The silversmith’s apprentice looked to be about twenty-four or twenty-five years old. He had a broad face with a nose that was slightly flattened and dark red hair. His high cheekbones gave his face an almost oriental cast and the skin was riddled with broken veins, giving him an appearance of dissipation. The flesh of his face and hands was a mottled white. His clothes were of poor quality-a dark brown tunic of fustian and hose of rough wool. His cloak was of cheap material and bore no clasp, only ties at the neck to secure it. It was wet and bedraggled. Bascot saw the rent in the front of Fardein’s tunic and pulled the cloth apart to examine the wound. It was as he had expected from the sheriff’s description, a deep and jagged hole between the ribs over the heart. The incision appeared to have been made by a blunter, and broader, instrument than the narrow wound inflicted on Brand. The flesh around the wound was covered with blood that had dried after he was stabbed but later become viscous from its covering of moisture-laden snow.
The Templar felt gently at the back of Fardein’s head and found the place where a blow had fractured the skull. It was a shallow depression, and had it been the only injury inflicted, there was a good possibility the apprentice would have recovered. Nonetheless, the clout would have been strong enough to take him out of his senses for a time and make it easy for his attacker to stab him, just as could have happened to the clerk.
Fardein’s possessions had been removed and laid beside him on the bier. Bascot first examined the scrip. It was of rough leather and still fastened to the dead man’s belt. As the sheriff said, it contained only two silver pennies. Alongside it lay a dagger and a small cudgel, the latter made of solid hickory and of the type many men carried for protection. The Templar fingered it thoughtfully. Neither weapon bore any trace of blood. Why had the apprentice not used one of them to defend himself? Perhaps because he had known his attacker, or been assaulted from behind? These questions and more all needed to be answered, but it appeared that nothing likely to prove useful could be learned from the condition of Fardein’s body or his few possessions.
Asking heaven’s forgiveness for his intrusion, Bascot rearranged Fardein’s clothing and left the chapel.
Roget was waiting outside the silversmith’s workshop when Bascot guided his horse down Mikelgate to Tasser’s manufactory. There were a few people about, but not many, even though the streets had been shovelled clear of snow. Piles of dirty slush lay heaped in intermittent piles alongside the thoroughfare. Thankfully, the temperature had stayed above freezing point and although the cobbles underneath his horse’s feet were wet, they were not slick with ice. Bascot dismounted in front of the silversmith’s door and, tying the reins of his horse to one of the posts placed at intervals along the street, greeted Roget.
The captain of Camville’s guard had a countenance that would strike fear into the heart of any miscreant having the misfortune to encounter him. Black visaged, and with the scar of an old sword slash running from temple to chin, he had a powerful, rangy build and an aggressive stance. He gave Bascot a smile as the Templar came up, revealing strong white teeth that were gapped in places. The two men knew each other well and had become friends over the time Bascot had been in Lincoln.
“Hola, de Marins,” Roget said. “I got your message.” He looked up at the sign hanging above Tasser’s door, a wooden board painted with a picture of a silver cup on a blue background. “I hope you want my help to interrogate this chien. It would give me great pleasure to beat some truths out of him.”
Bascot laughed. “The sheriff told me that he is not the most honest of men. I understand his criminal activities have given you some trouble in the past.”
“More than I care to remember,” Roget replied. “Tasser is a thief of the worst kind. He lets others take the risk of stealing but ensures, by his slyness, that he garners the profit for himself. He is slippery, like an eel, and just as difficult to catch.”
Bascot told him about the discovery of Fardein’s body outside the castle gate. “What kind of man was the apprentice? I have examined his body but that does not give me his measure.”
“He was an apprentice in more than silversmithing to Tasser,” Roget said grimly. “As a child apes a parent, so did Fardein copy his master. He was often in one tavern or another, all of the lowest type, and huddled together with men who have had their noses clipped for thievery. I am sure he helped Tasser buy stolen goods but I have never been able to prove it.”
Bascot considered this information and then said, “The sheriff thinks the body of the apprentice may have been taken outside the town through one of the postern gates. Either that, or Fardein walked through it willingly with his attacker before he was killed. How carefully are the gates watched by your guards?”
Roget thought for a moment. “There is no gateward on any of them, but my men ensure they are shut and barred at curfew.” He shrugged, a Gallic movement of his shoulders. “But the gates are closed to keep intruders outside the city walls, not to prevent honest citizens from leaving. They are only sealed by means of an iron bar across the inside. It would be an easy matter to remove the bar and leave the gate open for a couple of hours without my guards noticing, then reenter the town and close it again. I will ask my men if they noticed anything untoward during their nightly rounds over the last few days, but I am sure they would have reported it if they had.”
“Do that, Roget, but in the meantime let us see what Tasser has to say about the death of his apprentice. I want to know why he didn’t raise an alarm when Fardein failed to report for work over the last few days. Sheriff Camville has given his permission for us to be as forceful as we like with our interrogation.”
Roget’s mouth split into a grin. “I am glad to hear it, mon ami. It will make this task one greatly to my liking.”
Eleven
Within an hour of the finding of Roger Fardein’s body, report of his murder had spread through Lincoln. The first to relate it was a chandler who had been in the castle ward when the guards brought the body into the bail. When the chandler left the bail, he related it to an acquaintance he met in Ermine Street. A few minutes later the chandler’s acquaintance told the story to one of the flesh mongers in the market and the monger, in turn, repeated the news to every customer who stopped at his stall. After that, rumour of the death, like the heavy rain that had fallen on Lincoln before Christ’s Mass, flooded through every street in the town.
Two hours later, in a large room on the upper floor of Helias de Stow’s house, two women sat in company with each other. One of them, and the older of the pair, was de Stow’s wife, Blanche; the other was the spouse of the assayer, Simon Partager, a vivacious young woman named Iseult. They sat in front of a roaring fire, drinking watered wine heated with a hot poker. Blanche was stitching on a tapestry while her companion sat idle, toying with an expensive bangle encircling her wrist.
The two women were not much alike in appearance or nature. The moneyer’s wife was a plump woman with plain features, but she had about her an air of competence while Iseult, although very handsome with long braids of corn-coloured hair and flashing eyes of deep blue, had a petulant manner. As she sat sipping her wine, there was a decided droop in her full red lips.