[Roger the Chapman 05] - Eve of Saint Hyacinth (22 page)

Lionel hauled himself to his feet, impatiently fending off all offers of assistance, and with his free hand clapped Matthew on the shoulder. 'Steady, lad, steady! I've told you, you're too young for me to let you run your head into unnecessary danger. As I said before, how should I answer to, my aunt and uncle if any harm befell you?'
 

Matthew's soft lips pouted and the dark eyes, fringed by their even darker lashes, wore a sulky expression. 'I'm not a child,' he protested sullenly, his demeanour in many ways proving the opposite. He added defiantly, 'You were quite willing to make use of me when you had need.'

‘That's true enough.' Lionel glanced at Timothy. 'It would be only fair to tell the lad what conclusions we have cached.'

'Oh, very well,' came the grudging answer. 'But be quick about it. It's time we returned to our duties and used our eyes and ears.'

Matthew listened docilely while his cousin made him free of our deliberations and then eagerly offered to keep watch over his fellow Squire of the Household, Jocelin d'Hiver.

Timothy, after the briefest of reflections, once again gave his consent. 'It will give Roger all the more freedom to study the movements of Stephen Hudelin and Humphrey Nanfan. Lionel, in case we don't meet again before our departure at dawn tomorrow, get well soon and join us in France as quickly as you can. Meantime, both Roger and I will keep an eye on your young kinsman here. And to you, Master Wardroper, I say this. Be very careful in your dealings with Jocelin d'Hiver. Until there is proof to the contrary, think of him as an extremely dangerous man.'

I doubt if Timothy Plummer would have approved my immediate action after quitting the tower, which was to seek out Amice Gentle in her sewing-room.

She and her companions were not engaged with their needles today, but had been granted permission to begin packing up some of their work in readiness to leave with Duchess Cicely for Berkhamsted in three days' time. So Amice told me in the first rush of pleasure at seeing me again; a pleasure all the more freely expressed because of the absence of Mistress Vernon, the head seamstress.

'I've come to say goodbye,' I said, holding her little hand in mine. 'We're off at first light tomorrow.'

'I know.' She nodded solemnly, drawing me to sit down beside her on a bench, while her companions giggled and gossiped low amongst themselves, glancing frequently in our direction. 'Take care of yourself,' she added, shyly pressing my fingers. 'I... that is, we... were all very proud of you last night for the way that you saved the duke's life.' While I muttered an uncomfortable disclaimer, the large hazel eyes lifted questioningly to mine. 'Is there really a plot to kill His Grace, as some people are saying, or was it just a madman, as others insist, who managed to find his way into the castle?'

'I don't know,' I lied, sending up a short prayer for forgiveness. 'But it will behove all of us to watch over Duke Richard with extra care.' I took a deep breath. 'When I get back from France, may I come to visit you at Berkhamsted?'

The eager light died out of her eyes and once again I sensed that withdrawal which had rebuffed me at supper two days earlier. After a moment she said regretfully, 'No. It would be to no purpose. I am already betrothed.'
 

I felt for a moment as though I had been winded by a blow to the stomach, but at last I managed to stutter, 'I see. I - I'm sorry. I - I didn't know. Your mother, when I talked with her in Southampton, gave no hint of such a thing.'
 

'It was arranged, with Her Grace's approval, the day before we left to come to London. My mother and father know nothing of it yet, for I've had no time to send a message to them since it happened.'

'You... love him, this man you're betrothed to?'
 

She answered quietly, 'I like him. Very much. Robert's a good man. He's one of Duchess Cicely's grooms. He'll be kind to me and Her Grace will give me a greater dowry than my father can afford.' Amice freed her hand from mine, smiling tremulously, and lifted her chin. 'I shall be contented enough and that's surely as much as most of us can expect in this life.'

'Perhaps ... Then this is indeed goodbye.' I leaned forward and kissed her gently, full on the lips.

Tears welled up slowly in the hazel eyes and ran down her face unchecked.

'Yes.' She stroked my cheek and I felt the coldness of her touch. 'We hardly know one another. Why, then, does it feel as though I'm saying farewell to a friend?'
 

I did not answer but kissed her hand and the icy little lingers clung to mine. In the end I had to force myself away.

Once outside the sewing-room I propped my back against the wall, breathing deeply until my emotions were once more under control. Amice was right: we barely knew each other. It was foolish to feel so bereft. And yet I found that I had been thinking of her constantly throughout the past low days; that her face had been always somewhere at the hack of my mind. Ah well! It was not to be. I should soon forget her, I told myself angrily. There were plenty more fish in the sea and I had often fancied myself sick with love in the past, only to recover swiftly. Why then should this time be any different?

I squared my shoulders and ran downstairs to the bustling courtyard. There was too much else to occupy my thoughts for me to waste them on Amice Gentle.

We set out the following morning in a chill, grey mist, the harbinger of a hot summer's day. As the seemingly endless procession clattered across London Bridge, on through the sprawling suburb of Southwark and out on to the Dover road, the damp, pungent smell of the still-wet earth tickled our nostrils. Birds, wakened all too soon by the tramp of many feet and the thud of horses' hooves, started up their plaintive chorus; and as the hours passed trees, their leaves trembling with dewdrops as big as diamonds, swam up out of the milky haze which was beginning now to disperse.

In every village and hamlet through which we passed people left their work and came running to gawp at the brilliant cavalcade and at the three royal brothers who, in all the glory of martial display, with tuckers sounding and pennants flying, rode at its head. Each prince was surrounded by his most senior officers, while far behind followed the hordes of lesser servants and the rumbling baggage wagons.

Never having been a soldier, and knowing nothing of battles, I was astonished to discover how many and how varied were the numbers of retainers necessary for the maintenance of a lord's comfort in wartime.

'It won't all be fighting,' Humphrey Nanfan informed me, proudly displaying his superior knowledge of these matters. 'There's bound to be a great deal of feasting, jousting and suchlike when the king and his brothers entertain the Duke and Duchess of Burgundy at Calais.'
 

'It seems to me a funny way to conduct a war,' I grumbled.

We were sitting on the tailboard of a cart packed with napery, enjoying the warm sunshine and resting our weary legs. The head of Duke Richard's procession was now miles in front of us and would reach the night's halt at Rochester while we lesser mortals were still on the open road, where we would content ourselves with such shelter as we could find. I could only trust that Timothy Plummer was taking all precautions to ensure His Grace's safety; for with Lionel Arrowsmith left behind in Baynard's Castle, and with the necessity for me to keep watch over Humphrey Nanfan and Stephen Hudelin, an even greater responsibility had fallen upon his shoulders. At least Matthew Wardroper would be keeping Jocelin d'Hiver under his eye.

Idly I watched a man pause in his haymaking to hone his scythe, then take a drink from the leather bottle on the ground beside him. Women were moving slowly, bent almost double in the noonday heat, separating the stalks of already-cut grass in order to ensure that they dried out properly. Others were raking between the swathe lines, making certain that none of the morning's scything was wasted. It was a peaceful, harmonious scene, repeated at that time of year all over England, and I wondered how these men and women would feel if they thought that a foreign army was about to invade their world and trample down their crops. And, not for the first time, I fell to wondering what had decided King Edward to make war on France at this particular moment.

No doubt the more practical of his advisers had encouraged him to do so for the perennial reason of previous English kings: victories abroad discouraged dissension at home and that could only work to the ruler's advantage.

Others, more idealistic, had probably pressed England's two-hundred-year-old claim to the French throne through Isabella Capet, wife and queen of the second Edward. Yet from the little I had seen of King Edward the fourth, I suspected that neither of these arguments would weigh very heavily with him. There was a scarcely veiled cynicism in that still handsome face which, to me at least, made his apparently motiveless decision all the stranger.

I hinted at these thoughts to Humphrey Nanfan, who was quick to counter with his own solution. 'It's to keep brother George from making more trouble I reckon. There's been a powerful lot of bad feeling between him and the queen's family these many years past; indeed, ever since she married His Highness.' Humphrey lowered his voice and wriggled closer to me on the tailboard. 'Years ago, when Jacques de Luxembourg, Her Grace's uncle, came to this country for her coronation, it was Duke George who dubbed him Lord Jakes. And whenever the poor fool went out riding in the London streets the crowds would pursue him, shouting things like "Here comes the Keeper of the Privy Purse" and directing him to the public privies in Paternoster Row. He didn't know what was going on, did he, poor sod? He'd smile and nod and thank 'em, and all the time my master would be doubled up with laughter. But the Woodvilles, they took it badly, especially as Duke George had protested one of the loudest against what he called his brother's misalliance.'

'You called Clarence your master just now,' I accused him.

Humphrey looked uncomfortable for a fleeting moment, then smiled guilelessly. 'My late master, I should have said, for at that time I was a page in Duke George's household. I told you,' he added defensively, 'that I fell out with a fellow servant and wished for another place. His Grace persuaded his brother of my usefulness.'

'I remember. It was the manner in which you spoke of my lord of Clarence, as if you still regarded yourself in his service.'

'Nonsense!' Humphrey tried to change the subject. 'Sweet Saviour, it's hot! I could do with a drink of ale.'
 

'Where were you the other evening,' I asked, 'during the mumming, when the attempt was made on Duke Richard's life?'

He turned his head sharply, regarding me with a sudden curiosity which he had not displayed before. I could see his suspicion deepening and the swift calculations going on behind his eyes as he pieced together certain incidents of the past six days, the days since I had become one of Duke Richard's servants.

'What does it matter to you?' he asked abruptly. 'You don't suspect one of the duke's own people, surely? His Grace has explained what happened. A madman got in from outside.'

I shrugged in an attempt to appear unconcerned. 'No reason. Just interest, that's all.' I forced a smile. 'You take me up too quickly, Humphrey.'

He stared hard at me for a moment longer until, apparently satisfied of the innocence of my intent, he too hunched his shoulders, 'Why shouldn't I tell you? It's no secret after all. I was talking to Stephen Hudelin. You can ask him if you wish. He's only over there, walking alongside the cart containing His Grace's silver.' He raised his voice. 'Stephen! Come here! You're needed.' And when the older man had quickened his pace to catch up with our wagon, Humphrey continued without wink or nod or any change of expression that I could see, 'When that madman tried to kill Duke Richard where was I? Our friend Roger Chapman wants to know.'

Stephen glanced at me in his usual surly fashion. 'He was talking to me,' he said. 'But what does it have to do with you?'

Chapter Fifteen

We were on dry land once more, in Calais.

The great fortresses of Guisnes and Hammes frowned down upon us as we landed, but the town itself was in festive mood to welcome ashore King Edward and his two brothers. The summer weather had smiled upon us during our crossing of the Channel, and the richly decorated houses of the wool merchants hemmed us in on either side as the royal procession made its way to Saint Nicholas's Church to give thanks for our safe arrival.

Some of the thousands of advance troops who had lined the harbour to voice their greeting were already encamped in the marshy ground beyond the ditch outside the town, and it had been my expectation that, along with Stephen Hudelin and Humphrey Nanfan, I should be consigned to these miles of tents and baggage wagons which stretched as far as the eye could see from the double walls encircling (Calais towards the friendly territory of the Duke of Burgundy. But I had hardly regained my land legs or settled my stomach after the heaving motion of the ship when I was summoned to a house which faced on to the market square, and which had been put at His Grace's disposal by an obliging merchant (who no doubt considered future patronage worth present inconvenience). There I discovered Timothy Plummer pacing up and down the parlour floor like some caged animal.

'Is this wise, sending for me so openly?' I asked as, at a gesture from him, I carefully shut the door behind me.

It was a pleasant room with a fine oaken table in the centre, a large carved armchair and several joint stools.