Kate Sedley: The Weaver's inheritance

The letter, brief and obviously written with all the difficulties experienced by a person unused to wielding a pen, reached the home of my mother-in-law, Margaret Walker, just prior to the Christmas season of that year of Our Lord, 1476.

For once in my life, I had been looking forward to the cosiness of a winter spent mainly within four walls. I would contribute towards the household expenses by hawking my wares around the outlying villages and hamlets of Bristol, but intended to venture no further afield than a half-day’s journey, thus ensuring my return home before curfew and the closing of the city gates. I had also promised myself that those long, dark evenings, when doors and shutters were closed early against the inclement weather and we huddled together around the fire, would be spent getting to know my motherless daughter better.

Elizabeth had celebrated her second birthday in November, and was now a busy, prattling little girl — although it needed Margaret to interpret most of her utterances for me — toddling about the cottage, her hands constantly outstretched and ready to meddle in everything that did not concern her. Her grandmother’s spinning wheel held a particular fascination for Bess, as did the cooking crane over the fire, with the big iron pot suspended from its hook. Indeed, the only items in which my daughter evinced no interest were her toys; two wooden dolls named Rosemary and Fleur, a brightly painted wooden spinning top, and an equally garishly coloured wooden ball. These lay neglected and gathering dust in the chest alongside the bed which she shared with my mother-in-law.

Those of you who have read my previous chronicles, will know that Elizabeth’s impending arrival was the reason why I had married her mother, Margaret Walker’s daughter, Lillis. Our wedded life had been of short duration, Lillis dying in childbirth eight months later; and I had never been able to forgive myself for the overwhelming relief which I had felt at this tragic event. Guilt, as well as the heady sense of freedom which life on the open road engendered, had kept me almost continuously on the move these past two years, abandoning my child to the care of her grandmother.

Watching Elizabeth, that cold, grey December morning, as she sat amongst the rushes on the floor, carefully examining one of her feet, my chief consolation was that she in no way resembled Lillis, or my self-blame would have been compounded by ever-present reminders of my dead wife. But there was nothing small and birdlike about my daughter; she had none of the black-haired, brown-eyed, sallow-skinned colouring which characterized Margaret Walker, and which had betrayed so clearly Lillis’s Welsh and Cornish origins. No, my daughter was mine through and through; fair-haired, fair-skinned, blue-eyed and already big for her age, showing every promise of being as tall and well-built as I was myself in those days.

‘Yes, she’s yours all right,’ my mother-in-law remarked, coming in through the street door and slamming it shut behind her. She set down the raw wool she was carrying; wool which she would shortly begin to comb and spin, making the most of the remaining hours of winter daylight which filtered through the oiled-parchment panes of the cottage’s only window. ‘There’s no mistaking her for anyone else’s child.’

‘You made me jump,’ I accused her, smiling. ‘I didn’t expect you back so soon.’ I nodded towards her overflowing basket. ‘Work seems to be plentiful.’

She removed her cloak and pattens before seating herself at her wheel.

‘And likely to get busier now that young Master Burnett’s joined his business with that of his father-in-law, Alderman Weaver. Old Burnett must be turning in his grave. Only three months dead, and already his son is making changes he would never have countenanced if he had lived to be a hundred!’

‘Why do you think William’s done it?’ I asked idly, drawing Elizabeth on to my lap and trying to persuade her to put on her stocking and shoe. The bare foot was like a small lump of ice.

Margaret, busily removing burrs and other foreign matter from some of the wool, shrugged.

‘His wife is Alderman Weaver’s sole heir. Since her brother Clement’s death, the old man has neither chick nor child else, other than Alison, to leave his fortune to. So perhaps it makes sense to combine the Burnett and Weaver looms; the spinning and dying, the fulling and weaving and the tenting. After all, Redcliffe’s been fairly divided between the two families for years now. And without Alderman Burnett’s steadying influence to guide him, maybe young William feels the need of an older and wiser head in charge.’

I snorted with laughter. ‘That I can well believe.’

I had met William Burnett to speak to only once, five years ago, when, fresh from my release as a novice at Glastonbury Abbey, I had taken joyously to the road in my new calling as a chapman — or pedlar, to use the commoner word — and discovered for the first time my ability to solve those mysteries and puzzles which, with God’s help, had already brought several villains to justice. William had been a fop then, interested in little beyond his appearance, and still was. I had thought him empty-headed and vain, a rich man’s son unchecked and overindulged, and wondered what a spirited girl like Alison Weaver could see in him; for, even though it was doubtless a match arranged by their fathers, I recalled that she had looked at her betrothed with admiration. Women were, and are, and always will be, an enigma to me.

During the intervening five years, I had, on rare occasions, noted Master Burnett walking in procession to the nearby Temple Church, where members of the Weaver’s Guild maintained the Chapel of Saint Katharine, ensuring that candles were always kept burning before the altar of their patron saint. Those brief glimpses had convinced me that he had not changed, so overdressed and self-satisfied did he seem.

Alderman Alfred Weaver’s appearance, on the other hand, had suffered considerable alteration. When I first had dealings with him, he had been a florid, thickset man with the glow of health about him, but the loss of his only son and heir had taken its toll. Even two years ago, when we had again had some contact, he had begun to lose weight, and the hair covering his bald pate had been thinner and sparser than before. But my most recent sighting of him, leaving his house in Broad Street three days earlier, had shocked me beyond measure. His flesh hung loosely on his bones, a fact which could not be disguised even by the heavy, old-fashioned garments which he always wore. His jowl sagged, his cheekbones were jutting almost through the skin, and his eyes, as he looked at me across the street, were dull and lifeless, holding no spark of recognition. He had been accompanied by Mistress Burnett, and it struck me for the first time that there was a stronger resemblance between father and daughter than I had previously imagined …

A loud knock on the cottage door disturbed my reverie. Putting Elizabeth aside, I scrambled to my feet, my mother-in-law being busy with her combing. The man who stood outside was known to me, although we had never spoken, as one of Alderman Weaver’s carters; he was called Jack Nym. I stared at him in surprise, wondering what he could want, and he grinned back good-naturedly, showing a mouthful of blackened and broken teeth.

‘I’ve a letter here for Mistress Walker,’ he said, ‘and a message to go with it. Can I come in?’

Margaret put down her work and rose, picking bits of wool from her skirt as she did so.

‘A letter for me?’ she enquired. I held the door wide to allow our guest across the threshold. ‘I know no one up in the Wolds.’