‘But that’s not a lie, is it?’ Corbett asked.
He swore as a dog came yapping at his horse’s hoofs.
‘No, it’s not.’ Sir Maurice gathered the reins in his hand. ‘Oh, never mind. Let’s go on, the light is fading.’
They went down a narrow lane, out along the back streets, past the garden plots, piggeries and outside stables of the cottagers’ houses. They turned right up a cobbled track and reached the crossroads, a slight rise providing a good view of the surrounding countryside. A little of this was plough land but most of it meadows, dotted with sheep. Small copses and lines of hedgerow broke the greenery. To Corbett’s left, the beginning of a great forest which stretched north. He shaded his eyes and caught a glimpse of the river Swaile.
‘Prosperous land,’ he murmured. ‘Well cleared and watered. It makes me homesick.’
He wondered what Maeve was doing at their Manor of Leighton. Would she be in the kitchen doing business with the steward and bailiffs, checking their accounts, planning what they were doing tomorrow? Eleanor would be tottering around whilst Uncle Morgan would be leaning over the crib-cradle tickling Baby Edward. Or, if Maeve wasn’t looking, trying to pick him up and play with him once again.
‘I hate this place!’
Corbett started. Sir Maurice had moved ahead and was staring up at the great gallows post, its three stark branches black against the evening sky. Corbett had studied a map of Melford. Of course, this was the spot where Sir Roger had been executed. The scaffold was immense, its main post sunk deep into the earth and strengthened by mortar. Sir Louis was also staring up, as if fascinated by the sharp hooks at the edge of each outstretched beam. Sir Maurice crossed himself and sat for a while, head bowed. The cold breeze caught their cloaks, tugging at their hoods.
‘It was here?’ Corbett asked. ‘Were you present?’
‘No, he wasn’t,’ Tressilyian whispered back. ‘He was only a lad. His servants kept him at the manor, Thockton Hall.’
Corbett was about to continue his questioning when Sir Maurice cursed and jumped down from his horse. He walked over to the scaffold. Corbett glimpsed a piece of parchment fluttering on a nail just above the base of the beam. Sir Maurice snatched this off and brought it back.
‘It’s the same as on the gravestone,’ he murmured, handing it to Corbett.
The parchment was a greasy piece of old vellum: in the fading light Corbett made out the red scrawclass="underline" ‘REMEMBER!’
‘Someone has been busy. Sir Maurice, may I keep this?’
His companion nodded. Corbett folded the scrap of paper and slipped it into his wallet. The clerk stared around. The crossroads and the surrounding fields were not so pleasant now. The breeze was cold, the sky more grey and threatening, the misty haze like a shifting gauze veil. A feeling of dread, of quiet menace pervaded. The lives of many in Melford had been blighted. The secrets they nursed, hidden sins, could surface and manifest themselves in brutal and bloody death, especially on an evening such as this.
At Tressilyian’s insistence they rode on, Chapeleys slightly ahead of the others. Corbett considered drawing Tressilyian into conversation about the trial but decided that this was not the time nor place. The justice himself seemed to be in a dark mood, keeping his head down, chin tucked into his cloak, cowl pulled across his face. Corbett realised that Tressilyian must also be alarmed, seriously concerned that he had condemned and supervised the execution of an innocent man. The silence grew oppressive. Corbett could understand why Ranulf, a creature of the alleyways and streets of London, felt fearful in the countryside, especially in this quiet time before dusk as if the creatures of the night were waiting for darkness to fall. The path they had taken was nothing more than a broad, rutted trackway, ditches on either side and high, prickly hedgerows. Every so often this line would be broken by a gate or stile.
Corbett reined in, forcing the other two to stop. ‘I am a stranger,’ he reminded them. ‘I am trying to get my bearings. This is Falmer Lane?’
‘Yes.’
‘And the village of Melford lies — ’ Corbett gestured with his hand — ‘to the south? The church stands at one end. We have streets and thoroughfares, the marketplace in the centre, then it curves slightly out into the countryside?’
‘You are not such a stranger,’ Tressilyian replied. ‘But yes, that’s a good way of describing the town.’
‘So, there are many trackways and thoroughfares out?’
‘Yes, I told you. Melford has grown as prosperous, and as rambling, as the fleece on a sheep’s back.’
‘And Molkyn’s mill is at the church end of the town?’
‘That’s right. There’s the mill, Thorkle’s farm is nearby. In fact, it’s almost a small hamlet. There’s the mere, the millpond.’
‘And Goodwoman Walmer’s cottage?’
‘About a mile from the mill.’
‘And lanes and trackways aplenty?’ Corbett asked.
‘Oh, Sweet Lord, yes,’ Tressilyian laughed. ‘If you read the report of the trial, one witness actually described Melford as a rabbit warren. There are lanes and trackways out. You’ve seen the gates and stiles. Footpaths crisscross the meadows. God knows,’ he sighed, ‘as a justice I am always having to rule on what is trespass and what is not. You see, Corbett, the land round here has changed. Sheep, not corn, is the measure of a man’s wealth. So woods are cleared, hedgerows planted, fences and gates put up.’
‘If I catch your drift,’ Sir Maurice said, ‘an ideal place for murder, yes, Sir Hugh?’
‘Any place is ideal for murder,’ Corbett replied. ‘Ranulf dislikes the countryside. He claims it’s more dangerous than the alleyways of London. For once I agree with him. Once darkness falls, a man who knew his way around here could slip along the lanes and gullys and do what he wished. He’d be as well protected as he would in the dingy slums around Whitefriars or the maze of Southwark alleyways.’
‘I have seen both those places,’ Tressilyian replied. ‘I prefer Melford.’
They continued along the lane. The fields gave way to a copse of woods on either side. Corbett felt as if he was going down a hollow, darkened passageway. The lane rose, dipped, then rose again. Corbett identified Devil’s Oak before Tressilyian pointed it out: a great, squat tree once used as a boundary mark. The huge oak had been struck by lightning but its branches, now stripped of their leaves, still stretched up to the evening sky. Corbett dismounted. He looked across the fields to his left: a water meadow which ran down to the banks of the Swaile. Corbett glimpsed the tumbled ruins just near its bank.
‘What’s that?’ he asked.
‘Beauchamp Place,’ Chapeleys explained. ‘It was once a small manor house: piggeries, dovecotes, stables, but the man who built it was a fool. The land is waterlogged. After heavy rains it tends to flood. It’s been a ruin for about thirty years now. The last relic of the Beauchamps was a madcap old man, found drowned in one of the cellars. The townspeople still say it’s haunted.’ He pointed to the oak. ‘They say the same about this and poor Elizabeth’s ghost.’
Corbett stepped across the ditch. There was a gap in the hedgerow on either side of the oak. Corbett slipped through one of these.
‘Elizabeth’s corpse was found here?’
‘Yes,’ Chapeleys replied. ‘That’s what Blidscote said, to the right of the great oak tree, on the field side of the hedgerow.’
Corbett squatted down. The grass was cold, catching at the sweaty skin on his wrist. He brushed this aside and looked along the hard, gnarled branches of the hedge but could see nothing amiss. Feeling with his gloved hand, he searched the area carefully, digging with his fingers.
‘What are you looking for?’ Tressilyian asked.
Corbett got to his feet. Tressilyian was leaning against the oak tree, Chapeleys on the far side of the ditch. Corbett repressed the feeling of unease at the atmosphere of danger. He did not like Devil’s Oak. Here he was with two strangers in a place of brutal murder. He half wished Ranulf was with him.