THE EARL (A HAMMER FOR PRINCES) (34 page)

“He was stabbed from behind,” Fulk said. “Who?”

Leicester sent away his men. “Looters, I would think. We found him in the alley this morning, as you see him.”

“What was he doing in Stamford?”

“Chester sent him in last night, apparently, to carry this message to Thierry.” Leicester took a scrap of canvas from his coat; there was writing on it.

“Chester sent him alone?”

“I don’t know.”

 Fulk looked at the piece of canvas. The scribbling on it blurred so he could not read it. He said, “It’s for my sins. God has stricken me for my sins.”

“Will you take him to Ledgefield?”

Fulk made a small sound in his throat. Morgan had sunk down near Rannulf’s head and was staring at him. “Is it too far?” Fulk said. “But Eleanor would want to bury him. His lady.”

Leicester said, “I will arrange it.” He got up and went to the door.

Fulk looked around. Roger came in. “My lord—” He knelt stiffly in his hauberk. “Do you need me, my lord?”

“We’ll take him to Ledgefield.”

“They say that Chester sent him to the city and he was killed there,” Roger said.

Fulk nodded; he was staring at Rannulf’s face. It looked much older. My son is dead. He could not bear to think of Margaret. Morgan went to a chest and opened it and took out a cloak lined with fur. Coming back, he unhooked the clasp of the one Rannulf was wearing. The sentry said, “My lord, my lord of Chester is here.”

With Chester came Rannulf’s squire, who began to help Morgan. Chester said, “Fulk, I had no idea he would go alone. He knew the city was—”

“Thank you,” Fulk said mechanically, to make him stop.

“They’re blaming me, all over the camp,” Chester said. “Everyone liked Rannulf.”

Fulk stood up. Eleanor, Rannulf’s wife, with her two baby children—He thought again of Margaret. The sentry let Simon d’Ivry in, who bent down to look at Rannulf and threw a harsh glare at Chester. Fulk stared at Chester, wondering what he was doing in here, and the sentry put his head in the door and said that Thierry was outside.

“No,” Fulk said, but Thierry was already through the door.

“Poor Rannulf,” Thierry said, and knelt down and put his hand on the boy’s wounds.

Fulk went over to Leicester and said softly, “Get them out of here, please.”

Leicester spoke to the men filling the tent. Fulk went into the back, among the piles of packed baggage. He felt hot, and he ground the heels of his hands into his eyes to stop the tears flowing.

“They’re gone,” Morgan said, and he turned. Even Leicester was gone. Rannulf’s squire had wrapped Rannulf into the cloak. Morgan was straightening the body’s legs.

“Let me,” the other squire cried. “He was my master.”

Morgan slid back out of the way. We should take him to Stafford, Fulk thought. And lay him under the altar where his mother lies and his great-grandfather, where I will lie. Ledgefield was closer. It’s for my sins. See how I am punished. He pressed his fist to his chest.

A man of Leicester’s came back, with Roger, and Roger said, “My lord, we have a litter. Is that enough?”

“Yes.”

He had bled so much—his clothes were stiff with blood; if they had found him sooner, might he not have lived? Fulk wiped his face on his sleeve. Don’t think that way. I could not find him last night, he must have been in Stamford.

Hugh came in, looked at Rannulf, and came straight to Fulk. “My lord, shall I go with you? To Ledgefield.”

Fulk jerked his head up. He had not thought of Hugh once. Calm, not crying, Hugh met his gaze and said, “I’m sorry. Let me go.”

“I should have asked you to,” Fulk said.

“Do they know who did it?”

Fulk shook his head. “Looters. Maybe we can find out.” Hugh’s face was all new to him, like a stranger’s: my living son. “Did you see him before he died? Yesterday?”

“No. I haven’t seen much of him since he came. We always fought, you know that.”

So did he and I. Fulk shook his head; he felt as if he were waking up. He looked around the tent. “When will we leave?”

“Before noon,” Roger said. “Morgan, get your lord some wine.”

“No. I’d get drunk.” Fulk stood up. “Morgan, you’ll have to unpack again, I’ll need clothes. We’ll be gone some days, Hugh. Get ready.” He walked aimlessly around the tent, and went to the door. Outside, the camp in the confusion of breaking up covered the stretch of land between him and Stamford, and he stood and watched it all blur and clear and blur before his eyes.

Ledgefield Castle stood on a low round hill, baked hot and brown by the late summer sun; like Stafford, it had a gatehouse and a tower opposite each other on the wall, but it was made of gray limestone, not the red rock of Stafford. They reached it in three days from Stamford, and took the body into the chapel and laid it out before the altar.

Hugh had gone on ahead of Fulk to tell Eleanor. She met them and led them into the chapel; Fulk beside her could see her hands trembling, but she neither wept not spoke, and her pale, thin face was expressionless. She looked at Rannulf once, after he had been laid out, and turned to Fulk.

“Come inside, my lord.”

She took him across the courtyard. The chickens scattered before her, clucking; her household was all gathered in a quiet knot by the well. Hugh was arranging everything, she said, in a toneless voice, and took him up the stairs into the gatehouse. She passed the door into the hall and went up another flight of steps to the top room, where she slept and where her children were.

“She is asleep,” she said, nodding toward the bed on the far side of the room. Fulk could see the little girl curled up on it, beside a hunting dog. It was getting dark, and Eleanor picked up a candle and lit it from one on the wall. She lifted the candle over the cradle.

All Fulk could see of the baby was its mass of dark hair and a fat little hand. Eleanor thrust her free hand out quickly to catch the wax dripping down the candle, so that it would not splash on her baby, and turned away. The light shone on her plaited yellow hair and in her pale eyes.

“I can’t believe he’s dead.” She whimpered and moved away. “I thought I would see him once again, at least.” When she walked, the bundle of keys at her belt jangled; she walked heavily, like an old woman. She was seventeen.

“Mama?” the little girl called sleepily, and the dog lifted its head and licked her face. Her nurse came out of the alcove and went over to quiet her. Fulk heard the murmur of the old woman and the child’s drowsy voice and went out the door after Eleanor.

“Will you find out who did it?”

“I’ll try. I don’t know. They robbed him, we’ll keep watch for what they took.”

“Since Hugh came I looked at the babies, until you came. Just at my babies.” She went down the narrow stairs, holding the candle up with one hand and her skirts with the other.

“Where is Hugh?”

“In here.” On the landing before the door into the hall, she pulled at the latch, and it opened immediately from inside. Roger backed up to let them in.

“Thank you, Sir Roger,” Eleanor said. She put down the candle, took a napkin edged in braided red and yellow thread and blew her nose. Her head turned toward Fulk. “Do you think it was an accident, that my husband died?”

Roger went off across the room, toward the bed in the corner. Morgan was there already, watching from the shadows, with Hugh. Fulk frowned at Eleanor. “What do you mean?”

“I have lived thus far in my life and seen nothing that was accident,” she said. “Tell me it was an accident that my husband is dead.”

“He was robbed and murdered,” Fulk said. With a glance, he saw that Roger was watching him intently. Chester sent him there, he thought; his heart was hammering, and he could not meet Eleanor’s eyes. Chester—he shook his head. “I know what you mean. It was an accident.”

All her face swollen, her eyes red behind their pale, thin lashes, Eleanor faced him, exactly his height, and said, “I want my vengeance.”

There was a page near the door. Fulk beckoned to him. “Go to bed, my lady.”

“Rannulf is dead, I want vengeance.”

The page stood beside her. Fulk said, “Light my lady to her rooms, boy. Eleanor, I have to go back to Stamford tomorrow. Whoever killed him, I will find out.”

“God’s curse on you if you do not.” She turned stiffly, as if she were made of wood, and followed the page and his candle. From the doorway, Fulk watched her go up the stair, and after she had rounded the corner he watched the candlelight bobbing along the wall. He pulled the door shut by the iron ring of the latch.

“Do you think it was an accident?” Roger said.

Fulk crossed the room to the end where the bed was. On the hearth, there was a basin of water warming, and he sent Morgan for it. He thought, If it were no accident, then I am not guilty. “I would believe that it wasn’t, if I could think who would want to kill Rannulf.”

“Chester sent him there alone.”

“Why should Chester kill him?” He pulled off his coat and his shirt; Morgan put the basin down in front of him, and he bent to wash his face and hands. “Chester would kill me, not Rannulf. Thierry would kill me. You just want someone to strike back at.” He dried himself off and reached for his shirt again.

“Where are you going?” Morgan said. “You are tired. You should sleep.”

To the chapel,” Fulk said. He put on his shirt again and took his coat over his arm. “To pray.”

Eleanor cried all through the mass, and her daughter, terrified, clung to her and howled. Fulk could hardly keep his eyes open. He had slept a while, on the floor of the chapel, but it had not been enough. The stench of the dead man drowned the incense. The voice of the priest sounded as if it came from a great distance. They carried Rannulf down into the vault under the altar, and the clammy, sweating air woke Fulk up a little. Eleanor’s sobs and the screams of the little girl and the baby reverberated around the tomb. Long before they went back up into the chapel, Fulk was shaking violently. Roger saw it and gave him his cloak.

They went up into the sunlight, the soft wind, and the blue sky. Their horses were waiting, and Roger sent the knights who had come with them to mount up. Eleanor came over, clutching the baby, with the little girl in the arms of her nurse and still screaming.

“My lord, when I spoke last night—” She bit her lip until it turned white. “I was wild, I meant no insolence.”

“You are never insolent.” She hadn’t slept either, he could tell by her hollow eyes. “I wish I could stay longer. Is there anything I can say to comfort you?”

“My lord, you know there is not.” In her arms, the baby looked up at her solemnly and yawned.

“Take your children and go to your mother. I don’t want you to stay here alone.”

“No,” she said. “I have Ledgefield to rule, I’m a grown woman now. Be careful, my lord.”

Fulk kissed her hand and her cheek and went toward his horse. He was so tired that he had to stop and gather his strength before he could step into his saddle. It had done no good, all the prayer; he had gotten neither an answer nor resignation. The ride back to Stamford seemed like a torture and the great affairs there of no more importance than the flutter of the leaves in the wind.

“Let’s go,” he said to Roger, and they rode at a noisy trot out the gate.

TEN

The gold medal of Saint Anne lay in Fulk's palm. Before him, Simon twuisted the ring on his little finger as if he meant to tear his finger off. "That man of Thierry's had it--Haaken. Thierry came to him when he saw he was wearing it and they argued and Thierry took it from him. I got it later from his room. He and all his men are in one of Lincoln's houses, they don't tyhink it odd if I go there, they know me from before when I was Thierry's man. You know that medal is Rannulf's."
      Fulk turned the medal over in his fingers. "It was Rannulf's."  He drew a deep breath and held it a moment and let it out. In a soft voice, he said, "I would not have thought this of Thierry."

"My lord, let me--"

"No." Fyulk stood up, toiok the medal, and went into the back of the room to put it into his chest. This room was large and sunny, and he could look out the windows and see the trees of the garden. He went back to Simon.

"The man who had it, before Thierry took it," he said to Simpon. "Haaken. Go get him for me. Not dead."

"I can't, my lord," Simon said. "He is dead. Drowned. They pulled him out of the river the day after I saw him with the medal."

Fulk clicked his tongue. "Too bad. You must have frightened them. Don't go down there again, Thierry must know--No, no, go if you wish, but be careful, and keep watch on him for me. Will you?"

"My lord," Simon said, fiercely.

"Never let him go anywhere without your watching."

Simon whirled and bounded out the door. Fulk stood looking at the trees through the window; they were heavy with ripe apples.

It was proof of nothing, that the man had the medal--Fulk could think of several ways he might have come by it, and several innocent reasons why Thierry would have taken it from him. But the man was dead. Another accident. Fulk called to Morgan for his cloak and went down the stair into the hall of the house.