Chains of Folly (35 page)

Jean swallowed hard. “When Mistress Claresta went up to bed, she bade me wait by the door for any order from Master Rhyton. Mistress Claresta is always careful that her servants understand what is needed so we will not be blamed for what is not our fault. I saw Master Rhyton start to rise, perhaps to call me to bring another flagon of wine, but he nearly fell. He said then that he had had enough. I saw Sir Linley to the door and locked it behind him and then helped Master Rhyton up the stairs to his bed.”

“And the time?” Bell asked, blocking a movement by Linley with his body; his voice was softer than usual, calm. Bell had known Jean when he was so starved and constantly beaten that he was reduced nearly to idiocy by fear.

“A little after Complin,” Jean whispered. “I heard the bells. I was tired and I wondered when Sir Linley would leave so I could go to bed.”

“Thank you, Jean,” Claresta said, smiling.

Bell looked down at Linley, who was cursing lying servants and fingering his knife suggestively. “And I have the word of Mistress Pechet of the Cask of Wine that it was near Matins when you came into the alehouse,” Bell said loud enough to drown Linley’s threats. “So where were you between Complin and Matins?”

“He was getting my letter from the whore!” Sir John burst out.

“I tell you I never knew of your letter, whatever it was and to whom,” Linley shouted, but he was shaking and white. “If Nelda took it she did not tell
me.
I knew nothing of it.”

“Then what were you quarreling about with Nelda that made you throw her down the stairs?” Bell asked.

“I didn’t,” Linley screamed. “I never wanted to hurt Nelda.” He uttered a half sob and then said more quietly, “Anyone will tell you that I never beat her. She was clever and she was amusing. I knew she was not perfect, and she brought terrible trouble on me—”

“When she stole Gehard fitzRobert’s family seal,” Magdalene said.

Linley looked at her, but his thoughts were turned inward and he did not seem to recognize her. “Gehard beat her terribly but she… Perhaps she was afraid that if she admitted what she had done and returned the seal he would kill her, or perhaps she thought she could make some profit out of it.” He sighed but looked at Bell, not at Magdalene. “She was terribly greedy.”

“But Gehard threatened you.” Magdalene’s voice was soft, sympathetic; there was no accusation in it. “You could not fight him and you had to be rid of him. He was a terrible man. Even his own soldiers feared him.”

“Yes, yes. There was only one way. No one grieved for
him.
But I never meant harm to Nelda. I pleaded with her but she would not give me the seal to return to him. I only meant to shake her. And she bit me, and I pushed her, and she fell… I doubt I will ever find a woman so companionable.”

“How nice to know you find a whore more companionable than I.”

Claresta’s voice stabbed like an icicle pulled from a roof edge. Linley did not seem to notice. Spencer made a low, growling noise and his big hands clenched and unclenched. Bell spared a glance for the big journeyman and wondered just how long it would be before he took Linley apart.

“Companionable!” Sir John roared. “Companionable? Oh, yes. She made me laugh and fed me tidbits and sips of this and that between chuckles. She asked me where I had been, saying she smelled the sea on my clothing. She laughed and teased so I nearly forgot what she was and I told her I had been to Normandy, that the earl of Gloucester had received me. And then she drugged me and stole my letter.”

“It is nothing to do with me,” Linley said more briskly. It was plain to Magdalene that he was relieved by not needing to confess he had poisoned Gehard and expected Nelda’s death to be accepted as accidental. “I knew nothing of it. I was busy here and had not seen Nelda for almost a week.”

“But I am sure she knew you would be returning to her,” Claresta snapped.

“That is none of your business,” Linley said to her, with utter indifference. “Why should you care? You will be my wife by law, lady of Godalming, which is what your father wants. And the son I will get on you will be baron after me.” He looked down his nose. “That is enough for such as you.”

Claresta drew a sharp breath, but Spencer started toward Linley, his big hands out to grasp. Bell turned from where he stood, somewhat to the side but between Linley and Sir John and in easy reach of both. He took two quick steps to put himself in Spencer’s path.

Seeing the threat from Spencer contained, Linley turned back to Sir John and shook his head. Now his voice had an easy confidence. He said, “If Nelda took your letter, it is gone for good. The whore—” he waved at Magdalene “—came with the bishop’s man and cleaned out her rooms. She told me that everything Nelda had went to the bishop of Winchester. So Winchester must have the letter, too, if Nelda stole it.”

“Winchester? Winchester has it? Then I am ruined!”

The husky whisper should have warned Bell, but the easy confidence of Linley’s voice and his crude dismissal of Claresta had brought a snarl to Spencer’s lips. For just one moment too long, Bell’s eyes were fixed on the young giant and Sir John’s knife was out and buried in Linley’s throat. Then Bell was on him and the knife was pulled free and wrested from his hand.

But for Linley it was too late. The knife had severed the big vein in his neck. A fountain of blood followed the blade when Bell pulled it out, running over Bell’s hand and spattering his tunic. Linley’s hands flailed helplessly toward his throat but never even reached it before his body slid bonelessly to the floor.

Claresta screamed, high and shrill, and Spencer pulled her into his arms and buried her face in his broad chest.

Magdalene nearly fainted. The knife. The blood. The body falling all stained with red. Lashed by memory, she held out her hands, but they were clean. She had not shed this blood. She closed her eyes and swallowed her sickness, leaning on wall behind her for support.

“Why?” Bell asked, still stunned by what had happened, staring at Sir John’s suffused face. “He was a nothing. Why kill him?”

“Nothing?” Sir John gasped, wrenching at his wrist in Bell’s grip and pulling free when Bell relaxed his hold. “That nothing has destroyed me, utterly destroyed me.”

“He
destroyed you because
you
chose to sleep with his whore and she stole from you?” Bell said, disbelievingly. “That is ridiculous.”

“I tell you he did it all! If he were not a puling coward, he would not have killed the whore. If he had not lied to me… He told me he found her dead. He shook me out of a drugged sleep and he accused me of killing her. And then when I could hardly think, he demanded that I help him get rid of the body. And he said, laughing, that we should put it in the bishop’s house and let him explain it while he tried to call a convocation to reprimand the king.”

Bell started to laugh. “You were truly hung by your own rope. Nelda had the letter you so urgently desire wrapped in her breastband. I found it when I looked her over to see if there was any cause, other than her broken neck for her death.” He shook his head at Sir John and uttered another chuckle. “You are right. Had you left Nelda lying at the foot of the stair… Well, you would not have had the letter, but it would have made all the scandal your master desired.”

“Laugh at me, will you?” Sir John’s eyes narrowed. “You will laugh less when your bishop is reduced to the state of that other traitor, Salisbury.”

Bell’s lips thinned when he heard Winchester called a traitor, but he did understand the desperation of a man who had failed a master with little patience or compassion. He understood, too, that despite being addressed to Winchester the letter was never supposed to come to him. Likely Mandeville would have brought it to the king, with some tale of how his man had come by it that would blacken the bishop.

Mandeville, Bell guessed, hoped to raise himself in King Stephen’s eyes by adding proof that Winchester was a traitor to the rage the king must feel over Winchester’s call for a convocation. Having that ploy not only fail but backlash at him, when Winchester found the letter on the body of a whore, would infuriate Mandeville. His spite would turn on Sir John, who had not only failed him but actually helped the bishop. And Mandeville was the kind not only to dismiss Sir John from his service but to blacken his name so that no other noble would be willing to employ him.

“I will go back to Gloucester,” Sir John said, staring up at Bell. “I will explain to him that I lost the letter and beg for another to be written. He will do it. It will cost him no more than the sheet of parchment…”

“That is useless,” Bell said, almost with sympathy. “The bishop has already sent the letter to the king and explained how it came into his hands.”

“Is that so? I am very glad you told me. Then I will not waste my time on a letter proffering friendship. I will bring back a reply from Gloucester…a reply…yes…that will prove Winchester is a traitor.”

“Winchester is no traitor,” Bell snapped. “Don’t be stupid, man. The king is his brother.”

“Stupid am I? We will see who is the cleverer.”

Sir John started to turn away, but Bell’s hand fell on his shoulder.

“Let me go,” Sir John snarled, shaking free of Bell’s light grasp, and stepping back almost onto Magdalene’s toes.

“I cannot let you go,” Bell said, frowning. “You say you had cause, but in my eyes you just murdered Sir Linley, who was not even holding a weapon. He is bleeding at your feet. I cannot allow you to take ship for Normandy…at least not until you have explained yourself to the sheriff and Master Octadenarius the justiciar. Come—”

“No!” Sir John bellowed, suddenly drawing his sword. “I
will
go to Normandy. You cannot stop me!”

Claresta screamed again, and Spencer pushed her behind him, himself backing as far away as he could get from the moving weapon. Bell danced aside from the stroke, his hand going to the hilt of his own sword. But as he twisted to avoid another slashing blow, his elbow struck Spencer’s arm and he cast a single glance over his shoulder. There was no room for him to swing a sword; a backstroke might hit the two innocents behind him. Cursing luridly, Bell drew his long poniard. If he could catch Sir John’s sword arm or hand, he could disarm him.

Magdalene neither moved nor cried out although the blood pounded in her throat so hard she thought she would choke on her fear for her lover. She knew that the very worst thing she could do was to distract him by any sound or movement. She saw him reach for his sword, felt a small flutter of relief. Sword in hand, there were few men who could match Bell.

The relief was short lived. Fear surged higher when Bell backed to avoid Sir John’s second blow and nearly collided with Spencer. Magdalene saw Bell glance over his shoulder at Claresta and Spencer, sobbed behind bitten lips as she saw his hand leave his sword hilt. No! she cried silently. Knife against sword. No!

Bell dodged again, but Magdalene saw he was closer to Sir John, saw the edge of Sir John’s blade brush against Bell’s sleeve, saw him lean precariously away from the slice, barely drawing his leg clear of the sword edge in time. He could not escape again.

Magdalene could not breathe. She heard Sir John cursing Bell with a stream of foul obscenities. She saw him raise his sword, gripping it now in both hands for a killing blow. She saw that if Sir John were closer to Bell, the sword would go beyond him, not strike him at all. Still silent, she leapt forward, arms rigid, both hands slamming into Sir John’s back with her full weight and all the impetus she could get from her strong legs.

Sir John screamed. Bell shouted in surprise and belated warning as Sir John fell against him, fell against the knife he was holding at waist height, slightly tilted upward, ready to strike at the wrist of Sir John’s sword arm as the arm came down. Instead when Sir John fell against him, both arms struck Bell’s shoulder, but the sword he was holding was well beyond Bell’s body.

Spencer also cried out as the sword seemed to come directly at him. He dragged Claresta sideways, still shielding her with his body, but that was scarcely necessary as the sword drooped downward and then dropped from Sir John’s hand.

Sir John himself seemed to be clinging to Bell and then he screamed again as Bell pushed him away, pulling his knife free. Sir John staggered backward, crying out once more, his hands reaching for his hurt; then he began to fall. Bell caught at him, one-handed, holding his knife well away in the other hand. Sir John’s body twisted in his grip and he wailed wordlessly, but Bell managed to ease him down to the floor, where he lay quite close to Sir Linley’s body, moaning, hands pressed to his wound. Bell stood staring down at both bodies, eyes and mouth open with shock.

“What happened?” he gasped. “Why did he leap at me?” By long habit that operated without thought, Bell cleaned his knife on his already blood smeared tunic and sheathed it.

No one answered his question. Spencer had been watching only Sir John and the threat from his weapon. Claresta, terrified, had been hiding her face in the journeyman’s broad back. Magdalene was backed against the wall again. If Bell had not seen what she had done, she decided, she would not admit it. He would be fit to murder her for interfering in his fight, even if her action had saved his life.

“Pu—pu—” Sir John struggled to lift his head, his voice a gurgling mumble.

Magdalene stiffened as Bell went down on one knee to listen, but the effort had done some final damage to the injured man. Blood ran out of Sir John’s mouth, stifling anything more he might have said, and he fell back limply. Shaking his head, Bell pulled Sir John’s hands aside so he could see the wound. Blood was pulsing out of it and air bubbles frothed the blood, but Sir John was still breathing. Bell hesitated for one long moment and then stood up.

Behind him Claresta was sobbing hysterically. Bell turned toward where the journeyman still stood, nearly paralyzed by shock. “Take her out of here,” Bell said to Spencer. “Take her up to her solar and send the servant, Jean I think it is, in here to me.”

Spencer nodded, looked at the two bodies, and lifted Claresta into his arms so she would not need to walk past them. He carried her out of the room with her face buried against his breast so she did not see the men, one dead, the other nearing that state.