Kate Sedley: The Midsummer Rose

‘Roger must do as he sees fit,’ my wife said warningly. ‘He is the head of the household, after all.’

Margaret gave a derisive snort. ‘If he believes that, he’ll believe anything. And he’s not the head of my household. I can tell him the truth.’

‘Not under this roof,’ Adela answered quietly, before adding, ‘Besides, there just might be something in his story.’

‘What do you mean? What’s changed your mind?’ I stuttered.

‘You’re humouring him,’ Margaret accused.

‘Nothing’s changed my mind, and I’m not humouring him. But …’ She paused long enough to encourage the children, who had finished eating, to run away and play. The elder two thundered upstairs, where they charged around like stampeding horses. The noise did my headache no good at all, but I did my best to ignore it. Adam performed his crab-like crawl and shuffled off to a corner of the kitchen, where he beat out a tune on the stone-tiled floor with his spoon. I ignored that as well.

‘But?’ I encouraged my wife, while Margaret looked sceptical.

‘It’s nothing, really.’ Adela took a deep breath and clasped her hands together on the table. ‘It’s just that a week ago, while you were still on the road, Robin Avenel’s widowed sister came to stay with him …’

Here, Margaret interrupted, anxious to fill in details which someone who had had the misfortune not to be born in Bristol might not know.

‘Bess Avenel married into the Alefounder family. Her late husband’s uncle is Alderman Gregory Alefounder. Well, you can’t help but know who he is. Owns the biggest brewery in the city. But, more than that, her sister-in-law, that little fly-by-night Robin Avenel married, is Gregory Alefounder’s daughter. Jeffery, Bess’s husband, wasn’t interested in the brewing business. He preferred to lead the life of a country gentleman. His father, Gregory’s older brother, indulged him and let Jeffery live at home on the family manor near Frome. When he died, Jeffery inherited the house and lands, and Bess, in her turn, inherited them from him. She still lives there, no doubt queening it over her tenants and the local peasantry.’ Margaret’s tone was acerbic. Elizabeth Alefounder was plainly no favourite of hers.

‘Thank you, Mother-in-law,’ I said gravely and raised my eyebrows at Adela. ‘So, what about this Bess Alefounder, sweetheart? What does she have to do with me?’

‘As I was saying, she arrived in Broad Street to stay with Master Avenel while you were away. I think it was the Saturday before you were brought home. Her maid came with her and they must have been there now for almost a fortnight. I’ve seen Mistress Alefounder around on several occasions. It was Richard who first pointed her out to me.’

‘Go on.’ I nobly refrained from enquiring what she was doing in the company of Richard Manifold. (A chance meeting, of course. Really, I knew that without being told.)

Again, Adela hesitated. ‘Oh, I don’t know!’ she exclaimed at last, with a shrug of her shoulders. ‘It’s just that your description this morning of the woman in brown sarcenet reminded me a little of Elizabeth Alefounder.’

‘Aha!’ I shouted, disturbing Adam, who stopped banging his spoon on the floor and shuffled across to embrace one of my legs in an iron grip.

‘There’s no “Aha!” about it,’ my wife reproved me. ‘I said it reminded me a little . Now, sweetheart, please don’t go leaping to conclusions.’

‘I should think not, indeed!’ Margaret protested. ‘What on earth would a respectable woman like Bess Alefounder be doing mixed up in a murder? What nonsense it is! Why don’t you admit you were delirious, Roger, and simply dreamed it all?’

I could tell from Adela’s expression that she was reluctant to say anything further that might bolster my belief in my story, but her natural instinct to see justice done made her go on.

‘You forget, Cousin,’ she said gently, ‘that for the past year, ever since last summer, the Sheriff’s men have been keeping a close watch on Robin Avenel’s household. He was suspected, if you remember, of Lancastrian sympathies. If it had ever been proved that the man we all thought was a Tudor spy really had been one, then there’s no doubt, according to Richard Manifold, that Robin Avenel would have been arrested. As it was, with the stranger being murdered like that, nothing could be proved against him. Against Master Avenel, I mean.’

‘But what has that to do with his sister?’ Margaret demanded, rising from her stool. ‘I’m surprised at you, Adela, encouraging that great oaf in this piece of arrant folly. He was exposed to too much sun. He fell in the Avon. And in his delirium, he dreamed he saw the re-enactment of an old murder, which he had recalled while passing the house where it happened. That’s all there is to it. Now, I’m going upstairs to collect my things, and then I’m going home. You don’t need me any longer, not now that Roger is up and about once more. And I’ve been away from Redcliffe for far too long. Goodness knows what’s been happening in my absence. Maria Watkins and Bess Simnel will have been having things all their own way.’

Adela made a half-hearted attempt to persuade her cousin to stay, but I think, secretly, she was as anxious as I was to see her go. Margaret Walker was a woman with a heart of gold, an excellent friend in times of trouble, totally to be relied upon. But she was also domineering and liked to be in charge, whether at home or in someone else’s house. A wearing woman whose strength of will necessitated constant combating with one’s own.

I barely registered her decision to leave, I was so busy mulling over what Adela had said. I abandoned all thought of visiting Rownham Passage for the present. My first priority now was to try to catch a glimpse of Mistress Alefounder. I freed myself from Adam’s hold and got unsteadily to my feet.

My wife observed me with a jaundiced eye. ‘Still determined to go out?’ she asked.

I grunted. ‘But not so far. At least, not yet.’

Adela smiled. ‘Only as far as Broad Street, is that it?’

‘The next woman I marry,’ I retorted darkly, ‘won’t be able to read my mind. It’s too unnerving.’

She laughed and gave me a swift kiss on one cheek. Friendly, but no more than that. ‘Sweetheart, there’s not a woman born who couldn’t read you like an open book.’

I returned her kiss with interest and suggested there was nothing so urgent that it couldn’t be postponed. But I was out of luck. She swore she had too much to do. When she had cleared the breakfast dishes, she must sit with the two older children in order to teach them their alphabet and numbers from one to ten. Their lessons, she said, had been sadly neglected during my illness. I sighed and began to pull on my boots.

‘Tonight?’ I whispered suggestively.

She shrugged and muttered something that sounded like ‘maybe’. I was hurt, but said nothing. I cleaned my teeth with willow bark and found my jerkin, for although the sky beyond the open shutters gave every indication of another warm day, the early June morning was still chilly. And as one who had so recently been an invalid, I could take no chances.

‘If you’re really going round to Broad Street,’ Adela said, ‘would you call in at Saint Giles’s and light a candle for me?’

I had a suspicion that some date around this time was the anniversary of her first husband’s birthday, or his death, or some such thing, but I didn’t enquire and she volunteered no explanation. We are all entitled to those secret places of the heart, those shrines to memory which are ours, and ours alone.

‘Of course,’ I said, kissing her cheek.

Until seven or eight months previously, when Adela and I had rented a cottage in Lewin’s Mead, we had naturally worshipped at Saint James’s Priory, the church being our landlord. Since the upturn in our fortunes and the move to Small Street, however, we had many more to choose from. Within a few minutes’ walk were the churches of Saint Giles, Saint Stephen, Saint John, Saint Werburgh, Saint Lawrence, Saint Leonard and Saint Ewen, while slightly further afield were Christchurch and All Saints. Inside the city walls, between the rivers Frome and Avon, there were more churches than taverns, which should have made Bristol an exceptionally godly place. It wasn’t. There was as much crime stalking its streets as in any other town in England.