Elsewhere in the castle of Lord Robert Grosmal the great beauty Lady Foella was being not very beautiful at all.
'Where's that stinking puss hole de Turold?’ she screamed, her charmingly even face and wide brown eyes pinched into fury, drowning under waves of auburn hair.
Her maid, Eleanor, kept her distance. 'I don't know, my lady. I didn't see him last night,’ she squeaked in her ‘don’t blame me’ voice.
Eleanor had in fact lain awake in her straw most of the night, expecting the Norman to burst in at any moment, eager to fall upon her lady. While their chamber was ample, it wasn't as large as Grosmal's, and Eleanor's place at night was on the floor, close to her lady's bed. She had wanted to make sure she wasn't fallen on by mistake. Or as well. Only when the first, faint glow of approaching dawn crept into the room did she start to feel safe. That stopped with her mistress's first scream of the day.
'Well, why the hell not?’ Foella demanded.
'I'm sure I don't know, my lady.’
Foella drew breath for another scream.
'But I'll find out,’ Eleanor pre-empted, and scuttled from the room.
She closed the door gratefully on the familiar sound of things being thrown about. Many of them far heavier than a lady ought to be capable of throwing. At one point she was sure she heard the bed move, but surely that wasn’t possible, not even for Foella at the height of her fury.
Muttering her usual litany of complaint about mistresses who were unfair, inconsiderate, harsh and plain loose in the head, Eleanor headed off in search of information. She hitched her thick skirt up a couple of inches to avoid all the varieties of muck on the floor and started looking for her favourite guard, William.
…
William le Morton was happy with his lot as a very minor guard in the employ of Robert Grosmal. He led a pretty unremarkable life and had a fortunate name, as his mother had perfectly well realised. Before 1066 William le Morton had been called Erik Slaymonger; he had enjoyed a safe life as the supposed descendant of a horribly violent Viking who might just pop back at any moment. It was a pity that his family was blissfully unaware that he was, in fact, a direct male descendant of Julius Caesar. Once the Normans arrived Erik swiftly became William, making himself available for various guard duties as required.
He was also a handsome young man, just Eleanor's type. He was big and burly, but as soft as week-old milk. And as pliable. She was seventeen now, and with him already twenty-two she could have a good few years and then be a respectable widow.
William was just the man for this job. There was no way she was going to approach de Turold's personal household to find out what was going on. That consisted of one grizzled old Norman who spoke no English, but had hands which could reach places she didn't know she had.
As usual she found William carefully guarding the fire in the keep. He was even holding his palms towards it to prevent it leaping from the grate.
'What's going on?’ Eleanor hissed as she sidled up, flicking her long blond hair expertly towards him.
'Oh, 'ello,’ said William, shifting from the warmth of the fire towards the warmth of Eleanor. 'Big trouble.’
'What?’
William looked around to check no one was listening to them. 'De Turold's dead. Murdered, they say.’
'Oh no.’ Eleanor paled and slumped in shock.
'Oh, I'm sorry,’ William said, obviously surprised at the reaction. 'Were you close?’
''No, of course not, but he was supposed to visit my mistress last night.’
'And did he?’
'I don't think so. I kept awake as long as I could and he didn't turn up. If he had done, I'm sure the noise would have woken me'
'Perhaps he arrived and they were quiet?’
'My mistress doesn’t do quiet.’
'Perhaps he turned up and she killed him,’ William joked.
Eleanor took the question seriously. 'She wouldn't. Not till after they were married, anyway.’
‘Married?’ It was William's turn to be knocked back.
'I know, horrible thought, but she's desperate. She’ll lose her father's estate to King William if she can't find a husband on the winning side pretty soon.’
'Good looking woman, your mistress. Shouldn't have any trouble, I'd have thought.’
'Oh, sure, nice enough to look at, but you try talking to her…'
'Difficult?’
'Doesn't even begin to describe her outer ramparts. She can scare the skin off a weasel, that one.’
'But de Turold was willing.’
'Oh, he didn't know. She might have told him on the wedding day. And once she's made her mind up, that's that. No point in arguing that he never agreed to marry her or nothing. Mind you, if he turned her down she'd get pretty cross.’
'And she kills people when she gets cross, does she?’ William exaggerated outrageously.
'Not usually.’
'Usually?’ William choked.
'Well, there was this once with a young nobleman.’
'She really killed him?’ William whispered and shouted at the same time.
'Nothing was ever proved, but they were both in company and were alive...’
'Yes?’
'And then they were alone together and he was dead.’
'Good grief.’
'She kills animals for no reason at all. She’s probably like them creatures what kill their mates after they've done it.’
'Spaniards?’
'That's them.’
William frowned. None of this sounded good. 'So you'd better tell her he's been found, see what she says.’
'Not me.’
'Who then?’
Eleanor stroked William's arm. 'You're a big, strong chap.’
William looked shocked, but he didn't take his arm away. 'But she's your mistress.’
'Yes, but you've probably got armour and stuff. I bet you have. Chainmail and that. And a pointy helmet.’ Eleanor sighed in happy reminiscence. ‘I like a man in armour.’
'Armour? You must be joking. The likes of me don't get expensive kit like armour. Our head guard says the best way to avoid someone stabbing you is to stab them first.’
'Sounds fair enough,’ said Eleanor. The topic of men in armour and stabbings gave her a lovely warm feeling inside.
'It would be if they give us any knives to stab with. All I get is me long stick.’ William picked up a long wooden staff which would have been a pike staff if it had a pike on the end. It didn’t. He held it out to Eleanor.
'Just the job for keeping my Lady Foella at a safe distance.’ Eleanor stroked his staff thoughtfully.
William was thinking too. 'I'm sure she'll find out soon enough – it's all over the castle. Just keep your head down here long enough, then you can pop back once she's heard.’
Eleanor shook her head. 'No good, she doesn't do castle gossip.’
'Too high and mighty, eh?’
'Nah – just that no one'll talk to her.’
William folded his arms. 'You got a problem then.’
'You could escort me.’ Eleanor batted more eyelids than she actually had.
'Eh?’
'Yeah. There's a dangerous killer on the loose and all helpless women are to be escorted by guards. She wouldn't kill me if you were there.’
William looked very doubtful.
'You wouldn't have to say anything, or do anything. Just stand behind me, looking guard-like. I'll tell her and then get out of the way.’
'You reckon?’ His tone said no. William was not stupid. He was not going to do it.
…
A few moments later they approached Lady Foella's door, having planned the approach.
They walked slowly, then in the last few steps rushed to the chamber, making as many loud and hurried footstep noises as they could. Eleanor knocked once and threw the door open.
'My lady, grave tidings,’ she called out in a panic, looking around.
Foella was sitting by the window, looking out on to the courtyard below, her red winter gown spread around her just like a damsel in a tapestry. Not the rude sort of tapestry either. Her hair hung loose and her neck was at just the right angle to catch the beams of the rising sun. Her beauty was turned away from them, but it penetrated the room like an aura, slipping from her pose to impress all those who gazed upon her.
'What?’ Lady Foella snapped, turning and pulling the final legs off the spider she'd been playing with.
'Henri de Turold is dead.’ Eleanor announced, faking a slight swoon back into the protective aura of William, who had himself taken a step back.
At the news Foella's face became expressionless for a moment. It was just a pause on route to becoming a thing of horror. She didn’t look as if she was just about to bite the head off a kitten; she looked as if she had just done so. Eleanor had seen that look before, on the face of a particularly stupid guard who had thought that kitten decapitation would impress her. It had, actually, but it made him taste funny when she kissed him.
'My lady,’ said Eleanor with worry in her tone. 'What are you going to do?’
'Robert,’ was all Foella would say, but she didn’t say it in a very nice way. 'Where’s Robert?’
'My lady, don’t do anything rash. Lord Robert is very powerful.’
So was Foella. She stepped across the room very quickly indeed and picked Eleanor up by the scruff of her neck. Then she threw her into the straw on the floor and strode to the door.
Striding to the door she brushed the large and heavy William aside with one arm, and swept out.
'Where's Grosmal?’ The lady screamed as if the stones would answer. They didn’t, but they rattled a bit.
Eleanor got up and joined William. They watched her disappear down the corridor.
'She's going the wrong way,’ William said.
'Good job,’ Eleanor responded. 'This is not going to end well.’
'I'll kill him,’ wafted down the corridor from Foella's departing form.
'See what I mean?’
William did.
***
The Lady Foella's journey through the Castle Grosmal was a testament to its design. It was long, repetitious and largely pointless. She had been given the full guided tour when she arrived, but had been so fundamentally bored by the whole thing she hadn’t paid much attention. Now she cast about wildly trying to find some recognisable landmark from which she could plan her search.
She clearly found each opening and passageway increasingly irritating as she mumbled and swore at them. Eventually settling on a direction for no particular reason, she pressed on.
The corridor Foella had chosen was narrow and curved slightly off into the distance so she could not see its far end. This had been shown to Foella as an example of the Castle's most accurately built and plumb passage, but that memory had been despatched.
A guard, whose duty it was to make sure the riffraff did not trespass into the nicer bits of the castle, saw Foella’s approach and prepared to avoid bumping into his lord’s most welcome lady guest. His first ever lady guest, in fact. Well, the first who had stayed more than one night.
Foella saw the guard as well, but he had about as much impact on her senses as Eleanor's personal problems – such being the way of the noble class. It was pure, inbred, unconscious reaction which delivered the appropriate words for the encounter.
'Get out of my way,’ she snapped, without realising that she'd said anything at all.
The man backed away frantically as Foella got nearer and he managed to corner himself against an old door. The only way he could think of to avoid contact was to open the door and slip through it. He knew Foella’s reputation. If he impeded her in any way, obstructed her or, God forbid, bumped into her, she would be on to His Lordship. The life of a newly created corpse did not appeal.
He didn't have a clue what was behind the door, though. If he interrupted Lord Robert himself his death would be a lot slower, a lot more painful and probably very rude.
He pushed hard at the door, threw it open and stepped quickly backwards through it. The Lady Foella swept past without a sideways glance. The guard made a very interesting discovery and took a downwards glance.
For some weeks Robert’s resident builder had been trying to find the door he knew he had built, but just couldn’t remember where. It was supposed to open onto a balcony above the main gate, which would give a commanding view of the countryside. He had never done a balcony before and so his search had not been conscientious.
The thought of the great contribution he was making to the development of Castle Grosmal never even entered the guard’s mind. Instead he plummeted all thirty of the feet to the stones below, where his mind mingled with the straw and manure.
Those living in the courtyard below, those passing through the courtyard below and those who were just having a quick look at the courtyard below took absolutely no notice of the event. This sort of thing was happening all the time.
…
Lady Foella, quite oblivious of the life she had just despatched, carried on with her randomly brutal meanderings. She found herself eventually in the minstrels’ gallery above the main hall, where she was lucky to find a piece of sound flooring to stand on. The first time some minstrels had been sent to the gallery the only entertainment they had been able to provide was falling in harmony.
Casting a glance around the room below that would have put the shivers up a wolf, she lighted on a figure sitting in a large chair in front of the roaring fire. Bobbing up and down like a woman of loose virtue in a hurry, she craned her neck to see who it was.
'Robert!’ she bellowed in frustration.
The figure in the chair stirred and looked up. It was indeed the master of the house and he waved a friendly greeting to his guest before getting up and strolling over to stand underneath the gallery.
The massive fire, which occupied the space of a fair sized house, burned through trees at an alarming rate and had to be kept going, day and night, in case the master got a bit cold. No one else was allowed to warm themselves in front of it of course, even if they were freezing to death.
The remains of Robert’s breakfast lay scattered around the room, as if each bit had made a separate bid for escape. Venison bones, with enough meat left on them to feed a family, were laying under the table. Half a loaf of bread was dropped by the chair, and another substantial chunk had somehow found its way on to a rafter. This would provide a surprise meal for a family of mice, who never expected to find anything so wholesome quite so far from the ground.
Only the flagon of ale was as it should be, nurtured in the hands of Grosmal as he took regular swigs.
He sat in solitude, his mind wandering wherever it went in moments of relaxation. There was much speculation in the castle about where his mind went, and about where it deserved to go. None of the speculation was very pleasant, and it certainly wasn’t shared.
Putting his thoughts aside, for which they were probably grateful, he stood up and strolled over to stand underneath the gallery.
'Ah my lady,’ he said in an ingratiating voice which still came across as menacing, 'you will have to remember how you got up there. Some of my idiot workmen claim to have lost the way to the gallery. But then, that’s Saxons for you,’ he said, forgetting that Lady Foella was Saxon, or not caring.
'Come closer, my lord,’ said Foella in a voice that would have given a starving beggar indigestion. Robert duly approached, however, and stood under Lady Foella. The thud of the dagger descending at some speed from the gallery and embedding itself in the great table next to Robert seemed to cause him not a whit of bother.
'Bugger, missed,’ said Lady Foella.
'My lady is in playful mood today,’ opined Robert.
'I’ll kill you,’ screamed Foella.
'Why?’ Grosmal asked, reasonably enough.
'De Turold is dead.’
Robert stared at her. 'How did you know?’ he demanded in rising panic. 'It's supposed to be a secret. Did you do it?’
'My maid told me.’
'So she did it, eh? What's her name?’
'How should I know?’ Foella snapped back, thinking that she did know the name of her maid, but couldn’t immediately bring it to mind. 'You killed my husband.’
Grosmal frowned at this statement, which seemed to come out of nothing. 'Very likely,’ he shrugged. 'He shouldn't have been at the battle in the first place.’
'What battle?’
'That big one, down south somewhere. A field with a hill in it.’
'What's that got to do with anything?’
'It's probably where he got killed.’
Foella shook her head to get the confusion out. Things were getting out of hand and this rambling Norman seemed to be completely mad. Why wouldn’t he pay attention? 'Then why's he here?’
'Who?’ Robert shook his head now. Nothing was making any sense to him – which was hardly his fault. These Saxons really were an odd bunch. He glanced around the floor, spotted a joint of half-eaten venison nearby, and stooped to pick it up. He gnawed absentmindedly.
He returned to the conversation between a mad woman and an idiot.
'De Turold, that's who,’ Foella spat.
'De Turold is dead.’
'I know that.’ Foella was losing what little control she had ever had of her brittle, insensitive and demanding nature. She was also starting to look more alarming than normal, which was not a pretty sight.
'As well as the man in the battle?’ Grosmal puzzled easily.
'What man at the battle?
'Your husband.’
'I've never been married.’
'But you said I killed your husband.’
'And you did.’
Grosmal gave this some profound thought. 'How? If you've never married.’
'None of your business.’
'My lady seems confused,’ Grosmal patronised, safe below. Bored with his venison now, he threw it back where it had come from.
'Did you, or did you not, kill Henri de Turold?’
'Not that it's any of your business, but I did not.’
'Oh.’ Foella was confused and disappointed by this reply.
'Did you kill him?’ Grosmal asked. 'We’re looking for whoever did. If it was you it would save a lot of time and effort.’
'No, I did not,’ Foella screeched at such a pitch and intensity that the mice on the rafter ran for cover.
'Hum.’ Grosmal wasn't convinced. 'We'll find out who did,’ he said in a tone laced with meaning and threat. Then he returned to surer ground. 'And I might have killed your husband,’ he offered.
'That's him.’
'Who?’
'De Turold.’
'Really? Your husband? He never mentioned it.’
'Well, he nearly was. He would have been if he wasn't dead.’ Foella paused. 'Perhaps I'm his widow.’
Robert gave up. His head ached. So did his ears. This woman was so far out of her tree, the best woodsman wouldn’t find her in a month. 'Well, in Normandy we tend not to marry people after they're dead,’ he explained. ‘God knows what you Saxons get up to. You all seem a bit weird to me.’
'We're weird?’
'And if you are his widow, perhaps you did kill him.’
'How dare you.’ Foella’s voice dropped in tone now. It took on a low grumble, which Eleanor would have recognised as the signal to get as far away as possible.
'Well, it wasn't me, and you’re claiming to be his wife. That makes you the most likely. Typical Saxon – marry a fellow and then kill him.’
'I never got round to actually marrying him.’
'Probably killed him out of anger when he refused you then.’ Robert was getting the measure of Foella. ‘Now you come to mention it, I wondered what you were doing, following him round all the time. Probably just looking for your opportunity.’
Foella threw her hands up in frustration. She pointed at Grosmal. 'Stay there, I'm coming down.’
'Good luck,’ Grosmal mumbled.
They turned their backs on one another.
'Bleeding idiot,’ they both spat.
Foella left the balcony to begin the completely hopeless task of finding a way down to the hall. Once there, she would be able to do to Robert in person all the things she’d only been thinking about. And being Foella, she’d been thinking about a lot of things. If she considered for a moment she’d realise that every one of them would get her into an awful lot of trouble. Foella had never indulged in considering for a moment.