Alys Clare - The Tavern in the Morning

‘You came back!’ he cried joyfully. ‘I’m so glad to see you! Shall we make a fire? Do you want to stay in my camp again?’

‘No, Ninian, but thank you for the offer.’ Josse bent down, taking both the boy’s hands in his. Trying to think of a way to ask what he desperately needed to ask without alarming the child, he said, with an attempt at a casual tone, ’Er — did your mother say it was all right to come to play out here today? I mean, it’s very cold and-’

‘Oh, she doesn’t know I’m out,’ the boy replied with innocent pride. ‘I waited till she ’d gone out, you see, then I sneaked out after her.’ A frown creased his smooth, high forehead. ‘She says I’ve got to stay inside the house but I hate it, there’s nothing to do and when she’s gone out, there isn’t even her to talk to. Anyway,’ he glanced round him with a proprietorial air, ‘I had to come to check on my camp.’

Josse said carefully, ‘Do you know where your mother is, Ninian?’

‘Yes, she’s gone to Mag’s house. She said she has to fetch something. In fact,’ he was frowning again, ‘she said some one, but I’m sure she meant some thing because we don’t know anybody here except Mag, and Mag died.’

‘I know,’ Josse said gently.

The boy’s bright blue eyes were fixed on him. ‘I think she was very old and that’s why she died,’ he confided.

‘Yes, Ninian, she was quite old,’ Josse agreed.

‘Much older than my mother,’ Ninian said. ‘ And you,’ he added as an afterthought. ‘Only old people die. Don’t they?’

‘Usually people are more likely to die when they get old, certainly,’ Josse said. Poor child, he thought, what a life he’s had recently. No wonder he seeks reassurance.

‘My father died,’ the boy was saying. ‘ He was much older than you. About as old as Mag, I’d say. He fell off his horse,’ he added.

Josse didn’t think the child sounded particularly upset at describing his father’s demise. ‘That must have been awful,’ he said.

‘No, it wasn’t awful at all.’ Ninian was poking around in the entrance to his camp, tidying a stray branch of the thorn bush. ‘He didn’t like me and my mother much and when he was dead it meant he didn’t beat us anymore. Mother said I didn’t need to pretend to be sad if I wasn’t really, so I’m not.’

‘No reason why you should,’ Josse said.

‘The priest said my father was in heaven,’ Ninian said in a whisper, as if afraid some representative of the church might be listening, ‘but Mother and I think he’s probably in hell. My mother says she hopes so, anyway.’

‘And what about you?’ Josse asked gently.

‘Well, I don’t really want him to be in hell,’ the child replied carefully, ‘although I think he’s undoubtedly in purgatory. I hope he’ll get to heaven in the end. In a few hundred years, perhaps, if he’s good and if lots of masses and that get said.’ He had finished with his branch, securing it to his satisfaction. ‘There! Shall we go inside?’

‘Ninian,’ Josse said, thinking hard how best to phrase what he wanted to say, ‘I think your mother might have gone to Mag’s house to find me.’

‘Really? Isn’t she silly? You’re here!’

‘Aye, but she didn’t know that.’ He hesitated. ‘Do you think it would be all right for you to take me to the house?’

‘Mag’s house?’

‘No, your house. The house where you’re staying, where your mother took me when it was too cold for me to stay out here in your camp.’

The boy chewed his lip. ‘I don’t know if I’m allowed,’ he said. ‘Mother made me promise not to tell anybody.’

‘I understand about that,’ Josse said, hating himself. ‘But it’s not as if I haven’t been there before, is it?’ He hoped Ninian didn’t know about the blindfold. ‘It’s not as if the house’s whereabouts are a secret from me.’

‘Then why do you need me to take you?’ the boy asked intelligently.

‘Er — well, we’ve met up with each other now,’ Josse improvised. ‘Why don’t we go back together?’

‘She’ll be cross,’ Ninian said resignedly. ‘I’ll be sent to bed early, with bread and water for my supper.’

‘I’ll say it was all my fault, that I persuaded you,’ Josse offered. ‘I wouldn’t ask, Ninian, only it’s important I speak to your mother. As I say, I’m almost certain she’s gone to Mag’s house to look for me.’

Ninian stared at him for a long moment. What was it about those blue eyes? Josse wondered absently, about the boy’s-

‘Very well.’ Ninian had made up his mind. ‘My mother likes you, she said so. And I like you too,’ he added.

‘I like both of you,’ Josse said. ‘Wait while I fetch Horace, then we’ll be off.’

‘Can I ride him?’ Ninian called out as Josse brought Horace down the sloping side of the little vale.

‘Aye. Hold on tight, though.’

The last thing he wanted, he reflected as, with Ninian directing him, he led Horace off through the forest, was to arrive back at the secret house not only having persuaded Ninian to break his word to his mother, but with the child damaged from a fall from a large horse into the bargain.

* * *

Joanna was already back at the manor house when Josse and Ninian got there.

Having tended to Horace together, Josse and the child went on into the house, to find her pacing to and fro in front of the fire.

Ninian had predicted she would be cross. In fact, she was furious. Josse, who knew full well that her anger was born of anxiety — he didn’t like to imagine what she must have felt on arriving home to find the child gone — let her rave for a while, then, with a protective arm around the boy, said mildly, ‘He’s safe, Joanna. Isn’t that all that matters?’

Instantly she rounded on him. ‘And just what do you think you’re doing here?’ she demanded. ‘Nobody comes here without being blindfolded! Not even you!’

Even in her fury, there was a brief glint of something else in her eyes as she stared at him. Something that suggested she remembered their last farewell as clearly as he did. He tried to ignore the blood beginning to pound through his body; now wasn’t the moment.

If there was ever going to be a moment.

‘I thought you were going to let me help you!’ he protested.

‘Whatever made you think that?’ she shouted. ‘Perhaps I might have been, before this! But now that I’ve seen how you wormed your way in, how you’ve played on my son’s youth to make him tell you where the house is, how you’ve — you’ve-’

He waited, but she didn’t seem to be able to think of anything else. ‘You’re not to be trusted!’ she finished.

Ninian wriggled out from beneath Josse’s arm, still round his shoulders, and rushed to his mother. ‘You mustn’t say that!’ he yelled at her, as furious as she was; he seemed, Josse reflected, to have inherited Joanna’s temper. Thumping at her stomach with both fists, Ninian cried, ‘I don’t want to be just with you anymore, I want him! ’

‘Ninian, we-’ Joanna began.

But Josse interrupted her. Stepping forward, he grasped Ninian firmly by the upper arms and said quietly, ‘Ninian, a man never hits a woman.’

Ninian rounded on him, trying to break the grip of Josse’s strong hands and, when that failed, attempting a sly kick in the crotch. But Josse, who had several nephews, was used to small boys. Easily evading the child’s foot, he said, ‘And an honest fighter doesn’t do that, either.’

The small face was scarlet with rage, making the eyes even more blue in comparison. With a voice full of authority, Ninian said, ‘Let go of me.’