[Roger the Chapman 05] - Eve of Saint Hyacinth (15 page)

There were others, whose names and functions I can no longer remember, but who all played their part in keeping the Duke of Gloucester's household running smoothly.

I was told that, in fact, fewer than half of the duke's lesser retainers had come south with him from Middleham, but the number was daunting, none the less; particularly when I considered that, in theory at least, the would-be assassin could be any one of them. I was indebted for the information to Humphrey Nanfan, whose acquaintance I had hastened to make after I had been left with my fellow Yeomen of the Chamber. He was, I judged, a couple of years older than myself, with a mop of thick, carelessly cropped brown hair, grey eyes and, outwardly at any rate, the jollity which is generally associated with people of his build and stature. He was not really fat, just short and rounded, girth and height together giving the impression of a greater corpulence than he deserved. I soon discovered that he was the butt of the other Yeomen, who teased him unmercifully about the amount of food he ate; again undeservedly for, after observing him closely at several mealtimes, I noted that although he piled his plate high with victuals, the greater part of them went into the charity bowls for the beggars. He also gave the impression of being stupider and slower than he was and, in between bouts of good-natured clowning, would sit still and silent, forgotten temporarily by his peers, but alert and observant of everything and everyone around him. He was the man suspected by Timothy Plummer of being a spy for George of Clarence and, while I could imagine that it might very likely be the case, I could not bring myself to believe that the duke, any more than the king, would order the killing of his own brother. And for what reason?

It was true that he and my lord of Gloucester had married sisters and had a mother-in-law in common. But cautious inquiries elicited the fact that the Countess of Warwick's lands had already been divided between her daughters' husbands, just as though she were dead, the Act of Settlement having been finally confirmed in Parliament only four months earlier. And the greater share of the estates had gone to the Duke of Clarence. So there was no cause on brother George's part that I could see for resentment. Besides, why would he insist that the killing should take place before the Eve of Saint Hyacinth? There was no sensible explanation for that, and I was more than half inclined to erase Humphrey Nanfan from my list of suspects there and then. But wisdom had taught me that nothing was ever exactly as it seemed and there might well be other reasons for my lord of Clarence to harbour a grudge against his brother. It behoved me, therefore, to keep an eye out for Master Nanfan, however much I would have wagered that he was not our assassin.

The other Yeoman of the Chamber mentioned by Timothy was Stephen Hudelin, the only one of the five that he called a spy without conjecture. Anthony Woodville, Earl Rivers, eldest brother of the queen, was named his paymaster; and although this might, in itself, have been sufficient to make me take Stephen Hudelin in dislike, it was not necessary. I disliked him on sight, from the moment of our very first meeting.

Chapter Ten

Stephen Hudelin was, I judged, somewhere in his middle thirties, thickset without being squat, the top of his head reaching well above my shoulders. He had red hair in which there was not a trace of brown, so that his fiery pate was visible wherever he was, indoors or out, and his eyes were a greenish hazel. I soon discovered that he had the quick temper which went with his colouring, but which, in general, he was forced to subdue, a necessity which left him in an almost permanent state of truculence. It also became obvious that the other Yeomen of the Chamber, or at least those who had accompanied the Duke of Gloucester south on this expedition, did not much like him. They were wary, however, of his bouts of ill-humour, treating him with an off-hand civility which excluded him from their fellowship far more effectively than picking a quarrel could have done.

I learned from Humphrey that the Hudelins had been in the service of Sir John Grey, Lord Ferrers of Groby, the queen's first husband and sire to her two eldest sons. The Greys, and therefore the Hudelins, had supported the House of Lancaster, and both Lord Ferrers and Walter Hudelin, Stephen's father, had been killed at the second battle at Saint Albans, fighting for the late King Henry.

When, however, King Edward's fancy had settled on Lord Ferrers's widow, the Hudelins, like the new queen's own family, the Woodvilles, had found no difficulty in changing sides and becoming staunch followers of the House of York. Their loyalty, in common with that of so many, was not to a cause but to the masters they had served for generations, now embodied in the young Marquess of Dorset and his brother, Lord Richard Grey, and in Anthony Woodville, their maternal uncle.

'How does Stephen come to be in the service of the Duke of Gloucester?' I asked Humphrey as he instructed me in the laying of the dinner-table.

My mentor shrugged. 'Why shouldn't he be? There's no law of the Medes and the Persians which says a man may not move from one place to another if he so wishes. Perhaps Stephen wanted a change and Lord Rivers recommended him to His Grace, for he's a good enough worker and pulls his weight. I myself was previously with my lord of Clarence, but fell out with a fellow servant and wished to find another berth. His Grace used his influence with his brother and here I have been, very happily, ever since.'
 

I made no answer, keeping my thoughts to myself, and concentrating instead on Humphrey's instructions concerning the protocol of place settings. The raised dais at the end of the hall, facing the musicians' gallery, was easy: the duke and his mother, the Duchess of York, would sit beneath the canopies with other persons of note on either side of them.

'The table to the host's right,' Humphrey explained, 'the one against that wall, is known as the Reward, because people at the head of it are served with the same dishes as the lord and his guests. The table opposite, to the host's left, is called the Second Mess, and the people sitting there mostly get the same food as the upper servants. And in both cases, the lower you sit down the board, the further away from the dais you are and the nearer to the kitchens, the coarser the victuals. Wooden plates and spoons below the salt, pewter above it. Trenchers of bread for all, with smaller ones to heap the salt on. While we're here in Baynard's Castle, we keep the same hours as the Duchess Cicely: breakfast at seven, dinner at eleven and supper at five o'clock, although at home, at Middleham or Sheriff Hutton, the duke likes his meals somewhat earlier.' Then, without being asked, he provided the information which interested me most. 'Members of the household have their meals beforehand.'

I breathed an inward sigh of relief. The prospect of having to watch others eat whilst suffering the pangs of hunger myself would have been more than I could bear. At least now I knew that I should be comfortably replete and, consequently, alert to those scraps of gossip or information which can often be gleaned where people are gathered together and off their guard. I tried not to dwell on the impossibility of the task I had been set, nor on the vulnerability of any man in the public eye to the poisoned chalice or the assassin's dagger. I could only do my best and trust the hand of God to guide me.

There were still three other suspects whose acquaintance I had not yet made, all of whom were Squires of the Household, and in order to identify them I had to rely on Matthew Wardroper. For this purpose, we both kept an eye cocked for one another whenever we crossed a courtyard or sped from one chamber to the next, along the passageways or up and down the stairs. The first time we met, after I had been supplied with a suit of livery, he gave way to unseemly mirth.

'It's too small for you,' he hooted. 'You're bursting out of that tunic in all directions.'

'Of course it's too small,' I snapped, losing my sense of humour. 'How many men of my height do you think His Grace employs? But I've been promised that a sewing woman from Duchess Cicely's household will lengthen it and let out the seams. Now, stop that foolish sniggering and tell me what news you have, if any.'

We were standing in the inner courtyard, half concealed by one of the pillars of a colonnade, which supported part of the building's upper storeys. We drew back a little further into the shadows.

'None of any moment,' Matthew sighed, 'but by a stroke of good fortune, Ralph Boyse, Jocelin d'Hiver, Geoffrey Whitelock and myself are all four on duty tonight at supper. If you can also contrive to be on hand I'll try to point them out to you. What of your two fellow Yeomen?'
 

'Little enough as yet. I know who they are and am ready and willing to believe the worst of Stephen Hudelin. On the other hand, if Humphrey Nanfan were to be proved innocent of the charge of being in my lord of Clarence's employ I should be happy. I like him. However,' I added on a grimmer note, 'my judgement is not always sound. I have in the past liked - and in one case more than liked - those who have turned out to be rogues and villains. Do you have a message for me from Timothy Plummer or Master Arrowsmith?'

The dark eyes darted this way and that, making certain that no one was within earshot.

'Only that the former was for once mistaken, and the duke, after great persuasion from my cousin Lionel, has allowed his three other Squires of the Body to be admitted into the secret. They are, apparently, considered to be above suspicion, with the result that His Grace is far more closely guarded than ever before. Master Plummer now considers it possible that, luck being on our side, we can reach the Eve of Saint Hyacinth without harm befalling Duke Richard, even if you are unsuccessful in discovering the would-be assassin.'

'Which is more than possible,' I answered gloomily. I knotted my brows. 'But why, oh why, the Eve of Saint Hyacinth? For by then the duke will be in France, fighting.'

'It was only what Master Plummer was told by Thaddeus Morgan,' Matthew pointed out. 'A rumour which, perhaps, may have been false. We don't even know for certain that there's any plot to kill my lord of Gloucester.'
 

'Then why was Thaddeus Morgan killed?' I shook my head. 'No, no! I think we have to accept the truth of the story.' I ran one hand despairingly through my hair. 'If only we could find a motive for someone - anyone! wanting to murder His Grace! I still refuse to believe that either of his royal brothers would wish him dead for any reason. The Burgundians are our allies. And surely the French would prefer King Edward's death to that of the Duke of Gloucester. This invasion seems to be purely on his whim.'

Matthew Wardroper heard me out in sympathetic silence, but could offer no solution to the problem beyond observing that the French were unlikely to order the murder of an English monarch for such a cause. 'For every ruler of this country dreams of winning back the Norman and Angevin lands of his ancestors and no doubt will continue to do so for generations to come. To assassinate King Edward might scotch the snake, but would not kill it, and the French are surely clever enough to know that. But in any case,' he finished with a shrug, 'it's not His Highness's life that's threatened.'

Sadly I agreed, and we parted to go about our various duties. 'I shall look out for you tonight in the great hall,' I called over my shoulder.

And thus it was, not watching where I was going, that I bumped into a young woman who had just emerged from an archway on my right and who was breathless from hurriedly descending a steep flight of stairs. I turned quickly to apologize and found myself looking down into a pert, rounded face with the complexion of a peach, widely-spaced hazel eyes, at present brimming with laughter, and a good-humoured mouth which curled up naturally at the corners. She was small and delicately boned, with little hands and feet, and her features reminded me of someone; someone, moreover, whom I had met not all that long ago.

'Forgive me,' I said. 'I wasn't watching where I was going.'

To my surprise, she continued to clutch at me. 'The fault was mine,' she insisted. 'But please don't run away, because I think you must be the man I'm looking for. With that height and these clothes, you can only be Roger Chapman, my lord of Gloucester's new Yeoman of the Chamber.'

I acknowledged the fact cautiously, particularly as I suspected that I was an object of some amusement to her.

'Who are you and why should anyone give you my description?' I wanted to know.

'My name is Amice Gentle, sewing-woman to the Duchess of York, and I was told that your tunic is in need of alteration.' She gurgled with laughter. 'And indeed, I can see that it is. I must take some measurements. Come with me to the sewing-room so that I can see more easily what needs to be done.' And so saying, she turned and whisked away again, up the stairs.

Gentle; Amice Gentle; I said the name over to myself as I followed in her wake. Then, of course, I remembered.

She was the daughter of the Southampton butcher and his wife.

The room into which she led me was lit by a generous number of candles, for the daylight, even at the height of summer, was poor, filtering in through three small, unshuttered windows, set only in the outer wall. Five or six other young women, some sitting, some standing, were busy at two long trestle tables which ran the length of the room.

Two were working on an elaborate piece of embroidery which, at a cursory glance and judging by the subject matter, I guessed to be an altar cloth. The rest were stitching away at various garments, mending rents, darning holes or resetting hems; the sort of good, plain sewing which is a necessity of every household, however humble, but especially in one as large as Duchess Cicely's was in those days.