The Service of the Dead

Already she missed Strasbourg. Though it sat at the foot of the Alps, it enjoyed a more temperate climate than York. Or had Ulrich’s love simply made it feel warmer?

“Dame Eleanor?” Her man Griffin peered at her face, shadowed by the hood. “Are we to proceed?”

“Yes. Of course.” She glanced over at her companions and saw how their shoulders crept toward their ears. Brigida was visibly shivering. “Come along, my dears. We shall soon be warming our hands at my nephew’s hearth. His manse is just within this gate.” She prayed that was so, that they were expected. The decision to leave Strasbourg and set up her Martha House in York had been sudden, of necessity. She had written a letter, but whether it had preceded her to York she could not know until she was face-to-face with her nephew William. He had procured his late father-in-law’s great house on Micklegate, a manse large enough to house Eleanor and her three companions, as well as the two servants and Griffin. It was only a temporary sanctuary, until Eleanor persuaded her daughter Katherine to part with one of the sweet houses on High Petergate that had been part of her dower. There might be tenants to evict, but surely for her mother, and to the benefit of her immortal soul… Eleanor, though, had never mastered the art of predicting how her daughter might respond.

Griffin knocked on the substantial oaken door to William’s fine house. The confusion evident on the face of the servant who answered was disappointing.

“I pray your master informed you that he was expecting us,” said Eleanor.

A large woman stepped in front of the servant with such determination that the keys on her gold and silver girdle tinkled delicately. All in velvet in late morning, and it was not even a feast day. Isabella Gisburne Frost. She was certainly her father’s daughter, keen to remind all how much she was worth. Eleanor prayed her nephew had not caught the malaise. He had been an honest, worthy man when she had parted with him. But he had made a name for himself, and such things did go to a man’s head. “I know nothing of my husband expecting guests. You are–?”

“I have come to see my nephew, William Frost. I am his aunt, Eleanor Clifford. You do not recognize me?”

“Dame Eleanor who lives in Strasbourg?” The chilly gaze warmed slightly, but the narrow, colorless lips remained pursed as if she detected a bad smell. “It has been a long while.”

My, what an unattractive woman William had wed. Eleanor did not remember her as quite so long in the face, the eyes so close together and small, the nose so sharp, the torso so… abundant. They ate well in this household. Too well for some.

“Lived, my dear Isabella. I have returned to York as a widow, a wealthy widow, and William has welcomed me to bide with you until I have set up my own household.” Or he would, were he the man she believed him to be. Hoped him to be.

“William said nothing to me–”

“It is raining again,” Eleanor remarked, stepping aside and motioning Dina, Clara, and Brigida to enter. “I had thought delaying the journey to arrive in April I might avoid such dreadful cold. Alas, it seems I have forgotten how long winter lingers here.” She slipped past her reluctant hostess and shepherded the young women toward the hearth. A hearth, not a fire circle. How forward-looking. “Did your father install this, or was this my nephew’s addition to the hall?”

“My father, of course. Though my husband installed another for our dear Hazel’s bedchamber. It is better for her lungs.”

So their one child was cursed with her father’s weak lungs. “Yes, of course, poor William. He was the youngest, you know. The runt of the litter. His lungs were weak from birth. That is why he spent summers with us up north, breathing and strengthening. My sons put him through his paces. Put muscle on him.”

“Your sons. Yes.” For a moment the woman’s face softened with sadness. But only a moment. “Who are these women, Dame Eleanor?” Isabella’s beady eyes looked down the considerable length of her nose at the young women timidly holding their hands out to the fire.

“They are Beguines, Isabella. Lay sisters, poor sisters. I am not certain what you call them here. They will set up the Martha House I am founding in York, to tend to the souls and welfare of the poor. Dina, Clara, Brigida.” The three young woman bowed and offered a blessing in French.

Isabella frowned. Difficulty with the accents, perhaps, or perhaps she was the sort who felt uneasy around pious virgins. “And this man?” Isabella gestured toward Griffin, who had remained near the door, arms folded, as the two servants hustled past him with Eleanor’s baggage.

“Griffin. My late husband’s factor.” And armed retainer. But naming him a factor, a man of business, was clearly what would reassure this woman that the man was not a barbarian come to ravage her. He had served as Eleanor’s escort – three young virgins, precious cargo, God knows. Griffin had been armed and ready to defend them.

“A factor? Do you intend to trade here in York?”

“Perhaps.” Eleanor looked around. “Where is my nephew?”

“At the council chambers or… He is a busy man. But I expect him for dinner.” The woman’s eyes were suddenly far away, probably thinking how to extend the food for the unexpected guests. Or praying that her husband had not forgotten to inform her that he was dining elsewhere, forcing her to entertain Eleanor and her three women without him. “Would you not be more comfortable in your daughter’s home? Do you remember it, situated next to Thomas Holme’s lovely manse, and across Castlegate from the gardens that lead down to the Foss?”

Eleanor remembered Simon Neville’s house as much too small for her traveling party. It was her daughter’s additional houses in the city that interested her. But she must approach Katherine with care. Her daughter could be quite stubborn when she felt pushed. “This will suit us very well, Isabella my dear. If you would just show us where we might shed our traveling clothes and wash?”

Kate and Griselde stood in the repaired and refurbished hall next to the guesthouse, discussing whether or not to lease the house with furnishings or without. Odo was now comfortably lodged in the home of a midwife in Fishergate, and Berend had just supervised the transfer of the spices to the small house in front of her own on Castlegate. Much to Lionel’s dismay, she had hired a clerk whose sole job was keeper of the spice. Young Seth was delighted with the work.

“Furnished is best,” Griselde concluded. “Then it is always at the ready.”

They were about to climb to the solar when Jennet rushed in. “Dame Katherine!”

“God help us, what has happened now?” Kate asked, seeing Jennet’s flushed face, the mud on her hem.

“It’s your mother. Dame Eleanor. She has just arrived in the city.”

Kate felt her heart turn over.

God help you, Kate, Geoff muttered.

“Mother is here?” Kate groaned. “Did Ulrich decide to return to York?”

Jennet shook her head. “Apparently she is a widow again, and she has brought three poor sisters with her, to open a house here. To serve the poor of the city.”

“That part of Walter’s story was true?”

“You will hear soon enough. She is biding at Master Frost’s house on Micklegate and Mistress Frost has sent Tib with an invitation for you to dine there today.”

She could not. No. It was too soon. “Does she know about Walter?”

“Tib says she has proposed that the Frosts make the journey north with her, for the wedding. Dame Isabella wants you there now. She says it is your duty to break the news.”

Kate muttered a curse. Nothing was so bad that her mother’s presence would not make it worse. Far worse. And to be the one to deliver such news, such blame.