He was not going to find anywhere better so he unsaddled Horace, took off the horse’s bridle and, loosely holding a clump of the horse’s mane, led him over to the stream, waiting patiently till he had drunk his fill. Then he took a length of rope from his pack and fashioned a rough head collar, fastening the end of the rope to an alder a few paces away along the hedge. Horace, used to such treatment, waited until Josse signalled with a slap on the horse’s rump that he was finished, then ambled off and began grazing.
Josse unrolled his blankets and laid out the coarser one on the ground beneath the willow tree. The other one he would use to cover himself. Then, sitting down with his back to the tree’s broad trunk, he opened up the neatly tied cloth that contained his supper and began eagerly to eat.
Before he settled for the night he took a last stroll down to the creek. In the hour that had elapsed since he last looked at the water, the level had risen considerably. The water was flowing fast, still busily filling up the creek, and Josse reckoned it must be a few hours yet till high tide. Then there would be that still time before the tide turned and the creek began to empty once more.
Well, he would be asleep by then. Yawning, he turned and walked back to his camp, unbuckling his sword belt as he paced up the slope. It seemed a quiet enough spot but, all the same, he would sleep with his dagger to hand and his sword within easy reach. It did not do to be careless.
He lay under his blanket looking up at the stars. Then, yawning again, he stopped fighting the heaviness in his eyelids and, turning on to his side, was soon asleep.
He was awake and ready for the day by the time there were any signs of activity along the creek at Small Hythe. He had washed his face and hands in the cold water of the little stream, watered Horace and fed him from the supplies brought with him and eaten his own breakfast from the remains of last night’s supper. He was ready — or so he hoped — for whatever the day might bring.
He mounted Horace and rode the short distance back to where a group of three older men and a couple of lads had appeared and were standing on the bank staring at him, their mouths open. He wished them good day and the eldest of the men grunted something in reply. He wondered again what work they did in that out-of-the-way place but thought it best not to admit his ignorance by asking. Instead he said, ‘Can you tell me the way to Readingbrooke? I wish to speak to Sir Raelf.’
The grunting man, who seemed to be the group’s spokesman, said, ‘That I can, sir. You follow the north bank a ways, you cross the stream you’ll come to in a short while, then you’ll take a turn on to your left hand up into the higher ground. Now you’ll need to take care there a’cause it’s right steep in places, but it’s not near so dangerous now it’s summer and dry as in winter when it’s wet.’ He grinned, showing pink gums empty of teeth save one that had worked its way across to the middle of his upper jaw. ‘Now, you’re with me so far, sir?’
‘Aye,’ Josse replied.
‘Right, then.’ The man seemed to be momentarily stuck for inspiration but then, as if recalling where he had got to, he said brightly, ‘Then ’tis easy, for you follow the edge of the Hanging Wood till you find a track leading off to your right and, if you follow it right to its end, you’ll find yourself at Readingbrooke, can’t help it!’
Memorising the instructions, Josse nodded his thanks and, reaching into the soft leather purse on his belt, extracted a couple of coins and lobbed them to the man, who shot out a hand and deftly caught them.
‘Much obliged,’ the man said, touching the hand that was clenched around the coins to his forehead.
Josse wished the group good day and then, leaving them still staring at him, kicked Horace into a trot and rode away.
* * *
He reached Readingbrooke too soon, for he had still not worked out exactly what he was going to say to Galiena’s family. But breaking the news would become no easier for waiting so, without pausing for thought, he rode on into the courtyard that opened out before Raelf de Readingbrooke’s modest manor house and called out, ‘Halloa! Is anybody at home?’
A woman with a sacking apron over a nondescript dark brown gown came out of a building to his right. From the sounds that followed her out, it appeared that it was a dairy and that she had been in the middle of milking.
‘Yes?’ she said, looking up at him curiously. ‘What do you want?’
‘I wish to speak to Sir Raelf and his wife,’ Josse said.
‘Who are you?’ she asked.
‘Josse d’Acquin.’
She nodded. ‘You have the manor at New Winnowlands. You’re a King’s man, so they say.’
‘Aye,’ he said, to both statements.
‘The master and the mistress are in the solar,’ she said, ‘together with the girls. Wait here. I’ll tell them you wish to see them and I’ll send someone out to tend to your horse.’
‘Thank you.’
He slipped off Horace’s back and, a short time later, a lad of about thirteen came out and shyly took the big horse’s reins, leading him off into a shaded corner of the yard where there were tethering rings set in the wall and a large tub of water.
‘Give him a drink, if you would,’ Josse called after the lad, who nodded.
Then the woman was back and, beckoning to him, she led him up the steps and into the hall, which they crossed to reach another, narrower flight of stairs that circled up to a smaller room on a higher level. The room had wide windows facing south, whose leather hangings were at present fastened back, allowing the sunshine to stream in.
There was a long, narrow table placed in the middle of the room and along each side was a bench. At each end of the table were chairs, beautifully made of pale oak. In the larger chair sat a ruddy-faced, broad-shouldered man aged, Josse thought on first impression, about forty. In the other sat a woman, petite, brown-eyed, perhaps five or six years younger. On the benches sat their four daughters, two to a bench. All four girls were dark-haired like their father and had their mother’s round face and ready smile. They were aged, Josse guessed, from about sixteen down to a toddler of three or four. The woman and two of the girls were stitching at fine embroidery; the littlest child was being helped in a simpler piece of work by one of her sisters. The man appeared to be doing nothing except watch his women folk.
At Josse’s approach, the man got to his feet — he was quite short in stature — and said, ‘I am Raelf de Readingbrooke. We welcome you, Sir Josse d’Acquin, and wonder to what we should ascribe your visit?’
Oh, it was difficult! Turning from the courteously spoken Raelf to his smiling wife, Josse regretted more than ever the task he had to do. But do it he must; he had made a promise.
He said, ‘Sir Raelf, I am afraid that I bring bad news. Perhaps you and I should speak privately …?’
Hurrying forward and grabbing hold of Josse’s arm, Raelf said, ‘Bad news?’
‘It concerns your daughter Galiena,’ Josse murmured in his ear.
Raelf muttered something — it might have been, ‘Oh, dear God.’ Then he said, ‘Tell me. What has happened?’
‘She is dead,’ Josse whispered. ‘I am so sorry.’
‘Dead.’ The colour blanched from Raelf’s face. ‘Oh, but I cannot believe it. She is young, healthy! You are quite certain that it is she, my Galiena, who has died?’ His voice broke on the word.
‘Aye,’ Josse said. ‘I saw her with my own eyes.’ He pictured the beautiful face, grossly swollen and distorted in death.
Raelf coughed and cleared his throat. ‘How did this happen? How do you, Sir Josse, come to be the bearer of this ill news?’