The agister leaned back and gave a mirthless chuckle, his florid countenance gleaming with a sheen of sweat despite the chill of the morning. “I would say he will be even more appreciative if it is proved I have also caught a murderer.”
“A deer I may have killed, but I have murdered no man,” Fulcher proclaimed, trying to ignore the dogs, which were tensed and seemed ready to spring at the sound of his voice.
“So you say, brigand, so you say,” Copley said, still grinning. “But it would not be unexpected for a man in your position to lie, would it?”
The agister did not wait for Fulcher to respond, but ordered the bowmen to bind the outlaw and bring him and the deer to Lincoln castle.
Fifteen
Just after midday the weather warmed slightly and rain began to fall, gently at first, then with more intensity until it became a driving sleet that covered the streets with an icy slick that made walking difficult. Despite the weather, all of Lincoln was aware of what had happened that morning and people gathered in twos and threes under eaves or in one another’s homes to discuss how the charcoal burner and his sons had been found murdered and that an outlaw had been taken for poaching the sheriff’s deer.
In her house on Mikelgate the goldsmith’s widow, Melisande Fleming, sat discussing these matters with Hubert’s uncle, Joscelin de Vetry. They were well known to each other, both being in the goldsmith trade, and were also connected from earlier times, from not long after de Vetry had married his wife and Melisande had been looking for a comfort that her elderly husband could not provide. They had been lovers for a time, but not in love, and when their lust had grown cold they had ended the liaison, but had remained friends. This suited them both, for each had a mercenary bent that made them easy confidants.
Now, in the small solar above the hall of Melisande’s house, they were seated comfortably in chairs that possessed both arms and padded cushions, sipping an amber-coloured wine from Spain that the goldsmith’s widow had ordered opened for their enjoyment. The chamber was richly appointed, the light from beeswax candles reflected in gleaming points of light on the silver of their goblets, and draughts were kept at bay by a profusion of fine tapestries on the walls. Under their feet a coverlet of sheepskin graced the floor before a fireplace of smoothly dressed stone, and the wood burning in the grate filled the chamber with a warm glow.
“So, you will be taking your nephew’s body home tomorrow, Joscelin?” Melisande asked.
De Vetry sighed heavily. “Aye. It will not be a pleasurable task to bring the corpse to his mother. She is of an agitated nature at the best of times. What she will be like when she hears of how her son met his death, I shudder to contemplate.”
“But you said you requested that the coffin be sealed. Is there any need for her to know the more distressing details?”
“No, but they are sure to be bruited abroad by gossiping tongues. I would rather she heard them gently, from a member of her family.”
Melisande nodded in agreement. “That is a caring thought, my friend. It is a shame the boy was killed at all.”
“Yes, but he was a careless youth, heedful only of his own pleasures, and greedy for them. I told him more than once that he might one day end up in trouble if he did not curb his impulses, but he would not listen. And now he is dead, murdered, most likely by someone he angered beyond toleration.” De Vetry sighed again. “For all his cunning intelligence, he was a stupid boy.”
Melisande reached over and placed her hand comfortingly on her companion’s knee. “And his stupidity was most likely the cause of his death, Joscelin. You must not blame yourself.”
As the goldsmith murmured his acceptance of her condolences, they were unaware that their conversation was being overheard. Outside the chamber door, which was slightly ajar, stood Melisande’s daughter, Joanna, a young woman just past her eighteenth summer. She was not pretty, being rather too plump for beauty, but her eyes, when not red rimmed from crying, were of a luminous quality that gave her the look of a startled doe. Now, listening to the conversation going on in Melisande’s chamber, she stuffed the corner of her sleeve into her mouth to stop herself crying out. Hubert was dead and her whole world was crashing into pieces around her.
In a chamber not far from Melisande’s house, in the top storey of Lincoln castle’s new keep, another young woman was in distress. Alys had gone to the room she was now sharing with three other girls to sit and think. Neither Alinor nor the others were there, and she was glad of their absence, for what Hugo had told her had alarmed and frightened her.
She had, from its onset, noticed the morose mood that had occupied her young cousin for the last few days. At first she had thought it was due to a reprimand for some prank or other, or perhaps for being negligent in his duties, but when he had continued to be dejected, an attitude so different from his normally cheerful bonhomie, she had become concerned, especially as he seemed to become more depressed when in Alain’s company, for he had always respected and admired her brother. That morning, after attending Mass, she had watched for him among the crowd and pressed him to walk with her in the castle herb garden, saying she had need of his company as an escort. He had followed her in an abstracted manner, not seeming to feel the cold bite of the wind that had been a harbinger of the sleeting rain which soon followed. Alys had wrapped her cloak tightly around her and pressed him to tell her what it was that was distressing him so.
“There is something wrong with you, Hugo,” she had said. “Do not deny it, for it is obvious. Please tell me, so that I may help you.”
Her soft caring tone had made the boy stiffen at first, then he had flung himself down on a stone bench that was placed in the lee of the wall. Pulling at a late-blooming sprig of mint, Alys had thought he was going to be stubborn and not answer her, and she sat down beside him in an attempt to cajole him further. But there had been no need. Seeming relieved, he had spoken first.
“I don’t see how you can help, Alys, but I must tell someone before I burst with it. I dare not even tell a priest, for fear that somehow Alain will suffer.”
“Alain?” Alys felt her mood swing from concern to alarm. “What has Alain to do with what is troubling you?”
Hugo looked up, confused. “But I thought that was why you asked what was the matter, that you, too, suspected…” The squire shook his head in dismay and sunk his head into his hands. “Oh, I should not have said anything, anything at all.”
Alys touched him gently on the shoulder. “But now you have, Hugo, and you must tell me what it is. If it concerns Alain, I have a right to know. I am his sister and, like you, I love him. I would do nothing to hurt him, even if to do so meant hurt for myself.”
Although her words were brave, her dismay had intensified as she had listened to the tale that Hugo had to tell. It had been about the night that Hubert had met his death, and how her cousin suspected that Alain, and perhaps also Renault, was responsible. “We were all sleeping on the floor of the hall,” he had said, his voice tremulous, “wrapped in our cloaks, along with a lot of other guests. I couldn’t fall asleep-the man beside me was snoring so loud I thought he would choke-and I saw Alain get up and leave the hall, quietly, so as not to disturb anyone. Some time later, maybe two hours or perhaps three, Renault followed him.”
“But that does not mean…” Alys started to protest.
“They did not come back for a long time, Alys,” Hugo interrupted her. “It was early in the morning when they returned. I know it was because just a few moments later the cathedral bells rang the hour of Prime. They had been gone nearly all the night.”
“Did you ask Alain where he and Renault had been?” Alys said.
“Yes,” Hugo replied miserably. “But he lied. He said he had only got up once, to relieve himself at the privy, and had returned almost immediately. When I tried to say I had seen him, and Renault, he just laughed and said I must have been dreaming.” The boy gave her an agonised look. “I wasn’t dreaming, Alys. They were gone all that time. And it was during those hours that Hubert must have been killed.”
“But why would Alain or Renault want to harm Hubert?” Alys said, fearful of the answer, fearful that her
