Maureen Ash: The Alehouse Murders

Jennet wasn’t too sure if this was true or not, about the Templar being sent by Nicolaa de la Haye, but she had heard a man-at-arms from the castle telling the Haye serjeant that Lady Nicolaa would be waiting for their report in her own chambers so there was a good chance that the castellan had sent them. Whether it was so or not, Jennet wanted to scare her sister into doing as she was told, and Sheriff Camville was enough of a devil to scare anyone.

“Oh, Jennet,” Agnes wailed, “what am I going to do?”

“Tomorrow we’ll ask Father Anselm to tell the Templar you want to see him, and then you’re going to repeat what you told me. I’ll go with you,” she added, seeing the distraught look on her sister’s face. “The sooner the task is done, the sooner you’ll be easy.” She looked down sternly at her sister. “There isn’t anything else you’re not telling me, is there?”

Agnes shook her head and swore that there wasn’t. Jennet was not confident that her sister was telling the truth, but she decided not to press the matter because Agnes truly did look as though she might swoon from the torment of emotions that her ordeal had caused. Later, when Agnes had rested, Jennet would question her again. She was sure there was something her sister was hiding.

Finally allowing the compassion she felt to come to the surface, Jennet took her sister by the arm and led her up a flight of narrow stairs to a bedchamber above. “You lie down on our pallet and sleep now, Agnes. I’ll come up later and fetch you a bit of food for your dinner.”

Willingly letting her sister take charge, Agnes crawled under the thin cover and closed her eyes. She didn’t know what she would have done if she hadn’t been able to come to Jennet.

Once Jennet heard her sister’s breathing begin to grow slow and regular, she left her. There was more to this coil than could be seen, she was sure of that. Just as she was also sure that Agnes could be blamed in some way, if not for the actual killing, then for having a helping hand in it. She hadn’t suggested that to her sister, for it would scare her even more than she already was and, besides, Jennet was sure that Agnes was innocent. She was a trial sometimes, and could be unexpectedly stubborn, but she would never hurt anyone. Why, if she had been that kind she would have fought back at Wat when he hit her. She had enough strength to lift a cask of ale, she could have defended herself. But even when she was being beaten she had never tried to hurt the one who was doing it to her.

Of one thing Jennet was sure, and that was that she didn’t really want her sister to be taken in for questioning by the sheriff’s men. Gerard Camville was a brutal man, and crimes committed by anyone other than himself were harshly punished. And he would be looking for a solution to this murder. It would be bad for custom in the town to have an unknown murderer on the loose and he was fond of his silver, was the sheriff. Just let him see a drop in the tolls and taxes the fair would bring and he would be angry, angry with that cold fury he was capable of-and would look for someone to blame it on. No, she had to get Agnes to tell what she knew and preferably to someone not directly connected to Camville. If she had put the right interpretation on what she had overheard, then the Templar was Lady Nicolaa’s knight, not Camville’s, and it would be much better for Agnes to be under the jurisdiction of the castellan rather than the sheriff. Lady Nicolaa was stern, but she was fair, unlike her husband. Yes, Jennet decided, she would take Agnes to the Templar. Besides, he was a monk, God’s own man, and despite her remarks to Agnes about clerics, she did believe that some of them were good, especially one who had risked his life in the service of Christ amongst the heathens. Muttering a prayer beneath her breath she asked for God’s help and that her instinct about the Templar prove true. She had always tried to protect her sister and often failed; she implored God for assistance in safeguarding Agnes now.

After he and Ernulf had made their report to Nicolaa de la Haye, Bascot left the keep, motioning for Gianni to follow him. Outside, the bailey of the castle was a mass of moving men and animals as visitors arrived for the fair and castle servants rushed about unloading baggage and arranging for it to be stored. Along the perimeter of the castle walls outbuildings were packed close together-smithy, granary, the garrison sleeping quarters and stables, and space allotted for use to the carpenters, fletchers and coopers. There were also pens for sheep and swine, an area for poultry and, at the far north side, walled in for protection against a stray four-footed intruder, Lady Nicolaa’s herb garden. Adjacent to the garden were the mews where the castle hawks were kept.

Bascot and Gianni threaded their way through the crowd, making for the tall tower of the old keep, and Bascot’s room at the top. The Templar knew it was a rare privilege, and in deference to his standing as a member of the Order, that he had been given a private chamber, for the majority of Haye retainers made up their pallets on the floor of the great hall. Although he was grateful for the privacy, the room was almost at the top of the narrow tower, and he cursed his aching ankle as he climbed the circular stairway to the third storey. Once inside, he sank down gratefully onto the shelf that held his pallet and told Gianni to pour them ale from a leather flagon standing in the corner. Reaching into a bundle by the bed, Bascot brought out a small leather sack. In it was a supply of the lumps of boiled sugar that were sent to England from Templar property in the Holy Land, made from sweet canes that grew in the fields near Acre. The Arabs called them al-Kandiq, but in England they were known simply as candi, and were one of the items the Templars used in trade to raise funds for the upkeep of their Order. Bascot was very fond of them, even though they made his teeth ache if he ate too many. He tossed one to Gianni and watched the boy’s delighted expression as he popped it into his mouth and let it roll on his tongue.

Bascot sipped his ale and sucked the candi thoughtfully, his mind on the meeting from which he had just come. Lady Nicolaa’s husband, Gerard Camville, had been present, just returned from a morning’s hunt. Bascot was reserved in his opinion of the sheriff. Ostensibly the Templar was a guest in the retinue of his wife, for it had been to her that his introductions had been directed when he had arrived last year, but Camville was her husband and, as such, was lord over both her and her offices and possessions. The sheriff was an impressive man, massive with thick black hair cut high on the nape of his neck in the old Norman fashion and a heavy jaw that he kept clean shaven. He seemed as broad as he was tall, with thick shoulders and thighs that swelled beneath the rust-coloured jerkin and hose that he wore. But his unpredictability disturbed Bascot, for his moods were as restless as his body seemed to be. All the time Bascot and Ernulf had been giving a report of their findings at the alehouse, the sheriff had prowled back and forth in front of them and behind. It was as though he found the walls of the private chamber in which they were holding the meeting too small to contain his wide frame.

When the tale had been finished, Gerard had muttered an oath and said, “And tonight we can expect a deputation from the town officials, come to complain about a murderer being loose, spurred on by their wives and daughters. Every female in Lincoln will be seeing a bloody fiend behind her bed curtains, or lingering malevolently near her privy. Damn the deed, and him who did it! My men are stretched as far as they can be at the moment, protecting visiting merchants from outlaws on the road and from thieves in the town. I cannot spare any to go hunting this miscreant.”