‘Parson Warfeld?’
‘Sir Rauf often talked about it,’ the priest replied. ‘How he would love to have a son. Sir Hugh, in a word what Master Desroches and I are saying is that Sir Rauf Decontet was impotent, incapable of begetting a son. Therefore, the Lady Adelicia must have had a lover. I suspect you know who-’
‘Wendover!’ Ranulf intervened. ‘It’s Master Wendover, captain of the city guard.’
‘True, true,’ Desroches murmured.
‘Who is Wendover?’ Corbett asked. ‘What is his background?’
‘He is Sir Walter Castledene’s man, body and soul,’ Warfeld replied. ‘He served in his personal retinue, and when Sir Walter was elected mayor, Wendover was appointed captain of the city guard. He is a Canterbury man, a former soldier; he has seen service here and there. A blustery man but of good heart, with an eye for the ladies! More importantly, Sir Hugh, he was present when Adam Blackstock and The Waxman were brought to judgement. He witnessed the hanging.’
‘And he was also on guard at Maubisson,’ Corbett declared, ‘when Paulents and the others were killed.’ He filled his wine cup and sipped it gently. He was beginning to feel sleepy. He needed to withdraw, reflect and collect his thoughts. He recalled the lament of David over Jonathan and thought of poor Griskin, as well as something Les Hommes Joyeuses had said to him. ‘Is there anything else?’ he asked.
Desroches got to his feet; Parson Warfeld also.
‘We thought it only proper to tell you now,’ the physician explained. ‘I mean, before we met tomorrow morning.’
‘And Decontet’s house is still under guard?’ Corbett asked.
‘Oh yes,’ Parson Warfeld replied. ‘I pass it many a time. It is securely guarded at every entrance. Sir Walter Castledene has insisted on that.’
‘And Maubisson?’ Corbett asked.
Desroches shrugged. ‘I don’t know, Sir Hugh. Perhaps you had best ask Sir Walter yourself.’
When the two men had left, Corbett finished his wine whilst his comrades chattered amongst themselves. ‘I was attacked!’ he intervened brusquely, immediately the conversation died. ‘On leaving Vespers,’ he continued. ‘An assassin, a bowman as in the forest. Two crossbow bolts were loosed. I do not think he intended to kill but to warn me.’ He smiled thinly and was about to get up when Ranulf put a hand over his.
‘Sir Hugh, you should go nowhere by yourself. Next time I will be with you. Lady Maeve insists on that.’
‘And me,’ Chanson declared hotly. ‘My leg is well, the ulcer is healing.’
‘Who could it be?’ Ranulf mused. ‘Desroches was with us before Vespers ended and never left.’
‘And Parson Warfeld?’
‘He came but then went to see the prior; a lay brother took him there.’
Corbett rose to his feet. ‘I shall retire to my chamber. I will close the shutters over my window, lock and bolt my door, then I shall think. Gentlemen, good night. .’
Corbett flung down the quill in desperation and glared at the triptych on the wall celebrating the arrival of St Augustine in Kent and his meeting with the Saxon king. He noticed with amusement how the artist had depicted Augustine in all three panels as if suffused by a golden glow, whilst his adversaries, the Saxon king and his entourage, were hidden in a cloud of shadows. He rose and stretched, easing the soreness in his legs and arms. He ignored the goblet of mulled wine standing on the table and stared down at the document taken from Paulents’ casket. In truth, he was unable to break the cipher. At first he had thought it would be easy. Now a faint suspicion pricked his mind: was it all a farrago of nonsense? But in that case why was Paulents carrying it? As far as he could see, the so-called Cloister Map made no more sense than the jabbering of an idiot. Or was it just that he was frustrated? He had used his own cipher book, moving the letters scrawled on that piece of vellum, but all to no avail. Only the occasional word made sense.
Eventually Corbett had diverted himself by writing to Maeve, sending love and affection to her and the children, and concentrating on the petty aspects of their life such as the use of the long meadow at Leighton, the manor’s claims to the advowson of the local church, as well as his rights as manor lord over assart and purpresture. He left most of these things to Maeve, who loved the complex legal claims underpinning tenure. She thoroughly enjoyed arguing with her attorney, Master Osbert, their audacious serjeant at law, about payment in fee or the true meaning of assart. Once he’d sealed his missive to her, Corbett turned to the letters he’d received from Westminster. The first had been dispatched under the Secret Seal. The second was from the prior of the abbey there, William de Huntingdon. The King’s missive, written hastily, probably by Edward himself, gave details about the Lady Adelicia’s wardship. How it had been granted to Sir Rauf Decontet at the behest of Walter Castledene. How both men had been colleagues and comrades in the past and proved themselves to be loyal servants of the Crown. In other words, Corbett reflected cynically, they had loaned the Exchequer considerable amounts of money. Corbett had asked for such information before he left Westminster. He was surprised Sir Walter hadn’t described his relationship with Decontet more accurately, and wondered whether Castledene should be the right man to sit as judge of oyer and terminer in the case. The King had had no difficulty in sharing such information. Corbett could imagine Edward, iron-grey hair framing that falcon face, his right eye drooping, lips puckered, as he stood in some chancery chamber, kicking at the rushes and dictating the letter. Afterwards, pushing the poor scribe aside, he’d added a sentence in his own hand, a postscript about his precious snow-white hawk, now ill at the royal mews, reminding Corbett to pray at Becket’s tomb that the bird should recover.
‘I wish to God you’d given me more information about Castledene and Decontet,’ Corbett murmured. He tapped the letter against the table. That was another question he hoped to ask Sir Walter when they met tomorrow morning. In fact, although Corbett had made no progress with the cipher, he had decided how he would manage these affairs. So far he’d simply blundered around, acting on what others said or what he observed: that must end. He unrolled the King’s letter again and studied its hasty last line: ‘Dieu vous benoit, par la main du Roi.’ The Norman French letters were ill-formed, but the King wished Corbett well and assured his principal clerk that he still enjoyed his royal master’s favour and love.
The second letter, from the Prior of Westminster, was brief and succinct. Brother Hubert of Canterbury had left their community early in the summer of 1293. Before his swift departure he had destroyed all records of himself and disappeared from view. He had never returned. Hubert’s departure, the prior confided, was as abrupt and sudden as a summer storm. Until then he had been a veritable beacon of light: a great scholar with a flair for study, well liked by his brethren, an obedient monk who strictly observed the rule of St Benedict in every way. As to his description, he was slim, of medium height, with comely face and pleasant manner. The only thing the prior had discovered was that Brother Hubert had received a mysterious visitor around the time of Pentecost. Once he had left, Brother Hubert had retreated to his private cell claiming sickness; three days later he was gone. Rumours had seeped back that Hubert had forsaken not only his vows, but any love of God, becoming a venator hominum — a hunter of men — but the prior could not comment on this.
Corbett put both letters down as he heard a knock on the door and Ranulf calling his name. He unlocked and unbarred the door, and Ranulf came in bearing a fresh goblet of posset wrapped in a napkin. Uninvited, he sat down on a stool.
‘Chanson is sleeping, master, and so you should be.’
Corbett took the goblet, sat on the edge of his bed and sipped carefully. He was determined on a soul-fast sleep, no heart-shaking dreams, phantasms or nightmares fed by too much wine. He stared down at the cold grey stone floor and shivered at a nasty draught which seeped like a fiend beneath the door to prickle the skin.