The King's Bishop Read Free

interests and he wished to complete the task. Where was his secretary? Admiring himself in his mirror?
    When at last Michaelo arrived he was breathless, his face was flushed, and much to Thoresby’s surprise the hem of his habit was soggy.
    ‘Where have you been?’
    ‘Your Grace, there has been a terrible—’ Michaelo shook his head, sat down at the writing desk, and dabbed his face with a cloth, closed his eyes, took a deep breath.
    ‘A terrible what, Michaelo? You are all atremble.’
    His secretary nodded, blotted his upper lip.
    ‘Michaelo!’
    ‘Forgive me, Your Grace. I wished to catch my breath.’ Michaelo shook his head. ‘It is the marks, Your Grace. And his cloak. He was floating in the moat, not an ale-cask. How does one spill so much ale as to
soak
an entire cloak? Even stranger, why wear a cloak while drinking?’ Michaelo bowed his head, pressed the cloth to one temple, then the other.
    The Archbishop studied his uncharacteristically dishevelled, babbling secretary. ‘Have you overindulged this morning? One of your headaches?’
    Michaelo raised his head slowly, frowned up at Thoresby as if puzzled. ‘No, Your Grace. I was making my way here when they discovered him and pulled him from the ditch.’
    ‘
Who
was pulled from
what
ditch?’
    ‘Did I not say? I pray you forgive me, Your Grace. It was Daniel. Sir William of Wyndesore’s page. Downbelow the Round Tower. Drowned, Your Grace. Or worse.’
    Worse? ‘Drowning is rather final, I should think. What could be worse?’
    Michaelo’s brows pulled together. ‘I said nothing to the men who found him. I do not wish to make something of nothing. But there were marks on his wrists. As if his hands had been bound, Your Grace.’
    That could be troublesome. But it was the victim’s identity that set off alarms in Thoresby’s head. His secretary had a weakness for handsome youths. ‘Daniel. A rather pretty young man, as I recall. You have not been breaking your vows again, have you, Michaelo?’
    The question seemed to clear Michaelo’s head. He sat up, suddenly alert. ‘Your Grace! I was merely walking past.’
    ‘I do not doubt that, Michaelo, but your agitation bespeaks an attachment.’
    Michaelo’s nostrils flared. ‘I kept my distance as always, Your Grace.’
    Deo gratias
. Thoresby hid a smile as Michaelo lifted his chin, his back stiff with indignation, raised his quill pen and sat with it poised above the parchment.
    ‘Shall we begin, Your Grace?’
    His secretary’s injured feelings reassured Thoresby. ‘Indeed. I have resolved my approach to the letters our King has requested.’
    It was a matter of emphasis, Thoresby had decided. Praise those aspects of Wykeham’s service of which the Cistercian abbots least approved – how in his past post of Clerk of Works and presently as Keeper of the Privy Seal the King found him indispensable, which, of course, emphasised Wykeham’s worldly loyalties.The King could not deny it, nor could he deny that Thoresby couched his words as praise. Thoresby smiled to himself as he began to dictate to Michaelo.
    Rather elegantly gowned for an early morning walk, her brown hair carefully coiffed beneath a gossamer veil, Alice Perrers swept through the Norman Gate from the upper ward clutching a fur-lined cloak round her shivering body. It was too early to be abroad; the blood was not yet warmed in her extremities. The guard bowed to her. Her page hurried after her carrying a goblet and a flagon of watered-down and delicately spiced wine. Alice intended to wake properly with her usual morning refreshment no matter who had been found floating in the moat. After attending Sir William she must return to the apartments of the ailing Queen and attend her. There would be no time to see to Alice’s own needs. Not that she resented her duty to Queen Phillippa. Alice owed her position to the aged Queen’s affection. But she must also take care of herself – no one else would. She was nineteen years old