A Play of Knaves (16 page)

Her hands flew to her face again, and Ellis, despite having turned dark red with anger and his mouth set into a hard line, drew her carefully forward into his arms, and she let him, burying her face against his shoulder, sobbing helplessly.

Her father stood up. “We’re away from here tomorrow,” he said grimly. “And we’ll be well rid of the place, I think.” He brushed his gown where he had been sitting on it. “It’s time we went to see about our pay from Father Hewgo. Joliffe, you’ll come with me. The rest of you start back to the camp. We’ll catch you up when we’ve finished with the priest.”

“Medcote . . .” Ellis started.

“If fortune favors us, we’ll never lay eyes on him again,” Basset said.

“If fortune favors him,” Ellis returned, “
I’ll
never lay eyes on him again.”

Chapter 10

On the whole, most priests and churchwardens for whom the players had worked over the years had dealt fairly with them. From those who did not, Basset had learned enough to deal with their kind when he met them, and from what Joliffe had seen of Father Hewgo, he suspected Basset’s dealing skills would be needed here, however clear the agreement had been three days ago. Their best hope was for fair-dealing churchwardens who would stand firm against whatever Father Hewgo tried to do. But he and Basset weren’t even to the church door when Basset said, “Trouble.”

It was not their trouble, though. Midway between the churchyard gate and the church door, Medcote and a man Joliffe had not seen before were confronting each other. And whoever the man was, he had had more to drink than was good for him, and was as angry as he was drunk, swaying forward and poking a forefinger into Medcote’s chest, declaring loudly, “You cheated me! You know it! Everybody knows it!”

Medcote shoved his hand away. “I know you’re a drunken fool, Jack Hammond. You can’t hold your ale any better than you hold your land. What’s done and over is over and done. Give up your whining.”

Whining was hardly what Hammond was doing. His shouting was drawing more lookers-on than only Basset and Joliffe, and he declared loudly, maybe deliberately for all of them to hear, “Nothing’s done! You’re a cheat and a liar! Nothing’s not even by half done!”

“I hope Hammond flattens him,” Basset said, low-voiced and turning away.

“And stomps on him for a while afterward,” said Joliffe, following, leaving the men to whatever their quarrel came to.

The heavy door into the church’s nave was standing open. Joliffe shut it behind him, closing the arguing voices outside. Farther up the nave Master Ashewell looked around from where he was standing with Father Hewgo and Walter Gosyn and said, “Thank you.”

Basset bowed. “Our pleasure.”

“You’ve come about your payment,” Master Ashewell said, “and are in good time. We’ll do the counting out as soon as Master Kyping and Medcote come.”

“You’re all churchwardens together?” Basset asked.

Two churchwardens was a more usual number but four was not unheard of, and that Medcote and Master Ashewell were wardens here was to the good, Joliffe thought. They knew what had been agreed between the players and priest.

“Master Kyping isn’t one of us,” Master Ashewell said. “He’s bailiff here for the abbey and merely going to watch the counting out.”

“To see we don’t come to blows about it,” Gosyn said, and he was not jesting.

Joliffe wondered whose benighted choice had made Ashewell, Medcote, and Gosyn churchwardens together?

Behind him, the outer door he had just closed was shoved open, and John Medcote stalked in, followed by Master Kyping.

“It didn’t come to a fight then?” Gosyn called.

“Hammond hasn’t the guts for a fight,” Medcote snapped.

“Not this time,” Master Kyping said smoothly over him. “A quiet word in the ear and a heavy hand on the shoulder can do wonders.”

“Especially the heavy hand,” Master Ashewell said, smiling.

“Shall we get on with it?” Father Hewgo demanded.

He was rubbing his hands together like a merchant expecting good profit, and Joliffe was braced for the unpleasantness that shortly came in the sacristy where they all went to count out the coins on a table. Master Kyping had brought the take from the ale-fest itself: the fees that folk had paid to set out their goods for sale and all the profit from the sale of the ale itself. Mostly, the coins were farthings and half-pennies, but when all were counted, they made a goodly sum, even before Master Kyping said easily, “Now, Father Hewgo, where’s what you collected after the play? You put the pouch in your undergown’s pocket, I think?” The bailiff put out a hand and patted the priest’s side and said, smiling, “Yes, there it is.”

As the proverb went, if looks could kill, Master Kyping would have been a dead man from Father Hewgo’s glare just then, but he went on smiling, his hand held out for the pouch. Father Hewgo fumbled it from beneath his outer robe and tossed it ungraciously onto the table. Master Kyping, as if he did not see the priest’s ire, loosened the wide mouth of the purse and poured out a very pleasant amount of coins.

Withdrawn into disdainful dignity, Father Hewgo said down his nose, “I supposed the players were giving their share as their gift to the church.”

“Were you?” Master Kyping asked Basset.

“No, sir. We were not,” Basset answered smoothly. “I believe it’s written that the workman is worthy of his hire. Besides that,” he added, “our tenth was from the full profits of the day, not simply from our playing.”

Father Hewgo turned his glare from the bailiff to Basset while Joliffe thought at him, You lying disgrace to your priesthood, and Gosyn said, “I say they should have their full tenth and no quarrel about it. They were that good they had me in tears.”

“You and a good many others,” Master Ashewell said. “I agree there’s no room for quarrel about it.”

Everyone looked at Medcote, whose agreement should have come readily, but it did not. To Joliffe it was almost as if he were thinking the chance to make trouble by arguing would be worth it. No, Joliffe corrected. By the glint in Medcote’s eyes, he was not
almost
thinking that—he was very certainly thinking it, and Joliffe’s tight hold on his anger at the man began to slip. The players had done far better work today than was asked or expected of them, and now they were threatened with being cheated by the priest’s greed and Medcote’s love of trouble.

There was no telling whether, in the end, Medcote resisted the temptation to make trouble or simply decided that irking Father Hewgo would be more diverting, but he said, “I agree. They should have full payment and no quarrel.”

Balked of his last hope of an ally, Father Hewgo folded his arms across his chest and stood glowering at them all, Medcote included, while Master Kyping went on with the counting-out.

This was the second time Joliffe had seen Father Hewgo’s expectation of support from Medcote disappointed. Whatever alliance the priest thought they had was either ended or one on which he had better learn not to depend.

Master Kyping finished the full counting, then counted out the players’ share to one side, all very openly and fairly. While Father Hewgo brought a small but iron-bound box from a closed aumbry against the wall, Basset loosed his leather pouch from his belt, swept the players’ share into it, latched it firmly closed, and refastened it to his belt. While the priest scooped the considerable remainder of the coins into his box as if expecting someone would yet try to “cheat” him out of even more, Basset and Joliffe bowed to the other men with more thanks given all around and then got themselves out and away from the sacristy, gathering speed as they left the church, wanting nothing so much as to be well away from the place. By the time they were outside and crossing the churchyard, they were at as full a stride as possible short of breaking into a run.

The village was nearly settled back to its usual quiet, with most of those come for the church ale well on their way home by now, to be there before dark or not long after. Joliffe wondered if Mary’s husband had hired a horse for the day, or if she would be walking back to Faringdon, the child asleep in her arms, his head heavy on her shoulder. Or maybe her husband was a good enough husband that he would be carrying the boy, with maybe a hand free to be holding Mary’s hand.

Joliffe was unready for the loneliness that shifted through him then, and he gave it a hard shove to keep it shifting right on and away. Choices made were choices made, with regrets and what-ifs to be left behind with the choice unchosen. Or else carried well back in the mind, to be brought forward and considered in the balance when time came to make new choices. And presently he had no need to make new choices or regret old ones, well settled as he was into the player’s life and things going as they were for the company.

Basset waited until the village was behind them and the road all theirs, with the lowering sun throwing shadows long across the level fields around them, before he said a few sharp things about Father Hewgo, and then, “Saints! I don’t know when I’ve seen so many ill-humours going so many different ways as we have here.”

“Gosyn and Master Ashewell at least are friends, by the look of it,” Joliffe said, “but neither of them much likes Medcote, and nobody likes the priest.”

“Who returns the favor. And then there’s the man who was quarreling with Medcote in the churchyard just now, with bad blood there, for certain. And those are just who we’ve noted the few days we’ve been here.”

“You missed the fellow angry at Gosyn earlier today,” Joliffe said. “And Gosyn angry at him, come to that. Let alone what had passed between Hal Medcote and Gosyn, and Nicholas Ashewell. You didn’t see that either.”

“Saint Genesius see us away from here tomorrow,” Basset said from the heart. “When does that bailiff mean to talk with us? He should have heard by now from the steward or his abbess why we’re here, but asking him in the church seemed a poor thought since I doubt he wants anyone here to know they’ve been spied on.”

“That’s likely it,” Joliffe said. “Maybe he means to meet us on the road after we’re away.”

“However it is, it’s his trouble to talk to us, not ours to find the chance to speak to him. No matter what, we leave in the morning,” Basset declared.

“Amen!” Joliffe agreed.

By the time they came to the field, Tisbe was unharnessed and set to graze, and Ellis and Gil were just lifting the first hamper out of the cart. Basset stopped them with, “It was a great day in more ways than one! Before we do anything else, lay out the exchequer cloth, Rose!”

An exchequer cloth was painted in large squares—checkered—and used for counting out and reckoning money by large households and governments with money enough to need such accounting. The players did not have, had never had, any such cloth, and laughing at her father, Rose got her white apron from the cart and laid it on the grass beside the firepit. The players gathered around it, sitting down on their heels or on the grass. Basset emptied today’s coins into a heap on the apron and with due solemnity counted them out in even shares, one share to each of them and a share for the company purse.

In the usual way of things, Basset would then write it all down on the small scroll he kept of the company’s accounts, such as they were, give each of them a few coins from their share, and all the rest to Rose to hide in the cart in a place only she was supposed to know. There it was carefully kept and given out as needed, rather than wantonly spent, with the company’s share kept to meet the company’s day-to-day needs and any grievous necessity that might come, St. Genesius forbid. But this time with the counting finished, Basset sat back, looked at the separate gatherings of coins, and then shoved all of Ellis’ toward him, all of Joliffe’s toward him, and so on to the others, saying, “This you’ve all earned twice over. Today’s work was more than I’ve ever asked of you, and you met my hopes to the full.”

Piers whooped and scooped his coins into his belt pouch before springing to his feet and into delighted dance around the campsite. Rose put an arm around her father’s shoulders and kissed his cheek. Ellis, Joliffe, and Gil thanked him heartily.

“My thanks doubled to you,” Basset answered. “Without it was all of us together, we’d not have made it. Now let’s finish the day and have our well-earned rest.”

With a sense of high triumph, they set to their end-of-day work, the men and Gil making short work of hauling the hampers out of the cart, then leaving them to Rose, seeing to building up the fire and putting the bedding into the tent again, while Piers fetched water and Rose looked over the garb and properties they had used that day, finding nothing that needed washing and only the hem on Christ’s robe in need of mending where it had pulled out. That was something easily done and could wait for a better time, because by the time everything was folded and packed away to her satisfaction, dark was drawn well in. It was by firelight and the sunset’s last glow that the men reloaded the hampers into the cart along with everything else except what they would need tonight and in the morning.

With that their day was done except for supper, and after their good meal in the village, they settled now for simply bread and cheese and ale, no work for anyone, most especially Rose. At his grandfather’s bidding, Piers had built up the fire against the coming darkness and cooling night, and they gathered around it, fairly tired past much talking, simply eating and drinking, with it becoming clear that Medcote had done one good thing today. While Rose sat with one arm around Piers, who was leaning against her more asleep than not, on her other side she was leaning against Ellis, his arm around her. The comfort he had given her today, and her anger and fear at Medcote, had brought down the wall she had set between herself and Ellis. It was maybe forgiveness between them now, or maybe it was only her need of him, but by the look of it, Ellis had hope she would take more than comfort from him tonight, Joliffe thought.