01 - Murder in the Holy City by Simon Beaufort Page B

arrogant man, she thought, noting the confident stride all Norman nobles seemed to master from birth. But at least he had talked to her in Greek, and not simply spoken French louder and louder until he thought she understood, as most knights would have done—had they bothered to address her courteously at all.

    Geoffrey strode up the street, hoping that the weakness he still felt in his knees was not apparent to the people he knew were watching him. He rounded the corner and was confronted by Roger, who was livid.
    “What was all that about?” he demanded. “What were you thinking of, sending us off and facing that mob alone? They might have killed you!”
    “I told you to go to the citadel for help!” exclaimed Geoffrey in horror. “Why did you not go?”
    He imagined the mob closing in on him, while he had struggled to buy time for Roger to come with reinforcements. And all the time Roger would have been watching from around the corner, not understanding a word that was said. The thought made his blood run cold.
    “I had no idea what was going on with all that jibber-jabber in Egyptian …”
    “Greek.”
    “Greek, then. It is all the same heathen babble.” Roger was silent for a moment, and then relented. “So what did she tell you?”
    “Nothing,” admitted Geoffrey. “Nothing that she did not say yesterday. In fact, it was all a waste of time, and we should not have gone there at all.”
    “We should have spent the afternoon in one of them cool brothels,” said Helbye. “Or in a drinking house sipping cold ale.”
    “Where are we off to now?” asked Roger, slipping into step beside Geoffrey. “An Egyptian encampment outside the city walls, perhaps, or a snake pit? Somewhere as accommodating as the last place we visited?” He grinned; his fury was clearly forgotten, and for him, the business was over. Geoffrey still felt a residual anger that Roger had not done as he had been asked, and he envied Roger’s ability to shrug off ill feelings with such gay abandon.
    He gave Roger a weak smile. “We know John lived at the citadel, but according to the notes of the Patriarch’s scribes, Sir Guido had recently moved into the Augustinian Priory near the Holy Sepulchre. He was apparently considering giving up knightly duties to become a monk.”
    “Was he heat-struck or something?” asked Roger, clearly nonplussed. “Why would he want to do anything as stupid as that?”
    “He would not be the first,” said Geoffrey. “Several knights and soldiers joined the priesthood when they reached Jerusalem. Not everyone came on Crusade for the loot and the fighting.”
    Roger looked unconvinced, and Geoffrey wondered what the burly Englishman would think if he became aware of Geoffrey’s own misgivings about his knightly obligations.
    They walked in silence. The sun was still fiercely hot, although its intensity had started to fade. Geoffrey felt slightly light-headed, but did not like to admit so to the others. The effects of his near escape were beginning to take their toll, and he wanted nothing more than to lie down in his own chamber and sleep. Helbye asked that he be allowed to stop to buy water from a man carrying two leather buckets suspended from a yoke over his shoulders, but Geoffrey sensed something untoward in the man’s evident enthusiasm for selling it to them, and refused permission. He bought some for the dog, and felt vindicated when the animal declined it after a single sniff.
    They were received politely but coldly by the Augustinians at their premises near the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, but at least they were invited to sit for a while in the cool of a marble chamber. While Geoffrey marvelled at the delicate patterns set into the stone, the others sipped appreciatively at the fine red wine they were brought.
    “What do you want with us?”
    Geoffrey turned at the hostile voice and saw an obese man in the robes of an Augustinian Canon standing in the doorway. The Canon had a bright