A Mortal Bane (13 page)

Chapter Six

21 April 1139

Old Priory Guesthouse

Magdalene was a little disturbed when Sir Bellamy hardly reacted to the sight of her women, all sitting together near the fire. Letice and Ella were embroidering. Sabina had apparently been singing; her lute was in her lap, her fingers still in position upon it, but she must have stopped as soon as she heard the snick of the latch. Magdalene had hoped that so much beauty of all different types would distract him from her. Not that she planned to allow him access to any of the women without the normal fee—that would be tantamount to admitting they had something to hide—but she would have been more comfortable if he showed more interest and desire.

Ella jumped up as soon as they were in sight, laying aside her embroidery. She did not mind the work and did it reasonably well, if not with the exquisite skill Magdalene had, but she loved her other work much more.

“Have you brought a new friend?” she asked eagerly. “He is very pretty. My name is Ella. I am pretty, too.”

Magdalene heard a faint, strangled sound from Sir Bellamy, but did not turn to look at him. “Go back to your seat, love,” she said to Ella as the girl started forward. “Sir Bellamy is, indeed, a friend, but he has not come here to lie with any of us. He is on the business of the Bishop of Winchester.”

Ella blinked, and her pretty mouth drooped with disappointment, but she obediently went back to her stool and picked up the embroidery. “Does that mean he can
never
come to bed? Surely when his business is done—”

“Hush, love,” Magdalene said, smiling. One could not help smiling at Ella’s dedication. “That is for Sir Bellamy to decide, and you know we do not urge our friends one way or the other. But I wish to make known to him Letice and Sabina now, so work and be quiet.” She turned to him. “Sir Bellamy, the small, dark woman is Letice; she is mute and cannot greet you. And the woman with the lute is Sabina. Please speak so she will know where to direct her conversation; she is, as I mentioned to you, blind.”

“Blind, mute, and….” Bell swallowed and did not finish his sentence because Ella was looking at him with bright interest and he could not call her an idiot to her face. He turned abruptly to Magdalene. “Why?” he asked. “Do you collect discards?”

“Do my women look like discards?” she snapped angrily. “Each one of them is beautiful, clean, skilled at her work. Discards indeed! I searched long and hard before I found my women.”

That was not really true. Ella had been cast out of a house, bruised and bloody, and had fallen almost at Magdalene’s feet. She was weeping hysterically, totally unable to understand why she had been so treated, repeating over and over that she had done her work well and carefully, that she had not broken anything or stolen anything. Only after she had got the girl home and clean and calmed did Magdalene learn that Ella had been in both the father’s and the son’s beds in that house, that she had thought that the greatest fun, was always eager to return, and never once asked to be compensated. It was, of course, the women of the household who had mistreated her and driven her out.

Letice and Sabina had been chosen more deliberately. Letice had come herself, having heard of Magdalene’s house through the rumor that flew among such places. Because she was mute, the whoremaster for whom she worked had used her for what she knew was dangerous and dishonest work—like placing genuine seals on false documents. Letice did not mind the dishonesty; she was only fearful that she would be thrown to the wolves when the true guilty parties were suspected. Still, she had been resigned until the whoremaster decided she could be given to men who enjoyed hurting women because she could not scream. Then she had fled.

Sabina had been sold to Magdalene by another whoremistress, who complained that she was altogether too popular because her clients were forever leaving without paying. Since she could not name them nor point them out without touching them, it was almost impossible for the whoremistress to wrench the money out of them. That was unimportant to Magdalene, who collected the fee before the client joined his woman or, from many clients, received a weekly or monthly stipend that permitted reasonable access by appointment.

“Apurpose?” Sir Bellamy asked. “You chose them apurpose?”

“You may be certain I did, and also my cook, who is deaf.” She smiled at him. “Have you never heard the tale of ‘hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil’? This is a safe house. Safe. I told you my clients pay very well to be assured that their possessions, their affairs, and their persons will be secret and inviolate. They feel more at ease with women who cannot speak to identify them, cannot see to describe them, and cannot remember when, where, or who. They can say what they like, do what they like—so long as they do no damage to their partners—and feel that no one will be the wiser.”

She then laughed aloud. “It is not true, of course. Letice can make herself understood when she wishes; Sabina can see a great deal with her ears and fingers. Ella….”

He burst out laughing. “But you see and hear all—”

“Not what goes on in bed, I assure you. And that is where a man likes to feel perfectly free. In the outer chamber, he wears what armor he likes and no one tries to see what is beneath it. Also, most of my clients know me of old and know I will not betray a secret.”

He stood shaking his head for a moment, then said, “I hope they realize they must tell
me
the truth.”

“I did,” Ella said. “I told all the truth, and that cruel man hit me with his staff. Will you hit me if you do not like my answers? They were the truth. They were.”

“Certainly not,” Bell said. “You see I have no staff, so I could not strike you with it.”

“You have a sword.”

“Only a madman would strike you with a sword for no reason. I will not, I promise.”

Magdalene heard the faint note of impatience in his voice and said, “I think you will accomplish more and feel more comfortable if you question each of my women privately. We have an empty room to which you can take a bench and a stool. I can provide a small table if that will be of help.”

“Thank you, that will do very well.”

“Shall I ask the women each to go to her own room so that you need not be concerned lest we decide among us what to say?”

He looked at her and smiled slowly, guessing she was making the point because he had not sent her home alone from the priory. In fact, he was amused now to think he had suspected they would concoct answers. They had had a full night and day to do so already. The truth was, he had wanted to walk with her and made a stupid excuse to himself. But he was not about to admit that and spoke his first thought.

“If that had been your intention,” he said, “you would have decided among you long since.”

She looked surprised. “That is true, but you do not seem sure of it. We
are
innocent. To kill a client of this house would be insane. No matter how much money he was carrying, we would lose more in the long run by having our other clients lose confidence in us.”

“Except that this man was a stranger. You indicated to me that you had guessed he came from Italy and that no one knew he was coming to your house. If he disappeared, who would know? If he died on the church porch, who would associate him with you? You could take all that he had—”

“Ridiculous.” Magdalene laughed. “This house was the first place the monks thought of. Do you think we are unaware of how they feel? And why should we take such a chance? Would it not be more sensible to have drugged him, then smothered him and dumped him in the river? We may be sinners, but we are not fools.”

“What are you saying?” Ella looked up and her eyes were round as saucers. “Did someone fall in the river?”

“No, love. We were talking about dumping offal in the river. You know that Dulcie sometimes does that.”

“Does she? No, I did not know. I would never go with her to the river. My mother taught me that, never to go near the river and never to touch a knife.”

“Never to touch a knife, Ella?” Bell said. “How do you eat, then?”

“With my fingers, like everyone else who has any sense. I lick them clean and wash my hands after.” She shuddered. “I could not put a knife in my mouth. I have to look away when friends do it.”

“Letice cuts up her food,” Magdalene said, shook her head slightly, and turned away. “If that bench near the hearth on the east wall and the stool by the window will suit you, take them.”

Bell picked up the bench and stool and followed her down the corridor to the last room on the right. He had been a little suspicious at first when Magdalene suggested he question the women separately in private, but by now he was reasonably sure it was not to hide anything from him but from Ella, who caught bits and pieces of the talk, did not understand it, and was easily frightened.

It looked less and less likely that these women had had any part in Baldassare’s death. The mute was simply too small. Had she used the knife, it would have gone in at a completely different angle. There was a small possibility that the blind woman could have killed him by accident, but the cut would not have been so clean if she had been flailing around. Ella? He shook his head. He tended to believe in her fear of knives; she was plainly several bushels lacking of a full load of corn.

Magdalene could have done it; she was tall enough and strong enough—and he suspected there had been an accusation of murder in her past—but she was the least likely to act out of rage or fear. And if those were not the cause, she had made a telling point about the killing. It would have been infinitely easier for them to drug Baldassare’s wine and dispose of him without a drop of blood being shed and, considering how close they were to the river, without much chance of the body’s being found anywhere near them. That was more a woman’s way, too, than using a knife.

Magdalene opened the door and stepped in. Bell stopped in the doorway, surprised by the chamber. The walls were smoothly plastered, which was pleasant though not unusual, but the size of the room was. It was nearly six long paces wide, four paces deep, and well lit by three small windows right under the ceiling.

“This was a priory guesthouse chamber?” he asked, setting the bench and stool down.

Magdalene laughed. “No, the sisters were not at all given to comforts of the flesh. This was
three
guesthouse cells, as you can see by the three windows. Each cell was just wide enough for a cot for a night’s lodging.”

“Could you not make more profit by having more women?”

“This is not a common stew,” Magdalene said coldly. “And no, I could not make more profit, because no man would pay my price for a filthy cell and a filthy slut. I have told you over and over why I am desperate to find Messer Baldassare’s killer. I sell pleasure in comfort and security.”

Bell suddenly turned and stared at her, alerted to a fact he had missed the pride in her voice. He realized that because he had met her in the bishop’s presence, he had failed to be surprised as he should have been by her speech and manner. This woman was not common-born. A whore she might be now, but she had been born a lady.

“Besides,” she was continuing, “when I came here, the house was in great disorder—” She shuddered. “There was old blood on the walls, and the vermin…. There are always fleas and lice, but these were so thick they walked about on each other in layers out in the open. I could not use the place as it was, so it was reasonable to make it suit my purposes. Since the walls did not support anything” —her mouth twisted— “except vermin, I had them taken down and replaced to give more space. I had the bishop’s permission.”

His lopsided smile acknowledged that he recognized she was unlikely to fail to take that precaution. “I remember now. I remember wondering, when I was driving out the two-legged vermin, whether the bishop should not have the place pulled down.”

“A stone-built house with a slate roof pulled down? What a waste. No, after the inner walls were gone and the place stripped to the bare stone—I even had the floors up—we had sulfur burned for three days and shut the place up tight for three more. Then I had the house scrubbed and new walls built and the whole place plastered. An apothecary gave me something to put into the water used for the plaster which, he swore, was a flea bane. We are careful, of course. The bath is across the corridor and if a guest needs one, he gets one—free of charge. So far, we have had no trouble.”

He nodded. “Well, it will be a pleasure to work here.”

Magdalene said she would get from her chamber the small table on which she sometimes did accounts and left him. When she returned, she set the table down. Sir Bellamy had moved the bench to the wall under the window and placed the stool opposite it, near the middle of the room. He smiled at her, took the table and set it in front of the bench.

“There is another reason why I would not harm a messenger from Italy whom I believed was connected to the Church,” she said, “especially one who mentioned the Bishop of Winchester. I am indebted to the Bishop of Winchester, who not only allowed me to rent this house, but gave me personal assurances that—”

“I thought that Guiscard de Tournai carried the offer of the house to you,” Bell said, sitting down on the bench. “Did I not hear you say that to him in the bishop’s house?”

“Yes, you did.” Magdalene sat on the stool and saw that his placement of the bench, table, and stool had been very clever. His face was visible, but not enough light struck it directly to make out small changes in expression, while the light from the windows was full on her face. “However, I did not like or trust Guiscard. He would give me no assurance about how long I could keep the house, the rent was exorbitant, and he spoke as if Lord William had given him grave insult by recommending me. So I refused his offer.”

Bell laughed. “Guiscard must have been surprised. But how did you get the house after all?”

“When I told William what had happened, he arranged for me to meet the bishop directly.” Magdalene laughed. “I was greatly amused to discover that Henry of Winchester was much less proud than his servant. He offered me a leasehold of the house, under conditions I was delighted to accept—except for the rent—” She sighed. “But his offer was more reasonable than Guiscard’s, and the bishop’s protection is worth the pennies I could otherwise save.”