‘It must have been the felon,’ Sir Peregrine asserted.
‘Stabbed in the dark,’ Baldwin mused, frowning.
‘What of it?’ Sir Peregrine demanded. ‘It’s how an outlaw would strike, isn’t it?’
‘Perhaps. But if another man struck him down, perhaps the felon merely arranged the corpse neatly and took his purse. Since the knight wouldn’t need the money again, an honourable man could do that.’
‘Oh, really!’ Sir Peregrine sneered.
‘It could be one explanation. It is easier to believe that another trained man-at-arms of whatever rank killed him rather than a weakly abjurer.’
‘I hope you don’t mean to suggest…’
Baldwin smiled. ‘What could I mean, Sir Peregrine?’
The bannaret stood coldly, plainly angry. His eyes held Baldwin’s with a glittering intensity.
Simon wanted to interrupt them but daren’t. If he was not careful, he could insult one or the other and precipitate a duel.
It was Lord Hugh who relaxed the tension. ‘Come, Sir Peregrine, there’s no need for weapons to be drawn. Sir Baldwin meant you no insult.’
‘Certainly not, Sir Peregrine,’ Baldwin said guilelessly. ‘I was thinking aloud, no more.’
‘I apologise, then. I am becoming peppery. It must be this sad death. Sir Baldwin, Master Bailiff, would you walk with me in the yard while we await our evening meal?’
‘Naturally,’ Baldwin said, allowing the tension to leave him. The three took their leave of the lord and walked down the stairs to the yard. Baldwin had to flex his fingers to ease the clenching where he had bunched his fists, but more than Sir Peregrine’s sudden temper, Baldwin was fascinated by the reason behind his apparent loss of control.
William Small the sailor sat drinking ale. His guard had been removed when the Coroner decided he had no case to answer and now he sat alone, back against the ladder which led up to the walkway along the walls. Behind him was the doorway to the storeroom from which he had fetched his drink.
The sky was light, the clouds tinged with a vivid salmon pink as the sun followed its course down to the horizon, far out of sight from here, hidden as it was by the curtain wall of the castle. With its passing the yard was thrown into shade and the night chill was overtaking the place although the cobbles and stonework still gave off a little warmth.
It was ending a good day after all. He had feared that he might be attached to appear at the next court, having to pay more money in fines, but somehow he had escaped. It looked as though he was free. Everyone assumed that poor Sir Gilbert had been killed by the felon, and that suited William; it meant he need not be held for long here.
His belongings were all in the tack-room at the side of the stables, and as he sat near the hall, he noticed a man loitering nearby, in the doorway. For some reason William found himself studying him. It was a man-at-arms, a smartly turned-out fellow, who leaned as if casually against the door-jamb, but William was convinced that there was a watchful set to his shoulders. William had been a soldier, he could recognise the attitude of another who was on the scrounge.
William settled back with a smirk, certain that someone was inside the room rummaging through his things and those of the good, dead, Sir Gilbert. They were welcome, he thought. They’d find nothing in all his stuff. William had already been through the lot, looking for the money. It wasn’t there.
It must have been that day when the knight left him and went on alone, returning late reeking of wine. He had taken the bags with him, because William had searched through the camp after he’d gone and there was nothing there. But Sir Gilbert didn’t bring it back with him: it was all gone when the knight was found dead.
What the hell! Some you win, some you lose. William rested his head against the ladder. The beer felt good in his belly, he was fed and he was as contented as a man could be. Although he loved the sea in all her moods, he was happy to be living safely on land for a while.
There were footsteps nearby, but he ignored them, closing his eyes. He didn’t want to chat; he wanted a good sleep and an early start. Hardly had he begun to doze, however, when he heard a low, rumbling growl. The man outside the tack-room had also heard the noise and was standing fearfully, staring at Aylmer. Seeing such a large man worried by the dog made William grin to himself.
Then the humour was wiped from his face as he recognised the man: the scene from the street outside the tavern in London came back to him and he was suddenly struck with a quick fear. That man had been pinned to the wall by Aylmer before.
He was about to call out when a blade rested on his throat, a blade that felt as sharp as a razor, as cold as only polished steel could be, and a voice hissed in his ear. ‘If you call that sodding hound, you’ll die.’
‘Perhaps it was fortunate,’ Sir Peregrine continued when the three were once more outside, ‘that Sir Gilbert died, if he was a messenger.’
‘Fortunate?’ Baldwin enquired casually. The callousness of the bannaret’s attitude shocked him, but he wanted to discover all he could from the man. ‘Ho, Aylmer! Leave that man alone.’
He watched smiling as the great dog padded gently away from Perkin, trotting to Baldwin’s side. Baldwin tickled his ears while they spoke.
Sir Peregrine eyed the dog warily. ‘At least as an excommunicate he wasn’t anyone to be mourned. And the felon dying with him was more or less a proof of God’s justice. Others deserve more grief, don’t you think?’
‘If he was a messenger, couldn’t he have carried a message from the King?’
‘I would doubt it, Sir Baldwin. The King has his own men – why should he use a renegade Templar?’
Baldwin gave a brittle smile. ‘I suppose not.’
‘But of course Despenser would have wanted to bring Lord de Courtenay to his camp if possible.’
‘You think so?’
Sir Peregrine shot him a look. ‘There’s no need to try to sound disinterested, Sir Baldwin. You and Bailiff Puttock here are friends of Walter Stapledon. He’s mentioned you both in my presence and a friend of the good bishop’s will know his views, won’t he?’
‘He rarely conceals them,’ admitted Baldwin.
‘ “Trenchant”, I have heard them described. I think he became disgusted with court politics earlier this year, and I can’t blame him, but that doesn’t mean he’s right now.’
‘You mean he is wrong to declare the banishment of the Despensers to be illegal?’ Baldwin wanted to know.
Sir Peregrine made a gesture of irritation. ‘Of course he is! The bastards had to go. Look at them! Greedy, vain, never satisfied, the pair of them. Always looking out for more advantage.’
‘Yet if they were wrongly exiled…?’
‘The pair are a danger to the realm. If they stayed in power, putting whoever they wanted into every official position, stealing any lands they fancied, throwing honest men into prison on their whim – aye, and poisoning the King’s ear with stories about other men – the country would soon have gone to war.’
‘They had to go, then?’
‘It was inevitable.’
‘And what now?’ Baldwin asked quietly.
‘We must ensure that the Despensers never return. That would be a disaster.’
‘I see.’
‘No, Sir Baldwin, I don’t think you do.’ Sir Peregrine halted. They were at the well and Sir Peregrine sat on the low wall that surrounded it, gazing up at Baldwin with the air of a teacher instructing a wayward pupil. ‘If Hugh Despenser, the young one, comes back to England, there will be war. It may be Lancaster who precipitates it, it may be the Marcher Lords, it may even be the King himself – I don’t know – but if the Despensers come back, there will inevitably be civil war.
‘If the Despensers win that war, the whole realm will become subject to Hugh and then no man will be safe. Can you imagine the country under his boot? He steals what he wants. Power is the only authority he understands. That is why we have to support the Marcher Lords and Earl Thomas of Lancaster.’