The Tainted Coin (20 page)

“Set that fellow upon the floor,” Sybil demanded, pointing to Osbert. “He’s one who kept me confined.”

“He is injured, and will remain as he is.”

“My father will hear of this.”

“Soon, I hope. There is much your father needs to hear. Tomorrow, early, I will take you to the castle. Lord Gilbert Talbot will make a place for you until your father can be summoned.”

I might have taken Sybil to the castle this night, roused Wilfred the porter, and turned the lass over to John Chamberlain. He would have found an unoccupied chamber for her. But her behavior was so repulsive that I decided I would trouble no man to meet her wishes.

Sybil fumed, but when she saw ’twas to no avail, she thumped down upon the pallet beside Alice.

“I am sorry,” I apologized to Alice, “for this imposition. Sybil will trouble you for but one night.”

That I begged pardon of Alice rather than her for the sleeping accommodations infuriated Sybil even more. Her eyes flashed anger but I cared little for her rage.

Kate, Alice, and Osbert had already eaten supper, and there was little remaining, so I made a meal of maslin loaf and cheese. I offered some to Sybil, but she snarled a rejection and turned her face to the wall. Alice peered at me with raised eyebrows, left the pallet, and spread her cloak upon the reeds across the room from Sybil. She would rather sleep upon the floor herself than share a straw pallet with such a shrewish companion. Someday, possibly, Sybil Montagu will wed. I wonder how many nights her husband will sleep upon the floor?

While I chewed upon the maslin loaf I spoke to Osbert, who had already consumed his evening cup of ale laced with ground lettuce seeds. Kate must have provided a strong dose, for ’twas all I could do to keep the man awake and lucid.

I described the men who had entered Galen House, threatened Kate and Bessie, and made off with the coins and jewelry I had found in John Thrale’s house. The two, Osbert answered, might be mistaken for Sir Philip Rede and Piers, his younger brother, who was not tall, and was given to indulging his appetite. But this could not be so, for no horse with a broken shoe was found on their manor. I asked if other men matching the description could be found in East Hanney.

“Many gentlemen about who be tall an’ spare, or short an’ stout,” he said.

“Aye, but the tall fellow commonly wears a red cap, and the short man wears a blue cap. And they may often be seen together.”

Osbert was silent, thinking. I feared he had fallen to sleep while he considered my words, and this was nearly so, for his speech was slurred when he replied.

“Sir John’s got squires. Might be two of them you seek. Folk like me don’t see much of gentlefolk from another manor, but I seen ’em a time or two when they was with Piers. The three of ’em is friendly, like.”

“Sir John Trillowe?”

“Aye,” Osbert finally replied. I saw that I was losing him to Morpheus and decided further questions could wait for the morning. In the other room Alice slept upon her cloak, and Sybil breathed heavily upon the pallet. I lifted the candle and with it lighted my way up the stairs to Kate, Bessie, and my bed. I had ridden Bruce far that day, and my wounds ached.

I awoke next morn to the sound of movement below. The east window of our bedchamber allowed enough light from the grey dawn that I could see my way down the stairs, where I found Alice tending the coals upon the hearth, fanning them to flames under fresh wood she had placed there. Osbert was awake, observing the procedure. Sybil lay upon her pallet, watching from under a scowl.

I turned to Osbert and was pleased to see him rise to an elbow, take a deep breath, then push himself to a sitting position upon his pallet.

“Dreadful stiff,” he said, “an’ hurts some. But I’m weary of layin’ here on me belly. Won’t spill so much ale if I can sit up.”

We broke our fast with what remained of yesterday’s maslin loaves. I ate rapidly, so as to be rid of Sybil Montagu the sooner. She was eager to go to the castle, assuming that there she would be amongst folk of her own quality, and be assigned a feather mattress upon which to sleep.

Wilfred had the portcullis up and the gate already open, so I did not have to rouse him to admit us to the castle. I found John Chamberlain, told him briefly of Sybil Montagu and the reason she now stood pouting beside me, and asked him to relay the tale to Lord Gilbert. Men must be sent to South Marston, I concluded, so as to inform Sybil’s father of where he might collect her. I should probably have taken Sybil to Lord Gilbert myself, but I had little desire to stand in my lord’s presence.

Somewhere in East Hanney Amice Thatcher and her children were held, and likely in conditions designed to persuade her to tell her captors where John Thrale had found his loot.

She did not know, so she said, and I believed her. But would those who took her agree? If they finally did so, would they release her, or do murder so as to cover one felony with another? And if they thought she did know the place where the chapman found coins and jewels, what hurt would they inflict upon her and her children to compel her to tell? Whether Amice Thatcher knew of the cache or not, I must find her and set her free. If I could not, harm would come to her, no matter her knowledge or ignorance. And when I found Amice I would also find the men who murdered John Thrale.

Osbert was prone upon his pallet when I returned to Galen House. “Got dizzy,” he said in explanation. This was good to know. If Lord Gilbert asked of his recovery I could honestly tell of his infirmity.

When I sat before him upon a stool to learn more of East Hanney he rose again from the pallet, catching his breath once as pain stabbed him.

“Do you know much of Sir John Trillowe’s manor?” I began.

“Nay. Never been inside the gate.”

I feared as much. “You would not know, then, if there was some place – an unused hut, perhaps – where two squires might keep a hostage unknown to Sir John?”

“Nay. Might be such a place. Most villages ’ave abandoned ’ouses now, since plague.”

“Are there many such in East Hanney?”

“Aye. Two on Sir Philip’s lands. Don’t know how many on Sir John’s manor, but I heard tell there was some.”

“Sir Philip’s lands lie to the north of the village?”

“Aye.”

“Whereabouts are Sir John’s lands?”

“Most of the village is Sir John’s, an’ to the south an’ west. His lands is greater than Sir Philip’s.”

“Do you know of Sir Simon?”

“Him of the ear what’s skewed out aside ’is head?”

“Aye.”

“Some years past ’e spent ’is time in Oxford, mostly, but a year or so ago ’e come back to East Hanney. Returned to help see to ’is father’s lands, folks do say.”

I did not tell Osbert why Sir Simon left Oxford, nor why he had a misshapen ear. Perhaps another time I shall do so.

I wished to prowl the lanes of East Hanney to learn what I could of the village, abandoned houses there, and sheds and huts which might be found adjoining Sir John Trillowe’s manor house. And while I explored the place I would study the mud of the street to see if the mark of a broken horseshoe was there.

But I was known in East Hanney. I could not set foot in the place without some villager recognizing me as the fellow mounted upon the crazed dexter who helped free the villein who, according to Sir Philip’s design, was providing entertainment for the village nine days past.

As I considered this my hand went absent-mindedly to my beard, which I had not trimmed for many days, and a solution to the problem came to me. A few days past I had examined myself in Kate’s mirror and saw white whiskers amongst the brown. Each month there seemed to be more. I complained of it once, and Kate replied that the graying of my beard made me appear distinguished and mature. Kate can be tactful. What she meant was that I am beginning to appear old. If I powdered my beard and hair with wheaten flour from Kate’s bin, I might appear older than my years.

From one of Lord Gilbert’s ploughmen I could get an old, tattered cotehardie and surcoat, and a pair of worn shoes. Garbed in such a manner, with hoary beard, I might pass unrecognized through East Hanney. When I told Kate of my plan she gazed at me as if I’d been dropped upon my head as an infant, the result only now becoming plain.

I took a sheet of parchment from my chest and asked Osbert to sketch upon it a map of East Hanney. With my hand under an elbow he stood and walked unsteadily to a stool I had set before our table. The man could not read or write, but was a competent artist. When he was done I knew the location of Sir John’s manor, the village well, the blacksmith’s forge, the baker, St. James’ Chapel, and where Sir Philip’s manor stood in relation to the village.

After a dinner of pease pottage and wheaten bread I set out for the castle to seek Arthur. I intended him to accompany me as far as the forest north of East Hanney, there to wait for me to complete a survey of the village. When I told him of my scheme he also studied me as if I’d lost my wits. Perhaps I had, but if I could not do something for Amice Thatcher, and soon, there was a fair chance the woman would lose her life.

From the castle I went to the house of Alfred, a ploughman. Some years past, when I was new come to Bampton, I had surgically removed a stone from his bladder. Alfred surely wondered why I asked the loan of his oldest cotehardie and surcoat, but when a lord’s bailiff makes a request, most men will answer as needed. And Alfred remembered the relief I had brought him.

He had but one pair of shoes, but I found a shabby pair in the castle, belonging to Uctred, another of Lord Gilbert’s grooms. Thus equipped, I was ready to set out again for East Hanney early next day, and instructed the castle marshalsea to have Bruce and the palfrey ready when the Angelus Bell sounded from the tower of the Church of St. Beornwald.

A man wearing such frayed clothing, yet riding a great horse, would attract unwanted attention. So when Arthur and I set out from Bampton next morn I carried Alfred’s and Uctred’s contributions in a sack slung over the pommel of my saddle. In the sack also was a length of stout hempen rope. If we found Amice, and she was guarded, it might be necessary to bind the man.

’Tis eleven miles or thereabouts from Bampton to East Hanney. Arthur and I arrived well before noon, having met few travelers on the way, and none since Marcham. Again we entered the convenient forest at the north edge of the village, and there I donned my shabby disguise and powdered my beard and hair with the flour.

I had brought with us a bag containing two maslin loaves and a small cheese. We shared one of the loaves and a bit of cheese, and so fortified I set out for the village.

According to Osbert’s map Sir John’s manor lay to the west of the village, and to find it I must turn to the right when I reached a chapel dedicated to St. James. As I walked I affected a limp, hoping to further convince any observer that I was poor and harmless and not worthy of their interest. This seemed effective. Although I was a stranger passing through a small village, where folk knew one another, few bothered to give me a second glance when I passed.

Sir John Trillowe’s house was indeed fine. He had done well, I think, pocketing fines when he served as Sheriff of Oxford, which post he lost when King Edward tired of complaints from Oxford burghers and replaced him.

There had been little rain for several days, but a muddy road does not soon dry in November. As I limped past the manor I turned my face from the house, partly because I feared that, even in disguise, Sir Simon, if he looked from a window at an awkward moment, might recognize me, and partly because I sought the mark of a broken horseshoe. Sir Simon did not see me, but I found the mark.

This print of a broken horseshoe had not been recently made, but it was clear enough that I had no doubt it was the print I had followed on other roads in days past. And the beast which made it turned from the road at the gate which led to Sir John’s manor. Somewhere beyond that gate was Amice Thatcher. I was sure of it. And also there were two men who had beaten another man to death and threatened my wife and child. It might be easier, I thought, to find and free Amice than prove the guilt of John Thrale’s assailants.

I continued my limping progress past the manor house, and as I did I considered some course of action. Would a King’s Sheriff, even one replaced in some disgrace, hold an ale wife hostage in his house, or allow a squire to do so? I could not think it of the man, venal as I knew him to be.

Sir Simon was a different matter. From what I knew of him, he would take coins from a beggar.

If Sir John’s squires were the men I sought, it seemed unlikely that they could hide Amice and two children in the manor house. Sir John would soon know of his guests. Amice would be held someplace Sir John was unlikely to visit.

If Amice and her children yet lived, they must be fed. I continued past the manor for a distance of two hundred paces, then, at a place where the wall which bordered the road was joined to another which ran perpendicular to the road, I glanced around to see that no one was about, then scrambled from the road to follow the second wall.

This wall divided a fallow field from another which had been planted to grain, now harvested. I followed this wall to another, intersecting wall, fifty paces or so from the road. Behind this wall was a forest, a part of the same wood where, at its eastern end, Arthur awaited my return. Beyond the wood, visible now through leafless trees, flowed a small stream.

Unless some villager prowled the forest seeking fallen branches for fuel, I was not likely to be seen if I squatted behind this wall. From the wall I could see the enclosure behind Sir John’s manor house – the barns, coops, stables, sties – all was visible. I could watch to see if any man took a bundle which might contain food from the house to some other building.

No man did. I had set before myself a fool’s errand. Perhaps, even if Amice and her children were held, like Sybil Montagu, in some outbuilding, they were fed but once each day, in the morning. I would not crouch here behind a wall for a day to see was it so. And my wounds began to ache, bent over as I was. Alfred’s cotehardie and surcoat were threadbare, and a cold wind cut through the thin fabric.