Chapter Twenty
Everyone stared. At last Timothy voiced the general question.
‘What in God’s name do you mean?’
‘What I said. This isn’t Matthew Wardroper. If my guess is correct, his body lies somewhere in a clearing in the woods near his home.’ I stirred the figure on the ground with my toe. ‘Am I right? I don’t know how you killed him. With a knife, probably, that seems to be your favourite weapon. But he’s buried near that empty shrine.’
The brown eyes stared up at me, full of malevolence, but there was no answer.
Lord Hastings, who had arrived with the King and a few other lords, demanded harshly, ‘Then if this isn’t… well, whoever you thought he was, who is it?’ He glared down at the prisoner. ‘Speak up! Who are you? You might as well tell us because we shall get it out of you, one way or the other. Speak up, you miserable traitor!’
‘I’m no traitor!’ the reply came, hot with indignation. ‘I’m Julien d’Amboise. My mother was English, but my father is the Comte d’Amboise and I’m a true liegeman of King Louis!’
‘A likely story,’ snorted the Duke of Suffolk. ‘If that’s the case, why are you trying to murder my brother-in-law of Gloucester?’
I had been watching the King closely ever since the young man had revealed his true identity and now saw the sudden half-turn of his head towards his Master of the Rolls, who was standing just behind him. Immediately, John Morton stepped forward saying smoothly, ‘This inquisition can surely be conducted elsewhere. His Highness must be wishful of discovering how my lord of Gloucester does – as indeed we all are – so let Monsieur d’Amboise, if that really is his name, be put under close guard and escorted to some safe place where he can be interrogated later.’
The King nodded his approval. ‘Put Monsieur d’Amboise in chains until the morning, when I shall send my own men to question him. At once! Now then!’ He flung an arm around Lord Hastings’s shoulders. ‘Let’s go and find Dickon.’
I sat with Timothy Plummer in the Duke of Gloucester’s tent, the two of us having been summoned by His Grace when the fuss had at last died down and the camp was quieter. On our way there Timothy had whispered urgently to me, ‘Whatever other answers you give Duke Richard, you know of no reason why the French should want to kill him – that is, unless you wish to fall foul of King Edward.’
I understood his warning. If the King’s future conduct precipitated a quarrel between him and his youngest brother that was one thing, but for a mere underling to cause strife on account of what might still prove to be wild speculation was quite another.
‘You can trust me,’ I assured him.
Duke Richard, stripped of his doublet, his upper left arm swathed in linen and the wrist supported by a strap, was sitting on the edge of his camp-bed, unattended except for one sleepy page. When Timothy and I were ushered into his presence he bade us draw up stools and make ourselves comfortable. The page was roused from his torpor to pour us wine, then allowed to return to his corner again and doze.
‘You see, chapman,’ the Duke said with a smile, ‘that I presume all danger is past, now that you have caught my would-be assassin. Once more, I am deeply in your debt.’
‘I am always happy to be of service to Your Grace.’
‘In that case satisfy my curiosity and tell me how you knew that Matthew Wardroper was dead and that an imposter had taken his place.’
I sipped my wine, warily eyeing the goblet of fine Venetian glass in which it had been served. I was afraid my clumsiness could easily destroy this beautiful object and I sympathized with the packers and porters whose job it was to transport such things.
‘In order to answer that question, Your Grace,’ I began, ‘I must first describe how God directed my steps to Southampton and then to London.’ And I filled in the background to my story as best I could. When I had finished the Duke nodded and Timothy stirred impatiently.
I went on, ‘There were several things, my lord, which should have made me suspect the truth from the start, if I’d had my wits about me. One of these was that the shepherd’s dame told me how alike were Matthew and his mother. “Eyes, hair, features,” she said. But whereas Lady Wardroper’s eyes are blue, those of Julien d’Amboise are brown. Now, although I have never seen Sir Cedric Wardroper, I suspect that his, too, are of that same colour, for Amice Gentle remarked that although Matthew, as she thought him, had his mother’s delicate features and dark hair, he had his father’s eyes.’
‘Continue,’ urged the Duke as I paused again to drink.
‘While I was with Lady Wardroper she sang a few words of C’est la fin. She asked me if I cared for music, adding that she knew no man who did. Is it possible she would have said so if her own son both played and sang, as our false Matthew does?’
‘Very unlikely,’ Duke Richard agreed. ‘Proceed.’
‘One of the things which always puzzled me was the way Wardroper, or d’Amboise as I suppose we now must call him, sometimes gave the impression of being two different people. Mostly he appeared to be what he was meant to be, a light-hearted, somewhat feckless young man. But there were moments when he seemed quite otherwise: astute and far more worldly wise. I should have thought more about it and asked myself why.’
‘I suppose d’Amboise could not prevent his own character from now and then showing through,’ said the Duke. ‘But you judge yourself too harshly, Roger. You could not be expected to guess the reason.’
I shook my head and placed the precious goblet, now empty, carefully on the ground beside me. ‘I cannot forgive myself so easily, Your Grace. All these things, together with the fact that I should have suspected him sooner of Thaddeus Morgan’s murder, would have prevented you much unease.’
‘When did you first begin to guess the truth?’ asked Timothy.
I rubbed my chin. ‘I think, but without realizing it, it was one evening in Calais, when the man I thought to be Matthew Wardroper and I were sitting drinking outside the inn. Jocelin d’Hiver and one of his Burgundian friends appeared and spoke to him in French, which he perfectly understood and replied to without any difficulty. Yet Matthew Wardroper, according to Master Gentle, the Southampton butcher, knew very little French.’
The Duke frowned as he finished his wine and twirled the empty goblet between his long, thin fingers. The light of the candles made it glow with myriad rainbow colours. ‘But how did King Louis’s spy-masters know what Matthew Wardroper looked like?’
‘Ralph Boyse,’ I said promptly. ‘It was his job to find that out, which he did by gaining leave of absence from Your Grace and going to Chilworth Manor in the guise of a travelling minstrel. It had to be before Matthew took up his position in Your Grace’s household, but Ralph knew all his movements from Master Arrowsmith, through Berys Hogan. The day after he quit Chilworth where, amongst other songs, he had sung C’est la fin to Lady Wardroper, Ralph was in Southampton. Both the butcher and his wife made mention of him. Mistress Gentle said that the minstrel spoke in a Yorkshire dialect and Ralph Boyse came from that county. I suspect that he met with one of King Louis’s agents and gave him a full and detailed description of young Matthew. He also informed him of the day on which Matthew would leave for London. The agent then recrossed the Channel and reported to his masters, who at once looked round for a young man as like Matthew Wardroper as possible, who was willing to undertake a dangerous mission. If a detail or two, such as the colour of his eyes, did not tally, it was of little consequence. Ralph knew that Lionel had not seen his cousin for many years and it was highly unlikely that in the short time between Matthew’s arrival in London and Your Grace setting out for France either of his parents would visit him.’