‘We have heard quite a lot about the day that Herbert died, Stephen. Witnesses state that you were seen up near the stream. Many saw you there, and several saw you attacking Anney’s boy, and Anney herself says she saw you chasing after Herbert and trying to thrash him. She says you murdered Herbert – did you?’
Stephen sat up on his seat. As the bailiff had said, he was safe here. There was no court which had jurisdiction over him other than a correctly constituted church one. Stephen glanced at Anney and allowed a little of his contempt to show. ‘No, of course not. The woman’s deranged.’
‘Me! I’ll-’
She would have rushed at him, had not Edgar stepped forward and blocked her path. The priest shook his head sadly.
‘Bailiff, this woman has been deluded for many months now – in fact, I believe she has been thus ever since her first boy died. He drowned in the old well in the yard, you know. What with that and the discovery that her husband was no more than a lascivious fellow who would swear marriage vows to any woman whose bed he wanted to invade… well, you will comprehend why this poor woman has a fixation about all men, not just me.’
‘That’s a lie!’
‘All I can say is, I didn’t kill my young master Herbert – why on earth should I? And as for the other, er, wild allegations… well, I am prepared to forgive them. She clearly doesn’t realise what she is saying.’
All this was said so coolly that Simon almost thanked him. But then he recalled the other evidence. ‘So you say you didn’t see him up there?’
Before the priest could respond, Baldwin rested his elbow on his knee, cupping his chin in the palm of his hand and gazing at the cleric with a distracted air. ‘Stephen, we have heard that you grabbed this woman’s son, Alan. Why was that?’
‘Why?’ Too late, Stephen realised that he should have instantly denied seeing Alan. He shrugged. ‘He was up there spying on me. I get bored with the boys constantly following me everywhere. It becomes thoroughly tedious after a while, and when I found him doing it again, I sought to convince him that continuing to do so would only result in pain for him.’
‘So you caught him and beat him?’ i tried to, yes. But the boy twisted away, and escaped.‘
‘And you chased after him?’
Stephen assented.
‘What did you do then, Brother Stephen?’
‘I… I went to the stream to sit and contemplate. I like it up there, it’s peaceful and pleasant.’
‘What about Petronilla?’ asked Baldwin.
‘She spoke to me for a few minutes before I went to the stream, but please don’t ask me what about – it was a matter of the confessional, you understand.’
Simon nodded. He knew as well as anyone that the secrecy of the confessional could not be breached. ‘And she left you?’
‘Yes.’
‘A little later you were seen chasing after and catching Herbert. Why?’
Stephen’s face hardened. ‘The little devil fired a stone at me. It hurt. I dare to suggest that if someone had done such a thing to you, Bailiff, you too would have tried to punish the perpetrator.’
‘Quite possibly. But I wouldn’t have killed him.’
‘Do you suggest that I did?’
Baldwin spoke softly. ‘Tell us what happened.’
‘He shot me. I got up and couldn’t see anyone, but I heard a rustling and laughter, and chased off towards it. When I got there, Herbert jumped to his feet and ran away. I am fairly fleet of foot, but he was too fast for me.’
‘What then?’
‘Then?’ Stephen blinked, unsure what additional evidence the knight needed. ‘Why, I returned to the stream.’
‘What had you lost there?’
Stephen froze, but then licked his lips and gave a feeble smile. ‘What makes you think I had lost anything?’
‘We saw you searching on the day it rained. You had gone back to seek something, and were looking most assiduously under bushes, so I assume that whatever it was must have been valuable.’
‘No, it was merely a small trifle, nothing much.’
‘You mean to tell me that you went back there a few days later and started fumbling all over the place on your hands and knees trying to find an insignificant trifle? What would you have done for something valuable?’
‘I do not think I need to remain here to be harangued,’ said Stephen with dignity. ‘If that is all, I…’
‘It was not that you were searching for a shoe, Brother?’
Stephen paled, and his voice dropped to a hushed whisper. ‘No!’
‘You are lying: you were looking for a shoe. On the day Herbert died you had been struck by a pebble and took off after your attacker, and as you pelted after him, your shoe fell off. You caught the boy, struck him in your rage and fury, and went back to find your shoe without realising how severely you had hit Herbert. Later, when you decided to return home and passed by the same place, you found the boy’s body…’
‘No, no, that’s not true,’ Stephen said, shaking his head.
‘… and in a panic, not knowing what to do, you hauled his body to the road, waiting until a cart arrived, at which time you thrust the boy down onto the road itself. Then you came back home.’
‘No… no,’ Stephen kept repeating, his face full of an astonished horror.
Simon scratched his ear. ‘Tell us the truth, then. You can see how convincing the evidence is – convince us. What is the truth?’
Alan sat idly on a barrel, swinging his legs while he surveyed the room with wistful longing. There was so much food and drink in here; it would take him and his mother all year just to consume the dead game hanging on the walls, let alone drink the barrels of wine. Such wealth, he thought. To own all this would mean never being hungry again. The concept was wonderful – but impossible. He couldn’t conceive of such fortune.
For Jordan it was still more fabulous; he simply gaped all around.
Hugh had stirred the snoring Wat, and the lad had brought Hugh more wine. Wat was older than Alan by some two years, but there was a certain mutual understanding between them: both had been brought up to work on estates, and both found the opulence of their halls more or less intimidating, although Wat was less overawed. Having grown up to run errands and help serve within the hall itself, he was naturally more attuned to the ways of a great manor. It was natural, just as it was natural that he should treat the other boys with a faintly distant politeness, as if to emphasise the slight difference that existed between them.
Once he was happy that the lads would not begin to have a vulgar brawl among the jugs and barrels, Hugh allowed his curiosity to get the better of him and he went through the screens to the hall, sitting on a bench towards the back.
‘What’s happening in there?’ Alan asked once the figure of Authority, as represented by Hugh, had left them to their own devices.
‘They’re trying to sort out who could have killed the young master.’ Wat eyed the jugs jealously. His head was heavy from the previous night and this morning’s drinking, and he was sorely tempted to try some more wine, if only to ease the gentle pounding at his temples.
Jordan was experimentally tracing the inner surface of an earthenware bowl. He had never possessed anything quite like it, and his mother had nothing remotely so fine. It had a wonderful smoothness which he found irresistible, and he couldn’t help but keep testing it with his finger to find a rough section.
He looked up as he heard voices raised, some angrily. ‘Alan, isn’t that your mum?’
It did sound like Anney. Alan dropped from his seat and padded to the door.
Wat told him not to stray out to the screens, for Hugh had made him promise to keep the lads inside, and Alan was content to obey. The door to the buttery didn’t open opposite the main door from the hall, so Alan couldn’t see who was talking, but that also meant no one could see that he was eavesdropping. As he listened to Stephen talk, his face fell, and he gazed fearfully towards the yard. Then he heard the cleric’s explanation and the contemptuous way he dealt with Anney, and Alan glowered angrily. His mouth became a thin line.