Iris Collier - Day of Wrath

‘My under-steward, Giles Yelman. You probably don’t know him; small, insignificant, a bit shifty. Makes himself useful, so I can’t complain. Now I’ve heard a report that he’s been seen up at Mortimer’s place. I had a go at him this morning, but he swears he’s never been there. Now what do you make of that?’

‘Who’s your informant?’

‘Jane. Jane Warrener.’

‘Mistress Warrener? Now I can’t see her telling lies. She’s a bright lass. Sharp tongue, mind. She’ll have to control that or else she’ll turn into a right shrew. I pity the man who marries her.’

‘That’s as may be. Now she told me that Giles has been visiting Mortimer’s house. Now why should he do that? And why should he deny it?’

‘I suppose he’s every right to go to Mortimer’s place.’

‘Not without my permission, he hasn’t. Apparently he was there the day Matthew died. I don’t like it, Landstock. There’s more to Matthew’s murder than a chance encounter with thieves.’

‘Now you’re back with your conspiracy theory again. I hope you’re not going to accuse Sir Roger of treachery. Mind you, I find him a surly bugger. Nice wife though, and three nice children. He wouldn’t want to see them come to any harm, would he? What are you implying, Lord Nicholas? That Sir Roger told Giles Yelman to bump off your steward? Doesn’t sound likely, does it?’

‘Yelman’s no murderer. But he could have let the murderers into my manor house.’

‘On whose orders? Mortimer’s? Come off it, Lord Nicholas, I don’t expect Mortimer even knows what Giles Yelman looks like. In any case, why should Mortimer want to get rid of your steward?’

‘Matthew was friends with Bess Knowles. The two of them could have overheard something.’

‘And Mortimer wanted him silenced? Sounds a bit farfetched.’

‘Depends what Matthew overheard.’

Landstock looked keenly at Nicholas, his eyes suddenly alert. ‘Well, I suppose we ought to take a closer look at Master Yelman. You say you’ve spoken to him?’

‘I cross-examined him this morning, but got nowhere. He denied going over to Mortimer’s place.’

‘Then let me have a go at him. Hold on to him tonight, and I’ll come over to your place tomorrow after the funeral. As you say, someone’s lying; and I don’t think Mistress Warrener’s the lying type. Incidentally, how is Bess? I’m very fond of her.’

‘She’s taken Matthew’s death very badly. They were going to be wed, you know.’

‘So I heard. It’s hard on the lass. It would have been a good match. She’s got no dowry, but she’s a good-looker and has the support of Lady Mortimer. Hayward had a good position in your household. Now she’ll have to look elsewhere.’

‘Has she no family to go to?’

‘None that I know of. They say she’s old St John Pearce’s daughter by one of his servants. He and his wife brought her up with their only daughter, Lady Margot, and she brought her to Mortimer’s place when she married him; God knows why! Bess was lucky. Not many ladies of the manor look after their husband’s bastards. My wife wouldn’t, that’s for sure. She’d throw me out as quick as greased lightning. Not that I own a manor, nor ever likely to. But then the St John Pearces are the sort who close ranks.’

Nicholas left the Sheriff’s house and rode the four miles back to Dean Peverell. The road was a good one, running straight as an arrow along the edge of the Downs towards London. Built by the Romans and designed to last.

He arrived at his house and a groom took Harry away. Then he shouted for Giles Yelman and his bailiff, Geoffrey Lowe, came running out, looking more worried than usual.

‘He’s gone, my Lord. We can’t find him anywhere.’

‘Hell’s teeth, I should have anticipated this. Damn! Damn! Get a search party going, Geoffrey, and be quick about it. And for God’s sake, when you’ve got him, don’t let him go.’

‘ Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine. ’ The sonorous chanting of the monks sounded like a choir of angels bringing Matthew home to rest. Nicholas, sitting in his place of honour at the bottom of the sanctuary steps in the parish church, looked through the open doors, one on either side of the altar, to where the black-robed figures, their hoods pulled down over their faces, sat facing each other in their choir, and he thought how privileged he was to be the patron of this Priory church. He remembered how seriously his father had carried out his responsibilities, how he’d looked after the monks, and given the parishioners of Dean Peverell a new roof to their church with a vaulted ceiling so that they could worship in a building that was not only spacious, but dry in wet weather.

And then Nicholas wondered what would happen to the monks if the King ordered them to leave. Some of them, like Father John for instance, had spent their entire lives here. How long would he survive if he had to rely on people’s charity? He didn’t deserve to die like a stray dog in the bottom of a ditch. The image was an uncomfortable one, and Nicholas knew that he couldn’t let that happen; he had to do something. If he couldn’t stop the King, then at least he could look after the monks.

At the top of the sanctuary steps, Matthew’s body, wrapped tightly in its woollen shroud, rested on a bier, behind which stood the diminutive figure of the Vicar, Alfred Hobbes. Usually dressed in a threadbare cassock, today he was wearing the cope that Nicholas’s mother had given him. It was made of black velvet and she had embroidered with her own hands the elaborately entwined flowers which decorated it, using expensive gold and silver thread which she’d ordered from a London haberdasher’s. Today, Hobbes’s face was glowing with the satisfaction of knowing that this was his church, his service, and that the monks were confined to their own part of the church behind the screen that separated them from the parishioners, and that, for once, the Prior was no longer centre stage. He needed the monks’ voices, though. Matthew couldn’t be laid to rest without the appropriate chanting of the requiem Mass.

Nicholas raised his eyes from the figure on the bier and looked round. People were pouring in and soon there would be standing room only. Matthew had been popular and friends and relations were coming from Marchester and neighbouring villages; some had arrived before dawn bringing their bundles of food with them. They were perched on benches along the side of the nave like a row of roosters determined not to be removed from their perches.

Sheriff Landstock came in, nodded to Nicholas, and sat down on one of the benches which the verger had placed at the front of the church for the use of the gentry. Then Guy Warrener pushed his way to the front, and pointed to a place just behind Nicholas, where the verger set down his bench. Nicholas smiled a greeting and was treated to a scowl in return. Guy Warrener’s large, flat face was crisscrossed with lines of disapproval and he rarely smiled. However, his face softened when Jane came to sit next to him. She looked cool and elegant that morning. She was wearing a grey dress of some soft material with lace at her throat and encircling her cuffs; her hair was covered by a fashionable, square-shaped cap, fringed with starched white lace, that framed her face to perfection. Master Holbein ought to see her now, Nicholas thought, and paint her just as she was, sitting on a rough bench next to her father in a country church; and he’d be the first person to buy the picture. She smiled at Nicholas and he forgot the solemn chanting of the monks and heard only the chorus of the song birds outside in the churchyard, filling the brilliant May morning with their joyful hymns to the spring.