The day was creeping on as Dolwyn looked down at him, and Matteo felt uneasy. The growing shadows gave him an oddly evil appearance.
‘There are messages for you,’ Alured said, stepping over to the bed. Then: ‘Are you well, master?’
Matteo gestured irritably. ‘Just a little tired, no more.’
It was a firm belief of Alured that work was a great healer. ‘These have all arrived in the last few days.’
Matteo eyed the pile of sealed notes without enthusiasm. ‘So many?’
‘Your clerk brings more every day.’
Matteo sighed and held out his hand. For the rest of the day, he lay back, absorbing snippets of information from the messages: one from the servant of Sir Roger Mortimer, one from the Abbot of Winchester, three from a merchant who traded between London and York, and then, after thirty or more notes of minor importance, he came across a little scrawled parchment. It was from a disreputable coroner in Bristol whom he had engaged some years before. He had never liked the man, but an intelligencer did not need to like his contacts. It was enough that they were reliable.
A comment at the bottom took his attention. He sat up in his bed, frowning.
‘Something wrong, master?’ Alured enquired.
‘I don’t know,’ Matteo muttered.
The note told him that the servants of the Queen were delighted to have had confirmation of the Bardi brothers’ support. It was still more gratifying, he read, that the Bardis had sworn not to have any dealings with the King — that in future, all their efforts would be concentrated on the Queen, her son the Duke of Aquitaine, and their supporters.
Matteo stared at it. During the meeting with his brothers, they had agreed that they would make an offer of financial assistance to the Queen, but also send a similar letter to the King. This stated that the Bardis had sworn not to aid him. If news of this were to get out and the King heard, it would be impossible to recover, were Edward II to return to his throne.
That fool Benedetto had over-reached himself! Matteo swore under his breath at the thought of his carefully nuanced work, all ruined by this one act. Unless he could somehow retrieve the situation. .
Then Matteo accepted that he had been here for a month now, lying in his bed, wracked by fever. Perhaps he was not so well-informed as Benedetto. The position could have changed.
And then the memory of Benedetto’s shrewd face came to mind. Benedetto was schooled in Florentine politics and business, where it was desirable always to remove a competitor. Now that Manuele was dead, Matteo was Benedetto’s sole competitor for running the bank. And since his stabbing, Benedetto had been quick to take over the reins of power. Very quick.
Almost like a man who had planned for the eventuality.
‘Dolwyn,’ he said, ‘I have a task for you. I need you to go to Bristol and learn what you may from this man. But you must be very careful that you are not followed. You understand me?’
Matteo felt enormous thankfulness as Dolwyn nodded once, listened to his instructions, and then left.
Staring down at the parchments before him, Matteo rose with a grunt of pain, and shuffled to the fire. There he took out the letter which Manuele had signed just before his death. He read it, and was about to hold it to the flames when he hesitated. This letter could still be useful. It could be shown to the King, if he ever did return to authority, to prove that the Bardi had been on his side. He may not have received this letter, but its existence demonstrated that the bank had been willing to help him.
After a moment’s thought, he shoved the letter into his chemise, next to his flesh, before going back to the bed and lying down with a grunt.
He fell asleep, hoping that Dolwyn would bring useful news from Bristol.
CHAPTER FIVE
Third Wednesday after the Feast of St Martin
St Peter’s, Willersey
Panic did not fully overwhelm him until later, when he heard of the death of Sir Hugh le Despenser, and went to open the chest hidden in his undercroft. Only then did he comprehend the full horror of his situation, and Father Luke cried out, gazing about him as though all the fiends of hell were encircling him, lurid in the gloomy light, watching to tempt him.
Because inside the chest, gleaming in the candlelight, was more gold coin than he had ever seen before.
Before the men appeared, that day had been much like any other. Calm, orderly, unexceptional.
Father Luke of St Peter’s Church, Willersey, was unaccustomed to shocks. His had been an exemplary life. He had lived here in Willersey for eleven happy years, and now, in his middle thirties, his paunch attested to the wealth of the area. The crow’s feet at his smiling blue eyes showed him for what he was, a contented, affable priest. His living was good, the tithes more than adequate for his limited needs, and the local peasants were willing to supplement his resources when he needed more food or wine. There was no doubt about it: since he had first arrived and seen the great church of St Peter’s with its tall spire, he had thought he was privileged to serve God here.
He was a man of learning, who had early discovered that there was a lot of sense in the stern injunctions against amatory adventures. All too often he had seen his peers humbled as their little misdemeanours came to light. For Father Luke, it was better by far to accept his position and enjoy serving the souls of his vill than to indulge his natural desires with the women of the area.
His was a round, ruddy-complexioned face, with full lips and heavy jowls — a face made for smiling, while slightly protuberant eyes viewed the world with an amiable fascination. He was that rare creature: a priest who genuinely liked his fellows. His slight pomposity made him human, in the eyes of the folks about him, and endeared him to them, while his irritation at their gambling in his churchyard on Sundays did not make them angry, only bemused when he railed at them for their ungodly behaviour. His was a figure designed to inspire jollity and companionship, rather than stern respect.
It had been an unexpected interruption when the horses arrived this morning — and a disturbing reminder of Despenser’s men’s appearance almost six weeks ago.
Earlier today, Father Luke had been at the base of the tower, idly studying the tympanum within the arch. The stone held a series of rich carvings: circles on either side with a flower inside them, a chequerboard strip beneath with a cross at either side, also set inside circles. In the middle, between the two flower shapes, was another circle, with four more set within, and a fifth as a hub between them all.
A strange design, this, which had always intrigued him. He wondered who the mason was, and what had urged him to make these patterns. Father Luke would have expected simpler devices, perhaps an angel’s face, rather than these long-forgotten symbols that had been here for perhaps two hundred years.
The sound of hooves pulled him back from his reverie, and he walked to his door and peered out, watching as two men reined in weary-looking beasts. The men were sodden, from their hoods and cowls to their booted feet. One wore a russet woollen cloak drawn about him, but the fabric was so soaked that the water dripped steadily from the dangling corner. The other had a leather cloak that had once been waxed, but this too had given up under the rain’s assault.
They wore no armour, but both had the stolid appearance of fighting men. Luke had to fight the compulsion to step away from them — there were too many stories of churches broken into and their priests knocked down for him to be entirely at his ease. For all that, he did not get the impression that they were dangerous, only desperate.