‘All right!’ I said disgustedly. ‘I understand. You didn’t really hear anything. You were just making a fool of me.’
My nervousness had had the inevitable effect on my bladder, so I was forced to struggle with my laces and relieve myself in the long grasses that now rioted all over what had once been Upper Brockhurst’s main street (although a few patches of cobbles were still visible in places). Then I prised a furious Hercules away from his excavation, tucked his squirming body under my cloak and proceeded to follow the line of the old watercourse until I was back beside the Draco, maybe half a mile further on from where I had left it some fifteen minutes earlier.
I released Hercules and directed my footsteps downhill once more, walking beside the stream as it purled over its stony bed, cutting deeper and ever deeper into the new channel that the men of Lower Brockhurst had dug for it a hundred years ago. No doubt, while they were about it, those men had also knocked down and removed much of the masonry from the upper village, a free source of building material for the lower. (There was always gain to be made out of other people’s misfortune, as I had reason to know only too well. I should not now be the owner of a house in Bristol’s Small Street had it not been for the unlawful death of an innocent and lovely young woman.)
I passed again the spot where the Draco had originally curved out from Upper Brockhurst village, and which marked the end of the new watercourse. The stream plunged onwards now between a strip of scrub and some stunted trees, whose top-most branches made a pattern like the hands of skeletons arched against the gloomy afternoon sky. An easterly wind was rising that drained the landscape of what little colour it had, turning everything to a uniform greenish-grey, and the dank smell of decaying leaves and rotting wood hung in my nostrils. It was as if the year were dying around me instead of being almost within sight of spring.
I judged, from the sudden levelling out of the ground, that Hercules and I were now crossing the ridge that overlooked the valley. Abruptly abandoning the Draco, I turned to my right and went in search of the remains of Upper Brockhurst Hall. They were more difficult to find a second time amongst all that dense foliage, but eventually I repeated my fall of yesterday when I again stumbled over the lid of the well in what had once been the Hall’s outer courtyard. Hercules came bounding through the undergrowth, a silly, doggy grin on his face that looked up into mine, where I knelt on the soft, damp grass, cursing my luck.
‘It’s all very well for you,’ I complained bitterly. ‘You have four feet, and that’s what’s needed to keep your balance on this sort of ground.’ Hercules curled his lip, making it plain that he thought it a poor excuse for my clumsiness, and began to forge ahead through the overgrown grasses until I called him back. ‘Not so fast,’ I said. ‘Now we’re here, I’d like to take a look at the well.’
Hercules watched with interest, head cocked to one side, as I shed my cloak and cudgel and removed the heavy lid; but he was less enthusiastic when I began to climb down the iron ladder fixed to the wall.
‘It’s all right,’ I assured him as he whimpered and began running around the rim of the well. ‘It’s quite safe.’
But a moment or two later, I was not so sure. After a hundred and thirty years, the iron was badly corroded. I could feel the jagged flakes of rust beneath my fingers, and some rungs were missing altogether, causing me almost to lose my footing the first time that I encountered such a gap. Afterwards, I proceeded more cautiously, groping around with one foot before lowering myself another step. In at least two places, three or four rungs had rotted away together, and it was only my long legs that enabled me to find the next one safely. And here and there, the ladder was coming loose from the brickwork that lined the shaft, making the whole thing shake.
I had no idea how far off the bottom I was, and I called to Hercules, whose face I could just make out, still peering over the rim of the well. His answering bark sounded anxious and a long way off. The daylight filtering through the canopy of trees above him was dim and diffused, and I wondered if I dared descend any further without risking life and limb. Then my left boot squelched into an inch or so of soft mud, and I knew I must have reached the bottom of the ladder. My eyes had by now grown accustomed to the gloom and I was able to look around me.
The walls of the shaft were running with damp, ferns and mosses sprouting in abundance between the bricks. The floor, as I have said, was thickly coated with mud, but Dame Jacquetta was right: there was no longer any water in it. I did notice a slight seepage where the base of the shaft had been roughly patched with stones and mortar; but the diversion of the Draco, a century or more ago, had doomed the well to dry up and become a hazard to the children of the district; until, that is, the Elders of Lower Brockhurst had had a lid made to cover it. I sighed. Eris Lilywhite was most certainly not buried here. Perhaps, after all, she wasn’t yet buried anywhere. Perhaps she was still alive, although I didn’t really believe so.
Ten minutes later, I emerged from the well-shaft, dirtier and decidedly smellier than before I went down. The fetid air at the bottom seemed to have permeated all my clothes. Even Hercules, not known for his particularity, backed away from me with a reproachful look. My hands were filthy and covered with flakes of rust.
‘All right, boy,’ I said, heaving the wooden lid once more into place. ‘I know I stink. I’m hoping the breeze will blow some of it away. I’ve a clean shirt and hose in my pack, and if I have a good wash under Mistress Lilywhite’s pump, I might just be fit company for the Fair Rosamund by this evening.’
‘Ah!’ exclaimed a voice behind me, nearly making me leap out of my skin. ‘You must be the pedlar who’s lodging with the Mistress Lilywhites, or so I hear. I think I saw you at our Patronal Mass this morning.’
I turned to see the priest, his arms full of kindling, standing a yard or so away from me, smiling benevolently. My heart was still beating unpleasantly fast; but at least his presence in the woods explained the cracking twig I had heard earlier.
‘Sir Anselm,’ I said, filled with an inexplicable relief. I really was becoming far too jumpy, but the whole atmosphere of death and decay – the ruined Hall and village, the dried-up well, the tale of violent murder – was beginning to make me nervous.
The priest smiled. ‘You prefer the old-fashioned form of address, do you? My flock are more up-to-date.’
I returned his smile. ‘I’ll call you Father, if you prefer it. In Bristol, where I live, both modes of address seem to be acceptable nowadays.’
He nodded. ‘Either will do, my son. I’m not choosy. Are you returning to the Lilywhites’ now? If so, perhaps you’ll be so kind as to give me your company. But I’m afraid I must hurry you, otherwise I shall be late for Vespers, although my long-suffering flock are used to my tardiness. Tonight, however, there is to be an alefeast and a game of Nine Men’s Morris to celebrate Saint Walburga’s Day. They won’t be happy if either is delayed.’
‘I know. I’m a member of Mistress Rosamund’s team,’ I said. ‘She enlisted my services yesterday evening.’
The priest regarded me with amusement. ‘Did she? I can see why, of course. You’re a very good-looking young man.’
‘I’m married with three children,’ I answered shortly before he could start adding two and two together and making five. I put on my cloak, picked up my cudgel and whistled to Hercules. ‘Come on, boy! We’re going home.’ (Hercules wasn’t fussy. Home to him was anywhere there was warmth and food. Before he had attached himself to me, he had run wild on the hills above Bristol.)