Jack was just a boy. A boy! Small, insignificant. He would barely have aroused Crispin’s notice back at his lost estates in Sheen. And yet here he was confiding in the churl. He would have laughed if he had thought it the least bit funny.
Setting his mouth into a somber line, he turned the wine bowl in his hand. “No. It was not the Templars who did this to me. I have since met these Templars. No, the men who abducted me were the French anti-pope’s men. It seems they, too, want the grail for their own purposes.”
“God’s holy eyes!”
“Just so.” Crispin saluted with his cup and drank. He listened to the congenial quiet, to the fire crackling, and inhaled the satisfying aroma of wine before the unpleasant memory of his encounter with the sheriff and the grail intruded.
Absently, Crispin rubbed his sore chest. “It all started as just a simple murder.”
“Simple murder?” huffed Jack. “Is that what murder is? If so simple then why are so many now involved? Who is the murderer? Is it that man you hate? Stephen St Albans?”
Crispin chuffed a laugh. “Yes, Jack. But that is not the half of it. The first man Lady Vivienne would have me find was the dead grail knight. I am almost certain of it.”
“What has Lady Vivienne to do with these two gentlemen?”
He thought of her encounter with the strange man in the tavern. Now he wished he had intruded. “That, my boy, is the puzzle.”
Jack picked up his wine bowl. “That’s a fine bit of pastie, isn’t it? All these bits of dough pressed together.” He slurped the wine and licked his lips. “So this is what you do, eh? Tracker. Well, I suppose it’s a fair sight better than making a shoe or weaving cloth.”
“It is also considerably more dangerous.”
“Aye. It is that. But it is an occupation that makes a man think. Is there much money in ‘tracking’?”
Crispin shrugged. “Look around you.”
Jack did, but Crispin did not see disgust or pity in his eyes. To the boy, it was shelter and a damned sight better than the streets. “There is something satisfying in putting one’s mind to it instead of one’s back,” said Jack.
Crispin watched the wheels turn in Jack’s mind. He smiled.
The boy took a hasty sip and belched. “If you truly think the murderer is this man who betrayed you,” said Jack suddenly, “then he must have the grail, eh?”
Crispin’s smile faded. The thought made him uneasy and he leaned back in the chair. “He must. It appears he intends to sell it or give it to the anti-pope.” He raised the bowl but didn’t drink. “Such treachery. It is one thing to conspire against another man. But to conspire against the seat of Peter…”
“But if it isn’t the true grail…”
“Who can know? Not I. I have yet to see it.”
Jack drank thoughtfully, clutching the bowl with one hand. He wrapped his other arm around his upraised leg and scooted close to the fire. “It’d be funny, wouldn’t it?”
“What?” Despite the warmth of the fire and the wine Crispin was wide awake.
“It’d be funny if your Lady Vivienne were looking for the grail, too.”
Crispin leaned back and closed his eyes. He raised the wine bowl to his face and drank the sharp taste of the pungent liquor. “Yes. Funny indeed.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Crispin groaned and rolled his head along the stiff, linen pillow. Jack lay curled up like a dog before the hearth. He and Jack had ended up drinking all the wine and talking half the night before Crispin dropped off from exhaustion somewhere in the middle of one of Jack’s recitations.
He glanced at the shutters. Early morning. His lids hung heavy and his body felt lethargic, but he could not find enough sleep, and little wonder with so much on his mind. So many tangles and snags. This whole business made him uneasy. He wanted his revenge on Stephen. Of that much he was certain, but the circumstances did not sit well with him. He did not like the idea of Rosamunde being anywhere related to conspiracies and heresies. But she was there with Stephen at the Rose not too long ago, much more recent than the week she admitted to. Why did she say nothing of this? And then there was Vivienne with her secretive schemes.
He threw his legs over the side of the bed and clutched his aching head. Rising, he stumbled to the washbasin and threw cold water on his face and stared at his reflection in the polished brass mirror hanging on the wall. His thoughts were as distorted as his image. He splashed more water on his face, shaved hastily and sloppily-nicking his chin-and toed Jack awake from his place before the fire.
“I need you to do something for me,” he said to the drowsy boy.
Crispin paced before the White Hart. He looked up through a cloud of breath at the window he reckoned was hers. The foggy morning revealed nothing beyond the inn’s slate roof but whiteness. The fog obscured the lanes, and London looked like it consisted of only a few alehouses and shops. Spires, smoke, even sounds were absorbed by the shrouding white.
Crispin could stall no more. He slapped his scabbard for comfort, strode through the door, and climbed the stairs to the rooms. Her manservant Jenkyn stood beside the door and stepped in front of it to block Crispin.
“My lord. What business have you with my lady?”
“My own. Announce me.”
“My lord, it is early. I dare not.”
“Then I’ll announce myself.” Crispin maneuvered around him and pounded his fist on the door.
“My lord! Please!”
“Who is there?” asked Rosamunde’s maid and she opened the door a crack. Crispin saw her eye stare at him and widen. The door swung to close but he thrust his foot and leg between the door and the jamb before it could close.
“Leave us,” said Crispin and pushed the door open.
“Master, I cannot-”
He grabbed the maid by the shoulders and shoved her across the threshold into Jenkyn’s arms. Crispin slammed the door and bolted it. When he turned he inhaled sharply.
Rosamunde stood in the center of the room. Her startling beauty always gave him pause and today was no different.
She looked more annoyed than shocked. She wore her green gown again and a gold fillet encircled her head. She was softness and elegance; everything in its place.
“You lied to me,” he said.
“I?”
“Do not compound them.” Her gaze fastened on him, following his step as he made a slow orbit of her. “Why did Stephen argue with the dead man? What do you keep from me?”
She looked down. Her proud shoulders fell slightly, but her demeanor did not change. “Nothing.”
The facts coursed through his head. Rolf at the Rose saw Stephen and Rosamunde together. Eleanor at the Boar’s Tusk saw Stephen arguing with the dead man and also saw a woman talking with the dead knight after Stephen left, but Crispin assumed this must have been Vivienne. Now he did not feel so certain.
“Was it you?” he breathed. “Was it you who spoke to the man in the Boar’s Tusk? I found a witness.”
She did not raise her face when she said at last, “Yes. It was me. I did talk to him.”
Crispin closed his eyes and could not speak for several heartbeats. When he opened them again her expression remained unchanged. “Why?”
She strode to the window and looked out through the open shutter. White, gauzy sunlight cast her skin in an ashen pallor. “Does it matter so much?”
“Yes. It does. It could make you a murderer.”
She whirled.
“Rosamunde, you must tell me why you were there and what was said. I must know it all.”
She shook her head.
“Rosamunde.” He strode to her side and lifted his hands to touch her, but then thought better of it. Gently he said, “It is me, Rosamunde. Have you forgotten how it was with us? We could keep nothing from the other. What has changed that you cannot confide in me?”