Bone of Contention Page 5

  Bell was smiling when he turned back to Ormerod and was surprised again to find the young lord staring hard at him.

  “You know Lord Sutton of Culham?” he asked.

  “Well, not to say ‘know.’ Culham is not far from Abingdon Abbey where I was schooled, and Lord Sutton has several farms deeded to the abbey in his care. He pays his rent with a small troop of men-at-arms, who guard the abbey. I took my first lessons in sword and knife play from those men.” Bell raised his brows. “How do you know Lord Sutton?”

  “I was betrothed to his daughter—the girl who…who was killed.”

  “I am so sorry!” Bell exclaimed.

  Lord Ormerod shrugged. “Don’t waste any sympathy on me. I only met the girl once and, to speak the truth, we did not take well to each other. I was younger then, of course, but I did not think the dower lands offered with her were worth a lifetime in her company. Also she hinted pretty broadly that there was another she preferred—” he wrinkled his nose. “And what could have offended Sir Ferrau in what I said to him?”

  For a moment Bell was silent remembering his surprise at Ferrau’s abrupt departure, and then he shrugged. “It was not that he took offense. I think he has not influence enough with Count Alain to suggest that he hear a stranger’s case, and he did not wish to admit it.”

  “Ah—” Ormerod began, but stopped speaking as Magdalene, who had seen the road ahead widen enough to pass the cart blocking them, kicked her mare into a trot.

  Lord Ormerod quickly followed her. Bell brought Monseigneur around more cautiously. The destrier was not beyond taking offense at a cart and biting the driver or the mules that drew it. When Bell caught up with his companions, they had passed the party to whom the cart belonged and were riding side by side, conversing easily.

  “Did you bring Magdalene to Oxford, Bell?” Ormerod asked, grinning.

  “You introduced yourselves?”

  Ormerod laughed. “No need for that. I’ve known Magdalene a long time. M’father brought me to the Old Priory Guesthouse…what? five years ago? Said he didn’t want me to get a taste for serf girls and maidservants and wanted me to know what futtering should be like. I lay with the mute girl that time.” He laughed again, snickered. “Didn’t make a sound, but she taught me. Unless I’m too drunk to see or smell, I leave the common women alone. M’father was no fool. Well, you know that, Bell.”

  “I do know it. And I know you have a pretty wife, too.”

  “Yes, she is.” Ormerod grinned. “And a good woman also, but sometimes…that Ella!” He sighed then grinned again at Magdalene. “Haven’t been to the House in a long time, but”—suddenly his eyes were full of tears—“m’ father died.”

  “Oh, I am so sorry!” Magdalene exclaimed, and neither man doubted that she truly felt grief. “He was not a frequent client, but he was so kind and good humored that all the women were eager to go with him. Sabina will weep. I will not tell Ella, if you do not mind, my lord. She would be so upset. It is so hard to explain to her.”

  “No, don’t tell her. If she remembered next time I came, she’d ask me…” He swallowed hard, then found a smile. “I’ve been so busy. I haven’t had time for much except the estate. When I can… I’ll come for a night in his name.”

  “I will see that it is special for you,” Magdalene promised.

  “So you are still whoremistress there?”

  “Of course.” Magdalene laughed. “It is my livelihood.”

  “Ah…” He looked sidelong at Bell. “I thought perhaps since you had come with Bell that you and he…”

  “No, no. I only begged escort from him. I am here on business. I do not think you know that Sabina has left us. One of her clients found he could not live without her. He married her. I found another woman, but business grows better and better and I could use at least one more. An old friend here thinks she may have found what I want.”

  “You picked a terrible time to come,” Ormerod protested.

  Magdalene sighed. “I know, but the whoremistress of the Soft Nest might not be able to hold the girl long without using her—especially when so many highborns are in the town. You know my women love their work and that my house is special. I do not want the girl frightened or broken. Oh, look, is that not the gate? Thank God we have arrived.”

  “At the gate, perhaps,” Bell said drily, “but not yet in Oxford. Look at the crowd.” He shook his head. “I think we can accommodate you at Wytham Abbey, Ormerod, if you have no other place.”

  “I am not so behindhand. I am staying with an old friend—” Ormerod chuckled “—well, he is some years younger than I. I was senior squire when he was still a page, and he looked to me for help. He has a manor at Osney.” He sighed. “Usually it is quickest for me ride across Oxford. Osney is no more than a third of a league or so on the road west and then a little way south.” He snorted. “Today I would have done better to ride around. I knew it was crowded, but this…”

  However, it did not take them as long as they feared to get through the gate. It turned out that most of the delay was caused by a cart with a broken wheel, and that was dragged away only a few moments after they arrived. Once the way was clear, the people poured through quickly, the gate guards making no attempt to stop and question anyone.

  Having taken a good look at the stalls of merchants and the slowly moving mass of people, Ormerod said he would go out the South Gate and around the farm lanes. He raised a hand in farewell and turned left to follow the wall. Magdalene waited until he was away and then said to Bell that they could take the same path.

  “We will come out by St. Friedesweide’s church. We can then turn north on the road that goes to the Carfax. The Soft Nest is on Blue Boar Lane, and you can leave me there. If Florete does not have room for me, she will ask around for another place that I could stay. I will leave a message with her for you if I must go elsewhere.”

  “I could wait—”

  “No. I want to find out what Florete knows, and she would be less than frank in your presence. You can just ride north along the same road, which will take you to the North Gate, and there you will find the road to Wytham Abbey.”

  “You know Oxford all too well,” Bell said flatly.

  “Of course I know Oxford well.” Her voice was angry, hard. “My first ‘keeper’ died here in contest with another man who wanted me. When the second man was killed in a drunken brawl in which I was again the prize, I decided there had been enough bloodshed because of me and that I would never be any one man’s woman again. So I worked in the Soft Nest for Mistress Lysette. William found me there and set me up in a house of my own.”

  “So much for not being one man’s woman,” Bell said.

  “I was not his woman. Never. He knew I would take other men and he approved of that. In fact, he brought other men to me. I worked like any other whore, except that I could choose which man I would serve and which I would not—”

  “Except for the ones Lord William brought.”

  Magdalene’s lips thinned. “Yes, except for those. But then I found Ella, and that problem was solved.”

  While they spoke they had followed the wall for a little way, then Magdalene turned right into a lane that was not quite a street but was wider than an alley. At its far end it debouched into a large vegetable garden with a low house at the edge of the field. A cart track separated the garden from a graveyard, across which they could see St. Friedesweide’s church. They rode past the graveyard and the church and Magdalene turned right again on the broad street by the church. They passed several merchant’s houses, stalls out in front and well patronized, although the crush was much less than on the street leading to the East Gate. Then the mouth of an alley opened. Magdalene pointed at it.

  “That is Blue Boar Lane,” she said. “Do you want to come in and meet Florete so she will know you? If not, I can just give her your name…or any name you want to use if you prefer not to be known by name to a whoremistress.”

  “As if I were not already so k
nown?”

  “But that is business. You are the bishop of Winchester’s knight. He is my landlord. You come to…ah…collect rent, to answer complaints, to…”

  Bell burst out laughing, his good humor restored. “Do not work so hard to make me innocent. It is some years since I was pure.” Then he frowned. “Is it true that this Florete is keeping a girl for you?”

  “Unfortunately no. I have put out word that I would like to find a blind girl who was new to the craft, but I have heard nothing. That was only an excuse for my coming here at this time. I cannot admit William sent for me until I am sure he wants that known. I believe he does…but guessing is dangerous when mixing in his affairs.”

  “But you are looking for another girl.”

  “Yes…” She sighed. “But even if I never lie with a man again, will I be less a whore?”

  She reached out and patted his hand just before she turned her mare into the alley mouth. Bell stared at her back bleakly for a moment, then followed. They passed an alehouse, its front yard full of idling men, some crouched over rolling knucklebones, others cleaning weapons or checking boiled leather armor. A few of the men looked up at the passersby, but most paid no attention.

  Just beyond the alehouse Magdalene passed through an open gale into a yard in which several horses were tied to rails between sturdy posts. Beyond the rails, which prevented the mounts from coming too close to the building, was a wide-open door. Bell dismounted and tied Monseigneur at the far end of the yard, well away from the other animals. Then he returned and lifted Magdalene down from her mare.

  “Will Monseigneur be safe there?” Magdalene asked, knowing the destrier was worth as much as a good house.

  Bell sighed. “I just hope he doesn’t kill anyone for coming too close. Yes, he’ll be safe.”

  Magdalene shrugged. Any man should be able to recognize a destrier caparisoned for war, if he approached the animal he was a fool or had ill intent and would deserve what he got. She walked quickly through the open door and then stood still for a moment in the poorly lit corridor suppressing an old tremor of fear and a frisson of revulsion.

  The Soft Nest was better than the lowest form of stew. There were no couples humping in the dim corridor, nor to the left in the corners of the whoremistress’s large reception chamber. That was open in a wide arch to the corridor, but the way was blocked by a long, sturdy table. Behind the table the whoremistress presided, keeping an eye on the men and women who used her premises. At each end of the table was a stool. On one a large man sat, clearly a bullyboy.

  Along the wall to the right of the table were two long benches, one to either side of the window that lit the room, another two were set to the right of the hearth. To the left of the hearth, against the far wall, was a large, curtained bed. Farther down along that wall was an open doorway.

  Only a few women sat on the benches, talking or dozing, waiting in case a man came in to choose one. He would then pay the whoremistress and take the girl through the door beyond the foot of the bed into a large dormitory. The price was two farthings, higher than that in a common stew, but it paid for a pallet that was not too infested with crawling things—the straw that filled it was discarded once a month and the covering washed—and a modest space around the pallet. In the worst houses the pallets were never washed and would be set edge to edge. It was not unknown for two copulating couples to roll over onto each other.

  This early in the day most of the women were still sleeping on the pallets they used in their work. Magdalene guessed that a larger number than usual were doubly occupied with men who were willing to pay extra to stay the night in greater comfort than their tight-packed lodgings provided. When the town was not so crowded, only a few women stayed in the whorehouse. Most sought out safer, quieter rooms elsewhere, but because of the king’s Court, all of them had been driven out to make room for better paying lodgers.

  The seat behind the table was empty, but the whoremistress could not be far because the bullyboy had not risen or called out. Before she stepped up to the table, Magdalene looked down the corridor. Her eyes felt dry and hot and she had a bitter taste in the back of her mouth. The torches had been allowed to gutter out because the open door provided enough light, but the corridor was never really dark.

  Fairs of torches were provided so that anyone traversing the narrow corridor would be forced nearly to touch the curtain-hung doorways that lined it. In those doorways a woman could stand, barely clothed and within easy arm’s length, to smile, move suggestively, even touch in order to entice a man into her room rather than another.

  As she thought it, two women came to lift a curtain. Seeing Bell, they posed and smiled. Magdalene swallowed more bile. She herself had stood in one of those doorways when she served in the Soft Nest. Any man had been free to push her in or walk past her into the small, windowless chamber behind the curtain. When it fell, she had been on her own. If a client thought she asked too much, she would be beaten, and the whoremistress would not interfere. The condition of the tiny chamber and how she protected herself and collected and kept her payment had been up to her. For that privilege, she had paid a penny a night in rent.

  From behind the two closed curtains nearest them came characteristic sounds of sexual engagement—mostly grunts and groans, but Magdalene did hear one masculine laugh and a feminine giggle. At least those were sounds that told of a well-regulated place. There were no thin shrieks of abused children, no screams of agony, no snarls of sadistic rage.

  Magdalene swallowed once more, and walked up to the table. “Is Mistress Florete here?” she asked, speaking English rather than French.

  The man, who had been looking at Bell, expecting him to ask for a chamber or some other accommodation, turned his head to Magdalene. “Out back. She—oh, here she is now.”

  A medium-sized, sturdily built woman was coming down the corridor. Magdalene saw with relief that her shift, which was tied a decent inch above her cleavage and well above the edge of her low-cut gown, was clean and white. The gown itself, a pleasant shade of light green, was also unstained and clean, its folds those of the chest rather than of the bed. Her hair was clean, too, a glossy brown, worn in two thick plaits, one falling over each shoulder.

  As she approached, Magdalene was sorry to see that Florete’s brown eyes had lost their sparkle and were without expression and that her lips had become thin and tightly drawn to give nothing away. But in the next moment, her whole face changed. The eyes brightened and opened wide, the lips softened and tilted upward.

  “Magdalene!” she cried, running forward. “Magdalene! What in the good earth are you doing here?”

  “Not setting up a rival establishment,” Magdalene said, laughing.

  “Nor looking for work,” Florete said, examining Magdalene’s riding dress, which was a soft gray-blue, simple until one noticed the quality of the cloth and took in the elaborate embroidery around neck, sleeves, and hem.

  “No.” Before Magdalene could control it, a shudder passed over her. She suppressed another and smiled. “I have a long tale to tell and a huge favor to ask, but I don’t want to keep Sir Bellamy from his duty any longer than I must. I just wanted to make him known to you so that, if I cannot stay here, I could leave a message for him so he would know where to find me.”

  Florete blinked, looked from one to the other, then smiled at Bell. “I am not likely to forget him.”

  Bell smiled back. “My name is Bellamy of Itchen, and I serve the bishop of Winchester. If any message besides those from Magdalene should be left for me, you will be well rewarded if they come into my hand and into no other.”

  An expression of anxiety crossed Florete’s face. “For a friend of Magdalene’s, I promise to do my best to make it so, but you must understand…we are whores here. If we are questioned straitly, we answer before worse befalls us.”

  “Good enough,” Bell said, pleased with her honesty. “If you do not offer information, I will be satisfied.” To Magdalene, he said, “You know whe
re I will be. A message left with the dean will reach me. I doubt I will be able to come back to Oxford today. Will I see you tomorrow?”

  “Yes, unless William sends me away from the city. In any case, I will leave word for you if I am not here.”

  He bowed slightly and left. Florete stared at his back, then bent sideways so she could watch him cross the yard. When he seized the reins of the destrier and mounted, she turned back to Magdalene.

  “I thought you swore you would never be any one man’s woman again.”

  “And I have kept that oath. That Bell would like me to break it is neither here nor there. He is welcome in my bed only on the understanding that others will be welcomed there also.”

  “Does he understand the honor bestowed upon him?” Florete asked, her eyes full of laughing mischief for a moment.

  Magdalene laughed aloud. “Almost. He has even stopped flinching when I mention William.”

  The mischief in Florete’s eyes was replaced by wariness. “The same William?”

  “Yes, the same.”

  For a moment Florete was silent, then she went to the door and across the yard into the street. She looked both ways. When she came back, she told the man at the table to call her only if necessary, beckoned to Magdalene and went to her bed. Having crept inside the curtains and gestured for Magdalene to join her, she said softly, “I cannot go out now. Business will begin to increase soon. This is the best I can do for privacy.”

  “It is enough for now,” Magdalene assured her, speaking no louder than she had. “I have no great secrets to keep or to tell. I am indeed here at William’s behest, but I know no more than that. All his clerk told me was that he needed a safe house.” She sighed. “Naturally he asks that of me right in the middle of the greatest concourse of men to take place in years. Do you know of a small house that I could empty temporarily? My old house? I can pay.”

  “What about here?” Florete asked.

  “The cocking chambers are not large enough,” Magdalene said at once. “There are likely to be several men, and the curtain at the door does not give enough privacy.”