Before he turned a corner he scoured the ground under the fitful moonlight. Large indentations in the snow could have been footprints, but they were quickly filling with new flakes.
He ran to the rhythm of his own beating heart for several more paces before he slowed to a stop. He listened again.
Nothing.
Jack came up behind him, beating the ground, skidding in the snow to grab hold of Crispin’s cloak. “Master!” He panted, eyes wide disks. “What was that?”
Crispin rolled the dagger’s handle in his sweaty hand once before sheathing it. Baleful apprehension would not allow his heart to slacken. “Jack, by the Holy Rood, I . . . do not know.”
4
Disturbed more than he could say, it was after some minutes of searching—for what he knew not—before Crispin allowed them to return to the Great Gate. He took careful measure of the sounds and sights on the street, and when they backtracked, he tried Jack’s patience by keeping his eyes to the ground and even returning to the street where the pursuit had ended.
Jack thumbed his dagger and kept licking his chapped lips. Crispin continued to look over his shoulder.
When the gate was in sight again, Jack crossed himself for the hundredth time. “Let us hurry and meet this Jew, Master. I would be home in me own bed.”
“Yes,” he answered distractedly before shaking it off. What was the matter with him? This business of dead boys was touching his mind. That was only some man going home to his warm lodgings. Some large man. Perhaps a blacksmith or a mason. How the shadows can make the ordinary sinister! He almost laughed at himself, but the lingering sense of disquiet would not allow it. He merely led Jack to the Great Gate and when they walked silently across the vast outer ward, they stepped up to an arched portico at the front steps. Under the arch, a porter warmed his hands over a brazier with several pages standing beside him.
Crispin approached, breaching the light cast by the brazier. The porter spied him and turned, grabbing his pike. “Hold there!” he warned.
Crispin bowed. “I have a message for Jacob of Provençal. I was to meet him here.”
The porter glanced at the pages, who looked reluctant to move.
“I can send my servant if you do not wish to fulfill your obligations,” said Crispin, gesturing toward a scowling Jack.
A page, with hair as black as Crispin’s, straightened and pulled at his tabard. “I shall go to the Jew. Whom shall I say is at the gate?”
Crispin smiled. “He will know.”
The pages shared a look with the porter, but the dark-haired one soon trotted to do his business.
Unfortunately, the brazier was within the stone portico. Crispin and Jack were obliged to stand in the snowy courtyard without benefit of a fire. Jack trotted in place to keep the cold away. Crispin stood stoically under his cloak. He had long experience waiting in all manner of weather for a battle. This was no different.
In time, the page returned with the physician. The man looked none too pleased and quickly scampered into the courtyard to meet Crispin in the shadows.
“You are tardy, sir,” said the man in a severe tone.
“I am here now. How am I to get into court?”
Jacob looked back at the porter and pages and drew Crispin and Jack deeper into the shadows of the courtyard’s wall. “We will exchange cloaks.” He showed Crispin his. On it was the yellow rouelle designating him as a Jew. “Your servant and I will enter at the Queen’s Bridge, while you return this way.”
“A feeble ruse,” said Crispin, eyeing the man’s full beard while rubbing his own clean-shaven jaw.
“Keep your head bowed. I am all but ignored. No one sees me unless they must.”
Crispin digested this even as he unbuttoned his cloak. He handed the garment to Jacob just as the old man passed his to Crispin. Crispin allowed a wave of discomfort before he spun the cloak over his shoulders and lifted his hood, hiding his face.
“The corridor by the Painted Chamber,” said Jacob before he hastened out of the courtyard. The Painted Chamber? That was in the royal quarters, by the king and Lancaster. Crispin’s heart thrummed in his chest. But he turned to Jack and urged him without words to follow the man. Jack grimaced his distaste but nonetheless followed.
Keeping his head down, Crispin walked like an old man, striding under the gate arch without the porter or any of the pages questioning him.
Glancing back, he snorted. So, the old Jew was right. He wasted no more time and headed down the familiar corridors toward the southern end of the palace. Crispin had managed to slip into the palace on other occasions, but after the latest incident with the king, he doubted his presence would be greeted with much joy.
Iron cressets burned, lighting his way, and there was occasional laughter muffled behind closed doors as he passed apartment after apartment.
He waited in the shadows, his hood heavy over his face.
A scuffled step. Crispin raised his head and saw both figures approaching; the older man and a reluctant Jack Tucker close behind him.
“This way,” hissed Jacob, and Crispin and Jack followed his quick pace.
Crispin had been curious as to what the apartments of a Jew would look like. A certain uneasiness warred within his gut. Would it be odd and foreign like the homes of Saracens in the Holy Land, full of exotic smells and strange furnishings? His heart quickened when the door opened, but as his eyes adjusted to the dark, the fact of a normal room melted away his apprehension to disappointment.
The hearth burned low. Jacob took a poker and urged the flames to life, adding a log. Crispin sneered at the wood in envy. He had no logs for his fire. Only peat and the meager sticks Jack bought from the wood sellers or managed to scavenge.
Jacob used a straw to light several candles. As the room glowed, Crispin glanced about. Bright drapery hung on the walls, giving the plaster a cheery appearance. Shadowed alcoves pricked Crispin’s curiosity, where tables with various beakers and bowls stood ready. Except for the numerous bottles and canisters and the odd smells emanating from that direction, the room looked to be as any ordinary physician’s parlor. A door to the left must have led to a bed chamber. Not bad for a Jew, mused Crispin grudgingly.
The chamber door opened suddenly.
Crispin’s hand reached for his dagger. A young man, thin and pale, stepped through the opening. At first Crispin thought him to be a page, but the yellow rouelle on his dark, ankle-length gown soon snuffed that notion. He wore a scarlet sash about his waist and from it hung a gold chain with a key, a money pouch, and a small dagger. A thick, gold chain on his chest seemed an attempt to hide the rouelle. The youth glared with narrowed, jewel-green eyes. “Mon père.” His voice was harsher than Crispin expected from his slight features. It was almost hoarse. His brown hair hung limply on either side of his cheeks down to the jaw. A dark cap perched on the crown of his head.
Jacob nodded toward the lad. “This is Julian. My son.”
The boy did not acknowledge his father, but continued his mistrustful stare at Crispin.
Jacob frowned. “Is this how I taught you hospitality? How do you treat guests?”
Julian gritted his teeth and shuffled to a table near the high window. He poured four shares of wine into bowls, bringing the first to his father. When he settled his own to his chest, he leaned against the wall and studied Crispin from afar.
“Qui sont ces mendiants?” Julian asked derisively.