Michael JECKS - Squire Throwleigh’s Heir

Simon grunted, mopping his forehead with the hem of his tunic, then wringing it out again. They had made for home as soon as the downpour had set in in earnest, but by then, as the bailiff knew, it was too late. This Dartmoor rain had a curiously pervasive quality: it appeared only a thin mizzle yet it swiftly permeated all their clothing. The drops were flying almost horizontally. The only compensation for the bailiff was the expression of horrified disgust on Sir Baldwin’s face as he felt the drips slithering down his skin.

The wind blew from behind them, but it whirled and howled in their ears, and Simon had to speak loudly for Baldwin to hear him. ‘If we keep to the riverbank, we’ll soon make it down to the road, and then all we have to do is turn right to follow it back to the manor.’

The knight nodded, and the two set off again, slithering in the black, peaty mud. Baldwin looked down with dismay. The track was a quagmire now, and every step he took thrust his ankle under the surface. His feet were wallowing in the stuff. He looked up, narrowing his eyes against the wind, and it was here that he fell.

He was some feet behind his friend; he placed his boot on what looked like a solid enough rock, but when he put his weight on it, it slid away. Suddenly he was off-balance and toppling backwards; he put out both hands, but his right thumb caught awkwardly on another stone, and the nail was ripped off.

At first he didn’t notice. He sat, his backside throbbing where it had connected with another lump of rock, staring bleakly ahead, swearing quietly but with feeling. Then he stood up, furious with himself for his clumsiness, trying to brush off the worst of the mud and assorted plants, and generally besmearing the whole of his tunic. Glancing at the stone on which he had landed he was about to kick at it when he stopped dead.

The rock stood out in the peaty mud all about, but near where he had fallen there was a clear smudge next to the track, roughly circular in shape. It appeared to connect Simon and Baldwin’s path to another trail, a narrower one this time, that curled away up the hill. Baldwin gave it little attention, thinking it was merely a sheep-path. However, he noticed a cord sticking up from the mud, and he prodded at it with a foot. He suddenly realised it was a piece of leather, and knelt down to pull it free. Then, frowning, he studied the ground round about at closer quarters.

Simon returned, puffing and blowing up the hill on realising his friend had disappeared.

‘Don’t you think it’s time we got back to a cup of wine and a warm fire? What are you up to now?’ he demanded irascibly. But then a look of concern came to his face. Baldwin followed the direction of his eyes and swore when he saw the blood dripping from his thumbnail.

‘Are you all right?’

‘Simon, this is where the boy was killed!’

The bailiff stared down, then back at his friend. ‘What on earth makes you say that?’

‘Look,’ said Baldwin, pointing carefully at the smeared patch of mud. ‘I think this is where the boy must have been killed. He crawled up here, for some reason, but someone met him and brought a stone down on his head. Perhaps the stone I just fell over was the very one that killed him.’

‘Don’t you think you’re being a bit over-imaginative?’ Simon asked disbelievingly. ‘There’s nothing to show he ever came near here.’

‘We followed the track all the way from the road, so it is fair to reason that he might have come this way,’ Baldwin said. ‘But this is what makes me believe he was here. See this?’ He held out what he had found: two narrow thongs tied to a stout patch of leather.

‘A sling?’ Simon said doubtfully.

‘A typical boy’s toy,’ Baldwin agreed. ‘I’d be prepared to gamble that he had it in his hand and let it fall when he was struck.’

‘Farfetched!’ Simon scoffed.

‘Perhaps. But let’s consider it as a possibility.’

‘You say he crawled here. Why should he do that?’

‘Perhaps he was playing up here, pretending to be a hunter or a man-at-arms.’

‘Oh, really?’ Simon asked sarcastically. ‘And on what do you base that? It looks like a sheep-track to me.’

‘Oh, Simon! Look at the way it curves round – when have you ever seen a sheep wander like that? Sheep go to great efforts to follow the contours of the hills they traverse, while this is descending steadily, down from that ledge…’

‘You want to follow it, don’t you?’ Simon sighed. He glanced up at the sky. The rain had slowed now to a gentle drizzle, and the bailiff reminded himself that he was unlikely to get any wetter. He gave a long-suffering sigh. ‘Oh, Christ’s bones! Very well! Come on, then.‘

‘Shove the bastard in the storeroom!’ Thomas said as he drew his mount to a halt in the court. He watched his grooms lead the dejected figure of Edmund away before he dropped from his horse, feeling that he had at least shown he could make decisions, which was more than that damned fool from Furnshill.

He left his horse standing and walked towards the stables. Nicholas stood in the dark a short way from the door.

‘Well?’ Thomas demanded.

‘The Fleming went inside a while back, sir. I’ve not seen him since.’ Nicholas forbore to mention his attempt at finding solace. Petronilla was unlikely to complain – she was only a servant. Not that his master would mind overmuch. The wench had better make up her mind to be more friendly in future. After all, Nicholas was his master’s trusted steward and, now Thomas owned the Throwleigh demesne, if Petronilla wanted to keep her job she would have to look after Nicholas too.

The reflection made him grin, and he promised himself that he would renew his acquaintance with the maid as soon as he could.

Thomas kicked idly at a stone, sending it skipping over the dirt of the yard. ‘What will he want now?’

‘Sir?’

‘That sodding Fleming. He’s after something, but what?’ Thomas was no fool, no matter how indiscreet he might be in a tavern. He knew men, and at this moment he was perturbed by James van Relenghes. ‘He’s banging on about purchasing a plot of land from me, but I don’t believe he’s really that bothered. If I had to guess, I’d say he was more interested in Lady Katharine than in any of my territory.’

‘Maybe he wants a plot to settle on.’

‘It’s stupid – as if I’d sell some of the estate! I need every penny it brings. Even if there weren’t an entail, I wouldn’t sell to some foreigner with smarmy manners.’

‘Perhaps he’s after your sister-in-law. She’s not bad-looking.’

‘Be sensible, fool! The bitch isn’t out of her widow’s weeds, for God’s sake.’

Nicholas said nothing, but gave his master a meaningful look.

‘You think…’ Thomas thrust his hands into his belt and stared thoughtfully out into the yard. His servant was better acquainted with the ways of women. Hadn’t he been married twice himself? ‘You really think he might be considering an attempt on her?’

‘Look at the way he is with her: I’ve only seen them together out here in the yard, but he seems to be all over her like a cheap tunic. Call me old-fashioned, but I’d say he was showing all the classic signs of trying to get inside her drawers. He hangs on her every word, praises her work, defends her husband’s memory…’

‘Would a man after her do that?’ Thomas asked doubtfully.

‘Sir, if you want a woman to trust you, first you have to show you approve of her and her choices. Since she married your brother for love, only a complete idiot would suggest to her that the squire was a cretin with more brain between his legs than over his neck.’

‘Hmm. And you think this foreigner’s driven by what’s between his legs? I can’t see why. She doesn’t possess much – her dower won’t be a lot.’