Paul Doherty - The Magician

‘What are you looking for?’ he called.

‘I thought they might have come and left, but there is no sign of them; no one has been here.’ Ranulf walked back. ‘Though,’ he sighed, ‘the snow is beginning to melt.’

Corbett stared across at the silent, forbidding priest’s house.

‘Why should a priest,’ he asked, ‘use a good bronze bowl to mix saltpetre and other substances then throw it out into the garden? Why does he say he hasn’t eaten when I can smell the odour of cooking?’

‘He did say he was going to make some oatmeal or gruel.’

‘True.’ Corbett stamped his feet. The day was dying and they could not stay here much longer.

‘Ranulf, something may have delayed Horehound. He knows where we are; let’s return to the castle.’

They mounted their horses and rode back along the trackway. When they came to the tavern they saw the gates closed. Corbett glimpsed the light of lanterns and candles, and the faint, pleasing sound of a lute drifted out. They passed two chapmen, half bowed under the bundles piled up on their backs, eager to reach the castle before nightfall. They shouted a greeting; Corbett raised a hand in reply.

On their return to the castle, Corbett told Ranulf that he should begin preparations for leaving; he also asked his henchmen to bring some food and wine from the kitchens.

‘You are not joining us in the Hall of Angels?’ Ranulf asked.

‘I’m tired of de Craon’s smirking face. Anyway,’ Corbett slapped Ranulf’s shoulder with his gauntlets, ‘I know you will be busy with the Lady Constance.’

Corbett went up to his chamber, where he checked the great chest at the end of the bed and carefully searched the room for any sign of an intruder, but could find none. He built up the fire, lit more of the capped candles and cleared the small writing desk. He took out of the Chancery box some ink, his writing tray and a smooth sheet of vellum. He intended to write letters to the King and Lady Maeve, but what could he say? He couldn’t hide his growing anxiety as well as his anger at de Craon’s smug arrogance, as if the Frenchman had told a very funny story of which Corbett couldn’t see the point. He now accepted that de Craon had brought those three magistri from Paris to have them killed, but what further mischief was planned? He divided the piece of vellum into four, giving each column a heading, ‘De Craon’, ‘The Deaths’, ‘The Castle’, ‘The Church in the Forest’, then, using his own secret cipher, filled each of these categories with what he had seen and learnt, recording conversations, glimpses, who had been where when something had happened. He thought of Father Matthew, his pale, unshaven face, that lonely house and deserted cemetery.

Ranulf came up with a tray of food. Corbett drank the wine too fast; he felt his face flush and his eyes grew heavy. He could understand the deaths, the murder of the three Frenchmen, but how, and who was responsible? He took a second sheet of vellum and, going back to the Chancery box, brought out all he had learnt about Ufford’s stay in Paris. The hours passed and Ranulf returned to see that all was well. Corbett, immersed in his task, only mumbled a reply. He bolted the door once Ranulf had gone and lay down on the bed only intending to sleep for a short while, but he woke in the early hours, cold and tense, the fire gone down and many of the candles gutted. He pulled the cover over him and went back to sleep.

Corbett woke some time later and attended Father Andrew’s dawn mass in the small castle chapel. The priest wore black and gold vestments whilst he offered the intercessory prayers for the dead. The day was proving to be a fine one. Outside the chapel both the inner and outer wards were bustling with people coming into the castle. Now the roads were clearing, a servant told him, more chapmen and travelling tinkers seemed to be on the move, all eager to take advantage of the break in the weather. Corbett went over to the kitchen to break his fast. The servants were busy preparing for de Craon’s feast to be held that evening. He glimpsed the boy Ranulf had brought from the tavern, his hair and face all washed, an old jerkin about his bony shoulders. He even boasted a woollen pair of hose, and good stout boots on his feet. Corbett called him over. The boy, chewing on a piece of chicken, pushing the morsels into his mouth, came over wide-eyed.

‘You don’t want me to go back, do you?’

Corbett smiled, took a coin from his purse and gave it to the boy.

‘What do they call you?’

‘I think my name was Tom, but usually they call me Fetchit.’

‘Very well, Tom Fetchit. Did you know Horehound the outlaw well?’

The boy’s eyes slid away.

‘Come on,’ Corbett urged. ‘There’s no crime in speaking with men of the woods. Here, lad, you can have this coin too. You know Horehound,’ Corbett continued, ‘was going to take the King’s pardon? We were supposed to meet him yesterday. Ranulf, the red-haired one, took food down to him in the saddlebags.’

‘And?’ the boy asked as his curiosity quickened.

‘Neither Horehound nor any of his coven appeared.’

The boy stopped his chewing.

‘Are you surprised? Does that appear strange?’

The boy turned and dropped a piece of chicken on the floor; immediately a large mastiff snapped it up.

‘That’s not like Horehound, sir,’ the boy replied. ‘He would never refuse food; something must be wrong.’

Corbett gave the boy another coin and walked out across the yard. He heard the crack of a whip and turned as Master Reginald drove his cart into the inner ward, one of his ostlers sitting beside him. Corbett decided to return to his own chamber, to scrutinise everything he had written the night before. The others came up, Ranulf, Bolingbroke and Chanson, but they could see their master was distracted, and Ranulf was only too eager to return to the Hall of Angels and seek out the Lady Constance.

The day passed slowly for Corbett. Now and again he left to walk across to the Jerusalem Tower, and later in the afternoon he returned to that crumbling doorway and the dark, lonely passageway leading down into the old dungeons. This time he went armed, sword belt about him, accompanied by two of Sir Edmund’s Welsh archers. He recalled the terrors of that night, of hiding in the freezing darkness as the assassin waited to take advantage.

He returned to the inner ward just as the coffins bearing the dead Frenchmen were blessed with incense by Father Andrew, before being loaded on to a cart to be taken on their long journey to Dover and across to France. Corbett couldn’t tell which coffin was Crotoy’s, but as he watched the cart leave, he crossed himself, quoted the psalm of the dead and quietly promised he would seek vengeance for his old friend’s murder.

Ranulf was waiting for him on the steps to his chamber.

‘Sir Hugh, you have been wandering this castle like a ghost. Sir Edmund is insistent that we show de Craon every courtesy.’

‘Is he, now?’

Corbett took out the key and unlocked his chamber. Ranulf followed him inside. He helped Corbett shave, then laid out the red, blue and gold cotehardie, the white cambric shirt and the dark blue hose Corbett always wore on such formal occasions. Ranulf could see old Master Longface was distracted, even forgetting to put on his chain of office or take the Chancery rings from the small casket on the table. Even when they reached the Hall of Angels, Corbett remained silent and withdrawn, almost unaware of the lavish preparations Sir Edmund had made for the banquet: the fire roaring in the hearth, the dais covered in snow-white cloths glittering with silver and gold flagons, goblets, tranchers and knives. The air was rich with savoury smells from the nearby kitchens, soft music floated down from the minstrels’ gallery and even the chill corners of the hall were warmed by fiery braziers.