"Lady Katherine, how does my wench?" she asked suddenly. "Does she serve you well?"
"Oh, Dame Emma, I cannot tell you how well! She's my sister, my friend - indeed I - I-" Her eyes, though shadowed by worry, shone with wistful gratitude.
Katherine threw down the cracker and pick amongst the tray of rattling nuts and wandering to the window peered out again. "Robin's coming, he's past St. Magnus' church!" She opened the door and flew out to the street.
They came back together and Katherine cried to Dame Emma, "All's well with the Duke! Thanks be to God and His Holy Mother - tell - tell what happened, Robin."
The young squire laughed and picking up some hazel meats crunched them in his strong teeth. "When I got back, His Grace and Lord Percy had already left the church with Wyclif. I talked to one of Percy's squires, he thought it all a rare good joke. With the turmoil and the shouting, and a score of bishops darting here and there, the folk got confused; and then the rood screen tumbled down and frightened them so they rushed back into the nave."
"And then?" cried Katherine.
"Why, then, the Duke and my lord Percy simply walked out through the Dean's door, mounted and rode off towards Cornhill, where they are to sup with Sir John d'Ypres. Percy's squire said my lords were cool as spring water and very tickled at the breakdown of the trial."
"There's a-many won't be," said Dame Emma, frowning. "God's nails, 'tsounds a disgraceful brawling all around."
Yes, it is so, Katherine thought bitterly. She sank down on a little three-legged stool within the hearth and rested her forehead on her cold hand. She closed her eyes and saw John as he had stood beneath the amber light of Paul's great window, when she had thought him a god. Now she knew that he had never been less godlike. Hot temper he had always had and arrogance, but not like this. She thought of the furious shoutings and the clash of a sword next to Blanche's quiet tomb.
The squire and Dame Emma looked at the brooding, desolate figure on the stool within the hearth. Firelight shimmered on the burnished head, on the lovely lines of the brow and straight nose and round cleft chin, and they glanced at each other.
Robin yearned to kiss the little hand that plaited and un-plaited a fold of the grey skirt, to implore her to smile.
The goodwife's impulse was more practical. "Sir Squire," she said, "since me men folk're out, do ye go down cellar t'far corner behind a keg o' malmsey. Ye must move the keg to reach a stone crock o' peach brandy wine I put down last Lammas. Fetch the crock an ye'll be so kind, 'tis prime cure for low sperrits."
When Robin had made off into the courtyard, bound for the passage that led to the cellars, Dame Emma reached up to a shelf and taking down her two engraved silver cups began to polish them; for she never served her famed liquor in ordinary mugs. Dame Emma had but dipped her cloth into the powdered pumice when she heard the pound of running feet outside and a banging on the door. In the excited shouts she recognised Jack Maudelyn's voice.
Dame Emma jumped up and yanked the settle around so that it hid Katherine. "Stay there," she whispered, and pulled the bolt. Her son-in-law shot in.
"Out of me way, old mother," he cried, dancing with impatience. "I want me headpiece and bow and quiver, Master Guy too, get down his pike and sword." He flung open the door to the passage where the Pessoner weapons were kept and began to pull them feverishly off the wall pegs.
"Not so hot, not so hot, me lad!" cried Dame Emma, grabbing his arm. "What's all this coil? Where's Master Guy?"
"He's coming." He shook her off as he grabbed a handful of arrows from his quiver. "Where's Longshot? Where's me best goose-tipped shaft? The devil take it - who's been meddling here! - and this pike's dull as wood - no matter, 'twill serve-" He thrust his sandy shock-head into the helmet and slung the quiver over his shoulder.
"Serve for what, Jack Maudelyn?" cried Dame Emma in a great voice.
"Why, to pierce the Duke's black heart, if God gi' me that honour!" He was fumbling with the leather lacings of his headpiece and did not hear Katherine's gasp from behind the settle, but Dame Emma ran to the hearth as though to mend the fire. She held her finger to her lips and shook her head violently.
Katherine had started up but she sank back on to the stool. The dame returned to the passage and said sternly, "What d'ye mean by that wicked speech, ye rascallion!"
Jack seized his longbow, shouldered his pike and cried exultantly, "I mean that John o' Gaunt and that whoreson Percy'll never see another sunrise! Men o' London're roused at last! They've gone off to Percy's now - then we're on to the Savoy after Lancaster!"
"Jack, Jack!" cried Dame Emma, starting back, "ye couldna do this fearful thing an' ye would, the Duke's own guards - -"
Jack broke in contemptuously. "The Duke's own guards'll not stand against two thousand men! Hush your blab, old 'oman, I'm off, tell Master Guy to hurry after - -" He dashed through the kitchen and the slam of the front door shook the house.
Katherine stood up. Her face had gone pale as the plaster wall. "Call Robin, quick!"
The dame obeyed.
The squire had been tugging at the malmsey keg but he heard the frightened voice, ran up to the court and into the kitchen. Katherine stood in the centre of the rush-strewn flags, her looks so white and strange that Robin cried out in alarm. She shook her head impatiently to still him and spoke with tense restraint.
"Listen - a mob two thousand strong is after the Duke. They would kill him - but they think him at the Savoy. You know where he is?"
Robin gaped, but the control with which she spoke conveyed urgency quicker than if she had shouted. "At Sir John d'Ypres' in Cornhill," he whispered. "But Lady, how know you this
"No matter. Hurry, Robin, warn him - my God - -" Her voice rose suddenly. "But where can he go - tell him west out of the city!"
"He would not run from a rabble, lady." Robin, breathing fast, had now caught the full impact of her news. "Not our Duke, and with this reckless spirit he has shown."
She nodded, biting her lips, frowning with the force of her desperate concentration. "Then tell him little Richard is in danger too, that he must get across the river to Kennington and protect the boy. Make him go!"
Robin turned with his hand on the latch, when Dame Emma ran up with a paring knife, "Best take this off," she cried and slicing the stitches, yanked the Duke's badge from Robin's shoulder.
The squire grunted and dashed out. While the door was opened both women heard the distant roars of the mob. "They must be at Ludgate," whispered Dame Emma. "Christ's blood, but they've gone mad - and you, too, Guy le Pessoner!" she shouted, for her husband came lumbering along the street, his moon face purple, his paunch heaving beneath his guildsman's tunic.
"No, you don't," she cried, pushing him down on the settle as he started for the armoury passage. "Ye'll not go out again to join those ribauds!" The dame, arms akimbo and eyes snapping like sparks, glared down at her panting husband.
"Emma, forbear," stammered the fishmonger. "Ye don't know what they're doing to us. They aim to make us serfs here, to take London's liberties. They've a bill at Westminster ready now, to put that stinking marshal over us. Already he's ta'en a prisoner he'd no right to, had 'im mewed up in a dungeon. We freed the knave and burned the stocks they'd put him in. We searched for Percy - -"
"And did ye find him? Nay, stay there," Dame Emma thrust the poker at her lord's belly and he sank back on the settle.
"Not yet - he'll be at the Savoy wi' t'other traitor - Peter - who's this?" The excited fishmonger had just caught sight of Katherine standing like a church statue beyond his angry wife.