The Nun's Tale by Candace Robb

gardeners, Your Grace. Master Nicholas Wilton. Was never a man knew as much about gardens as Master Nicholas.’ Simon slipped his hat back on and bent to his work.
    Nicholas Wilton had been dead for two years. Thoresby had not known him well. But Lucie Wilton’s present husband, Owen Archer, was much on Thoresby’s mind. He awaited Archer’s return; he was just the person to look into this abysmal situation.
    Thoresby could not complain of Archer’s absence. He had been pleased when John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, had requested Archer’s help in preparing men for the expedition to be led by Edward, the Black Prince, to restore Don Pedro of Castile to his throne. The previous winter the French had helped Don Pedro’s bastard brother, Enrique de Trastamare, usurp the throne of Castile and banish Don Pedro from the kingdom. King Edward and the Black Prince had vowed to restore Pedro, King by right of birth, and Edward’s third son, John of Gaunt, was to aid his elder brother in this venture.
    Assisting the Prince and Lancaster suited Thoresby, as he wanted their support in his efforts to rid the royal household of their father’s new mistress, the upstart Alice Perrers. And Archer had been glad to oblige, welcoming the chance to spend time with his old friends, Lief and Gaspare.
    But this uproar at St Clement’s Nunnery – it was just the type of business Archer sorted out well.
    ‘I was set against liking her new husband,’ Simon the gardener was saying. ‘Looks like a knave with that patch and his soldierly ways.’ He had loaded a handcart with dirt and lady’s mantle. With a grunt he began to move away.
    Thoresby followed. ‘Archer’s appearance does work against him.’ He had been surprised when he had first encountered Archer in the old Duke’s entourage, but Henry of Grosmont had been a keen judge of men, and Thoresby had never doubted that Archer must be a quick-witted, resourceful, trustworthy spy. ‘But his looks, patch and all, appeal to the ladies.’
    Simon shrugged. ‘I’ll never understand it, but my wife says ’tis true. Captain Archer’s a good man, no matter his looks. He’s made Mistress Wilton laugh again. ’Tis a blessed sight to see a pretty woman laugh.’ Simon stopped in front of a freshly dug bed. Picking up the slips, he set them aside on the grass, then dumped the soil into the bed. He knelt down and began to place the plants at regular intervals. ‘I expect this is the first of many children.’
    ‘Children? Whose children?’
    ‘Captain Archer and Mistress Wilton, Your Grace. They’ve been kind to Tildy and Jasper. It’s good they’re beginning their own family.’
    ‘I had not realised.’
    Simon shrugged. ‘Well, you were down at Windsor and up in the Dales so much of the winter, weren’t you?’ He bent over the bed again, pressing mounds of earth around the new plants.
    Thoresby did not like this piece of news. He did not like that Archer had not told him. ‘If I had known Mistress Wilton was with child, I would not have sent Archer away.’
    Simon squinted up at the archbishop. ‘He’ll be back soon enough, won’t he?’
    ‘And gone again.’
    Simon shrugged. ‘Back by Michaelmas?’
    ‘Long before that.’
    Simon nodded. ‘Then ’tis a good thing. Come close to her time, the captain will be a help to Mistress Wilton, but before that he’d be fussing over her and she’d be pushing him away.’ Simon, the father of five, spoke from experience.
    ‘Odd that Archer said nothing,’ Thoresby muttered. He looked up at the angle of the sun. ‘I must take my leave of you now, Simon. I have some unpleasant business to attend to.’
    ‘God go with you, Your Grace.’
    ‘And with you, Simon.’
    Thoresby had already spoken with his nephew and Nicholas de Louth, knew of the horsemen and Dame Joanna’s odd behaviour. He knew too that Dame Isobel had declared the nun to be Joanna.
    Nicholas de Louth had certainly proved a bungling fool. How could he have