Murder at Broadstowe Manor Read online

  “Since you’ve got no business going, I want you to get Martin’s stuff from those bastards, and his wages,” Peg said, rubbing her drooping eye.

  “All right, Ma,” Ellie said. But she did not move.

  “Now!” Peg commanded.

  Ellie stood up. “What if they don’t give ‘em to me?”

  “Then you don’t leave until that fucker Curthose gives you satisfaction. I want what’s owed. We need it. Things are going to be tight again without what he brought in.”

  “All right, all right!” Ellie waved a hand as she walked away toward Bye Street. “Get off my back!”

  “I’ll show you what it’s like to be on your back!” Peg cried and dashed after Ellie, the knobby stick raised. Peg did not get close, though, because Ellie took off running, beat her to the corner, and passed out of sight.

  Peg came back, twirling her stick.

  She gave Stephen the eye as she returned to the bench. “What you looking at, arsehole?”

  “Nothing,” he said.

  “Then get your arse out of here,” Peg snapped. She leaned back and called over her shoulder. “Ale! I need a fucking ale!”

  People were looking at Stephen now, so he hurried down Grope Lane. The lane met the wall and ran along it out of sight, but it wasn’t hard to spot the fifth house on the right. It had a tavern on the ground floor, but there were stairs just inside the front door leading up to the first floor. Stephen climbed the stairs and rapped on the door.

  He heard a small girl’s voice behind the door, then it opened. A woman’s freckled face showed in the gap.

  “Who is it, Mum?” asked the little girl who was out of sight.

  “What do you want?” the woman demanded.

  “Does Nick the gate ward live here?” Stephen asked.

  “What business is it of yours whether he does or not?”

  “I just wanted to ask a question.”

  “Huh.” The woman looked down the stairs to see if anyone else was there. “Wait a moment.” She shut the door.

  A long time passed before the door opened again. This time a stocky man much shorter and broader than Stephen stood in the gap. He held a long, slim dagger in his stubby fingers. He also looked down the stairs to see if Stephen was alone.

  “You Nick?” Stephen asked.

  “What if I am? What do you want?”

  “Geoffrey Curthose asked me to make an inquiry into the days before his lordship’s death.”

  “You don’t look the sort that Curthose would ask to clean a privy.”

  “He doesn’t want to spend much on it.”

  “No wonder. He’s got to fall back on his little manor now that he’s been discharged.”

  This was news to Stephen but he shrugged as if he already knew it.

  “So what’s this got to do with me?” Nick asked.

  “I’m told you were on the gate when he and Martin came through the night they died.”

  Nick leaned against the door jam and began to pick his fingernails with the tip of the dagger. “I was.”

  “You remember it?”

  “Sure. There wasn’t much to it. They came through. Sir Rogier tipped me well, as he always did, and that was that.”

  “There wasn’t anything unusual? Nothing out of the ordinary?”

  “They did have another fellow with them, but that wasn’t unusual either.”

  “Did you know this fellow?”

  Nick shook his head, frowning at the effort to remember. “No, can’t say that I got a look at him. He had his hood up.”

  “Just the one fellow?”

  “Just the one. I figured he was another of the boys FitzHerbert was always bringing home. They come through after dark so they wouldn’t be noticed. That’s why he tipped so well — he was more decent than most, but I’m sure it was so that I’d keep me lips shut. Now that he’s dead, I guess it doesn’t matter so much. It wasn’t a great secret what kind of man he was. And now with the hanging, everybody knows.”

  “FitzHerbert was in the habit of bringing other boys to his house? Even though he had Martin?”

  “Yeah, he liked his threesome.”

  “Squinty Peg, would that be Martin’s mum?”

  “She is, or was.” Nick scratched an itch in his privates. “You know, come to think if it, I’ve always wondered why Martin took up with FitzHerbert. He wasn’t one of those as far as I know. He loved his turn with the girls hereabout. He was a strutter, you know. Always preening for the girls to get a piece of arse. I wonder if Peg didn’t put him up to it somehow.”

  “Grope Lane doesn’t seem like a place FitzHerbert would have visited.”

  “Nah, a swell like him wouldn’t be caught dead here, although we get our share of nobs looking for some cheap and nasty fun. There are places down by the water that cater to FitzHerbert’s kind.”

  “How would someone like FitzHerbert manage it? Finding his boys, I mean.”

  “There’s a bath house down by the Wye Bridge in the lower town where the upper crust like to gather. A lot of hanky panky goes on in those taverns, all very quiet, you know.”

  “You wouldn’t happen to know the name of the place FitzHerbert frequented, would you?”

  “The Peacock.” Nick chuckled. “Good name for it, don’t you think?”

  Getting to the Wye Bridge meant crossing the town and running the risk that he’d be recognized. Stephen had begun to get over his fright that he would be identified, but then he thought of a way to get where he needed to go without cutting through the town and running a risk that might be unnecessary.

  He walked down Grope Lane toward the wall. The street ran along the base of the wall for a short distance and dead-ended at Hungreye Street at Saint Owen’s Gate. Stephen passed through the gate, dodging a herd of goats tethered together with rope that the gate wards were counting so they could assess the appropriate toll. They were too busy with this to notice him.

  Beyond the gate, Saint Owen’s Church occupied the middle of the street, and sat at a fork where Saint Owen Street ran westward, the King’s Greenway headed southeast, and a path skirted the edge of a water-filled moat beneath the castle’s east wall. Stephen took the path.

  He passed an apple and cherry orchard on the left that belonged to the King, and soon came upon the river. A mill’s wheel creaked slowly with the current of the stream running through the moat.

  A miller’s helper was visible within the mill pouring a sack of grain into a leather funnel at the top of the grind stones. Stephen and the helper exchanged waves, then Stephen turned down the path along the top of the riverbank away from the city.

  About a hundred yards down river from the mill, there was a ford, one of two that had given the city its name. This one was seldom used these days, although it was plainly visible from the high bank: ripples in the surface as the Wye flowed over the rocky bed.

  Stephen waded into the river, soaking only his stockings up to the knees.

  He was soon on the other bank, where the ford delivered him to a rocky beach on the south side of the river.

  He walked along the edge of the river to the lower town’s embankment and wooden palisade. Then he clambered up the steep riverbank, fifteen feet high if it was an inch. Entering the lower town was as simple as this.

  There were no wardens upon the wall, though Stephen watched to make sure. But there was danger enough, because the eastern part of the lower town was given over to pasture and orchards belonging to the bishop. It was a severe crime to trespass upon them. Even though the bishop had been imprisoned by Montfort’s supporters, there had to be someone looking after his honor’s rights. However, a path ran north along the bank. People were given leave to use this path for fishing and for the hauling of barges along the river. As long as you stayed on the path you should be safe. But stray a step and you would be arrested and fined by reeves on the lookout for that very thing.

  It was a good five-hundred yards from the castle ford to the Wye Bridge, a pleasant walk wi
th the river and city to the right presenting an attractive panorama, particularly when the bishop’s lush gardens and the cathedral behind them came into view, and on the left broad orchards and pasture where sheep grazed. He spotted a boy keeping watch over the herd from the top of a hayrick.

  He reached the bishop’s ford, which crossed the river at the cathedral and was unused by anyone now there was a fine wooden bridge just upstream. It served these days as an obstacle to heavily laden boats and barges carrying commerce up the Wye from the River Severn. Indeed, a crew was up to their knees in the river manhandling a boat over the sandbar at the ford as Stephen passed the town wharf, where more than two dozen boats were tied up at the bottom of the shear bank.

  The public warehouse for storing goods was here, and north and east of Saint Martin’s Church were the taverns and inns that catered to the boatmen. No sense in looking here.

  The more high-toned establishments lined Saint Martin’s Street. Stephen walked up and down that short street, and saw no sign indicating a tavern called the Peacock.

  Bathhouses, however, usually sat near water since it was so hard to carry, and at the Wye Bridge a narrow alley lane led away to the west along the bank. Stephen found the Peacock there, last in the lane, hard against the river, tucked away out of view. It, like its customers, were the objects of official condemnation, but in practice, people looked the other way and pretended not to know as long such persons exercised discretion, and the tavern paid the sum due the alderman every month.

  It was a large house and well-kept on the outside, the timbers painted a fresh, dignified black and the plaster between them a shining white with no sign of rot or mold; no fancy colors so as not to draw anyone’s attention. Obviously, money was spent here, but that did not seem unusual. Hereford was a large town, and people would come here from far and wide for the chance to find safety behind the Peacock’s doors to drop their masks among people who would not eye them with suspicion and contempt.

  Stephen lifted the latch and entered. The tavern’s hall was like that of any other tavern or bathhouse: a chamber with six tables and benches with a fireplace at the back. Doors opened on either side of the fireplace and a stair climbed to the upper floors over one of the doors.

  Three fellows were drinking at one of the tables. They seemed like ordinary fellows, no different from what you’d find in any tavern, well-to-do burghers or minor gentry. They all looked at Stephen, and then away, resuming a low conversation.

  A serving girl who had been hovering over the table crossed the room to Stephen. “What do you want?”

  The tone suggested that he was not welcome here; his clothes were shabby compared to those by the fireplace.

  “I’d like to speak to the steward,” Stephen said.

  “We don’t need no one here,” the girl said. “We’re full up.”

  “I’m not looking for work,” Stephen said. “I just have a few questions.”

  “Questions about what? We don’t allow no questions. Be gone.”

  A fellow with a round pot belly secured by a dirty apron came out one of the doors by the fireplace. “What’s going on, Mazzie? Trouble?”

  “This lout has questions,” the serving girl said.

  “Off with you,” pot belly said. “Or I’ll break your head.” He removed a truncheon from the small of his back and smacked it in a palm.

  “Are you the steward?” Stephen asked.

  “I am, if it’s any business of yours. Now get out.” Pot Belly took a menacing step forward.

  Stephen retreated a step to give himself room to defend if needed. “I have been asked by Sir Geoffrey Curthose to help in his inquiry into Lord Rogier’s death.”

  “He depends on you?” Potbelly said with disbelief. “A clod kicker?”

  “I am only one of several Sir Geoffrey has sent about for that purpose.”

  “Why are you doing this? Curthose don’t work for the honor no more. The widow discharged him first thing. The word is he was stealing goods and money from his lordship’s manors.”

  “He still has an interest. He was his lordship’s friend. He doesn’t believe his lordship committed murder and killed himself. He is determined that his lordship should have a Christian burial on hallowed ground.”

  Potbelly frowned. “Well, he deserves that.”

  “You knew Sir Rogier?”

  Potbelly hesitated. “He was our landlord. He owns this lane and the west side of Saint Martin’s Street. A right decent man. Always ready with a kind word and a care. Not the sort of man I’d ever expect to commit murder and then suicide. He was always cheery like, you know?”

  “You’ve had speech with him, then.”

  Potbelly cocked an eyebrow. “Once or twice,” he said noncommittally.

  “When was he in here last?”

  “Oh, he never came here. He always patronized the Cauldron next door.”

  “The Cauldron?” Stephen asked, puzzled. Then he remembered the sign over the door of the neighboring house, a red cauldron tipping on the side with blue water pouring out.

  “Our competition, so to speak.”

  “Another bathhouse?”

  “My, you are quick. No wonder Sir Geoffrey employs you.”

  “I see. And the Cauldron, does it …?”

  “It caters to the ordinary sort. Not our clientele. We’re special. You’re not from around here, are you.”

  “No.”

  “Where you from, then?”

  “Nowhere. Up north.”

  “Where up north?”

  “Chester.”

  “You don’t sound like Chester born. You sound right Herefordshire or I’m a flea.”

  “Raised in Shrewsbury.”

  “Huh. And you’re here for Curthose?”

  “That’s right.”

  Potbelly considered these things silently for a few moments, his rather piggish face screwed up at the effort that this cost. “Come out back with me.”

  Potbelly led Stephen through the left doorway by the fireplace down a long corridor. Chambers with tubs in them lined both sides of the corridor, visible when the curtains across the doorways were not drawn.

  They came out the back door to a path on the top of the embankment that sloped precipitously to the green river.

  “I did not get your name,” Stephen said.

  “Quentin. You’re not a clod-kicker. Who are you?”

  “Let’s leave that for now. This is intended to be a discrete inquiry. What do you have to add?”

  “Curthose thinks that his lordship didn’t kill himself?”

  “There is good reason to think that he didn’t.”

  “What do you need to know?”

  “Sir Rogier was seen leaving through Wydemarsh Gate during the evening that he died, four days ago now. He was with the boy Martin, and one other. My informant did not get a look at the third fellow’s face. I need to know who he was.”

  “More likely a she.”

  “A she?” This took Stephen aback. It was not what he had expected.

  Quentin sighed. “Let me tell you how it worked. His lordship has a private chamber in the Cauldron. Martin comes over and selects one of our guests to tarry with Sir Rogier. They come out the door,” he gestured to the door they had just exited, “and cross over to the Cauldron.” Quentin pointed to the path that ran along the lip of the bank. “His lordship’s chamber is in the back on the left. It’s easy to go in and out without attracting notice, and since his lordship owns a share in both the Cauldron and the Peacock we didn’t ask no questions.”

  “You said this person was a woman.”

  “Yeah. Never seen her before a week ago. She showed up with a troupe of players. They entertained at the castle and then at the market. For some reason, she and two of the boys from the troupe hung out here for a few days.”

  “But I thought Sir Rogier was inclined to men.”

  “He was. He liked to give Martin presents. Martin said he enjoyed watching. He was right sweet o
n Martin. I warned him that any spawn of Squinty Peg’s couldn’t be trusted, but he was smitten. Deeply smitten. In love, perhaps. Martin was a charmer.”

  “And Martin went both ways.”

  “Well, I think he went more one way than the other, and the other was for the money. That rat would do anything for money, like the rest of the brood.”

  “It seems you didn’t like him.”

  “I don’t like any of Squinty Peg’s brood. Greedy to the bone and utterly without conscience, the lot of them. And there are lot of them.”

  “What was this woman’s name?”

  “Mary. At least, that’s the name she gave out.”

  “What does she look like?”

  “She’s a tiny thing. Red hair, freckles. Quite pretty. Limber as an eel. She went up to the roof and walked a handstand along the peak on a bet.”

  “And after she went off with FitzHerbert and Martin, you never saw her again?”

  “Not a sign.”

  Chapter 9

  Quentin returned to the Peacock.

  Stephen stared for many moments at the translucent green water of the Wye flowing lazily beneath his feet, long water plants stirring in the current like banners. He tried to make sense of what Quentin had told him, to fit it into a pattern that explained the deaths of FitzHerbert and Martin. But try as he could, he was unable to see how a slender girl could have killed them.

  Unless those two boys helped somehow. They could have followed this Mary as she walked with FitzHerbert and Martin to the lord’s house, and she could somehow have seen they got into it. Or they could have killed the two along the road and carried them into the house. Or killed them on the doorstep. They would have had to kill FitzHerbert to get the key around his neck. Or would they? He felt like he was running in circles.