“I will undertake what you wish, Father Abbot,” said Cadfael, “to the best I may.”
He went to Vespers with a burdened heart and a vexed mind, but for all that, he was glad of the Abbot’s charge. It was, in any case, impossible to give up worrying at so tangled a knot, once it had presented itself to his notice, even apart from the natural concern he felt for the girl, and there was no denying that the Benedictine round, dutifully observed, did limit a man’s mobility for a large part of the day.
Meantime, he drove the affairs of Emma Vernold from his thoughts with a struggle that should have earned him credit in heaven, and surrendered himself as best he could to the proper observance of Vespers. And after supper he repaired to the cloister, and was not surprised to find Hugh Beringar there waiting for him. They sat down together in a comer where the evening breeze coiled about them very softly and gratefully, and the view into the garth was all emerald turf and pale grey stone, and azure sky melting into green, through a fretwork of briars blowsy with late, drunken-sweet roses.
“There’s news in your face,” said Cadfael, eyeing his friend warily. “As though we have not had enough for one day!”
“And what will you make of it?” wondered Hugh. “Not an hour ago a lad fishing in Severn hooked a weight of sodden cloth out of the water. All but broke his line, so he let it back in, but was curious enough to play it to shore until he could take it up safely. A fine, full woollen gown, made for a big man, and one with money to spend, too.” He met Cadfael’s bright, alerted eyes, rather matching certainties than questioning. “Yes, what else? We did not trouble Emma with it—who would have the heart! She’s drawing Aline a pattern for an embroidered hem for an infant’s robe, one she got from France. They have their heads together like sisters. No, we fetched Roger Dod to swear to it. It’s Master Thomas’s gown, no question. We’re poling down the banks now after hose and shirt. To any wandering thief that gown was worth a month’s hunting.”
“So no such leech would have thrown it away,” said Cadfael.
“Never!”
“There were also rings taken from his fingers. But rings, I suppose, might be too good to discard, even to prove that this was a murder for hate, not for gain. Rings would sink even if hurled into the Severn. So why hurl them?”
“As usual,” said Hugh, elevating thin black brows, “you’re ahead of me rather than abreast. On the face of it, this was a killing for private malice. So while we examine it, Ivo Corbière very sensibly points out that a murderer so minded would not have stayed to strip the body and put it into the river, but left it lying, and made off as fast as he could. Vengeance, he says rightly, has nothing to feed on in a bundle of clothing. The act is all! And that moved my sheriff to remark that the same thought might well have occurred to the murderer, and caused him to strip his victim naked for that very reason, a hoodwink for the law. Now we drag out of the river the dead man’s gown. And where does that leave you and me, my friend?”
“In two minds, or more,” said Cadfael ruefully. “If the gown never had been found, the notion of common robbery would have held its ground and told in young Corviser’s favour. Is it possible that what was said in the sheriff’s court put that thought into someone’s mind for the first time, and drove him to discard the gown where it was likely to be found? There’s one person it would suit very well to have the case against your prisoner strengthened, and that’s the murderer himself. Supposing yon fool boy is not the murderer, naturally.”
“True, half a case can come to look almost whole by the addition of one more witness. But what a fool your man would be, to toss the gown away for proof the killing was not for robbery, thus turning suspicion back upon Philip Corviser, and then creep aboard the barge and steal, when Philip Corviser is in a cell in the castle, and manifestly out of the reckoning.”
“Ah, but he never supposed the theft would be discovered until the barge was back in Bristol, or well on the way. I tell you, Hugh, I could see no trace of an alien hand anywhere among those stores on deck or the chattels in the cabin, and Emma herself said she would not have missed the lost things until reaching home again. They were bought on this journey, she had no intention of wearing them. Nothing obvious was stolen, she had almost reached the bottom of her chest before she found out these few bits of finery were gone. But for her sharp eye for her own neat housekeeping, she would not have known the boat had been visited.”
“Yet robbery points to two separate villains and two separate crimes,” pointed out Hugh with a wry smile, “as Emma insists on believing. If hate was the force behind the man’s death, why stoop to pilfer from him afterwards? But do you believe the two things are utterly separate? I think not!”
“Strange chances do jostle one another sometimes in this world. Don’t put it clean out of mind, it may still be true. But I cannot choose but believe that it’s the same hand behind both happenings, and the same purpose, and it was neither theft nor hatred, or the death would have ended it.”
“But Cadfael, in heaven’s name, what purpose that demanded a man’s death could get satisfaction afterwards from stealing a pair of gloves, a girdle and a chain?”
Brother Cadfael shook his head helplessly, and had no answer to that, or none that he was yet prepared to give.
“My head spins, Hugh. But I have a black suspicion it may not be over yet. Abbot Radulfus has given me his commission to have an eye to the matter, for the abbey’s sake, and permission to go in and out as I see fit for the purpose. It’s at the back of his mind that if there’s some malignant plot in hand against the Bristol merchant, his niece may not be altogether safe, either. If Aline can keep her at her side, so much the better. But I’ll be keeping a watchful eye on her, too.” He rose, yawning. “Now I must be off to Compline. If I’m to scamp my duties tomorrow, let me at least end today well.”
“Pray for a quiet night,” said Hugh, rising with him, “for we’ve not the men to mount patrols through the dark hours. I’ll take one more turn along the Foregate with my sergeant, as far as the horse-fair, and then I’m for my bed. I saw little enough of it last night!”
The night of the first of August, the opening day of Saint Peter’s Fair, was warm, clear, and quiet enough. Traders along the Foregate kept their stalls open well into the dark hours, the weather being so inviting that plenty of customers were still abroad to chaffer and bargain. The sheriff’s officers withdrew into the town, and even the abbey servants, left to keep the peace if it were threatened, had little work to do. It was past midnight when the last lamps and torches were quenched, and the night’s silence descended upon the horse-fair.
Master Thomas’s barge rocked very softly to the motion of the river. Master Thomas himself lay in a chapel of the abbey, decently shrouded, and in his workshop in the town Martin Bellecote the master-carpenter worked late upon the fine, lead-lined coffin Emma had ordered from him. And in a narrow and dusty cell in the castle, Philip Corviser tossed and turned and nursed his bruises on a thin mattress of straw, and could not sleep for fretting over the memory of Emma’s doubting, pitying face.
The Second Day of the Fair
CHAPTER 1
The second day of the fair dawned brilliantly, a golden sun climbing, faint mist hanging like a floating veil over the river. Roger Dod rose with the dawn, shook Gregory awake, rolled up his brychan, washed in the river, and made a quick meal of bread and small ale before setting off along the Foregate to his master’s booth. All along the highroad traders were clambering out of their cloaks, yawning and stretching, and setting out their goods ready for the day’s business. Roger exchanged greetings with several of them as he passed. Where so many were gathered at close quarters, even a dour and silent man could not help picking up acquaintance with a few of his fellows.
The first glimpse of Master Thomas’s booth, between the busy stirrings of its neighbours, brought a scowl to Roger’s brow and a muttered oath to his tongue, for the wooden walls were still fast closed. Every hatch still sealed, and the sun already climbing! Warin must be fast asleep, inside there. Roger hammered on the front boards, which should by this hour have been lowered trimly on to their trestles, and set out with goods for sale. He got no response from within.