Squire Throwleigh’s Heir aktm-7

by Michael Jecks

  Benefit of clergy meant he wouldn’t be executed, though, and that was something. Petronilla didn’t have the same protection. Stephen patted her hand. ‘Don’t fear. You will be safe enough. Once they have me, they won’t bother with you.’

  She gave him an anxious look from the corner of her eye. ‘I have done nothing to make me fear the rope. It’s not that which worries at me. It’s that man Nicholas.’ It hadn’t been possible to tell the priest before, but now she burst out with the sordid story. ‘He grabbed me, here?’ she cried, and her tears glistened as she remembered the scene. ‘And now whenever I pass him, he leers at me.’

  Stephen felt a rush of affection for her sweep through him. He took her hand and held it to his breast, and she saw the kindly smile touch his eyes. She bent her head and allowed him to gently kiss her hair. ‘Be easy, child. You shall be safe; I shall see to it.’

  ‘Safe from who?’ Hugh demanded, marching into the buttery with two empty jugs of wine, and overhearing the priest’s final words. Although he habitually wore a scowl, beneath it Hugh had a generous soul and a soft-natured heart, and he had taken a liking to this poor young girl.

  The priest gave him a rather measuring look. ‘My son, there are some men who insist on taking advantage of women, whether the women wish to comply or not.’

  Hugh’s dour features visibly darkened. ‘Has that henchman tried to muck about with you again?’ he asked Petronilla.

  She gave a sour laugh. ‘No – since I’ve kept well out of his way.’

  Stephen looked serious. ‘You mustn’t do anything against him, Hugh. You’ll only get yourself into trouble. Leave him alone, but tell me if he tries something again so that I may rescue this poor girl.’

  Hugh nodded. In silence he refilled his jugs and left the buttery to rejoin the guests in the hall.

  But Stephen sat a while longer, holding Petronilla’s hand in his own and staring at the ground as if on it were written the answers to all his confusions.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  In his home at Throwleigh, Jordan sat quietly in the corner of the room, his dark eyes never leaving the rocking form of his mother.

  Christiana sat before the little fire, her daughter Molly cuddled on her lap, her figure casting a terrible, crone-shaped shadow against the far wall. It looked like a witch, swaying from side to side as she cast a spell of doom on them, waiting to leap upon the family and bring disaster to them all.

  And the disaster had happened. There was no protection for a family that had no means of support, and if his father was thought to have killed Herbert, he was guilty of treason. Jordan wasn’t sure, but he thought his father could be burned alive for that. It was as vile an act as could be envisaged: it was still more wicked than ‘petty treason’, the murder by a wife of her spouse. Everyone knew that Edmund’s manumission, his formal release from serfdom, had been revoked by Lady Katharine, and it followed that everyone would believe that he had killed her son in revenge. He could expect no mercy.

  Jordan felt the sobs rising in his throat once more, and sniffed hard to quell them, wrapping himself tighter in his blanket. The fire was low, but they had little wood left to burn, and it was very chill at this time of night. It was normal for Jordan to shiver himself to sleep throughout the winter and well into spring, and if it was too cold even for that, he would climb into the bed with his parents and sister. Now, with the house silent in the absence of his father, he wanted to cuddle up with his mother. He felt a hole in his very soul at the sight of her misery, and longed to ease her fear, and make things better – but he didn’t have the words. Somehow he knew that only another adult could do that.

  He was hungry, but dared make no demand for food. There was none to be had, and asking for it would only set his mother off again into another frenzy of rage at her useless husband.

  And it was all because his father had been arrested for running over Master Herbert, Jordan knew. His father – arrested, and for something Jordan knew he couldn’t have done. Fortunately, he and his friend had the thing that could demonstrate the priest’s guilt, and now he decided that there was no time to lose. He must go with Alan to see the knight, the man everyone said was so clever.

  A shiver of fear upset his resolve. It was one thing to want to protect his father, to rescue him from prison, but to speak to a knight? When he was a lowly serf? It had been a shock for their family, to become slaves once more, but Jordan had speedily adapted to his new position. If anything, it had made his friendship with Alan even stronger – for now he was on the same footing as the older boy.

  Jordan’s spirit quailed within him at the thought of speaking to a knight – and a Keeper of the King’s Peace at that. This Sir Baldwin was the most powerful person the boy had ever heard of, even superior to his old master, Squire Roger. Would he listen to a boy with a story such as his?

  Baldwin and Jeanne joined the bailiff and his wife. They took their stand at some distance from the fire, nearer the trestles which were now being cleared of food.

  Jeanne was struck by the change which had come over her husband. The quiet, introspective man she had married had gone, and in his place was this implacable stranger who had but one aim – to avenge the death of the young Master of Throwleigh. She had seen Baldwin at his work several times already, at Tavistock and in Crediton, but never before had he appeared to be so fired with grim determination.

  He drank his pot off now, and held it out to Edgar to refill. ‘This wine is good.’

  ‘I am glad you like it, Sir Baldwin. It is from my last shipment from Bordeaux.’ Thomas had appeared as if from nowhere, and stood now at Baldwin’s elbow.

  The knight nodded. ‘From Bordeaux? That is where the Fleming says he came from.’

  ‘Him?’ Thomas snorted. He was feeling more himself now, and he gave van Relenghes a cold stare. ‘I’d be surprised. He has more the look of a wandering mercenary than a soldier.’

  A manservant dropped a bowl, which shattered, and Thomas gave a roar of anger, striding over to the man and slapping him on the face.

  Baldwin and his wife exchanged a glance. ‘He is not quite so calm as he would like us to think,’ said Baldwin, and before Jeanne could respond, she saw his eyes light on the Fleming and his guard once more. ‘Simon, we haven’t managed to get that fellow Godfrey alone, and yet he is a prime witness as well,’ he went on.

  ‘Who, the weapons master? He’s said all he’s likely to, surely?’

  ‘I wonder. What if we could get him away from his employer?’

  ‘You’d need a polearm to separate the two of them,’ Simon joked.

  ‘Why, though?’ Jeanne asked suddenly. ‘I mean, why should the Fleming need to have a guard with him all the time even while he’s here, safe in a hall? On a journey any man of sense will have a guard, particularly now with so many outlaws on all the highways, but why in here? Even Thomas has left all his men out in the stables.’

  Baldwin looked down at her proudly. He loved his wife for her beauty and abilities, but never had he felt such an attraction purely for the value of her common-sense. ‘My love, you have hit the nail perfectly.’

  ‘But what is the answer?’

  Simon drained his own pot. ‘That’s simple. A man only has such a guard when he’s in danger, and the fact that he has Godfrey with him all the time is certain proof that he does not feel safe here in the hall.’

  ‘No friend of the squire’s would come to harm here,’ Jeanne protested.

  ‘No,’ her husband agreed, ‘and there is another explanation which Simon has missed, but…’ Before he could say more, his attention was drawn to the little huddled figure near the fireplace, Lady Katharine.

  She slowly rose to her feet, and Baldwin saw her close her eyes as if in prayer. Her veil had been raised so she could drink, and now she dropped it back over her face. With a cautious precision that proved her consumption of wine had been considerably higher than usual, she stepped away from the roaring fire towards a cooler seat.
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br />   At her side moved her faithful retainers: Daniel and the maidservant Anney. Then Lady Katharine stumbled, and Baldwin saw two things that intrigued him.

  The first was that Daniel instantly reached out and took her arm, gripping it carefully above the elbow. She rested her other hand on his for a moment, looking up into his face with gratitude, before gently extricating herself and sitting.

  The second and equally interesting part of the tableau was Anney’s reaction to her mistress’s near-fall. The woman made absolutely no move to save her lady from falling. It was as if she had no interest in whether her mistress hurt herself or not.

  Anney watched the people in the room dully. There was no pleasure in being here. It was hard enough to be away from her son, and the Lord God Himself only knew what Alan would get up to tonight without her there to keep him under control. She didn’t need the extra responsibility of looking after her lady while she received these men. Especially at this, the occasion of Herbert’s funeral.

  Anney glanced at her mistress and was unnerved to see that Lady Katharine was watching her.

  ‘Are you thinking of Tom, Anney?’

  Anney nodded shortly. What else would she be thinking of, she wondered angrily, with all these fine, noble people here to celebrate the little life of Master Herbert? And yet what was Herbert but a useless fool, a boy who had let her own child die?

  Perhaps a little of her bitterness of spirit transmitted itself to Lady Katharine, because she blinked again, quickly, as though about to break into tears, and looked away.

  That day was all too clear in Anney’s memory: she supposed it always would be. The morning had been bright and fresh, without a hint of the wet weather that was to follow, and she had set off for her work with a light heart. Because of her bigamous husband, Anney had lived away from the manor, preferring to remain in the cottage in the village, even after his deceit was proven and her journey homewards became so difficult, if not dangerous. It was partly from the hope that he might return to her, and partly that she felt secluded from the pointing fingers and laughter of other servants if she had her home as a hiding-place.

  The morning had begun like any other. She had risen before dawn, kicking Tom and Alan from her bed. Both boys knew their duties, and Alan had fetched the bucket and started his walk down to the stream, while Tom had collected two large faggots of sticks to make up the fire. While she was in their garden picking vegetables for their food, he had taken his flint and knife and begun to strike a spark to his tinder.

  He had been sleepy, and his aim was poor, and when Anney came back inside, her skirts holding a small cabbage and onions, to find no fire burning in the grate, she angrily clipped Tom about the ear and shouted that he was pathetic. Then, dropping the vegetables on the floor, she had taken the snivelling child’s knife and struck a strong spark, from which she soon had a small fire lighted. The two bundles of wood would be enough for the day, and provided Alan and Tom kept an eye on the fire, the house should be warm enough at evening for them to have a hot drink before retiring to their bed.

  Except her son, her Tom, would never sleep in bed with her again. That was the day he’d died in the black gloom, drowning in the slimy, weed-encrusted base of the well-shaft, and all because her master’s boy hadn’t the gumption to call for help.

  On that last day she’d eaten a dry crust or two of bread, and so had her boys, and she had allowed them to eat an egg between them, a spare one which she had kept back from Daniel’s beadle, before sending them off on their jobs. Alan then, as now, was a bird-scarer, and with his sling would keep crows and rooks from the crops, while Tom had been granted the position of playmate to Lady Katharine’s child.

  At the time his place, and the trust in him which it implied, had been a magnificent honour to Anney, but now it was the greatest regret of her life that her boy had been taken on. There was no point in receiving an honour if it wasn’t possible to enjoy the fruits of it in later life, and the only result of this had been the ending of his life. If it hadn’t been for the job, he would be alive now. But he had taken the job, he had played with Herbert, and he had fallen into the well – nobody knew why even now – and from that moment on, her life had been empty.

  Lady Katharine met her gaze again, and the eyes of both women filled with tears.

  ‘Anney, I’m so sorry about Tom. Only now can I truly understand how you must have felt.’

  ‘My Lady,’ Anney said, and grasped her hand. With difficulty she forced a certain sympathy into her voice. ‘I would never have wanted to see Herbert die. Anything but this. It is so miserable to lose a son this way.’

  ‘Any way in which one loses a son must be cruel,’ Katharine said.

  ‘At least he is with God,’ Anney murmured. That was her sole comfort since Tom had died: at least he would be at peace now in Heaven. Mary would take in the youngster, Christ would treat him like a brother – wasn’t that what the priests always said? It was only reflections like that which had kept her sane in the long, depressing evenings after her son had been taken from her.

  Not that her lady had understood at the time, Anney reminded herself.

  When she had found Herbert, he was standing at the edge of the well, peering over into the depths, and she had cried to him to come away, but he had said that he was waiting for his friend. Only then had Anney realised something was wrong. She had shouted down into the echoing depths, but when there was no answering call, nothing, she had gone to search other, more obvious places, first with annoyance, but soon with nervousness.

  Tom was nowhere to be seen, and at last she called the steward – a cold, clammy panic setting in as Daniel and the men fetched ropes and dropped them down into the foul interior. One of them gingerly undertook the mission, a youngish fellow, she recalled, Ralph, a groom with the arms and shoulders of a blacksmith, and a high brow. He returned with the child in his arms, both of them dripping green weeds and slime. Anney had managed one shrill scream before collapsing with horror.

  Lady Katharine had not comprehended her distress: perhaps she thought serfs couldn’t suffer much, perhaps she assumed that a mere servant couldn’t feel the same pain as a highborn woman.

  She understood it now, all right, Anney noted with a vicious sense of justice.

  ‘Shall we find Stephen and question him now?’ Simon asked.

  ‘No,’ said Baldwin thoughtfully. ‘He has to prepare for the burial tomorrow.’

  ‘There is another man we must see: Nicholas. At least he won’t be so difficult to prise away from his master as Godfrey,’ Simon said.

  Baldwin agreed. ‘I could do with a walk to cool my blood. A stroll in the fresh air would be most pleasant.’

  Simon grinned to himself. There was a more pressing desire on his part, having now drunk the better part of two quarts of ale, but he decorously avoided mentioning it in front of Baldwin’s bride. Instead he and Baldwin took their leave of their wives and went outside, Simon strolling to the heap of manure at the corner of the stables and relieving himself.

  The evening was breezy, and the wind soughed and moaned about the yard, scattering straw in little whirls. Baldwin, gazing up at the numerous stars, stepped into a pile of hound’s faeces and muttered a curse, making Simon chuckle as he straightened his hose.

  Light from lanterns and braziers blazed cheerily in the open stable doorway. Peeping inside, Baldwin saw grooms and stablemen polishing harness and saddles, chattering happily like so many rooks preparing for the night.

  At the other side of the long building were the five men Thomas had brought with him. Nicholas and his companions were seated on logs playing dice, and none looked up until the knight and bailiff were almost at their backs. Then the sudden silence as the leather-polishing stopped penetrated even to the five, and their game was halted.

  Nicholas stood, grunting as his bones complained from resting too long on a cold, hard seat. ‘Sirs? Can I help you?’

  The stable workers slowly began to work again, but not so
noisily as they all eavesdropped. Baldwin was sure that the manor’s servants did not like Thomas’s men.

  ‘We would like to ask you some questions,’ Simon said smoothly. ‘You were with your master on the day the boy was killed, weren’t you? Out towards the north.’

  Nicholas licked his lips, but without visible concern. ‘Yes, sir. Squire Thomas and I rode out in the afternoon.’

  ‘Why did he take you with him?’

  ‘My master knows this area – he grew up here,’ Nicholas shrugged. ‘So he knows that there are plenty of felons – and other dangers about. Or what if he was thrown from his horse on the moors?’

  ‘You didn’t go to the moors, though.’

  ‘We went where the fancy took him.’

  ‘Until you met the Fleming and his man.’

  ‘What if we did?’ His tone had altered, as had his stance. Now he stood as if ready to spring.

  Baldwin edged to his left, Simon right, to defend themselves. The other four men also rose to their feet. None had reached for a weapon, but now the knight saw the fearsome war axe leaning against the wall, a heavy bill above it. Nicholas himself wore a heavy falchion, not a modern weapon, but a good, solid, battering blade that could be ferociously lethal in the right hands.

  The grooms were silent. Nicholas was now their steward and they looked at each other; unsure whether to interrupt or ignore what was developing into a fight.

  Baldwin threw a look at his friend, and Simon nodded, saying, ‘Nicholas, we want to know what was said between your master and the Fleming that day’

  ‘It’s nothing to do with you.’

  ‘I’ll be the judge of that…’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And we want to know what happened later, when you held Thomas’s horse while he thrashed around in the undergrowth,’ Simon continued. ‘What was that all about?’