Several of the women glanced up from their work as we entered, at first with indifference, but then with growing hilarity as they took in my height and the shortness and tightness of my azure-and-murrey tunic. I tried to make myself as inconspicuous as possible, but with little success.
Amice introduced me. ‘My lord of Gloucester’s new Yeoman of the Chamber. The Sergeant of Livery had nothing that would fit him, and as the Duke has brought no sewing-women in his train we’ve been asked to help. Take the tunic off, Master Chapman, and sit down if you can spare a moment, while I begin unpicking the seams and hem.’
I did as I was bid and seated myself on the end of one of the wooden benches. I knew that I should probably have been helping to oversee the laying of the dinner-tables, or on call in case the Duke desired a message to be run; but I was in no fear of dismissal for my negligence, however vociferously my fellow Yeomen might complain. Whatever excuses were needed to explain my behaviour, they would be found.
One or two of the girls eyed me flirtatiously, but the arrival of the head seamstress quickly put paid to all such nonsense, for which I was very glad.
‘Was that Matt Wardroper you were speaking to?’ Amice Gentle asked, the point of one of her scissor blades slashing at the threads of the tunic’s hem and seams.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Of course, you know him. I was forgetting.’ And in answer to her inquiring stare, I explained how I had eaten at her parents’ shop some four weeks earlier, adding, ‘While I was still a pedlar. Before I decided I had had enough of life on the open road and came to beg a return of favour from the Duke. Your mother spoke of you and her pride in your situation. She also spoke of young Matthew Wardroper.’
‘Well! Fancy that, now!’ she exclaimed. ‘It’s a small enough world, I reckon. But as for knowing Matthew Wardroper well, that I don’t. But I’ve heard him talked about since my youth. There were always servants from Chilworth Manor in and out of Southampton and many of them came to Father’s shop, both to buy and to fill their bellies. Naturally, they mentioned Master Matthew, as well as Sir Cedric and his lady.’ She ripped out a final piece of thread and held the tunic up to the light of the nearest candle. ‘I’m ready to start restitching when I’ve measured you. I’m afraid you’ll have to stand up, or I can’t do it.’ When I had complied, Amice passed a narrow strip of material around my body, first around my chest and then my waist, snipping each piece off at the requisite length. While she did so she went on chatting. ‘Of course, I’ve seen Sir Cedric and Lady Wardroper many times when they’ve visited Southampton, but Matthew I never saw as a child. He was sent away soon after he reached his seventh birthday.’
‘To somewhere in Leicestershire, I understand.’ Obediently, I raised an arm on her instructions.
Amice hunched her shoulders. ‘I dare say, although I honestly can’t remember. In fact, I’d forgotten all about him until we came here from Berkhamsted with my lady. Quite by chance, I heard a member of the Duke’s household mention his name one day.’ She began to pin up the dismembered tunic and I resumed my seat on the bench. ‘Later, I got someone to point him out to me.’
‘Would you have recognized him anyway, do you think?’
‘There was something familiar about him. He has the same delicate features and dark colouring as his mother, although he has his father’s eyes. Sir Cedric is much stouter.’
I nodded. ‘Yes, you’re right. At least, about Matthew resembling Lady Wardroper. I haven’t met Sir Cedric.’ Once again, Amice sent me a glance of interrogation and I had to explain my visit to Chilworth Manor. A sudden thought occurred to me. ‘Do you know the lands thereabouts?’ I asked her.
Ignoring my question for the moment she bade me rise once more while she fitted me with the loosely pinned tunic. At last, satisfied, she eased the garment from my shoulders and laid it out on the table, then broke off a length of linen thread and inserted it into the eye of her needle.
‘Can you remain while this is done?’ she wanted to know. ‘Or are you needed?’
‘I’ll wait for you to finish,’ I said boldly, although uneasily aware that the head seamstress was watching us, suspicious of my protracted stay.
The needle whipped in and out of the cloth, making a row of tiny stitches, exquisite in their neatness and precision. After a moment or two I repeated my question. The hazel eyes opened wide and the soft mouth was pursed in consideration.
‘Around Chilworth Manor?’ Amice shook her head. ‘I never went there above a couple of times, to help out with the sewing when one of the women was sick. True, I’ve made the journey between Chilworth and Southampton, but I couldn’t describe it to you. Now if you asked me about the town it would be a different matter.’
‘No,’ I answered. ‘I wanted to know about the land to the north of the manor. Have you ever at any time heard mention of a deserted shrine in the woods? Think carefully.’
She did so, even pausing momentarily in her sewing and frowning. But the result was merely another shake of the head.
‘Never,’ she answered. ‘But I don’t suppose such things are uncommon. I’ve heard my granddam say that whole villages were wiped out by the Great Death and that the buildings fell into decay. Some were never rebuilt, while others were built again in different places. Why do you want to know? Is it important?’
‘No,’ I said, recalled by her question to a realization of just how unimportant and irrelevant was this petty, personal concern. Indeed, looking back it was difficult to understand the sense of evil which had gripped me in that woodland clearing. So much had happened since that it had almost faded from my mind.
‘You could ask Matthew Wardroper,’ Amice suggested, snapping the thread between strong, white teeth.
‘So I could,’ I agreed. ‘And so I might, if I remember.’
Our conversation languished as she bent again to her task, a fact which appeared to please the head seamstress, who now withdrew her gaze and went to oversee the work on the altar cloth. I debated with myself whether or not to return to my work without the tunic, but finally decided against it. Surely I should not be welcomed on duty only half dressed and in any case, Amice would soon be finished. I had never before met anyone who could sew so fast.
‘What made you give up peddling?’ she asked suddenly, completing the second seam and turning her attention to the hem.
‘I – er – just tired… of the wandering life,’ I lied and swiftly changed the subject. ‘Does the Duchess remain here long?’
‘Only until next Wednesday, the day after the King and his brothers leave for France.’
France! I had temporarily forgotten that dread word and the prospect of accompanying the Duke across the Channel. It was more than I had bargained for when I had let myself become entangled in this mesh. That I could unmask our villain within the next few days, provided that he himself did not strike first, was an impossible dream; and yet again the futility of searching for a needle in a haystack struck me most forcibly. There was nothing to confirm that any one of the five men named by Timothy Plummer was the would-be killer. How foolishly optimistic our assumption suddenly appeared. But what else had we to go on?
‘You’ve grown very serious,’ Amice remarked, looking up from her sewing with a friendly smile. ‘Do you find the duties of your position so weighty?’
I returned the smile, realizing all at once how pretty she was.
‘Your mother,’ I said, ‘didn’t oversing your praises.’
It took her a moment to catch my meaning, but when she understood she laughed and blushed with pleasure.
‘Oh, you don’t want to take any notice of Mother!’ she disclaimed hastily. ‘She’s very partial.’