Whited Sepulchres (24 page)

He turned as the sound of multiple horses came from the gate. Sir Geoffrey rode in, followed by another man who was leading a pony on a rein. There was no mistaking the small mount with its distinctive forehead blaze, but the saddle was empty.

Edwin sat in the embrasure up on the curtain wall, trying to think. He had joined in the search of the ward, but when it had proved fruitless he’d decided that he was likely to be more useful thinking while others looked. He had last seen Thomas that morning, after the hang– after the events at the crossroads. To start with Thomas had looked elated and Edwin had been shocked at his callousness. But afterwards, he had looked frightened and sick, as well he might after witnessing the executions. Most of the other children, and indeed some of the adults, had been the same. But wait, Edwin hadn’t looked at him straight afterwards – he’d been too busy keeping his own stomach inside himself. No, he hadn’t looked up until after the earl’s final words. What had he said? Something about punishing the malefactors. Yes, and then, as he had turned away, ‘So perish all who disobey me.’ And it was
then
that Thomas had turned green.

Dear Lord, was Thomas frightened that he was going to be hanged for something? If so, did he have anything in particular that he was guilty of? He was the earl’s nephew, he wouldn’t be punished for stealing food or any such petty crime, it must have been something more serious … oh my Lord. Could he have had anything to do with Hamo’s death? But surely that wasn’t possible. The two of them had had a few run-ins, but that wasn’t surprising given their respective temperaments, and surely such a small child could not be capable of such evil?

He sat back against the wall. As it happened, that might solve one of his problems, as it pretty much put William Steward in the clear. If there was a less likely scenario than William poisoning Hamo (rather than, say, beating him to death), it was him getting Thomas to poison Hamo for him – William loathed Thomas even more than Hamo did. But that wasn’t exactly proof, and if, when he laid his thoughts before the earl, the earl decided that William had murdered Hamo, then he too would be swinging from a gibbet unless Edwin could prove otherwise.

But why might Thomas do such a thing, and who else might be involved? He couldn’t go and tell all this to Sir Geoffrey until he’d straightened it all in his mind. At that moment he looked down and saw the knight clattering through the cobbled area by the gate, with the riderless pony behind him. Edwin felt a jolt. This was serious. Had Thomas, in a panic, run away from the earl’s men after the hangings and then fallen from his horse? He can’t have been attacked by any more outlaws or they would have taken the pony, so it must have been an accident. But what if someone else had assailed him? What if Thomas, rather than being the guilty party, had seen something which incriminated someone else, and that someone had taken steps to ensure he wouldn’t talk? A chill ran through Edwin despite the heat of the day, as he remembered another page, another little boy who now lay silent and still in his grave. He had to stop this evil before anyone else died.

But there was another possibility. What if Thomas were the accomplice of the guilty party, and that man had simply hidden him away safely somewhere? That would make it someone who cared about him, for otherwise the boy might be seen as disposable. Someone who had influence over the boy, who wanted to keep him safe …

It was all going round and round in his mind as he made his way down the steps, so much so that he stumbled as he reached the bottom. His head felt like it was splitting apart again so he stood in the shade for a moment before stepping out into the blinding light of the inner ward. He found Sir Geoffrey in the armoury, being divested of his mail and the gambeson underneath, sopping wet as the soldier dropped it on the floor. He waited until the man had left and Sir Geoffrey had taken a large swig from a wineskin.

The knight nodded to him, still a little breathless. ‘Well?’

‘I think I’ve got an idea.’

The knight wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. ‘Good. Tell me.’

‘Well, I think Thomas has disappeared because he knows something.’

‘You mean someone has done away with him?’

Edwin shook his head. ‘No. I think … what I mean is …’ how could he say this about a member of the earl’s family? ‘I think William Fitzwilliam might have murdered Hamo.’

‘
What?
’

‘Well, a lot of things seem to point that way – John said he’d seen them meeting each other sometimes; Hamo called out “William” when he died; and he doesn’t seem to be very upset that his son has disappeared. Thomas looked greensick after he heard my lord saying “perish all who disobey me”; I think he was imagining his father, or even himself, swinging from a gibbet. When William realised that Thomas had seen him doing something and might tell our lord, he took him away and hid him somewhere.’

Sir Geoffrey stroked his damp beard. ‘Well, it’s possible. But you will need to have something better than that before we can go to the lord earl with accusations against his goodbrother.’

Edwin nodded. ‘Oh, yes, I don’t want to tell our lord yet. For one thing, I still don’t know
why
William Fitzwilliam might have wanted to kill Hamo, and until I know that I won’t be satisfied that he actually did it. Something still isn’t right. No, what I’m suggesting is that we watch him carefully to see if he gives himself away at all. Surely if he does know where Thomas is then he will go to him eventually.’

‘All right. We will keep this between ourselves for now, but we will keep him under our watch to see what he does. In the meantime, you see if you can find out more.’

‘Yes, Sir Geoffrey.’

The knight stretched. ‘In the meantime I am going to change my shirt. At my age, if I sit around wet like this, I’ll either get the summer ague or my bones will grow too stiff to move.’ He half smiled. ‘The perils of age, lad.’ As he passed he gripped Edwin’s shoulder briefly. ‘You’ll get there one day, but not for many years, thank the Lord.’

Edwin watched him go, and then went out into the brightness of the ward. He could smell the evening meal being prepared, and sniffed the air.

If anything, it was even hotter in the great hall than it had been the evening before. No fires were lit, of course, but the place was packed with sweaty men sitting shoulder to shoulder, causing a wet fug in the air, and their smell was drowning out the scent of the pottage. Edwin had managed to bag himself a place on a bench which was near the door, so an occasional waft of air came his way, for which he was grateful. He could feel the sweat under his arms, and his shirt and tunic sticking to his back. From his place he had a good view of the door to the service area, and he watched the men scuttling in and out with their heavy loads of dishes, glad at least that he didn’t have to work in the kitchen in this weather.

He recalled that on the night he died, Hamo had stood in that very entrance. He had spoken to the serving men as they went back and forth, and then he had stopped and stared at Edwin, his eyes so wide and his face so pale that he might have seen the very devil himself. Edwin shuddered and crossed himself at the thought.

‘Did you want me for something?’

‘What?’ Edwin came back to himself to realise that the man opposite him, a visitor he didn’t recognise, was addressing him. ‘Oh, no, sorry.’

‘Well, stop staring at me like that then.’ The man returned to his meal.

Edwin was about to explain that he hadn’t been staring at the man but rather beyond him, but he swallowed the words before he could say them. Of course! How could he have been so stupid?

He looked around. Yes, there he was. Edwin got up with some difficulty, apologising to the man on his left as he kicked him trying to get his legs back over the bench, hurried round the bottom end of his table and over to the lower end of the other one which ran parallel down the hall. He tapped on a shoulder. ‘Can I talk to you for a few moments? Outside?’

Joanna tried to ignore everything going on around her as she ate her meal. It wasn’t often that she could tell herself she was happy. Not only had she spent some precious moments alone with Martin over the last couple of days, not only had she spoken to him and Edwin about something of wider significance than embroidery, but her future suddenly looked better as well. A few stolen moments were one thing, but her future, at least for the time being, was in serving Isabelle, and upon Isabelle and her whims her happiness naturally depended. And Isabelle had
actually noticed
that she would like to go and look after Martin, and had
actually suggested
that she do it. Could this be the same lady she had been serving all these years? The one who generally treated her as a possession, as though she were as unfeeling as a tapestry on the wall, or as useful as a comb to be picked up when she needed and discarded again afterwards? Truly, love could work miracles. She gave a small prayer of thanks as she sipped her wine.

But she couldn’t shut it all out for long. The afternoon had been terrible, with all the nobles – other than Isabelle, who was too overjoyed at Sir Gilbert’s escape and too excited about her wedding drawing ever nearer – arguing and sniping at each other and inevitably taking it out on their squires and companions. The Lady Ela had been hysterical when she’d heard about Thomas’s pony being brought in, and she’d shrieked at her husband and at the lord earl, who at least had the option of saying he had matters to attend to, and leaving the room.

William Fitzwilliam had no such escape route, and he’d had to sit and listen to his wife’s frenzied outbursts, sitting stoically and trying to ignore her. Joanna simply couldn’t read him at all. Was he upset about his son’s disappearance? Was that what he’d been praying about in the chapel? But no, that had been before Thomas had vanished, and before the hangings.

Somebody else was watching William Fitzwilliam closely, she realised: Sir Geoffrey, who was placed next to him at the table. Come to think of it, he’d been – unusually for him – in the great chamber since he returned from his latest search for the boy, and he’d positioned himself near to the earl’s goodbrother then, as well. Joanna looked at the knight with more interest, noting the way he held his eating knife almost like a weapon. He was eating little and drinking less, his grey-bearded face stony as always. He’d been at Conisbrough since long before she arrived and to her was as much a fixture as the keep, but she had never really spoken to him – well, she had no need to, did she, for they lived in different worlds although they shared the same walls – and she admitted to herself that she was just a little bit scared of him.

As she watched, Sir Geoffrey cast a glance behind him. Joanna followed his gaze and noticed the man-at-arms standing in the shadows towards the back of the dais. She didn’t know his name, but she recognised him immediately – the one with the barrel chest and the neck almost thicker than his head, whose favourite trick was to pick up two of his fellows at once, one in each hand. Now that
was
unusual. Why would he be here while they were eating?

The remnants of her daydreams dissolved, and she lost her appetite. She poked her spoon into the sauce on her trencher as she looked across the table. Matilda was tearful, having been pinched by the Lady Ela for some minor infraction, and nursing the bruises on her arms. Rosamund was quiet, overawed by the currents of ill-feeling around her as she had been all day. Past Sir Geoffrey and William Fitzwilliam sat the Lady Ela herself, her face blotchy as she listened to the minstrel, who had rather unluckily got to a bit of the poem where the great Charlemagne was wailing out his grief for his lost nephew. The earl, in the centre with Isabelle and Sir Gilbert on either side, stared straight ahead of him as he chewed, paying only the barest minimum of courtesy to them. Past him, Henry de Stuteville and the Lady Maud were sober, although she was attempting some little good humour with her son and nephew. And at the far end of the board, Sir Roger and Father Ignatius were debating something in low tones, trying not to cause a disturbance.

Joanna put her spoon down. She was annoyed – either with herself or with others, she didn’t know – that she couldn’t hold on to her happy thoughts. In between the gloomy faces at the table, the menace of the man behind them, the subdued air in the rest of the hall, and the despair in the voice of the minstrel, who for once she wished would shut up, they were outnumbered. She wondered when the meal would ever end.