Song of a Dark Angel

pretty pottage,' he whispered. 'Who would think, Master, that such a collection of notables would have so much to hide?'
    Dame Cecily was straining her ears to overhear them so Corbett simply shook his head in reply. But I am not surprised, he thought, staring across the table. Wherever there is wealth, power and the human heart you will find all sorts of crimes, misdemeanours, and sordid affairs. At the king's court high-born wives sold themselves for favours and high-ranking clerics hid in their love-nests a sweet girl or a fresh-faced boy with soft hands and plump buttocks.
    At last the servants withdrew. Gurney tried to divert the conversation by asking Corbett about the progress of the war in Scotland, but Selditch, full of wine and mischief, steered the conversation back to the recent murders.
    'The murder of the baker's wife,' he said challengingly, 'is a mystery that will tax even you, Sir Hugh.'
    'I shall advise Sir Hugh about that and the other deaths in my own time,' Lavinius Monck warned quietly.
    'Tush! Tush!' said Selditch. 'It's a macabre mystery. Here is the good wife, a pretty young thing – flaxen-haired and full-bosomed, with generous hips and a mouth like an angel's. She slips out of the house at dusk, leaving her husband behind, saddles their one and only horse and rides out along the headland. The next morning her corpse is found dangling from the old gallows.'
    'Giles, stop it!' Alice commanded.
    'No! No!' Selditch held up his hand. 'The mystery, Sir Hugh, is that, although the ground beneath the scaffold was wet and muddy, no hoof prints were found of a horse other than her own. And villagers saw the lady riding back to the village, though only the horse made its way all the way home to the baker's shop.'
    'Is that correct?' Corbett asked.
    'Yes, yes.' Monck snapped. The evidence seems to show that the baker's wife went out to the scaffold and hanged herself and then, somehow or other, rode her horse back to the edge of the village.'
    'Then there's the death of your man,' the physician added slyly.
    'Ah, yes, poor Cerdic' Monck gave a sour smile. 'He left here late in the afternoon. The next morning his decapitated corpse was found on the beach, his head impaled on a pole. Again there were no footprints or hoof marks and no signs of violence.'
    'Enough!' Gurney rapped the table top and looked warningly down at Selditch. 'Hugh, you left the king at Swaffham?'
    'Yes. He and the court were to move on to the Virgin's shrine at Walsingham.' 'And afterwards?'
    'The king may stay in the area or he may travel on to Norwich or Lincoln.'
    Catching the pleading look in Gurney's eyes, Corbett turned the conversation away from the murders and on to the gossip of the courts. But Selditch, however, was not so easily put off. Ranulf made the mistake of commenting on the physician's ink-stained fingers. Selditch held them up admiringly.
    'Oh, yes,' he said. 'I am more of a scholar than a leech. I seek learning' – he preened himself – 'rather than gold.' He smiled coyly at Corbett. 'The king should be careful in these parts,' he said.
    Monck sighed in exasperation.
    'Why is that?' Corbett asked.
    'Don't you know your history, Sir Hugh? The king's grandfather, John, crossed these lands with his army. He was fleeing from his barons with his treasure loaded on sumpter ponies. He attempted to take a short cut across the Wash near the river Nene, but the tide came in rapidly. The king and his lords escaped but the treasure was lost together with its guards and all the sumpter ponies.'
    Corbett smiled. He could tell by the look on the faces of the others that Selditch's airing of his knowledge was a constant source of vexation.
    The meal drew to an end. Dame Cecily apologized but said she had to return to the convent and Gurney offered servants to escort her. Father Augustine accepted an invitation to stay the night. Alice withdrew with the thanks and plaudits of her guests ringing in her ears. Gurney escorted Dame Cecily out. The rest pushed back their chairs, accepting the servants' offer to refill their cups. Corbett whispered to Ranulf that he should take the now sleeping Maltote up to their chamber. Once they'd gone, Monck grinned sourly at Corbett.
    'A penny for your thoughts, Sir Hugh. Or shall I tell them for you, eh?'
    Corbett glanced across the table at Father Augustine, then at Selditch, who sat in his chair cradling his cup like some fat, cheerful goblin.
    'Tell me,' Corbett murmured.
    'A pretty