Mel Starr - Rest Not in Peace

“Of what use was it to the tailor?”

“Poked holes in leather an’ canvas an’ stuff as was too tough for ’is needle to pierce.”

“Could this be the bodkin you made?”

Edmund snorted. “’Ow could I know that? They’re all alike… an’ it’s been years past.”

“You’ve not been asked to make anything similar since?”

“Nay,” he said, and turned back to his bellows.

I had not entered Edmund’s forge expecting to learn much, so was not disappointed. I left the forge and walked up Church View Street to Galen House, where I also expected to learn little. This assumption, however, proved wrong.

Kate was preparing our supper, Bessie at the hem of her cotehardie, when I opened our door. Kate was bent over the hearth, frying a dish of hanoney upon scattered coals. I had neglected my postponed dinner in a desire to be at the trail of a felon, and my stomach took the moment to remind me of its empty state.

“What news?” she said as she stood from her cramped labor.

“I have found a murder weapon, I think, and perhaps a bit of cloth used to wipe away Sir Henry’s blood when the man was slain.”

I drew the items from my pouch and held them forth. Kate shrank from the objects as from an adder.

“That bodkin was plunged into Sir Henry’s ear?” she asked.

“So I believe. I found it hidden, driven into the base of a lampstand, in the chamber where two of Sir Henry’s squires lodge.”

“One of them has slain his lord, then?”

“So Sir Roger believes.”

“You do not?”

“’Tis all too neat and simple. The sheriff found a scrap of parchment upon the floor of his chamber this morn. Someone slid it under his door in the night. It told him to seek for what he hoped to find in the squires’ chamber.”

“And that is the bloody cloth?” Kate asked, curling her lip in distaste.

“Aye. A scrap of linen, of the finer sort. Perhaps torn from a gentleman’s kirtle.”

Kate’s curiosity overcame her distaste and she reached for the fabric. She took it daintily, seeking to avoid the dark stained portions, and examined it closely.

“Here is no kirtle,” she said.

“What, then?”

“Men!” she smiled. “Fancy yourself a sleuth, but do not know the difference between undergarments and a table cloth.”

“Table cloth? That?”

“Aye, or napery or perhaps a portpain.”

“Why do you say so?”

“Look there,” she said, and pointed to the edge of the cloth. “I think no kirtle would be hemmed so, and the weave is twill. Who would have a kirtle woven so?”

One hem looks much like another to me, but Kate is experienced with needle and thread.

“If I seek the pantler tomorrow and ask him to search the pantry, you believe he will find one of Lord Gilbert’s napkins missing a fragment of this size?”

“Aye. And look, it has been cut neatly, with a sharp blade, not ripped or torn.”

“Hmm, ’tis so.”

This bit of linen fabric was not employed by chance, then, but sliced from some larger cloth with a purpose in mind. So it seemed to me.

As the long midsummer eve faded to night I heard townsfolk upon the street, making their way to a meadow north of the Church of St Beornwald where all the day men had gathered wood for the bonfire which signaled midsummer’s eve. Kate and Bessie and I followed the throng, but before we left Galen House Kate plaited the flowers of St John’s Wort into her hair, and into the wispy, silken locks of our daughter, to ward off evil for the coming year.

Those who possessed white garments, and few did in such a town, wore them in honor of St John’s Day. The quarter moon gave such folk a ghostly appearance, but soon flames reflected yellow and red from clothing and faces. Unless a man was ill and confined to his bed he would be celebrating the summer this night.

Bampton Castle was empty as well. I watched as Lord Gilbert traded some witticism with Father Thomas and saw the old vicar chuckle. Even Sir Henry’s household had joined the throng about the blaze. Most of these were conspicuous for their solemnity. But Walter seemed to enjoy himself, smiling and boisterous and dancing about the blaze, and Sir Geoffrey smiled over the shoulder of Lady Margery as the flames rose higher. Kate saw this as well, and looked to me with questions in her eyes.

Bessie soon grew bored with the fire. When it was first lit her eyes glowed with delight, but after a short time she laid her head upon my shoulder and fell to sleep. So sooner than most Kate and I left the blaze and returned to Galen House and our bed. Three years past I would have frolicked through the night. Now I was content to seek my home with wife on my arm and babe upon my shoulder. I do not grieve for my lost youth.

A man with a clear conscience is said to sleep well, while the guilty will toss upon his pillow all the night. I hope whoever murdered Sir Henry slept less that night than I did, for Kate slumbered peacefully while I lay awake, and I saw dawn arrive through our chamber window before even Kate’s rooster announced the new day. A note slipped under a door, a bodkin, and a bloodstained piece of linen occupied my mind to the exclusion of sleep.

Lord Gilbert’s pantler is an aged valet, grown grey in service first to Lord Gilbert’s father, Lord Richard, then to Lord Gilbert. I approached Humphrey next morning as he unlocked the pantry to prepare for dinner. The wizened fellow bid me “Good-day”, and asked how he might serve me. I showed him the bloody linen and asked if any napery or table cloths in his care had recently gone missing or been found missing a fragment of the same shape and size.

“Nay,” he replied. “Was any of Lord Gilbert’s wares mutilated like that, I’d be sure to know. See to the linen every day. An’ did I miss something like that, the maids in the laundry’d find it an’ tell me straight away.”

“How oft is the linen laundered?”

“Table cloths twice each week. Napkins every day. Portpains whenever needful.”

“So if this bit of linen came from your pantry it would not have been carved from a napkin, else the damage would have been found the same day. When were the table cloths last laundered?”

“Half was done yesterday.”

“And none were found marred?”

“Nay.”

“How many portpains are kept in the pantry?”

“Fourteen.”

“Is more than one needed for a meal?”

“Not generally. But when Lord Gilbert welcomes guests we’ll use more. Since Sir Henry come we need three portpains for dinner an’ three more for supper.”

“And then these are washed?”

“Aye. Six laundered every day since Whitsuntide.”

“Has any of Lord Gilbert’s table linen gone missing?”

“The pantry’s kept locked, an’ only me an’ John Chamberlain’s got keys.”

“But do you count the table linen often, just to be certain ’tis all accounted for?”

“Don’t see the point. The closet’s locked. ’Course, I do a tally every year, when steward comes for hallmote.”

“So the linen has not been counted since January?”

“No need.”

“I’d be obliged if you would count your stock now, whilst I wait.”

Humphrey sighed his displeasure at the unwanted and, to him, unnecessary task, but swung open the heavy door and with a candle to light his way entered the pantry.

I had no desire to crowd behind the valet into the cramped, dark chamber, so waited at the door in the screens passage. I heard Humphrey rummage about in the pantry, then silence. The fellow muttered something to himself, and I heard the audit resume.

A few moments later the pantler joined me in the screens passage, blinking in the light. “Must be one more’n I thought got sent to laundry,” he said.