12 - Nine Men Dancing (16 page)

Hercules roused himself, staggered to his feet and placed his front paws on my knees. He had had enough of all this idle chatter. He wanted to get on.

I stroked his head. ‘In a minute, boy.’ I turned back to Alice. ‘When was it generally known that Eris had jilted Tom in favour of his father? When did news of her disappearance reach the village?’

Alice pursed her lips. A few remaining flakes of white lead dislodged themselves and crumbled.

‘
I
knew about Eris and old Nathaniel when Tom arrived here just after midnight. He told me all about it. And a terrible state he was in, as I mentioned to you yesterday. But I don’t suppose the rest of the village knew anything until the next morning, when Ned came down to enlist the men’s help in looking for Eris. Then they learned the whole story. Of course, Tom and I knew nothing of that until we’d dressed and breakfasted. I went as far as the mill with him, when he left here, in order to get some bread. That was when Goody Miller, Lambert’s mother, told us what was going on. Lambert wasn’t there. He was off, with the rest, searching for Eris.’

‘And Tom?’

‘He went to help, naturally.’

‘Did it strike you that he wasn’t surprised by the news that Eris had vanished?’

Alice shook her head decidedly. ‘No. I’d say he was stunned by the news. He turned so white I thought he was going to faint. Later on in the day, when they still hadn’t found her, I went to help look, as well. I’d say that Ned was more composed than his brother.’

But then, I thought, Ned Rawbone had less reason to be discomposed than Tom. He hadn’t liked Eris Lilywhite and, deep down, probably secretly hoped that they’d seen the last of her. I supposed he might have been afraid that Tom had murdered her in a fit of rage. But from the little I knew and had been told of the Rawbones, I guessed them to be quite capable of closing ranks, whatever their internal quarrels, and covering up even so dire a crime as murder.

I pulled myself up short. I was making an assumption that Tom was the killer. That, indeed, there
was
a killer.

I asked Alice, ‘Do you think that Eris Lilywhite ran away?’

She shook her head vigorously, so that her carroty-coloured mop of hair flew in all directions.

‘Why should she?’

‘Conscience? Guilt at the mayhem she had caused?’

Alice screeched with laughter. Hercules hurriedly lay down again, hiding his head between his paws.

‘No, dear! Not a chance! Eris’s beauty of soul never matched her beauty of face. I doubt if she knew what a twinge of conscience was. Strange, really. Gilbert Lilywhite was a sweet-natured man, for all he was a foreigner from Gloucester. And Maud, well, I’ve never known her play a dirty trick on anyone. Yet, between them, they produced a monster like Eris. No, you can take it from me, she didn’t disappear of her own free will. But who killed her, and where the body’s hidden, is a different matter. I wouldn’t care to speculate.’

It was the same answer that I got from everyone. I rose to my feet. It was time I was on my way.

I walked back along the village street, encountering one or two curious glances, and several disapproving looks from people who either knew or guessed where I had been. Others, busy about their daily business, ignored me. A few hailed me in a friendly fashion, but with that element of reserve in their greeting that reminded me I was a stranger in their midst, and therefore to be treated with caution. I smiled at them all, but did not stop until I reached the priest’s house, just beyond Saint Walburga’s Church.

The main door stood hospitably open, and I entered without knocking. I found myself once again in the hall, with the staircase to my left and three doors to my right, the first two separated by a small stone hearth, empty except for a couple of logs, gathering dust.

I raised my voice and called, ‘Sir Anselm!’

An answering shout invited me into the kitchen. This, if I remembered correctly, was the third door along. Hercules, however, had already preceded me, recalling where he had been fed and watered the previous afternoon and hoping for similar largesse today. I followed him.

The priest was standing by the table, in the centre of the rush-strewn floor, washing the silver chalice that had held the wine for the morning’s service. Seated opposite him, keeping his balance on a rickety stool, was Ned Rawbone.

‘Come in, chapman! Come in!’ Father Anselm beckoned with a dripping hand, describing, as he did so, an arc of rainbow-hued droplets that hung momentarily in the air, and then were gone. ‘Do you know Edward Rawbone? From Dragonswick Farm?’

I leaned on my cudgel and nodded towards my fellow visitor.

‘I saw Master Rawbone in church yesterday morning, and again, later in the day, at the farmhouse, when I was there at the request of Dame Jacquetta. But so far, we haven’t spoken.’

Ned looked startled. I guess he would have said he didn’t know me: neither meeting had made any impression on him.

The priest continued, ‘Ned is the Warden of our Lamp Fund, particularly the Alms Light. He ensures that we have sufficient money for lamp oil from the sale of fleeces from two of the Dragonswick sheep, especially earmarked for the purpose … Now, there’s another stool around here, somewhere. Sit down and make yourself comfortable while I finish drying this bowl. Then I’ll find us something to eat. It must be nearly ten o’clock and dinnertime.’

I found the stool, tucked away beside a pile of brushwood, and did as I was bidden, ignoring Hercules’s reproachful stare. He had expected to be fed at once. I dropped my cudgel on the floor, rested my elbows on the table and smiled at Ned Rawbone.

There was no answering smile, only a suspicious glance from those extremely blue eyes, so like his father’s. He had removed his hood, and now put up a hand to subdue his unruly thatch of hair. I noticed several streaks of grey amongst the brown. A handsome man, as I remarked earlier, in a weather-beaten way. (But what else should I have expected from a man who spent most of his life out of doors? I must be weather-beaten myself, when I stopped to think about it.)

‘Are you the pedlar who’s been asking questions about Eris Lilywhite?’ he demanded bluntly, just as I had decided that I must break the silence, and had opened my mouth to speak.

‘Er, yes,’ I admitted.

‘Why?’

‘W-why?’ My tongue stumbled a little, as I was caught off guard.

‘Yes. Why? What’s she to you?’

I took a deep breath and steadied my voice. I would not be browbeaten.

‘Dame Theresa Lilywhite has requested me to find out, if I can, what has become of her granddaughter.’

Ned Rawbone muttered something under his breath that I was unable to catch, then asked, ‘And has anyone talked to you on the subject?’ He cocked a suspicious eye at the priest.

Sir Anselm suddenly looked very hot, but it could simply have been the exertion of giving the chalice a final, vigorous rub.

‘Your aunt, Dame Jacquetta, was most voluble on the subject,’ I answered, with a certain amount of malicious satisfaction.

‘Oh, she would be!’ Ned exclaimed, flushing angrily. ‘I might have guessed it! She’d never be able to resist
you
.’

I ignored the jibe. ‘Why don’t you give me your account of what happened on the night of the storm?’ I suggested.

For reply, he put a question of his own. ‘What does Maud Lilywhite have to say on the subject of your interference?’

It would have been easy to resent the word ‘interference’, but it seemed as pointless as lying.

‘I don’t think she wants me to discover the truth,’ I confessed. ‘As long as she remains in ignorance of Eris’s fate, she can imagine that her daughter is still alive.’

Ned Rawbone nodded. ‘Exactly! Then why don’t you respect her wishes? Maud’s the person most closely concerned, after all.’

‘I hate a mystery,’ I told him frankly. ‘And I hate even more the notion that there’s a murderer walking around free somewhere. A man who’s robbed a young girl of her life.’

‘Why a man?’ he wanted to know. He had absent-mindedly taken the silver chalice between his hands and was twisting it round and around. The priest had gone outside to empty the basin of water and to hang his washing-cloth on a bush to dry. ‘Why not a woman?’

I glanced sharply at Ned, but his gaze was concentrated on the bowl, following the rotating pattern of leaves and figures. I watched it with him for a moment or two.

‘You think a woman might have killed Eris Lilywhite?’ I prompted at last.

He shrugged. ‘
If
Eris was murdered – and I emphasize that “if” – then why not? Rosamund Bush and her mother, Dame Winifred, are both known to have uncertain tempers.’

I put out a hand and gripped the rim of the chalice to prevent it revolving further: the movement was making me dizzy. Sir Anselm reappeared and, having put away his basin and polishing rags, carried off the cup to the church, presumably to lock it in the aumbry.

‘Do you think it possible, or even likely,’ I asked Ned Rawbone scathingly, ‘that either Mistress Bush or her daughter would have been out of doors, running around the countryside on such a night? I understand there was a terrible storm.’

Ned got to his feet. ‘How do I know? How can anyone know what happened, apart from Eris and her killer? If there was a killer.’

‘You can’t believe that she simply ran away!’

He turned on me, almost savagely.

‘Why not? Anyone who was responsible for so much wickedness and deceit might well have been shamed into removing herself elsewhere.’

I asked levelly, ‘Do you really believe that Eris Lilywhite ran away?’

‘What I believe in is keeping my thoughts and opinions to myself,’ he responded angrily, pushing past me and almost knocking me off my stool. The priest had again returned to the kitchen and was regarding us both anxiously, aware of raised voices and the heightened tension between us. The farmer clapped him on the shoulder. ‘I’ll call in sometime this evening, Father, and let you have the money for the lamp oil. You say Henry Carter is travelling to Gloucester tomorrow? He can purchase however much you need and bring it back with him.’

‘You mustn’t mind his brusqueness,’ the priest consoled me when Ned had gone, banging the outer door behind him. (Not that I was in need of consolation. I was reconciled to rubbing people up the wrong way.) ‘It’s possible that he’s secretly afraid that Tom’s guilty and doesn’t want you – or anybody else, for that matter – turning up evidence that might seem to confirm it.’

He bustled about, setting a pot of fish stew over his meagre fire to heat, cutting up the heel of a coarse barley loaf and bringing out of a cupboard a piece of mouldy goat’s milk cheese. Obviously, unlike many of his kind, he had never mastered the art of good living. (On reflection, I felt thankful that he had not invited me to stay to supper the previous evening.)

I said little until the meal, such as it was, had been set before us on the table. The priest put a third bowl of stew on the floor for Hercules, who seemed to have no difficulty with the fact that the broth was not only lukewarm and extremely greasy, but also full of lumps of dried cod that were as tough as leather. (A very dry cod indeed was my guess, and only partially soaked before it was cooked.) In fact, having wolfed down one lot, Hercules sat up and begged for more.

‘I like a dog with a healthy appetite,’ Sir Anselm observed, ladling a second helping into Hercules’s bowl from the pot, which had now been removed from the fire. (The stew looked even more unappetizing than it had before.) I stirred my own portion and tried to appear as though I were enjoying it.

‘So,’ I said at last, ‘what do
you
think is the answer to Eris Lilywhite’s disappearance, Father?’

‘My son, your guess is as good as mine, or as anyone else’s in this village.’ He rose from his stool and went to draw two cups of surprisingly tasty ale from a barrel in the corner, then returned to the table and resumed eating, all without once meeting my gaze.

‘You must have some theory,’ I persisted, but he only shook his head, still without looking at me. Finally, however, reluctantly, he did raise his eyes to mine.

‘Chapman, my earnest advice to you is to leave matters well alone. The girl has gone and the village is a better place without her. That, you may think, is not a very charitable thing to say, but I can assure you it’s the truth. From the time she first began to realize that she had the sort of beauty men run mad for, Eris was trouble, playing off one young fellow against the other. No one can say for certain that she’s dead; that she’s been murdered. If there was proof, it might be different. It
would
be different. The murderer would have to be brought to justice. But as things are, there’s nothing anyone can do about it. A Sheriff’s Officer came from Gloucester shortly after Eris was reported missing to make enquiries; but although he was naturally very suspicious of Tom Rawbone, without witnesses or a body, no arrest could be made.’

‘If Eris has run away, where might she have gone?’ I asked.

Sir Anselm scratched his head. ‘There’s her great-aunt, who lives in Gloucester. But as Theresa Lilywhite was staying with her sister when Eris vanished, it’s reasonable to suppose that the girl didn’t go there. Moreover, subsequent investigations at the great-aunt’s house proved fruitless. There are also, I understand, some distant Haycombe cousins who live near Dursley, but they are almost total strangers even to Maud. She was adamant that the girl would never have thought of them. Although, once again, I believe someone did pay them a visit, just to check, but she hadn’t been near them.’ The priest picked a sliver of fish from between his teeth and regarded it thoughtfully for a moment or two before swallowing it. ‘But it’s perfectly possible,’ he went on, ‘that Eris just ran away, not
to
anyone in particular, but simply to seek her fortune. To make a new life for herself. Even as we speak, she could be working as a cook-maid in the kitchens of someone’s hall or castle. Or as companion to some lonely old lady.’ Sir Anselm paused, presumably to consider this charming picture. Then his eyes met mine once more, and he sighed heavily as though acknowledging my right to be sceptical.