Candace Robb - A Spy For The Redeemer

‘I saw Brother Michaelo,’ Kate said, standing over Lucie, holding out a cup of ale. ‘He looked so solemn. And then I saw you weeping. I pray that nothing has happened to Captain Archer.’

Lucie took the cup. ‘It is Sir Robert. The chill took him at last.’

‘Oh, I am sorry, Mistress. He was a good man.’ The young woman shifted feet. ‘Are those letters from the captain?’ Kate had boundless admiration for the literate.

‘They are.’

‘Will he be home soon?’

‘Brother Michaelo says the captain hopes to be home by Corpus Christi.’

Kate made a face. ‘Still so long. But it is good to have his letters?’

‘It is, Kate. I was going to read them now.’

‘Oh, to be sure. I must return to my duties.’

‘You will not tell your sister about Sir Robert in front of the children?’

Kate’s older sister, Tildy, was with Gwenllian and Hugh near the kitchen door. ‘Oh, no, Mistress Lucie. It is for you to tell them. I shall not even tell my sister.’

Lucie sighed as she watched Kate hurry away. Why did everything seem so difficult of late? When had she last laughed?

Roger Moreton had made her laugh last night, at supper — until Jasper insulted him. The boy’s animosity was misplaced. It was true that Roger was a widower. His wife had died in childbirth — a stillbirth — the previous autumn. But his wealth and good reputation made him the hope of all parents of marriageable young women. Who would be his next wife was a topic of much excited conjecture in the city. Roger had no need to woo a married woman.

Lucie looked down at the letters in her hands. Where to begin? She untied the string that held them together. Owen had marked on each the place and date of writing so she might read them in order, and so follow his journey. In the first letter he mentioned Sir Robert’s cough, his dizziness. The river crossings had been difficult in the early spring, from the border country to Carreg Cennen. There was much in the letter about Owen’s mixed feelings upon returning to his own country, but Lucie skimmed to find news of her father. Owen wrote of constant bickering between Brother Michaelo and Sir Robert, good-humoured on the monk’s part. A later letter mentioned Brother Michaelo’s tender nursing of her father. The monk perplexed Lucie — in the time she had known him he had metamorphosed from a self-serving sybarite to a trusted servant of the Archbishop of York. Practical changes, she had thought, still self-serving. But this tenderness towards her father — this was change of a deeper sort. God had watched over Sir Robert, to grant him such a companion on his final earthly journey. In the last letter, Lucie at last found the news that calmed her. Not only had her father reached St David’s, but he had been granted a vision at St Non’s Well, a vision that had given him the absolution he had sought over many pilgrimages. Sir Robert had died in peace, a happy man. Thanks be to God.

For a long while Lucie sat, head bowed, the pile of letters in her lap, remembering her father. Melisende, her ageing cat, curled up at her feet. Faintly Lucie heard her children’s voices.

The church bells chiming Nones woke Lucie from her reverie. She must return to the shop. Gathering up the letters, she took them to the workroom, tucked them on a shelf that had once held wooden dishes and spoons when Lucie and Nicholas, and later Owen, had lived in this house behind the shop. It was Sir Robert who had given them the fine house across the garden. He had tried hard to make up for his earlier neglect. Lucie hoped her father had known, in the end, how much she had loved him.

Jasper raised his head as Lucie entered the shop. ‘Does the captain say when he might return?’

‘In his last letter he said he hoped to be home within the month. That was over a month ago.’ She nodded towards the package he was wrapping. ‘Is that for Mistress Skipwith?’

‘Do you want to check it?’

‘I should.’

Jasper unwrapped it. Lucie poked about with a mixing stick, found nothing amiss and handed it back to Jasper.

‘By the time she has cooked this in lard it will be useless anyway,’ Jasper said glumly as he refolded the parchment and placed it on the counter.

‘She believes that it helps her sleep. A little on the temples.’

Jasper hung his head.

Lucie hated seeing him like this. ‘I shall close the shop while I am at Freythorpe Hadden. I must tell Phillippa of her brother’s death.’

‘I could go to Freythorpe.’

‘You will stay here. It needs a woman’s delicacy. And I need you to see to the stores, and the garden.’

‘But the roads — ’

‘Take the remedy to Mistress Skipwith!’

Jasper grabbed the package.

‘And hurry back. We have much to do.’

As Lucie walked out on to Davygate the next morning, a hooded figure stepped out of the shadow cast by the jettied upper storey.

‘Have you found the counterpoison for my jaundice?’ Alice Baker asked.

Lucie felt her blood rise to her face, her heart pound. It was not her nature to enjoy confrontations. ‘I told you what I thought caused it and what you must do to undo it.’ She repeated the advice, hoping this time Alice would hear it. ‘An infusion of vervain and dandelion root. Nothing more. Then fast for two days, drinking only water, eating nothing. After that, eat moderately and take no medicines.’

‘You have found no counterpoison.’ A statement, made an accusation by her tone.

‘That regimen is the remedy. I believe you mixed valerian with skullcap.’

‘Have a care, Lucie Wilton. I could ruin you.’

Ungrateful wretch, Lucie thought. But she merely said, ‘I cannot believe you wish to do that, Alice.’

Lucie glanced up at the sound of a door opening and shutting across the street.

‘May God go with you, Mistress Baker, Mistress Wilton.’ Roger Moreton smiled as he crossed the street from his house. Another man followed in his wake. Lucie mirrored Roger’s smile — how did he manage to be there when she needed him?

‘Master Moreton.’ Alice Baker simpered, then remembered herself and turned so that her jaundiced face was in shadow.

Roger was a handsome man, clear-featured and solidly built. He always seemed delighted with life, his eyes twinkling, his colour high.

‘Can you believe it?’ said Roger rather breathlessly. ‘Just as I mentioned your name, I turned, and there you were. Is it not so, Harold?’

‘Quite so.’

‘God go with you, gentlemen, Mistress Wilton.’ Alice hurried off.

Lucie had paid no attention to Roger’s companion. Now she looked up into the stranger’s eyes. Sweet heaven but they were remarkably blue. He gave her an oddly formal bow.

‘You spoke of me?’ she asked Roger.

‘I lied. But that terrible woman. She will insist on blaming you for her foolishness.’

‘It is difficult to accept that one is a fool,’ Lucie said. ‘But I thank you. And you,’ she said to the stranger.

He in turn glanced uncertainly at Roger.

‘Forgive my discourtesy,’ Roger said hurriedly. ‘Mistress Wilton, this is Harold Galfrey. He is to be my household steward when I move to St Saviour.’ Although he lived alone, Roger had recently purchased a large house in another parish in the city. It had increased the frenzy of the rumours regarding his choice for the next Mistress Moreton.

Lucie would not have guessed the man to be a steward. With his tanned skin and sun-bleached hair he did not seem one who spent his days inside, organising a household. Neither was his physique that of such a man. However, his attire was appropriate for a household steward. His clothes had been chosen with an eye to cut and fabric, and yet in such muted colours they would offend no one or call attention to him. ‘You are fortunate to find yourself in Master Moreton’s household,’ she said.