A Vigil of Spies by Candace Robb

Author:Candace Robb [Robb, Candace]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Tags: Crime, Mystery & Detective, General, Historical, Fiction
ISBN: 9781407010809
Google: AoLDvIjgpJ0C
Amazon: B004FV4XNA
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2010-12-13T18:30:00+00:00

Anticipating that the presence of the Princess of Wales would insinuate itself in some marvellous way throughout the palace of Bishopthorpe, Alisoun was disappointed to find the archbishop’s chamber unchanged. It was still overheated, dark, and tinged with the smell of the sickroom, though the latter only faintly, for Brother Michaelo was skilled in tempering the odour with fragrant fires and aromatic oils.

Brother Michaelo, however, seemed alarmingly changed. Wilted. Hollow-eyed.

‘Benedicite, Alisoun,’ he said, rising from his seat beside the archbishop’s great bed, his smile oddly sad, as if she reminded him of happier times now gone.

‘Benedicite, Brother Michaelo,’ she said. ‘Dame Magda is with Captain Archer. She sent me to arrange her things.’

‘Are you hungry? Thirsty?’

She nodded. ‘Dame Magda told me to have a servant bring food.’ She glanced at the servant who stood ready at the door.

‘Yes,’ Michaelo nodded to him, ‘some food for this young woman. And for Dame Magda?’

‘She said she would nap a while, and then attend His Grace,’ said Alisoun.

Michaelo motioned for the servant to see to it, then led Alisoun away from the sleeping archbishop to review with her His Grace’s condition during her absence. Alisoun wondered whether the archbishop had surrendered to his fate with the physician’s diagnosis, but Michaelo did not allude to that and she was not comfortable asking him. When she had eaten a little and arranged Magda’s trunk of physicks, she offered to sit by His Grace.

Michaelo seemed most grateful. ‘I will leave you, then, and go make certain the servants are seeing to the evening meal. With so many guests, they are easily confused.’

He stopped in a far corner to drop something on a cot that had not been there before. She wondered whether that was a sign that the archbishop needed more constant attention.

A quiet time ensued, interrupted only by one of the sisters the captain had warned her about inquiring whether Alisoun would like some company. It was the older one, Dame Katherine, and Alisoun saw no harm in her presence as long as she was not left alone in the chamber. They sat quietly for a long while, the nun praying, Alisoun spinning. When Thoresby woke and asked for some wine, the sister departed, having exhibited no suspicious behaviour. The archbishop seemed genuinely glad to see Alisoun. She did not find him at all diminished by the gloomy prognosis of the princess’s physician. In fact, he seemed as calm and matter-of-fact as before, though he sought to reassure her that she need not feel threatened by the deaths of Dom Lambert and his servant. She appreciated that he treated her as a responsible adult.

When Magda arrived in Thoresby’s chamber, she told Alisoun that she was free to do as she wished until dawn.

‘Magda has rested. She looks forward to a quiet night in His Grace’s company.’

Alisoun had grown accustomed to the friendship between Magda and Thoresby, and understood when she was in the way. But it was difficult, despite her admiration for Magda, to believe that the elderly woman could remain awake all through the dark, quiet, uneventful hours.

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