[Illustration]
* * * * *
Sir Pierre Morlaix, Chevalier of the Angevin Empire, Knight of the
Golden Leopard, and secretary-in-private to my lord, the Count
D'Evreux, pushed back the lace at his cuff for a glance at his wrist
watch--three minutes of seven. The Angelus had rung at six, as always,
and my lord D'Evreux had been awakened by it, as always. At least, Sir
Pierre could not remember any time in the past seventeen years when my
lord had not awakened at the Angelus. Once, he recalled, the sacristan
had failed to ring the bell, and the Count had been furious for a
week. Only the intercession of Father Bright, backed by the Bishop
himself, had saved the sacristan from doing a turn in the dungeons of
Castle D'Evreux.
Sir Pierre stepped out into the corridor, walked along the carpeted
flagstones, and cast a practiced eye around him as he walked. These
old castles were difficult to keep clean, and my lord the Count was
fussy about nitre collecting in the seams between the stones of the
walls. All appeared quite in order, which was a good thing. My lord
the Count had been making a night of it last evening, and that always
made him the more peevish in the morning. Though he always woke at the
Angelus, he did not always wake up sober.
Sir Pierre stopped before a heavy, polished, carved oak door, selected
a key from one of the many at his belt, and turned it in the lock.
Then he went into the elevator and the door locked automatically
behind him. He pressed the switch and waited in patient silence as he
was lifted up four floors to the Count's personal suite.
By now, my lord the Count would have bathed, shaved, and dressed. He
would also have poured down an eye-opener consisting of half a water
glass of fine Champagne brandy. He would not eat breakfast until
eight. The Count had no valet in the strict sense of the term. Sir
Reginald Beauvay held that title, but he was never called upon to
exercise the more personal functions of his office. The Count did not
like to be seen until he was thoroughly presentable.
The elevator stopped. Sir Pierre stepped out into the corridor and
walked along it toward the door at the far end. At exactly seven
o'clock, he rapped briskly on the great door which bore the
gilt-and-polychrome arms of the House D'Evreux.
For the first time in seventeen years, there was no answer.
Sir Pierre waited for the growled command to enter for a full minute,
unable to believe his ears. Then, almost timidly, he rapped again.
There was still no answer.
Then, bracing himself for the verbal onslaught that would follow if he
had erred, Sir Pierre turned the handle and opened the door just as if
he had heard the Count's voice telling him to come in.
"Good morning, my lord," he said, as he always had for seventeen
years.
But the room was empty, and there was no answer.
He looked around the huge room. The morning sunlight streamed in
through the high mullioned windows and spread a diamond-checkered
pattern across the tapestry on the far wall, lighting up the brilliant
hunting scene in a blaze of color.
"My lord?"
Nothing. Not a sound.
The bedroom door was open. Sir Pierre walked across to it and looked
in.
He saw immediately why my lord the Count had not answered, and that,
indeed, he would never answer again.
My lord the Count lay flat on his back, his arms spread wide, his eyes
staring at the ceiling. He was still clad in his gold and scarlet
evening clothes. But the great stain on the front of his coat was not
the same shade of scarlet as the rest of the cloth, and the stain had
a bullet hole in its center.
Sir Pierre looked at him without moving for a long moment. Then he
stepped over, knelt, and touched one of the Count's hands with the
back of his own. It was quite cool. He had been dead for hours.
"I knew someone would do you in sooner or later, my lord," said Sir
Pierre, almost regretfully.
Then he rose from his kneeling position and walked out without another
look at his dead lord. He locked the door of the suite, pocketed the
key, and went back downstairs in the elevator.
* * * * *
Mary, Lady Duncan stared out of the window at the morning sunlight and
wondered what to do. The Angelus bell had awakened her from a fitful
sleep in her chair, and she knew that, as a guest at Castle D'Evreux,
she would be expected to appear at Mass again this morning. But how
could she? How could she face the Sacramental Lord on the altar--to
say nothing of taking the Blessed Sacrament itself.
Still, it would look all the more conspicuous if she did not show up
this morning after having made it a point to attend every morning with
Lady Alice during the first four days of this visit.
She turned and glanced at the locked and barred door of the bedroom.
_He_ would not be expected to come. Laird Duncan used his wheelchair
as an excuse, but since he had taken up black magic as a hobby he had,
she suspected, been actually afraid to go anywhere near a church.
If only she hadn't lied to him! But how could she have told the truth?
That would have been worse--infinitely worse. And now, because of that
lie, he was locked in his bedroom doing only God and the Devil knew
what.
If only he would come out. If he would only stop whatever it was he
had been doing for all these long hours--or at least finish it! Then
they could leave Evreux, make some excuse--any excuse--to get away.
One of them could feign sickness. Anything, anything to get them out
of France, across the Channel, and back to Scotland, where they would
be safe!
She looked back out of the window, across the courtyard, at the
towering stone walls of the Great Keep and at the high window that
opened into the suite of Edouard, Count D'Evreux.
Last night she had hated him, but no longer. Now there was only room
in her heart for fear.
She buried her face in her hands and cursed herself for a fool. There
were no tears left for weeping--not after the long night.
Behind her, she heard the sudden noise of the door being unlocked, and
she turned.
Laird Duncan of Duncan opened the door and wheeled himself out. He was
followed by a malodorous gust of vapor from the room he had just left.
Lady Duncan stared at him.
He looked older than he had last night, more haggard and worn, and
there was something in his eyes she did not like. For a moment he said
nothing. Then he wet his lips with the tip of his tongue. When he
spoke, his voice sounded dazed.
"There is nothing to fear any more," he said. "Nothing to fear at
all."
* * * * *
The Reverend Father James Valois Bright, Vicar of the Chapel of
Saint-Esprit, had as his flock the several hundred inhabitants of the
Castle D'Evreux. As such, he was the ranking priest--socially, not
hierarchically--in the country. Not counting the Bishop and the
Chapter at the Cathedral, of course. But such knowledge did little
good for the Father's peace of mind. The turnout of the flock was
abominably small for its size--especially for week-day Masses. The
Sunday Masses were well attended, of course; Count D'Evreux was there
punctually at nine every Sunday, and he had a habit of counting the
house. But he never showed up on weekdays, and his laxity had allowed
a certain further laxity to filter down through the ranks.
The great consolation was Lady Alice D'Evreux. She was a plain, simple
girl, nearly twenty years younger than her brother, the Count, and
quite his opposite in every way. She was quiet where he was
thundering, self-effacing where he was flamboyant, temperate where he
was drunken, and chaste where he was--
Father Bright brought his thoughts to a full halt for a moment. He
had, he reminded himself, no right to make judgments of that sort. He
was not, after all, the Count's confessor; the Bishop was.
Besides, he should have his mind on his prayers just now.
He paused and was rather surprised to notice that he had already put
on his alb, amice, and girdle, and he was aware that his lips had
formed the words of the prayer as he had donned each of them.
_Habit_, he thought, _can be destructive to the contemplative
faculty_.
He glanced around the sacristy. His server, the young son of the Count
of Saint Brieuc, sent here to complete his education as a gentleman
who would some day be the King's Governor of one of the most
important counties in Brittany, was pulling his surplice down over his
head. The clock said 7:11.
Father Bright forced his mind Heavenward and repeated silently the
vesting prayers that his lips had formed meaninglessly, this time
putting his full intentions behind them. Then he added a short mental
prayer asking God to forgive him for allowing his thoughts to stray in
such a manner.
He opened his eyes and reached for his chasuble just as the sacristy
door opened and Sir Pierre, the Count's Privy Secretary, stepped in.
"I must speak to you, Father," he said in a low voice. And, glancing
at the young De Saint-Brieuc, he added: "Alone."
Normally, Father Bright would have reprimanded anyone who presumed to
break into the sacristy as he was vesting for Mass, but he knew that
Sir Pierre would never interrupt without good reason. He nodded and
went outside in the corridor that led to the altar.
"What is it, Pierre?" he asked.
"My lord the Count is dead. Murdered."
After the first momentary shock, Father Bright realized that the news
was not, after all, totally unexpected. Somewhere in the back of his
mind, it seemed he had always known that the Count would die by
violence long before debauchery ruined his health.
"Tell me about it," he said quietly.
Sir Pierre reported exactly what he had done and what he had seen.
"Then I locked the door and came straight here," he told the priest.
"Who else has the key to the Count's suite?" Father Bright asked.
"No one but my lord himself," Sir Pierre answered, "at least as far as
I know."
"Where is his key?"
"Still in the ring at his belt. I noticed that particularly."
"Very good. We'll leave it locked. You're certain the body was cold?"
"Cold and waxy, Father."
"Then he's been dead many hours."
"Lady Alice will have to be told," Sir Pierre said.
Father Bright nodded. "Yes. The Countess D'Evreux must be informed of
her succession to the County Seat." He could tell by the sudden
momentary blank look that came over Sir Pierre's face that the Privy
Secretary had not yet realized fully the implications of the Count's
death. "I'll tell her, Pierre. She should be in her pew by now. Just
step into the church and tell her quietly that I want to speak to her.
Don't tell her anything else."
"I understand, Father," said Sir Pierre.
* * * * *
There were only twenty-five or thirty people in the pews--most of them
women--but Alice, Countess D'Evreux was not one of them. Sir Pierre
walked quietly and unobtrusively down the side aisle and out into the
narthex. She was standing there, just inside the main door, adjusting
the black lace mantilla about her head, as though she had just come in
from outside. Suddenly, Sir Pierre was very glad he would not have to
be the one to break the news.
She looked rather sad, as always, her plain face unsmiling. The
jutting nose and square chin which had given her brother the Count a
look of aggressive handsomeness only made her look very solemn and
rather sexless, although she had a magnificent figure.
"My lady," Sir Pierre said, stepping towards her, "the Reverent Father
would like to speak to you before Mass. He's waiting at the sacristy
door."
She held her rosary clutched tightly to her breast and gasped. Then
she said, "Oh. Sir Pierre. I'm sorry; you quite surprised me. I didn't
see you."
"My apologies, my lady."
"It's all right. My thoughts were elsewhere. Will you take me to the
good Father?"
Father Bright heard their footsteps coming down the corridor before he
saw them. He was a little fidgety because Mass was already a minute
overdue. It should have started promptly at 7:15.
The new Countess D'Evreux took the news calmly, as he had known she
would. After a pause, she crossed herself and said: "May his soul rest
in peace. I will leave everything in your hands, Father, Sir Pierre.
What are we to do?"
"Pierre must get on the teleson to Rouen immediately and report the
matter to His Highness. I will announce your brother's death and ask
for prayers for his soul--but I think I need say nothing about the
manner of his death. There is no need to arouse any more speculation
and fuss than necessary."
"Very well," said the Countess. "Come, Sir Pierre; I will speak to the
Duke, my cousin, myself."
"Yes, my lady."
Father Bright returned to the sacristy, opened the missal, and changed
the placement of the ribbons. Today was an ordinary Feria; a Votive
Mass would not be forbidden by the rubics. The clock said 7:17. He
turned to young De Saint-Brieuc, who was waiting respectfully.
"Quickly, my son--go and get the unbleached beeswax candles and put
them on the altar. Be sure you light them before you put out the white
ones. Hurry, now; I will be ready by the time you come back. Oh
yes--and change the altar frontal. Put on the black."
"Yes, Father." And the lad was gone.
Father Bright folded the green chasuble and returned it to the drawer,
then took out the black one. He would say a Requiem for the Souls of
All the Faithful Departed--and hope that the Count was among them.
* * * * *
His Royal Highness, the Duke of Normandy, looked over the official
letter his secretary had just typed for him. It was addressed to
_Serenissimus Dominus Nostrus Iohannes Quartus, Dei Gratia, Angliae,
Franciae, Scotiae, Hiberniae, et Novae Angliae, Rex, Imperator, Fidei
Defensor_, ... "Our Most Serene Lord, John IV, by the Grace of God
King and Emperor of England, France, Scotland, Ireland, and New
England, Defender of the Faith, ..."
It was a routine matter; simple notification to his brother, the King,
that His Majesty's most faithful servant, Edouard, Count of Evreux had
departed this life, and asking His Majesty's confirmation of the
Count's heir-at-law, Alice, Countess of Evreux as his lawful
successor.
His Highness finished reading, nodded, and scrawled his signature at
the bottom: _Richard Dux Normaniae_.
Then, on a separate piece of paper, he wrote: "Dear John, May I
suggest you hold up on this for a while? Edouard was a lecher and a
slob, and I have no doubt he got everything he deserved, but we have
no notion who killed him. For any evidence I have to the contrary, it
might have been Alice who pulled the trigger. I will send you full
particulars as soon as I have them. With much love, Your brother and
servant, Richard."
He put both papers into a prepared envelope and sealed it. He wished
he could have called the king on the teleson, but no one had yet
figured out how to get the wires across the channel.
He looked absently at the sealed envelope, his handsome blond features
thoughtful. The House of Plantagenet had endured for eight centuries,
and the blood of Henry of Anjou ran thin in its veins, but the Norman
strain was as strong as ever, having been replenished over the
centuries by fresh infusions from Norwegian and Danish princesses.
Richard's mother, Queen Helga, wife to His late Majesty, Henry X,
spoke very few words of Anglo-French, and those with a heavy Norse
accent.
Nevertheless, there was nothing Scandinavian in the language, manner,
or bearing of Richard, Duke of Normandy. Not only was he a member of
the oldest and most powerful ruling family of Europe, but he bore a
Christian name that was distinguished even in that family. Seven Kings
of the Empire had borne the name, and most of them had been good
Kings--if not always "good" men in the nicey-nicey sense of the word.
Even old Richard I, who'd been pretty wild during the first forty-odd
years of his life, had settled down to do a magnificent job of kinging
for the next twenty years. The long and painful recovery from the
wound he'd received at the Siege of Chaluz had made a change in him
for the better.
There was a chance that Duke Richard might be called upon to uphold
the honor of that name as King. By law, Parliament must elect a
Plantagenet as King in the event of the death of the present
Sovereign, and while the election of one of the King's two sons, the
Prince of Wales and the Duke of Lancaster, was more likely than the
election of Richard, he was certainly not eliminated from the
succession.
[Illustration]
Meantime, he would uphold the honor of his name as Duke of Normandy.
Murder had been done; therefore justice must be done. The Count
D'Evreux had been known for his stern but fair justice almost as well
as he had been known for his profligacy. And, just as his pleasures
had been without temperance, so his justice had been untempered by
mercy. Whoever had killed him would find both justice and mercy--in so
far as Richard had it within his power to give it.
Although he did not formulate it in so many words, even mentally,
Richard was of the opinion that some debauched woman or cuckolded man
had fired the fatal shot. Thus he found himself inclining toward mercy
before he knew anything substantial about the case at all.
Richard dropped the letter he was holding into the special mail pouch
that would be placed aboard the evening trans-Channel packet, and then
turned in his chair to look at the lean, middle-aged man working at a
desk across the room.
"My lord Marquis," he said thoughtfully.
"Yes, Your Highness?" said the Marquis of Rouen, looking up.
"How true are the stories one has heard about the late Count?"
"True, Your Highness?" the Marquis said thoughtfully. "I would
hesitate to make any estimate of percentages. Once a man gets a
reputation like that, the number of his reputed sins quickly surpasses
the number of actual ones. Doubtless many of the stories one hears are
of whole cloth; others may have only a slight basis in fact. On the
other hand, it is highly likely that there are many of which we have
never heard. It is absolutely certain, however, that he has
acknowledged seven illegitimate sons, and I dare say he has ignored a
few daughters--and these, mind you, with unmarried women. His
adulteries would be rather more difficult to establish, but I think
your Highness can take it for granted that such escapades were far
from uncommon."
He cleared his throat and then added, "If Your Highness is looking for
motive, I fear there is a superabundance of persons with motive."
"I see," the Duke said. "Well, we will wait and see what sort of
information Lord Darcy comes up with." He looked up at the clock.
"They should be there by now."
Then, as if brushing further thoughts on the subject from his mind, he
went back to work, picking up a new sheaf of state papers from his
desk.
The Marquis watched him for a moment and smiled a little to himself.
The young Duke took his work seriously, but was well-balanced about
it. A little inclined to be romantic--but aren't we all at nineteen?
There was no doubt of his ability, nor of his nobility. The Royal
Blood of England always came through.
* * * * *
"My lady," said Sir Pierre gently, "the Duke's Investigators have
arrived."
My Lady Alice, Countess D'Evreux, was seated in a gold-brocade
upholstered chair in the small receiving room off the Great Hall.
Standing near her, looking very grave, was Father Bright. Against the
blaze of color on the walls of the room, the two of them stood out
like ink blots. Father Bright wore his normal clerical black,
unrelieved except for the pure white lace at collar and cuffs. The
Countess wore unadorned black velvet, a dress which she had had to
have altered hurriedly by her dressmaker; she had always hated black
and owned only the mourning she had worn when her mother died eight
years before. The somber looks on their faces seemed to make the black
blacker.
"Show them in, Sir Pierre," the Countess said calmly.
Sir Pierre opened the door wider, and three men entered. One was
dressed as one gently born; the other two wore the livery of the Duke
of Normandy.
The gentleman bowed. "I am Lord Darcy, Chief Criminal Investigator for
His Highness, the Duke, and your servant, my lady." He was a tall,
brown-haired man in his thirties with a rather handsome, lean face. He
spoke Anglo-French with a definite English accent.
"My pleasure, Lord Darcy," said the Countess. "This is our vicar,
Father Bright."
"Your servant, Reverend Sir." Then he presented the two men with him.
The first was a scholarly-looking, graying man wearing pince-nez
glasses with gold rims, Dr. Pateley, Physician. The second, a tubby,
red-faced, smiling man, was Master Sean O Lochlainn, Sorcerer.
As soon as Master Sean was presented he removed a small, leather-bound
folder from his belt pouch and proffered it to the priest. "My
license, Reverend Father."
Father Bright took it and glanced over it. It was the usual thing,
signed and sealed by the Archbishop of Rouen. The law was rather
strict on that point; no sorcerer could practice without the
permission of the Church, and a license was given only after careful
examination for orthodoxy of practice.
"It seems to be quite in order, Master Sean," said the priest, handing
the folder back. The tubby little sorcerer bowed his thanks and
returned the folder to his belt pouch.
Lord Darcy had a notebook in his hand. "Now, unpleasant as it may be,
we shall have to check on a few facts." He consulted his notes, then
looked up at Sir Pierre. "You, I believe, discovered the body?"
"That is correct, your lordship."
"How long ago was this?"
Sir Pierre glanced at his wrist watch. It was 9:55. "Not quite three
hours ago, your lordship."
"At what time, precisely?"
"I rapped on the door precisely at seven, and went in a minute or two
later--say 7:01 or 7:02."
"How do you know the time so exactly?"
"My lord the Count," said Sir Pierre with some stiffness, "insisted
upon exact punctuality. I have formed the habit of referring to my
watch regularly."
"I see. Very good. Now, what did you do then?"
Sir Pierre described his actions briefly.
"The door to his suite was not locked, then?" Lord Darcy asked.
"No, sir."
"You did not expect it to be locked?"
"No, sir. It has not been for seventeen years."