleam. It must be metal – perhaps a knife, or a jewel set in some gold? There was a clear glinting through the mud where his stick had scraped the surface.

  Scrambling gingerly down the bank, he reached the spot and began to dig with his fingers in the filth. There was something there, a hard disc of some sort, and then he uncovered a drum, a tabor. At the rim there was a gleaming ring of steel which had a leather thong bound to it, trailing off into the mud. That was what he had seen. Just a metal ring from a drum. It was tempting to swear, but then he shook his head and crossed himself in pious gratitude. A drum, once cleaned, and so long as the thing hadn’t lain there too long and become rotten, would be worth a few pennies. He might be able to sell it for enough to buy a loaf.

  He gathered it up, and began to make his way up the slope once more, but the thong held him back. Till then he had thought that it was just trailing loose, but now he understood that it was tied to something. Giving it an experimental pull, he thought it gave slightly. He tugged harder, jerking it, then drawing it steadily, and it began to give. Further and further, until he stopped very suddenly. Gasping, he began to step backwards, but stumbled, and then, keeping his eyes firmly fixed on the mud, he scuttled up the bank and out of the ditch.

  ‘You all right, old man?’ a fellow called, seeing his discomfort.

  ‘Sweet Jesus, come and look at this,’ Simon Corp said, and then started to bellow hoarsely for the hue and cry – before pausing to puke.

  Chapter Six

  Château Gaillard

  Jean left his companions and walked out to the walls, untying his hosen and spraying the wall until his bladder was empty, conscious only of the relief.

  Finished, he settled his clothes and began to make his way back to the guard rooms, but then turned away at the last moment. There was no hurry. All the others would be in there, drinking their beer and wine, swapping the tall stories they had rehearsed so many times before. There was nothing new for them to share with each other. Jean knew them as he knew the hairs on the back of his hand. They were too familiar to be interesting: old Berengar with his untidy mop of greying hair cut to fit beneath his steel cap so that none showed, only his great red nose and enormous moustache; Guillaume, the black-haired Norman with the narrow face and close-set brown eyes that appeared so shrewd and suspicious; Pons, the fair man from the east, with the muscled shoulders and carriage of a warrior much older than his three or four and twenty years. And then there was Arnaud.

  All must detest a man such as that. The torturer and killer of so many, who seemed to take pleasure in the suffering he inflicted. Everyone in the garrison had heard the gloating tone of voice he used while he described cutting off a nose or lips for some infringement. Once he had told Jean of the ‘great’ times he had enjoyed down in the south with the bishop, Jacques Fournier. He had been assistant to the executioner, and had himself put many men and women to the fires. Those had been great days, he had said. It had taken all Jean’s self-control not to plant his fist in the man’s face.

  More recently his revulsion at the sight of Arnaud had grown. The men had told him that Arnaud had repeatedly raped the woman in the cell below the tower. The one who le Vieux had said would have been a queen, were it not for one crime.

  Le Vieux was himself an odd man. Certainly he had seen much in his life. He was one of the oldest men Jean had ever met. Over time, he must have fought in any number of battles. Someone had told Jean that he too had been in the battle of the Golden Spurs, at Courtrai, when the rebels had all but destroyed the flower of French chivalry. The rebels had taken the spurs and war belts from the dead and used them to decorate their churches. Le Vieux had been one of the foot soldiers there, and had been back afterwards to help hunt down the guilty – all those who’d assisted the rebels to defeat the French host.

  Jean liked to listen to him, though. He wouldn’t talk much about his experiences in wars, but he was honest when he did – he had no false pride, only genuine satisfaction in some things he felt he had done well. He was a man who had learned honour in the course of a long and hard life. But tonight he would be sitting with Arnaud.

  No, Jean did not want to re-join them. Instead, he walked up around the line of the wall of the inner enceinte, over the great ditch and in through the gatehouse. He climbed up on to the walls and stood there gazing at the River Seine as it wound its way past the castle and the little town of Les Andelys nearby. It was a lovely place, this. Safe, with good views all about the countryside.

  There was a shout, and Jean glanced at the sky automatically to see what the time might be. It was the first watch after their lunch, of course. There was no need to check. And yet there was something that made his hackles rise. Something felt wrong. It was nothing obvious, but there was enough of a sense of danger to make him move away from the open, crouching down a little while he listened and watched.

  For some while there appeared to be nothing to alarm him. No running, no men calling or blowing horns, only a strange sense that something was not well in the castle. And then he heard it: a rasping, panting breath.

  It made him think of a man he had once known. That one had had not an ounce of cruelty in his heart, but he had been chased to exhaustion like a hart, and when Jean saw him, the fellow was already near to death. He stood in a little clearing, bent over, hands resting on his thighs, looking about him with desperation, so confused by the chase that he couldn’t recognise his own pasture where he had been a shepherd. He died a short while later – a sword thrust ended his life.

  Then Jean saw Berengar, hurtling around the wall like a mountain goat, fleeing some terrible horror. There was already blood running freely from a wound in his scalp, and his fists moved back and forth as though he was trying to punch the air from his path. He flew over the court and through the gate to the next section of the fortress, and just as Jean was wondering what he should do, whether he ought to chase Berengar and bring him back, he
heard a loud laugh and saw Arnaud leaping over some rubble and haring off after Berengar, a long, bloody knife in his hand. At the sight, Jean shrank away. Arnaud must have become insane.

  He heard the skittering sounds of little stones as the two rushed off, and he was tempted to go straight to the stables to fetch his horse, but he couldn’t. He was in the service of the King, when all was said and done, and he must honour that service. So he slipped back down to the gatehouse and walked quietly back towards the guard house.

  But he didn’t make it inside. On the threshold, he saw something lying in the dirt. He found his steps slowing. In the doorway there was a body. A bloody mess, a man with only red horror where his face should have been. It had been pounded with a hammer, from the look of it. Nearby there was another body. This one was still moving, and Jean recognised Guillaume. He was on his back, and the breath was rattling in his throat as he clutched at the wound in his breast as though to stop the slow pumping of the blood that came in bright, scarlet bubbles. Jean went to him and tried to ease his last moments, raising him and trying to calm him, giving him the only comfort he could, cradling his head in his lap.

  Guillaume looked up at him with terror in his eyes, looking into the doorway, then up at Jean. Not for long – thankfully his misery was soon over. As soon as his body had tensed that last time, then melted, like a child going to sleep, Jean set him back on the ground.

  The man lying in the doorway was not le Vieux. The poor old man must still be lying inside. If Arnaud had any sense, he would kill the experienced warrior first, and then the others. Still, the fellow could have had little enough sense to have done this in the first place. The dead man there must be Pons. His hair … and the jerkin he wore. It looked like Pons … Reluctantly, Jean entered the guard room. There at the side of the table was le Vieux, lying on the ground, blood oozing from a wound above his ear.