Kate SEDLEY - The Holy Innocents

I thanked him gravely and accompanied him, like any good host, to the street door, but as he was about to step across the threshold, he hesitated and turned back.

‘Master Colet is… a valuable client,’ he said, with some constraint. ‘One that I should wish to please. I wonder therefore …’ He made a determined effort to smile, trying to make his request sound as natural as possible. ‘Would you be willing to remain as a lodger in this house until next Saturday? I am leaving then, for Exeter, and what you do after that is up to you. But I shall have shown myself willing, whilst here, to comply with Master Colet s wishes, and so escape his reproaches.’

‘And earned yourself an even fatter fee,’ I thought, ‘than the one you are charging him already.’ Aloud I said, ‘I must give the idea some consideration before making my answer. I had not intended to stay in Totnes for more than one night.’

‘If… if money is short, I might arrange for… for a small sum to be paid to you.’

I shook my head. ‘My purse is, at present, as full as it will hold, Master Cozin. But it is spring, and I need to be on the road. The confinement of four walls is all very well in the winter, when the wind blows from the north, and there is snow and ice underfoot, but once the thaw sets in and the trees begin to leaf then I like to be on the open road. But I promise that I will think about your proposal and let you have my reply in the morning.’

And with that, the lawyer had to be content. After a moment’s silence, he said, ‘You’re an honest man. I do right to trust you. Very well, I will await your verdict tomorrow. You know where to find me, at my brother’s house. And I shall accept your decision whatever it might be. I shan’t try to persuade you otherwise.’

I watched him walk away, until he disappeared round a bend in the roadway, then went back inside, closing the front door behind me. The bells of the Priory were only just ringing for Vespers, and it would be light for an hour or two yet.

Time enough later to go out and buy myself food and ale before curfew. Moreover, whatever Oliver Cozin might say, I wished to see all of my new domain. But before I did either, I had need to sit quietly and think. I returned, therefore, to the downstairs parlour, where I dusted the large, carved armchair with the sleeve of my tunic and seated myself, face tilted upwards, so that my eyes were not distracted by my surroundings. And thus, staring at the smoke-blackened ceiling, where cobwebs festooned the corners like folds of grey gauze, I considered my present situation.

Even if my suspicions had not already been aroused, this last exchange with the lawyer would have alerted me to something being wrong. No landlord, or his agent, offers to pay a tenant for living in his house, such a proposal is to turn the world of business dealing upon its head. That apart, however, there were other things which intrigued me. Why did the widowed Eudo Colet not wish to remain here, even though he was worried by a possible attack from the outlaws? And why was the assiduous Master Cozin unable to find a native of the town willing to oblige? Was there no neighbour ready to despatch a son, or one of his men, to play the role of caretaker? And why did there appear to be no single person eager to purchase such a handsome dwelling, even if it were solely for the purpose of renting it out to others? There was only one conclusion to be drawn in answer to all these questions. Something had happened here, some event which had given everyone, including its owner, a distaste or fear of the house. I could think of no other explanation which fitted the facts, so I decided that while there was still enough daylight to see by, the sooner I looked it over, the better. I stood up and fetched my cudgel from beside my pack, having left both of them just inside the street door.

The downstairs parlour, which the late Sir Jasper Crouchback had also used for trading purposes – whatever those might have been – I already knew, with its panelled walls, its pair of finely carved armchairs, large table, handsome fireplace, decorated overmantel and flagged stone floor. There was also a cupboard whose shelves had most probably once contained silver and pewter plate, but whose doors now swung wide to reveal nothing but dust. The twisting corner stair, which led to the upper storey, had a delicately carved banister to help with the ascent. Altogether, this was a room whose furnishings were designed to impress.

By contrast, the counting-house behind did no more than serve its purpose. A greater air of neglect hung about it, as though it had been long unused. A table, a bench, two stools and a stout cupboard, secured by a rusting lock and chain, was all that it contained, while the beaten-earth floor showed no drift of mouldering rushes, nor any other sign of recent occupancy. The walls were a greenish-grey colour, but it was impossible to guess, at the first cursory glance, whether this was caused by dirt, or by potash and sulphur mixed with the wash of lime. There was nothing here of interest, and I returned to the passageway.

I stepped into the courtyard, which was rinsed with a pale golden light in the rays of the westering sun. The covered gallery to my right threw long, slanting shadows across the paving stones, where soft cushions of moss and tall stems of nettle and hairy bittercress were forcing themselves between the uneven flags. The well and the pump stood close to the kitchen door, which I unlocked with my key. There being nothing there that I had not already seen in the company of Master Cozin, I mounted the ladder to the storeroom and servants’ quarters above. The same musty odour of damp and disuse met me here as it did everywhere else in the house, and the bareness of the boards, denuded of all hint of human habitation, only served to emphasize the fact that it was surely some months since anyone had slept here. The walls had again been lime-washed, but this time there was no doubt that red oxide had been added to the quick lime to give it a pinkish colour.

A door in the far wall led into the storeroom, which had a faint, lingering scent of apples to sweeten the less pleasant smells. But this, too, was empty except for a sack of grain in the corner. Sharp teeth had torn a hole in the cloth, and corn was spilling on to the floor. A bright-eyed mouse turned to look at me as I entered, then, with a whisk of its tail and a scutter of tiny claws, disappeared into a hole between the boards. In the corner directly opposite me was another door, and this, when unlocked, opened on to the gallery connecting the two blocks of buildings which comprised the whole.

I descended to the kitchen, locked the door from the inside, and returned once more to the storeroom, stepping out on to the covered way and again meticulously locking the door behind me. The planking shook and creaked a little beneath my weight as I walked the length of the courtyard wall, and I was glad of the handrail for support. Nevertheless, the structure seemed safe enough and in no danger of collapsing.

Yet another door at the other end, when unlocked, gave access to the bedchambers and upstairs parlour of the main dwelling.

The room in which I found myself was obviously the chief of the bedchambers, judging by the four-poster bed, hung all around with blue silk draperies. A rich green damask coverlet was draped over what proved, on examination, to be a goose-feather mattress, and the walls were painted with an intricate pattern in red and white which could only have been done at considerable cost and by a skilled craftsman. There were two beautifully carved clothes chests, one supporting a six-branched pewter candelabra, bearing the stumps of pure wax candles, while the floor was still scattered with rushes and dried herbs, now brittle and brown with age. A curtain, drawn across one corner of the room, concealed two chamber-pots and a bathtub.