‘Who is looking after him?’ Josse asked.
‘Brother Firmin.’ She looked up and met Josse’s eyes.
She has the same thought as I, he realised. She fears that this — thing — is too hungry to be content with its present tally of victims. And Brother Firmin is an old man, and not strong. .
I must not dwell on that, he told himself firmly. There is work to do and I will offer to help where best I can. ‘My lady,’ he said, ‘and Gervase, I suggest that the next step is to return to Adam Pinchsniff in Newenden to ask him if he knows of any connection between Nicol Romley and Master Kelsey in Hastings. Such a connection will be reassuring because it will tell us that these cases of the sickness all stem from the one source.’ It was, he thought, unthinkable that there should be two separate outbreaks of this deadly disease. ‘And, in addition, the more we find out about Nicol’s recent movements, the sooner we will be able to discover why he had to be killed and who killed him.’
‘Fine optimism, Josse,’ de Gifford said with a smile.
Josse gave a quick grin. ‘Aye, I know. But optimism and a plan of action are preferable to standing here wringing our hands and waiting for catastrophe to overwhelm us.’
‘Indeed,’ de Gifford murmured.
‘I will go back to Newenden,’ Josse said, with another grin in de Gifford’s direction, ‘for it is likely that the apothecary will be more willing to discuss the matter of his apprentice with me than — er — than with the sheriff here.’
‘Why-?’ the Abbess began.
But that, Josse decided, was too long a tale to tell now and anyway it was irrelevant. With a bow, he interrupted her. ‘With your leave, my lady, I should set out as soon as possible,’ he said. ‘Horace is none too lively, given that we have only just arrived here from New Winnowlands, and-’
‘Take the cob,’ the Abbess suggested. ‘He has not been ridden for some time and you will go faster on a fresh horse.’
‘Thank you, my lady. I will return as soon as I can.’
He hurried out of the room, only just catching the ‘God’s speed’ that she called after him.
Chapter 5
The Abbey cob was hard-mouthed and not in the first flush of youth, and Josse was pleasantly surprised to find that the horse had a good turn of speed. But then Sister Martha knew how to look after an animal and the cob did her credit.
He reached Newenden late in the afternoon and rode straight to the apothecary’s house. ‘Master Morton,’ he muttered to himself as he dismounted and tied the cob to the hitching ring. It would not be the best of beginnings to antagonise the man by calling him by his village nickname, appropriate though it was.
Adam Morton opened the door and said, ‘Oh, it’s you again. What is it now?’
‘Good day, Master Morton. There have been more cases of the sickness,’ Josse said without preamble. ‘A family from near Hastings has arrived at Hawkenlye. I am told that six people are already dead and now another has developed a high fever. The sickness was-’
His opening words had earned him the apothecary’s full attention. Grabbing hold of Josse’s sleeve, Adam Morton pulled him inside and closed the door. ‘Fool!’ he hissed. ‘Do you want the whole town to hear you? Such things spread terror and panic!’
Making himself ignore the insult, Josse said evenly, ‘No, Master Morton; panic is the last thing I want, since it might have the effect of sending half of Newenden scurrying to Hawkenlye.’
The apothecary waved a hand. ‘I apologise,’ he muttered. ‘But you frighten me, sir knight.’
‘We are all frightened,’ Josse agreed. ‘I am here to discover your late apprentice’s recent movements, if you will tell me them. It seems there must be some connection between Nicol and the family from Hastings, since both he and they appear to have been suffering from the same sickness. I guess that this contact may be through a merchant named Master Kelsey.’
‘Martin Kelsey, aye, I know of the man,’ Adam Morton said. ‘I’ve sometimes purchased my supplies from him.’
‘And your apothecary has been recently in Master Kelsey’s presence?’ Josse said eagerly.
‘Aye. They sailed home to England together not a fortnight ago, although they were not known to one another and I doubt that they were aware that they had a common associate in me. I had sent Nicol over to Troyes for the fair; there were items I needed — foreign herbs and drugs; musk and myrrh and the like — that cannot be obtained in our land other than at an exorbitant rate from some importer. Nicol met Martin Kelsey in Boulogne; the man had been on some venture over there, although I cannot tell you what it was.’
Boulogne, Josse thought; Troyes. Hardly able to contain his excitement, he pictured a huge fair swarming with people from all over Europe and even further afield. Then he thought about a large sea port where ships put in from the oceans of the world. Nicol Romley had been to Troyes; Martin Kelsey might well have gone there too. The two men met up in Boulogne to take ship for England and one of them, already carrying the pestilence, infected the other.
It appears, he told himself, that we have found our link. .
I must visit the home of this Martin Kelsey, Josse decided, and find out, if there is anybody there who can tell me, where he went and whom he met, particularly after his return home. ‘Thank you, Master Morton,’ he began, already impatient to be off, ‘I shall-’
But the apothecary was frowning and did not seem to hear. ‘There was something odd about young Nicol when he returned from France,’ he said slowly.
‘Odd?’ Josse was instantly on the alert. ‘But he was sickening with the disease. Would that not make a man seem odd?’
‘No, it wasn’t that.’ Adam Morton rubbed a hand across his jaw. ‘I’d say it was more that the lad was afraid. And it wasn’t the threat of the sickness that scared him, sir — er, sir knight, for he was acting in a strange way before he fell ill.’
‘What was he doing?’
‘He seemed to think that somebody was after him,’ Adam Morton said slowly. ‘He kept opening the door and peering out and one evening when I told him to deliver a basketful of simples to some of my customers, it was all I could do to get him out of the house. Then he came scurrying back in double-quick time, bolted the door behind him and raced up to his room where he shut himself in and wouldn’t come out till morning.’
‘To what did you ascribe this peculiar behaviour?’ Josse asked.
The apothecary smiled thinly. ‘I thought perhaps he’d involved himself with some young lass and that her father was after him with a horse whip.’
‘Was that likely?’
‘Oh, yes. Nicol was a well-favoured lad and he had the girls queuing up.’
The apothecary bowed his head, but not before Josse had caught the expression on his face. Gervase, I wish you could witness this, he thought; for, at long last, Adam Morton was acting like a human being and grieving for the young man whose life had been so suddenly and so violently ended.
‘You have been very helpful, Master Morton,’ Josse said gently. ‘I do not think it was any enraged father who was looking for Nicol; I think it was the man who killed him. And I shall do my best to track him down and bring him to justice.’
Adam Morton raised his head. ‘Do that, sir knight,’ he said. ‘I shall dance at his hanging.’
Such was his fervour to follow this new and promising lead that for a moment Josse considered setting out for Hastings there and then. But he soon changed his mind; for many reasons, only a fool willingly rode through the night and Josse was not a fool, even if Adam Pinchsniff had called him one.