The lowly were always making more of such events than were called for, he decided. A physician’s remedy somehow becomes a miracle. The simple truth of it, Crispin knew, was that the body healed on its own. He himself sustained many a battle wound, some horrendous. Nasty gashes from swords; blows from maces that dented his helm. But he recovered each time, some under a physician’s art and some simply because of his own obstinacy.
He walked on, thinking of Man’s folly, of his own, and even of revenge. “Living on revenge,” he muttered, considering Eleanor’s words. He had not liked those words when she spoke them, but now he could not erase them from his mind. They rang in his ear, punctuated by each of his plodding steps. They prevented him from immediately noticing Jack Tucker standing in his path until he nearly ran him down.
Crispin stopped and looked up. “My shadow,” he said with a frown.
“Aye, sir. A good servant knows what his master is about.”
Crispin felt in no mood for the “not my servant” roundelay, so he said nothing and side-stepped him.
“The sheriffs are awaiting you at your lodgings, Master,” Jack said to Crispin’s retreating back.
Crispin took one more step then stopped. He raised his head and stared up into the raining sky. It misted his cold cheeks with the patter of drops. “Of course they are,” he muttered defeated. “Then I must see them at once, no?”
“They are not patient men.”
Crispin yanked his cloak across his chest and cursed under his breath. “Neither am I.”
Crispin found Sheriff Wynchecombe and Sheriff John More staring at his meager hearth flames when he entered. Jack took up a post in a corner of the small room. Crispin nearly told him to be off but at the last moment decided against it. He turned to Wynchecombe and More and bowed. “Welcome, my lords,” he said without a shred of welcome in his voice. He strode past the sheriffs to stoke the fire.
“So these are your lodgings.” Wynchecombe looked about with distaste. His gaze swept over Jack but there did not appear to be any recognition in his eyes.
“What would you expect?” said More. He was a shorter, rounder man than Wynchecombe, appearing his opposite in every way. Where Wynchecombe was dark, More was light with sandy blond hair. And where Wynchecombe sported beard and mustache, More was clean-shaven like Crispin. His houppelande was scarlet with small pearls sewn onto the chest. He chuckled and placed his thumbs in his wide belt. “For my part,” he went on, “it appears better than I anticipated.”
Wynchecombe scowled. London well knew that he did not approve of his partner being elected to the post of sheriff and in fact, More was more absent in most proceedings than not. He sniffed, ignoring More. “Why London, Crispin? One would think you would hide yourself far from here.”
“A man can lose himself in London. Or at least…” He set the poker aside and faced them both. “He can try.” He felt a wave of uneasiness with the sheriffs standing in his place of safe and private surroundings. “My lords, to what do I owe-?”
Wynchecombe looked at More before answering. “The body is gone.”
Crispin raised a brow. “Indeed.”
More shook himself. “Is that all you can say?”
“What would you have me say, Lord Sheriff?”
“Damn you, Guest,” said Wynchecombe. “You couldn’t let it go, could you? Couldn’t let me hang that useless cutpurse who now seems to be your lap dog. Now it’s missing Templars and dark mysteries. I want none of it, I tell you.”
“You have a sworn duty-”
Without warning, Wynchecombe slammed his forearm into Crispin’s chest and pinned him against the wall. Jack made a half-hearted lurch forward, but truly, what could he do?
More stood beside the fire uncomfortably, shuffling from foot to foot.
Inhaling a sharp breath through his teeth, Crispin swore softly. The freshening pain of his wounds smarted. “Don’t tell me my duty,” Wynchecombe spat at Crispin’s cheek. “I know it right well.” The sheriff waited, but Crispin said nothing. Wynchecombe snorted. He held Crispin one moment more before releasing him. He paced, as if nothing had happened between them. “But this,” he said. “This is beyond me. Templars. Bah! I tell you I know not what to do.” He snarled in Jack’s direction and the boy cringed. There was a pause and Crispin waited for whatever pronouncement Wynchecombe would surely hurl at him. Instead, he was surprised by Jack scurrying around them offering bowls of wine. Wynchecombe took one, looked into his bowl, but did not drink. More refused the offer, lifting his face in disdain.
“Perhaps…we might work together on this,” offered More.
The wine proved interesting again to Wynchecombe, but only to look at. “Eh? What is it, John?”
“Well, might I suggest, just this once, mind you, that Master Guest…I mean him with his history as a knight and us with… with…”
“With the might of the king’s majesty?” said Crispin.
Wynchecombe nodded abruptly. “Yes. Yes, to be sure. Am I right in assuming you mean to hire this churl, John?”
“It is just that he has inconvenienced us, has he not? With his distractions of cutpurses and Templars. We must be about the king’s business, not this nonsense.”
Wynchecombe smiled, though not a pleasant one. “So? What say you, Guest?”
Their mummery was good, he mused. Not as practiced as it could have been, but good enough. “‘Evil draws men together’,” he muttered.
“What’s that?”
“Nothing. Pardon my asking, but what do I gain from this extraordinary partnership?”
More stuttered.
“What?” cried Wynchecombe. “You mean pay you? Ha!” He finally drank and then grimaced, looking quizzically into the bowl. He handed it off to Jack who took it and sniffed its contents, shaking his head.
“My wages are sixpence a day,” said Crispin.
Wynchecombe laughed. “Sixpence? I pay my archers as much and they work harder.”
“Sixpence is my fee, archer or no. And more often than not, I hit the mark.”
Jack snorted a laugh but quickly suppressed it when both sheriffs eyed him with twin scowls.
“Yes,” said Wynchecombe. “I do recall something a year ago about your finding Westminster Abbey’s missing altar goods. They were returned forthwith.”
“Not so forthwith,” said Crispin, shying from the warmth of flattery. “A fortnight, perhaps.”
Wynchecombe pushed More aside to glare hard at Crispin. “You think yourself very clever.”
“As long as I am clever, my lord, I eat.”
Wynchecombe smirked. His dark mustache framed his white teeth. “You were fortunate they did not execute you for treason.” The low growl of his words reassured them both of their status with one another.
Jack froze while setting the empty bowl back on the shelf.
“Was I?”
“Come, Crispin,” Wynchecombe said, magnanimous again. “You live.” He glanced about the dingy room. “Such as it is.”
“My title, my lands all taken with my knighthood,” he managed to say without gritting his teeth. “Yes. I live. Such as it is.”
More snorted and clutched his gloved hand on his sword hilt. “By God! The gall. You were a traitor, sir! Conspiring with other traitors to put Lancaster on the throne over King Richard, the rightful heir.”
Wynchecombe leaned against the wall, his arms folded in front of him. “You do not think you deserved to lose your knighthood over that? Better your knighthood than your head, eh?”
Crispin eyed their swords still in their sheaths before flicking his gaze away. “I know not. In similar circumstances, I, too, might have cast my vote to degrade such a knight. But when it is oneself, the circumstances seem…unjustified.” The flames caught his attention and he shook his head. “Richard is king now. There is nothing to be done. But ‘they should rule who are able to rule best’. I stand by that now as then.”