“It has been proven to my satisfaction that Gosbert is innocent of the crime of poisoning Sir Haukwell and Ralf the clerk. He will now return to his duties, and I charge you all to know he is under my protection. Should any of you be foolish enough to cast further aspersions on his name, that person will be dismissed from his or her post and banished from Lincoln.”
As she said this, she turned her eyes towards Thomas, the squire. The young man reddened but returned her gaze steadily, and nodded in her direction to show that he realised the import of her words and would obey her instruction.
Gosbert fell to his knees in front of Nicolaa. “I thank you, lady, for your trust in me. I would never harm you, never.”
“You may get up, Gosbert,” she said kindly. “I never doubted your loyalty, but it had to be proved before I could release you. Return to your duties. You have trained Eric well, but he does not have your delicacy of touch when it comes to preparing the roasted coney of which I am so fond.”
Gosbert rose to his feet and gravely nodded his head. “I shall prepare it for you tonight, lady,” he said, “and in the manner to which you are accustomed.” The cook gave his mistress a solemn bow and then, his head held high, strode across the bail to the kitchen.
While Gosbert was being released from the holding cell, Bascot was on his way to visit the apiary at Nettleham. The preceptor had sent a message to Ivor Severtsson, instructing him to await the Templar at Nettleham village. Hamo, a serjeant from the preceptory, went with Bascot at d’Arderon’s suggestion, so there would be no doubt in the bailiff’s mind that any enquiries put to himself and the residents of the apiary were being made with the Order’s permission. The Templar would have liked to bring Gianni with him. The boy had sharp eyes and ears, and his help had been invaluable to Bascot on the previous occasions when a murderer had been abroad in Lincoln town. But his involvement in his master’s investigations had, the last time, nearly cost the boy his life, and Bascot was reluctant to put him in such jeopardy again. Gianni had been downcast when he had been told he would be left behind, but it was better he suffer disappointment than take a risk with his well-being.
Bascot gave a glance at the stern countenance of the knight riding beside him. Hamo was a dour and taciturn individual, but his devotion to the Order was total and without reservation. He would, Bascot knew, be as anxious as the preceptor to prevent any stigma from attaching itself to the Templar brotherhood through the actions of one of its tenants.
The weather was holding to its promise and the day was again a warm one, with white fleecy clouds scudding overhead across a pale blue sky. After leaving Lincoln by the northern gate of Newport Arch, they turned off Ermine Street a short distance from the town, onto a track that led eastwards towards Nettleham and Wragby. As they rode, the sights and sounds of the countryside engulfed them; all of the trees were in bud, and intermittent patches of bluebells filled the air with their earthy scent. Small birds flitted to and fro, twigs or bits of leaf clamped in their tiny beaks as they went about the task of building their nests, and the hammering of woodpeckers made an intermittent, and clamorous, accompaniment to their passage. An occasional traveller passed them on the track, mainly carters taking produce to one of the markets in Lincoln, but for most of the way, the road was empty.
Nettleham village was situated about four miles’ distance from the main road, with the larger property of Wragby a further seven miles on. The village was a tiny one, consisting only of a small church, a blacksmith’s forge and a few cots built of wattle and daub. On one side was a grassy area of common ground where meetings could be held or animals grazed, and beyond that was a stretch of rolling flatland dotted with sheep. A few villagers were in the street, a woman with a basketful of eggs over one arm and another two women standing gossiping by a well near one of the houses that had a sheaf of greenery fixed beside the door, denoting it was an alehouse. Severtsson was waiting for them outside the blacksmith’s forge, his horse tethered to a nearby post and a pot of ale in his hand.
He was a tall man, with handsome, craggy features, broad shoulders and a shock of close-cropped blond hair above a pair of blue eyes almost as pale as Bascot’s single one. Not only his name but his appearance indicated that it was likely he had Viking blood among his antecedents.
Setting his ale pot on a block of wood at the entrance to the forge, he greeted them in a deferential manner and waited to be told the reason he had been summoned.
Bascot suggested that they mount their horses and ride a little way out of the village lest the smith, who was engaged in repairing the blade of a plough, or any of the other villagers overhear their conversation.
When they had left the hamlet behind them, Bascot slowed his horse to a walk and said to the bailiff, “Did Preceptor d’Arderon include the purpose of our visit in his message?”
“No, lord,” Severtsson replied, “he only gave an instruction that I was to be here to meet you this morning.”
Realising that the bailiff had not yet heard of the poisoned honey that had originally been in his uncle’s house, he explained the matter carefully. “We are here to make enquires concerning the matter of five deaths that have occurred within the castle and town. All were victims of poison, and the substance that killed them was placed in jars of honey that came from Nettleham. I have been sent by Lady Nicolaa, with Preceptor d’Arderon’s permission, to determine whether it is possible that the honey was adulterated while it was in the beekeeper’s care at the apiary, or during its transport to the places where the poisoned pots were discovered.”
Severtsson’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “I have heard of the deaths in the castle,” he said, “but not of any in the town. May I ask who it is that has died?” The bailiff was well-spoken, but his words were touched with a slight Scandinavian accent, which confirmed the impression that he was of Nordic stock.
“A neighbour of your uncle Reinbald’s,” Bascot replied. “A spice merchant named Robert le Breve, and his wife and young daughter.”
The information startled the bailiff. “I am sorry to hear that,” he said. “Le Breve was a good friend of my uncle’s. I know he will be distressed at his passing, and especially by the manner of it. You say the little girl was poisoned, too?”
Bascot nodded. “The only one left alive in the household was an elderly servant. A woman named Nantie.”
“And it is certain that the honey in which the poison was placed was purchased from the apiary at Nettleham?” Severtsson asked.
“It was, but it was not le Breve who bought it. It was given to Maud le Breve by your aunt, and came from a stock which she said was supplied to them by you.”
It took a moment for Severtsson to register the implications of what Bascot had told him, and when he did, the blood drained from his face. “Are you saying that if my aunt had not given the honey to her neighbour, it would have been she and my uncle who died?”
“Yes. It would seem that the poisoner’s intended victims were members of your family, not le Breve’s.”
Bascot gave the bailiff a few moments to recover from the shock of what he had been told and then asked, “When did you take the honey pots from Nettleham to your uncle’s house?”
“Last autumn, just after it had been harvested,” Severtsson replied, his voice unsteady. “My uncle asked me to buy some for him and I did so, when I went to Nettleham to collect the beeswax that is the beekeeper’s fee for tenancy.”