The Clerk’s Tale (20 page)

And then there was Master Champyon’s ambition. He was said to want the manor as a way into favor with Suffolk. How great was that ambition? Great enough for him to go to the trouble and expense of taking the matter to law, at least. Did he have any other way to come to Suffolk’s notice or was the manor his only one and therefore his interest the more desperate? But then how did he come to have sufficient knowledge of Goring to know about the infirmary garden and where it was in the nunnery and how to reach it unseen? Did his wife know? And if she did, then how? She wasn’t from here, it seemed. But Frevisse knew so little about her or her dead sister and had only other people’s word that her ambition to power matched her husband’s. Not that it needed to. Simple greed to have the manor could be as powerful a force as greed for influence with powerful men.

Come to that, why not suppose she could have gone to meet Montfort herself? Nothing had yet been said about where she was when he was killed. For all Frevisse knew, Mistress Champyon might well have the strength to kill a man and so might Juliana, come to that. But where would either of them have come by a ballock dagger? It could be carried concealed under a cloak, that was no problem, but it was hardly a woman’s weapon, hardly something either of them would happen to have with them. So it would have to be someone else’s—husband, son, brother, even a servant—who either did not know it had been borrowed or else knew it had but did not realize that it mattered… or else
did
realize and was keeping silent anyway.

Christopher must ask more openly about that dagger. It might be in the Thames by now but it might not. It depended on whether the murderer thought he was better rid of it and maybe have someone wonder where it had gone than to keep it and deny having aught to do with Mont-fort’s death if he were asked.

The cold had begun to slip through Frevisse’s cloak and habit and undergown. She was not chilled yet but soon would be and rather than wait for it she uncurled her legs, slipped stiffly off the bed, and began to pace the chamber without letting loose of her thoughts. There was still Rowland Englefield to consider. He wasn’t well accounted for the afternoon of Montfort’s murder. Despite not questioning him at the inquest, Christopher had surely checked the brothel or wherever Rowland claimed to have been, to learn what was said there. That was something she would ask Master Gruesby when next she had chance. Or Christopher himself, though she doubted chance for that would come until after his father’s funeral. In the meanwhile, how could she go about making acquaintance with both the Champyons and Rowland? More acquaintance with Juliana she did not want or even need because, despite she might have been able to kill Montfort, there was no open reason why Juliana would have bothered herself with having Montfort dead. She had pointed out herself that she did not stand to gain anything by her mother having the manor, and Juliana had not seemed to Frevisse someone who would trouble herself on anyone’s behalf but her own.

Unless, of course, having disposed of Montfort, she planned next to dispose of her brother and thereby clear her own way to inheriting the manor and possibly other things, depending on how the Englefield lands from their late father were entailed.

Maybe she should consider Juliana a little further. The question of the dagger was the same for her as for her mother, and she knew Goring well enough to come and go the back way to Lady Agnes’s garden. But Stephen had very likely told her that, and even supposing she somehow knew how to reach the infirmary garden, it was hardly likely she—or her mother, come to that—could have gone there and come back without being noticed and remembered by someone and more probably several someones. It was possible, Frevisse was willing to grant, but hardly a chance a murderer would care to depend on, surely?

The only thing made simpler by considering Juliana as the murderer was that she would have had no trouble coming near enough to Montfort to use the dagger if she had chosen to let him think she was attracted to him…

Frevisse pulled back from the pointless unkindness of that thought. Juliana was already too unkind to herself to need more unkindness from anyone else.

But had Christopher even asked about where she was that afternoon?

That was something else she would have to ask him or Master Gruesby when the chance came. She equally wanted to see the letter that had come to Montfort from Lord Lovell, though how a letter he had not yet read could have brought on his death she did not try to guess. And another thing she should have asked about before now was how Montfort had been lured to the garden at all. There had to have been a message. Why had nothing been said about it or about who had brought it?

Frevisse rubbed at her face with both hands, her mind beginning to congeal with too many questions still to be asked. She was warm again, though, and curled back onto the bed. To fill some of the time until she could ask the questions, she should spend at least a while in prayer for Montfort’s soul after letting the uneven and disjointed past few days serve as excuse not to, needful though she knew it was. Given Montfort’s greed and uncare for anyone but himself in life and the suddenness of his death, his soul was likely lost beyond hope in Hell, but there was always the chance there had been some small piece of virtue in Montfort, enough to have rescued him into Purgatory where at least there was hope of winning through the torments there to Heaven. And if there was the smallest chance of saving a man’s soul, even Montfort’s…

With more grimness than grace, Frevisse brought herself to,
“A porta inferi, Domine, erue animam eius. Domine, exaudi orationem meant. A porta inferi, Domine, erue animam eius
…” From the gate of Hell, Lord, rescue his soul. Lord, hear my prayer. From the gate of Hell, Lord, rescue his soul…

She had always believed that a prayer with her heart and mind behind it was worth more than one of merely words but though she tried now for better than only the sound of her own voice, she did not feel she had much succeeded by the time the nunnery bell freed her to go to Vespers.

Chapter 13

At Vespers’ end, while St. Mary’s nuns hurried off to their supper in the refectory, Frevisse went out with Domina Elisabeth into the last of the day, with swathes of creamy clouds across the pale sky and a faint-orange sunset fading down behind the westward hills as they made haste back to Lady Agnes’s, into the warmth and ordered hurry of the tables being set up for supper in the hall there. Although there were no other guests and only a single remove of beef and mutton pie, a fish tart cooked with fruit and spices, garlic boiled to tenderness and savory with saffron, salt, and cinnamon, and yesterday’s gingerbread with warmed honey and nutmeg poured over it, the meal went on longer than any nunnery meal might have done and by its end Frevisse was stifling yawns and grateful when, as they rose from their places, Domina Elisabeth asked Lady Agnes’s pardon because she and Dame Frevisse wished to withdraw to their chamber to say Compline and go to bed nearer to their usual hour than they lately had.

‘We’ve had days busier than is our wont and been keeping late hours into the bargain,“ she said, smiling. ”By your leave, a night closer to our proper way of things will do us well.“

‘An early-to-bed will do me no harm either,“ Lady Agnes said, adding with a look at Letice, ”So I’m told,“ and they parted with mutual wishes for a good night and sound sleep.

Frevisse, at least, after she and Domina Elisabeth had said Compline together and hastened into their warmed bed, had both the good night and sound sleep but found the morning none the easier to face. Hurriedly dressed and with Prime’s prayers hurriedly said, they descended to the hall’s fire-warmth and breakfast, to learn that Montfort’s funeral would be that afternoon, for a certainty.

‘His son’s to be back this morning,“ Emme said, setting wedges of cheese next to the bread already on the table, ”and what with the dozen people I’ve heard came in yesterday and some more expected this morning, there’s enough to do it proper. There’s been no stinting on the feast neither, from what I’ve heard. The inns and bakers are beside themselves with readying it all. But won’t Domina Matilda be glad when it’s all done with and things are quiet again?“

Domina Elisabeth agreed she would be indeed. Silently so did Frevisse because, when it was all over and done, Mistress Montfort and her people would leave and maybe by tomorrow night there would be place for Domina Elisabeth and her in St. Mary’s.

‘Even the weather is to the good,“ Emme went on, taking up the pitcher to pour more ale for Domina Elisabeth. ”Not nearly so cold today. There’s some friends of Lady Agnes will be here to dinner and they’ll be glad of the better riding. Oh, and Mistress Letice said to tell you Lady Agnes will be lying in this morning, to be rested for when they come and for this afternoon.“

She left them then and while they ate and drank Frevisse wondered how it was at the nunnery, with the Office of the Dead to be said at the usual hours of prayer and the funeral to be readied for, but was turned from her thoughts by Domina Elisabeth asking if she would spend the morning with her and her cousin. ‘To give her different company the while, please you?“

‘Of course,“ Frevisse said, as courtesy demanded, but found, once the words were out, that she did not mind doing it. There would be small chance she could ask questions of Master Gruesby today and no chance at all of talking with Christopher. Nor was she much minded to be caught in talk with Lady Agnes and her friends and there would be no sheltering in the church, busy with final readying of the grave and all. To be out of the way of everything for at least a few hours seemed the best chance the morning held.

It held other chance, too, beginning when they discovered as they came outside, cloak-wrapped and ready to hurry, that there was small need. Just as Emme had said, yesterday’s freezing cold was gone, the air almost mild, with a soft dripping from eaves and the rising sun a red-orange ball through thin white clouds. Giving up hurry, they crossed the street into the nunnery foreyard and along it toward the cloister door through the early morning come-and-go of servants about their business, until Frevisse saw Dickon standing in the further gateway through into me stableyard, holding a pitchfork but only busy at watching people, not doing anything himself except, when he saw them, to raise a hand in greeting.

With a sudden thought Frevisse said, “My lady, there’s Dickon. May I have a word with him? It’s his first time so far away from home and I wonder how he’s doing.”

Domina Elisabeth glanced toward him. “Master Naylor’s boy? Of course.”

She could have beckoned him to come to them, but not wanting Domina Elisabeth to hear what else she wanted from Dickon, Frevisse went toward him, quickly enough that although he promptly set the pitchfork aside and came to meet her, they were well away from Domina Elisabeth and as by themselves as they were going to be in the busy yard when they met and she asked as he straightened from his bow to her, “How goes it with you and the others? Is everything well?”

‘It’s crowding up in the stable, there’s so many folk come in now.“ He was cheerful about it. ”Keeps it warmer at night. We’re fed well, too.“

‘Straw,“ she said, pointing at bits of it caught in his hair.

He brushed it away and asked in his turn, “How goes it with you, my lady?”

‘I’m beset with too much talking and not enough to do.“ Surprised at herself for saying that aloud and at Dickon’s laugh, she went on quickly, ”There’s something I’d have you do for me.“

Dickon brightened even more. “Surely, my lady.”

‘I’d know how easy or hard it is to go along the back wall of the nunnery from outside without being seen. There’s a part of the wall along there that’s only wicker hurdles. I’d like to know about that part especially. How easy it is to come to and anything else about it you can see. Without you being noticed at it. Without anyone else knowing what you’re doing.“

‘Especially the murderer,“ Dickon said. ”That’s what it’s for, isn’t it? It’s about Montfort’s murder.“

Dickon would have been small use to her if he weren’t sharp-witted but Frevisse said quellingly, “Yes. So be careful.”

‘Careful as a king in his counting house, my lady,“ he said, cheerful as if she’d given him a holiday. ”I promise.“

She left him with hope he’d keep his promise, rejoining Domina Elisabeth who asked, “All’s well with him?”

‘With him and with the other men, he says. They’re keeping warm and are well fed.“

Domina Elisabeth laughed. “Then all’s well.”

But not with Frevisse, busy with being displeased with herself for not having asked Dickon to do this two days ago, in the church when she’d had the chance and should have thought of it, rather than letting it go until now. What else wasn’t she doing? Of what else hadn’t she thought? And was she not thinking of them, not doing them, be cause she cared too little about finding out Montfort’s murderer? With that thought troubling her, she followed Domina Elisabeth through the cloister, this morning almost as busy with servants as the yard had been, preparations for the funeral and afterwards leaving no peace even here until they reached the infirmary and its quiet, not even the infirmarian there.

‘Ysobel may be sleeping,“ Domina Elisabeth said softly. ”Wait here while I see.“

Careful of the inner door, she let herself into the next room and Frevisse waited, content where she was beside the work-marred table among the mingled, familiar, pleasant odors of herbs and oils and other things, but the respite was brief before Domina Elisabeth returned to the door and nodded for her to come on.