Silent Knight

Walter backed toward the fireplace. “Has your mind snapped in twain? I must give Edith more credit than I thought. I did not know you harbored so deep an affection for her that your brain has become sickly at her death.”

With a roar, Roger vaulted over the stool. Shoving one arm against the younger man’s throat, he pinioned his son against the wall. Ignoring Walter’s struggles, Roger slashed through the padded green velvet and the cinnamon-colored satin lining of Walter’s jacket. Within a minute, the expensive clothing hung in tatters from the young man’s shoulders. This violent action reduced Walter to frozen shock.

Grabbing his son by the scruff of his neck, Roger pulled him into the center of the light cast by the four candles. When he saw the profusion of open sores dotting Walter’s chest and disappearing below the drawstrings of his trunk hose, Roger nearly gagged. He pulled Walter’s head closer to the flames. His stomach turned sour at the sight of the bald patches shining through Walter’s close-cropped hair. A red mist rose up before Roger’s eyes, and a deep ringing filled his ears.

“You pernicious piece of a dungheap!” Roger followed up these words by slamming Walter once more against the coarse stone wall.

“What mean you?” Walter gasped, attempting to pry Roger’s finger’s from around his throat.

Roger suddenly released his son, who staggered to the stool and flung himself down upon it. The sting of scalding tears pricked at the older man’s eyelids, before he dashed them away. “How long have you had the pox?’

Walter picked up his cloak and drew it around his shivering shoulders.

Roger drew back one thick-booted foot and kicked the stool out from under his son. The wood splintered as Walter fell to the stone floor. “Where did you collect this souvenir of pleasure?” Roger growled. “At court? In the stews of London? Under a hayrack?”

Hugging the cloak, Walter scrambled away from the stamping feet.

“Answer me!” Roger roared. A vein at his right temple began to throb. By nightfall, he knew, he could expect another one of his vicious headaches. He ignored the warning. “When did you know you carried this... this filth?”

“’Tis but a rash.” Pulling himself to a standing position, Walter stared his father in the eye. “I have been scratching overmuch. ’Tis nothing but lice.”

A small part of Roger’s mind applauded his son’s impudence, though the fury of hellfire still burned through him. “Lice? Aye, that and more, from between a drab’s legs! Mince no words with me, hedgepig! I’ve seen enough of the world to know the pox. Have you sought treatment?”

Walter paused before answering, surprised at the turn of questioning. “A physician in York gave me mercury, though I think he sought to kill me, not to cure me.”

Roger turned toward the fire and stared into the glowing embers. “Too bad ’twas young Edward who died. ’Twould have been better if it had been you,” he said very softly, not caring whether Walter heard him or not. All his hopes and ambitions for the Ormonds had disappeared like the feeble smoke curling up the chimney.