Out of the chill rage that consumed him he heard the woman, roused now and eager, saying: “No, but that’s not all! For it so chanced I followed the man out when he left, but softly, not to be seen too soon.” Had he given her an appraising look, smiled, flashed an admiring eye, to draw her on a string? No, not if he had anything to hide, no, he would rather have slid away unobtrusively, glad to be rid of his winnings for money. No, she was female, curious, and had time on her hands to spare, she went out to see whatever was to be seen. And what was it she saw? “He slipped along to the left here,” she said, “and there was another man, a young fellow, pressed close against the wall there, waiting for him. Whether he gave him the money, all of it or some of it, I could not be sure, but something was handed over. And then the older one looked over his shoulder and saw me, and they slipped away very quickly round the corner into the side street by the market, and that was all I saw of them. And more than I was meant to see,” she reflected, herself surprised now that she came to see more in it than was natural.
“You’re sure of that?” asked Nicholas intently. “There was a second with him, a younger man?” For the three innocents from Lai had been left waiting in Andover. If it had not been true, one or other of them, the simpleton surely, would have given the game away at once.
“I am sure. A young fellow, neat enough but homespun, such as you might see hanging around inns or fairs or markets, the best of them hoping for work, and the worst hoping for a chance to get a hand in some other man’s pouch.”
Hoping for work or hoping to thieve! Or both, if the work offered took that shape-yes, even to the point of murder.
“What was he like, this second?”
She furrowed her brow and considered, gnawing a lip. She was in strong earnest, searching her memory, which was proving tenacious and long. “Tallish but not too tall, much the older one’s height when they stood together, but half his bulk. I say young because he was slender and fast when he slipped away, and light on his feet. But I never saw his face, he had the capuchon over his head.”
“I did wonder,” said the silversmith defensively. “But it was done, I’d paid, and I had the goods. There was no more I could do.”
“No. No, there’s no blame. You could not know.” Nicholas looked again at the bright ring on the woman’s finger. “Madam, will you let me buy that ring of you? For double what your husband paid for it? Or if you will not, will you let me borrow it of you for a fee, and my promise to return it when I can? To you,” he said earnestly, “it is dear as a gift, and prized, but I need it.”
She stared back at him wide-eyed and captivated, clasping and turning the ring on her finger. “Why do you need it? More than I?”
“I need it to confront that man who brought it here, the man who has procured, I do believe, the death of the lady who wore it before you. Put a price on it, and you shall have it.”
She closed her free hand round it defensively, but she was flushed and bright-eyed with excitement, too. She looked at her husband, who had the merchant’s calculating, far-off look in his eyes, and was surely about to fix a price that would pay the repairs of his shop for him. She tugged suddenly at the ring, twisted it briskly over her knuckle, and held it out to Nicholas.
“I lend it to you, for no fee. But bring it back to me yourself, when you have done, and tell me how this matter ends. And should you find you are mistaken, and she is still living, and wants her ring, then give it back to her, and pay me for it whatever you think fair.”
The hand she had extended to him with her bounty he caught and kissed. “Madam, I will! All you bid me, I will! I pledge you my faith!” He had nothing fit to offer her as a return pledge, she had the better of him at all points. Her husband was looking at her indulgently, as one accustomed to the whims of a very handsome wife, and made no demur, at least until the visitor was gone. “I serve here under FitzRobert,” said Nicholas. “Should I fail you, or you ever come to suppose that I have so failed you, complain to him, and he will show you justice. But I will not fail you!”
“Are you so ready to say farewell to my gifts?” asked the silversmith, when Nicholas was out of sight. But he sounded amused rather than offended, and had turned back to his close work on the brooch with unperturbed concentration.
“I have not said farewell to it,” she said serenely. “I trust my judgement. He will be back, and I shall have my ring again.”
“And how if he finds the lady living, and takes you at your word? What then?”
“Why, then,” said his wife, “I think I may earn enough out of his gratitude to buy myself all the rings I could want. And I know you have the skill to make me a copy of that one, if I so wish. Trust me, whichever way his luck runs-and I wish him better than he expects!-we shall not be the losers.”
Nicholas rode out of Winchester within the hour, in burning haste, by the north gate towards Hyde, passing close by the blackened ground and broken-toothed walls of the ill-fated abbey from which Humilis and Fidelis had fled to Shrewsbury for refuge. These witnesses to tragedy and loss fell behind him unnoticed now. His sights were set far ahead.
The inertia of despair had lasted no longer than the length of the street, and given place to the most implacable fury of rage and vengefulness. Now he had something as good as certain, a small circlet of witness, evidence of the foulest treachery and ingratitude. There could be no doubt whatever that these modest ornaments were the same that Juliana had carried with her, no chance could possibly have thrown together for sale three such others. Two witnesses could tell of the disposal of that ill-gotten plunder, one could describe the seller only too well, with even more certainty once she was brought face to face with him, as, by God, she should be before all was done. Moreover, she had seen him meet with his hired assassin in the street, and pay him for his services. There was no possibility of finding the hireling, nameless and faceless as he was, except through the man who had hired him, and such enquiries as Nicholas had set in motion after Adam Heriet had so far failed to trace his present whereabouts. Only one company of Waleran’s men remained near Winchester, and Heriet was not with them. But the search should go on until he was found, and when found, he had more now to explain away than a few stolen hours-possession of the lost girl’s goods, the disposal of them for money, the sharing of his gains with some furtive unknown. For whatever conceivable purpose, but to pay him for his part in robbery and murder?
Once the principal villain was found, so would his tool be. And the first thing to do now was inform Hugh Beringar, and accelerate the hunt for Adam Heriet in Shropshire as in the south, until he was run to earth at last, and confronted with the ring.
It was barely past noon when Nicholas rode out of the city. By dusk he was near Oxford, secured a remount, and rode on at a steadier and more sparing pace through the night. A hot, sultry night it was, all the more as he went north into the midlands. The sky was clear of cloud, yet without moon or stars, very black. And all about him, in the mid hours of the night, lightnings flared and instantly died again into blackness, conjuring up, for the twinkling of an eye, trees and roofs and distant hills, only to obliterate them again before the eye could truly perceive them. And all in absolute silence, with nowhere any murmur of thunder to break the leaden hush. Forewarnings of the wrath of God, or of his inscrutable mercies.
Chapter Twelve
THE MORNING CAME BRIGHT, VEILED AND STILL, the rising sun a disc of copper, the mill pond flat and dull like a pewter dish. The ripples evoked by Madog’s oars did no more than heave sluggishly and settle again with an oily heaviness, as he brought his boat in from the river after Prime.