‘I’ll be sleeping with Adela,’ I interrupted in a voice my nearest and dearest knew well and which meant that I would brook no argument (not that that ever stopped them). ‘And Hercules will sleep in our chamber. He gets upset in strange houses if he doesn’t know where I am, and barks all night.’
‘As you please.’ Clemency Godslove shrugged and I noticed for the first time that she was dressed from head to toe in unrelieved black. She was plainly in mourning. I glanced at Adela and noted that she, too, was wearing dark colours.
I switched my attention back to my hostess as she led us towards the house, and saw an elderly woman — I learned later that she was in her fifty-sixth year — short but with an upright carriage that made her appear taller than she really was. I doubted that she had ever been beautiful in the conventional sense of the word, but with her high cheekbones, aquiline nose and determined jaw she must always have been striking. Even now, with the lines of age seaming her cheeks and forehead, she would stand out in a crowd. Her best feature was her eyes, a dark blue, set beneath heavy black brows, now turning grey.
Adela, meanwhile, was demanding details of my journey, but seemed happy enough with the bare bones of my reply. Her mind was patently elsewhere, although she gripped my arm hard and every now and then squeezed it as if to reassure herself that I really was there. Nicholas and Elizabeth had raced ahead of us, the dog at their heels, the former intent on showing his playmate all the hidden corners and secret places of the overgrown garden, while, for once, Adam walked sedately at my side, plotting future mischief. (I recognized that particular expression of his and it boded no good for anyone.)
Clemency Godslove led us indoors, into a high-ceilinged hall which was obviously used as the principal room of the house. A large dining table stood in the centre of the stone-flagged floor with a number of chairs and stools surrounding it. To the right was a huge fireplace, with a carved stone overmantel, in which a whole ox could have been roasted, but which boasted only a very small fire of logs, some of which were too green to burn properly, a fact which doubtless contributed to the general chill of the place. At the far end of the hall, a wide staircase led to the upper rooms, while on either side, a couple of heavy oaken doors opened, presumably, into other groundfloor chambers. The rest of the furnishings consisted of a pair of settles, pulled up close to the hearth, two chests made of Spanish leather, several piles of cushions, some of them rubbed and worn, a display cabinet showing items of silver and pewter, various candlesticks and, finally, a candelabra of latten tin suspended from the middle of the ceiling. My first impression was of a family stretched to its financial limit, but I was to learn later that there was no shortage of money at the Arbour. The Godsloves were just naturally parsimonious.
‘Come to the fire and sit down,’ Adela urged me, guiding me towards one of the settles, at the same time relieving me of my cudgel and canvas sack ‘Are these yours and Elizabeth’s clothes?’ She turned to her cousin. ‘Clemency, my dear, do you think one of the maids could see them taken up to my bedchamber? I’ll sort them out later. And perhaps some ale for Roger?’ She patted my shoulder comfortingly. ‘It’s almost dinnertime. I expect you’re hungry.’
I suddenly realized that I was. Breakfast at the stall in Westminster seemed a long time ago.
Before I could reply, however, or Clemency could summon one of the maids to give her orders, a third female voice demanded querulously, ‘What are you talking about? What’s going on? Who’s this?’
I looked towards the stairs where, halfway down, a woman in a long linen nightshift was supporting herself by clinging to one of the handrails. Her feet were bare and her once dark, but now greying hair tumbled loosely about her shoulders. Her extreme pallor suggested that she had just risen from her sick bed.
Clemency and Adela both started towards her.
‘Sybilla, go back to your room at once,’ the former ordered, mounting the stairs to take the other woman’s arm. ‘You’re not fit to get up yet. You know Dr Jeavons told you that you must rest.’
‘Oh Roderick fusses too much,’ was the petulant answer. The newcomer shook off Clemency’s restraining hand and descended the rest of the stairs.
At close quarters it was easy to see that she and Clemency were sisters; the same blue eyes, the same high cheekbones and imposing noses. But as well as being slightly younger and less wrinkled, Sybilla’s features were less clearly defined. It was as though an artist had drawn a portrait of the older woman and then gently smudged the outline.
The outside door opened once more and a man came in, wearing a lawyer’s robes and a flat black velvet cap devoid of any ornament. Again, it was not difficult to trace a resemblance to the two women except that the newcomer was much younger. I judged him to be in his early forties and there was, as yet, very little grey in his dark hair; but his eyes were the same blue beneath the same thick black eyebrows and he had the beak-like nose of his sisters. He was perhaps an inch or so taller with the older woman’s upright bearing; and, as with Clemency, this made his height seem greater than it actually was.
‘There is a girl in the garden,’ he said in a high complaining tone, ‘running around and shouting and encouraging Nicholas to do the same.’ He turned to Adela. ‘Cousin, I told you that I had no objection to your remaining here as long as the children were quiet and well-behaved. Who is this hoyden and where has she come from?’
Seeing from my expression that I was about to come to Elizabeth’s defence in no uncertain terms, Adela interposed hurriedly, ‘I’m sorry, cousin. It’s my stepdaughter. She has just arrived and she and Nick are so pleased to see one another that I’m afraid they have let their high spirits get the better of them. I’ll go and speak to them.’
‘How has she arrived?’ the man demanded, barring Adela’s way.
‘What? Oh. . My husband brought her. Oswald, this is Roger. Roger, this is my cousin, Oswald Godslove.’
I made my bow, but not a very deep one. There was something about the lawyer to which I took an instant dislike. Something precise and old-womanish in his manner that irritated me and I felt no surprise that he was unmarried and still, in middle-age, living at home with his sisters, who no doubt petted and spoiled him. Indeed, Clemency was clucking with alarm that his homecoming had been disturbed by my noisy daughter and worrying that dinner had been delayed and was not already on the table. But her brother had finally noticed Sybilla and hastened forward to support her in his arms.
‘What is she doing out of bed?’ he asked angrily. ‘Someone should have been sent to watch her. She is not yet fit to be up, Adela!’
His tone was sharp and he looked over his shoulder evidently to admonish my wife, but fortunately she had gone to bring in the children from the garden. This was just as well, because if these cousins of hers were treating her as an unpaid servant they would soon get the rough side of my tongue. I was in any case beginning to feel uncomfortable and had decided that no reason Adela could adduce would persuade me to remain in this house. We would go this very afternoon to find Jack at the Boar’s Head in East Cheap and be back in Bristol within the week.
I said as much to Adela when she reappeared with a much chastened Nicholas and Elizabeth, who had obviously been severely taken to task for their unruly behaviour. We had the hall to ourselves, Oswald having supported Sybilla upstairs to bed and Clemency having vanished through one of the side doors, presumably to hurry along the arrival of dinner.
‘No, no, Roger!’ my wife exclaimed, clutching my arm. ‘We can’t do that. They are in such trouble and you are the very person to sort it out, to discover what is going on. I can’t desert them. They have been so good to me, allowing the boys and me to stay here. As for Oswald, his bark is worse than his bite, and so long as Bess and Nick restrain their natural exuberance now that they’re together again, we shall do very well. Adam has grown to be so good these last weeks, you’d hardly know him.’ Here, I exchanged glances with my younger child, who smirked at me and cast down his eyes, the picture of sainthood. I wasn’t fooled for a single instant. Adela went on, ‘It’s a pity you had to bring Hercules, though. None of them except Celia really cares for animals, so we must just try to keep him out of their way. I suppose Margaret wasn’t too happy about looking after him?’