Dark hunter, p.17
Dark Hunter, page 17
He hits me then, storming off with Will scurrying after him. I can feel my jaw aching, blood seeping through my teeth, but nothing broken, I think.
Sir Anthony comes to me. ‘You’d better go and speak to him.’ He nods at Ralph Holme, who is nearly the only person left in the courtyard.
Ralph is angry, too, but his anger is quiet, purposeful. ‘Explain and do it quickly.’
‘Did Sir Anthony tell you what I did, sir?’
‘Yes. But a man may be a traitor and not be able to read.’
‘Indeed. But we must balance that with the possibility that Henry is telling the truth and decide which is the more likely. He cannot have written the details of the garrison and the walls, so he cannot be our traitor.’ Ralph opens his mouth, but I pretend not to see. ‘And I have spoken with Dame Eleanor. There is nothing that connects Henry to Alice. Which means there is a more sinister explanation that cannot be ignored.’
‘And what is that?’ He spits out the words.
I try to hold my thoughts together, even though my head aches almost as much as my jaw. ‘If we imagine for a moment that Henry merely found the purse on the day Alice was taken out of the Cowgate, as he said he did, then it must have somehow fallen out of the sack in which she was carried.’
‘Why can’t it have fallen before?’
‘Because there is blood on it, sir.’
He moves a jewelled hand to his mouth. ‘Go on.’
‘And that means – and it is so obvious I should have thought of this before, but we were so busy finding Henry and then I was working on the cipher – that means Alice was killed because she had found the traitor out. She tried to go to Sir John, on the day she died. It is such a pity she did not find him.’
‘How the devil could Alice have found a traitor?’
‘I don’t know, sir. But it’s hard to believe she would have come across him in the tents.’
‘Possible, though.’
‘Everything’s possible until it isn’t, sir.’
He nods. ‘Very well. Go back to your infernal cipher. But we keep Henry here under lock and key until we know more. You’d better go to him now.’ He jerks his head to where Henry still lies face down on the ground, the courtyard quite empty.
I touch him gently on the arm, casting my eye over the wounds on his back. My efforts with the woundwort have kept most of them clean, but I have more to do. ‘Henry, you need to get to your feet. I can’t do it without you.’
He moans. ‘Leave me here, you devil.’
‘I’m trying to help you. Now get up and I will see to your wounds once you’re back inside.’
I do what must be done for Henry, but already my mind is far away, working on the curious arrangements of letters in the ciphered message. For there the truth lies.
The weather turns very wet, the rain bouncing off the cobblestones and whipping against windows. I grow tired of staying inside and staring at the paper until my eyes see stars. But, at last, there is a breach in the cloud and I hasten on to the Fields, though staying always only a short distance from the gate. Great seas of mud spread out before me, while out to sea, the Scottish ships perch like birds waiting for carrion.
I’m not the only one taking advantage of these moments of cloud-tossed sunshine. Schoolboys run around trying to catch each other, watched with envy by the cowherds whose charges have now gone to stand in the muddy water. Rebecca Scot and Elizabeth Belford huddle together, and I think they seem more pinched and uncertain than when I first came. No one wanders far.
I know that what presses upon all of us most heavily is something we can do nothing about. It really is very simple, though no man here will say it, even if all think it. But I can tell the grass and the sea and the sky, for I do not believe they care.
If the king does not come this year, how long can Berwick stand alone?
A wind ruffles the grass and I turn my head to watch great galleons of black cloud sailing towards us from the west. Standing up, my eye is caught by movement some distance away to the north, and I stare at the shapes, trying to make them into something ordinary. But then I think it might be riders and doubt it augurs well. I shout at the cowherds to move their beasts, if they can, as I run towards the walls. But I have not even reached the gate when trumpets sound. Those on duty on the walls have seen it too.
I turn back to run with the cowherds behind the cows and sheep, but some of the beasts are frightened and run off in all directions. ‘Leave them,’ I shout. The boys’ faces are twisted and pale. One is sobbing and stumbling, and I link my arm beneath his. ‘We’re almost there.’ I worry about Elizabeth and Rebecca, but there’s nothing I can do now.
The men on the Cowgate have begun to shut it, even as the beasts dash through. I see Rebecca and Elizabeth inside, Elizabeth collapsed on the ground like a sack, her friend nodding and moaning over her. The heavens open so that I am quickly soaked right down to my braies, but I run up the stairs on to the walls, see Peter Spalding leaning over. ‘Do we ride?’
He turns. ‘Are you mad?’
I see Sir Anthony along at the Waleysgate, one arm pointing. I catch my breath and look north again, count fifteen riders. Their horses appear so small they would excite mirth in another time, another place. But not here and now. Peter is right, though I wish he wasn’t. I do not like to stand here and let them do whatever they please. I look for black-haired Douglas come to hunt us down, but he isn’t there.
They stop, facing us in a line, their skill and impudence astounding. I wish I had a bow and arrow, but, after giving us a derisory bow, they are off again, deftly going after the cows and sheep, turning and weaving across the Fields until all is under their control. And with a great whoop, they turn again and go back the way they came, their message most certainly delivered.
The men-at-arms meet in our hall. Someone brings the news that we have lost thirteen cattle and twenty-nine sheep, another that a woman died of fright and I know it must be Elizabeth. Sir Anthony has notched more lines into his face and he listens with his elbows on the table and his hands to his mouth. And then he tells us that no one must leave the gates without written permission, not even the herds. They must graze the town’s beasts on the broken-down land where the tents are. And then he goes off to speak with Ralph Holme.
But already I shiver, and by nightfall I shake with fever.
The fever consumes me so that night and day become one, but finally it lifts, leaving me weak. I sit in our room and think hazy thoughts. It gladdens my heart to receive a message from my sister, Elizabeth, for it has been so long, thanks to the siege. She is well, though she admits that she too suffered from a fever these past weeks and still feels as weak as a new-born lamb. I feel the distance between us, imagining her dead and me not knowing. But such thoughts are to no purpose. Her only other news is that the bailiff has run away with the miller’s daughter, leaving behind an irate miller, the bailiff’s equally irate wife and five quarrelsome children, who will doubtless become more so without him to chastise them. I smile at the disapproval in her words, the child’s contempt for unruly grown-up hearts. And then she remembers something she does care for – her new music teacher, Sister Agatha, who is young and has ‘the palest, most beautiful hands I have ever seen and that I confess draw my eyes far more often than is seemly’.
My heart lightens until I read what she has added along the bottom of her letter. I am to be married. My stepfather has applied himself at last and is very pleased with the result, for Juliana fitzWilliam will bring as her dower a portion of her father’s lands at Clixby, which lie only a few miles from our manor at Howsham. Juliana is fourteen, a few years older than Elizabeth. But my sister must have made her acquaintance, whether at church or some gathering of gentlefolk, and yet she says nothing about her, which leads me to fear the worst.
And then she adds something that crawls up the side of the letter and must have come directly from our stepfather. I am not to concern myself with my clothes or gifts or any of the other accoutrements that belong to a wedding, for he will attend to all that. Rather, I should give proper consideration to the duties of a husband. I can only pray I please this Juliana – or, at least, that she will not find me loathsome. And that I might find in her a friend and comfort.
I confess that in this matter at least I am grateful to the Scots for one thing: there is no question of my leaving while we are under siege, to be married or not. They linger still at the mouth of the Tweed but have not come before our walls since the day I took ill. They don’t need to. But rumours slip through doors and race through the streets. They are said to be mustering in force, though to what purpose, nobody knows for certain. Sir Anthony says nothing, as usual, but we all know he fears the worst. Even though Ralph Holme and the other burgesses would be held responsible by the king, it would be a terrible slur on his honour if he were to lose Berwick. He walks round the walls, poking and prodding at weaknesses as if he were a veritable engineer.
But there is nothing to be done to improve them, for the burgesses say they have no money, that they have already spent what little they have on our defences, and these wars have cost them dear. If it’s not Scottish pirates seizing their ships, then it’s rivals in English ports who don’t seem to be able to tell friend from foe. Not that they are sending any ships south anyway, thanks to the Scots lying in wait on the German Ocean.
It does not help that our king has indeed sent his army into Northumberland. But the rebellion continues and has spread to Yorkshire. I worry it might catch hold even further south and resolve to reply as soon as I can to my sister, though whether my missive will reach her, I could not say. And we still don’t know if the king is sending ships to chase off the Scots.
I put Elizabeth’s letter away as Will and Stephen come running in to say a fight has broken out between two of our foot soldiers and a tailor and his apprentice down in the Ness. There is nothing unusual about such fights, whether among men of the garrison or between them and the townsfolk. But this time one of the foot soldiers drew a knife and sliced off the apprentice’s ear. Sir Anthony has locked the man in with Henry, who still languishes downstairs. Abandoned and fighting amongst ourselves. If only the Scots knew. Perhaps they do. I know they have every reason to press on with their fiendish designs, no matter how loud the clarion calls for peace.
Some time before I fell ill, the warden of the Franciscans, Friar Adam, left Berwick to speak with Bruce, to see if he might fare better than the papal messengers. I know he has prayed most fervently for the bloodshed to cease and that he will do whatever he can to bring it about.
He returns to Berwick at Michaelmas, when the harvest is over and the husbandmen must pay their dues to their lords. It is a melancholy time of year. The light now leaves us early again, after the long summer days, and the damp and the cold seeps into stone and bones.
The good friar must have felt most melancholy, too, for not only did the accursed leader of the Scots refuse to see him, but he was set upon and robbed right down to his last stitch of clothing on the road home. When I go to the friary I see him through the screen, lying prostrate before the altar, as if the fault was his. But I don’t believe I ever thought much would come of his journey, though I understand his desire to try.
I am looking forward to seeing Lucy again for the first time since my fever. But there is nothing excited or welcoming on her face when she enters the church. Instead, she staggers forward, walks past me, turns and hobbles towards me again.
‘What’s the matter? Is it your back?’ I try to swallow the burn of impatience, for we have work to do on the cipher.
She shakes her head violently, rubs her face. ‘I don’t really know.’
‘Then come and sit and tell me what has brought you to this agitation.’
‘Yes. Thank you. I didn’t know who else to speak to.’ She hauls herself down on the other side of a pillar on the far wall, pushing up her knees and wrapping her arms around them. ‘I don’t know how to start. It’s something that has crept upon me, even as I have come to find it strangely usual.’
‘Something that concerns Alice’s death?’
She lowers her chin on to her knees. ‘Must everything have to do with that?’
‘No, of course not. I just thought . . .’ I see she is most distressed, and why would she not wish to confide in me? I am her friend, and she mine.
‘I just wanted to speak to you about it. Forgive me if I presume too much.’ Her voice is flat and small.
‘It is for you to forgive me. I spoke without thinking.’
She lifts her head, nods slightly, traces a pattern in the dust on the stone floor with her finger. ‘And please forgive me, for it is something I have told you before and . . . you did not think much of it. That Edward . . . was master in our house, my mother always careful in his presence, though of what, I couldn’t say.’
‘I thought it was her intention that he should take over some of her concerns, if he had married Alice?’
She nods. ‘But I do not know that any of what passes between them is at her bidding. Even the marriage with Alice . . .’ Tears glimmer but she blinks quickly. ‘She seems to shrink and shudder just a little when he is near to her, even when he is speaking in the way a servant should. As if she is afraid. Did I not say something of this before?’
‘Not that she was afraid. I suppose it must be difficult, to be a woman and alone and mistress all at the same time.’
‘I did something. I’m ashamed of it, but it needed to be done and I hope you won’t think too ill of me.’ The painting on the floor grows more frantic.
I smooth a hand over my mouth to hide my smile, for how much mischief could she accomplish? And how glorious that she cherishes my good opinion. ‘What did you do?’
‘I pretended to go out with Mary. And then I lay as quietly as if I was in my grave in the big chest in the solar. I thought they would be down in the hall, but Edward followed my mother up there. It was as if they had been speaking before and he wasn’t finished.’
‘What did he say?’
‘You are not disappointed in me?’
‘Perhaps I should be. But if you thought your mother was in danger in some way . . . Is that what you thought?’
‘Not danger, exactly, but that there was some awful secret between them.’
‘You haven’t told me what he said.’
She frowns again. ‘I must ask you something first. And you must promise most solemnly.’
‘Promise what?’
‘Will you keep it secret? His words, they were not . . . You will understand when I say them.’
It is my turn to frown. ‘Lucy, I cannot promise when I don’t know what significance they might have. Of course, I will try, but if they do have some bearing on Alice’s murder . . .’
‘I don’t see how they can. He lost a prize when I lost my sister.’ She twists her mouth, looking me straight in the eye. ‘I’m not sure of all his words, but I think it was: “I can still tell everyone you’re a whore, Eleanor. Since I can’t have Alice, I’ll have to wed you. I’ll be a respectable burgess, and no one can throw me out. Just because Wysham’s gone, it doesn’t mean any of them like our kind, you know that.”’
It sounds to me as if she remembers entirely. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘No.’ She says it quietly. ‘I don’t either. But this morning Mother told me they are to be wed. I thought she was telling me she was to be hanged.’
I say nothing for a moment, running her words hither and thither. But I cannot think of anything to say to reassure her. Taking her hand, I stroke it gently. ‘He is a most enterprising fellow, this Edward . . . What is his surname?’
‘Smith.’
Her hand is warm in mine. ‘I imagine you know nothing about the meaning of his words?’
She looks me straight in the eye. ‘You mean, why he called my mother a whore? No, I do not.’
‘Didn’t you tell me she was with child when she came to Berwick?’
‘Yes. The Scots killed her husband. She does not speak of it.’
‘What if that wasn’t true? What if she was unmarried and carried a child?’
Her hand stiffens in mine, and I think she will remove it, but she does not. ‘And Edward has come to know of it?’
‘Yes. Though I cannot think how. He told me he’d never met her before he came to Berwick.’
She twists her mouth. ‘That need not be true either.’
‘I suppose. Do you want me to speak with him?’
She shakes her head. ‘What could you say? And you have more important work to do.’
I’m glad she refuses, as I think the same thing. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t be. You let me speak of it and for that I thank you.’ Pushing her hair away from her face, she quickly leans towards me and kisses me on the cheek. ‘Did you bring the cipher?’
‘Of course.’ There seems to be something sticking in my throat.
‘Do you think we’ll find the answer?’
‘Do you?’
‘Yes.’
As I pull out the cipher, I think of my marriage and feel suddenly lost at the thought of life without Lucy when I leave.
Chapter 14
And still the cipher eludes us, though we think for a moment we have found the word ‘Berwick’, which brings great encouragement. But if we have, then the letters do not help us find anything else. Lucy waits for her mother in the friary, and I walk home, head trailing towards the ground. Will sits by the window in our room. He watches me looking at the paper, shifting constantly. I wait for the words to fall out of his mouth, but he turns back to look out the window.
‘What?’
He looks at me with a frown. ‘I didn’t say anything.’
‘I can hear you thinking from here.’
‘Well, if you’re so clever, you’ll know what it was.’ He turns away again.
I sigh and put the parchment down. ‘What’s the matter?
‘Nothing.’
