The Moers Murders (Master Mercurius Mysteries Book 8) by Graham Brack

Author:Graham Brack [Brack, Graham]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Sapere Books
Published: 2024-09-13T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

There are people who can achieve a lot because anyone they meet immediately recognises them as essentially good. Biesma was such a man.

It seemed that having arrived at the castle he had sought out the housekeeper and explained why Anna Erler was there. Despite her many duties the housekeeper had taken her in hand and suggested that her hair should be washed and brushed because any woman feels better when her hair is well dressed, during which time some soup had been warmed and fresh bread taken from the oven. Biesma sat opposite Anna and while he took nothing himself he gently coaxed her to eat a little something. It was at the kitchen table that I found her on my return.

‘No, do not stop,’ I insisted. ‘My questions will wait. I only wanted to let you know that we have retrieved your parents’ bodies and we will take them for cleaning and preparation for burial.’

‘I should do that,’ she blurted out, half-rising from the table before Biesma gently pulled at her elbow and caused her to sit once more.

‘I don’t think they are fit for a young lady just now, but when we have examined them they will be cleaned and I will send for you so you can say farewell to them.’

Whether their coffins would be open or closed would depend on the extent to which we could make the corpses look half normal. Certainly we would have to find a way of keeping Frau Erler’s mouth closed. Until they were cleaned it was not easy to determine how ghastly they looked.

I was tempted to ask for a bowl of soup myself, firstly because it looked good and, more importantly, because I was finding the life of a governor exceedingly solitary. I had had many wild notions of feasting in merry company with all those who worked in the castle, presiding at a great board and occasionally lobbing a chicken leg towards some favoured underling. Not that feasting is my favoured behaviour, you understand, but I thought that it might be expected of me.

In fact, I usually ate alone. Occasionally Pringle would join me, but he was too busy at the moment fleecing the inhabitants of Moers of anything that the army might need which, to judge from the letters of complaint I was receiving, included all the apples in town, a large number of boots and the occasional cart. Biesma did not think it proper to share a table with his master, and while Fleckstein did, I did not think it proper to share a table with anyone like Fleckstein. As for that valet Tap, I had not seen him for a day or two and had no idea what use a personal servant was who did not stay close to my person. Admittedly my linen was all clean and folded, so the fellow had clearly been doing something to earn whatever it was he was being paid, but the opportunity to have a word or two with him would have been good.

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