‘Better that, surely,’ I urged, ‘than finding himself at the wrong end of an assassin’s dagger or drinking from a poisoned chalice!’
Timothy dragged a hand through his thinning hair. ‘Try telling that to His Grace. It may seem the sensible answer to you. It may seem the sensible answer to me. (Oh, yes! It’s certainly what I’d do if I were allowed my way.) But these Plantagenets are an obstinate, high-stomached race; and my lord would no more let himself be cowed by a threat from an enemy than he’d take a knife to his lady mother and hold it at her throat.’ Timothy glanced around, suddenly aware that we were perhaps talking too loudly and too freely. ‘Ssh! Lower your voice. Fortunately, up here it’s mostly sleeping quarters.’
‘Where does that lead?’ I asked, indicating a door in the wall behind us.
For answer, Timothy opened it and beckoned me into a small room no bigger than many a closet that I’ve seen in some great houses. Inside were two narrow pallets, on one of which the injured Lionel Arrowsmith was lying. He reared up on one elbow as we entered.
‘What–?’ he began, but Timothy, closing the door behind him, waved him to silence.
‘Better we speak in here, where no one can overhear us. Lal, I’ve much to tell you, but be patient a moment. As you see, chapman, this room has been put at the disposal of those two of His Grace’s Squires of the Body who are not on duty. The two who are sleep on truckle beds in His Grace’s chamber. You can guess that, with two households sharing the castle, arrangements tend to be somewhat cramped.’
‘The other three Squires of the Body,’ I demanded, ‘can they be trusted?’
Lionel Arrowsmith’s glance was scornful. ‘They’ve been in the service of His Grace as long as, and in two cases longer than, I have. Squires of the Body are the most carefully chosen of all a lord’s servants, whoever the master. And amongst royalty they are the scions of families who have proved their loyalty over several generations. Now, what is it that you have to tell me?’
He listened with a gathering frown as, between us, Timothy Plummer and I told him of our discovery: how the staircase immediately outside this room, which he had to descend in order to reach the Duke, showed signs of having been booby-trapped in an effort to cripple him and so prevent his meeting with Thaddeus Morgan. When we had finished he hauled himself into a sitting position and reached for his crutch.
‘The Duke must not be left alone for an instant,’ he said. ‘One of the Squires has to be with him, and alert for danger, every moment, day and night. I must see His Grace urgently. He must be persuaded to admit the other three to his confidence.’ Lionel chewed his underlip. ‘At least this proves for certain that the rumours circulating among the Brotherhood, and brought to us by Thaddeus, have foundation.’
Timothy snorted. ‘I had no lingering doubts of that once Thaddeus was murdered.’
‘But how,’ Lionel wondered, ‘does our assassin know what we know? How did he find out where Thaddeus and I were to meet yesterevening?’
Timothy jerked his head towards me. ‘Tell him, chapman!’
I repeated what I had seen the night before last at Holy Trinity Priory. ‘So,’ I finished, ‘I misdoubt me now that the man, whoever he was, was a chance interloper like myself. Rather, he was someone who had followed you from Baynard’s Castle.’
The Squire took the news as badly as I had feared he might, covering his face with his free hand and sinking into gloom.
‘But it still doesn’t explain,’ Timothy remarked, lowering himself on to the second pallet, ‘how our assassin came to know of the assignation at the Priory. You and I, Lal, have been most careful not to breathe a word to another soul, apart from the Duke and, eventually, to young Matthew. And even he knew nothing of that particular meeting.’
Lionel made no response, but there was a less than whole-hearted agreement in the way he nodded that worried me. Did he have a sneaking fear that he had let slip something to someone who, in turn, could have passed on the information which might have alerted our murderer? I decided to keep a watchful eye on Master Arrowsmith, for it was plain that he had no intention of owning to the fault and Timothy, equally plainly, was unsuspicious of his friend.
I wondered, with an inward sigh, how anyone so unsuited to the job had come to be appointed Spy-Master General for the ducal household; then recollected that my lord of Gloucester himself profoundly despised, and had a contemptuous disregard for, the intrigues and seamier undercurrents of political life. The Duke was a man of conscience who would hesitate before any but the simplest of white lies; rigid, unmalleable, as honest in all his dealings as it was possible to be in a court where dog ate dog, and which was dominated by the Queen’s conniving family; a man of stern, unyielding principles and therefore one who made bitter enemies; a man who carried the seeds of his own destruction within. For it seemed to me that if the Duke were ever to betray those principles then he was finished; a man who could neither forgive, nor live with himself.
I could say none of this aloud, however. I asked, ‘You are both perfectly certain that young Matthew Wardroper is to be trusted?’
Lionel reared his head and replied angrily, ‘He is my kinsman! Are you daring to cast aspersions on the good name of my house?’
Timothy waved him to silence. ‘That has nothing to say to the matter, Lal, and well you know it. There have been houses enough divided against themselves over the past twenty years. No, the point is, chapman, as I have already told you, that Thaddeus Morgan came to me with his story at the beginning of May, while we were resting at Northampton, on our way south from Middleham. Young Wardroper did not join us until after we had reached London from Canterbury at the beginning of June.’
This was a fact for which I could vouch. Had not Mistress Gentle, the Southampton butcher’s wife, informed me on Thursday, the eighth of June, three days before the longest day, that ‘Matthew set out for London this Monday past, to take up a position in the Duke of Gloucester’s household’?
‘And Thaddeus Morgan insisted from the start that the threat to His Grace’s life lay within his own ménage,’ Lionel corroborated icily.
‘Then clearly Master Wardroper is exonerated from all suspicion,’ I agreed. ‘Is there anyone else in the Duke’s entourage of whom you can say the same? Apart from your two good selves,’ I added on an ironic note, which seemed, however, to elude them.
‘I think you may forget the other three Squires of the Body,’ Timothy said after a judicious pause. ‘And the steward. Aside from them, it might be unwise to advance any name with total confidence, although I would stake my life on the loyalty of nearly all the Duke’s retainers.’
‘Also,’ added Lionel, ‘it would be well-nigh impossible for you, chapman, to watch every member of the household. No, you’d best concentrate on those five we mentioned yesterday.’ He looked sternly at me. ‘Can you remember their names?’
‘Refresh my memory,’ I begged, unwilling to confess that I had no recollection of any of them.
‘Very well.’ Timothy Plummer began ticking them off on his fingers. ‘Stephen Hudelin, Yeoman of the Chamber, whom we know for certain to be Lord Rivers’s man, and so a spy for all the Woodvilles. Geoffrey Whitelock, Squire of the Household, who is probably in the pay of the King. (Not that I would suspect His Highness of plotting the death of his favourite brother. The very notion is absurd. But if Whitelock is in the pay of two masters, then why not a third?) Jocelin d’Hiver, a Burgundian, another Squire of the Household, who has given us some cause to think that he could be working for Duke Charles. Humphrey Nanfan, like Hudelin a Yeoman of the Chamber, formerly in the employ of the Duke of Clarence, but who apparently deserted to our own duke after some petty quarrel with a fellow servant. (I feel he needs watching. Once or twice in the past Duke George seems to have had prior knowledge of His Grace’s plans.) And finally, Ralph Boyse, Squire of the Household, whose mother was a Frenchwoman who married one of His Grace’s Middleham tenants. Five years ago, when King Edward and my lord were forced to flee for their lives to the Burgundian court, Ralph was amongst those who accompanied Duke Richard. King Louis’s agents are everywhere, but particularly in Flanders. It might be possible that Ralph, who made little secret of his admiration for his mother’s country, was persuaded to turn his coat and spy on our royal master.’