them she has not lost her senses. I do not know what I am going to do about her.”
“Let me speak to the little one,” Roget offered. “Perhaps I can allay her fears.”
Constance led him upstairs to the chamber where she prepared her scents and sweet-smelling unguents. “Agnes will not leave the upper floor except to go down and bar the doors,” Constance said as they went up the stairs. “She keeps herself either locked in her room or stays with me while I work.”
The chamber they entered was crammed with pots and stoppered jars. Bunches of herbs and orrisroot hung from a beam in the ceiling. Some of the pots contained dried leaves or pieces of root that had been crushed with a pestle, others were filled with liquid, among them the goat’s milk that Constance had said Agnes had gone to fetch early in the morning of the day that Adele had been strangled. The room had a heady fragrance that was almost overpowering and Roget recoiled slightly when they went in. Constance noticed his reaction and went over to the larger of the two casements and threw it open.
“I am sorry, Captain, for the strong aroma. I am so used to it that I sometimes forget it can be cloying, especially to men.”
In a corner of the room Agnes was seated on a stool. She was, as Constance had said, in a state of abject terror. Her eyes were red from weeping and her hands were clenched into fists on her bony knees. She was a girl of the utmost plainness and her sorry state made her more unattractive, but not even the most hard-hearted of men could have failed to be touched by her plight. She was like a tiny rabbit caught in a trap, fearfully waiting for its neck to be wrung. Roget went over to her, and hunkering down in front of her, spoke in soft tones, assuring her she had no need to be afraid. “I promise you, ma petite, that you will come to no harm. One of my guards will be outside your mistress’s house every hour of the day and night. This man who is frightening you will not get in here, I assure you.”
He took her hand in his and stroked it. Her fingers were thin and the skin rough, the nails bitten down to the quick. Roget continued to speak in the same vein until the girl began to relax. Finally she gave him a tremulous smile and when Roget asked her if she could summon up the courage to answer some questions, she gave him a hesitant nod.
Constance had stood and watched the captain calm her young maid and, when Roget stood up and turned to face her, she gave him a grateful smile, her eyes alight with appreciation of his kindness. The captain felt a stirring in the region of his heart and tried to ignore it. He had long ago promised himself that he would never get seriously involved with any woman, but realised he was perilously close to feeling more for this lovely perfumer than simple lust. Trying to disguise his emotion from both himself and Constance, he asked if either of the women had seen men answering the description of Askil and Dunny.
“They are both sailors; Askil is the older of the pair and has eyes of unusual colour-one is brown and the other blue. Dunny is young, very slim and has pitted skin on his face. Have you noticed any men who look like that outside in the street, or entering Adele’s house?”
Constance and Agnes both shook their heads and suddenly the little maid burst into tears. “But I didn’t see the man’s face, Captain,” she wailed. “He could have had eyes like you said, or a scarred face, and I wouldn’t have noticed. What if he did and thinks I saw him? He’ll be sure to come after me.”
This time it was Constance who calmed her maid. In an even voice she said, “Then the guard outside will catch him, Agnes, and your travail will be over. Come now, pour the captain a cup of cordial. We must show our appreciation for the care he is taking to protect us. It is not every woman in the town who has a guard on their door day and night. You must compose yourself and be brave.”
Her words seemed to penetrate the fog of fear that surrounded Agnes and she went to the corner and poured some liquid into a cup for Roget. It was thin stuff and scented with some sort of flower essence, but he drank it down as though it were ambrosia. To remain in the company of the attractive perfumer he would have drunk stagnant water and believed it to be the finest of wines.
Nineteen
About an hour after Prime, Gianni and Ernulf left the castle bail and walked across the grounds of the Minster and through the gate in the eastern wall of the city. As they travelled along the path that led to the enclave, the boy felt his anxiety return. That morning he had looked at his reflection in the piece of polished metal that Ernulf used for shaving. In its wavy surface he could see the fine line of down on his upper lip and, initially, it had swelled his confidence. Now, however, apprehension filled him with a desire to run back to the castle.
As they approached the preceptory, Gianni distracted himself by remembering what Bascot had told him about the Lincoln enclave. The Templar had said it was a small one, similar to other provincial preceptories that were subordinate to commanderies in large cities like London and Paris. Some of these were huge, Bascot had said, especially in lands where there was need to protect pilgrims from infidel attack and the brothers were often engaged in battle with Saracen forces. The larger ones usually had a castle as their base and many more officers in the chain of command, such as a seneschal and a marshal. Nonetheless, when they neared the squat twin towers that guarded the entrance, Gianni’s heart began to pound. What if the Templar on the gate refused to admit a boy of his small stature? Had Lady Nicolaa been right in saying he was old enough to go inside or had she been mistaken? He was glad he had the stocky bulk of Ernulf by his side. The serjeant would ensure, at least, that the message Gianni carried would be given to his former master.
The boy’s fear was not realised. After Ernulf told the guard of the purpose of the visit, the Templar man-at- arms made no demur at Gianni’s presence and bid them come in, calling to one of the soldiers inside the compound to tell Sir Bascot there was a message for him from the castle.
After they walked through the solid archway of stone, Gianni was surprised to see that the interior of the enclave, although smaller, was not much different in arrangement from the castle bail. To one side was a long low building housing the stables, there were storehouses and a forge and, instead of a keep, a two-storied building where the Templars ate and took their rest. Only the round chapel marked a strangeness that Gianni was not accustomed to; that and the absence of women. The latter radiated an aura of male-ness that was almost palpable. Here were men carrying out tasks that, in the bail, were the lot of female servants-in one corner a man with a humped back was washing clothes in a huge tub of water and, nearby, another was emptying vegetable slops from the kitchen onto a midden. The air rang with the sounds and smells of masculinity-the clashing of the blacksmith’s hammer on his anvil, the acrid tang of sweat and the pungent aroma of leather and metal. It was an atmosphere that Gianni breathed in eagerly, consciously relishing his emerging manhood.
Bascot was among a few pairs of men exercising their military skills in the middle of the training ground. Facing him was a younger man that also wore the three-foot-long sword wielded by those of knight’s rank. The other knight was young and, since Gianni knew there were only the preceptor, the draper and his former master of knight’s rank stationed in the commandery, judged that the younger knight must be one of the men forming the contingent whose departure had been delayed. Bascot was instructing the knight in how to use his shield as a defensive weapon. Both men had kite-shaped shields painted with a Templar cross slung from their shoulders and were holding flails-short-handled weapons to which a length of chain was attached. At the end of the chain was an iron ball fitted with wicked looking spikes. On the ones they were holding, these spikes had been blunted but when they were used in battle, they would be honed to needlepoint sharpness. As Gianni watched, Bascot and his opponent hefted their shields in front of them and began to strike at each other with the flails. In one quick movement, Bascot hooked the edge of the other knight’s shield with the iron ball, pulled it out of his opponent’s grasp and then struck at his exposed body with his own buckler, giving him a hefty blow in the chest. The knight fell back but Bascot did not press his advantage. Instead he began to instruct the man in how he should have moved to defend himself.
Gianni was well aware that if they had been engaged in real battle, Bascot’s shield would have struck more solidly and his flail would have come down in a deadly stroke that would have incapacitated, or even killed, the other man. The boy’s narrow chest swelled with pride. Even though he now thought it unlikely that a Templar had killed the prostitutes, the danger to the man he held in such high regard was always at the back of his mind. Watching Bascot give the young knight instruction had reminded Gianni of the Templar’s skill with arms and went a little way to relieving his concern for his former master’s safety.
The man-at-arms sent by the guard on the gate waited until Bascot had finished instructing the young knight
