This guardian of her virtue was with her now, helping her to cut mussels from the sand. Edgith was at least threescore years. According to hearsay, mostly her own, she had been a great beauty in her youth, and having lived so long, there were few folk remaining who could contradict her. Her wizened face did indeed possess regular features, although they were somewhat marred by the decayed state of her remaining, worn-out teeth. Still, her eyes were bright with a zest for life. She had been married to a fisherman, but he had been lost in stormy seas some eight years ago. Four brawny sons she had borne, and they were all fishermen too.
Edgith dropped another bunch of mussels into the basket and pressed her hands to the small of her back. She unstoppered the water bottle hanging from the tie at her waist and took a drink.
'Did your husband fight in the great battle against the Normans, Mistress Ailith?' she asked curiously as she dug around in her pouch and brought out a small, flat griddle cake saved from the breaking of fast.
Ailith shook her head as the old woman offered to share, but she too stopped work for a moment. She licked her wind-dried lips and tasted salt. 'No, he was badly wounded fighting the Norse in the north. On the day of the great battle he was lying in his bed raving with fever. I had two brothers though, and their bones lie bleaching on Hastings field. They were members of King Harold's bodyguard. Lyulph was only in his nineteenth year.' Her voice started to tremble. Abandoning the muddy sand, she went to rinse her feet in a shallow channel of running water that was carving a path to the sea.
Edgith chewed carefully on her griddle cake and drank her water, her old eyes fixed shrewdly upon Ailith. 'So, if you had so much grief from the Normans, what be you doing with this one?'
Ailith turned sharply.
'Oh aye,' Edgith nodded sagely. 'I know that you are a respectable woman — and so does the village. Most of 'em are sick to the back teeth with being told that you and the lord do not bed together. But you be friends with him and you speak the Norman tongue uncommonly well for an English woman. How came this to happen when your own kin died for King Harold? Doesn't it disturb you to sit down at his table and see those two great battle axes on the long wall? Don't you ever wonder about who he killed to get them?'
Briefly, with a hint of defensive irritation, Ailith told Edgith about her friendship with Felice and Aubert, and how she had come to know Rolf. 'I do not allow myself to wonder,' she concluded. 'I do not look at those axes — to me they do not exist.'
Edgith made a non-commital sound and returned to harvesting mussels.
'Do you think I am wrong?'
'It is not for me to say, Mistress Ailith.'
'No, I want to know. Do you think I am wrong?'
Edgith straightened once more. 'They do exist,' she said. 'So does his hunger for you and yours for him. You can pretend all you want, but neither will go away just because you have buried yourself in the sand. One day you will be dug out of your hole.'
'I do not hunger for Rolf de Brize!'
'The defences you have built say that you do, that you fear him, and rightly so I think.' Before Ailith could reply, she nodded behind them. 'Visitors, mistress. Perhaps we should gather extra mussels for the table.'
Perturbed by Edgith's words, which held an alarming ring of truth, Ailith turned to see a troop of horsemen advancing along the shore towards them. She could tell that they were Normans from their manner of dress. Eight grown men she counted, and a blond-haired boy. A like number of bay and chestnut horses followed on leading reins.
One of the riders detached himself from the party and kicked his mount to a canter. The man's hauberk glittered like fish scales, the sun glanced off the sharpened tip of his spear. He drew rein before the women, pulling the horse in tight so that it danced on the spot. Ailith looked up into a square, powerful face with long dimples in the cheeks and a wide expanse of chin.
'Which way to Ulverton?' he demanded in appalling English. Another Norman rode up beside him, a younger man porridged with spots.
'Look at the udders on that, Tancred!' he enthused coarsely in French. His eyes lingered on Ailith's breasts before dropping to her exposed legs. He smacked his lips.
The older man snorted. 'God's eyes, is that all you ever think about?' There was indulgent humour in his tone. 'You haven't got time today to go swiving in the dunes. Still, I see what you mean.' He looked Ailith appreciatively up and down.
Ailith glared at the two men. 'Ulverton is that way,' she said in immaculate French and directed with her arm. 'Follow the track for half a mile and you will come to the castle. Lord Rolf, I am sure, will be fascinated to know what you think about his chatelaine.'
The square-faced man blinked rapidly, then bit his lip, stifling his amusement. The younger one blenched. Ailith turned her back on both of them and resumed picking mussels.
'I am sorry, my lady. If we had known your status, we would have been more polite,' said the first Norman.
'Is a fisherwoman not as entitled to as much courtesy as a lady of rank?' she said scathingly without bothering to look round. Beside her, Edgith glared at the two men, her knife held ready in her hand.
Without reply, the men sheepishly withdrew, and when Ailith raised her head, it was to see them riding off the beach in the direction she had indicated.
'Visitors indeed,' she muttered through her teeth to Edgith.
'I encountered your "chatelaine" down by the shoreline,' Tancred said to Rolf.
Rolf had been examining his new mares and deliberating whether to graze them on their own for a while, or introduce them immediately to Sleipnir. Now he turned and looked at his overseer.
'I thought she was nought but a fisher-wench, but she soon set me and Arnulf to rights.'
Rolf grinned. He had seen Ailith set out for the shore with Edgith and the donkey. She had been wearing an old, patched homespun gown, ancient shoes, and a plain linen kerchief over her braids. 'I can imagine that she would.'
Tancred eyed him soberly. 'Arnulf's a randy pup. He made certain crude remarks concerning her figure. I agreed with him before I realised she could understand us. I did not know that she was yours. There was no insult intended.'
Rolf resumed his inspection of the mares. 'Do not assume that because she is my housekeeper, she warms my bed too,' he said as he assessed a small, perky chestnut. 'I wish that she did, but Ailith has her own thoughts on the matter. She is a respectable widow and intends remaining so.'
Tancred looked nonplussed. 'Then she is not your mistress?' he said with an air of astonished disbelief.
Rolf shook his head regretfully. 'Not at the moment,' he said, and then suddenly grinned. 'But who knows what the future holds?'
The three weeks which Tancred and his party spent at Ulverton were the most uncomfortable of Ailith's life, and she was not sorry to see them leave before the winter storms began to make the crossing of the narrow sea too treacherous an enterprise.
In defence of that first encounter on the shore, she had made sure that in their presence she was always dressed properly and in the high Saxon style, which meant layer upon layer, so that not so much as an outline of breast could be discerned. She had fastened her belt loosely so that there was no emphasis on the trimness of her waist. Nor had she worn a kerchief again, but had replaced it with the full wimple and circlet, a brooch pinning its folds secure for good measure. And she had kept her distance, conspicuous by her absence at the high table. It had been less embarrassing for all concerned.