She gazed into his eyes to try to gain confidence from him, but then she shook her head and looked away. ‘All you want is to hear me accuse another man,’ she said sadly. ‘You don’t care about me any more than you care about a rat.’
That was the truth. These men wanted a trophy that they could hang on a wall. They weren’t interested really, not in a beggarwoman. Why should they be? She was just a victim of her circumstances. It was not her fault that she had been widowed, it was just something that had happened. Because of it, she was without a protector, and had become a beggar, regarded by some as a whore. She had so much to give, but now she must spend her time hidden in case she was hunted down.
With shaking hands, she pulled her cowl up and over her head again. From beneath its protection her voice appeared to gain a little strength. ‘His name is Afonso. He’s a young man in his mid-twenties, perhaps younger. A handsome fellow, so long as you don’t look in his eyes. He’s a mercenary — no loyalty to any lord. He was a Portuguese in the company of an Englishman and his squire. I saw Afonso run at Matthew with the knife in his hand. Matthew died; Afonso fled. I saw him run.’
‘Do you know why he did it?’
‘You think I should have asked him?’ she asked with slow, cold sarcasm. ‘While his hands were yet bloodied?’
‘The girl, Joana,’ Simon said hesitantly, glancing at Baldwin. He could sense that the knight’s mind was focused on Matthew’s death, but Simon was more interested in Joana’s. ‘She was killed in such a ferocious manner. I wonder …’
‘What?’
Simon saw Baldwin throw a look over his shoulder towards the inn, as if he could stare through the walls and see the beggar sitting, still weeping, where they had left her.
‘I just wondered …’
‘It makes no sense,’ Baldwin interrupted. ‘Why should a young man want to kill him? How on earth could someone like Matthew have offended a fellow of twenty-five or so?’
Simon sighed to himself. ‘It could have been anything. You know as well as I do that some men will take umbrage at the way another man looks at them. Remember that Knight of Santiago whom we saw on the day we got here? He was the sort of fellow who was prepared to take offence for no reason.’
‘The knight? Oh, yes — the man with the woman.’
Simon gave a low whistle. ‘I hadn’t thought: it was Ramon, wasn’t it? And the woman must have been Joana. Poor girl. She had no idea she was going to die that day.’
Baldwin shrugged. ‘Most victims have no idea of their impending end. I wonder if Matthew did?’
The two old friends made their way down to the Cathedral. There they joined a queue to pray at a chapel, and when they were done, they wandered about the square until they saw Munio, who gave them a welcoming smile and waited for them to catch him up.
‘So, have you enjoyed any success?’ he enquired.
‘We have been considering some ideas,’ Baldwin said.
‘At least you have had some ideas, then,’ Munio said drily. ‘Which is more than I have done. I have arranged for Matthew to be buried, but that is all.’
‘There is one thing that occurred to me,’ Simon said hesitantly. He wasn’t sure how rational his thoughts were, in the cold light of day. ‘The attack was so extreme, I wondered whether it was deliberately brutal, just to conceal the identity of the girl.’
‘You think that is possible?’ Munio asked. ‘You think we were lucky to recognise her so swiftly?’
‘If we did,’ Simon said. ‘I was saying to Baldwin last night that the identification was too swift. Perhaps the lady was wrong to think it was her servant. Could someone else have been killed, and this servant girl used her body to effect her own escape from a miserable existence with her mistress? Or did someone abduct her, leaving this other woman in her place so that he wouldn’t be followed?’
Munio’s face had grown longer as he spoke. ‘The lady did say it was her maid. The clothes …’
‘You say that the body is already buried?’ Baldwin asked.
‘Yes. We couldn’t leave it above ground for any longer. In this temperature …’
Baldwin had turned to Simon with an expression of resignation, as though that settled the matter. It spurred Simon to say, ‘Of course. But we could ask the Dona whether there were any distinguishing marks on her maid’s body. Perhaps those who laid her out would have noticed something. If not, we could always have the corpse exhumed so that we can check.’
‘It was Ramon who laid her out,’ Baldwin reminded him.
‘Yes, with that man Gregory, he said,’ Simon recalled. ‘So often, matters seem to point to this Ramon.’
‘There is one other thing,’ Baldwin said, and told Munio what Maria had said.
‘Afonso?’ Munio considered. ‘I do not know the man, but I shall ask the gatemen whether they have seen him.’
‘Good!’ Simon said. ‘So now let’s go and see the Dona Stefania and ask her whether there’s a reason to dig up her maid.’
‘A good suggestion, but where is she likely to be?’ Baldwin wondered.
‘The woman is supposed to be a Prioress, isn’t she?’ Simon grunted. ‘She’ll be in a church, obviously — or a tavern!’
The three men visited the nearby churches, and were disappointed, but when they began to check the drinking-houses nearer the main square, Munio suddenly pointed, and following his finger, Simon saw Dona Stefania sitting at a bench with a rough-looking man clad in dark clothing of a particularly shabby material.
Baldwin and Simon trailed a few steps after Munio and stood in the background as he went up to her, smiling. ‘Dona Stefania. Do you mind if I ask you a few more questions? There are some things we should like to clear up.’
‘But of course,’ she said graciously, waving her hand to indicate that he might stand beside her. Her companion looked Munio up and down in a thoroughly insolent way, but the Pesquisidor didn’t appear to notice. Simon himself felt his ire rise at the sight of his attitude, though, and he walked to join Munio even though he felt the sweat breaking out all over his body. It was unpleasant, because he actually felt rather chilly in his sweat, even though he knew the heat was terrible.
Other than the man at her side, there were a pair of pilgrims who, from their voices, came from the lands about Bavaria; they sat fanning their faces with their great broad-brimmed hats while they spoke in a desultory manner. On the opposite side of the table were two stoic-looking men who appeared to be local traders up to sell their goods at the market. Both seemed unaware of the heat, so far as Simon could see. They slurped their wine and muttered incomprehensibly to each other, to all appearances quite comfortable. It made Simon feel irritable to see them so relaxed when he felt so crotchety and sticky.
Perhaps it was their clothing; their shirts and hose might be made of something that made them feel cooler, Simon thought. As for him, he could better appreciate the Bavarians, with their red faces beaded with sweat, puffing and blowing. Simon reckoned he could leap into a well and drain it, it was so hot. He had never known a place to be so burned by the sun. It was as though the air itself was being exhausted from an oven’s vent, and each breath seemed liable to scorch his throat.
Munio stared at the two locals, who were of a mind to ignore him and remain, but then Munio jerked his chin at the landlord, and suddenly the table was entirely empty but for the Prioress and her friend; the traders were whisked away like dirty platters, and the two Bavarians took one look at the way they had been ejected, and decided not to argue. It was always the way for a sensible traveller: while in a foreign land, it was better to avoid disputes.
‘So, lady,’ Munio said, when they were sitting, ‘we wanted to talk with you a little about the murder of your maid. Our apologies for this. It must be hard for you, having lost your sole companion.’