“I’m recovered now, Ivo,” she said. “You need not trouble for me further. I will tell Hugh Beringar that he is needed.”
“Brother Cadfael entrusted you to me,” said Ivo with gentle and confident authority, “and you did not reject me. I shall fulfil my errand exactly. As I hope,” he said smiling, “I may perform any other missions you may care to entrust to me hereafter.”
Hugh Beringar came with four of the sheriff’s men, dispersed the crowd that hung expectantly round the booth of Euan of Shotwick, and listened to the accounts rendered by the neighbouring stallholders, by the butcher from over the road, and by Rhodri ap Huw, for whom Cadfael interpreted sentence by sentence. In no haste to go, for as he said, his best lad was back with the boat from Bridgnorth and competent to take charge of what stock he still had to sell, the Welshman nonetheless showed no unbecoming desire to linger, once his witness was taken.
Imperturbable and all-beholding, he ambled away at the first indication that the law had done with him. Others, more persistent, hung about the booth in a silent, watchful circle, but were kept well away from earshot. Beringar drew the door to. The opened hatches gave light enough.
“Can I take the man’s account for fair and true?” asked Hugh, casting a glance after Rhodri’s retreating back. There was no backward glance from the Welshman, his assurance was absolute.
“To the letter, for all that happened here from the time I came on the scene.
He’s an excellent observer, there’s little he misses of what concerns him, or may concern him, and what does not. He does business, too, his trade here is no pretext. But it may be only half his business that we see.”
There were only the two of them within there now, two living and the dead man.
They stood one either side of him, drawn back to avoid disturbing either his body or the litter of leatherwork scattered about and over him.
“He says there was a light showing through the chinks here past midnight,” said Beringar. “The light is quenched now, not burned out. And if he locked his door after closing the booth for the night …”
“As he would,” said Cadfael. “Rhodri’s account of him rings true. A man complete in himself, trusting no one, able to take care of himself, until now. He would have locked his door.”
“Then he also unlocked it, to let in his murderer. The lock never was forced until now, as you saw. Why should a wary man unlock his door to anyone in the small hours?”
“Because he was expecting someone,” said Cadfael, “though not the someone who came. Because, it may be, he had been expecting someone all these three days, and was relieved when the expected message came at last.”
“So relieved that he ceased to be cautious? Given your Welshman’s estimate of him, I should doubt it.”
“So should I,” agreed Cadfael, “unless there was a private word he was waiting for, and it was known and given. A name, perhaps. For you see, Hugh, I think he was already well aware that the one he had expected to deliver the message was never going to tap at his door by night, or stop in the Foregate to pass the time with him.”
“You mean,” said Hugh, “Thomas of Bristol, who is dead.”
“Who else? How many strange chances can come together, all against what is likely, or even possible? A merchant is killed, his barge searched, his booth searched, then, dear God, his coffin! I have not yet had time, Hugh, to tell you of that.” He told it now. He had the rose-petal in the breast of his habit, wrapped in a scrap of linen; it still spoke as eloquently as before. “You may trust my eyes, I know it did not fall earlier, I know it has been in the coffin with him. Now that same man’s niece makes occasion to come by stealth to this glover’s stall, only to find the glover dead like her uncle. It is a long list of assaults upon all things connected with Thomas of Bristol. Now, since this unknown treasure was not found even in his coffin, for safe-conduct back to Bristol in default of delivery, the next point of search has been here - where Master Thomas should have delivered it.”
“They would need to have foreknowledge of that.”
“Or good reason to guess aright.”
“By your witness,” said Hugh, pondering, “the coffin was opened and closed between Compline and Matins. Before midnight. When would you say, Cadfael - your experience is longer than mine - when would you say this man died?”
“In the small hours. By the second hour after midnight, I judge, he was dead.
After the coffin, it seems, they were forced to the conclusion that somehow, for all they had a watch on Master Thomas from his arrival, and disposed of him before ever the fair started, yet somehow he, or someone else on his behalf, must have slipped through their net, and delivered the precious charge. This poor soul certainly opened his door last night to someone he believed had business with him. The mention of a privileged name … a password … He let in his murderer, but what he had expected was the thing promised.”
“Then even now,” said Hugh sharply, “with two murders on their souls, they have not what they wanted. He thought they were bringing it. They trusted to find it here. And neither of them had it. Both were deceived.” He brooded with a brown fist clamping his jaw, and his black brows down-drawn in unaccustomed solemnity.
“And Emma came here … by stealth.”
“She did. Not every man,” said Cadfael, “has your view of women, or mine. Most of your kind, most of mine, would never dream of looking in a woman’s direction to find anything of importance in hand. Especially a mere child, barely grown.
Not until every other road was closed, and they were forced to notice a woman there in the thick of the matter. Who just might be what they sought.”
“And who has now betrayed herself,” said Hugh grimly. “Well, at least she reached the guest-hall safely, thanks to Corbière. I have left her with Aline, very shaken, for all her strength of will, and she will not stir a step this day unguarded. That I can promise. Between us I think we can take care of Emma. Now let’s see if this poor wretch has anything to tell us that we don’t yet know.”
He stooped and drew back the coarse sack that covered half the glover’s narrow face, from eyebrow on one side to jaw on the other. A broken bruise in the greying hair above the left temple indicated a right-handed blow as soon as the door was opened to his visitor, meant to stun him, probably, until he could be muffled in the sack and gagged like Warin. Here it was a case of gaining entry and confronting a wide-awake man, not a timid sleeper.
“Much the same manner as the other one,” said Cadfael, “and I doubt if they ever meant to kill. But he was not so easily put out of the reckoning. He put up a fight. And his neck is broken. By the look of it, one made round behind him to secure this blindfold, and in the struggle he gave them, tried all too hard to haul him backwards by it. He was wiry and agile, but his bones were aging, and too brittle to sustain it. I don’t think it was intended. We should have found him neatly bound and still alive, like Warin, if he had not fought them. Once they knew he was dead, they made their search in haste, and left all as it fell.”
Beringar brushed aside the light tangle of girdles and straps and gloves that littered the floor and lay over the body. Euan’s right arm was covered from the elbow down by the skirts of his own gown, kicked out of the way of the searchers in their hunt. When the folds were drawn down Hugh let out a sharp whistle of surprise, for in the dead man’s hand was a long poniard, the naked blade grooved, and ornamented with gilding near the hilt. At his belt, half-hidden now under his right hip, the scabbard lay empty.