“What fee, then, do you ask?”
“Some information. Is that reasonable enough?”
“Aye, if I got it.”
“If you do not, perhaps you can get it for me when I return tomorrow.”
“If I can. What you want t’know?”
“Perhaps we should go inside to talk. Here, I’ll help you stand.”
I assisted the woman to her feet. She leaned heavily on me as I helped her into the dim interior of her hut. She sat heavily on the first bench we came to. I went back for the other outside.
“The smith’s girl…Margaret. Had she other suitors than Thomas of Shilton?”
“Oh, la, she were always popular with the lads. But I don’t know as you could call all who gave her a look suitors.”
“What would you call them?”
“Pleasure seekers, maybe.”
“Were they likely to find it with Margaret?”
“Couldn’t say. Rumors ’bout town said maybe yes, maybe no. But folks didn’t gossip much ’bout Margaret ’cause they didn’t want to explain theirselves to her father, if you take my meanin’.”
“Then she was an attractive girl?”
“Oh, aye. A beauty. Could’ve had most any lad hereabouts, but she seemed set on Tom.”
“‘Seemed,’ you say?”
“Oh, she’d flirt with the lads some. You’ll not credit it now, but I were pert when I were a lass. I seen her with men a time or two, an’ I remember how it was.” Her eyes, once fixed on mine, wandered over my shoulder to the window. “A villein’s daughter has little to look forward to. So a little harmless dalliance wi’ the boys…it’s ’bout all she’s got.”
“Harmless?” I asked. “Is it always? Does dalliance sometimes lead to serious matters?”
“Aye, it does that.” She pursed her lips. “I could tell you stories…”
“Of Margaret?”
“Oh, no. I were thinkin’ of times long past, though there be folk hereabout younger’n me who’d remember well enough.”
“So Margaret’s flirting with other young men was not so serious as to lead them on, or cause Thomas to be jealous?”
“Well, I can’t say as what’d cause a lad to be jealous. Margaret was that pretty, I guess a fellow’d get anxious whenever she spoke to other lads.”
“You think Thomas of Shilton the jealous sort?” I asked.
“Can’t say. He don’t live in town, ’course. Seems a quiet lad. I probably heard him speak a time or two, but I couldn’t recognize his voice were he callin’ outside the door this moment. Not very helpful, eh? What you want to know all this for?”
“Lord Gilbert Talbot has charged me with finding Margaret’s killer.”
“Oh!” She sat up straight, eyes wide. “You think her Tom mighta done it, or one of t’others she’d trifle with?”
“I know not what to think,” I answered. “Perhaps you can help me. Can you find answers to my question by tomorrow, or should I wait another day or two?”
“I got friends who know what I don’t,” the woman smiled. “An’ I don’t wanna live with me toe a day longer than I got to. You come back tomorrow. I’ll have somethin’ for you, if there’s anythin’ to be knowed.”
“Don’t forget the wine.”
I intended to speak also to the smith that day. But I was of two minds. Should I interrogate a man, who two hours earlier had buried his daughter, about her friends and activities? Should I wait until the morrow, when my presence in the town would be bandied about? I’d ridden up and down the streets often enough that many saw me. A stranger in such a place is likely to create questions anyway, particularly one who seems to wander the streets aimlessly. The smith lived on the opposite bank of the river Windrush, but gossip would carry that far soon enough.
I turned Bruce north when I reached the High Street and crossed the bridge. As I approached the smith’s hut, I saw a wisp of smoke rise from his forge. Bereaved or not, a man must earn a living.
I heard the rhythmic pounding of his hammer before I dismounted. I had to speak his name twice before Alard laid down his hammer and turned to me.
“Oh. You have news? I must finish this hinge before it cools.” And he turned back to his work. A few more skilled blows, and the work was done.
“Now, then, you said as you’d tell me soon as you learned what befell my Margaret…” He left the phrase dangling, not as a question, but as an acknowledgment of either my competence or his faith.
“I did, but I do not know that yet. I am here to learn more of her, that I may solve this puzzle.”
“What good will that do? Know what you will of her…won’t tell who killed her,” he said with bitterness in his voice.
“It might. I think most who are murdered are done to death by someone they know, not some stranger or unknown thief on some deserted byway.”
Alard shrugged. “Then ask what you will.”
“Had Margaret any other suitors?”
“You mean more than Tom? Aye, she was one who caught men’s eyes. Like her mother.” He crossed himself.
“Any in particular?”
“None as had a chance with her. She’d set her cap for Tom Shilton.”
“Did the others know that?”
“Yer askin’ did she lead lads on, like?”
Alard was no fool. He saw the answers I sought before I asked the questions. “Yes, that’s what I wish to know.”
Alard looked down at the hammer dangling from his right hand. “We had words ’bout that. A few times.”
I thought, from his manner and tone, that Alard and his daughter might have visited the subject more than a few times. I said nothing, waiting for him to continue on his own.
“She liked the attention, y’see. ’Twas Tom she’d chosen. Most other lads hereabout knew it. Didn’t stop ’em as thought the matter weren’t settled.”
“Did Margaret give them reason to think ‘the matter weren’t settled’? Is that what you had words about?”
“Aye.” He hesitated. “Told her as it wasn’t right, leadin’ lads on. She’d laugh an’ say ’twas but a lark. I told her they might not see it that way.”
“Any young men in particular who thought they might have a chance with her?”
Alard paused and contemplated his hammer again. “’Bout all of ’em, I suppose. Maybe John, the miller’s boy,” he bent his head toward the mill, just in view upstream, “was most taken with her.”
“What kind of fellow is he?”
“Oh, he’ll do well. Inherit the mill with but a small fine to the Earl. His wife’ll not want for bread nor ale.”
Spoken like a true father. I asked again, phrasing my question differently. “What of his appearance? Tall? Short? Handsome? Ill-favored?”
“Oh…well, not so handsome. Short, stocky fellow. Some lasses might not care for his looks, but he’ll get more appealin’ to his wife as the years pass an’ the family grows an’ he provides.”
“Are there girls who are interested in him?”
“I suppose. I think Theobald’s daughter — he’s in trade, wool merchant — would have him.”
“Would have him, or wants him?”
Alard smiled thinly. “All right…wants him.”
“What did the merchant’s daughter think of Margaret?”
“They wasn’t close. Her bein’ of a different station. She didn’t much like it that the smithy’s daughter could dress plain an’ get more attention than her in fine clothes.”
I thought my next appointment should be with the miller’s son. I bid Alard farewell, took Bruce by the reins, and led him up the path along the river to the mill.
The creaking and grinding machinery drowned out my call, so I walked through the open door and found the miller at his work in the dusty interior. He peered through the haze at me, trying to place me among his circle of acquaintances. He held up a finger to indicate a brief delay, then resumed his work. When he finished he pushed past the sacks of flour recently ground and made his way to me.
“I am Hugh de Singleton, surgeon of Bampton. You know of the fate of Margaret, the smith’s girl?”
The miller motioned me to follow him out the door to the relative quiet of the yard. “Aye…woeful thing.”