The stranger came to an abrupt halt. Kit immediately stepped off the road onto the plank bridge adjoining a field gate. Wondering what had made the fellow nervous again, he peeped ahead and saw a sight that made his breath catch in his throat.
Alys, on horseback, was coming back from church. Hannah Shawcross, and some of Avery’s friends, trotted their mounts some distance behind her, ahead of the group of servants walking back to the manor.
The cloaked stranger continued towards them, but before he reached Alys, something small fell from him and tumbled onto the road. Instantly, he was on hands and knees, scrabbling around in the sun-hardened potholes for whatever it was he had dropped. As Alys came level with him, the man stood up smartly, brushed himself down, and exchanged greetings with her. Kit was too far away to hear what actually passed between them.
After a few moments, the pair went their separate ways. Kit hid behind the young hazel trees that bordered the field gate, unprepared for a meeting with Alys. Looking through the yellowy-green leaves, he saw her rein in her horse, slide down, and pick something up from the roadway. She gazed after the strange man—had she picked up a coin? Was it his purse that had fallen? But instead of calling after him, she secreted the object in her hanging pocket.
Something untoward was going on. Had he been wrong about Alys after all? As soon as she came level with him, he grabbed the horse’s bridle and dragged the animal off the highway and into the field.
Chapter Nineteen
Alys gasped as Kit pulled her from her mount and behind a stand of trees. “Kit! What are you about? You’re hurting me.”
The powerful hands that bit into her upper arms, holding her fast, relented slightly. He gave her a tiny shake.
“Who was that man you were talking to?” Why did he sound so enraged?
“He told me he was a cunningman. I’ve never seen him before.”
“A cunningman? What, like a peddler of remedies?”
“Aye. Kate sent for him. She needed physick for a sore head. What’s wrong with that?”
Kit’s face was as hard as sculpted stone. The brown eyes that normally regarded her with warmth were steely in their intensity. She had never before considered him dangerous—now she knew she must think again.
“Will you not unhand me?” She wriggled in his grasp, but his grip merely tightened. “What are you hiding in your hanging pocket?”
“Nothing. I gave alms at church. There is naught left within.” Surely, he didn’t mean to steal from her? Confusion brought a lump to her throat. He’d seemed so gentle before. Now he was behaving as if he hated her.
“Don’t lie to me, Alys. I saw you pluck something from the road.”
“Oh, that. Just a bead. Nothing of any value.”
“I’ll be the judge of that. Show me.” Why was he bullying her like this? Damn the man.
He could have it if he wanted, though she’d no idea why he might. What a fool she’d been to allow herself to like him!
He let go, but his hands hovered close. With fumbling fingers, she pulled open the drawstrings of her pocket and brought out the bead, dropping it into his callused palm.
He examined it intently, then stared at her, his dark eyes glittering dangerously. “You know what this is?”
“As I said, a bead. I wondered if the cunningman had dropped it—he seemed to be hunting for something on the roadway when I came up. Mayhap ’tis from one of his charms or something. How would I know? I’ve never been to a cunningman or a hedge witch. We usually use the apothecary in Cheyneham.” Her voice was unsteady, tears threatening.
Kit’s expression changed. “Forgive me. I don’t mean to be harsh. For a moment there, I feared, I believed you might be… but no, I’m a fool. A hundred times a fool.”
He reached for her, pulling her against his chest. She was so confused by his abrupt change of behavior she could think no further than that he smelled of newly-cut grass and old leather, and that she rather liked it. His hands came up to cradle her face, and he blessed her cheeks with a few deft kisses. When she looked up, he was smiling.
“You genuinely know nothing of that bead?”
She shook her head.
His grin broadened. “I’ll tell you what it is if you swear not to mention it to a living soul.”
“I swear.”
“It’s a rosary bead. Black Venetian glass.”
She frowned as she scoured her memory. Of course, her grandmother had owned a rosary, back in the days when England was pledged to the Church of Rome. Then the significance of her find struck her.
“Oh, dear. You think the cunningman is a Catholic?”
“I doubt he’s a cunningman at all—that is a disguise. He may be a Catholic priest, or even a Spanish spy. You must have noticed his swarthy looks—they could well mark him out as a foreigner.”
“But what business could he have with Kate?”
“Ah, my darling, innocent Alys! How happy it makes me to hear that question.”
She was still musing on the fact he’d called her darling when his warm breath caressed her face. She blinked up into the brown eyes so disconcertingly close to her own, and her breath caught. Kit’s gaze dropped to her mouth and, with a satisfied grin, he captured it with his own.
There was no time to react or rebuff him. Not that she wanted to rebuff him—his kiss was a taste of Heaven as she gave herself up to it, luxuriating in the sheer abandonment with which Kit moved his heated lips over hers, tasting, pressing, exploring. He held her so tightly she could feel the rapid beat of his heart against her own. Her arms twined about his neck as her hands delved into his thick, silky hair.
No, this was madness! She pulled away. “The rest of the household will be upon us in a moment.”
Kit’s hot breath fanned her ear. “I don’t care.” He claimed her lips again.
The taste of him filled her with a million yearnings, but this was impossible. “They’ll see my horse in the field. They’re bound to stop.”
Kit’s hands slid down her back and nestled against her waist. “Let them.” He lowered his head to continue the sensual onslaught, but the sound of approaching hoofbeats had become too loud to ignore.
Releasing her, he said, “I’m not leaving yet—I’ll be coming back to the house, if only for a short while. I pray—continue on and act as normally as you can. I’ll explain all to you, I promise, my sweeting!” Then he leapt over the gate, kicked his pack into the ditch and immediately followed it down out of sight.
Hannah’s bay mare was now opposite the open gate. She reined in and stared at Alys’ abandoned horse. Terrified the woman would spot Kit if she came any closer, Alys raced through the gate and stood in the road. “All is well! There’s no alarm!”
Hannah glowered down at her. “I didn’t see you fall off your horse, yet you look like you’ve been pulled through a hedge.”
Alys smoothed out her kirtle. “I saw a falcon loose in the meadow here,” she lied, impressed by her own inventiveness. “I wondered if one of ours had escaped, so I came to look.”
“And was it?”
“Was it what?”
“One of ours?”
“Oh, no, I don’t think so. So, all’s well, then.”
Hannah’s eyes bored into hers. “I’m not sure all is well. Your eyes are feverish bright, and I declare, I’ve never seen your cheeks so red.”
A faint snort sounded from the ditch behind her. Alys coughed loudly to cover the sound. “I feel perfectly well, thank you.” Turning her back on Hannah, she climbed the gate and mounted her horse.
Straight-backed, she made a dignified retreat, hoping the ditch in which Kit lay was full of foul, stagnant water. How dare he laugh! When she saw him again, she’d make sure he didn’t get the welcome he expected.
Chapter Twenty
Kit crouched in the cutting, cold water seeping into his shoes. A stand of nettles hid him from view, a stand of nettles he wished he’d noticed before choosing the ditch as a hiding place. Pushing th
oughts of Alys to the back of his mind, he climbed out and returned to the spot where he’d left the little pile of stones. Depositing his soggy pack by the wayside, he examined the place where the Catholic foreigner had appeared.
Here, the hedge was of unbroken hawthorn, too prickly and too high to climb, especially in a cloak such as the so-called cunningman had been wearing. The field was interrupted at this point by a stand of trees, whose size declared them to be of some antiquity. At their center was a blasted oak even older than the rest. Entering the cleft in the hollow trunk, Kit found there was room enough for at least four men inside. He searched around on the leaf-littered ground but could find no clues. Moving out again, he shaded his eyes and looked about him. The twisted brick chimneys of the manor house could just be seen from here—he reckoned the place was within bowshot of where he stood. There was no obvious cover between here and the house. The only way to get from there to the road unseen would be underground.
He shouldered his bundle once again and sped off towards the manor, hoping to reinstall himself in the gardener’s hut before anyone thought to question his absence. Thankfully, as it was Sunday, everyone was taking their ease, and no one saw him return with his loaded pack. It wasn’t easy donning once again the cloak of disguise, but nobody disturbed him as he pottered about the garden performing meaningless tasks, his brain engaged on the problem of how to discover a hidden tunnel on an estate as large as Selwood.
When he finally came up with a solution to the problem, it was so brilliant, so daring, that he could hardly believe he’d come up with it himself. But to examine the possibilities in daylight would excite suspicion, so he waited until dusk before venturing out in the direction of the old fishpond. Once there, he started prodding at the crumbling brick wall.
“Are you anticipating another swim?”
Alys. He spun around and took her hands in his. “You should not be here. We dare not be seen together now.”
“Wherefore is it different now? You were unconcerned about such risk when you grabbed me in the field.”
He rolled his eyes. “I do not grab. I merely got a little carried away. But if we’re going to talk—and I think we must—I know a place we may not be overheard or overlooked.”
It felt so natural to take her hand and walk beside her as if they were childhood sweethearts. Relishing the feel of her slender, trusting fingers, he led her over the old back bridge to the untended area on the other side of the pond.
Here, the grasses and willow herb grew tall, mixed in with woundwort and the hairy comfreys with their bell-like flowers. Kit settled himself down with his broad back against a tree, patting the space next to him. It was cooler here, beyond the protection of the garden wall, and when she shivered, he used it as an excuse to pull her into his warmth.
“You are making very free with my person.”
“You may freeze if you wish. I was merely playing the gallant.”
“Then play on, good sir knight. I would prefer not to freeze.”
He held her close and kept his voice low. “I promised you an explanation, but first I must ask if you’ve been into the cellars below the manor.”
“Not for a long time. They are cold and full of spiders—I like them not.”
“Are the rooms of a good size? What is stored down there?”
“Wine in cades, old ale in barrels. There is salt fish, and butter and cheeses keeping cool. They are dry enough for smoked hams as well. Have you not seen them yourself? Jacob hangs onions there to dry.”
“I haven’t. It is not yet the season for onions. Has there been any work in the cellars recently, the shoring up of a wall, or the creation of new alcoves?”
“Nay. The cellars are well-built. They may even pre-date the present house—I understand the old manor was more substantial than the present one. When first I heard of the place, ere I came to live here, my parents spoke of a tunnel that ran some distance towards the road. I know not what it was meant for. It’s probably crumbled away long since.”
He could barely contain his excitement. “A tunnel, you say? Did its entrance run from the cellars, or from within the house?”
“I know not. ’Twas all meant to be very secret. It’s possible there could have been access to it from the house, but then there’d have to be a staircase down to it, and I’ve never seen any.”
“Are there any doors leading off the cellars that you’ve never been through?”
She stiffened in his embrace. “I thought you were going to tell me something, not interrogate me.”
“Please, Alys, this is vital. Bear with me, I beg you.”
She let out a sigh. “No, no doors. I suppose one could be concealed by shelving. Won’t you tell me why the cellars are of such interest?”
“Not now. The less you know of my mind, the less danger we will both be in.”
“Danger? Why should we be in danger?”
Now was the time. If he wanted to protect both her and himself, he had to rely on his instincts. And those instincts told him to trust her.
Offering up a silent prayer, he said, “Because I am a spy, and I have told you some of what I know.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Alys’ mouth went dry. Suddenly, she wished she had a goblet of wine to hand. Several goblets.
“A spy? But you said you were banished from court and being punished. You said naught about spying.”
“I know, my dove. I regret not being able to tell you before. Nay, do not pull away from me. Be angered if you will, but don’t cast me off. We must work together, else both of us may be damned.”
This did not sound promising. And, once again, Kit had deceived her. Where would it all end?
He interrupted her gloomy thoughts. “Have you heard of Sir Francis Walsingham?”
What did Walsingham have to do with anything? “Aye. He ranks highly in the queen’s esteem, does he not?” Ah, of course. He was Elizabeth’s spymaster, his main aim being to ensure the stability of her reign. A finger of dread ran down Alys’ spine as she realized the significance of Kit’s confession.
“He is a personal friend of mine,” Kit continued. “To whom I owe a debt of honor. The queen required me to repay him by becoming a spy until she felt I’d done my penance for that unfortunate entanglement with a lady of which I spoke before. Now, you must not reveal anything I’m about to tell you.”
“Who do you think I would tell?”
“Your cousin. Sir Thomas Kirlham, Richard Avery.”
As if she would confide in any one of them. “The first two care nothing for me—the latter I barely know as yet.”
“There are ways in which they can press you. That’s why I have been so loath to reveal myself before now. They are my enemies, Alys. They are also enemies of the queen, the state and everyone in the land who upholds the English church and the rule of the Tudor monarchy.”
“How can you be sure?” How could such things have been happening at Selwood, and she not know about them? Underground tunnels, plots against the queen, secret visits by Spanish Catholics?
“I can find no other explanation for what I’ve observed.”
Kit’s uncompromising words made her shiver, but he immediately pulled her to him, so her head rested against the unshaven roughness of his chin. He stared out across the darkening water, his fingers lightly stroking her shoulder. “This is not going to be easy for you, but I expect you to be brave.”
“I’ll try.”
“Do you know of Mary of Scotland?”
She nodded. Queen Elizabeth’s cousin was a perpetual thorn in the monarch’s side. “Then you may know also that Walsingham has untangled a web of intrigue surrounding her. There have been plots uncovered, plots to destroy Elizabeth and set her cousin on the throne, thus making this a Catholic country once again. The Scots have long favored the French, and the King of Spain is no friend to England.”
Yes, she’d heard about the plots. But not a whisper of anything so close to home. “Kirlham may be gu
ilty of conspiracy, but no firm evidence has yet been found to condemn him. He has been seen paying pageboys to deliver messages to someone at court—numerous messages, but no one has yet been able to intercept them, or discover for whom they are intended. Some have speculated he is writing poetry for a forbidden lover—but you’ve seen what manner of man he is. Can you imagine it?”
She shook her head. Kirlham was the least romantic man she’d ever met.
“Has no one asked him what they are?”
“Nay. If he is part of a plot to topple Elizabeth, there’ll be others involved. Only by subtlety will every single one be caught, and only then will Bess’ throne be safe. Walsingham hopes that if the fellow’s given enough rope, he’ll eventually hang himself. I think I’m on the verge of discovering exactly what the game is, which is why I’ve returned to Selwood. All I need is the means to flush the plotters out.”
She raised a hand to silence him. “But what of Avery, what of Kate? What makes you think they are part of this intrigue?”
“I overheard a conversation ’twixt Kirlham and Avery, referring to their joint ‘cause’. They had been spying on you, and they spoke of Kate’s deceitful behavior—she would have us think her far less cunning than she is. All must be duly punished—I hope you can bear that, dear heart. I know you dislike your cousin, but you’re not vindictive. If you aid me, a grateful Queen Bess will ensure you are rewarded with the manor of Selwood.”
A steely cold seeped through Alys’ body. She backed out of Kit’s embrace and stood up, glaring down at him. This man had fooled her—he’d fooled all of them. And now he wanted to destroy everything, tear apart the only family she had.
“In truth, I am not fond of Kate, but neither am I fond of dissemblers like you. By making me keep your secret, you’ve gulled me into betraying my own people. That was an unkind thing to do, Kit. You should have told me long before this moment about your mission.”
He got to his feet as well and took her by the shoulders. “Alys, I’m sorry. You must understand I knew not whom to trust. My life would be at stake if I made a single wrong move. Please, join with me to bring the traitors down—don’t run the risk of being found guilty by association. I swear to fight for you with every last ounce of my strength, but if I fail, you could end up in the Tower with the rest of them, awaiting the royal pleasure. What good will Selwood do you then?”
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