A Spy for the Redeemer (10 page)

‘Who wants me?’ a man grumbled in reply.

Jared stepped inside. Owen followed.

The room within was faintly lit by a smoky fire and a lantern near the door. Blinking against the smoke and the sudden dimness after the bright daylight without, Owen felt he was a target for anyone whose eyes were adjusted to the gloom. He gradually picked out a large man seated in the middle of the room, bootless feet propped up on a stone so close to the fire it was a wonder his stockings were not scorched. To one side of him lay a large cat, to the other side the remnants of a meal. Behind him stood an incongruous wood-framed, cloth-draped bed. How had he brought it up that path, Owen wondered. Captain Siencyn slowly raised his head, nodded lazily. The firelight gave his heavy features a menacing look. The frown he cast towards Jared did nothing to soften the effect. Then suddenly he grinned, causing a dramatic transformation. He looked almost boyish.

‘Jared, lad. You have saved me the bother of a journey up, over and down.’ He spoke English, with no Welsh accent. With his Flemish name he was likely from the area round Haverfordwest.

‘Captain Siencyn, this is Captain Owen Archer,’ said Jared, stepping aside.

‘Is it?’ Siencyn thrust his head forward, squinted up at Owen. ‘The patch, aye, they did tell me that about you.’ He shifted his feet from the stone, hooked one foot round a bench nearby, dragged it towards the fire. ‘Sit. I have something to tell you.’

Owen shifted the angle of the short bench so it might still be close to his host, but not so close to the smoky fire. Jared withdrew to the doorway.

Siencyn shook his head at Jared, tucked his feet back up to warm.

‘How soon do we sail?’ Owen asked, bringing Siencyn’s attention back to him.

‘I shall not be sailing,’ said Siencyn. ‘You must find another ship.’

‘You want more money,’ Owen guessed.

The man shook his head. ‘It has naught to do with money. I shall not be sailing for a time.’ He stuck out his chin as if daring Owen to protest.

‘Is this about your brother?’ Owen asked.

Siencyn’s feet hit the floor. ‘Why do you ask about my brother?’

‘He is accused of murder. It is the talk of the city.’

Siencyn sniffed. ‘I am not my brother’s keeper.’

‘I am glad to hear that. Perhaps we can still come to an agreement.’

‘Who are you working for?’

‘You agreed to carry us.’

‘Why should I sail with someone who will not answer my questions?’

‘Archdeacon Rokelyn wants to know why Cynog was executed. But I would rather depart for England.’

Siencyn grunted. ‘Those beady-eyed churchmen. I thought you looked like a man would be no fonder of them than I am. Aye, they have locked Piers away. For want of a scapegoat.’

‘You say your brother is innocent?’

Siencyn smirked. ‘Not a word oft used to describe my brother. But I cannot think why he would hang a man, much less that mason.’

‘Then why did they choose your brother as a scapegoat?’

‘He is a fool for a woman, that is why. But this time a greater fool than usual. He was seen in the dead man’s room a day or two before the hanging.’

‘With Cynog?’

Siencyn snorted, causing the cat to raise its head. ‘Piers was searching Cynog’s room for proof his lady had been with the mason. He would hardly invite Cynog to accompany him.’ Siencyn petted the cat, calming it.

Owen noticed that the man’s hand trembled slightly.

‘Cynog was your brother’s rival?’ Owen asked.

‘He sees all men as such.’

‘But he searched Cynog’s room.’

‘And how many others has he searched without being caught?’

Siencyn’s behaviour struck Owen as inconsistent. Hostile, then co-operative, specific then vague. He slurred the occasional word to give the impression of being in his cups, but his eyes were sharp and his breathing steady. The hand was most likely nerves. ‘So your brother was caught in Cynog’s room. What happened then?’

‘He went off and drank himself into a stupor is what happened then. While the black eye and the bloody nose turned lovely colours. He is subtle, my brother.’

‘Did he prove her untrue?’

‘Nay. And he looked so pitiful she forgave his distrust with a coo and a kiss.’

‘Someone did not forgive him. Someone must have told the archdeacon about your brother’s trespass.’

‘Aye. They say, too, that the murderer tied the noose to the tree with a sailor’s knot, and thus is Piers proved guilty. We are almost surrounded by water here. Is my brother the only sailing man about? Pah.’

‘If Piers did not murder Cynog, who did? Does he know? Does he suspect another?’

Siencyn shook his head. ‘He cannot save himself with that, more’s the pity.’

‘Enemies? Someone who wants him to suffer?’

‘That would be too complicated for simple folk.’

Owen abandoned that thread. ‘Do you have a plan to free Piers?’

‘I might. Meanwhile, I shall not make it worse for him. Rokelyn has forbidden you to leave before you discover Cynog’s murderer. To help you depart would endanger Piers.’

‘You pretended you did not know for whom I was working.’

‘It is wise in such times to test a man’s honesty.’

‘Such times?’

‘Now who is playing the fool? Owain Lawgoch is gathering an army of unhappy Welshmen, financed by the King of France. Any one of you might be traitors to King Edward.’

‘And not you?’

‘King Edward of England welcomed my countrymen to this fair land. Why should I betray him?’

‘Men have their own reasons for supporting such causes.’

‘Treason is punishable by death. To me that is reason enough to avoid it.’ Siencyn squinted at Owen. ‘But mayhap, being Welsh, you see it otherwise.’

‘You tire of my questions,’ Owen said, rising. ‘Send for me if you change your mind.’

‘About treason?’ Siencyn asked with a smirk.

Owen did not intend to be provoked. ‘About sailing,’ he said flatly.

Siencyn laughed. ‘Fare thee well, Captain Archer.’

Jared had the good sense to keep his thoughts to himself as they descended to the beach.

Owen had made a mess of that discussion, allowing Siencyn to control it. And more disappointment followed. He had hoped to find Glynis before she conferred with Siencyn, but she was nowhere to be seen and it seemed no one in Porth Clais knew where she was. Some even denied that she had been on the beach earlier.

‘I would wager it is not Piers for whom they are lying,’ Owen muttered as they slogged back up the hill towards St David’s.

Edmund joined them, looking equally disheartened.

‘So what did you see?’ Owen asked, expecting nothing.

‘A vicar played shadow for a time, but returned to the city when you disappeared into the captain’s hut.’

‘Good.’ Some luck at last.

Edmund scratched his head. ‘Good? I thought you would worry.’

‘Rokelyn will know that I am hard at work. Did you recognise the curious vicar?’

‘Simon, secretary to Archdeacon Baldwin,’ said Iolo, who had joined them so silently all three spun round, drawing their daggers. He grinned. ‘I did not think that such bad news.’

Jared cursed him.

Owen paused at the top of the cliff, looking down into the valley of St David’s, remembering the argument he had overheard the previous evening. ‘Why does Archdeacon Baldwin care where I go?’

‘It may have nothing to do with the archdeacon,’ Iolo said. ‘Father Simon is the self-appointed Summoner of St David’s. Bishop Houghton has not bothered to oust him.’

Meaning he watched over the morals of clergy and laity alike. And hence Rokelyn called him a weasel.

Edmund laughed. ‘So he thought to catch you in a tryst with a fair maiden, Captain.’

‘I should be a fool to think that.’ Owen regretted his words as soon as he spoke them. Edmund bowed his head and looked away. An apology might only make it worse. They had reached Patrick’s Gate. ‘Just Father Simon?’ Owen said. ‘No other shadows?’

Iolo and Edmund shook their heads.

‘I am off to talk to Piers the Mariner,’ said Owen. ‘What have you learned about him?’

‘You were right about Rokelyn’s servant,’ said Iolo. ‘Eager to help a countryman. He says Piers was put off a ship for thieving. He swears he was blamed for another’s crime, but no one will hire him. Except his brother.’

‘And now he has been wrongly accused again? He must think himself ill used, indeed.’

‘We have our man, eh?’ Edmund looked hopeful. They all wished to be on their way.

‘That is not the point,’ Owen said, gently this time. ‘Archdeacon Rokelyn wants to know on whose orders Cynog was executed. Find Tom and Sam. See whether any others followed me.’

Piers the Mariner was not in Bishop Houghton’s official gaol – that was in the dungeon of Llawhaden Castle, a hard day’s ride from St David’s. Piers was confined in a windowless room in the undercroft of the east wing of the bishop’s palace. Not a dungeon, then, but a dark, damp, unpleasant place all the same. He looked much like his brother but slighter and shaggier, the latter no doubt the result of his imprisonment. He sat cross-legged in the corner, flipping a spoon from one hand to the other. An oil lamp sat on the floor beside him.

‘I like to see the rats coming,’ he grunted in greeting. In English.

Owen greeted him in Welsh, explained that he wished to help Piers if he was innocent. Piers cursed, again in English.

‘You do not speak Welsh?’ Owen asked, still in his own tongue.

‘Is that why I am here? Because I prefer to speak English? For pity’s sake, I know you can speak English. I have heard of you, you know. You were to take ship home with my brother.’

Owen leaned against the door, judging it the cleanest surface in the cell, crossed his arms.

‘Getting comfortable?’ Piers growled. ‘Shall I send for refreshments?’

Detecting the smell of ale in the noisome mix of sweat, damp, urine and rat, Owen said, ‘You have had some refreshment already, eh?’

‘Father Simon is generous with drink, if naught else.’

‘I thought perhaps your wayward lady had been here.’

‘Wayward? Is she?’ Piers tried to sound indifferent, but failed.

Owen side-stepped the question. ‘You searched Cynog’s room.’

‘And for that I shall be remembered.’ Piers’s laugh was hollow.

‘Why did you suspect Glynis had been with Cynog?’

‘He hated me for taking her away. He was a desperate man.’

Here was news. ‘Cynog was Glynis’s lover?’

‘Surely he told you about it the night you bared your soul to him?’

Owen felt a shower of needle pricks across his blind eye. ‘When?’

Piers looked amused. ‘So you did not know that he had bragged about getting drunk with you, hearing all about your life? I can see that you did not. Is it an unpleasant surprise? That the city knows of your dissatisfaction with Archbishop Thoresby? Your beautiful wife? How tedious it is to work in her apothecary? How –’

‘Quiet!’ Owen shouted. ‘I did not come here to be goaded by the likes of you.’

‘Why did you come?’

‘To find out whether Archdeacon Rokelyn has unjustly accused you of Cynog’s murder. Why did you expect to find something in Cynog’s room?’

‘Someone had seen him with Glynis.’

‘Who discovered you?’

‘Would that I knew. My dagger might have put a stop to all this.’ Piers jabbed the air with the spoon.

‘Then how did you know you were seen?’

Owen thought Piers hesitated, but so briefly he could not be certain.

‘The next day it was all the gossip.’

‘What did you hope to find?’

‘Her scent, of course.’

‘Who told you that Glynis had been with him?’

‘I cannot remember.’

‘Surely –’

‘In a tavern one listens with his eyes on his cup, Captain. Someone spoke of it, they all began taunting me. I could use a draught now. You might have loosened my tongue with a tankard.’

‘Is that what Father Simon did? Loosened your tongue?’

‘No. He delighted to tell me that as no one has come forward on my behalf I am to be hanged.’ Piers’s voice hushed as he spoke the last three words.

‘And what did you say to that?’

‘I asked him about a trial by my peers. He smiled at my request.’

‘But you said no more? His threat did not bring a confession? Or a suggestion where he might find proof of your innocence?’

‘I had no cause to harm Cynog. If Glynis meant to return to him, so be it.’

‘You may say those things and yet be guilty.’

‘No one wishes to look further. But there is one who will come forward for me.’

‘Who might that be?’

‘You will see. All will see.’

‘But you will not say who it is?’