“Yes!”
“As we all know, good always overcomes evil, and the knight’s courage and true heart were stronger than the evil of the creature. So do you know how the knight overcame the creature and saved his confessor?”
Still clutching his hobbyhorse, Richard wiggled back to a sitting position. “Tell me how he did, Uncle.”
“The brave knight lay where he had been put under a spell until a wandering priest came upon him. The priest looked down at him and saw that the knight was under an evil spell but knew that the knight’s heart was pure because he was the knight’s uncle. So the priest said to him: ‘Knight, your heart is pure. Rise and speak to me of what you saw and your courage and goodness will conquer the evil creature.’”
“That was all he had to do?” Richard asked in a whisper.
“Aye, lad. All he had to do was tell his uncle, the priest, what he saw and his courage in so doing would slay the villainous creature and save the confessor.” Thomas reached out his arms and said in a gentle voice, “So tell me, lad, who pushed Father Anselm down the stairs?”
Richard threw himself into Thomas arms and began to sob. The monk hugged the quivering boy, tucking his small head under his chin, and rocked him gently until the tears began to slow. As they sat together in silence, Thomas closed his own eyes tight, willing the boy to speak.
Finally, in a barely audible voice muffled by the monk’s woolen robe, Thomas heard Richard say: “It was Sir Geoffrey, Uncle. It was Sir Geoffrey.”
Chapter Thirty
“Who will believe a child?” Adam was pacing. Thomas, Sister Anne and Eleanor sat watching.
“Do you, my lord father?”
“Do I believe that a man at whose side I fought from Poitou to Evesham, a man who covered himself in honor at tournament after tournament, a man who was the exemplar of knightly virtues to those he faced in battle, that such as he would try to kill a priest? For what reason? Tell me that! Whatever for?”
“The last thing Brother Anselm remembers saying might suggest to a hidden listener that he had seen Henry’s murder,” Eleanor said.
“Forgive me, my lady prioress, but no one could possibly conclude that a priest chasing after a child on a hobbyhorse and shouting about knightly deeds was referring to a murder.” Adam glared at his daughter.
“Unless Sir Geoffrey, or whoever else it might have been, heard Father Anselm saying that he ‘had seen your deeds and would hear more of them’? Perhaps he thought the priest had seen him and was coming to confront him?”
“A conclusion that stretches the bounds of credulity, my child.”
Eleanor had hidden her hands in her sleeves and was gripping her arms until they hurt to keep her calm with her father. “Not if Sir Geoffrey was coming down the passage from the tower and only heard Anselm’s words. If he did not see Richard and saw only Anselm standing outside the chambers he shared with his wife, he might have concluded that our priest had come to confront him about the murder of his own son.”
“Still a far-fetched conclusion when weighed against what I know of Sir Geoffrey’s character.”
“I ask again, father. Do you believe Richard?”
Adam slid into his chair with a wince. He said nothing, only reaching out a hand to touch the design on his mazer of wine.
Eleanor waited with great patience and in silence.
“He is a good lad,” Adam at last said in a low voice.
Eleanor nodded.
“An honest one as well.”
She nodded again, gripping her arms more tightly.
“Not given to telling wild tales as if they were true.” Adam hesitated, then turned the mazer cup in a half circle. “When asked, he says he only fights play dragons.” He turned the cup the rest of the way around. “He told me that one day he might find real ones to fight but the dragons here were just for practice, like the stuffed figures dressed in chain mail at practice tilts.” Adam smiled in spite of himself.
Eleanor relaxed her hands. Her nails no longer cut into her arms. She still said nothing, waiting for her father to say what she hoped he would.
“Oh, very well, lass! Yes, I believe the boy thinks he saw Sir Geoffrey. Maybe it was someone who looked enough like him to confuse the lad. I just cannot believe the man would have tried to kill Father Anselm! And it was Geoffrey who was most adamant about Robert’s innocence. Why would he want my son freed if he were the murderer? Does not a guilty man seek to cast his culpability onto another? How could he kill his own son, his heir and his own blood? Are these not enough contradictions to raise reasonable doubt that he is the murderer?”
Eleanor bowed her head. “Surely you know better than I that mortals are full of contradictions, father, but let us then say that he did not kill Henry but knows who did. Perhaps he wants to save Robert, because he is the honorable man you know him to be, and does not wish your son, an innocent man, to take the blame when he knows who did the deed. Perchance the person who did kill Henry is someone whom he also loves? Thus he may be the one who tried to kill Father Anselm but may not be the one who killed his son.”
Adam frowned. “Killing a priest is not the same as killing another man. Yet,” he hesitated, “I might believe that love or loyalty could drive him to it. Whom do you think he might be protecting?”
“Who is closest to him? George is not here. Henry could not have stabbed himself in the back and thus committed the sin of self-murder. That leaves his wife and his daughter.” Eleanor hesitated. “Unless you know of someone else in his company…”
“Nay, lass, you’ve named them all.” Adam took a sip of the previously untouched wine. “You have not yet explained his own wound. Could it be that Robert killed Henry and someone else attacked Sir Geoffrey?” He held up his hand to silence the expected protest. “Do not misunderstand me. I believe Robert is completely innocent and this latest attack makes such a conclusion credible, but we must consider all possibilities if we are to prove my son’s innocence. He was, after all, still found with dagger in hand, blood staining his hands while he bent over Henry’s corpse.”
Eleanor looked over at Thomas and Anne. Their wine was untouched, and they were watching her with quiet concentration. “I find the conclusion that there are two murderers loose in the small confines of Wynethorpe Castle as illogical as the idea that Robert is the head of a band of masterless men with some purpose in killing off the Lavenham family, one after the other. If the same person did not attack both father and son, then the motive for attacking Sir Geoffrey separately remains unknown and the likelihood of two separate attacks for two separate reasons is doubtful. We may live in troubled times, father, but Wynethorpe Castle is well disciplined and, as I have already said, not a breeding place of lawlessness.”
“Well argued, Prioress of Tyndal,” Adam replied with a smile that bespoke some pride in his child.
“Thus,” Eleanor continued, “we have three prime suspects in Henry’s murder: Sir Geoffrey, his wife and his daughter.”
“And in the attack on Sir Geoffrey?”
“The same three.”
Adam slammed his hand down. The cup bounced and wine splashed on the table. “I find it impossible to believe that a woman could kill two adult men, including one who was well-versed in fighting. I find it equally impossible to believe that my friend could have so grievously wounded himself.”
“Why not his wife and daughter, my lord? Certainly Juliana and Henry were of much the same build. Henry was more muscular, for cert, but he was small compared to most men and not inclined to sport, which suggests he had less strength than many, despite his quickness. Might not both Isabelle and Juliana have been the guilty ones?”
Adam shook his head. “Nay, women are weak creatures, my child.” He raised his hand as Eleanor began to speak. “Let me finish. Although you may argue that two women might have overpowered Henry, Sir Geoffrey is a trained warrior.” Suddenly, Adam looked down and frowned. “Still, you may have a point. Few men were equal to Geoffrey in a fair fight, yet no man can be prepared when someone he trusts and loves attacks him. Either his wife or daughter might have done this. They are both dear to him and could have gotten close enough to stab him before he knew what was happening.”