‘Do you think she has run away?’
‘Run away, sir? Why should my daughter run away? She was the apple of my eye. A good girl, Sir Hugh, with fine skin and lovely eyes, gentle as a baby fawn she was. Father Matthew’s best scholar, or that’s how he used to tease her. She had many friends.’
Mistress Feyner held the goblet in one hand and tapped her chest with the other. ‘I carried that girl for nine months. I would like to tell you, sir, that she ran away, that she is safe in some city or town, but a mother knows, sir, here, in the heart. Phillipa’s gone.’ Her voice broke. ‘If only I could have her body back for burial, sir.’
‘What do you suspect happened?’
‘Killed, like the rest,’ came the tired reply. ‘The forest is full of swamps, marshes and morasses, but I would like her back, just to hold her one more time.’
Corbett opened his purse and drew out three silver coins. ‘Here,’ he urged, ‘take them for yourself and for a Mass offering.’
Mistress Feyner nodded softly.
‘Now, the morning Rebecca’s corpse was found?’
Mistress Feyner lowered her head, a formidable woman, determined not to let this man see her cry.
‘I apologise for my questions, Mistress,’ Corbett pulled his chair a little closer, ‘but the people of this castle want justice.’
‘Alusia and Rebecca planned to visit Marion’s grave. They wished to place greenery on it, they wanted a lift on the cart. Alusia arrived but Rebecca never did. I had to leave. I stopped outside the cemetery, on the trackway. Alusia climbed down, I continued. You see, sir, Master Reginald has a fierce temper and a sharp tongue. The linen from the tavern is brought to the castle to be washed and cleaned. Master Reginald pays well, he buys supplies from Sir Edmund and often sells goods to our Constable. There’s a good understanding between Corfe and Master Reginald. However, when the taverner wants his clean washing, he wants it immediately.’
‘Mistress?’
She looked at Ranulf. Corbett she liked, felt comfortable with, with his soft dark eyes and smiling mouth, a man who could speak in honeyed tones, but this one, with the hair the colour of the devil and eyes like the castle cat, she would have to be wary of. ‘Yes, sir?’
‘You went along the trackway that winds past the church. It was there that Rebecca’s body was found. Did you see anything?’
‘Well of course not, though her corpse may have been there. You must remember the snow was falling. I kept my eyes on the horse and the trackway ahead. Bitter cold it was. Alusia said the same, huddled in her cloak sitting beside me.’
‘So,’ Ranulf put his quill down, ‘Rebecca might have gone to the cemetery beforehand and met her killer?’
‘But why didn’t she wait for me? What I think happened,’ Mistress Feyner drank from the cup, ‘is that she must have left the castle after me and met her death.’ She glanced at Corbett. ‘I can tell you no more, sir. People blame the outlaws, but I do not.’ She drained her goblet and got to her feet. ‘I thank you for the money.’
‘Mistress Feyner?’ She lifted the latch and turned round. ‘If I put you on oath, if I formed a jury and asked you under the law to name a suspect . . .’ The laundrywoman dropped the latch and came back.
‘Why, sir, would you do that? If you did, you could not summons me; my daughter is one of the victims, I’m certain of that. But I shall tell you something, sir, and I think of it every time I visit that tavern. Mine host is a former soldier. Many of the girls have worked in his tap room, and Master Reginald, well, his hands and his lips are always hungry. My Phillipa served there as a slattern in the kitchen. She called him as lecherous and hot as a sparrow.’
‘But he is not of the castle.’
‘Oh yes he is, Sir Hugh. He often brings his cart here; his purse is always jingling and his eye always bright.’
‘But none of the girls were ravished?’
Mistress Feyner returned to the door. ‘Ask amongst the girls, Sir Hugh. Master Reginald, how can I put it, may be a cock in a small barnyard, but he’s a gelded one.’
‘You are repeating rumour,’ Ranulf mused.
‘No, sir, whoever you are.’ Mistress Feyner grinned over her shoulder. ‘Master Reginald has tried to finger my bodice and got nothing for his pains. He’s tumbled others; the soil has been fresh but the plough has been weak. Master Reginald secretly knows that, for all his crowing, he’s mocked by the very ones he pursues. You should go down to the tavern, Sir Hugh, and ask your questions. He does business with Horehound.’
‘Horehound?’
‘Oh, he and his coven take the name of herbs and plants, but they are not as fierce as they sound. Petty thieves and poachers,’ she sighed, ‘men and women trapped between the castle and the forest. So, if that’s all?’ and not waiting for an answer, she opened the door and left.
Corbett began to put on his riding boots.
‘Oh no,’ Ranulf groaned. ‘Are we going hunting, Master?’
‘Let’s eat.’ Corbett got to his feet, strapping on his war belt. ‘We’ll visit the tavern and taste Master Reginald’s cooking, then we’ll visit the church. I understand Father Matthew celebrates Mass late in the day.’
Ranulf and Chanson prepared hastily, and booted and spurred, they collected their horses from the stable. The snow had stopped falling but lay ankle deep. Corbett carefully led his horse across the slush-strewn cobbles, then mounted.
‘Sir Hugh?’ Corbett turned in the saddle. Bolingbroke hastened down the steps from the Hall of the Angels and, cloak flying, came running across. ‘Do you wish me to accompany you?’ The clerk pushed back his thinning hair and wiped the drops from his face. ‘I’m wasting my time here. Sanson and I are comparing the manuscripts. They are the same, but as for their meaning . . .’
Corbett leaned down and patted Bolingbroke on the arm.
‘No, no, stay here and watch what happens.’
They crossed the outer bailey, silent under its carpet of snow. Most of the garrison had now withdrawn indoors. They clattered across the drawbridge, the smells of the castle fading as they reached the trackway leading down to the fringe of trees. It was a bitterly cold landscape, the sky iron-grey and lowering, and beneath it only two colours, black and white. The trees and bushes, stripped of their leaves, made a sharp contrast to the silent whiteness around them. Corbett was glad of his heavy cloak and warm gauntlets. He guided his horse carefully along the trackway whilst above them two crows disturbed from their tree cawed noisily. He could tell from the track that few had left the castle. Here and there he could see the prints of birds and animals. A splash of blood and a few pathetic feathers showed where an animal had gorged on warm flesh in this icy wilderness.
Slumped in his saddle, Corbett reflected on the various problems facing him. He was so absorbed, he started with surprise as Ranulf called to him that they were approaching the Tavern in the Forest. They entered by the main gateway, an arrowshot from the trackway. The inn was a two-storey wooden-plaster building on a red stone base; it boasted a tiled roof and a small stack for the smoke to pour out. The yard was empty apart from two ostlers, one breaking the ice in the water trough whilst the other swept manure into a pile in the corner. The reek of horses mingled sharply with the sweetness from the nearby bakehouse and kitchen.
Corbett, throwing back his cloak, walked into the tap room. Ranulf followed, noticing the various doors and windows, just in case they had to leave more quickly than intended. It was a comfortable room with clean, whitewashed walls, and a black-beamed ceiling from which small sacks of vegetables and rolls of smoked meat hung to dry in the heat, well away from the rats and mice. A brazier stood in each corner, a large one in the centre. At the top of the communal table a fire glowed in the hearth built into the outside wall. At one end, near the kitchen, were a range of vats and barrels, and from the kitchen Corbett could hear the clatter of pans and pots, the shouts and cries of slatterns and servants. A few villagers were seated around the table; they looked up as Corbett entered and huddled closer to discuss the newcomers. In the far corner, grouped around a brazier, were five men, their dress almost hidden by cloaks and cowls. They too turned. Corbett glimpsed swarthy faces, black beards and moustaches.