“So in that way he managed to get your knife, Harold. He used it to kill Alan Trevellyn. I don’t know how.”
“He came to the house and asked for wine. Maybe he told my husband that he had seen me with a man up in the woods? The servants were all terrified by my husband’s temper before he left to search for me. He was in a terrible rage.” it’s quite likely. Yes, he knew your husband well, as the partner of his father, so if Stephen saw Alan, Alan would probably have believed his story. And he could have promised to lead him to you, as well. It would not have taken much to drop back behind, and cut his throat as he stood in the trees. Then he covered the body with snow to hide it a little, and went back to see you two.“
“Why wasn’t he covered in blood this time?” asked Simon frowning.
“This murder was better planned. He knew that blood would cover the whole area after killing the old woman, so maybe he carried a fresh tunic with him, one that he only put on after leaving these two together. I don’t know, but he’s bright enough to manage that.”
“And then,” Simon finished, “he joined you, Harold, after your meeting with Angelina, and went home with you. It was his tracks and yours that we saw. Your feet, his horse.”
“Yes, he came back. He stayed with me a while, I think, but I hardly said anything to him. Angelina had confirmed that she would not leave her husband to live with me, not even if I could get us away, to over the sea. I felt that I had nothing to live for in Wefford any more. After he had gone, I packed and left. The rest, I think, you know.”
In the silence that followed, Margaret found it difficult to keep her eyes from the miserable figure of the farmer. He sat huddled, deep in thought, but none of the thoughts seemed to give him any joy. The woman was different, she could see. Angelina Trevellyn sat with a measuring gaze in her green eyes, and they were fixed intently upon Baldwin, who appeared to be unaware of her presence. The story of love and misery had struck him with its despair.
“Oh, don’t take her, Baldwin,” she found herself thinking with a shudder. To her surprise she found that the wish was so intense it struck her almost as a prayer. “She’s vicious, uncaring and grasping. Beware!”
As if he had somehow caught the drift of her thoughts, Harold Greencliff suddenly rose. Without a word, he swept from the room, his face downcast and his eyes avoiding meeting the gaze of any of the other people there. When she looked at her husband and the knight, Margaret saw the sympathy there, but the boy appeared not to have noticed as he slammed the door and stalked out into the open air.
After a moment, Baldwin stood and followed the boy.
Outside, the night was a grey curtain that hid the land around, and Greencliff was invisible in his dark tunic. But it was easy to find him from the sound of tortured sobbing that came from the side of the house. Baldwin stood undecided for a moment, not sure whether to go and interrupt the boy in his misery or not. He made up his mind. Steeling himself he strode on.
The boy was leaning against the log pile, eyes thrown upward at the star-filled sky, heaving great breaths and sobbing them out again in his despair and misery. He did not turn as the knight came up beside him, but continued his solitary skyward stare.
“What will you do, Harold?” asked Baldwin softly after a few minutes.
“Do? What can I do? What is there for me here? I’ve lost my only friends: my best friend is a murderer who tried to put all of the blame on to me; my woman, the one woman I thought wanted me as her husband, has made up her mind I’m not good enough for her! Not good enough to sweep her stables! What is there for me? What can I do, where can I go to find peace?”
Remembering Sarah Cottey and her spirited defence of him, Baldwin considered. He said slowly, “There are others who may be better friends or lovers, Harold.”
“There’s no one. I have no one. No friends, no family, nothing.” The tone was definite, the finality as certain as the slam of a tomb closing. In the face of it, Baldwin felt unequal to any further battle for the boy’s confidence. Turning, he stared away as he thought for a minute.
“Harold, if you need help, tell me. If you want to leave the area and go to Gascony like you said before, I’ll release you from your villeinage. But remember, you can only run from things you leave behind, not from things inside you. If you go but take the woman and your friend with you in your heart, you’ll never find peace. There must be another woman here that would be better for you, someone who can ease your life and…”
It was this that finally made the boy spin to face him. “Why? So you can take my woman? She’s told me that already, that you want her. It’s obvious why – a wealthy merchant’s widow and the wealthy knight – but don’t try to tell me it’s better for me when all you’re trying to do is look after yourself. Don’t try to tell me you’re trying to help me when what you’re doing is stealing my woman!”
Simon was sitting alone in the hall when the knight came back.
“How is he?”
Dropping into his chair, Baldwin gave him a grimace and puffed out his cheeks in a sigh. “There’s nothing I can say. He doesn’t trust me. I think if he stays for a week he’ll be here for ever, but if he goes far away I wouldn’t be too surprised. You never know, it might be best for him. It certainly did me good when I went abroad.”
There was a slight noise, and the door from the screens opened to show Angelina Trevellyn. She walked in as slowly and gravely as a nun and sat opposite the knight, her face showing a sad and compassionate concern. “How is he?” she asked softly, her voice low.
“I think,” Baldwin said, staring at her sceptically, “that you should find out for yourself, madam.”
“What do you mean?”
“He was your lover.”
Simon wriggled in his seat. He had no desire to be here for this. He glanced at the door in mute appeal, but no one entered, and he dared not interrupt them himself. Cringing back, he tried to make himself as small as possible.
“That was before,” she said calmly.
Baldwin spoke drily. “What, before you realised you were about to become a widow and could have your choice of the men – or should I say knights? – of the area, madam? Before you thought you could do better for yourself? Before you thought it would be pleasant to own a man with a title in preference to a mere merchant whom you had always feared and disliked?”
“That is hardly fair,” she said, giving a slightly nervous smile. Baldwin did not smile back.
“Isn’t it? I think it probably is. When did you decide on me? Was that some time ago too? Or was it a snap decision, like choosing to take a local farmer as your lover? It must have been funny until you got pregnant. That was the one thing that surprised me. Why were you so upset about being pregnant? Why should a married woman be so fearful that she is prepared to go to a woman reputed to be a witch to force the child to miscarry before her husband can find out?”
“I thought it would be wrong to bring up a child as his own when it might not be,” she said with a hint of defiance.
“I doubt that, I doubt it a great deal. I think it was because you knew that he could not have children. Oh, yes,” he carried on as her face coloured, “Walter de la Forte knew about that too. He told us. Tell me, though: when did you choose me? Was it when you saw my house here and realised how large my estates were? Or was it before, when you first saw me and thought I might be more enjoyable than a mere farmer?”
“I don’t have to listen to this!” she said, standing and glaring at him angrily, the light reflecting from her eyes in green glints of cold fury.
To Simon, it seemed that the knight stared at her for a moment as if trying to remember something, perhaps how he had felt when he had first seen her and been so enamoured of the beautiful green-eyed Gascon lady. “No,” he said softly, “you can go whenever you want, can’t you? Do whatever you want. You are wealthy now, and have money and lands. Well, go then. I wish you well.”