I turned to Arthur. “Take Walter to the dungeon, then tell the marshalsea that I will need Bruce and two palfreys tomorrow morning. We will take Walter to Sir Roger… you will accompany me.”
Arthur did not seem much pleased about this new duty. Perhaps he thought of Cicily and her indisposition. But he tugged a forelock, reached out a meaty hand for Walter’s arm, and lifted the downcast fellow to his feet. I would be melancholy also if I saw in my future a dungeon, unsympathetic judges, and providing entertainment for the young scholars of Oxford as I did the sheriff’s dance.
I found Lord Gilbert and Sir Geoffrey in the solar. The knight had told my employer of how matters stood, for when I entered the chamber Lord Gilbert stood and congratulated me.
“I have sent Walter to the dungeon in Arthur’s care,” I said. “We will take him to Oxford tomorrow. He may await the King’s Eyre under Sir Roger’s authority.”
“Well done, Master Hugh. Well done. Sir Roger would have taken the squire to his dungeon to await the judges.”
“Or Sir Geoffrey,” I said. “Perhaps this business will influence the next Commissioner of Laborers appointed for Bedford to deal more wisely with the commons, and gentlemen, who run afoul of the statute. Walter will hang, but that will bring no satisfaction to Sir Henry Burley.”
I said this for the benefit of Sir Geoffrey, who, I was certain, hoped to move shortly into the office, and matrimonial place, of his deceased lord.
I departed the castle feeling oddly unsatisfied. It was while I paused upon the bridge over Shill Brook that the reason for this ennui came to me. What of the portpain? Most of the portpain had been in Lady Margery’s possession. Had she taken it from the pantry, or had Lady Anne? If Lady Margery stole the portpain, when and why did Walter come to have a part of it when he slew Sir Henry? And if Walter was the thief, how did most of the linen cloth come into Lady Margery’s possession? Gazing into Shill Brook provided no answers.
I turned from the calming stream and returned to the castle. Wilfred seemed surprised to see me return, but men in his position are not to question the coming and going of their betters. The porter tugged a forelock and turned from me as if uninterested in what I was about. Perhaps he really had no interest in my return.
Bampton Castle dungeon lies beneath the buttery, at the base of a narrow, dark, stone stairway. Moisture gathers there in the summer, and the place is clammy with mosses. ’Tis an unpleasant place to be, as is proper. If a man has behaved in some lamentable fashion it is appropriate that he find himself in uncomfortable circumstance, the better to consider the felony which brought him there.
Two timbers, hinged on one side and dropped into a niche in the stone on the other, fastened shut the door to Walter’s cell. There was, at the level of my collar, a small window in the door. I opened it and bent to peer into the cell. Walter was not visible, for the dungeon was illuminated by only a small, barred opening in the upper wall opposite the door.
Walter must have heard the small door open, for a moment later his face, apprehension in his eyes, appeared before me. This window was small, barely larger than the palm of my hand. Large enough to pass a loaf, a cup, or a small bowl of gruel through to the cell’s inhabitant, but no larger.
Only a portion of my face would have been visible to the valet, and that in shadow, so he did not know who peered at him through the small hatch. Perhaps he thought some groom was bringing him a loaf. He was soon disabused of this notion, if he’d entertained it. He recognized my voice when I spoke.
“The portpain,” I said. “Did you steal it from the pantry, or did Lady Margery?”
Walter stared at me for some time, looked away once, then, without speaking, disappeared from my view to a corner of his cell. I heard what sounded like a body sliding down the stones of the wall, and a sigh as his haunches reached the filthy rushes.
“You,” I repeated, “or the Lady Margery, or some other? Lady Anne, perhaps?”
There was no reply.
“Why will you not answer? You can face no more severe penalty, so speak. If ’twas you took Lord Gilbert’s portpain, what did you think? That you could sell the linen in Bedford when you returned there?”
Walter still made no reply.
“It must be, then, that Lady Margery stole the portpain. If ’twas you,” I said, “you would have no reason to keep silent. But as you will die for your murders, you think to save Lady Margery, I think. Considerate of you, to protect the lady. Of course, the act will cost you little. But I wonder why she gave you a portion of the stolen linen. Did she know the use you intended for it? All know that Lady Margery was displeased with Sir Henry.”
I heard Walter stand and move through the rushes. A moment later his face appeared through the open hatch.
“Lady Margery found I’d taken the portpain an’ demanded it of me. Said she’d find some way to return what remained of it before ’twas known to be missing.”
“Why did you not say so?”
This explanation was unsatisfactory. Lady Margery had not been angry with Lady Anne for stealing Lord Gilbert’s silver, but rather had been cross with her stepdaughter for being found out. Why, then, would she demand that Walter return a stolen portpain, a thing of much less value than stolen silver? Because he was but a valet, and not high-born?
“So you gave her the portpain, but only after you had used a fragment to wipe away Sir Henry’s blood?”
“Aye,” he sighed, “as you say.”
“And did Lady Margery guess the use to which part of the portpain had been put?”
“Nay.”
My mind traveled back to the day Lady Margery had seen the felonious bodkin in my hand when she left the hall, and the startled expression upon her face. Reading faces is not my greatest skill. Perhaps I got it wrong. Perhaps ’twas fear I saw there. But of what could she have been fearful? Had she been in league with Walter? If some scrap of cloth had been needed to soak away Sir Henry’s blood, could they not have used some fragment brought from Bedford?
To have done so might have risked the fabric — if it was discovered, or used to incriminate some other, such as William — being identified as from Sir Henry’s household. There was risk, of course, in stealing goods from Bampton Castle’s pantry, but perhaps the hazard seemed less.
“They,” I had said to myself. Walter had said he acted alone, but my inclination was to think otherwise. Lady Margery had accused me and the lettuce-seed potion of causing Sir Henry’s death. Was this because she genuinely believed me guilty of malfeasance, or because she wished to turn suspicion from Walter, and thereby from herself? A lady cannot be accused of having a part in her husband’s murder on the suspicion of a mere bailiff. If Lady Margery connived in Sir Henry’s death I would need more than conjecture to accuse her.
CHAPTER 16
Chivalry is for gentlemen, not the commons, but although I questioned Walter sharply through the hatch in his cell door, he would say no word which might imply Lady Margery’s complicity in his deed. Eventually he moved away from the door to the invisible corner of his cell and I once again heard him sit heavily in the moldy rushes. I could get no other word from him. Either the Lady Margery had nothing to do with her husband’s death, or Walter would protect her from the penalty of her deed. If ’twas the last, doing so would cost him nothing. A man cannot hang twice.
I did not hesitate at the bridge over Shill Brook as I walked to my home. Perhaps I feared some new complicating revelation which contemplating the stream might bring to my thoughts.
Bessie heard the door of Galen House swing open, lifted herself to hands and feet, then gained enough balance that she could totter to me. A wide smile creased her face.