Kate Sedley - The Plymouth Cloak

'What do you want?' he asked me in a surly voice. 'Alwyn Steward and Mistress Overy gave me permission to go, now that you've caught the murderer.' He looked suddenly suspicious. 'The Sheriff's officer hasn't arrived yet, has he? It's not he who's told you to come after me? He doesn't wish me fetched back?'

I swung myself out of the saddle with a sigh of relief. In those days I was not a natural horseman. 'You can be easy on that score,' I reassured him. 'There was no sign of either Thomas Sawyer or the Sergeant when I left Trenowth, although no doubt they'll be here before nightfall. No, I'm the one who wants a word with you. There is something I need to know which you can tell me, and as I intend to have the information one way or another, you might as well make it easy for yourself by answering my questions. I am, when all's said and done, much bigger than you.'

He acknowledged this fact with an ill grace. 'What is it you want to know?'

'There's a cottage over there,' I pointed out, 'and as I shall have missed my supper by the time I return to Trenowth, let's see if the goodwife will spare bread and cheese and small ale for two weary travellers. The horse, too, could do with a rest and some water.'

Silas thawed a little with the realization that I was friendlier than he had at first supposed. 'Very well,' he agreed, falling into step beside me. 'We might as well be comfortable, although I could tell you here and now what it is you want to know, because I can guess what it is you've come for.'

It was nearly dark by the time I reached Trenowth manor house again. The gates of the compound still stood open and there was a bustle within which told me that the household was in imminent expectation of the Sergeant's arrival from Launceston. Cressets and torches had been lit in profusion, and Alwyn, hovering on the top step outside the great hall, staff of office in hand, had changed into his best furred gown.

Even those servants who lived in the village and should long ago have gone to their homes still loitered around the courtyard, hoping to catch a glimpse of any drama that might unfold. Isobel and Edgar Warden were seated on the stone bench outside the servants' quarters, and John Groom came forward at once to take my rouncey, having seen me ride in from his position in the stable doorway. Only Janet Overy was missing, and a brief question elicited the fact that she was in the kitchen, putting the finishing touches to a meal especially prepared for the Sheriff's officer.

'You won't get anything,' the groom informed me. 'She was main put out that you weren't at supper.' I made no reply, but made my way to the kitchen, hoping against hope that I might find Janet alone. My prayers were answered, the two little maids having been sent outside in order to warn of the Sergeant's approach as soon as it was known. As I entered, Janet half-turned, thinking it to be one of the girls, but her face clouded when she saw who it was.

'And where have you been?' she demanded angrily. 'You were supposed to be lying down on your bed.' I shut the kitchen door carefully behind me. 'I went after Silas Bywater,' I said.

Her voice became shrill. 'Why? You promised me-'

'I know, and I'm sorry to have broken that promise. But I had to know, you see. I had to know why you killed Philip Underdown.'

There was a protracted silence while I waited for her to deny the charge. But she didn't. Instead, she came forward and sat down heavily at the kitchen table.

'What made you suspect me in the first place?'

I swung my legs over the bench and sat opposite her.

'Because you gave yourself away, twice. Earlier this afternoon, when I asked why you thought Philip Underdown chose to leave the bedchamber from an upper floor window rather than a lower, you answered that he might have been afraid of rousing me if he rose and dressed and went downstairs. But by putting me to sleep outside the door, he could climb down the vine without any such worry. I should have seen then what I saw later, that only from Philip himself could you have learned of that stratagem. I did not tell you and no one else knew of it.'

She stared down at her hands which were clasped tightly together on the table in front of her. 'And how did I give myself away the second time?'

'You were very tired, as I was. Your thoughts were muddled and confused by all the events of the day. You could no longer distinguish between what you knew and what you were supposed to know. You knew that it was my cudgel that had been used to bludgeon Philip Underdown to death when the attack with the knife had failed. Again, only he could have informed you that it was mine. Did you never pause to wonder why it wasn't found beside the body, or how it was brought back here?'

She raised her eyes then to look me full in the face, a slight frown furrowing her brows.

'Of course I wondered, but as you said a moment ago, there were things I was not supposed to know and therefore could not question.'

'But you knew that I had discovered the corpse before Thomas Sawyer?'

'I did not know. I could not, without asking you for the truth. And I could not ask you without arousing your suspicions. But I guessed. You had realized that Master Underdown was absent from his bed long before you said you did. You went after him and found him dead. You also found that he had taken your cudgel and that it had been used to kill him. You naturally brought it away to save yourself being suspected of the crime.' I nodded and she continued: 'Don't think I blame you, lad. Any sensible man would have done the same.' She heaved a sigh of self-reproach. 'And then, foolishly, I betrayed myself. I was desperately tired and unable to think clearly any longer. I prayed to God you would not notice my error, but I knew He would not hear me. What right have I to His protection? I have taken the life of a fellow creature.' She put her hands over her eyes for a moment, then withdrew them. 'The earlier mistake I admit I did not notice. You have a sharp ear and brain.'

I shook my head. 'You give me greater credit than is my due. It escaped my notice, also, at the time. Even your second error did not immediately strike me, but took a little while to penetrate my mind. If it is any consolation to you, however, I had already begun to suspect you knew more about the murder than you admitted to.'

'Why?' Janet wanted to know. 'Where did I go wrong?' I shrugged. 'There was no one particular thing. But when I thought about it, your behaviour was full of contradictions.

First, you said no one could leave the compound at night because the gates were locked. Then you told me that anyone, if he or she so wished, could get out of the lower storey windows. Again, you played on my belief that Philip must have gone to meet Isobel Warden, and encouraged my conviction that her husband was a very jealous man, until your conscience began to bother you. After that, you did your very best to convince me that Jeremiah Fletcher was the murderer — as undoubtedly he would have been had he been given another chance. You also tried to dissuade me from making any further inquiries. And it was you, I fancy, rather than Alwyn Steward, who was anxious to let Silas Bywater go before I questioned him too closely about the meaning of the knotgrass. With your knowledge of herbs and medicinal plants, I think you already know its deadly properties.' There was another silence before she answered quietly: 'Yes, I know them.' She drew a painful breath. 'Were there any other mistakes I made?'

'They weren't truly mistakes, only some small things which by themselves meant nothing, but added to the rest had some significance. You said you had lost your son, but you did not say that he was dead. It was natural in me to assume so, but I repeat, you did not say so. And this afternoon, when you were attending to my hurts, you told me you were fond of me, adding: "My son should have looked like you. ." Not "would", meaning had he lived, but "should", a word suggesting that he ought to resemble me, but that some terrible mishap had befallen him. And finally, on your own admission, the apportioning of rooms to visitors is your responsibility in Lady Trenowth's absence. At first I thought it merely fortuitous that Philip and I had been allotted the bedchamber with the vine outside the window.