[Roger the Chapman 03] - The Hanged Man (2 page)

A hand touched my shoulder and a high, clear, slightly childish voice called, 'Mother! Over here! I think this young man is sick.'

Wooden pattens clattered across the cobbles and a maturer voice asked, 'What's the matter, Lillis? What are you saying? It will be dark soon and we haven't any time to waste.' Then there was an exclamation of concern and dismay. Another hand, larger than the first, gripped my shoulder. 'What is it lad? Are you ill?'

I nodded, unable to speak. I could feel my knees begin to buckle and I held on desperately to my column of the High Cross in an effort to remain upright.

The second voice continued, 'Where do you live?' But the first woman, address as Lillis, must have noticed my pack.

'He's a chapman, Mother. He's probably just passing through.'

I nodded my head, foolishly opening my eyes as I did so. The world somersaulted and I was promptly sick, heaving up what little food I had eaten in the past few hours on the roadway. With a sigh, I subsided in an ungainly heap.

The older woman was giving instructions to her daughter and, at the same time, shooing back the little crowd of onlookers which had gathered to find out what was going on. Any diversion was welcome on a miserable late afternoon in winter.

'Run back across the bridge, Lillis, and fetch some of the men to help carry him home. He can't be left like this, poor lad. He's in a fever. You and I must care for him until he's better. And what are you lot gawping at? Stand clear and give him room. How can he breathe with you fools bending over him?' There was an uneasy muttering in which I caught the word 'plague'. My benefactress gave a snort of derision. 'At this time of year? There's nothing wrong with him but a rheum which has become feverish with neglect and too much sleeping rough. I've met big, strong lads like this one before. They all think themselves Samsons and take no heed of their bodies' needs until those same bodies rebel. With good nursing he'll be as good as new in a couple of weeks.' Their worst fears allayed, most of the onlookers seemed to disperse. I dared not open my eyes again to check, but I heard the shuffle of their departure and felt, rather than saw, the open space around me. But someone must have remained, for a man's gruff tones objected, 'You want to take heed of yourself, Margaret Walker, two women living alone as you and Lillis do, before taking a strange man into your home. A chapman! He could cut your throats and be off with your purse one of these nights, while you're both sleeping.'

'If we're dead, we won't be sleeping, you silly old man!' was the acid retort. 'Don't you think I've lived long enough in this world, Nick Brimble, to know an honest face when I see one?'

There was a grunt which could have indicated either agreement or scepticism: I had no means of telling with my eyes fast shut. But after a moment, the man called Brimble warned, 'I'm only thinking of you and Lillis. You've had more than your fair share of misfortune these past ten months.'

Margaret Walker, taking no thought for the dirt on the cobbles, had knelt down beside me and was gently pillowing my head on her breast, supporting my sagging body with her slender frame. From her voice, I had imagined her - insofar as I was capable of imagining anything at that moment - as a woman of ample proportions, and I was vaguely surprised at the narrowness of her bony shoulder.

Her head, which she had bent towards me, reared indignant at the man's words. 'These last ten months! You have a short memory, Nick Brimble! And me a widow for seventeen years come May! A good man and a young son lost in an accident that should never have happened!' 'The will of God,' Nick Brimble murmured piously.

'The fault of a drunken carter who was too sodden with drink to control his horse properly when the beast took fright and bolted!' Her voice was bitter with suppressed rage.

'The will of God all the same,' her friend stoutly maintained° 'But this last misfortune...' There was a pause and a sigh before he continued somberly, 'The Devil had a hand in that, whatever the truth of it, and I doubt if we'll ever know that now. Your father was the only one who could have umravelled the mystery, and he's taken his secret to the grave.'

Before the woman had time to answer, there was a call of 'Mother!' and once again the clatter of pattens on cobbles. A sudden flurry of skirts told me that the girl Lillis had returned and, judging by the deeper male tones in her wake, had brought the required assistance with her.

‘How is he?'

'He'll do, but he'll be all the better for getting to bed with a hot brick at his feet and some decent blankets over him. 'You've brought a litter. Good. Nick, if you've nothing more important to do, lend Hob and Burl a hand and get the lad hoisted. He'll be a decent weight, I reckon.

‘Girl, you take his legs and Hob and Nick his head. That's right. That's got him.'

I felt myself lifted bodily and placed on the blanket slung between two poles, which had been laid near me on the ground. I ventured a quick upward glance between my lashes, but it was now almost completely dark, in addition to which that single effort had once more started me retching. My pack had been removed from my shoulders, and Lillis was instructed by her mother to bring it with her and to stop grumbling because it was heavy.

'You may deceive others with that fragile look of yours, my girl, but you don't fool me. You're as strong and wiry as a mule.'

Her daughter muttered rebelliously beneath her breath, but struggled obediently with the pack, which fortunately was none too full just at that present. As for me, I was too far gone to suffer any pangs of conscience. I had been rescued by two Good Samaritans, and that was all I knew or cared about. As we all set off down High Street, Hob and Bull each carrying one end of the litter, my long-suffering body jolted roughly from side to side as they made for 'home', wherever that was, I thankfully let my worries slide and gave myself up to the prospect of a warm bed and the ministrations of a pair of capable women. As we plunged into the dark canyon of Bristol Bridge, the houses and shops rearing up on either hand, I was once again violently sick before mercifully losing consciousness.

Chapter Two

During the next few days, I lay in that twilight state, half waking, half sleeping, between sanity and nightmare, when evil seems to gibber at the edges of the senses and has to be fought with might and main to be held at bay.

Only on three occasions before the fever finally abated did I have moments of conscious clarity.

The first time, I think, must have been briefly on the morning following my arrival, for just long enough to remember what had happened and to take in my surroundings. I had been undressed and was wearing a clean linen shift a size or so too small for me. The material was strained across my chest and had already split a little near the top of one of the sleeves. I was lying on a straw-filled mattress, covered with a couple of rough blankets which smelled sweetly of dried lavender, close to a central hearth. A fire of driftwood and sea coal, both doubtless scavenged for along the shores of the tidal River Avon, belched smoke through a hole in the roof of the cottage's single room. An adjustable pot-hook hung from the metal crossbar of a cooking crane, and from the hook was suspended a sizeable iron pot which made bubbling noises as well as giving forth the smell of a good broth; an aroma which at any other time would have made my mouth water, but then only made me heave.

I closed my eyes for a moment and did not open them again until my stomach had settled. This second glance informed me that a spinning-wheel stood near the only window whose shutters were open, allowing the pallid daylight of a January day to filter through the oiled parchment pane. The dim outline of a bed, large enough to a accommodate two people, could be seen at one end of the room, while a chest, a table, two stools, a wooden bench and a narrow cupboard were ranged around the walls. Recollecting the direction in which I had been carried in the litter, down the gentle slope of High Street and across Bristol Bridge, my previous experience of the city, nearly three years old now but still vividly remembered, told me that I was in the Redcliffe district where the weavers had their quarters, huddled in the lee of St Thomas's Church. There were rich dwellings here, as I recalled, but this was a weaver's cottage. Or had been, I guessed, when Mistress Walker's husband was alive; and it said much for the master that he had not turned her and her daughter out after the man's untimely death, although she was undoubtedly valuable as a spinner.

That was my last thought as I drifted once more into a semi-conscious state. The soft, low tones of women's voices, the rustle of their feet among the floor rushes, were only dimly heard; their gentle touch, as they washed mid fed me and attended to more intimate needs, only vaguely felt. I had retreated again into darkness and a world where I either burned or froze, but which was never free of demons.

The second time I came to myself, it was night. Rushlights burned in candle-holders set on table and chest.

Shadows flickered and curtseyed across the walls.

Margaret Walker was spinning by the light of a dying fire, while the girl Lillis sat and watched her. I realized with a shock that I had been moved to the comfort of the bed, and that the mattress I had lain on formerly was rolled up, together with the blankets, against one wall, and was, presumably, being used by the women. Had I been so ill that such a sacrifice was necessary? It must have been so, and indeed, when I made an attempt to move and call out, my limbs and voice refused to obey me. The most I could achieve was a feeble motion of one hand and a kind of mangled croak.

It was enough, however, to attract Lillis's attention and to bring her immediately to my side. 'He's awake, Mother,' she said, and the chatter of the spinning-wheel ceased.

Margaret Walker crossed the room in her deliberate, unhurried fashion, and smiled down at me. 'Don't try to talk,' she instructed, placing a soothing hand on my forehead. 'I expect you're thirsty. Lillis, fetch water and put some of that dried lettuce-juice powder in it. It'll make him sleep and that's what he needs just now. You've been very sick,' she added, confirming my own suspicions, 'and it will take a day or so yet before you're fit enough to be allowed out of bed.' She took the beaker handed to her by Lillis and held it to my lips. 'Get this down. It will do you good.' She propped up my shoulders while I drank, then lowered me back on to the pillows. 'Can you manage to tell me your name?' she asked. 'It's difficult not knowing what to call you.'

'Roger,' I whispered and closed my eyes. It worried me that I felt so weak, and that so little effort left me exhausted. I needed to get back on the road as soon as possible and to stop imposing on the charity of these good women.

Margaret seemed to read my thoughts. 'You're not to worry,' she admonished me. 'You must stay here until you are completely well. It's no hardship to us. In fact, it's a pleasure to me to have a man to look after again. I've missed the sense of purpose since my father died...' She broke off short, as though she had said more than she intended, and got up from her seat on the edge of the bed. 'There! Try to sleep now.'

She returned to her spinning-wheel, calling sharply to Lillis, who showed a tendency to linger at the bedside, smoothing my forehead with small, cold fingers. I smiled at the girl and let my eyelids droop, but continued watching her from beneath my lashes.

Lillis Walker was slight and very dark. Thin and plain, her huge brown eyes and coils of thick black hair were her two redeeming features. Her skin was sallow, her face elfin, and her body had the sharp angularity of a child's.

I still remember the surprise I felt when I learned that she was less than two years younger than myself, and was approaching her twentieth birthday. Her movements were quick and birdlike as she darted impulsively from one thing to another, her bright, inquiring gaze taking in everything around her. She had a strong Celtic strain, derived from her maternal grandmother, a Cornishwoman, and her father's people, who had originally come from Wales. All this, however, I learned much later, when I was up and about. That evening, as I lay and watched her as she returned reluctantly to her mother's side, I simply thought her a rather odd child.

The dried lettuce juice was starting to work its potent spell, lulling me once more into a troubled sleep, when there was a knock on the door which jerked me awake.

Both women stared silently for a moment, first at the door, then at each other.

'Don't answer,' breathed Lillis.

The tapping came again, soft but persistent. With a resigned sigh, Margaret rose to her feet and drew back the bolts and bar before opening the door a crack. From where I was lying, the aperture was just wide enough to help me make out a shadowy form and the gleam of a lantern, partially obscured by a drape of black cloth. Whoever stood outside was evidently at pains not to advertise his presence as he went about his business through the dark streets. This reticence might simply have been the result of its being after curfew, but somehow I did not think so. Obedience to the bell was no longer as strictly enforced as it had been once upon a time, any more than curfew's original purpose of damping down fires was nowadays regularly observed.

I caught a low, indistinguishable murmur, then Margaret's voice sounding firm and dear. 'No. I've already told you, I don't want you here. I made my message plain after my father died. You waste your time and mine. Please go.'

The caller, however, was not so easily put off. Further mutterings followed until his unwilling listener lost her patience. 'No! And again, no! You and your kind have no place in this house any longer. Remove your foot or I shall send my girl for the Watch.' Margaret glanced over her shoulder, 'Lillis!'