12 The Bastard's Tale by Frazer Margaret

Author:Frazer, Margaret [Frazer, Margaret]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: __Fixed, Britain, Convent, England, Fiction, good quality scan, Great Britain, _BIG_FIXUP, Henry VI; 1422-1461, Historical, History, Medieval, Mystery & Detective, Nuns, Traditional British, Women Sleuth
ISBN: 9780709075295
Google: sDFXAAAAYAAJ
Amazon: 0709075294
Publisher: Robert Hale
Published: 2003-01-07T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15

As Arteys had hoped, the wellyard was deserted at that cold, dark hour. He swung the board back into place and moved away from the fence. “Once you’re in,” Joliffe had said, “move as if you belong there. Try to stay out of the light, where you might be recognized, but don’t skulk. Nobody looks at servants going about their business but they look at skulkers. You understand?”

Arteys had understood; had understood, too, when Joliffe added, “After you’re in, how you come to Gloucester is your trouble. I don’t know inside St. Saviour’s well enough to give you even a guess.”

‘He’s in the rooms he was meant to have?“ Arteys had asked.

‘Yes.“

‘Then if the guards go away, I can reach him.“

If the guards went away as Joliffe had hoped and if nothing had been done about the outside stairs from the warden’s yard to Gloucester’s bedchamber.

But to find those things out, Arteys had to reach there, and remembering Joliffe’s order not to skulk, he walked openly out of the wellyard, across the stableyard, and into the wider yard beyond it. No one was anywhere. A few torches were burning, fretful in the wind, but such people as might usually have been out and about were away to the hall, he guessed, just as Joliffe had said. What had seemed possible when talked of in Bishop Pecock’s chamber began to seem truly probable.

His first pause came at the gate into the warden’s small yard. Keeping to a patch of shadow, he stood still, listening for any sound of someone on guard at the stairs. The red glow of a firepot was reflected on the courtyard’s far wall, telling somebody was or had been there, and he watched for a shadow of a pacing guard across it because the pot’s small charcoal-warmth was enough to keep a man from freezing but not enough to keep him warm. Anyone there would surely, sooner or later, move, shuffle, shift, or pace; but save for an outbreak of large laughter from the hall that told him the players were at work, Arteys heard nothing and slowly he edged his head around the gateway’s corner.

No one was there. He gave himself no time to think about it but rapidly crossed the yard to the stairs, into the darkness under their penticed roof meant to keep rain and snow off them but making welcome shadow tonight as he went up them to the door at the top. They were of wood but gave no betraying creak and at the top the wooden walls that porched the door on two sides to shield against wind gave him more hiding and would serve to keep any light from shining out like a beacon into the night when—if—he opened the door.

Safe from being seen but hardly feeling safe, Arteys leaned his head against the door’s thick planks, listening while he opened his belt pouch and took out the key. He heard neither voices nor movement but that was assurance of nothing.

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