Jack atte Hedge glanced at him. It was the second of them who had spoken, the one who didn’t carry the torch. Probably thought carrying something like that was too menial for him. Jack ignored him. He looked out over the river, then upstream back towards Thorney Island where the King had his new palace.
‘I said …’ the man began again.
‘Take me to him,’ Jack said quietly, and followed them in through the gate.
The little short gate with the incised cross of the Knights Templar cut into the lintel.
New Temple, London
Jack atte Hedge gazed about him as they passed up the path from the river. There were orchards, gardens, a little pasture all between the river and the cloister, but everything was sadly dilapidated. They entered the cloister by a small door, and he was led up some stairs into a large, almost bare chamber.
‘Sit here and wait,’ the second man told him.
Jack stared at the man, who scowled back as he took up position at the side of the door as though guarding his prisoner.
‘What’s your name?’ Jack asked.
‘What’s it to you?’
‘Nothing whatever.’
The man scowled, but as Jack turned away, he muttered, ‘William Pilk.’
He was as thick-skinned as he was thick-headed, Jack decided. One of those employed more for his ability to break another’s arms than for his skill at thinking. He had been told to bring Jack, so he assumed that Jack was in some kind of trouble and deserved to be beaten. He stood, and the man at the door stiffened as though preparing to defend it and stop Jack escaping. There were glazed windows at the northern side of the room, and he went to look out. In the courtyard he saw three men, all talking quietly together. He recognised two of them: Sir Hugh le Despenser and his henchman, Ellis Brooke. As he stood watching, they broke up. Ellis and his master walked towards the building from which Jack peered out, but the third man crossed to the other side of the courtyard. ‘Who is that?’ Jack asked.
Pilk walked to his side suspiciously, as though expecting him to try to knock him down if he lost concentration. He risked a quick look. ‘Him? Don’t know.’
Jack kept his eyes on the figure. Just for a moment the man turned before he walked through a doorway, and Jack saw a sallow face, a pointed chin, and black hair. Then the man was gone, slipping through and pulling the heavy door closed behind him.
Jack was always interested in strangers in this place. If Sir Hugh le Despenser was talking to someone, it could only be because there was profit in it for him. He wasn’t the sort of man to waste time with those who were of no use to him. Jack turned away from the window, wondering who the third man had been, barely aware of Pilk walking back to the doorway, where he stood glowering as before.
Before Jack could worry himself overmuch, he heard footsteps coming up the stairs; the door opened and Sir Hugh le Despenser walked in with Ellis.
‘I am glad to see you again, Jack,’ Despenser said.
‘And I you,’ he replied. But when he looked at Despenser, he was shocked by the change in the man.
Last time he saw him, Hugh le Despenser was a fit, tall young man in his early thirties, but the fellow before him now, although not yet forty years old, had the weight of the realm’s troubles upon his shoulders. There was a tiredness in the set of his shoulders which Jack himself had not experienced in all his nearly fifty years. He could have felt some sympathy for the young politician — if he hadn’t known how devious and untrustworthy the bastard was.
‘You asked me to come,’ he said.
‘Yes, I did.’ And Despenser moved into the room as though to embrace Jack.
That was too familiar, and Jack wanted none of it. He withdrew and glanced over Despenser’s shoulder. Ellis leaned there against the door-frame, mouth twisted into a smile. Since a knife attack, a scar left the left side of his face permanently drawn down in an expression of disapproval. ‘Jack. How goes it?’ Ellis said smoothly.
Jack grunted. Near the door still was the guard, his eyes widened to see that Despenser trusted this tatty old man. ‘That fellow Pilk can leave us,’ he snapped.
Despenser shot the man a look as though surprised he was still there. ‘You, Pilk — out!’ He waited until the door was closed, then began, ‘So, Jack, the reason I-’
But Jack had already soundlessly crossed the room and yanked the door open: William Pilk was standing less than two feet from it, looking guilty. Jack stood on the balls of his feet, staring at him. He heard a step, and felt a man at his side. He knew it was Ellis. Pilk glared at them both, then turned on his heel and left, stomping down the stairs. Jack glanced at Despenser, who nodded to Ellis. Ellis grunted assent and walked out, standing at the doorway to prevent any others from eavesdropping as Jack silently closed the door again.
He eyed his master. ‘So — who do you want me to kill this time, my Lord?’
‘Oh, it’s just a small job, Jack. I want you to kill the Queen.’
Chapter Two
Thursday after the Feast of St Hilary1
Lydford, Devon
Simon Puttock listened as the sound broke on the wind in the early morning. It was the sort of sound that a man who was used to the countryside would recognise from a great distance: a horse riding at a steady canter. Neither pounding along the roads with the urgency of a knight at the gallop, nor the steady plodding of a farmer with a packhorse, this was a man who had ridden some distance already, who had a need of haste, but who would have farther to ride, so was measuring his pace.
Simon was in his small hall when he heard it. A tall man, in his late thirties, with the broad shoulders of a farmer, and calm grey eyes set in a face that was sunburned even now in the winter, he was no coward, but he knew what the horse presaged.
Grabbing his staff, he ran out through the screens to the rear of his house. The stables were over on his right, and he made for them, his ear all the time cocked to the hooves pounding along the road. He had some time to escape, but not enough.
His wife, Meg, was gathering bundles of twigs and sticks to fire the copper ready to brew ale. There was a space behind the stalls which they always used as an overflow for their log pile, and as Simon came into the stables, he found her bent over, collecting some of the smaller twigs.
The temptation was too great. He grinned, and clapped a hand to her buttock, making her squeal, not entirely happily.
‘It’s not my fault,’ he protested, ‘such temptation …’
She eyed him coolly, a tall, blonde woman with her hair awry after her morning’s exertions. ‘It may be a period of rest for you, husband, but I still have a house to maintain and run.’
‘Oh, Christ’s pains!’
‘What is it?’
In answer, Simon jerked his head. She was still for a moment, listening, but then her face cleared. ‘The messenger?’
‘It must be.’
‘Would they have decided already?’
‘Meg, John de Courtenay was furious when he saw that Robert was to be made Abbot of Tavistock. He told me that he would contest the election as soon as he had been defeated.’
‘Yes, you told me,’ she said.
‘So — he will already have itemised all those aspects of the election which he feels may look as though something underhand has happened, and probably he has instructed a proctor. All he wants now is any other information on Robert. And I don’t have anything to give him!’
If only he did! Simon was not convinced of the integrity of the new Abbot, any more than he was of many other men. His only certainty was that John de Courtenay was even more unfitted for the post of Abbot than Robert Busse. John was from wealthy stock, and his main interests struck Simon as being modern fashion and hunting, as well as his wine-cellar. Of course, as the son of Baron Courtenay, he could muster some influential friends, and Simon was unpleasantly aware that the other man could make his own life difficult, if he chose.