Realizing he was outnumbered by those he dare not offend, the sheriff shrugged but his face paled with the effort of concession. “Her lust for the man and her outrage, when she believed he was swyving another woman, were observed by an impeccable witness. This same person saw her near the stable the night the groom was murdered, a time when the virtuous are in their beds or on their knees in prayer.”
“By your own words, Sir Reimund, you have also damned this witness as a vile sinner if he saw our cook wandering about at the Devil’s hour,” Huet replied. “Do you think any honorable man could hear the testimony of such a wicked soul and conclude it was honest?”
“How dare you!” Ranulf bellowed.
Huet grinned. “The witness must have been you, sweet brother. What were you doing, wandering around at such an hour? Looking for a horse to ride, or perhaps you sought help to raise your lance against the Prince of Darkness?”
The color of Ranulf’s face burst into apoplectic purple.
The sheriff said nothing and had apparently decided he would be well-advised to make sure his fingernails were perfectly clean.
“What have you to say for yourself?” Master Stevyn turned to Hilda, his customary roughness curiously softened.
The cook looked down at her filthy dress, then raised her reddened eyes to meet the gaze of every one in that crowd, people who would never forget this day of her humiliation. “Tobye did give me a kiss or two in payment for a few small sweets I baked,” she said, “things too imperfect and unworthy of your table. Aye, I felt a sinful pleasure in those kisses, but he was far younger than I.” Meandering tears whitened paths down her muddy cheeks as she wept anew. “Why should I feel jealousy when I always knew he would never love a woman like me with such a belly and hanging breasts?” Her speech dropped back to a whimper.
“Did you rage at him as you have been accused?” Stevyn’s face grew pale. “Did you go to him the night he was murdered?”
As if she had just been stripped naked, she wrapped her arms around her breasts and bent her head with shame. “Aye, I did roar at him once because of the woman-women he thoughtlessly swyved. As for being out the night Tobye was murdered, I went to the privy once, perhaps twice.”
“You were resentful because you are a woman, and lust banishes the little reason you possess,” Ranulf snarled. “Your defense is guided by Satan and it is his honeyed voice, spoken with your tongue that makes your wickedness sound almost innocent.”
Eleanor bit her lip. Hilda had slipped when she said she had berated Tobye for coupling with one woman, then tried to correct the error by making the number greater. Hilda was a loyal servant and would not give more information out of fear that she would lose Master Stevyn’s apparent sympathy. And she probably had the right of that. She might well be called a liar or traitorously ungrateful were she to name Luce. As matters now stood, however, her heated argument with Tobye sounded like the rant of a jealous woman, not a concerned condemnation of the affair between Tobye and the steward’s wife.
But was Hilda jealous? Could the cook be Tobye’s killer? Eleanor rather doubted the woman’s guilt. Unless Hilda was possessed of greater cunning than her demeanor would suggest, the prioress believed her innocent of this particular crime. But she was not so convinced that the woman had not been near the stable that night for some reason other than a mere trip to the privy. Her mention of that sounded hesitant as if she were desperate to find an excuse. Was there a way to question the terrified woman in private?
Huet’s voice interrupted her thoughts. “Come, come, elder brother,” he was saying. “Surely you know that some women don’t suffer from lust at all. Is not your own wife an example of such perfect virtue?”
Ranulf’s glared, his face changing hue from red to white and back again.
Eleanor concluded that Mistress Constance must be notoriously in arrears on the marriage debt.
The sheriff was losing patience and finally interjected: “All that may be argued with differing opinions amongst honorable men, but the fact remains, an unarguable fact, that this woman, who has confessed to lust before you all, was seen near the stable the night the groom was foully sent to God with all his sins riding on the back of his crooked soul. On that alone, I must arrest her.”
“If you will give me leave, Master Stevyn, I must speak.”
Eleanor looked up in surprise to see her monk maneuvering through the crowd toward the sheriff.
Sir Reimund opened his mouth to protest.
“Let us hear what you have to say, Brother.” The steward seized the sheriff’s arm with such strength that the man winced.
Thomas nodded gratitude for the permission. “The night the groom was killed, Master Huet and I shared a straw mat in the kitchen near the hearth. Since we had huddled closer to retain warmth from the dying ashes as the night went on, I awoke when Master Huet rose to attend a call of nature. I saw the cook in the kitchen, fast asleep on the nearby bench. That was the same place I had seen her lie down before I, too, fell sleep.”
Eleanor overheard an abrupt intake of breath behind her but instinctively pretended she had not heard Huet’s reaction.
“She could have left the kitchen and returned either before you awoke or after you had fallen back to sleep, Brother,” the sheriff replied, his voice tense.
“Since I am accustomed to rising for the early Office, I stayed awake and prayed until just before dawn broke. Only then did the cook leave the kitchen but for no longer than it might take anyone to visit the latrine or do a quick morning wash before returning. By then others were about. I could hear them.”
Master Stevyn raised a questioning eyebrow at the sheriff.
“That does not give her an excuse for much earlier in the night, Brother.” Sir Reimund’s voice shook.
Was his visible dismay caused by anger or doubt? Eleanor wondered.
“Since you surely examined the corpse and noted the extent of its stiffness, you must know that he could not have been killed too close to the time the sun set.”
Instead of replying, the sheriff glowered at the guard he had assigned to the prioress, as if he had expected him to prevent interference from all others as well.
Fortunately, the man failed to see his lord’s displeasure since he was bent in close conversation with a young woman.
Eleanor lowered her eyes and prayed that Thomas would rein in his tongue. She may have decided to get involved in this crime for reasons she deemed proper, but she also knew they had no explicit right to do so. Giving testimony in private was one thing, but they must tread lightly and most certainly must not reveal so publicly that they knew details they should not. Justice might be cruelly thwarted if a protest was raised because of Church interference in matters rightfully under the king’s authority.
“As for witnesses, Sheriff,” Huet called out, “I can add my testimony that the cook was asleep when I went to the privy. Since my bowels were loose that night, I spent some time there, or pacing nearby in discomfort, and neither saw nor heard anything untoward. Hilda was snoring when I returned. Brother Thomas was on his knees in prayer.”
Thomas blinked and then nodded in silence.
“Thus we have a highly regarded witness to her probable guilt and reputable witnesses to her possible innocence,” the sheriff muttered. “Where there is conflict…”
“…there is reason for caution and doubt,” Master Stevyn finished. “As to the testimony of the first witness?” He turned to his eldest son. “Can you swear it was our cook whom you saw? Can you give an hour?”
“A woman slipped into the stable. When I saw her, I thought she was Hilda. Tobye greeted her with a laugh and, although I could not hear their exact words, I did note her wheedling tone. I remember thinking it odd that our cook would have any honest cause to seek out the groom at such a time and place. I confess I did not see her face, nor can I tell you the hour of the night.” He folded his arms. The gesture was defiant, but his face was ashen and he could not meet his father’s eye. “I was on my way to pray.”