12 - Nine Men Dancing (18 page)

As I downed a further draft of ale, trying unsuccessfully to banish the after-taste of Sir Anselm’s fish stew, I was forced to admit that, so far, I had no firm idea as to what had happened to Eris Lilywhite, except for an unshakeable belief that she had not run away. Yet there again, there was no evidence to support this conviction apart from the general agreement concerning her character, and an equally general belief that she would never have abandoned her plan to become mistress of Dragonswick Farm. Most of the people I had spoken to were persuaded, either openly or covertly, that she had been killed. And that Tom Rawbone was her murderer.

But there were others who had been out and about that night who had had similarly compelling reasons for wanting Eris dead. It was high time, therefore, that I questioned members of the Rawbone family besides Dame Jacquetta.

I fancy the priest was relieved when I decided it was time to take my leave, even if Hercules was not. (He had made a warm and cosy bed in the rushes beneath the table and was indignant at being disturbed.) Sir Anselm cheerfully waved us off, before returning inside and closing his door.

It was nearly noon, judging by the position of the weak and watery sun high above the rooftops. A keen wind, that had arisen while I was in the priest’s house, was blowing along the village street in a whirlpool of dust and scraps of food and household rubbish. Some shreds of rag wrapped themselves around my boots and had to be disentangled before I could proceed.

But proceed where? I could hardly call at Dragonswick Farm and demand to question its occupants, even presuming any of the men were at home. The women would be there, of course. Dame Jacquetta, Petronelle and Elvina Merryman were unlikely to be abroad in the cold of a February afternoon, but I had no excuse to return. Neither Ned’s wife nor the housekeeper had evinced any interest in buying from my pack, and the oldest of the three had already done so. Moreover, Jacquetta had told me all she knew – or, rather, all that she intended to tell me. (And a night’s reflection could well have convinced her that she had confided far too much in a stranger.)

A glance in the direction of the mill informed me that the water-wheel was turning, and even from where I was standing, I could hear the clatter of the millstones. Lambert Miller was evidently hard at work and therefore not pursuing his courtship of the Fair Rosamund. So I turned my feet towards the Roman Sandal.

There were very few villagers in the alehouse at that time of day, but neither was there any sign of my quarry, only her father, who was busy broaching a new cask of ale. All traces of the previous night’s game of Nine Men’s Morris had vanished, the floor being strewn with fresh rushes and the table and benches back in their accustomed places in the centre of the room.

I recognized one of the two men sitting at the end of the trestle furthest from the fire as Ned Rawbone, deep in conversation with the second man, whose more fashionably cut clothes suggested a city dweller. And indeed, as I passed them I heard Ned say, ‘Fourteen marks the sack, not a penny less. That’s the market price for best Cotswold wool. You won’t get it cheaper anywhere. That’s two weys or three hundred and sixty-four pounds to a sack. Standard weight.’

A buyer, I guessed, from either Gloucester or Bristol, checking up on what he would have to pay for wool come June and the sheep-shearing season. I didn’t doubt that Ned Rawbone would drive a hard bargain. I saw the man called Rob Pomphrey downing a lonely cup of ale in one corner, but there was no one else among the scatter of early afternoon drinkers whom I knew.

I approached William Bush, tapping him on the shoulder as he stooped over the cask and making him jump.

‘Oh, it’s you, chapman.’ He did not sound best pleased. ‘What do you want?’

‘I was hoping to have a word or two with Mistress Rosamund,’ I said.

‘She’s gone out.’ He bent once more to his task. ‘Someone came with a message for her while we were having our dinner. And it’s no good asking me where she’s gone.’ His tone grew peevish. ‘My womenfolk never tell me anything.’

I nodded sympathetically. I knew what he meant. I was familiar with the sudden silence that descended whenever I entered a room where my wife and former mother-in-law were talking, heads conspiratorially together, either planning my future for me or ‘protecting’ me from things they considered it would be better for me not to know. And I could imagine only too well what it would be like when my daughter was also of an age to deceive me – entirely for my own good, of course! (Fears, I may say, that over the years have proved depressingly well founded.)

‘You don’t know where she’s gone, then?’ I asked unnecessarily.

The landlord straightened up again with a painful jerk and pressed a hand to the small of his back.

‘I’ve just told you …’ he was beginning fretfully, but was interrupted by his wife, who had come into the alehouse without either of us noticing.

‘She’s gone to meet Tom Rawbone,’ Mistress Bush announced with a worried frown. ‘I had my suspicions when she refused to say who’d sent the message, so after dinner I made it my business to seek out young Billy Tyrrell, who brought it. Fortunately, the message was by word of mouth, so he knew what it said, as well as the name of the sender.’

‘And what did it say?’ William Bush and I demanded almost in unison.

Mistress Bush’s imposing bosom swelled to even ampler proportions.

‘Tom Rawbone asked Rosamund to meet him in Upper Brockhurst woods, by the Brothers’ Well as soon as she could. He would wait for her there until she came. He begged her not to fail him.’

‘And are you telling me she went?’ William Bush was incredulous. ‘But why? She hates him.’

Mistress Bush looked witheringly at her husband, or as witheringly as her fear and distress allowed.

‘Of course, she doesn’t hate him! She’s still madly in love with him, as anyone with two eyes can see. Well, any woman,’ she amended scornfully. ‘I sometimes think men can’t see what’s in front of their noses.’

‘But … But after the way he treated her?’ The landlord, poor, simple soul, was still struggling to make sense of it all. He shook his head sadly, uttering the time-worn cry, ‘I’ll never understand women!’

For the second time, my heart went out to him. Fellow feeling made me pat his shoulder.

‘Never mind that!’ Mistress Bush exclaimed impatiently. ‘You must go after her, William! I don’t know how long she’s been gone, but if you hurry you may be able to find her before any harm befalls her.’ She added furiously, as her husband stared stupidly at her, ‘For goodness’ sake, man! Tom Rawbone is most probably a murderer!’

There was the thump of feet as Ned got up and strode the length of the table, his handsome face suffused with blood. Nevertheless, when he spoke it was with restraint, something I guessed to be habitual with him.

‘I should prefer it, hostess, if you wouldn’t accuse my brother of a crime that we don’t even know has been committed. Mistress Rosamund will come to no harm with Tom. Forgive me, but I couldn’t avoid overhearing your conversation.’

Mistress Bush ignored him. ‘William!’ she cried, and there was now an edge of hysteria to her tone. ‘Go after Rosamund! Now! At once! She mustn’t be left alone with that man!’

‘Let me go,’ I offered. ‘My legs are longer than Master Bush’s. I don’t doubt,’ I added, turning placatingly towards Ned, ‘that Mistress Rosamund is perfectly safe with your brother, but in the circumstances, it might be as well to make certain.’

‘Yes, yes! You go ahead, chapman!’ William Bush urged. ‘I’ll follow. But you’ll go faster than I can.’

Ned Rawbone looked displeased. ‘I think you’re making a mistake. I suspect your daughter won’t thank you for your interference.’

I had little doubt that Ned was right. If this meeting proved to be nothing more sinister than a lovers’ tryst, the Fair Rosamund would react furiously to any interruption. But with the suspicion of murder still clinging like an invisible cloak about her former lover, I, for one, was not prepared to take any chances.

As I strode uphill with Hercules, now fully awake and ready for any adventure, trotting happily at my heels, I tried to calculate how long Rosamund had already been gone. William Bush had said that she received the message while they were at dinner. It was now past noon, so that would have been nearly two hours ago. However, the landlord had given no indication that his daughter had rushed away immediately, so I presumed Rosamund must have finished her meal first. Had she then given the message some thought before making up her mind to meet Tom, as he had requested? But even if that were so, she must still have been gone an hour at the very least. Probably longer. Why hadn’t I thought to quiz Winifred Bush more closely? Sometimes I acted too impulsively, was too lax with my enquiries. It’s a fault I’ve mentioned before, and one that’s dogged me all my life (even now when I’m old).

Not that the length of time Rosamund had been absent was really important. Injury and death can strike a person down in seconds, with help almost at hand. I could only pray that if any danger did threaten her, I should not be too late to prevent it.

I followed the course of the Draco, to the woods cresting the Upper Brockhurst ridge. I saw both Theresa and Maud in the distance, as I passed the Lilywhite smallholding, and, further up the slope, I could just make out Billy Tyrrell, minding his flock. But there was no other sign of life at Dragonswick Farm. To my right, the stream glinted silver in the winter sunshine, then disappeared from sight as I plunged beneath the grey, overhanging canopy of the trees. The desolate woodland had a certain fugitive loveliness all of its own, but I was too preoccupied with Rosamund’s fate to stop and appreciate it.

Just before turning towards the now familiar path leading to the remains of Upper Brockhurst Hall, I glanced back over my shoulder into the valley below. A frieze of goblin figures, heads down, bodies hunched against the driving wind, was immediately recognizable. Just beginning to ascend the pasture from the village were three men, the first of whom, striding purposefully ahead of the others, was undoubtedly Lambert Miller. The two behind, in dogged pursuit, had to be Ned Rawbone and William Bush.

I cursed. What, in God’s name, had possessed the landlord to enlist the help of the miller? He must be aware of Lambert’s feelings for his daughter and of the latter’s reaction to any attempt by Tom Rawbone to worm his way back into Rosamund’s affection. And if this were, indeed, the purpose of this meeting, then Tom stood a fair chance of receiving yet another beating at the hands of his pugnacious rival.

I called loudly and insistently, ‘Mistress Rosamund! Master Rawbone!’

There was no answering cry, only the echo of my voice among the trees and the dismal cawing of rooks.

They were not at the Brothers’ Well, the meeting place named in Tom’s message. But that meant nothing, I told myself. It was a cold day and they had probably decided to take a walk as a means of keeping warm. But in which direction had they gone? I stared around, while Hercules, sensing my uneasiness, ceased hunting for rabbits and came to sit at my feet, staring up at me with a puzzled look on his doggy features.

I shouted again. ‘Tom Rawbone! Mistress Rosamund!’ But still there was no reply.

Think, I ordered myself. They were hardly likely, in that weather, to have wandered into the long grasses and undergrowth that shrouded the ruins of Upper Brockhurst Hall: not unless, whispered that inexorable voice of doom at the back of my mind, Tom’s intentions had been malign. But I decided to ignore this suspicion: I must assume Tom’s innocence until it was proven otherwise. Therefore, the only way they were likely to have gone was along the overgrown track leading to the old, ruined village, the track I had accidentally stumbled across when I had lost my way the day before yesterday (a time that already seemed remote, so much had happened between then and now).

I moved forward along the path, and almost immediately found myself, yet again, thinking of those two men, dead for a hundred and thirty years, homeward bound in happy anticipation of seeing wives and children after a prolonged absence, only to meet Death, with his empty eye sockets and leering grin, barring their way. They haunted me, that pair, and I didn’t know why; except that, for some obscure reason, I felt them to have a connection with the disappearance of Eris Lilywhite. I accepted that the feeling was unfounded, but I was unable to shake it off. And in the eerie silence all around me, I was suddenly disorientated, seemingly transported back to another place and time, unsure of where or who I was …

‘Chapman! Fancy meeting you here!’

I was back in the present, as if pulled by an invisible thread, and saw Rosamund, walking towards me, picking her dainty way along the muddy and overgrown path. Behind her was Tom Rawbone. I breathed a sigh of relief.

‘Mistress!’ I said, but making no attempt to move aside as she approached. ‘Master Rawbone.’

Rosamund stopped in front of me. Her pretty face, framed by the hood of her grey woollen cloak, glowed from the bite of the wind and the coldness of the air – and possibly from some other reason, too. I couldn’t be certain, and there was nothing to be gleaned from Tom Rawbone’s expression; but to me, he didn’t have the hangdog look of a man who had been repulsed too severely.

‘Are you going to let us pass?’ Rosamund asked sweetly, but with just a touch of acerbity in her tone.

‘In a moment,’ I answered. ‘But you’d do well to listen to what I have to say, first.’

Her swain – if that’s indeed what he was – took a step forward to stand beside her.

‘Move aside, chapman. This is no concern of yours.’

I ignored him and addressed myself to Rosamund.

‘Mistress, your father and Lambert Miller are not far behind me. Your brother, also, Master Rawbone.’

‘How … How did they know where to find us?’ Rosamund stammered. ‘And who invited Lambert to poke his nose in?’

I explained the circumstances as briefly as possible (although without being able to account for the miller’s presence), aware that it could not be much longer before the three men caught up with us. I finished by looking pointedly at Tom’s bruised and battered face. ‘If you don’t want yet another beating, Master, you’ll take my advice and make a run for it while you can. Do you know of any other way down from this ridge?’