Still clasping the box on its chain, the boy stared dispassionately down at his master. Should he call one of the monks? The old fellow could only just have stopped breathing. They could send for that big bossy nun who was in charge of the infirmary. She might be able to help. She could give the master some medicine, get those lungs working again.
Couldn’t she?
But the cold voice in his head said, no. Too late for that. Your master is dead.
‘Dead,’ the boy repeated in a soft whisper.
Nobody knows about this, he thought, tightening his fist around the metal box in his hand. It was heavy, he noticed; he shook it to see if it would rattle, which would imply there was something inside it, but it made no sound. And he had been promised a silver coin, which he surely would not be getting now that his master was dead.
For who was there to give it?
Another thought struck him, a dreadful thought that made him shake with fear. They’ll say I did it! They’ll say I finished him off! They’ll say I should have taken better care of him, fetched someone when he had that awful coughing fit earlier!
Wanting to moan but afraid to wake the other people in the shelter, the boy stuffed his ragged cuff into his mouth.
Get away from here, the cold voice advised. Put some distance between you and this scene of death. The monks and the nuns don’t know who you are or where you come from, do they? To them you’re just a servant, nameless, unimportant. They’ll never find you. They probably won’t even bother to look for you. Run, now, while you’ve got the chance. Morning is far off; you can be miles away by the time they find out the old man’s dead.
He thought hard, chewing at his sleeve. It was good advice. Wasn’t it?
All his short life he had been used to doing what he was told. To be forced to make a decision for himself was a unique experience.
Which, perhaps, excused its being such a poor one.
Without another glance at his dead master, he stood up, silently rolled his few possessions into a compact bundle and stuffed it inside his cloak and, with the box on the chain still held tight in his hand, tiptoed out of the shelter.
He stepped cautiously and lightly along the path until he was a good distance away from the small knot of buildings in the Vale. Then he hitched up his robe and ran.
PART ONE
1
Josse d’Acquin stood with his manservant, Will, looking gloomily out over the meadow which, last night, had contained the household cow and her calf.
The meadow was now empty, and there was a gap in the ragged hedge large enough for a cow and a calf to have squeezed through.
Will was muttering under his breath. The general tone of voice suggested he was a little disgruntled.
Josse patted his arm. ‘Don’t blame yourself, Will,’ he began, ‘we both knew the boundary was weak just there and-’
‘I weren’t blaming myself,’ Will replied, with an uncharacteristic display of spirit; Will, devoted and hard-working, usually tended to take the responsibility for everything that went wrong at New Winnowlands on his own narrow shoulders. ‘I was saying, it’s too much. There’s only so many hours in the day and, for the life of me, I can’t be in two places at once.’
Greatly surprised, Josse turned to look at him. ‘I agree, Will,’ he said gently. ‘But what am I to do? Whenever I have suggested that we take on more hands, you say you can manage. You say that you and Ella prefer to look after me on your own.’ Ella was Will’s wife, or perhaps his woman; Josse had no idea whether or not they were wed and certainly had never enquired. Ella worked as hard as Will and, although chronically shy, could turn her hand to any task within the house and quite a few outside it.
‘That we do, sir, that we do.’ Will was frowning, chewing his lip; clearly he had something on his mind.
‘Then I repeat: what am I to do?’
Will stood silent for some time, as if pondering over the relative merits of speaking out or keeping his thoughts to himself. Eventually — he was still glaring out over the empty meadow — he decided to unburden himself.
‘See, sir, it’s like this,’ he began, a hand rubbing at the small of his back. ‘Me and Ella, we don’t like taking orders from anyone, leastways, saving old Sir Alard, who could be tricky, God rest him, when an east wind put him in an ill humour. And yourself, a’ course, Sir Josse, and you’re not a demanding man. What we — I mean, it’s not as if we’ve ever been under the charge of others, and we’re probably too set in our ways to learn.’ He looked up hopefully at Josse to see if the significance of his little speech had been understood.
Josse, still in the dark, said, ‘I’m sorry, Will. What are you saying?’
Will sighed. ‘We wouldn’t take to it, sir. If that’s what you decide to do — and it’s for you to say, I do see that — then me and Ella might. . we might. .’ Whatever depressing image he was imagining was clearly moving him; his eyes blinked rapidly a couple of times and he swallowed hard, making the prominent Adam’s apple in his thin throat bob up and down. ‘And we’re settled here, settled and secure, and we’re that fond of our little place,’ he muttered, voice breaking.
Suddenly Josse understood. And hastened to correct his poor suffering manservant’s misapprehension.
‘Will, I would never put someone in over you, or over Ella,’ he said, forcing all the sincerity he could muster into his voice. ‘Why on earth should I want to do so? The pair of you have looked after me well these two years or more, and I have never had cause for complaint. I must assure you that I have no desire to change the arrangement — I do not intend to risk upsetting the applecart, not when it rolls along so smoothly!’ He tried to lighten the mood with a laugh, but Will did not join in.
‘And there’s my back,’ Will went on, as if he had not heard. ‘I’ve a pain down here’ — he was still rubbing — ‘like some little imp’s got in there with a red-hot pitchfork.’ He raised mournful eyes to Josse. ‘Maybe I’m getting too old, sir.’
When troop morale was as low as this, Josse reflected, remembering his soldiering days, the best thing to do was to organise a distraction. Take the men’s minds off feeling sorry for themselves.
‘Come, Will,’ he said bracingly. ‘First we’ll round up that cow — she can’t have gone far — then you must get Ella to put a warm poultice on your bad back. I can mend the gap in the hedge — a couple of hurdles should do it.’ Will shot him a dubious look. ‘Then I suggest that you cast around for a likely young lad to come and give you a hand here. Not just at the busy times such as sowing and harvest’ — he hoped he sounded more authoritative than he felt, being still far more a soldier than a farmer — ‘but on a regular basis. There must be someone, some son of one of my tenants growing out of childhood and with energy to spare.’ He waved a vague hand, as if suitable youths were lining up in the courtyard in front of the manor house, eager and alert, just dying to come and work under Will.
Will sniffed, managing to put a lot of expression into the brief sound. He said shortly, ‘Maybe.’
I do not know enough about the people who live on my land, Josse reflected. And, since the manor is but a small one, I have no excuse. I inherited my tenants from old Sir Alard, I take their rents and a portion of all that they produce and, presumably, Will organises their labours when they fulfil their commitments to me as their landlord.
He stood deep in thought but, try as he might, he could not bring to mind the face, features or demeanour of any of the peasants who lived, worked and, eventually, would die on his manor.
It was a sobering realisation. And one which, he felt, reflected badly on him. What would his friend the Abbess Helewise say? She, he was quite sure, knew every one of her Hawkenlye nuns, aye, and the monks too; their names, what work they did, their strengths and weaknesses, their likes and dislikes. What would the Abbess say to a man who knew absolutely nothing about the people on whom his very existence depended?