They crossed the Great Court, past the stables and storerooms, past the sties and kennels, and entered the Kitchen Court. Walking through it, they came to the prayle – the yard before the Abbot’s lodging, where he kept a small orchard and garden, secluded from the busyness of the Great Court, in which he could sit in peaceful contemplation.
The Abbot’s hall was in a building that formed a part of the Abbey’s main perimeter wall. They entered and ascended the stairs to his rooms, following behind an elderly servant.
“My apologies, Father,” Antonio said as the door swung open. “My son forgot the time, and has only now returned. I trust we have not delayed your meal?”
“Not at all, not at all. Please, come in and take some wine with us.”
While the wine was poured, Antonio surreptitiously kept an eye on the others. The bailiff, he knew, was married to the blonde woman, but the knight appeared to be paying great attention to the widow. Antonio stored the information for future use. It was always best, as an international trader and merchant, to log any points that could be of interest. If he was questioned, as he often was, about who knew whom and whether they were friendly toward each other, tiny snippets as to who was wooing which lady could be useful. Dealing with officers of kings he always found distasteful, but sometimes giving away gossipy items about people as a spy was the only way to avoid the more penal rates of tax. And sometimes information like this was useful locally; after all, any lord in the area could have an interest in someone as important as the Keeper of the King’s Peace.
The servants were seated at a second table nearer the door. He saw Pietro frown as a monk entered with the knight’s servant, Edgar, who stood surveying the room before walking to his own place between Peter and Hugh.
At his own table, the Abbot sat to one side, giving pride of place to Baldwin, his most important ranking guest. Antonio and his son took their seats near Baldwin, next to Simon and Margaret, while Jeanne was placed beside Baldwin at Abbot Robert’s insistence.
Jeanne gave a bright smile of apparent pleasure as the Abbot helped her to her seat, but in her heart she would have been happier to curse him. Champeaux’s motives were transparent, and she didn’t want a new husband yet.
It was not that Sir Baldwin de Furnshill was unattractive. While he was chuckling at a quip from Margaret, she took the opportunity to study his profile. He was quite comely, she thought – a strange mix of Norman and Celtic, with his swarthy skin and dark hair. The scar on his cheek gave him a reckless, devil-may-care air, though she was sure it didn’t reflect his nature. He appeared too solid and considerate. From the short conversations she had held with him, it was obvious that he was concerned for those poorer than himself, although his reticence about the Church was curious to her. She didn’t know he had been a Templar, and since the destruction of his Order had held the Pope and his cardinals in low regard.
It was a pity, she felt, that she had not met Sir Baldwin before and got to know him. Now, under the gaze of so many others, especially the bailiff’s wife, she felt as if she was being forced into a courtship for which she wasn’t ready.
The bowl arrived, and she dipped her hands in it, taking the towel and drying them. Afterward she caught Baldwin’s eye, and saw that he was nervous, too. Jeanne was offended. What reason did he have to be nervous? The man should have found her perfectly desirable; she wasn’t too old for him, surely? That Baldwin might be experiencing similar qualms as herself made Jeanne quite annoyed – and then she saw him give a quizzical look, and almost laughed out loud as she recognized the irony.
Their predicament was largely due to the matchmaking zeal of Margaret and the Abbot. Their attempts at subtlety were a farce, Jeanne thought without rancor. They were trying, no doubt to help their friends find happiness, though how curious it was that they should think they knew the key to other people’s contentment.
As if by agreement, both chose not to speak to the other. It was not a conscious decision on either side, more a reaction to the air of anticipation in which they were watched.
Margaret noticed the apparent coldness between the two. During the course of the meal she had seen that Baldwin and his elegant neighbor spoke little if at all, and she felt a growing frustration that her hopes might be thwarted, for she was keen to see him marry someone who could provide him with company and children, and this was the first woman in whom he had displayed any interest. That they should suddenly have developed a frostiness was worrying. She cast a quick look at her husband to see whether he had also noticed, but he was talking to Antonio. She heard the Venetian say:
“You mean to say that the dead man was not the stranger, as everyone thought?”
“No, sir. The man who was killed was a local farmer by the name of Roger Torre. He was in the tavern as well that night.”
“But I thought… I assumed he must have been identified. How could you have been so mistaken?”
“Yes, why could you not tell at once?” Pietro frowned. “Did no one bother to view the body?”
“Of course,” Simon explained patiently. “But the killer had cut off the corpse’s head and hidden it. It’s hard to recognize a body when there is no face.”
Pietro and Antonio exchanged a baffled look. It was the father who stammered, “His head? Why… I mean, why should a man do that to his victim, bailiff?”
Jeanne pursed her lips in distaste. “It seems a particularly cruel thing to do to a victim: take the life and then desecrate the corpse.”
“That’s what worried us as well. It makes no sense.” Simon broke off a piece of his bread and chewed it meditatively. “We have arrested the man in whose yard the head was buried.”
Baldwin was glad that Simon carefully avoided suggesting he thought Elias was the murderer. Enough people would be bound to assume his guilt without their help. He waved a hand, vaguely encompassing the borough outside the Abbey. “There is no need to worry all the traders. I daresay it was a dispute of some sort which quickly led to blows, and for some reason the killer decided to take the head.”
“A curious trophy,” Antonio mused.
“I expect you saw the dead man yourself, sir,” Simon continued, thinking of Elias’ words. “He was in the tavern at the same time as you.”
Antonio shrugged. “The tavern? Which tavern?”
“The one on the way to the fair. You were there, weren’t you? Torre was the man you barged into as you left,” Baldwin said, and was surprised when the old Venetian stared at him with suspicion.
“Do you suggest that I was involved in this dreadful act, Sir Baldwin?”
The Abbot interrupted soothingly. “The knight suggested nothing, Antonio. He was merely commenting that you might yourself have seen the man.”
“Has the man confessed yet?”
“No,” said Baldwin, returning to his food. Looking up, he noticed a strange expression on the Abbot’s face as he watched Antonio: suspicion mixed with a certain hardness. As Champeaux caught his eye, his face relaxed once more into genial hospitality. “More wine, Sir Baldwin?”
“Thank you.” Baldwin waved the bottler on to Jeanne, whose goblet was almost empty. He was intrigued by the look on the Abbot’s face. It evidently betrayed some inner concern, but what that concern could be, he had no idea. Then he recalled that Roger Torre had made allegations against the Abbot just before he died. It was hardly conceivable that Robert Champeaux himself could have been involved in the murder, but he could have come to hear about it – there was always the confessional. That made him think of the monk. Baldwin found himself surreptitiously watching Champeaux and the novice Peter.
Antonio was eager for any information about the murder, but that was no surprise. In Baldwin’s experience any murder attracted great public interest, and when it was as bizarre as this, with a decapitated corpse and a head found hidden in a vegetable garden, any man would be keen to know all the details. When he glanced over at Jeanne, however, he saw that the talk was offending her.
She sat stiffly as the discussion ranged over the mystery, rarely looking his way. It made Baldwin a little sad. He had thought she was interested in him when they had first met, but now she concentrated on her food and rarely even glanced in his direction. The knight saw her eyes flit quickly toward Margaret, and then he understood. He had been aware for over a year of the solicitous marriage planning on his behalf which the bailiff’s wife had undertaken. It was as plain as a battle-axe in a church that she had decided the knight had found his mate; intuitively, he guessed that for her part, Jeanne de Liddinstone was fearful of being paired again so soon after losing her husband.
