Lucie took her hand. ‘They’ve wit and courage. But I pray for them all the day. Are they worried?’
‘A little. They say there is something out there. Silences – all the birds quiet, as if on alert. Something’s prowling out there. And folk in the shacks against the abbey wall have seen men with dogs as big as wolves – some claim they are wolves. But they keep their distance. There’s been no trouble.’
‘Yet,’ Lucie whispered, sending Owen a worried look.
Kate did not seem to notice. ‘My brother is practicing his knife throwing and has set up a butt to practice with the bow. Rob believes with such a martial display anyone with a thought to attack will think twice.’ She laughed and turned to fuss with a pot hanging over the fire.
Such display means nothing to a hungry dog, Owen thought.
‘And it was Jasper who brought the ale from the York Tavern,’ Kate went on. ‘He said all was quiet in the night, and he’s opened the shop, so you need not hurry, Dame Lucie.’
‘Jasper’s opened the shop so early?’ Lucie glanced toward the door.
Owen reached for her hand and coaxed her to sit, promising he would take the time to talk to their son before he went to St Leonard’s. ‘The memory of you smiling at me across the table will warm me through the day.’ It worked, and he pushed all thought of the day ahead from his mind, talking instead about the garden, his plans for changes at the manor that had been gifted him, including the house, which had been neglected for a long while. ‘I could use your advice about that.’
Lucie seemed far away as she broke up some bread.
‘What are you thinking?’ Owen asked.
‘We might wish to go sooner rather than later, combine the visit to your manor with one to Paul Braithwaite’s. You said he mentioned it was close to Freythorpe Hadden, so it is close to your land as well.’
‘Braithwaite’s? Why?’
‘I don’t like the handler being so quiet, so unhelpful to Alfred,’ said Lucie. ‘A master of hounds loves to talk hounds. Galbot was his name? It may simply be that Bartolf’s beloved dogs have found a new home with him, and he fears we will tell the Swanns, who will retrieve them. But whatever it is, we should know.’
‘I hope we need not call on Paul Braithwaite at his home,’ said Owen, ‘that the murderers make a mistake and reveal themselves before we travel south again.’
‘If Alfred comes with news, I’ll send him to St Leonard’s?’
‘Yes. Tell him that I will head to the Braithwaite home after I’m finished at the hospital.’
Lucie rose and bent to kiss the top of his head, kneading his shoulders. ‘Now go on, see what our son is about.’
He found Jasper sitting on the floor of the workroom behind the shop, a large space that had once been the kitchen and hearth place of their home, before Lucie’s father bought the large house across the garden for them. Jasper was pulling the bound shop ledgers from a low shelf, stacking them up.
‘What is this?’
‘Mother hid Nicholas Wilton’s journals from me.’
‘She had thought for good cause. Had you not walked with Alisoun, had she gone that way without a lantern–’
‘But I did.’
‘It was your manner, son. And now since she understands why you behaved so, she’s been too busy to fetch it. Remind her – she won’t fuss. Want to lock up and walk with me to St Leonard’s?’
Jasper looked relieved, but he shook his head at the invitation. ‘I need to put these away and go out to the counter to see to customers.’
‘I do not know what we would do without you, son.’
A shy grin, a shrug, and Jasper busied himself with the task.
Owen left by the shop door opening onto the street, and quickly stepped back in to avoid a handcart careening toward him. A baker’s boy pushed the cart piled high with bread into the yard of the York Tavern. ‘Sorry, Captain!’ he called out. ‘This goes where it will of a morning.’
‘If he weren’t the baker’s son–’ Jasper shook his head, grinning. ‘Have a care now, Da.’
Bess Merchet was giving the baker’s lad a piece of her mind when Owen ventured out into the morning crowd. If the lad did not learn to control the cart he’d soon be out of work no matter that his father was his employer. Yet Owen silently blessed him for a moment of laughter in a grim time. As he headed to the hospital he was stopped every few steps. Several asked if Old Bede had been found. He lied with a shake of his head. A merchant’s wife said she would take some fresh bread to Winifrith and the children. An elderly clerk noted that as long as no one found Old Bede’s body, there was hope. ‘After this long?’ A young woman with a newborn in her arms shook her head. In Blake Street Owen came upon a man carrying a dog with a bloody rump, the lad with him weeping loudly. A red-faced woman followed them wringing her hands. ‘You should know better than to let dog loose after what’s happened to the Swanns. How was I to know he was your old hound, snuffling round me in the dark before dawn?’ There would be more such canine injuries before this was over.
The twins’ report, added to Ned’s sighting of the man at the Fentons, the whispers of a hellhound in the minster yard, and Old Bede’s fright at the staithes bothered Owen more and more. It was an organized siege, not just the murder of two enemies. He must find the connections so that he might anticipate the next potential victims.
‘Captain!’ George Hempe hurried toward him. ‘Alfred told me about today’s service. I will ensure there are sufficient men to protect the two families. I am turning a deaf ear on the aldermen’s complaints – they say the Braithwaites are using us as their personal guard.’
Owen thanked him.
‘I do not know how long I can continue to support you.’
‘I know.’
‘If you were captain of bailiffs …’
‘Did they say that? I’d have their full support if I accepted the post?’
‘They did, but that should not influence your decision.’
Owen heard his humorless chuckle and knew himself to be in danger of saying whatever he need say in order to keep the city safe. His city, the city in which his family and friends depended on his strategy. He cursed the bind he was in, cursed Thoresby for dying and leaving him at the mercy of city and prince.
‘Where are you heading?’ George asked as he hurried to keep up with Owen’s angry pace.
‘St Leonard’s. Erkenwald might have some information for me. And then to the Braithwaites.’
‘I will meet you there. Or at the church.’ George touched Owen’s arm. ‘I will do all I can, my friend.’
‘As will I. Pray it is enough.’
St Leonard’s yard seemed a haven of peace, canons and lay brothers and sisters going about their chores. Spying the barrel-chested Erkenwald rounding the far corner of the church, Owen hastened to catch up with him, sending pigeons flying out of his path. The canon glanced up at them, then round to see what had startled them. A grin and a nod. ‘Owen, my friend.’ He gestured to a bench at the edge of a garden still colorful at the waning of the season. ‘Matilda de Warrene’s garden. She would smile to see it so lovingly tended.’ A corrodian of St Leonard’s, she had loved this garden. ‘You are not come to steal me away for a bowl of ale and conversation at this early hour, and looking so solemn.’
‘You would be right.’ Owen settled beside him. ‘I am in need of information. Geoffrey Chaucer tells me you know Crispin Poole.’
Erkenwald raised his thick brows. ‘Was it for you he asked about Poole? Had I known that I might have been more forthcoming.’
‘But not for himself? You do not trust Geoffrey?’
‘Do you?’
‘For the most part.’ Owen could not lie to the good canon, a friend who had come to his aid during an outbreak of the pestilence when all the city was mad with fear. It was the death of Matilda de Warrene’s husband he’d investigated then.