Free A Head for Poisoning by Simon Beaufort

crazed murderer for a neighbour.”
    â€œMost Normans are crazed murderers,” said the Saxon Ingram, not without admiration. “That is what makes them such superb warriors. I wish I were a Norman.”
    â€œDo you mean you wish you were a superb warrior or a crazed murderer?” asked Geoffrey, favouring him with a cool stare. “I do not think that one necessarily leads to the other.”
    His attention strayed to the scratch on his mount’s leg, and he led it away from the two young soldiers to see if the animal limped. They watched Geoffrey critically.
    â€œHe does altogether too much thinking,” muttered Ingram to Barlow. “He would be better thinking less and … and …”
    â€œKilling more?” supplied Barlow helpfully.
    â€œIt is all this reading and learning that has made him like he is,” Ingram continued. “It has brought him nothing but trouble. And I wager you half my treasure that it will only be a matter of time before it leads him to problems at home. His brothers are rightly very suspicious of a man with letters.”
    â€œWhat are you two mumbling about?” asked Helbye, looking up as he checked the buckles on his treasure bags.
    â€œWe were just saying that learning and reading is the quickest way to the Devil,” said Ingram with passion, casting a defiant look at Geoffrey.
    â€œQuite right,” said Helbye sagely. “Reading is the surest way to end up in the Devil’s service.”
    â€œThen perhaps you should have a word with the Pope, and inform him that most of his monks are bound for Hell,” said Geoffrey mildly. “Because most churchmen can read.”
    Ingram glowered, and Geoffrey smiled at him, trying to coax a better mood out of the habitually surly man-at-arms. Geoffrey was popular with his soldiers, who liked his easy and pleasant manner—even if they were suspicious of his penchant for monkish pastimes, like reading. Ingram, however, was different, and had regarded Geoffrey with a deep distrust since he had first come under the knight’s command—mainly stemming from his inability to understand why Geoffrey did not always leap at the opportunity to indulge in a little unprovoked slaughter or impromptu pillaging.
    â€œThink about it, Ingram,” Geoffrey said. “How would you have had reliable news from home if it had not been for Enide’s letters to me? Reading and writing is not all bad.”
    Ingram pursed his lips and declined to answer.
    â€œWell,
I
would not trust anything important to a letter,” said Helbye firmly. “I sent a spoken message with Eudo of Rosse to tell my wife that I was coming home—Eudo was due to return here two weeks before us. I did not send her one of those evil letters for all and sundry to be reading.”
    â€œâ€˜All and sundry’ cannot read,” pointed out Geoffrey. “And anyway, how do you know your Eudo of Rosse did not tell ‘all and sundry’ every detail in your message to your wife?”
    â€œYou wait and see,” said Helbye, after a brief moment of doubt. “My wife will be waiting for me to come home, while those of you who entrusted news of your return to letters—” here he paused to eye Ingram and Barlow disapprovingly—“will find that they are not expected.”
    â€œIt would probably have been better to do both,” said Caerdig, sensing that here was a debate that was not the first time in the airing. “Then the letters would have reached home if the messenger had been delayed, and the messenger would have delivered the news if the letters had been lost. But Goodrich and Lann Martin are humming with the news that Sir Geoffrey is expected soon—that is why I knew who he was when he trespassed on my land—and so obviously some message or other arrived.”
    Bored with the discussion, Geoffrey dug his heels into his horse’s flanks, and went