A Holy Vengeance Read online

Nicolaa nodded at his succinct explanation and asked him to hand the blade to her clerk. While the lad was unwrapping the rag that covered it, the castellan turned her pale, slightly protuberant blue eyes on Constance. “So you were with the victim when she was killed?” she asked.

  “I was, lady,” Constance replied. “He tried to stab me, too, but the ravens at the shrine drove him off.”

  “Ravens?” Nicolaa said, her delicate eyebrows drawing into a surprised arch. “You say the assailant was chased away by birds?”

  The reeve interjected and said, “There’s allus been a pair of ravens guarding the shrine, lady, ever since I was a lad and before, so ’tis said. They never leave, not even in winter, and we puts out bits of suet and other scraps for them to feed on if snow comes.”

  “And how did you come into possession of the weapon?” Nicolaa asked Constance.

  “The murderer dropped it when the ravens attacked him,” the perfumer replied, “so I picked it up to defend myself in case he was still in the greenwood while I ran to get help.”

  Nicolaa leaned back in her chair. A strange tale, she thought. It was not beyond the bounds of possibility that the ravens would defend the saint’s shrine. Had not these very same birds stood guard over the huge fortress in London ever since William the Conqueror had built it two centuries before? The same species had also, she remembered, protected the body of St. Vincent of Saragossa from being devoured by wild animals after he had been executed, and had stayed for many decades to keep watch over the shrine on his grave. But these instances, and others, had been witnessed by many people, while the tale she had just been told had been overlooked by only one person, the young woman standing in front of her.

  She took a moment to regard the perfumer. She was handsome rather than pretty, with a wide mouth that held a promise of sensuality and intelligent hazel eyes. Nicolaa recalled that Mistress Turner had, a couple of years previously, been involved in another case of murder when her servant had given information that had helped to catch the man who had cruelly slain a prostitute. Was it coincidence that she was once again peripherally embroiled in another killing, or was her tale a fabrication to cover up her own guilt?

  The castellan, wishing to learn more before she pursued these thoughts, decided she would leave the question for the time being and spoke to her clerk. “Gianni, bring me the knife so that I may examine it.”

  The lad quickly got to his feet, came down from the dais, retrieved the dagger and laid it on the table in front of his mistress. The blade was long and narrow and bore smudged traces of blood, as did the rag in which it had been wrapped. There was a thin rim of grime embedded in the join of the hilt that looked as though it had been there some time. Although sharp and sturdy, it was plainly made and inexpensive, a household or workman’s tool such as would be sold at any of the ironmongers’ stalls in Lincoln. At a nod from his mistress, Gianni carefully turned the weapon over once or twice so that she could see both sides of the blade and hilt. There was nothing remarkable about it.

  Nicolaa thanked him and then looked at Constance. “Tell me how you and your friend came to be at the shrine, what happened when the attack took place and anything else you witnessed that may be of importance.”

  Feeling herself under a vigilant scrutiny from those seemingly innocuous pale blue eyes, and the shadow of doubt that had appeared when she had told how the ravens had saved her, Constance nervously related why Emma had wanted to go to the sanctuary and how it came about that she had accompanied her.

  “Emma had been married two years and not yet become enceinte,” Constance explained, “and because both her father and husband are armourers, she thought that if she prayed to their patron saint he might help her conceive a child.”

  Tears came unbidden to her eyes as she recalled how optimistic her friend had been, but she stifled them as she continued, “Emma and I were friends, and as she had no female relatives and wanted a woman to be with her, she asked me if I would go. Emma lives—lived—with her husband in quarters at her father’s house, next to the armoury, which is just outside the lower end of town on the Witham River, and a far distance to walk to the shrine. To save time, she stayed in my house last night and we left at first light to go to the dell.”

  Constance paused for a moment, collecting her thoughts. Looking straight at Nicolaa, and hoping she would not be disbelieved, she took a deep breath before she went on. “We had just reached the shrine, and Emma had knelt to pray, when a man burst from the trees and plunged that knife into her back. I turned to run, but he seized my arm and I believe he would have killed me too if it hadn’t been for the ravens. Just as he was raising the knife to stab me they flew at him, pecking at his head and face. He dropped the weapon and ran, and they chased him into the woods.”

  “Did you recognise him?” Nicolaa asked.

  Constance shook her head. “He had a hood on his head that was pulled down low, and some sort of wrapping over his chin so I could not see any part of his face except his eyes. They were a dark brown in colour and full of anger.” She shivered in remembrance of the terrifying moment.

  “And his build—was he tall or short, thin or well fleshed?”

  After a moment’s thought, Constance said, “He must have been only of middling height, lady, for he did not tower over me when he grabbed my arm, so was most likely only a handspan taller than myself. As to his girth—it was hard to tell under the cloak, but I would judge he was slender.”

  “Could you see anything of the clothes he was wearing? And if there was anything distinctive about them?”

  Again Constance shook her head. “The mantle he wore was of brown homespun, but the swathe of it covered the whole of his body down to the knees, so it was impossible to see any of his other garments.”

  After a moment’s concentration she added, “I have a hazy recollection, as he ran away, that his legs beneath the cloak were encased in dark hose, and his boots low-slung. But that is only an impression, lady; I was so frightened that my memory could be playing me false.”

  Nicolaa leaned back in her chair and looked over at her clerk. While Constance had been speaking he had been writing down her words on a piece of parchment. “Do you have all of that, Gianni?” she asked. At his confirming nod, she turned back to Constance.

  “Do you know of anyone who has quarrelled with your friend, or has reason to bear her enmity?”

  Constance paused for the space of a heartbeat, recalling her own argument with Emma. But it had no bearing on the murder and she did not mention it. “Not that I am aware of, lady,” she replied, inferring that her pause had been due to reflection on the question. “Emma was a kind soul, friendly to all who knew her. I cannot imagine her doing any harm so great as to make someone want to kill her.”

  But the castellan’s instincts were sharp. Had the perfumer’s hesitation been due to honest consideration of her answer, or had she used the time to craft a lie? She stared at Constance for a short space before continuing. “What about her husband and father? Do you know if anyone has a grudge against either of them?”

  This time, Constance’s response was swift. “I cannot answer that question, lady, for I do not know them well. I have met her father on a few occasions when I went to the armoury with Emma, but her husband I have only spoken to once. The armoury is a smoky, noisy place and Emma preferred to come to my house when we kept company together.”

  Nicolaa pursed her lips in thought for a moment and then turned back to the reeve, intending to dismiss him, but she saw, by the anxious expression on his face, that he had something more he wished to relate and asked if he had anything further to add.

  “Yes, lady, I does,” he said nervously. “When two of the young men from my village were carrying the poor woman’s body back to our compound, a dreadful thing happened.” The reeve hesitated, his countenance drawn with fear.

  “And that was . . . ?” Nicolaa prompt
ed.

  “Lady, an adder—a black one—slithered across the path in front of them and almost tripped them up.”

  Droplets of sweat began to form on Rudd’s brow as he went on, “’Tis well-known that the Devil often comes in the guise of a serpent; I reckon the Evil One is behind this death, either Him or someone who’s doing His bidding.”

  This last was stated with a sidelong glance at Constance and she was shocked to her very bones at the inference. This sighting of the viper near the shrine must have been the reason that the reeve had taken the cart along a different path to return to Lincoln. It also explained why the priest had blessed the wain and the beast that drew it before they left. All of the villagers had believed that Satan was responsible for Emma’s murder, and that she might be his accomplice.

  Nicolaa, however, received the news calmly. “Are you certain the snake was an adder,” she asked the reeve, “and not just one of the common variety that abound in the countryside?”

  “I am, lady,” he insisted. “They said ’twas black as Satan’s heart, such as is never the colour of any ordinary snake I’ve ever see’d.”

  Although the castellan nodded in understanding, she was reluctant to put much credence in the reeve’s tale. Black adders were very rare; they were more usually grey or brown with a zigzag marking on their back. It was far more likely that the men had just stumbled and, in their distressed state of mind, thought they had seen a “serpent” but had seen instead a small branch that had fallen on the track and perhaps moved when it had been dislodged by their passage. But since the reeve, and the other villagers, were taking the matter seriously, she made an attempt to allay their fears.

  “Snakes are foul creatures that are always attracted to places where evil has been done,” she said. “Rest assured that now the corpse has been removed, it will have gone and be seen no more.”

  Rudd was doubtful of her explanation but did his best to hide it. Burton was one of the villages in Lady Nicolaa’s demesne and he had no choice but to accept her opinion. To do otherwise might bring repercussions down on his head.

  Satisfied with his acquiescence, no matter how unwilling, the castellan turned the subject of the conversation in another direction, one that she knew would divert him from his fear.

  “I am grateful for your assistance in this matter, Rudd, and would reward you for your services.” She gestured to her steward, Eudo, to come forward and instructed him to give the reeve six silver pennies from the household coffers as recompense for his trouble.

  Rudd promptly cast his misgivings aside, gave a bob of deference, and smiled as he gratefully followed Eudo away from the dais.

  Once he was gone, the castellan spoke to Constance in a cool voice that held not a vestige of the warmth that had been in her tone when she had spoken to the reeve. “I will make arrangements for your friend’s family to be notified of her death and her body removed to their parish church. As for you, Mistress Turner, I have no more questions for you at this time, but will wish to speak to you again. You, too, may leave, and return to your home, but will hold yourself ready for my summons.”

  A chill of fear struck Constance at the castellan’s pronouncement. But hope resurged as she curtsied and turned away when Nicolaa give instructions to the serjeant, Ernulf, who had been standing nearby throughout the whole of the interview, to send one of his men into town to inform Roget, the captain of the town guard, to attend her immediately. Roget had once been a special friend to Constance and, if she had to withstand more interrogation from Lady Nicolaa about Emma’s death, his presence would greatly sustain her.

  Chapter 3

  Less than an hour later, Roget entered the castle ward. A tall, rangily built man, with powerful shoulders and a confident stance, in his younger years he had been a mercenary in a band of routiers employed by the late King Richard when the monarch went on crusade to the Holy Land. One side of his face was marred by the scar of an old sword slash and his strong white teeth were gapped in places, both remnants of his soldiering, but, nonetheless, he was still possessed of a rough handsomeness. The miscreants of the town feared him, and with good cause; he had a softness for a woman’s pretty face, but none for those, male or female, who broke the law. The copper rings threaded in his tangled black beard jingled as he spotted Ernulf waiting for him and he gave the serjeant a welcoming grin which soon faded when he was told of the reason he had been summoned.

  “A young woman stabbed at a shrine?” he exclaimed. “What kind of chien would do this?”

  “There’s more,” Ernulf informed him reluctantly. “Constance Turner was with the girl when it happened. Was nearly murdered herself, according to the reeve from Burton, who brought her back with him to report the crime.”

  This news distressed Roget even more and he let out an oath. Ernulf was one of the few that knew the captain had once been an admirer of the perfumer, and had become so when he had met her while assisting in the investigation into the murder of a prostitute who had lived next door to Constance. The attraction had lasted for a few weeks, and then, for some reason that had never been explained to the serjeant, or anyone else who had been aware of their friendship, Roget had ceased to keep company with her.

  What the serjeant didn’t know was that although Roget had been enamoured of the winsome perfumer, and she with him, the captain had soon realised that Constance was a respectable woman who would never let a man bed her without marriage, and he had honoured her too much to make any attempt to try to persuade her. Ever since he had been a young boy, Roget had sworn he would never marry, but with Constance, and for the first time in his life, he had been tempted to ask a woman to become his wife. It had been with only the greatest reluctance that he had not done so, and that was not because of his desire to remain unwed, but because he felt unworthy of her. He knew only too well that he was only a rough soldier, one who drank hard and had slept with many women in Lincoln—not only harlots, but also those maids and wives, of which there were quite a few, who found his roguish charm attractive. What had he to offer Constance but a scurrilous reputation, a captain’s small stipend, and an uncertain future? He had never explained to her why he had ceased to visit her, but he still held a great affection for her and had, from a distance, tried to watch over her well-being. And now he had just been told that she had almost been killed. Even though he knew it would have been impossible for him to foresee that she would be attacked out in the greenwood, he cursed himself for his lack of vigilance.

  Crossing the bail with a heavy heart, he went into the keep and entered the hall. At the far end, the castellan was still seated at the table on the dais. In addition to Gianni, an elderly clerk named John Blund, who was Lady Nicolaa’s secretarius, was sitting with her. In his hand was a sheaf of parchment, which he was consulting as he spoke to his mistress.

  “These are all the details I have in the archives about the armourer Robert Ferroner, lady,” Blund was saying as Roget approached the raised platform. “Your memory was correct in that Ferroner has his armoury on a small portion of the strip of land along the Witham riverbank that is part of your demesne. It is situated on the eastward side of High Bridge. According to my file, he has been there many years, and inherited the armoury from his father, John, who taught his son the trade. The fee for his holding is five shillings per annum.”

  Blund laid his sheaf of paper down and added, “Except for a couple of blacksmiths who do not possess his superior skills, he is the only armourer in Lincoln of any repute. His business, therefore, is a prosperous one, and your husband, Sir Gerard, has often availed himself of Ferroner’s services. I have records of purchases going back over quite a number of years for suits of chain mail, and repairs to the same, as well as a supply of swords, helms, maces, spurs and the like for the castle armoury.”

  Roget noticed that the elderly clerk’s hand trembled a little while he was speaking, and his face was very pale. The captain had heard a repo
rt that Blund’s health was failing lately and it now seemed, sadly, that the rumour was true. Blund was making an effort to hold his thin shoulders erect, however, and remained attentive to the mistress he had served for so many years. Nicolaa, too, had noticed the strain in her loyal servant and reached over and patted his hand.

  “Thank you for your assistance, John. Your records are, as ever, impeccable. But I fear you have risen from your sickbed too soon to return to work. You may go and rest now—Gianni can make any further notes that are necessary.”

  “By your leave, lady, I will stay here if you will allow it,” Blund replied. “This is a heinous crime; not only has a young woman been brutally killed, but a shrine has been desecrated, and in case I may be of more assistance to your enquiry into the death, I would rather remain.”

  “You are a stubborn man, John,” Nicolaa responded with a smile, “but out of gratefulness for your long service, I will concede to your wishes.”

  As the elderly secretarius, gratified, leaned back in his chair and took an abstemious sip from the wine cup in front of him, the castellan turned her attention to Roget.

  “Has Ernulf apprised you of the crime that took place this morning?” she asked.

  “He has, lady,” Roget replied. “And as Master Blund has said, it is a crime très terrible.”

  “I wish you to go and inform the victim’s family of what has happened,” Nicolaa said to him. “You know where the armoury is located?” Roget nodded a confirmation and she continued. “The bare facts of the matter are that Ferroner’s daughter, Emma, was visiting the shrine in the company of a friend when she was struck down by an unknown assailant. Her body is now in the castle precincts but as soon as I have confirmation from her father or husband as to which church they attend, I will arrange for her remains to be taken there and prepared for interment. Give them my condolences and inform them that I shall do everything in my power to bring the killer to justice. Also ask them if they know of any person who may have borne enmity towards the dead woman, or anyone else in their family.”