The goldsmith rose hastily to his feet. Nicolaa felt a perverse satisfaction in watching the colour drain from his face. “Yes, of course, lady. You are right. It is only proper that I do so.”
“Then, since the hour grows late, I suggest you do it now. Afterwards the body may be placed in a coffin ready for transport when you have finished your-matters of business.”
Calling to her steward, the castellan gave de Vetry over to his care, directing her servant to take the merchant to the chapel where Hubert’s body lay. She fancied that de Vetry would, in a few short moments, have a more proper respect for the death of his wife’s nephew than when he first arrived.
Bascot arrived back in the castle bail late in the afternoon. He took his horse to the stables and gave it into the care of one of the grooms, then started to cross the ward in the direction of the armoury so that he could divest himself of hauberk and helm. Before he had taken more than a few steps Gianni ran up to him, face alight with pleasure at his master’s return. Behind the boy, standing in the doorway of the barracks was Ernulf, and the familiar figure of Roget, captain of the sheriff’s town guard. Both men raised their hand in greeting, Roget brandishing a wine skin.
“ Hola, de Marins. Come, join us and wipe the dust of the journey from your throat. I have brought a good vintage for you to try. It will fare you better than the horse piss that Ernulf keeps in his store.”
Bascot nodded his acceptance of the offer and continued on his way to the armoury. Inside, Gianni helped him out of his hauberk, struggling to lift the chain mail shirt onto a stout wooden crosspiece kept for the purpose. Bascot resisted the temptation to help him. The mail weighed almost as much as the boy himself, but the lad took pride in his abilities and the Templar had decided to encourage him in this regard. It had taken Bascot much soul- searching to determine the fine line between indulging the boy and teaching him responsibility and, despite his affection for his servant, he knew that it would be a disservice to allow the lad a laxity that could lead to selfishness.
When they walked back into the barracks, one of the men-at-arms told them that Ernulf and Roget were in the small room that the serjeant claimed for his own, and Bascot went to join them. The doorway was covered with a heavy leather curtain and the Templar drew it aside so that he and Gianni could enter. The two soldiers were seated at a small table, sharing a jack of wine. Roget hooked a stool from beneath the table for Bascot to sit on, while Gianni scuttled to a corner and settled himself on a pile of neatly folded blankets.
Roget filled a mazer with wine for Bascot and the Templar drank it down thirstily. The captain had been right in his boast; it was good, full ripe on the tongue and warm in the gullet.
“So, de Marins, Ernulf tells me you were skewered by an arrow while roaming about in the wildwood looking for brigands. Is life here in Lincoln so dull that you must always be hunting a murderer?”
Roget laughed as he finished his jest, a full-bodied chuckle that came from deep in his throat. He was a fearsome looking man, tall and strongly built, with the scar of an old sword slash nearly bisecting one cheek from temple to chin. He had once been a mercenary and was reputed to be uncaring of either man or beast, as well as a lecher and a hard drinker, but Bascot found him good company and knew that, for all his faults, he was a capable soldier and loyal to Gerard Camville.
“I think a murderer must be easier to find than wine as good as this, Roget,” Bascot responded. “Where did you steal it from?”
The captain gave Bascot a gap-toothed grin and laid a finger alongside his nose. “I can smell out a good wine just as well as I can scent a willing woman, Templar. Le bon Dieu blessed me with a nose for both.”
They each had another cup of wine, then Ernulf told Bascot that Hubert’s uncle had arrived in Lincoln, come to escort his nephew’s body home.
“Is he much grieved?” Bascot asked.
Ernulf gave him a scornful look. “That one? The only thing that would bring sorrow to Joscelin de Vetry is a loss of his silver.”
“Was the boy of his own blood, or related by marriage?”
“Son of his wife’s sister. De Vetry is a pompous blowhard. He was gently born on his father’s side, but his mother was the daughter of a goldsmith. Never fails to remind everyone of his father’s lineage while adorning himself with enough jewels to weigh down an ox cart.”
Ernulf chuckled as he added, “Seems Lady Nicolaa turned him, if not his gold, a bit green, though. She barely let him get his foot in the ward before she sent him off to see the mess the crows had made of his wife’s kin. The steward told me that afterwards the goldsmith had urgent need to rush to the privy.”
Roget offered to refill Bascot’s cup but the Templar refused, preferring to wait until he had eaten some food. Rousing Gianni he sent the boy to the kitchen to bring him some cold viands and bread.
As the youngster scampered off, Ernulf’s face became serious. “I didn’t want to say this in front of the boy, Bascot, but you were foolish to go out alone this morning. You’ve already had one attempt made to kill you, yet you invite another. Why didn’t you take a couple of my lads with you? Never hurts to have a guard at your back.”
Bascot shook his head. “I will learn nothing from the villagers, or any other peasant, with a show of force, Ernulf. It only makes them herd together, like a flock of sheep, and seals their lips from fright.”
“But what if the sheriff is right and it was poachers who killed Hubert?” Roget said, his mobile face wearing a sombre expression. “Brigands like that have only one thing to fear, that of getting caught. They will kill you, or each other, without a flicker of conscience. And they will laugh at your stupidity.”
Ernulf nodded his head in agreement with the captain’s words, but Bascot refused to heed the warning. “I will have to chance that, Roget. It could be that the answer to who murdered the boy is to be found in the forest. I will only know for certain whether it does or not if I make a search for it. And this morning, my roaming, as you call it, was worth the risk. I may have sighted a very small glimpse of the truth.”
He related to Ernulf and Roget what the charcoal burner’s son had told him. Both listened intently until he had finished. “The male rider must have been Hubert, but if the female the boy saw was wearing a fine cloak, it does not sound as though it was Bettina. Unless Hubert had brought it for her as an enticement,” opined Ernulf. “Could it have been another wench, perhaps one more compliant than the dairymaid?”
“It may be so, and I must admit that I hope it was,” Bascot replied. “I would have sworn Bettina was telling me the truth. If she lied, she was most convincing. Of all the people I have asked about the dead boy, she is the only one I have been inclined to believe. Unless she was forced to the tale by her relatives, I would not have thought her corrupt.”
“ Mon ami,” Roget said sadly, “all men-and women-are corrupt. It is not a fine art to know that; it is to judge the degree of iniquity that is difficult. And those with the fairest face and form often have the blackest hearts. It is a sorrow, but it is true.”
Ernulf nodded in morose agreement and held out his wine cup for replenishment. Bascot thought on the mercenary’s words, reminded of the last time he had been involved in a matter of unlawful slaying and how he had been so easily gulled by a pretty countenance and a soft manner. Was it happening again? Was the dairymaid lying to him? And if she was not, and she also was not the girl the charcoal burner’s son had seen with Hubert, then who was?
Fourteen
Near the northern tip of Sherwood Forest, and a good few miles from Lincoln town, a ragged band of men, women and a few small children were gathered around a barely smouldering fire. Above the almost dead embers some thin strips of venison were roasting, threaded on a wooden skewer. It was the last of their store. Hunger was beginning to make itself felt once again and the hopelessness of despair was etched on all their faces. A tattered canopy of leaf-bare branches still shielded them a little from the stark winter sky above, but the smell of snow was in the air and they were cold. All the men were fugitives, brigands who had, in one way or another, broken the law and fled from the harsh penalties of justice. The women, tied by bonds of marriage or kinship, had chosen to flee with their men rather than face a life of poverty alone. But hunger is still hunger and is not eased by sharing it. Dusk had not yet fallen but most of their number were already asleep, too weak to stay awake. The women were huddled together, the children in their midst, getting as much shelter as they could from bracken piled against the trunk of a fallen tree. One of the children, a babe of barely twelve months, began to cry and his mother soothed him by
