Alys Clare - The Tavern in the Morning

‘A worrying business,’ Helewise said. ‘And presumably you have reason to believe she may have come here? To Tonbridge, you think?’

He edged the stool even closer. ‘I believe it may be a possibility, yes. I — she-’ For the first time he hesitated. Then, as if he realised he had no option but to respond to what was, after all, a perfectly reasonable question, he confided, ‘She has a friend hereabouts. A woman. I’m not sure where she lives, but I do recall hearing Joanna speak of her.’

‘And you think this woman may be caring for your niece?’

‘It’s the only thing I can think of!’ Denys de Courtenay flung his hands up in an expansive gesture. ‘No family of her own, as I said, save myself! And, for reasons which I cannot even begin to guess, she wished to distance herself from her late husband’s kin.’

She also wished to distance herself from you, Helewise thought. Or so it appears. ‘She did not try to contact you?’ she asked.

‘She — ’ The smile spread out across the handsome face, white teeth gleaming in the smooth, olive skin. ‘Abbess, she had no way of knowing I was at present in England.’ Leaning confidingly towards her again, he whispered, ‘She knows me to be a King’s man.’ He nodded as if in confirmation of his words. ‘Joanna, I am certain, would have believed me to be in Outremer. With the King.’

He obviously expected her to be impressed, so she said, ‘Indeed! With King Richard!’

He looked smug. ‘I have enjoyed the great privilege of being permitted to be of use to His Majesty in the past, I have to own. He knows he can depend on me, when he needs a good man in a fight.’ He examined the long fingernails of one hand.

‘But not this particular fight,’ Helewise said softly. ‘This supreme fight in which King Richard is now engaged, to regain the Holy Places.’

Denys de Courtenay raised his head and glared at her. The unctuous charm had quite vanished, and, for a split second, she saw something feral, something infinitely sinister and cunning, in his dark eyes.

He recovered as swiftly. So swiftly that she could almost have thought she had been mistaken.

Almost.

‘Abbess, Abbess,’ he smiled, ‘what can you know of the world of fighting men?’ Quite a lot, she could have answered. ‘I see I must enlighten you!’

‘Please, don’t trouble yourself,’ she said quickly. ‘My ignorance must remain, for there are weightier matters for our attention. You were speaking of your niece’s friend, the woman with whom she may be lodging.’

‘Yes, yes, so I was.’

‘What is the woman’s name?’

Again, there was that strange reluctance to divulge details. Instead of answering Helewise’s question, Denys said, ‘I suppose it is too vain a hope to ask if she has been here? Joanna, that is?’

‘Here?’ After her initial surprise, suddenly Helewise was quite sure this was what de Courtenay had been leading up to. The simple question: have you seen her? Then why all the rigmarole? Why all the acting? ‘Has she been to the Abbey, do you mean? Or to the Holy Shrine down in the Vale?’

She thought it was the first he had heard of any Holy Shrine. ‘Oh — here, I meant. Seeking food or shelter, perhaps…?’

‘I recall nobody named Joanna among our recent visitors,’ Helewise said. ‘More importantly, for she could easily have used a different name, I recall no young noblewoman. Our visitors, sir, tend more usually to be the poor and the sick.’

‘Of course, of course,’ he said smoothly.

‘What name does she go by?’ Helewise asked. ‘I ask in order that I may enquire of my nuns, monks and lay brothers, those, that is, who have dealings with the outside worlds.’

He had got to his feet, and she thought for a moment he wasn’t going to answer. His expression was stern, distracted, almost …

Then, replacing the seriousness with another smile, he said, ‘Her name? Did I not tell you?’

‘No,’ Helewise said. ‘You only said she was called Joanna.’

‘She was born Joanna de Courtenay,’ he said, ‘the daughter of one Robert de Courtenay.’

‘Your brother.’ So must the woman’s father have been, for Denys de Courtenay to be her uncle.

‘No, Robert de Courtenay’s father and my father were brothers.’ Denys laughed lightly, as if indulging a perfectly natural mistake.

‘Then,’ Helewise persevered pedantically ‘I believe that makes you and Joanna second cousins, or in fact first cousins with one degree of removal. But not uncle and niece.’

‘Does it indeed?’ He laughed again. ‘I never was very good at the complicated network of kin relationships. Not that it matters the smallest bit!’

‘Only if you wished to marry her,’ Helewise observed. ‘Second cousins have been known to be wed, given the proper dispensation, whereas uncle and niece cannot, such unions being commonly regarded as incestuous.’

There was an instant’s icy silence in the room. Then Denys de Courtenay swept his cloak across his shoulder, bowed to Helewise and said, ‘Ah, well. There it is. Now, I fear, Abbess Helewise, that I have wasted your time.’

‘But what of your niece’s friend?’ Helewise said. ‘Her woman friend? Surely-’

But he acted as if he hadn’t heard. Bowing low, he said, ‘I would ask, Abbess, that you and your nuns keep Joanna in your prayers. If it please God, I pray that she and I may soon be reunited.’ His eyes on Helewise’s, he went on, ‘You will tell me if you hear word of her, won’t you? Or if, by God’s grace, she comes here?’

Helewise didn’t want to undertake that she would. Adopting her guest’s evasive tactics, she said instead, ‘And how will we find you to tell you, if we do have news?’

He said, ‘No need for that. I will find you. ’

And just why, Helewise wondered, does that sound so ominously like a threat?

‘Now,’ de Courtenay was saying, ‘I have, as I said, taken up far too much of your precious time, so I will take my leave.’

Bowing again, he had let himself out and closed the door behind him before Helewise could say another word.

It did not occur to her for some time that, if Joanna de Courtenay had been married, then her name must now be something other than de Courtenay.

Something else which her uncle — in fact, her cousin — had chosen not to divulge.

* * *

She went straight over to tell Josse.

He was awake, in the middle of eating what appeared to be quite a substantial meal. He was, as she had hoped, riveted by what she had to say.

‘He has to be Tilly’s handsome stranger!’ he said, his mouth full of boiled hare. ‘Your description and hers tally far too closely for him not to be.’

‘It does seem likely,’ she agreed. ‘Denys de Courtenay. A King’s man. Have you ever heard of him, Sir Josse?’

Josse shook his head. ‘No, but that alone doesn’t mean he’s lying. About his royal connections, anyway. And, if he was the man I saw at Tonbridge Castle, that implies a link with the Clares and they certainly have court connections.’

‘If, if, if,’ Helewise said dismally.

‘One less if now!’Josse reminded her.

‘Probably,’ she said.

‘Oh, Abbess, let’s be rash! It is the same man!’

‘Very well. Which leads to the next question: is your mysterious woman in the woods the missing Joanna de Courtenay?’

‘She could well be,’ Josse said. ‘Although her name is not de Courtenay, or, at least, her son’s name isn’t. It’s de Lehon, and it’s a French name.’ He fixed Helewise with an intent look. ‘Did this Denys say she’d lived in France?’

Helewise thought back. ‘No. But, there again, he didn’t say she hadn’t. He was, as I said, very reluctant to tell me anything definite.’