Suddenly, one of them, who so far had stood a little apart from the others, smiling but not joining in their more vociferous merriment, came to my rescue. She moved between me and her companions, spreading wide her arms to protect me.
‘Enough!’ she protested, laughing. ‘Claim a forfeit and let the poor lad go! We’ve had our fun. Now, what’s it to be? I think a kiss apiece would suffice, don’t you agree? Granny Praule, in deference to your age, you can go first.’ There were cries of ‘Spoil sport, Grizelda!’ but in general, the women seemed content with this solution. Granny Praule pressed her withered, dry lips to mine, and, in relief I gave her a smacking kiss which evoked another cackle and a pat on the arm.
‘My! My!’ She gave a little skip. ‘You’re a good lad, Chapman! I haven’t been kissed like that these thirty years! You’ve brought back memories of my youth I thought I’d forgotten. I was a pretty girl, though you might find it hard to believe nowadays. I had the men after me like bees round a honey-pot.’
The rest of the women stepped forward, one by one, to claim their forfeit, some a little more boldly than the others, standing close to me as they placed their mouths on mine.
My rescuer, the woman they had addressed as Grizelda, was last, and at close range, I could see that she was not as young as most of her companions. I judged her to be some thirty summers, a handsome woman, with strong features and very dark brown eyes. Her complexion, too, was dark, and had she been a man I might have been tempted to think of her as swarthy, but her skin was too soft and delicate for that. In colouring, she reminded me of Lillis, so I knew, without seeing it, that the hair neatly concealed beneath the snow-white coif and blue linen hood was black. But there the resemblance ended. In physique, Grizelda was taller and much stronger than my dead wife. There was also a maturity about her, unmatched in Lillis, who, despite her twenty summers, had been childlike.
Two of the women, having unbound my wrists, proceeded to reset the trap for their next unwary victim, while the rest concealed themselves again amongst the bushes. All, that is, except Grizelda, who took her leave. When her friends protested, she laughed and shook her head.
‘I have work to do. Cheese to make and the hen to feed. The poor creature’s not been let out of her coop this morning, I was up and about so early.’ She turned to me. ‘Master Chapman, if you care to accompany me as far as my holding, I’ll protect you from any further hockers you might meet, and tell them that you’ve already paid your forfeit. My name,’ she added, ‘is Grizelda Harbourne.’
‘I’m called Roger,’ I answered, ‘and I accept your offer very willingly. I shouldn’t care to fall into the hands of any of your sister hockers if they are anything like you and your companions.’
There were shrieks of delight at this compliment before they were shushed by the youngest of the group – Janet by name, if I remembered rightly – with the information that another man was ascending the path. Hastily, I shouldered my pack and offered Grizelda Harbourne my arm.
We skirted the tiny village of Ashprington and traversed a belt of trees, arriving finally at a clearing. Here, a low, one-storey cottage was set in the middle of a smallholding which consisted of a plot for growing a little corn and a few vegetables, a hen-coop, a pigsty and a field where a cow was grazing. The cottage itself was furnished with a table on a pair of trestles, two benches, one covered with a piece of tapestry, which were ranged against the walls, and a central hearth surrounded by all the necessary impedimenta of cooking. At one end of the room, another piece of tapestry, faded and darned, imperfectly concealed a bed, the foot of which protruded some inches beyond the curtain.
I felt a stab of surprise as, invited in by Grizelda, I stepped across the threshold. There was no reason for my astonishment, the cottage was typical of its kind and no more than I should normally have expected to find on any smallholding.
But there was something about my hostess, her bearing, her tone of command when speaking to the other women, the slightly disdainful glance she cast around her present home, which suggested to me that she had known better times, been used to more gracious surroundings.
‘Have you eaten?’ she asked, waving me to one of the benches against the wall.
‘I had some bread and cheese an hour or more ago, down by the river. Food left over from last night’s supper.’
She smiled understandingly. ‘Not enough for a great frame like yours. If you can wait awhile, I’ll give you breakfast. There’s ale and bread and some salted bacon, or I can cook you a mess of eggs, if you’d prefer it.’
‘The eggs would make a welcome change,’ I said. ‘Could you also spare me a pot of hot water to shave with?’
She nodded. ‘There’s water heating in the cauldron over the fire.’ She reached down an iron pot with a handle from a shelf. ‘Here, use this. And while you shave, I’ll collect the eggs and free the poor bird from her coop.’
She went out, and I took the razor from my pack, looking for something with which to sharpen it. Then I noticed a leather strop hanging from a hook behind the door. I wondered who it belonged to, for there was no other sign of a man’s presence in the cottage. I dipped the iron pot in the seething water, lathered my chin with a piece of the cheap black soap which I always carried with me, and began to scrape off the night’s growth of stubble. I had hardly begun before Grizelda reappeared in the doorway.
She extended both hands. ‘Well, here are the eggs,’ she said, ‘but there’s no sign of the hen. The door of the coop has been forced and there are feathers on the ground. I’m afraid she’s been stolen.’
Chapter Two
I hurriedly finished shaving, then followed Grizelda outside to the coop, where I knelt down to examine it more closely.
She was right: the wooden latch had been forced and there was a drift of white feathers lying close by. I glanced up at the cow, placidly grazing, then at the pig, snorting and tootling in its sty.
‘You may count yourself very fortunate, Mistress Harbourne,’ I said, ‘that only the hen was taken. They must have stumbled upon your holding during the return journey, when time and their capacity to carry anything more was limited. Otherwise, you would have lost your other animals as well.’
‘They?’ Grizelda frowned. ‘Who are “they”, Master Chapman?’
‘Why, the outlaws who, I understand, have been terrorizing this district for some months past. Surely, living as you do in these parts, you can’t be ignorant of their depredations?’
She turned very pale and raised one hand to her heart, as though to still its beating. Her eyes dilated.
‘The robbers, you mean? The idea had not occurred to me. I assumed it was some local thief – largely, I suppose, because there is no other damage apart from the theft of Félice. I know of these men, of course, but they slaughter cattle, root up whole plantations.’ She drew a long, shuddering breath. ‘They even do murder. But none of that has happened here. Only my poor little hen has been stolen. Why should you think them responsible for the theft?’
Briefly, I told her of my encounter with the outlaws earlier that morning. ‘And one of them was carrying a hen under his arm, her beak tied to keep her from squawking.’
Grizelda blinked back tears. ‘Will they kill her?’