When Crispin rang the bell, it took longer than usual for a monk to appear and open the gate. The monk wasn’t a brother Crispin recognized, but he took Crispin to the abbot’s empty chamber. The monk served Crispin wine and hurriedly left, leaving him alone to contemplate the stained-glass window raining colors on the abbot’s desk.
After a brief interval, the door opened and the abbot rushed in.
“Forgive me, Crispin. As you can imagine, this is a busy time.”
“Yes. I came to get information on those very doings.”
“Good. I see you have wine. I will pour my own. Please. Sit.” Abbot Nicholas fussed with the flagon, lifted the goblet, and pressed the goblet’s rim to his dry lips. His throat, peppered with gray stubble from a rushed razor, rolled with a swallow. He moved smoothly to his chair, settled on its cushion, and looked up at Crispin. “A busy morn.”
“No doubt.”
A pause fell over the room until Nicholas broke it by something between a sigh and a snort. “The king is in good health, God be praised. Thank you for asking.” Nicholas’s sardonic expression disappeared behind the goblet.
Crispin quaffed his own cup. No, he didn’t ask, didn’t really care all that much about Richard’s health, but as a citizen he was interested to know. “Didn’t kill him, eh?”
Nicholas raised a hand. A benediction? A call for silence? “You truly should not speak your treason so loudly.”
“Is it treason to wonder if the king is dead?”
His age-yellowed eyes fell kindly on Crispin. “For you, perhaps.”
Crispin toyed with his empty goblet. “What happened?”
“His Majesty was taking an early-morning turn in his garden with his counselors when the attempt was made.”
“Don’t tell me. An arrow?”
The abbot’s eyes enlarged twofold. Wine glistened on his parted lips. “How did you know?” he whispered.
Crispin shrugged. He launched from his chair with the goblet, stood at the sideboard, and touched the flagon, but decided against it and left the goblet there. He turned. The abbot’s tonsure was a mosaic of color from the window’s light. “There is an assassin afoot and he uses a bow. Was anyone hurt?”
“Only a servant. He is well. It hit his arm. It was he who pushed the king aside out of harm’s way. He saw a cloaked figure with a bow ready to fire just over the garden wall.”
Crispin looked at the flagon and nodded. The innocent. They’re always dragged into the king’s business with disastrous results. Maybe more wine wasn’t such a bad idea. He grabbed the flagon and sloshed wine into the goblet, then snatched up the cup and drank. His sleeve took away the excess from the side of his mouth.
“Did the assassin escape?”
“God help us, but yes. The figure slipped back over the wall. No one else saw a thing, neither guards nor page. He seemed to fade into the shadows of court.”
“Hmm. ‘Shadows of court.’ Interesting.”
“Crispin, how do you know of this assassin? Do you know who it is?”
“Yes, I think I do. But there is much I cannot yet reveal.”
Crispin noticed the abbot eyeing the arrows in his belt. “You must! Have you told the sheriff?”
Crispin moved his hand over the arrows before he let his fingers drop away. “No. And I won’t.”
“By God’s wounds! Why not?”
The goblet reached his lips again and the deep peach and citrus flavors of the wine smoothed his tongue. “I have my reasons.”
Nicholas put his goblet aside and stood. “Is it because you would see the king dead?”
Crispin’s eyes narrowed over the rim of his cup and he drank the last of it, licked his lips, and set the goblet down. “Would I see Richard dead at the hands of an assassin? No. He is my king.”
Nicholas shook his head. “You have a strange sense of honor.”
“Is it strange to protect the crown but not its wearer? If that is so, then . . . well. Perhaps I do have a strange sense of honor. ‘It is in justice that the ordering of society is centered.’ ”
“As always, Aristotle proves wise. Your heart is in the right place, but your philosophy will invariably cause you trouble.”
“I do not shy from trouble, my Lord Abbot. ‘Trouble’ is my patron name.”
“Indeed. You know too much about this for my liking.”
“Don’t you trust me, my lord?”
“Yes.” Nicholas said it in a drawn-out tenor that made Crispin doubt.
“I see. Even my friends shy when the possibility of treason lies at the heart of it. Well, I have seen the like before.” He strode toward the door in long strides until Nicholas intervened.
“What of your French courier?”
Crispin halted and without turning asked, “What of him?”
“Did you not say he was dispatched by an arrow?”
“Yes. The same sort of arrow, in fact. I do not think it a coincidence.”
Nicholas eyed the arrows in Crispin’s belt again. “My son, is there . . . is there not something you would confess to me? Something . . . you keep deep in your heart?”
Crispin put his hand involuntarily on the arrows, feeling the stiff fletching under his calloused palm. “No, Lord Abbot. I have no need of shriving today.” He turned to go again when the abbot moved forward and laid a strong hand on his arm. Crispin stopped himself from shrugging it off. Nicholas meant well. But then, many had meant well.
Nicholas huffed impatiently. “You would simply leave, Crispin? Surely your path is a dangerous one. Why is it you never ask for a benediction when you depart? Lesser men ask for it. It is so little a gift to give.”
“I don’t need it.”
“Don’t need God’s blessing? Or is it you don’t believe in it?”
“Of course I believe.” He bit down on the rest of his words. What he couldn’t say was that he didn’t believe he deserved it.
Crispin saw the abbot approach and turned his head slightly. The abbot gave his blessing without the asking. The shadow of a cross fell over Crispin, painted in the air by the abbot’s sure hand. Crispin accepted it without comment and passed through the threshold, leaving the abbot’s lodge.
He did not look back as the door closed on the monk’s worried countenance. Instead, he strode purposefully through the familiar colonnade of the cloister, giving the cloister garden a hasty glance, its herbs and greenery slowly browning as summer blooms surrendered to fall. Coming to the end of the colonnade, he met the brother at the gate, thanked him with a bow, and left the abbey’s grounds.
Crispin’s tongue sang with the abbot’s good wine but he still had enough thirst for a bowl of the Boar’s Tusk’s finest.
AFTER A HALF HOUR of walking back to London he turned the corner at Gutter Lane and caught the sweet sight of the tavern, though the incongruity of men being shoved out the door so early in the day gave rise to a snicker in Crispin’s throat.
He watched the spectacle from across the lane. Gilbert himself helped the uncooperative men over the threshold. He clapped his hands together, looked up, and saw Crispin.
“Oi! Crispin!” He waved him over and Crispin trotted across.
“I feared you’d be closing your doors,” said Crispin.
“Not to you. Come in.”
Crispin was used to the tavern sitting empty, but such a sight was usually reserved for the middle of the night, not noontime. Ned stood in the center of the smoky room, surveying the vacant, worn tables with a sorrowful look on his face. He nodded a greeting to Crispin but couldn’t seem to smile it.
Gilbert offered Crispin a seat at his usual spot in the back, farthest from the door, and Crispin took it. “I suppose you know the tidings, then,” he said to Crispin.
He nodded and when Ned brought a full jug and two bowls, Crispin felt that he was home.
Gilbert shook his head and poured the wine, scooting the first bowl toward Crispin. “How is the king?”