The Witch in the Well: A Catherine LeVendeur Mystery (39 page)

“Not far from Aymon’s stable,” Brehier answered. “They don’t seem to be using the tunnel, though. Maybe our prisoner is what he says, a common thief.”

“Or maybe we captured him before he could report its location,” Edgar said. “Now what? Do you know where they are?”

“Too close,” Brehier told him. “They’ve left this camp up as a blind and have made clusters of huts in the woods much closer to the walls. I nearly walked right into one of their ‘villages.’ ”

Edgar quaked at the thought of how he might have done the same. When he fell, he could have slid right to Olivier’s feet.

That brought another thought.

“Brehier,” he said quietly. “If you had devised a phantom camp to fool the enemy, would you keep an eye on it to be sure the enemy didn’t find out?”

“Oh, yes,” Brehier answered.

They both thought this over.

“We’re going to have a hell of a time getting out of this alive, aren’t we?” Edgar said.

“Unless we can turn hedgehog and burrow home,” Brehier answered.

“It seems,”Edgar sighed, “that we’re the only ones who can’t.”

Edgar was so preoccupied the evening before that Catherine hadn’t been able to tell him about the embroidery pieces or the hunt for Mandon. She had planned to the first thing in the morning but, when she opened her eyes, he was gone.

“Samonie?” she called through the curtains. “Do you know where Edgar went?”

There was no answer. She poked her head out. Samonie wasn’t there.

Catherine threw on her clothes. How late had she slept? The sun didn’t seem to be very high. Was there an early Mass for Saint Michael that she hadn’t been told about?

She hurried into the passage and up to the nursery. The children were all sound asleep, the nurses dozing by the doorway. The heavy iron brazier they had placed over the trapdoor was still in place. At least Catherine needn’t worry that Mandon had made an appearance that night.

In the hall she found guards just coming off their watch and servants sweeping the rushes into piles to carry out to the mid-dens. No one else was up.

Where could Edgar and Samonie have gone?

Catherine was becoming alarmed. She went back to her room to fetch her outside shoes. To her amazement, Samonie was lying on her cot as though she’d been there all night.

“Where have you been,” Catherine demanded, shaking her. “Where’s Edgar?”

“Master Edgar? I don’t know,” Samonie yawned. “I’m sorry. I was with Brehier most of the night, but we didn’t sleep. I must have a bit before I start my duties today.”

“Samonie, that’s not my business,” Catherine said. “You haven’t seen Edgar, then?”

“No, but Brehier left while it was still dark out,” Samonie said. “He told me he had to meet a man about a mine. Mistress, I need to tell you something.”

“A mine,” Catherine repeated, not hearing any more. “Of course. Edgar was suspicious that the siege has been too easy. He thinks that Olivier has brought in engineers to tunnel beneath the walls.”

“He wouldn’t be so careless of his life as to go out there to find out,” Samonie told her.

“Yes, he would,” Catherine said, torn between fury and terror.

“But the walls here are too thick to be brought down by tunnels,” Samonie said. “If they were, the place would have fallen centuries ago.”

“If someone had told Olivier about the underground passages.” Catherine deliberated the possibility and decided it was all too likely. “Then the engineers would only need to create a new one that would connect with the others. From there they could gather the soldiers into groups and overwhelm us before we knew what had happened.”

“So Master Edgar decided to find out,” Samonie said dully. “And Brehier went with him.”

“Samonie, we have to do something,” Catherine said. “The answer has to be in those tapestry pieces. If we have to solve that idiotic puzzle to save ourselves, then we shall. Come with me.”

Samonie dragged after her, trying to tell her body that, even if she hadn’t slept, she had at least spent most of the night on her back.

“Elissent?” Catherine was at the door to the sickroom. “Could you spare a few moments? Samonie will stay with Aymon.”

“Mother, I don’t need a nurse, or a guard,” Aymon complained from his bed. “I’m nearly well now. Once this weakness
leaves my legs, I’ll be as good as new. You can leave me alone for a space. I’d rather like some time to myself.”

Elissent seemed doubtful. “What if that murderer comes after you again?”

“I have a knife,” Aymon said, grinning. “I’d love a chance to give a bit of what I got. But it’s not going to happen. He probably escaped into the forest right after I was attacked. No one else has been hurt, have they?”

“No.” Elissent was still uncertain. “But what if you need something?”

“I’ll shout for a maid,” Aymon told her. “Go on. You need some rest. Catherine, after she does whatever you need, would you see that she gets a few hours’ sleep?”

“Of course, Aymon,” Catherine said. “You really are looking much better. I’m sure you’re in no more danger than anyone else at Boisvert.”

She finally managed to drag Elissent away on the condition that Samonie was left on a bench outside the door, to rush to Aymon’s assistance at a moment’s notice.

“Now what is it?” Elissent was annoyed at being dragged from her son’s side.

“We need you to look at some embroidery,” Catherine explained.

“Oh, really! At a time like this, we need to be doing something more productive than stitching altar cloths,”Elissent sniffed.

Catherine took her up to the solar where they had laid out the pieces.

“I thought you might have the missing one,” she told her. “But then last night we found what I think is the final piece. We still aren’t sure what it means, though. We were hoping you could help.”

Elissent’s annoyance evaporated when she looked at the long panel of embroidery. Her expression was replaced by something that seemed like fear.

“I’ve seen this before,” she said. “But not for years. Just after Seguin and I were married, Gargenaud took it off the wall and cut it into pieces, one for his daughter, Madeleine, and the rest for his sons. Seguin’s father, Fulk, took his to the Holy Land. I imagine it is still there. It looked similar to this.”

She touched the piece that Agnes had received.

“What about this one?” Catherine showed her the one Margaret had found.

Elissent fingered it. “This looks like the original. All the others are new. They are much like the old ones, but not quite. Perhaps it’s just the colors, but they don’t seem right.”

“And this?” Catherine directed her attention to Brehier’s piece.

Elissent stared at it. It was a scene beyond the end of the story. The first part showed the knight and his lady at home in the castle with children around them. Then an image of a great storm cloud darkening their home. The last two showed the lady kissing her lord good-bye and, finally, the lady, holding the treasure box, standing in front of a gate of three stones, one foot raised to enter.

Elissent shook her head. “I’ve never seen this before. There was a story, but I. . .” She felt the material. “This isn’t from Gargenaud’s tapestry. It’s much older. Where did you get this?”

“Brehier had it from his great-grandmother,” Catherine said.

“Did he now?” Elissent said. “I heard that long ago there was another tapestry. But it was lost at the time of the raids from the Northmen. Gargenaud’s was a copy of it. There was no panel showing Andonenn’s departure. Everyone knows that.”

“None of us do,” Marie told her. “Yet we and all our children are in jeopardy because of the secrets you here at Boisvert are so determined to keep.”

“This makes no sense!” Elissent insisted. “The original pieces were scattered before any of you were born. Who made these copies?”

“Mandon?” Catherine suggested. “Or perhaps her sister, Berthe of Blois?”

“You keep talking of Mandon,” Elissent said. “But no one has seen her for years. She’s just a poor madwoman who hides under the castle. She must be dead by now. All that generation had weak minds. Madeleine isn’t the first, you know. Living here would send most women into madness. And she has no sister that I ever heard of, certainly not in Blois.”

“Very well.” Marie tried to make peace. “All we need to know now is if there is anything in the total picture in this tapestry that can help us defeat Olivier.”

“No,” Elissent said firmly. “It’s nothing but a story. It means nothing now.”

“But what about. . .?” Agnes began.

Marie shushed her. “Thank you, Elissent,” she said. “We are sorry to have disturbed you for no good reason.”

“I understand your worry,” Elissent told her. “But Boisvert can’t fall even if the water fails. You need not fear.”

When she had left, Marie looked at the others.

“Was that of any use at all?” she asked.

“Well, we know that Brehier’s section of the tapestry was new to her,” Agnes said. “And that someone copied all but Mother’s so that we would get them. And Elissent suggested that the last piece is the part of the story where Andonenn goes back to the spring.”

“I’m sure of it,” Catherine said. “I wonder if the writing would tell us where she went.”

“Since we can’t read it, we have to hope it doesn’t,” Marie noted.

They all glumly agreed.

“This is the end of the story, right?” Catherine said.

“Yes, that’s been established,” Agnes told her.

“I was just remembering the
jongleur
,” Catherine said. “The end of the saga of Jurvale and Andonenn. What was it?”

Open the lock in your darkest hour
Children of Andonenn needn’t cower
To save her you shall have the power
Follow the guide left in the tower
It will lead you to Andonenn’s bower
Fear neither storm nor shower
Insert the key into the flower
Find the treasure and win the dower.

They all turned to stare at Margaret. She blushed.

“It was easy to memorize,” she said. “Tumpty-tumpty and tumpty-tump. It just stuck with me.”

“How can you put a key into a flower?” Agnes asked.

“ ‘Fear neither storm nor shower,’ ” Catherine said. “And Mother went outside to find the way to Andonenn. Don’t you see? It’s not one of the doors within the keep. It’s somewhere beyond the walls.”

“Or by the well,” Margaret said. “Maybe she didn’t jump in. Maybe there’s a secret doorway in the well house, too.”

“Even if we find the door, we don’t have the key,” Agnes objected, but there was hope in her voice.

Catherine had been staring at the last panel.

“Edgar told me that the opening to the tunnel in the forest looked like some of the pagan stones you see in the countryside. You know, three slabs piled up like a doorway to nothing. Only these marked the entrance. Don’t you think this picture of Andonenn going home looks the same?”

The others crowded around.

“It could be,” Agnes said. “But the only way to find out is to go see it and, in case you’ve forgotten, there’s an army between us and the forest.”

“There has to be a way,” Catherine said. “We must do more than simply wait to be conquered or rescued.”

At that moment, their frazzled nerves were further assaulted
by a sudden explosion of angry screams mixed with shrieks of pain. As one, the women ran toward the sound.

Elissent was in the hall outside Aymon’s room. She was holding Samonie by the arm with one hand and, with the other, was beating her fiercely with a stick.

“You disobedient, lazy, traitorous woman!” she yelled as she struck. “What did they pay you? Where did they take him?”

“Stop!” Catherine cried, as she tried to grab the stick from Elissent.

Margaret threw herself over Samonie. “Don’t hurt her, please!” she begged.

Agnes and Marie helped Catherine restrain Elissent.

“Let me go!” She struggled in their arms. “That woman is a traitor! She let Olivier’s men in to kidnap my son!”

“What?” Marie asked.

“It’s not true!” Samonie shouted through a swollen lip.

“It is!” Elissent insisted. “I never should have left him so helpless. I came back and his bed was empty and this slut sound asleep when she should have been watching!”

“I was tired,” Samonie protested. “And I did drop off, but I’d have heard if anyone had carried Aymon away. He would have called for help.”

“That’s right,” Elissent said. “My poor boy! And no one but a serpent in our home to hear him!”

“Elissent.” Catherine was firm. “Samonie would never betray us. If Aymon has been abducted, she had nothing to do with it. Considering how many secret doorways there are in this place, he could have been taken out through a revolving seat in the privy!”

“How can you mock at such a time!” Elissent sobbed.

“I beg your forgiveness.” Catherine sighed. “But you have also overstepped yourself. Samonie is my servant. It is not your right to strike her.”

She knelt next to the maid, who was holding the side of her
face. There was a red mark across her hand. Catherine moved it to examine her bruised cheek.

“Marie, would you make a poultice for this?” she asked. “Margaret, take Samonie to her bed, please.”

They both nodded and, their arms wrapped protectively around her, took Samonie away to be cared for.

Agnes remained. She could see how angry Catherine was. Someone had to stay to assure that there wouldn’t be another murder.

“Elissent,” Catherine spoke from between clenched teeth. “I am sorry for your loss. It grieves me that death has come to Boisvert. It grieves me even more that my family and I have been brought into this. We came here out of respect for my grandfather and our heritage.

“We have been insulted and put in mortal danger. You have lied to us repeatedly. If it weren’t for the threat to my children I would say now that Boisvert deserves to be conquered.”

“I say the same,” Agnes stated, to her sister’s amazement. “Catherine and I are going to uncover the truth if we have to do it with spades and buckets. I’m sick to death of you and your ineffectual husband. And I think you have terrible taste in clothes!”

Elissent stared at them a moment and then covered her face with her veil and stumbled, weeping, in search of someone more sympathetic.