Mel Starr - The Tainted Coin

Where the narrow path entered Ock Street the crowd thinned, but yet the mud of the street was too trampled for a horseshoe, broken or whole, to be identified. Amice Thatcher was gone, likely now in the hands of men who sought silver and gold, and who thought she knew where it might be had. She did not, or so she had said. Did she speak true to me? If not, would she tell where John Thrale had found his treasure in order to save herself and her children? If she did not know where Thrale found the cache, what would wicked men do to her or her children to force from her that which she could not give?

The sun was low in the west and the evening was chill and threatened rain. There was nothing more to be done this day. I told Arthur we would seek the New Inn and a bowl of pottage, and renew our work next morn.

Sleep did not come readily that night. I thought of what I might have done to safeguard Amice Thatcher. Was not a monastery hospital as secure as any place where she might have found refuge? There was nothing to be gained by questioning now the decision I had made four days past to place Amice in St. John’s Hospital, but I did so anyway, thus forcing sleep from my troubled mind.

I thought also of the coin, and John Thrale’s dying words: “They didn’t get me coin.” Why had he but one coin, and that hid in his mouth? If he had visited his find earlier on his tour of villages and customers, would he not have had more of his treasure with him, hid somewhere on his person or in his cart? Perhaps he did, and his attackers found it. But he said not. And if the felons had discovered his treasure, why did they yet seek it? No, John Thrale had not visited the covert place where ancient coins and jewelry were hid before he was attacked in the forest near St. Andrew’s Chapel.

But if the cache was yet to be visited when Thrale made his rounds, why had he one coin hid in his cheek? The answer to that question drove sleep even farther from me. The chapman had one coin because it was there, in the wood to the east of St. Andrew’s Chapel, that he had found the hoard. If he had already visited the cache, he would have had more loot in his possession. Buried somewhere in that wood was the treasure Amice Thatcher’s captors sought. Perhaps John Thrale had been surprised as he uncovered the hidden wealth, and managed to hide it, but for one coin, before his assailants came upon him. If the treasure was at some place farther along his route, he would have had no coin with him.

I had more questions than answers, and slept little that night for considering these matters over and over again.

Arthur and I left the New Inn early next morn, attended mass at St. Nicholas’s Church, sought the baker so as to break our fast with a loaf, then set out for the crooked lanes of the bury. I had some forlorn hope that Amice Thatcher might have returned to her home, or would do so early this day. If not, she would not know about or resent me entering her house to see if there was anything in it which might tell me of her abduction, if that was truly what occurred when she went off with the men who had slain John Thrale.

The hour was yet early, but the lane before Amice Thatcher’s hut was aswarm with those who lived or labored in that place. It would not do to break down her door, flimsy as it was and easily breached. Inhabitants of such a lane look out for each other, and I saw several sideways glances of suspicion as we stood before Amice’s door.

I rapped my knuckles smartly upon the decaying planks of the door. There was no response, not even from the crone who lived across the way. She was about some work of her own, no doubt, which was good. Busy with her own tasks, she would not see as Arthur and I left the street and sought the rear of Amice’s house.

The passages between Amice’s home and those on either side were narrow. But if she earned a living as an ale wife there must be a toft behind her hut where she had vats and tubs for brewing. And if so, there must be a door opening to the toft from the rear of the dwelling. Such a door would not, I thought, be stronger than the door which opened to the street, so might be more easily forced, with the added advantage that doing so would be unobserved by a neighbor.

The space behind Amice Thatcher’s house was as I expected. The tubs and kettles necessary to her trade were there, and a door did indeed open from the house to this work space. It would be impolite to burst in upon the woman if she was within, so I rapped upon the door as I had earlier at the front of the house. There was, again, no response.

Oddly enough, this rear door was more stoutly constructed than its fellow at the front. Perhaps Amice believed that if some intruder sought uninvited entry he would be more likely to do so from the privacy of the toft than the street, where his deed might be observed. If so she thought, she was correct.

No fences separated Amice’s toft from those of her neighbors. I studied both spaces before turning to Arthur and making known my intent. There was no latch or lock upon this rear door — iron is too dear for such folk. The door was simply barred inside. A thin blade, slipped between door and jamb, might raise the bar and gain us entry. With my dagger, while Arthur kept watch, I hacked away at the doorframe until I could slide the dagger between door and jamb. The bar lifted readily.

Someone had been here before us. Amice Thatcher’s few belongings were strewn about the single room. Even the hearthstone in the middle of the chamber was overturned, and some man had dug up the soil beneath it. Arthur and I stood silently and gazed at the mess. After a moment I walked to the front door and tested it. It opened readily. It was not locked. Either Amice had failed to lock it when she and her children were taken off, or men had come in the night with a key. I chided myself that I had not tried the door the day before.

Little sunlight penetrated the single window of oiled skin, for the day was cloudy and a light drizzle had begun to fall. But there was enough light that the shambles which was Amice Thatcher’s home was plain.

“Didn’t tell ’em where the chapman found ’is coins,” Arthur said.

“Aye. Doesn’t know, or wouldn’t tell, else they would not have overturned this place seeking loot.”

“Did they come in the night, I wonder, or did this happen yesterday?” Arthur swept his hand and his gaze about the ruin.

“We might learn from the old woman who lives across the way. She strikes me as the sort who allows little to escape her notice.”

Arthur grinned agreement, and followed as I pushed through the front door and crossed the narrow lane to the crone’s hut. Vigorous thumping upon the woman’s door brought no response.

In the silence after my pounding Arthur heard something which had escaped me. The gentle mist softened other sounds, so when the old woman groaned a response to my knocking Arthur barely heard her and I heard nothing at all. And at the moment he was unsure of what he had heard.

I saw Arthur raise a finger and frown, then cock his head attentively toward the door.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Dunno… someone in there’s in trouble, I think. Heard a moan, like, just now.”

I tried the latch and the door swung open. If someone was within they had not troubled themselves to bar the door. They had not done so, I soon discovered, because they could not.

Rusty hinges squealed when I pushed the door open. When they quieted I heard from within the house a groan, frantic in nature, as if the soul who voiced it feared she would not be heard or discovered.

The interior of the house was dark, my vision obscured, but when I sought the source of the moaning I saw, propped against a wall, the shape of the old woman who had told me of Amice Thatcher’s departure the day before.