A Flight of Arrows Read online

  ‘As God is my witness,’ Courcy said, ‘I had no idea this was his intention. I thought he was on our side. He told me he wanted the powder to arm some ships.’

  ‘Ships?’

  ‘Apparently he is a shipowner, and some of his ships are armed with guns. Pots-de-feu, they call them in these parts. He was powerful knowledgeable about powder, quite put me to shame. I thought he was a fellow professional.’

  ‘So you sold him the powder, no doubt for a tidy profit. What next? You’re an alchemist, you said. You intended to make more powder yourself, and offer it to the king’s officers to replace the missing stocks. Once again, for a profit.’

  ‘I saw no harm in it,’ Courcy said. ‘Making gunpowder is easy, herald. You only need three ingredients: sulphur, charcoal and saltpetre. Getting hold of the sulphur is easy if you know the right people. Charcoal is cheap and plentiful, and if you want saltpetre, all you have to do is piss in a bucket. The king would have had all the powder he needed in a day or two. I swear on my mother’s grave, I intended no evil.’

  Merrivale regarded him for a long time. ‘I am sorry to hear of the loss of your mother,’ he said finally.

  ‘Don’t be. She’s as hale and well as I am. Her grave is already marked out and paid for in Kingsale church, nice and close to the altar so she’ll go to heaven all the faster. Unlike my father, who is headed in the opposite direction.’ Courcy sighed. ‘What happens now?’

  ‘We are alone,’ Merrivale said, watching his eyes. ‘You could try to kill me and then make a run for it.’

  ‘I could. But the problem is, you saved my life just now. Killing you would be damned ungrateful, wouldn’t it?’ Courcy tossed his sword in the air, grabbed it around the blade just below the crossguard and handed it to Merrivale hilt first. ‘Receive my surrender,’ he said.

  The herald took the sword, considered it for a few moments, and handed it back. ‘Return the serpentine to the king’s stores,’ he said. ‘How you do it, I do not care. What story you invent to account for its reappearance, I do not care. But make it so.’

  The other man hesitated. ‘And then what? We carry on as if nothing happened?’

  ‘Not quite. If you transgress again, I will inform the king and the constable and let you take the consequences.’

  Courcy thought about this. ‘Fair enough,’ he said. ‘Rather more than I deserve, in fact. People have always told me I am not worthy of my friends. I won’t say you can rely on me, because clearly you cannot. But I will do my best to keep my nose clean. You have my oath on that.’

  ‘There is one more thing,’ Merrivale said. ‘Help me discover who killed Edmund Bray. Do that, and I will use whatever influence I have to help you find you a position, something with a stipend attached that will give you the means to live. What income do you have now?’

  ‘Income? Faith now. I own a tavern in Carbery, back in Ireland, but it costs more to run than it brings in. From which you may gather that I am not a great success as a tavern keeper. I came to the war hoping to recoup my losses. So far, without much luck.’

  ‘And yet despite the wrong you did, you also proved your worth today,’ said Merrivale. ‘And you saved young Mortimer’s life last night. You deserve better, I think.’

  ‘Not everyone would agree with you. But I thank you for the kind sentiment, and if I can help you, I will. You have my oath on that too.’ Courcy paused. ‘You’ve probably heard this question before, herald. Why does this matter so much to you?’

  ‘Bray was killed because he witnessed a meeting between Fierville and a French knight,’ Merrivale said. ‘But I doubt that Fierville killed him. And if he did not, that means Fierville has accomplices in the army, men who are both traitors and murderers. I intend to discover who they are.’

  ‘Traitors and murderers,’ Courcy repeated. ‘You’re playing with fire, herald.’

  ‘I know,’ said Merrivale.

  7

  Carentan, 20th of July, 1346

  Evening

  Smoke boiled from the ruins of Carentan. A few stone walls still stood, but the stink of burning filled the air for miles.

  Godefroi d’Harcourt’s tent stood on rising ground east of the city walls, overlooking the flooded marshes. Merrivale stopped outside and spoke to the guard, a Norman serjeant in an iron helmet with an old-fashioned nose guard. ‘Ask his lordship if he will receive me.’

  The guard stepped into the tent. There was a brief murmur of conversation, and then he reappeared. ‘You may enter.’

  Harcourt was seated before a wooden table, reading letters. ‘What is it?’ he asked curtly.

  ‘Jean de Fierville is dead,’ Merrivale said, and waited.

  ‘How?’ Harcourt asked after a moment.

  ‘He and Barbizan, the captain of the garrison, attempted to destroy the gatehouse of the castle with gunpowder, but they were foiled by Sir Nicholas Courcy. Both were killed.’

  Harcourt looked up sharply. ‘Fierville was working with the enemy?’

  ‘Probably for some time, since before the army departed from Portchester. He was a conduit between Bertrand and other French agents embedded in our army. He passed on messages to a French knight named Macio Chauffin.’

  ‘Christ Jesus,’ said Harcourt, and Merrivale saw the bitterness in his scarred face. ‘I also employed him as a messenger to send letters to my allies in the countryside inviting them to join us. And he betrayed them to Bertrand. All of them have been arrested and executed.’

  ‘I suspect that is why he came to report to you in Saint-Côme-du-Mont: to tell you they were dead. I dispatched him to find you at Coigny, but he must have known I was suspicious of him, and he joined the enemy instead.’

  A long silence ensued. ‘My attempt to rouse the Norman nobles has failed,’ Harcourt said. ‘My friends, on whom I counted for support, are dead. The rest of the nobility have been persuaded, or threatened, into continuing their allegiance to Philippe. Not a single man will come over to me now.’

  He slammed his hand down on the wooden table so hard the parchment sheets jumped and fell to the ground. ‘I have failed, utterly. It is over.’

  ‘Surely not yet, my lord. Our army is strong.’

  ‘If you think fifteen thousand men can defeat France, you are a fool.’ Abruptly, Harcourt rose and walked out of the tent.

  * * *

  ‘Good evening, Sir Thomas.’

  Thomas Holland turned and glared at the herald. A group of young men had gathered around the Prince of Wales, who was rolling dice. They shouted and waved their wine cups when they won, and the prince, as always, laughed uproariously when he lost. He could afford to, Merrivale thought. He didn’t have to pay the bills. When he ran out of money, he applied to his treasurer, and his treasurer applied to the Exchequer. Job done.

  ‘You are not joining them?’ Merrivale asked, indicating the gamblers.

  A jongleur was playing a lute, rather well. No one was paying him the slightest attention. ‘I cannot afford it,’ Holland said brusquely. ‘I am not a rich man, herald. In case you hadn’t noticed.’

  Merrivale pursed his lips. ‘I had. But some of your men seem to be doing rather well. There is one party of looters from Wigan who are making sizeable profits. Perhaps you know them. Their vintenar is a big man, bald, with a scar across his head.’

  ‘I know who you mean. So?’

  ‘They are professional looters. Did you know they were out on the Valognes road the day Bray was killed?’

  Holland stiffened. ‘What are you insinuating?’

  ‘They might have seen what happened to him. Did they say anything to you?’

  ‘I don’t gossip with common soldiers.’

  ‘Will you make enquiries on my behalf?’

  ‘I will not. I owe you no favours, herald, and I don’t give a damn about what happened to Bray. I told you, I couldn’t stand the little turd.’

  ‘Then let me ask you another question. How well do you know Macio Chauffin?’

  Holland stared at
him. ‘What has that to do with anything?’

  ‘Chauffin was out on the Valognes road too, at the same time as your archers. Did you try to send him a message? Using Jean de Fierville as the messenger, perhaps?’

  For a moment he thought Holland was going to reach for his sword, but unusually, the one-eyed knight managed to control his temper. ‘If you have an accusation to make, herald, then make it.’

  ‘No,’ said Merrivale. ‘But if you want to allay my suspicions, you could try answering my question.’

  ‘Not that it is any of your business, but I met Macio in Prussia. He was serving with the Count of Eu.’

  ‘The Constable of France.’

  ‘Yes,’ Holland said impatiently. ‘There was a truce between England and France at the time, if you recall. So we all went to Prussia to fight the pagans. We were in Königsberg, and then out on the frontier at Allenstein and Rössel. We served together for about a year, all told. I haven’t seen Macio since we left Prussia.’

  ‘But you remain on friendly terms.’

  ‘Yes. Is that a crime?’

  ‘No,’ said Merrivale. ‘So long as friendship is all that passes between you.’

  ‘Go to hell,’ said Holland, and he turned on his heel and walked away.

  The prince had just lost a sizeable stake to his friend Salisbury. He yelped with laughter and called for more wine. Sir John Grey came and laid a hand on the herald’s shoulder. ‘You appear to have provoked Sir Thomas,’ he said.

  ‘I fear it takes very little to do so,’ said Merrivale. ‘He is an angry and bitter man.’

  ‘He has no monopoly on either anger or bitterness,’ Grey said unexpectedly. ‘But some of us manage to control our emotions rather better than he does. You had a couple of close shaves today. I came to see if you were well.’

  ‘I am, thanks to your forethought. Did you find the rest of the garrison?’

  ‘As you suspected, after Barbizan was killed, they fled through a postern behind the donjon. We caught them in the streets before they could get to the Saint-Lô gate. Thank you for sending Matt and Pip with the message.’

  ‘Tell me something, Sir John. When you decided to send your men after me, why did you choose those two?’

  ‘Because they are the best I have,’ Grey said.

  ‘Tell me more about them. You said they come from Warwickshire.’

  ‘Yes. Their father was a gamekeeper and forester on the Clinton estate at Kenilworth. Their mother died long ago, and their father reared them and taught them to shoot. When he died last year, the Kenilworth steward turned them out of their home. They were wandering vagabonds when my master bowman found them. He recruited them, and they have served us well ever since.’

  In his mind’s eye Merrivale saw Fierville stretched dead on the cobbles, shot in the back in exactly the same manner as Edmund Bray. The similarities between the two killings were shocking, and yet they were not identical. He remembered what Pip had said at Quettehou. We wouldn’t have wasted a second arrow. One would have been enough.

  Grey was watching his face. ‘If you think they had anything to do with Bray’s death, you are barking up the wrong tree. I have no doubts whatever about their fidelity.’

  ‘I am pleased to hear it,’ Merrivale said. ‘Thank you once again, Sir John.’

  ‘No thanks are necessary. I wish you good night.’

  Grey departed. Merrivale watched the gamblers for a moment longer, and then he too walked away towards his tent.

  * * *

  Tiphaine de Tesson was waiting for him. Her red hair hung in ragged locks around her neck; rather than attempting to disentangle the matted, filthy tresses, she had cut most of them off. Her ruined gown had been discarded too, and she wore a man’s green tunic over a plain shirt, and baggy, wrinkled hose with a pair of soft leather boots. She looked tense and suspicious. ‘Your servants brought me here and found me some clothes,’ she said. ‘I assume they did so at your orders.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Merrivale. ‘You need shelter until we can take you to a place of safety.’

  She shifted from one foot to the other. ‘For me, there is no place of safety.’

  He regarded her, seeing the suspicion and fear still dark in her eyes. ‘Have you no family or friends to whom you could go?’

  She shook her head. ‘Many are dead. Most of the rest are scattered, in hiding or in exile. Those who remain are known and watched, and have been threatened with dire punishment if they consort with rebels. Even to admit me to their house would be a sentence of death.’

  Merrivale frowned. ‘If you have been in prison for two years, demoiselle, how do you know this?’

  ‘Two friends of my father were captured and brought to Carentan in March. They told me that Robert Bertrand was sending riders all across the country, saying that the English were coming and threatening retribution to any who aided them. My father’s friends were arrested and executed as an example to the others. Then, after the landing, Bertrand arrested several more men whose loyalty was suspect and sent them in chains to Caen. They too now have been executed. Barbizan told me this,’ she said, anticipating his question. ‘He wanted me to know that the Norman revolt had failed.’

  The executed men would be the friends that Harcourt had spoken of. His hopes truly had been crushed. ‘I am sorry,’ Merrivale said.

  ‘Do not be.’ Her chin came up a little. ‘Barbizan was wrong. There are other Norman lords, powerful and in high places, who have long contemplated revolt. The Count of Eu, the Constable of France, is one of them. The Queen of Navarre is another. One day, Normandy will throw off the French yoke and be a free state once more.’

  Merrivale digested this. ‘These others, the Count of Eu and the lady of Navarre. Can they not help you?’

  ‘Even if they would help me, which I doubt, how would I get to them? Your soldiers are marauding and plundering everywhere. And you will not be on hand to rescue me again.’ She shivered. ‘If this is indeed a rescue.’

  ‘I have no designs on your person,’ Merrivale said calmly. He turned to Mauro. ‘Find the lady a cot and some bedclothes and… whatever else she needs. And rig a curtain across the tent so she has some privacy.’

  ‘Yes, señor.’

  ‘You are very kind,’ Tiphaine said, and there were sudden tears in her brown eyes. ‘I am sorry that I doubted you.’

  Merrivale bowed. ‘And now you must forgive me,’ he said, a little abruptly. ‘I fear I have work to do.’

  * * *

  Inquisition into the death of Edmund Bray, knight, near the village of Quettehou in Normandy on the XIIth day of July, in the nineteenth year of the reign of King Edward III. This report was composed on the XXth day of the same month.

  Two possible reasons for Sir Edmund’s death remain. The first is that he was killed by looters, and the second is that he was killed deliberately following his witnessing a meeting between Jean de Fierville and the French miles Macio Chauffin.

  Item, as to whether he was killed by troops whom he encountered looting. I can now exonerate Sir Nicholas Courcy of Kingsale and his men. However, a second body of plunderers, soldiers in the retinue of Sir Thomas Holland, were also in the area. They are also archers, and Sir Edmund was killed by two arrows from a longbow. However, there is no firm evidence that they killed him.

  Item, it is therefore probable, in my view, that while scouting on the Valognes road, Bray encountered Fierville in the act of passing information to Macio Chauffin. It follows that Bray may have been killed to prevent him from disclosing Fierville’s treachery.

  Item, it remains unclear who actually killed Bray. A search of Fierville’s baggage found no sign of a bow or quiver. I believe that the killer remains at large and that he was, and in all probability still is, among the ranks of our army.

  Simon Merrivale, heraldus

  * * *

  It was a short walk to the king’s big pavilion, glowing red with lamplight. Michael Northburgh’s tent was next to it, guarded by a single serj
eant. Beyond the camp, the walls of Carentan stood black, silhouetted against the still-glowing embers of the town behind them.

  Northburgh read the report, frowning. ‘So Fierville was a traitor all along?’

  ‘Yes, but not the only one. The maid who helps look after the king’s cattle overheard two men talking at Freshwater, planning to send a message to Robert Bertrand. Both were English, she says. And the demoiselle de Tesson has told me that Bertrand began arresting and intimidating suspected rebels as early as March this year.’

  ‘March! For God’s sake, the final decision to invade Normandy was only taken in February. The French must have had the news almost as soon as we did!’

  ‘There is something else you need to know,’ Merrivale said. ‘The demoiselle claims that the Count of Eu and the Queen of Navarre may also be considering rebellion.’

  Raoul de Brienne, Count of Eu and Constable of France, came from one of the highest families in the land; one of his ancestors had been King of Jerusalem and Emperor of Constantinople. Jeanne of Navarre was King Edward’s cousin, and like him had a reasonable claim to the French crown. ‘You didn’t put that in your report,’ Northburgh said.

  ‘My commission is to enquire into the death of Edmund Bray. I am telling you so that you may pass this news to the king. And claim the credit, if you wish,’ Merrivale added.

  ‘Very generous of you. What have you done with the demoiselle?’

  ‘She remains with me for the moment, until I can find a safe place for her.’

  ‘Ah.’ Northburgh winked. ‘Is she comely?’

  ‘That question is beneath you, Michael,’ the herald said stiffly.

  ‘Come, come, old friend, I am joking. These archers of Holland’s. You reckon Bray wasn’t killed by looters, but one of these men might have been acting on orders from Fierville, or the other traitors. Shall we arrest them and put them to the question?’

  Merrivale shook his head. ‘I have no actual evidence against them. Besides, I have always had doubts about torture as a means of persuasion. Men will say whatever they think the torturer wishes to hear. As a result, we get the answers we want, but not the answers we need.’