“There can be no doubt she died?”
“My lady, I’ve been here sixteen years, and heard it chewed over all that time. This is sure: alive or dead she never passed the gates, and alive or dead none set eyes on her again.”
“But he knew,” Julitta murmured. A suspicion rooted itself in her mind. Then she roused herself. “Holy Mother, here I stand gossiping!” she cried, and fled up the keep stairs.
A squad of well-bribed heroes emptied the garderobe pits and dumped their reeking tubs at the furthest end of the garden. Dung carts trundled the manure heaps out to the fields. The kitchen was finished, and Godric, pungently admonished as to the standards he was to maintain, moved in. Drunkenness would in future be hard to attain, for Julitta had restricted the ale-brewing. That was her most unpopular measure, and probably prompted the rock that narrowly missed her head as she walked past the stables that evening. The attacker escaped in the dusk and uproar, and Julitta overnight devised the most fiendish atrocity of all.
In the chilly dawn the men-at-arms rounded up all the grooms and scullions, marched them down to the river and made them strip and scour a lifetime’s grime from their carcasses, shear off hair and beards and assume clean clothing. The troopers found it a jest less hilarious when they were ordered in themselves, but no one was actually drowned and there was no mutiny. By midday every man had been scrubbed and shorn beyond recognition, and the laundry billowed with steam for three days as the women set about a monument of washing.
With such demands the well was down to noisome sludge, and after testing it with a lighted candle two volunteers climbed down to dredge out mud, bones, the remnants of several buckets and a decomposed cat. The carpenter hurriedly constructed a cover, and Julitta’s comments on fluxes would ensure its conscientious use for all of a fortnight.
In eight frenzied days the task was accomplished. All the linen and soiled garments had been washed, and now the tubs were filled for the women to bathe and wash their hair before settling to a mountain of mending. Julitta, filled with the satisfaction of achievement, wondered what her husband would say. She missed him. She would not have confessed it except in her own mind, but she missed his stirrings in the darkness, his company at table, his pungent speech; all other men were savorless as unsalted bread. In fact, he had seduced her into liking him.
In the morning she ordered a horse saddled and rode to Arnisby. Alain, the redhaired groom, offered to escort her. Washed and shaven he was a personable fellow, anxious to remedy his error of their first encounter. He worked a little too hard at it, but she was amused rather than displeased; she could not yet accept her consequence.
The weavers entertained her with ale and honeycakes in a long room dominated by three looms, and lighted by windows whose shutters were paneled with oiled linen to admit daylight whatever the weather. Her hosts’ faces brightened at her orders for woolens and linen. She listened sympathetically to hints about the benefit of a market and even a town charter but said nothing that might commit her husband, and departed in an atmosphere of goodwill.
Goodwill was less apparent among the fisherfolk. Wulfstan, the chief of their community, a barrel-shaped veteran whose raiment stank vehemently of his calling, seated her with a kind of surly courtesy on an upturned skiff at the shingle’s head, and yelled to a woman to bring ale and bannocks. Both were impregnated with fish, but she swallowed heroically, and asked after the prospects for Friday. Other men drifted over, were presented as Wulfstan’s three sons and two sons-in-law, and settled in a half-circle before her. Her proposal of a profitable bargain in stockfish and salted herring for the winter thawed some of the stiffness out of them, but they were plainly cherishing their grudge.
She grinned up into Wulfstan’s blue slits of eyes and said, “Wreck rights are lord’s rights, Master Wulfstan.”
His whiskers twitched. “We’d not cheat Lord Adam, m’ lady.”
“But you’d expect your pickings from the carcass?”
Teeth glinted yellow through the thicket. “Summat for t’ trouble o’ picking up. Took no thought, didn’t Lord Adam.”
“Do you imagine he’d have let them wreck?”
“There’ll no luck come of it,” offered a son-in-law. “’Tis ill done to cheat t’ sea.”
“A man as you saves from drowning’ll alius do you a mischance,” said the other gloomily. “Drown you in t’ end. T’ sea’ll have its meat.”
They all grunted agreement. The sea was a harsh divinity, and their ancestors had propitiated her with the blood of sacrifice. “Don’t let a priest hear you say so,” Julitta drily advised. “And Master Erling’s goodwill will be worth more in honest trade than goods washed out on the tide.”
They looked at one another, a secret certainty in their faces, and the youngest blurted, “What washes out t’ tide brings back.”
Her gaze challenged Wulfstan, who scowled at his loose-mouthed son and nodded. “Aye, m’ lady. Owt as goes out on t’ ebb, comes in on t’ next flood into Lykewake Bay.” He jerked his head at the southern headland that recurved beyond the low point into a wide bay.
She stiffened. The lykewake was the corpse-watch between death and burial. “The dead return there?”
“Aye. Any as drowns in these waters, t’ tide brings back.”
She thrust aside her enlightenment to say severely, “You are a tribe of corpse-picking ravens.”
They took it as a compliment, and grinned. There was an uneasy stir and another exchange of glances. Sons and sons-in-law nodded to Wulfstan, who cleared his throat, pursed his lips, recollected in whose presence he stood and swallowed instead of spitting. “Is it true as Lord Adam’ll build a sea wall and make all on us pay harbor dues?”
Julitta knew peasants’ minds, that their grinding toil filled with envy, suspicion and avarice. Only a lord commanded money and materials for any major project of public benefit, but once he charged a fee to recover his outlay it became an intolerable imposition to be evaded by an stratagem. Every lord who built a mill knew that, rather than pay for their corn’s grinding, his serfs would set their women to back-breaking hours every day at the quern. Someone ill-disposed to her husband had made the worst of casual talk at his table.
“It’s no more than a thought,” she told them. “Would a safe harbor harm you?”
“What was good enough for my gran’feyther’ll do me,” Wulfstan growled.
“Your grandsire fished inshore with lines from a coble,” Julitta retorted, “and ate his catch and little enough else. Will your grandsons be content with a shingle strip? Trade with outlanders like Erling would mean you could sell more fish.” Seeing that she had set thought creaking inside their skulls, she stood up and shook sand and fish scales from her skirts. “Discuss it with Lord Adam when he returns.”
Wulfstan, his brow furrowed, escorted her to her horse. Alain was flirting with a bare-legged girl, but he roused at once to meet her and swing her into the saddle. She gathered the reins, and the old man put out a hand to detain her for a moment.
“M’ lady, are t’ Scots ower t’ border?”
“It’s very likely.”
His lips lifted from his teeth. “I’ll be edging up me owd wolf spear. We’ve not forgot t’ last time. I was a lad wi’ me beard just sprouted, but I blooded steel when t’ holy Archbishop Thurstan raised t’ Standards in the invasion of ’thirty-eight. Aye, blooded proper; we seen what them Galloway men done.” He checked, breathing hard; then he jerked her a bow. “God go wi’ you, m’ lady.”
Alain looked sharply from him to his mistress, but she urged her mount towards the bridge. She was riding a placid gelding the grooms reckoned a suitable lady’s horse, without vice or any turn of speed in him. She turned off the castle track and ambled into Brentborough village. The geese, hens and pigs had been turned into the stubble, and the autumn ploughing had started in the fallow. Flails’ thwacking resounded from barn doors; the smith’s hammer was clanging; the carpenter and a team of villagers were erecting a new cott
age at the far end of the street; women in garden patches bobbed curtseys, and a cluster of children peeling rushes ducked shaggy polls. She rode straight to the alehouse, where she owed a debt.
Gunhild surged from her door. “God save and bless you, m’ lady! Heartily glad I am to name you lady in truth. Come taste my last brewing, if you’ll do me t’ honor.”
There were no men within doors, tippling away working daylight; no one but the same shriveled woman on the same bench, cuddling what looked like the same piggin and regarding them with eyes pugnacious as a robin’s.
“And don’t you think as you’ll shoo me out like I was a stray hen, Mistress Gunhild,” she snapped. “Ho, mighty lofty we be now m’ lady sets foot inside, but an alehouse it is an’ here I sits an’ sups me ale as I’ve paid for.”
“That’s no talk to set afore m’ lady, you cantankerous besom! Don’t you heed her, Lady Julitta; crazed in t’ wits she’s gotten, an’ muzzy wi’ t’ ale.”
“Take more nor your washy brewing to touch my wits!” the crone retorted. “Me as helped me mother to birth you, and a nasty squalling brat you was too!” She up-ended the piggin for a swig that would have won a veteran man-at-arms his peers’ respect, emerged for air and wiped her sleeve across her mouth. “Since there’s nowt better to be had, fill up and stop grouching, Mistress Lofty-nose.”
Julitta caught her wicked eye, which gave her a portentous wink and slewed round to Gunhild. She burst out laughing, sat down and accepted the ale-horn. A grin chased the scowl from Gunhild’s face; she whisked at the impeccable hearth and poked up the logs, and they were all smiling in amity.
“I owe you thanks,” Julitta said, “for your defence of me that night.”
“Defence, m’ lady? This is an honest house an’ I’m no bawd. What else should I ha’ done?”
“It cost you indignity and damage none the less.”
“All done wi’, m’ lady. Lord Adam hisself made t’ damage good, t’ next morning.”
“Lord Adam did?” Her incredulity gave tongue before she could halt it.
“Oh, there’s no vice in t’ lad,” said Gunhild, with the large tolerance of one who has been over-compensated for loss. “He’s nowt but a randy young stallion a-feeling his oats. Reckon as he’ll settle steady to t’ harness now he’s wed.”
“Cold-sober to bed each night an’ his wife’s bed at that!” contributed the old woman, grinning with three snaggle teeth. “Young Fire-in-the-thatch! Eh, but it’s early days still.”
“Mind your tongue, Hallgerd! Remember m’ lady’s wed to him.”
“Oh aye, she’s wed.” Julitta felt the blood burn up to her hair; those shrewd eyes had discerned at once, she knew, that Lord Adam’s bride was virgin still.
“Praise God for it!” said Gunhild with simple fervor. “When I knowed he’d carried you off, m’ lady, down I goes weeping on my prayer-bones amidst all t’ ruin and prays to t’ Virgin to guard you.”
“Aye, he’s man enough to make amends for his sins wi’out whining o’ t’ cost. Sobered him rarely, I reckons.”
“And what’s past’s done with,” Gunhild continued the antiphon of advice from veterans to neophyte. Rank was ignored; they were three women joined together in the Eve-old conspiracy against the male half of mankind. “Just you set to turn that den o’ whores into a seemly household t’ way you’re framing, and no carping on what’s best forgot.”
Julitta opened her lips on bitter comment, and swallowed it unuttered. Hallgerd grinned again, retired briefly behind the piggin, and read her mind.
“Don’t fret you about that silly trollop Thyra, m’ lady. T’ brat’ll be born afore t’ month’s out, wi’ all its finger and toe nails, and likely it’ll be redheaded—like t’ last ’un.”
“The last one?”
“Two she’s had and lost. T’ last was red—Alain t’ groom’s.”
“Alain’s—”
“Wolves breed true, and Lorismonds ye’ll know by t’ head-mark.”
“Wolves!” Gunhild snorted. “Yon’s no wolf. Nowt but a randy tup wi’ no mind above his belt.”
Such relief had shaken Julitta that she scarcely heard their opinions of Alain’s morals and intelligence; they mattered not at all to her. The child was not Red Adam’s; the claim had been made in spite and folly, by Constance and not Thyra, she remembered, and the girl was plainly near her time. It was illogical to be so thankful; her husband had frankly admitted his commerce with the girl, months before their wedding, but she praised Heaven for so much mercy.
The three yellow teeth gleamed again. “Happen she reckoned folks couldn’t count up to nine?” Hallgerd suggested.
“She don’t reckon nowt,” snorted Gunhild. “‘Twasn’t her thought o’ that one. Watch thissen, m’ lady; t’ fair ’un’s a mortal ugly foe, and you’ve shown her up proper for a shiftless slut and took her place besides.”
Julitta nodded. “I’m grateful to you both,” she said, setting down the empty horn. “And I’d ask your aid on another matter. Do you know what happened to my groom Ivar after he fled?”
The two exchanged pregnant glances. “Took service wi’ Humphrey o’ Crossthwaite, m’ lady,” Gunhild said shortly.
“Oh!” She might have expected it; hatred to hatred for a common vengeance. Yet a shock of disappointment assailed her. She looked bleakly into the fire, and then with a small sigh rose to make her farewells.
“M’ lady, is it true t’ Scots’re out?” Gunhild asked urgently as Wulfstan had done.
“It’s very likely,” she answered again, guessing at the rumors flying, talk repeated from the castle table, speculation about Red Adam’s sudden journey to York, all slashed scarlet with old folk’s memories of King David’s invasion thirty-five years past. Hallgerd must have been woman-grown in those times; she would have lain down and risen up in deathly fear when the Picts of Galloway were making the name of Scot accursed to unborn generations. Her withered face was grim as Julitta turned to her.
“Fire-in-the-thatch’d best look to his walls; t’ rats’re in ‘em,” she said cryptically, and again the peasant women looked at each other. Hallgerd nodded slightly. Gunhild hesitated, and then spoke in a rush.
“M’ lady, there’s talk as how Lord Maurice’s true son’s come to claim his rights. His rightful son out o’ his wedded lady, and Lord o’ Brentborough by birth.”
Amazed beyond speech, Julitta stared into the troubled face. “But—but that’s not possible!” she exclaimed at last.
“I’d ha’ said that mesen, m’ lady; vanished outa sight she did, and never a trace of her from that day. Never passed t’ gate, nor seen on t’ roads, nor yet washed up in Lykewake Bay.”
“Yet yon’s t’ tale,” Hallgerd corroborated. “Nowt but a whisper and no telling where from, but there’s mischief in it. And wi’ rebels a-plot and t’ Scots ower t’ Border, I reckon young Fire-in-the thatch’s owed a warning. I’ve knowed worse masters in me time.”
“Whatever’s behind the tale, I’m grateful, and I’ll thank you on my husband’s behalf too,” Julitta answered, her wits buzzing with conjecture. “Rats in the walls? I’ll turn ferret! God be with you both!”
One glimpse of her face brought Alain at an alarmed run from his conversation with two girls on their way to the well with yokes and buckets, but she merely nodded acknowledgment of his apologies and took the slope at an easy walk. It was quite incredible that Lord Maurice’s lady—what was her name? Beatrice? Bertha? No, Bertrade, that was it—should have fled undetected, lived unsuccored by kindred or friends, borne her child in secrecy. A woman distraught, heavy with child and near her travail; a lady unused to hardship, who had never traveled but by horse or litter; a lady of spirit and temper, insistent on her rights, carrying her lord’s lawful heir; such a one would stand fast, secure in her expectations and status. It was the seduced and deserted girl who fled to cover her shame, or was thrust by outraged kinsmen into the shelter of some convent. All Julitta’s robust common sense rose up
to reject the conception. If some claimant had appeared, he was an impostor. And remembering Lord Maurice’s reputation, the easy guess was most likely the right one.
Thought of sheltering convents set some memory nagging at her brain, until she chanced to glance over her shoulder and sight of Alain’s red head recalled it; a memory of the more tedious hours of her tedious years in the nunnery, sitting with Lord Maurice’s elderly cousin, sewing or playing decorous chess, surrounded by her little dogs and listening to an endless trickle of gossip, enlivened only by pungent comment from her old serving woman. She had paid little heed to reminiscences of thirty cloistered years, but some facts lodged in her mind; something to do with Lord Maurice’s kindness in helping her to move to this nunnery in North Parts from one near the Lorismond holding by Bristol, after an officious Bishop had bidden her be rid of her little dogs or depart. Some mention of a redhaired baby had stayed with her, but more than that she could not recall.
“Alain!”
“My lady?”
“I shall require Folie this afternoon; I must visit the convent.”
“Aye, my lady. May I escort you?”
“If you wish.”
Sir Brien helped her from the saddle. She had an engagement with him that drove all else from the uppermost layers of her mind, though her new problem was an uneasy pressure on her consciousness. The undercroft had been roughly set to rights during Brentborough’s upheaval, but today she intended a thorough investigation of all within it. With rebellion plotting among the neighbors, Scots over the Border and a doubtfully loyal household, she did not propose to take a gang of servants below to publish abroad any deficiencies. She locked the stair door behind herself, Brien and his body-servant, a middle-aged Englishman warranted close-mouthed, and they went at the task by the light of torches.
The rats no longer obtruded on ear and eye, after the rat-catcher had carried out a sackful of carcasses at the end of a half-day with ferrets and terrier, but their ravages were everywhere apparent. Gnawed sacks, riddled through and through in their ranked piles, spilled their fouled contents. The great grain bins, mounted on small staddlestones to baffle them, had escaped, but as lid after lid was lifted and the musty smells of mealworms and weevilly corn arose, Julitta reckoned that small benefit. Plainly the bins had not been cleaned out for years; each new supply had been tipped in upon the tainted remnants left inside, and infected in its turn. The Englishman silently scooped up a fistful of wheat and held it to the light, crawling with repellent life.
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