As the long midsummer eve faded to night I heard townsfolk upon the street, making their way to a meadow north of the Church of St Beornwald where all the day men had gathered wood for the bonfire which signaled midsummer’s eve. Kate and Bessie and I followed the throng, but before we left Galen House Kate plaited the flowers of St John’s Wort into her hair, and into the wispy, silken locks of our daughter, to ward off evil for the coming year.
Those who possessed white garments, and few did in such a town, wore them in honor of St John’s Day. The quarter moon gave such folk a ghostly appearance, but soon flames reflected yellow and red from clothing and faces. Unless a man was ill and confined to his bed he would be celebrating the summer this night.
Bampton Castle was empty as well. I watched as Lord Gilbert traded some witticism with Father Thomas and saw the old vicar chuckle. Even Sir Henry’s household had joined the throng about the blaze. Most of these were conspicuous for their solemnity. But Walter seemed to enjoy himself, smiling and boisterous and dancing about the blaze, and Sir Geoffrey smiled over the shoulder of Lady Margery as the flames rose higher. Kate saw this as well, and looked to me with questions in her eyes.
Bessie soon grew bored with the fire. When it was first lit her eyes glowed with delight, but after a short time she laid her head upon my shoulder and fell to sleep. So sooner than most Kate and I left the blaze and returned to Galen House and our bed. Three years past I would have frolicked through the night. Now I was content to seek my home with wife on my arm and babe upon my shoulder. I do not grieve for my lost youth.
A man with a clear conscience is said to sleep well, while the guilty will toss upon his pillow all the night. I hope whoever murdered Sir Henry slept less that night than I did, for Kate slumbered peacefully while I lay awake, and I saw dawn arrive through our chamber window before even Kate’s rooster announced the new day. A note slipped under a door, a bodkin, and a bloodstained piece of linen occupied my mind to the exclusion of sleep.
Lord Gilbert’s pantler is an aged valet, grown grey in service first to Lord Gilbert’s father, Lord Richard, then to Lord Gilbert. I approached Humphrey next morning as he unlocked the pantry to prepare for dinner. The wizened fellow bid me “Good-day”, and asked how he might serve me. I showed him the bloody linen and asked if any napery or table cloths in his care had recently gone missing or been found missing a fragment of the same shape and size.
“Nay,” he replied. “Was any of Lord Gilbert’s wares mutilated like that, I’d be sure to know. See to the linen every day. An’ did I miss something like that, the maids in the laundry’d find it an’ tell me straight away.”
“How oft is the linen laundered?”
“Table cloths twice each week. Napkins every day. Portpains whenever needful.”
“So if this bit of linen came from your pantry it would not have been carved from a napkin, else the damage would have been found the same day. When were the table cloths last laundered?”
“Half was done yesterday.”
“And none were found marred?”
“Nay.”
“How many portpains are kept in the pantry?”
“Fourteen.”
“Is more than one needed for a meal?”
“Not generally. But when Lord Gilbert welcomes guests we’ll use more. Since Sir Henry come we need three portpains for dinner an’ three more for supper.”
“And then these are washed?”
“Aye. Six laundered every day since Whitsuntide.”
“Has any of Lord Gilbert’s table linen gone missing?”
“The pantry’s kept locked, an’ only me an’ John Chamberlain’s got keys.”
“But do you count the table linen often, just to be certain ’tis all accounted for?”
“Don’t see the point. The closet’s locked. ’Course, I do a tally every year, when steward comes for hallmote.”
“So the linen has not been counted since January?”
“No need.”
“I’d be obliged if you would count your stock now, whilst I wait.”
Humphrey sighed his displeasure at the unwanted and, to him, unnecessary task, but swung open the heavy door and with a candle to light his way entered the pantry.
I had no desire to crowd behind the valet into the cramped, dark chamber, so waited at the door in the screens passage. I heard Humphrey rummage about in the pantry, then silence. The fellow muttered something to himself, and I heard the audit resume.
A few moments later the pantler joined me in the screens passage, blinking in the light. “Must be one more’n I thought got sent to laundry,” he said.
“One more of what?”
“Portpains.”
“You sent six to the laundry yesterday?”
“Thought so. Must’ve been seven.”
“Because you found only seven where there should be eight?”
“Aye,” Humphrey agreed.
“I will accompany you to the laundry. We will see how many are there,” I said.
The pantler locked the pantry door, then hobbled after me past the kitchen to where the laundresses labored. Kettles of water, soap, and soiled clothing boiled upon a great hearth. The heat and steam were onerous on a warm summer morn, but the work would be pleasant enough when winter cast a chill over all other corners of Bampton Castle.
I stood at the laundry entry, where a cooling breeze kept the heat at bay, and watched as Humphrey approached a woman who seemed to be in charge of the place. I have served Lord Gilbert at Bampton for three years, yet I did not recognize the laundress. Perhaps her crimson cheeks and sweat-beaded brow rendered her unrecognizable to me.
The pantler spoke, and through the steam I saw the woman shake her head. Humphrey spoke again, and waved his arms about to punctuate his words. Again the laundress shook her head, more vigorously this time. I saw Humphrey then point to a shelf, visible through the steamy space as through a winter fog, and the two walked to it. Folded upon this shelf were stacks of white fabric; Lord Gilbert’s table linen, I decided.
I watched as the laundress approached one of the pale piles and began to count through the stack. Even from my place across the room I could see that when she reached the number six all of the folded linen on that part of the shelf was accounted for.
The pantler’s head swung to the other stacks of folded linen on the shelf and he gestured toward them. The laundress seemed to sigh, then turned to the remaining table linen and carefully sorted through the mounds. She completed the work, turned to Humphrey, and with palms upraised before her indicated to him a lack of success. The pantler spoke again, then turned and walked as quickly as he could from the shelf to my place at the door.
“Lost one,” he declared when he faced me. “Incompetent woman! Lord Gilbert will hear of this. Portpains is made of finest linen. Cost near a shilling.”
“And one of your portpains is missing?”
“Missing? Aye… some wench in the laundry has stolen it. Be sold to some burgher in Oxford soon, if not already.”
“It could not have disappeared from the pantry?”
“Nay. ’Ow could it? Me an’ John Chamberlain’s got the only keys.”
“Is the pantry ever left unlocked while you attend other duties? Before dinner, for example, or after?”
“Well, aye, but not for long. My work don’t take me far from the screens passage when settin’ things out for Lord Gilbert’s dinner. You gonna see to this theft, you bein’ bailiff?”
“Aye, I will. But I ask you not to speak of the loss.”
“Best not to let the miscreant know we’re on ’is trail, eh?”
“Aye. As you say.”
The blood-soaked linen fragment was stolen from the pantry, of this I was now convinced. But was it taken while the pantler was about his work, or did some man gain access to his keys? Or to John Chamberlain’s keys? The thought raised another question.
“You are no longer a young man. Lord Gilbert assigned a page to assist you last year, and learn your tasks, did he not?”
“Aye. Young Andrew.”