'It is said to be very nutritious, Lady Matilda. It will help build you up after your awful ordeal,' she said virtuously. Matilda, whose solid body seemed in little need of rebuilding, thanked her effusively and glowed in the warmth of the friendship of this comely, cultured and altogether delightful young woman. John's wife, who seemed already restored to her normal health and spirits after the attack, sent Lucille scurrying out to the cookshed for some of Mary's sweet pastries and invited Joan to be seated in the other cowled chair before the good fire that was crackling in the wide hearth.
They spent a few minutes in polite conversation about Matilda's rapid recovery, the icy weather and the Holy Innocents' festivities in the cathedral the previous day.
The pastries arrived, but Joan declined the offer of wine, as befitted a sober, abstemious widow. Matilda had tried on several occasions to winkle out more detail about Joan's previous life, such as where exactly in Somerset she had lived and how her late husband had died, but she had seemed somewhat evasive, which increased Matilda's curiosity all the more. She tried again now, with little more success, and eventually decided that grief was causing the younger woman to suppress her memories of her former life.
Though the rest of the hall was as cold as a church crypt, the blazing fire overheated their fronts, and the wooden wraparound seats with the arched cowls above kept off much of the pervasive chill. The radiance of the logs, which had driven Brutus back a few feet, encouraged the two ladies to open their pelisses, the lined overgarments they wore on top of their kirtles. Joan had arrived with a heavy hooded mantle as an outer garment, which Mary had draped across the table, and Matilda noticed that it and Joan's pelisse, though of excellent quality, were worn from much laundering and had some patching and darning here and there. It was clear that she was in straightened circumstances compared to her previous life as the lady of a manor, and the older woman's heart went out to her new friend. She even toyed with the idea of subterfuges to improve Joan's wardrobe without appearing to be offering charity.
The warmth of their companionship was evident, the talk moving on to their mutual acquaintances in the congregations of St Olave's and the cathedraclass="underline" Joan's cousin, Gillian le Bret, seemed to have already introduced her to a considerable number of people in the city.
Their amiable talk went on for almost an hour until disaster struck. On her previous visits, Matilda had not told Joan all the details of her frightening experience, but now that the event was fading a little, she felt able to relate what had actually happened.
'The devil who assaulted me so cruelly said that he had killed three times already and that my brother Richard and another would also pay the price for Hempston!' Matilda said this in a tone of high drama, not noticing the sudden effect the single word had on her friend.
Joan went white and she almost gaped at Matilda.
'Hempston? Did you say Hempston? Surely that cannot be true,' she uttered in an intense whisper.
'It was indeed — some manor down near Totnes, so my husband says,' continued Matilda, blithely unaware of the fuse she was lighting. 'It seems that a rogue knight was expelled from there several years ago and now heads a band of moorland outlaws. Now he is embarking on a murderous crusade against those he claims wronged him. He attacked me so that I might convey his threats to his intended victims!'
Joan stood up so suddenly that the chair grated against the flagstones with a squeal that startled Brutus from his dozing. She stood and stared down at Matilda as if the lady of the house had suddenly grown horns and forked tail.
'That is impossible, mistress! Why are you making such a monstrous accusation?'
Matilda gaped up at her for a moment, then her mouth snapped shut like a steel trap. This was her house, and she was not going to be spoken to in that fashion.
'Watch your tongue, young lady. That is hardly a courteous thing to say!' She was torn between astonishment and annoyance.
'What you allege cannot be true!' blurted out Joan, shaking with emotion. Then she seemed to crumple and flopped back into the chair to bury her face in her hands. 'I have not been entirely frank with you, Lady Matilda,' she sobbed through her fingers. 'I am not who I say I am!'
By now the lady of the house was bewildered. She stared at the woman weeping in her hall, wondering for a moment who was going mad, the visitor or herself.
'Explain yourself, for heaven's sake!' she demanded.
Joan raised her face, tears streaming down her cheeks.
'You have been so kind to me, and I repay you thus, Matilda,' she gulped. 'My name really is Joan and I am the wife of a Crusader and a knight — but his name is not de Whiteford, it is Sir Nicholas de Arundell, of Hempston Arundell.'
Matilda rose slowly from her chair, her face suffused with anger. 'You are the wife of the devil who attacked me? How dare you come to this house, woman?'
'He did not attack you, madam,' screamed Joan. 'He would never do such a thing, he is an honourable man and was many miles away that night.'
'Get out of my house, damn you!' thundered the coroner's wife. 'If it was not your man in person, then it was some villain sent by him to carry out his vile deeds.'
She advanced on the hapless woman, who left her chair and backed away towards the door, her hands held out in supplication.
'I swear Nicholas is innocent, we were deprived of our manor and our life together by unscrupulous men, your brother being one of them.'
This was hardly the right thing to say in the circumstances and caused Matilda, her rage clouding her common sense, to become even more incensed. She bore down on the near-hysterical Joan, who turned tail and scurried to the door, sobbing as she fumbled with the latch. A moment later, there was a thud as the heavy street door swung shut behind her.
Matilda was left standing in the middle of the flagged floor, her anger subsiding as quickly as it had arisen.
She looked around and saw that Joan's cloak was still thrown across the table, the younger woman having run out into the icy weather with only her pelisse to shelter her. Matilda picked up the cloak and sadly put her cheek to it, already deeply regretting the irremediable loss of such a special friend. She was still not able to get her mind around the extraordinary claim that Joan had made, but instinctively she knew it to be true. Unusually for her, she vehemently wished that John was here now, so that he could explain what all this meant and reassure her that her friend had merely had a temporary fit of aberration, though she knew that this was wishful thinking.
Her dazed mind was suddenly interrupted by Mary appearing at the inner door.
'Is everything all right, mistress?' she asked concernedly, looking around the empty hall. 'I thought I heard shouting. Has your guest gone?' Matilda, who was usually brusque with the cook-maid, slowly shook her head and replied quietly, 'There's nothing amiss, girl. And, yes, the lady has gone.' When Mary had left, Matilda sank back into her chair, still clutching the mantle, and stared into the fire. 'Oh God, what's happening?' she murmured to the Almighty.
* * *
De Wolfe and his officer reached Exeter just as the gates were closing at dusk, and Gwyn went straight up to Rougemont to eat, drink and play dice with the men-at-arms for the rest of the evening. John made his way back to Martin's Lane and, after seeing Odin settled in the stables opposite his house, went home in mellow anticipation of at last getting warm before a good fire, with a jug of mulled wine and the pleasure of Mary's cooking.