The Cross Legged Knight by Candace Robb

Author:Candace Robb [Robb, Candace]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, azw3
Tags: Crime, General, Mystery & Detective, Historical, Fiction
ISBN: 9781446439296
Google: Ymcu4H_N-Q4C
Amazon: B004I8WLHA
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2011-01-10T18:30:00+00:00

Thirteen

A LADY’S

COMPOSURE

As Owen made his way towards the palace he tried to push aside thoughts of Eudo’s emotion, his frightened boys, his daughter’s frail dignity. He was impatient with the need to spend the rest of the morning pandering to Wykeham and Thoresby when Cisotta’s death and the grief it had caused were so fresh in his mind. But Owen must tactfully tell them of the Ferriby boys’ role in the tile incident and reassure them that it had been an accident. No doubt Wykeham would refuse to accept the boys’ innocence, but Owen must try to convince him. As he mounted the steps of the palace porch he passed Alain descending. The clerk nodded to him and Owen had just begun to ask where he might find His Grace and the bishop when Wykeham called out to him from the doorway of the archbishop’s hall in a peremptory tone. Owen swore beneath his breath. Alain must have failed to convince his lord that those attending the funeral were mourning, not plotting against him. Owen began to think parliament right in blaming Wykeham for the setbacks in the war – the war that had cost him his eye. The bishop could not act for all his anxieties about his good name.

‘We must talk,’ Wykeham said.

‘My Lord Bishop …’

‘Now, Captain.’

As soon as Owen shut the door behind him Wykeham rounded on him and demanded, ‘When did you intend to tell me the truth about the falling tile?’

‘The truth?’ Owen muttered, wondering what Wykeham had heard.

‘The Ferriby boys.’

‘I have just come to tell you the truth of it.’ Damn the gossips.

‘Walter, the master mason’s assistant, came to the palace last evening,’ Wykeham said. ‘Why did I hear it from him first, Captain, why not you?’

Cursed mason. ‘I considered it important to get the tale from the lads before I came to you, My Lord. And to tell their parents.’

‘And then you went home?’

‘I have had much else to attend to. You were in no danger.’

‘In no danger?’ Wykeham’s voice crackled with anger. ‘They are the grandsons of Sir Ranulf Pagnell and his widow, that viperous woman who would suck me dry if she could. Their uncle Stephen Pagnell has Lancastrian connections. I should have been told at once.’

‘My Lord, they are but boys. As a father I thought how frightened they must be.’

‘How kind of you. And their parents feigned surprise, I’ve no doubt.’

‘My Lord, they did not know.’

By the time Wykeham released him, Owen was shaking with anger. He headed for the barracks and drank his fill from a barrel of ale, then slept it off on Alfred’s bed.

Owen woke in mid-afternoon with a headache and marched back to the palace, telling a disapproving Michaelo that he must speak to the archbishop.

Interrupting a meeting with the mayor to speak to Owen, Thoresby was plainly irritated to hear Owen’s story of the Ferriby boys and complaints about Wykeham. ‘I don’t expect you to like the bishop. Your mission is to investigate the recent incidents involving him and his property.

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