‘And you considered him an adventurer, after your cousin’s money?’
‘Yes. How was it possible for me to think otherwise? And neither Rosamund nor he would ever talk about his life before they met. What he was, where he came from remained a secret which only they shared. As I said earlier, not even Master Cozin could uncover anything concerning him, although he despatched two of his servants to London to make inquiries. Rosamund was beside herself with fury when she found out, and it led to a breach of several months between them. But she needed Thomas to run her affairs, and when she discovered that he had been unsuccessful, she forgave him.’
‘What about Master Cozin’s brother, the attorney? Did he ever make any attempt to get at the truth?’
‘He may have done. I think it most probable, but I never heard of it. Rosamund had ceased to confide in me. I’m afraid I had made my dislike of Eudo too plain. My belief is that she would have suggested I leave and return here to live, had I not been so useful to her with the children. She had no need to trouble her head about them while I was there to look after them. She was free to spend her time as she wished, with her husband.’
‘And how did they seem together?’
‘To begin with, all was well. She doted on him.’ Again, Grizelda coloured faintly. ‘Eudo Colet gave her… what she wanted in a man. He provided… what we were talking of just now. In that respect, he was everything that Henry Skelton was not. But as time went on, there were disagreements between them. For it was obvious to me that she was far fonder of him than he of her, which only served to confirm my suspicions that he had married her for her money. In those circumstances, it was natural that, on occasions, his eyes should stray towards other women. But,’ Grizelda added grudgingly, ‘I don’t believe he deceived her in any bolder fashion.’
‘And the children?’ I asked. ‘Was he kind to them?’
She shrugged. ‘Neither kind nor unkind. If he were forced to take notice of them, he was polite enough, but for the most part, like Rosamund, he ignored them. As long as I attended to all Mary’s and Andrew’s needs, there was no reason why their mother or Eudo should have much to do with them.’
I interposed here with a question I had been wanting to ask for sometime, because of a memory nagging at the back of my mind.
‘What does he look like, this Eudo Colet?’
Grizelda considered, taking her time before answering. At length, she said, ‘Dark of hair and general complexion. Eyes the colour of hazel nuts, a slightly crooked nose and full lips above a bushy, dark brown beard. A twelvemonth younger than Rosamund. Five years younger than me.’
‘Then I’ve seen him!’ I exclaimed triumphantly. ‘Yesterday afternoon, early. I was returning to the town after eating my dinner down by St Peter’s Quay, when I encountered this horseman near the Leper Hospital. He was mounted on a chestnut with pale mane and taft, but appeared uneasy in the handling of the animal. A bearded man, richly dressed.’
Grizelda nodded. ‘Eudo, undoubtedly. Where was he going?’
‘We didn’t speak, but he was riding downhill, in the direction of the bridge.’
‘Then he was returning to his lodgings. Since he quit the house, after the children’s murder, he has been staying with Agatha Tenter and her mother.’
‘So Jacinta informed me. She seemed to find the fact significant.’
Grizelda’s head reared up. ‘Significant? In what way?’
‘That she didn’t make clear to me, but I should hazard a guess that she suspects some sort of affection between Master Colet and Agatha Tenter. You said yourself that he had a wandering eye. Might it not have ranged as far as the cook? After all, they were together, night and day, under the same roof –’
Grizelda bit her lip. ‘I never saw sign of such an attachment, but that’s not to say there mightn’t have been one. Agatha’s a year or so older than I, but not yet in her dotage.’ She gave me a sly, sidelong glance, conscious of fishing for a compliment, and hurried on, ‘A good-looking enough woman, too, if you like red hair and a buxom figure.’
I said nothing, only shook my head and grinned. Almost, but not quite, by accident, I shifted a little closer to Grizelda on the bench. After a momentary start, she made no effort to put more distance between us.
‘I’ve made you lose the thread of your story with my interruptions,’ I apologized. ‘Your cousin’s death in childbirth must have changed many things.’
‘It did. Rosamund discovered she was pregnant in February of last year. The baby was due around Martinmas. Strangely, with both Andrew and Mary she had difficulty in carrying them, but easy births. With her third child, it was exactly the reverse. She was well and happy throughout the entire nine months, with Eudo dancing attendance on her every minute of the day. To give him his due, I have never seen a man more delighted at the prospect of becoming a father, although I could not rid myself of the notion that he saw the coming child as a means of silencing much of the rumour and gossip which, even after two years, still persisted about him. But then, at the last, it all went wrong, and be lost not only his son, but his wife, as well. However,’ Grizelda continued cynically, ‘Rosamund’s death has left him a very rich man.’
‘No more,’ I pointed out, ‘than he has been from the moment he married her and became her lord.’
Grizelda wrinkled her nose. ‘I don’t think he had truly accepted, until that moment, that everything she had was his, yet another proof to me that he was not of gentle birth. He was too easily overawed by the power of money and by people such as lawyers. But after Rosamund’s death, all that changed. He began to realize just how wealthy he was.’ Her pleasant features hardened. ‘Unfortunately for him, the partnership between Sir Jasper and Thomas Cozin had, in law, been dissolved when the former died, but Thomas, out of the goodness of his heart, had continued to share the profits of the enterprise with his old friend’s daughter. But hardly was the funeral over, and Rosamund laid to rest, than Thomas announced his intention of doing so no longer. And that,’ Grizelda added, lowering her voice almost to a whisper, ‘was when I began to be afraid for the safety of my charges.’
Chapter Seven
By now, the sun was high in the heavens, and the shadows which lay across the beaten-earth floor were shortening as it rose towards its zenith. It was growing warm, too warm for early April, experience having taught me that heat too soon in the year often presaged a wet and chilly summer. I was hungry, for it was past the hour of dinner, but I was too eager to hear the rest of Grizelda’s story to interrupt her with a request for food. By good fortune, however, she thought of it herself, standing up and shaking out her skirt. She had on the same one of blue brocella that she had worn the previous day.
‘It’s time we ate,’ she said firmly. ‘I can offer you bread and cheese, apples and oatcakes, washed down with some more of my ale, to which you seem to have taken a liking.’
I accepted gladly everything except the ale. She made a potent brew and I had drunk enough. My head was already beginning to swim. So she filled me a beaker of water from the barrel which stood outside the cottage door, and then suggested that we, too, go outside and warm ourselves in the sunshine. So we sat on a stone bench which ran the length of the south-facing wall, eating Grizelda’s excellent home-baked bread flavoured with corncockle seeds, cheese, made from the milk of her cow, oatcakes sweetened with honey, and some small shrivelled apples from last autumn’s gathering, given to her by a neighbour. The rainwater from the barrel was cool and refreshing, in dry spells, she told me, when the supply ran out, she was forced to haul her water up by bucket from the river.