Michael Jecks - Dispensation of Death

The woman who had died — Mabilla — was the lady who had given the come-on to Earl Edmund, then rejected him when he got too keen. Yes, and all knew that he had been furious, threatening to rape her when she had done that to him. Perhaps many would see this as a foul act on his part, killing the woman who had spurned him? And all his advice in the last few months would be assessed against this new revelation about him.

His reputation would be destroyed. Aha, Piers thought, and a slow smile spread over his face. Perhaps that was what it was all about.

Simon and Baldwin were directed to a small stable set against the northern wall of the court, and there with the three men-at-arms, they unloaded their belongings so that the horses could be properly rested. Rob was left with the horses to groom them — much against his will — and Simon and Baldwin parted from the others there.

‘So that — that’s the Great Hall?’ Simon asked, awed.

‘Well, it’s not the smaller one,’ Baldwin said drily.

‘Is there one?’

‘Down the far side of this one. The King uses that more often, I imagine. This one is just too immense for comfort.’

‘Especially at this time of year,’ Simon agreed. Both had spent enough time in large halls in Exeter and beyond during the winter to know how long it could take for a fire to heat a chamber of any size.

‘Come — let us seek some warmed ale,’ Baldwin muttered. It was cold, and talking about it only served to remind them just how icy the air was.

They made their way to the inn beside the gatehouse and entered. There was a bar set over two barrels at the far end, and they repaired to this, ordering ales, and then taking their seats on low stools near a little fire that threw out a lot of smoke and not much warmth.

‘I wonder when the Bishop will be finished,’ Simon said.

‘Soon, I dare say. He doesn’t enjoy long journeys, and he’ll be keen to eat and find a bed.’

‘There are a lot of guards here. Do you think that the King always has this number of men about him?’

Baldwin was tempted to say that any tyrant must rely on a large contingent of guards to see to his defence, but forbore. ‘This is a large palace, and I suppose he has all the Crown’s jewels with him. It’s only natural that he should feel the need for protection.’

A grizzled old veteran of many winters in the King’s service had overheard their conversation, and now he leaned forward. To Baldwin’s mind his round, flushed features spoke of a better than nodding acquaintance with the ales served here.

‘Hadn’t you heard?’ he asked. ‘There was a murder here yesternight. A poor maid was struck down.’

‘A lover?’ Baldwin asked. It was the usual first question. He always found that in murders, especially the murders of younger folk, the killer almost invariably proved to be someone closely related. A man killed his wife, a lad his girl — sometimes it was the woman killing her spouse. More rarely it was a brother killing a sister because she had brought shame on the family.

‘Don’t know. The fellow ran off as soon as she was dead.’

‘There were witnesses?’ Simon asked.

‘Four or five of them. It was a lady-in-waiting to the Queen, and the Queen was there with the others when it happened.’

‘Did the man show any evil intent towards our Queen?’ Baldwin demanded quickly. Coming straight after the news that the King might seek to annul his marriage, it appeared to be the logical conclusion.

‘No, not that I heard. He just jumped out and stabbed Mabilla, and then fled the scene.’ The fellow clearly had nothing more to tell, other than vague allegations and suppositions.

‘What do you think of that then, Simon?’ Baldwin asked.

Simon belched, leaned back against the wall and spread his legs luxuriously. ‘Me? I think I’m as pleased as a hog in shit that for once, this is nothing to do with us. We can stand back and watch some other poor bastard get on with the work of finding out who was responsible. It’s none of our concern. And in the meantime, let’s have another ale, eh?’

There was one man who was concerned about the death of the maid though, and he was in the Queen’s chapel with Mabilla’s corpse.

‘Oh, Mabilla! How could you have come to this? Mabilla, my sister, I miss you! I shall avenge you, I swear it, on the Gospels!’

And with that Ellis Brooke, Sir Hugh’s most trusted henchman, stood, wiped his face, and made his way from the room.

Despenser left Bishop Stapledon and headed back to the Exchequer through the Green Yard. At least here it was peaceful. This little sanctuary was shielded from the madness and busyness of the main court north of the Great Hall. It might not be as restful as the Queen’s cloister, but it was damn near as quiet.

Sir Hugh stopped for a moment. Indecision assailed him, and he stood for quite some little while, simply staring at the Exchequer buildings while a great lassitude washed over him. Never before had he felt so enfeebled. All his life, he had been driven by his passions. He could still remember when he had been a young man, saying to a friend, ‘I desire nothing so much as money. One day I will have plenty of it. I will be rich.’

Well, that prophecy had come true. Yet for every new pound or mark which he accumulated, he grew ever more aware of the risks of his method of acquiring it and the likelihood that he would lose all.

Once he had. When those bastards the Lords Marcher decided to clip his wings, they did so by taking his castles and laying waste all his manors. It was a typical chevauchée , a fast ride over all his property, stealing or burning everything. The bastards first wrecked him and then saw him condemned to exile. Well, never again. No mother-swyving churl would ever be able to take away what he had built up, and he didn’t give a damn who knew it.

But something was going wrong here for him. Jack should never have attacked Mabilla, and if he did, why should it have stopped him from carrying on and killing the Queen? Although, thank God he hadn’t. Jack had been in tougher situations before, and being thwarted by a clutch of women would not normally have prevented him from finishing the job.

Someone else must have killed Mabilla. But who, in God’s name? Perhaps the story he had spun before the Queen, of Earl Edmund getting his revenge, had not been so wide of the mark, after all …

The thought gave him a new spirit of resolution, and he straightened his back just as a familiar face came the other way.

‘Sir Hugh.’

‘My Lord Kent. How very pleasant,’ Despenser said with a brief baring of his teeth that could have been a smile or a snarl. ‘I was just thinking of you.’

Eleanor de Clare was almost recovered now. She had been forced to drink a great deal of wine last night, just to try to eradicate the sight of all that blood, but it had only served to give her a waspish temper and sore head. Since visiting her husband, that had grown into an ache that encompassed her entire upper body.

Now she sought an answer as to why her husband should have wished to kill poor Mabilla. She had always thought that Sir Hugh was on perfectly amiable terms with her. He wouldn’t have permitted Mabilla to be involved with the Queen otherwise, surely? She had been a mild, pleasant enough young woman.

Alicia was with her, placing a cooling cloth on her forehead. ‘There, mistress. Be calm.’

‘Calm? When I’ve witnessed Mabilla slaughtered like a hog before me?’

Of course, she knew that Alicia had been there too. Alicia was the one who did not fly or faint. She alone had behaved impeccably, running to block the assassin’s path before he could launch himself either at the Queen or at Eleanor. She had acted with a natural courage, and now she was the only one of all who had any ease of mind.