‘A woman with your looks will always be able to force a poor, innocent knight to apologise,’ he riposted.
‘Thank you again, Sir Baldwin. I don’t know what I could have done to merit such compliments.’
‘Come, lady, you can hardly be unaware of your attractions.’
She gave a low, throaty chuckle, but there was little humour in it. ‘You mean to a man like my husband?’
‘Anney, I am sorry. I never intended to remind you of him.’
‘Why shouldn’t you? He was the only husband I ever knew. I don’t hate him. How could I, when he gave me my two boys? I believe you are hoping to speak to the priest?’
Baldwin nodded. Stephen was now at the opposite end of the room, deep in conversation with Thomas.
‘I thought so. You’ll find it difficult, Sir Baldwin. He doesn’t want to talk to you.’
‘Why?’
‘Perhaps he’s scared you’ll discover something.’
‘Such as?’
‘Such as how he disliked the squire’s son,’ she said coolly.
‘What could he have had against so young a child? Herbert was only five or six.’
‘Five, but rowdy with it. He never attended to Stephen’s lessons, wouldn’t obey his sternest orders, and treated the priest like a figure of fun. Herbert also used to shoot at him with his sling whenever he could, and for that Stephen would give him a good hiding.’
‘Did Herbert’s parents realise what was going on?’
Anney gave a short laugh. ‘Squire Roger had won his son a place with Sir Reginald of Hatherleigh. What more could he ask but that his cleric should teach the boy the same way he’d already taught the sons of Sir Reginald? There was no difficulty there, I assure you.’
Her tone interested Baldwin. ‘You think he wanted to beat the child?’
‘Of course he did. He hates children – not only the squire’s son, all children. It wasn’t just Herbert he thrashed: my own boy was often whipped or punched by him, and never for any real misdemeanour, only because it pleased him to do so. Look at him! He has such a soft, womanly appearance, and yet he has a heart of flint!’
Baldwin followed her gaze. The priest was still chatting to Thomas, his face animated. That same hint of femininity that he had seen on first meeting the priest caught the knight’s attention once more. If it was not for the tonsure, Baldwin could have thought him a woman from this distance. It was hard to believe that such a person could enjoy hurting children, and yet that was Anney’s clear implication.
‘Are you sure he wasn’t merely trying to teach them obedience?’ he hazarded.
‘Master Herbert was a pleasant, well-spoken child, and my own boy is very well-behaved. He has to be, seeing as how he’s had to learn to fend for himself without a father. What a lad like him needs is the gentle hand of someone who appreciates him, not bullying from one who should know better. And as for poor Jordan…’
Baldwin expressed polite interest but the woman shook her head. ‘No, I’ll leave it to you to speak to him. Make up your own mind.’
‘What do you think of the Fleming?’ Baldwin asked after a moment.
‘Him? Haven’t you realised yet?’ she asked, and then gave a long sigh. ‘Look at him! Ever at my lady’s side, always there with a flattering word, a generous compliment. It’s like watching a knight courting a lady, isn’t it? The man wants her. He knows she won’t inherit all the estates, although I think that was a shock to him at first because he was hoping that he might be able to master the whole manor with luck, but he still hopes to win her and whatever Master Thomas thinks fit to endow her with.’
‘What?’‘ Baldwin demanded, startled. ’But the woman has only just buried her man. She can’t remarry – it would leave her open to the charge of unchastity! She could be accused of lasciviousness – or of being guilty of infidelity while married!‘
‘In short, she would be suspected of infamy,’ agreed the maid unabashed. ‘Yes, she would, but would the Fleming care? Next time you talk to him, look deep into his eyes, Sir Knight, especially when he smiles, because the smile never touches them. He is cold and unfeeling, no matter what his words might be. Watch him carefully, Sir Knight. He’s not what he appears to be.’
When Jordan met Alan out at the fields near the manor, he could see that his friend had already heard the news about Edmund.
‘Are you all right?’ Alan asked him quietly.
Jordan nodded. His eyes were red from weeping all the long night, and he felt utterly miserable, but he said nothing. He couldn’t rely on his voice, and didn’t want to scare the quarry.
Thirty feet away three pigeons were feeding from four tiny mounds of grain. Others were circling, unaware of the two boys. A fourth and a fifth gradually felt the desire for food overcome their fears, and plummeted downwards. When mere inches from the ground, they stretched their wings, halting their mad plunge, and landed gently. In a few minutes there were eight there, and only then did Alan spring his trap. He pulled quickly at a hempen string before him; the knot at the far end slipped free, and the framed net fell swiftly onto the eating birds, only two managing to make off.
Flapping, the six remaining pigeons could not escape, and the boys laughed with delight as they ran to the net, sitting down and wringing their necks before beginning to pluck and draw them.
‘Have you seen your dad yet?’ Alan asked.
‘No, he’s up at the manor, in their gaol there. I’ll go and see him later. We’ll need to take him food, I suppose. Alan, we must tell them about the shoe. Otherwise my dad might be hanged, and he had nothing to do with it.’
Alan appeared not to hear him. ‘I talked to that knight this morning.’
Jordan waited expectantly.
‘He seemed quite all right, really,’ Alan continued thoughtfully. ‘Didn’t seem to look down on me just ’cos I’m a villager or anything, but listened to what I thought.‘
Jordan watched as his friend pulled a grass shoot and sucked the sweet, pale end.
‘Maybe we should explain about the shoe,’ Alan murmured.
‘You think we should take it into the manor?’
Alan nodded slowly. ‘I think we should tell him about the priest.’
Hugh gratefully handed his jug to Edgar and walked through to the buttery. There he drew off a large pot of ale for himself and carried it outside for a breather.
The early promise of the bright morning had been false, and now thick white clouds smothered the sky like a blanket over the whole world. Hugh took a deep breath and let it out contentedly. This was his country, for he had been born and brought up on a farm outside Drewsteignton, and he knew the moors and their weather as well as he knew himself and his own moods.
Especially around here, the north-eastern part of the moors, he could recognise the way that the weather was likely to develop. The hill behind the manor led up to another, still more massive, and this one, Cosdon he had been able to see from his father’s farm when he was out with his sling and his staff protecting the family flocks from beasts of all kinds.
It was a comforting scene. At the other side of the yard he saw four or five men, the ones from Thomas’s party. They watched him narrowly as he came out, visibly relaxing as they recognised who he was. Hugh gave them an interested look. They had the appearance of a set of outlaws setting an ambush, but they scarcely took any notice of him, and Hugh sat on a moorstone block, comfortably certain that they were no threat to him. Soon he began to nod.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Inside, Baldwin was still digesting Anney’s words about Brother Stephen’s hatred of children when he once more found himself being addressed. He apologised automatically. ‘I am sincerely sorry, but I was miles away.’