The Vanishing Witch (61 page)

Godwin, crawling on all fours, searched carefully. His chest grew tight as he struggled to breathe in the dust and ash. The great rock above him seemed to be slowly sinking towards him, trapping him, crushing him, as if he was once
more back in the dark hole of that French oubliette. His arms were trembling and sweat ran down his face, but he forced himself to remain inside. He needed something the girl would recognise that would bring her back here alone. But it was hard to make out any object in the dim light. What would she understand as a message? A fragment of pot? No, that wasn’t enough.

His foot slipped in the dirt
and he heard a grating sound as his sandal knocked against something behind him. Turning awkwardly he saw that he had dislodged a small slab of stone and beneath it, in the twilight, he caught a glint. He crawled towards the little hollow. There, lying in a nest of ash, encircled by amber beads and bears’ claws, was an amulet in the form of a golden boar’s head studded with garnets. Godwin’s mouth
was as dry as the charred bones around him, but his parched lips cracked into a smile as he snatched up the golden boar, kissing his fist in triumph.
You shall not suffer a witch to live!

If a man who has been baptised touches a witch with a branch of rowan, the devil will carry her off when he next comes seeking a victim.

I waited for him in the tower. I swore I wouldn’t go back to that filthy place, but trying to slip out of the city at night without the watchmen asking questions had become impossible since the uprising.

Behind me in the city, the
blazing torches set pools of orange and mustard light flickering down the darkened streets. In front of the tower, the dark red fires of Butwerk glowed, illuminating nothing save the distorted shadows of creatures that slid between them, like monstrous bats. Raucous laughter, yells and occasionally a scream of pain rose up with the stinking smoke of the fires, but who laughed and who cried out in
darkness, only the inhabitants of that desolation knew.

Now that the sun had gone down, a chill wind from the river whined through the window. I shivered. We would not be naked tonight, but soon, soon we would be together in Robert’s own bed, if all went to plan.

I heard his footsteps on the wooden stairs and hastened to the trapdoor, holding out a hand to help him as he climbed through it.
He kissed me briefly, then drew away, staring at the filthy bare boards, his face wrinkled in disgust.

‘At least you might have had Diot bring the sheepskins. I’ve made love to you in some piss-poor places, but I draw the line at hard boards.’

‘You’d prefer my husband’s bed.’

‘You know I would.’

‘Then, in a few days, you shall have it.’ I reached up and stroked his face. ‘Haven’t I always
given you what you wanted?’

Laughing, he caught me round the waist and, lifting me, whirled me round, like an excited child. ‘You’ve thought of a way?’ He set me down, and held me by the shoulders. ‘Tell me how you’ll do it.’

‘How
we
will do it,’ I corrected him. ‘Thanks to my diligently spreading the word, every man in Lincoln knows he’s a king’s commissioner, so it will come as no surprise
to anyone if he is found with a dagger in his chest.’

He giggled. ‘It’ll come as no surprise to Robert either. He’s convinced every man in England is out to assassinate him. But who’s actually going to . . .’ His expression suddenly turned serious. ‘Not you, surely.’

It was my turn to laugh. ‘The whole point is to induce someone else to do it, someone who’s certain to be caught and hanged for
it. That way no possible suspicion can fall on me. And as a poor woman tragically widowed after only a few months of blissful wedlock, I can beg the King for a sizeable purse, maybe even lands, in recompense, since my husband was cruelly murdered by one of the King’s enemies while doing his duty for the Crown.’

He flicked his finger across my lips. ‘Your powers of persuasion, my angel, are matchless,
but even you will have a hard time
inducing
a man to stab Robert if he’s certain to be executed for it. Anyone murdering a king’s commissioner will be tried as a traitor, and his death’ll be drawn out and agonising as a warning to the rabble. No, my sweet, you go to any of the taverns down by the wharf and you’ll find a dozen men in each who wouldn’t hesitate to cut the throat of a holy abbess
for a fat purse, but even they wouldn’t be stupid enough to do it unless they could make good their escape afterwards. And, besides, assassins for hire have a dangerous habit of returning later and asking for more money not to turn king’s approver and spill all to the justices in exchange for a pardon. We’d never be free of them.’

‘Ah, but if a man doesn’t know he’s to be the assassin . . .’
I said, sliding my hand up the inside of his thigh and feeling him squirm. ‘The only place Robert feels safe is in his own hall. That is where he lets down his guard. He always was a creature of habit but now he clings to it, like a babe to the breast. Every day when he returns home, he pours himself a goblet of spiced hippocras and flops into his chair near the tapestry to gulp it. It will be simplicity
itself to drug the wine.’

‘Poison? Again?’ He shook his head. ‘You’re losing your touch, my angel. If it happened in Robert’s own hall, even Hugo Bayus would suspect someone in the household. And you wouldn’t be able to shift the blame to Tenney or Beata, unless you were thinking of letting Diot burn for it.’

‘A tempting thought,’ I said, ‘save that the old hag would blurt out all she knows
long before the flames reached her. But you should listen to me more carefully. I made no mention of poison.
Drugged
,
I said. What I shall put in his wine will only befuddle him, dull his senses, make him slow to react. It’ll seem to him nothing more than the effects of drunkenness. It won’t kill him. You will.’

‘Me!’ He drew back, eyes wide in alarm, holding up his hands, as if he were pushing
away the very idea.

‘Yes, you, my beloved. You will hide behind the tapestry, and when you see he can no longer defend himself, you’ll slip out and stab him. If he’s still alive when the knife goes in, his blood will pour out naturally and no one will think to look any further into the cause of his death than the blood-stained dagger they’ll find dropped in the corner of the room.’

‘You’re right,
because they’ll be too busy looking for the man who plunged the dagger into him – me!’

‘Not if you use this.’ I held out a knife.

It was a vicious blade set in a plain mutton-bone handle, but its owner had cut his own mark on the handle to distinguish it from the hundreds of other almost identical boatmen’s knives.

My lover stared blankly at the knife. Much as I adored him, at times even I
had to admit his wits were not the sharpest.

I patiently explained: ‘When Robert was brought home ill from the warehouse, this was stuck in his belt. I removed it as I undressed him. I checked the mark on the handle against the marks in the payment ledgers. This is Martin’s sign, as the justices will clearly see when the two are compared. It’ll be all the proof they need of his guilt, for everyone
knows he had motive enough to kill Robert.’

‘But all Martin has to do is to show he was elsewhere at the time of the murder and, knife or not, he’ll be proved innocent.’

‘But he will not be elsewhere,’ I assured him. ‘Martin will receive a message that he is to be rewarded with a fat purse for having identified Gunter and his son as rebels. The message will ask him to come to the house to collect
his payment in the early evening, soon after Robert returns home. The boatman will think there is nothing odd in that. After all, Robert would hardly want to be seen handing over money in so public a place as the warehouse. Neither would Martin wish to be identified as an informer. It would make perfect sense to him that it should take place privately in Robert’s hall. And Martin is greedy.
He won’t hesitate to come.

‘When he arrives, he’ll find the courtyard empty and the door to the house open. He’ll walk into the hall and discover the body. I’ll come in behind him and, in horror, beg him to check if my dear husband still lives. Then, when he has blood on his hands, I’ll rush out into the street and scream for help. He’ll be trapped inside the house. Even if he runs for it, he’s
bound to be seen by someone at that time of day, and I will swear on every shrine and relic in Lincoln Cathedral that I came in and saw Martin plunge the knife into my husband, who was threatening to have him arrested for theft. The men-at-arms who brought Martin and his son to the warehouse will testify that he had already been seized once. No one will doubt his guilt.’

I stepped closer, and
ran my hand over my lover’s groin, feeling his prick swelling under my touch. ‘And then, then my dearest Edward, no more towers or fields for us. You will be unwrapping me in the comfort of Robert’s own bed.’

He bent down and kissed my mouth passionately. ‘And that is why I adore you, little Maman.’

If dry be the buck’s thorn on Holyrood morn, ’tis worth a kist of gold.

But if wet it be seen ere Holyrood e’en, bad harvest is foretold.

If a storm is raging, it may be stilled if a woman strips herself naked and presents her body to the storm. For this reason figureheads of bare-breasted women are often set on the prow of a ship to still the waves and abate the tempest.

Keys jangled outside the heavy wooden door as the gaoler sorted through the bunch dangling from the massive ring to find the right one.
The men heaved themselves into a sitting position, placing their hands on their bent knees, their heads bowed.

Gunter touched his son’s shoulder. ‘Wake up, Bor.’

The lad stirred sleepily, then realised who had woken him and flinched away, dragging himself upright. Every time he did it, Gunter felt another piece of his heart die inside him. He’d never thought to see a child of his draw away from
him in fear or hatred, and he knew from the expression in Hankin’s eyes that the boy felt both whenever he looked at his father.

The men eyed each other anxiously as the door opened. Was this it? Was this where the trial would begin and their lives end?

‘Maybe my feckless wife has finally stirred her arse to bake me a pie,’ Mack said hopefully. ‘About bloody time.’

Gunter felt sorry for him.
After the first day, no one had brought food for him. He suspected Mack’s wife had sent food, but it probably went straight into the belly of Hob, one of the soldiers on duty at the castle for, according to the guards, his daughter was always hanging round the gates waiting for him. The other men shared a little of what their families sent in, and occasionally the gaoler would take pity and bring
him a crust from a burned loaf, or a bone with a shred or two of ham still clinging to it. But it must be hard to think your family didn’t care if you starved.

At least Nonie, however much she despised her husband, still faithfully sent food for him and Hankin, making the exhausting walk into Lincoln and up to the castle each day. But he couldn’t imagine how much longer she could afford to feed
them, as well as Col and Royse, when there was no money coming in.

Had she sold the punt? It would be better than waiting for the King’s men to take it from her as soon as sentence was passed, for money could be more easily hidden. If she took Royse and Col and left Greetwell before the trial, the money from the punt would be enough to keep the three of them fed and warmed through the coming
winter, with a chance to start again somewhere new. He wished he could tell her to do just that. He should have warned her of what was going to happen, told her what she must do. Yet again, he had failed them.

The door groaned open. Mack’s face fell as he saw there was nothing in the gaoler’s hands except his ring of keys and Gunter’s wooden leg thrust under his arm. A second guard stepped into
the room, menacingly thumping a stout stick against his palm to make plain what would happen to any prisoner who caused trouble.

The gaoler pushed himself between Gunter and Hankin. He dropped the leg into Gunter’s lap. ‘It’s your lucky day, Bor. You’re going for a little stroll.’

A look of alarm flashed across all the prisoners’ faces. Much as every man prayed to be delivered from that place,
the fear of being taken to a worse fate was writ clear in all their eyes.

Mack leaned forward. ‘Where are you taking him? The justices – have they come?’

‘One of the commissioners wants to question him,’ the gaoler said indifferently. ‘I dare say there are more charges to be added to his list of crimes.’

As Gunter wrestled his stump into the wooden peg, he felt the man fumbling at the lock
that fastened the iron on his good leg to the pillar. He pulled the fetter from Gunter’s cut and bruised ankle. Blood began to flow painfully back into his numb foot. Gunter leaned forward to massage it, but the gaoler hauled him to his feet. ‘Hurry, Bor. You don’t want to put the old bastard in an even worse humour by keeping him waiting.’

Gunter hobbled towards the door. His ankle kept buckling
beneath him and the gaoler was forced to support him to keep him upright. Gunter twisted round, staring at Hankin’s back.

‘What about my son? Is he not wanted too?’

‘Nothing was said about the lad. My orders are to fetch you, that’s all.’

Gunter wanted desperately to say something to the boy. Suppose they didn’t bring him back here. Suppose this was the last time he ever saw him. ‘Hankin? Hankin,
forgive me, son, for everything.’

But the boy didn’t turn his head or show by the smallest sign that he’d heard.

Gunter’s shoulders sank, and he allowed himself to be dragged out of the cell into the narrow passage beyond. There they paused, while the guard locked the door behind them. Just as it closed, Gunter heard a faint cry: ‘Don’t hurt my faayther. Please don’t hurt him!’

With one guard
leading and the other shoving him from behind, Gunter was hurried along the passage and up a narrow spiral staircase. He was so unsteady that several times he slipped, banging his good knee hard against the stone steps above. His weakness unnerved and angered him. Ever since he was a lad he’d had to fend for himself, and his strength was something he’d prided himself on. He’d always been able to
depend on his own body, but he felt the shadow of old age creeping up on him. Soon would come a time when he wouldn’t be able to walk for miles, or move a laden punt or even defend himself. Then a worse thought crossed his mind. Suppose he never reached old age. What if his life was to end today?