Edward Marston - The Devil's Apprentice

‘I won’t bite you, lad,’ said Elias jovially. ‘Not too hard, anyway. And I promise faithfully not to kiss you — unless you kiss me first, that is.’

‘Leave him be, Owen,’ chided Nicholas. ‘He’s tired.’

‘Not too tired to tell us what happened, I hope. I don’t know about you, Nick, but I didn’t believe a word that his father said to us. Davy’s pony didn’t bolt.’

‘He did,’ said the boy defensively. ‘I swear it.’

‘Was your father telling us the truth?’

‘Hotspur bolted and a low branch knocked me from the saddle.’

‘But what caused him to bolt, Davy?’ asked Nicholas.

‘I don’t know.’

‘You’ve been missing for hours. Where were you?’

‘I’m not sure,’ said the boy evasively. ‘I don’t remember.’

‘We thought you’d run away from us. Did you?’ Davy shook his head. ‘Is that why you wanted to come to Essex with us?’ The boy shook his head again. Nicholas traded a glance with Elias. ‘You’re exhausted, lad. I can see that. Get yourself some sleep and we’ll talk again in the morning.’

Relieved to be spared an interrogation, Davy nodded and began to undress. His companions also got ready for bed. Nicholas sensed that the apprentice was lying but saw no value in trying to force information out of him. The only way to get to the truth was to win the boy’s confidence and convince him that he was among friends who would not sit in judgement on him. Jerome Stratton’s behaviour had been eloquent. It told them much about his uneasy relationship with his son and confirmed the suspicion that Davy had not joined Westfield’s Men voluntarily. However, since he was now legally a member of the company, they had a responsibility to keep him in it. They would be more vigilant in future. Before he clambered into bed, Nicholas blew out two of the candles.

‘Good night, Davy,’ he said gently.

There was no reply. ‘He’s fast asleep, Nick,’ observed Elias. ‘Dog tired.’

‘It’s been a long day for him, Owen.’

‘And he’s had a rough time of it, by the look of things.’

Getting into his own bed, Elias licked his thumb and forefinger before using them to sniff out the last candle. There was a long pause as he tried to get comfortable and Nicholas could hear him threshing about. Elias then settled down and seemed to go off to sleep. Nicholas was about to doze off himself when the Welshmen spoke.

‘Are you still awake, Nick?’

‘Yes.’

‘Do you think we’ll ever get to know why he went haring off like that?’

‘Not from Master Stratton,’ whispered Nicholas, ‘that’s for sure.’

‘I wouldn’t trust him to tell me what day of the week it was,’ muttered Elias, adjusting his position in bed again. ‘He’d probably charge me interest for doing so. Merchants are all the same. Cheats and liars to a man.’

‘Keep your voice down, Owen.’

‘Nothing I say about his father will upset Davy. You saw the pair of them together earlier. There’s no love lost between them. Besides,’ he added, suppressing a yawn. ‘The boy’s dead to the world.’

‘Then don’t wake him up,’ hissed Nicholas.

Elias reverted to a whisper. ‘What do you make of Sir Michael?’

‘He’s a perfect gentleman.’

‘He’s also completely mad. Firing a cannon at night to break the ice on the lake? It was all I could do to forbear laughing. And why does he keep all those weapons?’

‘They interest him.’

‘Weapons are for fighting and he’s the most peaceable man I’ve ever met.’

‘He’s also our host, Owen, so we must take him as we found him. Sir Michael and his wife have come to the rescue of Westfield’s Men. Never forget that. If he has a few outlandish ideas, we should tolerate them happily. No,’ said Nicholas, keeping his voice low, ‘I have no complaints at all about our hosts. The person who worries me is their steward.’

‘Why?’

‘To begin with, he doesn’t want us here.’

‘That was my feeling, Nick.’

‘If it were left to him, we’d be spending the night at that village inn. It never shows in his face but I fancy that Romball Taylard objects to the very idea of Westfield’s Men performing in the Great Hall.’

‘Does he think we’ll steal the silver or ravish the chambermaids?’

‘Who knows? But that’s not the only thing that troubles me about him.’

‘Isn’t it?’

‘No, Owen.’

‘What else is there?’

‘The simple fact that we’ve seen so much of the fellow,’ said Nicholas. ‘He’s the steward here. In an establishment of this size, that means he has immense responsibilities. He supervises the staff, advises Sir Michael, victuals the kitchens, controls the household accounts and so on. Yet he was waiting for us as soon as we walked through the door.’

‘So?’

‘Why should Taylard take on the office of a butler when he could delegate it elsewhere? Why lead us off to our meal when that was an office fit for a servant? Why do chores that should rightly be beneath him? Do you take my point, Owen?’ he asked. ‘Isn’t it odd that someone who’s so unhappy to have us at Silvermere is taking such pains to stay close to us?’

Elias gave a loud yawn. ‘I never thought about it that way.’

‘Neither did I until now.’

‘What’s the reason behind it, Nick?’

‘That’s obvious,’ said his friend quietly. ‘He’s watching us.’

Another yawn from Elias signalled the end of the conversation. After wishing each other good night, they snuggled under the warm sheets. Elias was the first to fall asleep, marking the event with a series of gentle snores. Nicholas lay awake for a while, thinking about Davy Stratton’s sudden departure in the forest and speculating on where the boy had really gone. When his eyelids grew heavy, he surrendered to fatigue and dozed off. How long he slept he did not know but it was still dark when a creaking sound brought his awake. He thought at first that it was Elias, making his way to the chamber pot but the Welshman was still snoring happily in the next bed. Nicholas sat up in bed and peered into the gloom through bleary eyes.

‘Is that you, Davy?’ he asked.

The creaking stopped instantly but there was no reply to his question. Nicholas grew suspicious. Hauling himself out of bed, he groped his way to the truckle bed and put out an exploratory hand. Davy was not there yet Nicholas was certain he was still in the room. He was fully awake now. Nicholas sensed that the boy was standing by the door and he moved across to reach out for him. Holding his breath and flattened against the door, Davy let out a yelp as strong fingers closed on his arm. Nicholas put both hands on the boy and was shocked with what he found.

‘You’re fully dressed,’ he said.

‘I was … going for a walk,’ bleated Davy.

‘In the middle of the night? You were running away again, weren’t you?’

‘No!’

‘You were,’ said Nicholas with subdued anger. ‘Why? Where were you going?’

‘Nowhere.’

Nicholas shook him. ‘Don’t lie to me, Davy. You put on your clothes to sneak out. I heard you trying to open the door, didn’t I?’

The boy capitulated. ‘Yes,’ he admitted, sobbing quietly. ‘I was creeping out and I’d have got away with it if you hadn’t locked the door.’

‘But I didn’t,’ said Nicholas. ‘I don’t have a key.’

He reached for the handle himself and twisted it. Though he pulled hard, the door did not move an inch. All three of them were securely locked in the room.

Jared Tuke did not seem to feel the bitter cold. A burly man of middle years, he walked through the churchyard as if it were a summer’s afternoon rather than an early morning in winter. His only concession to the weather was to wear his largest cap but even that was set back on his head to reveal the gnarled face. He paused beside a gravestone to offer up a silent prayer. Tuke had inherited the position of churchwarden from his father and he carried out his duties with the same plodding reliability. Reuben Tuke lay six feet beneath the earth now but his son was carrying on the family tradition and, in doing so, he was able to pay his respects daily to the old man whose name was chiselled on the stone slab in front of him. He brushed a layer of frost from the gravestone then strolled on up to the church. No light showed through the stained glass window in the west front. Tuke gave a grunt of satisfaction. He always liked to be the first there.