I shook my head. ‘It was standing by the moat. Too far away for me to tell if it were a man or a woman, even. It could have been anyone.’
The steward pursed his lips. ‘If it was on this side of the moat, it most likely means that the person is from within the manor. The gates are locked at night and the moat’s deep and takes some swimming … Ah well! I’ll report to Dame Audrea that the boy here’ — he nodded in Humphrey’s direction — ‘was riding the night mare and fell out of bed. But I repeat my warning, Master Anthony. Take care. And keep your bedchamber door bolted at night. And you can wipe that silly smile off your face. I mean it when I say that you’re in great danger.’
Eight
Morning brought another beautiful day and a feeling that the night’s events had been merely the stuff of dreams, part of the ridiculous muddle that had haunted my sleep. But as I lay on my back looking up at the bed-canopy, which, together with the curtains, I now saw depicted the story of Diana and Actaeon, the reality of what had happened began to dawn. I had indeed seen someone staring up at this window, and, later, someone had tried to get into this room. Yet the episode had had its humorous side, and I couldn’t avoid a snort of laughter as I pictured three grown men, as naked as the day they were born, struggling to get out of the door all at once, jostling and pushing like overgrown schoolboys. And before that again, the image of myself sent sprawling by the sheer accident of Humphrey Attleborough falling out of bed just at that particular moment contained all the elements of a May Day farce. I let out another snort, while at the same time cursing the ill luck that had prevented us from collaring the would-be intruder.
‘What’s making you so merry?’ enquired Anthony Bellknapp, raising himself on one elbow and smiling down at me.
I jumped. I hadn’t realized that he was awake. I explained and his smile broadened into a grin.
‘All the same,’ I went on, growing serious, ‘you should heed what Steward Applegarth told you. Be careful. Either that, or … or …’
‘Or moderate my behaviour,’ he finished for me as I faltered to a stop, suddenly conscious of my position as a guest under his roof.
‘Well … yes.’
He laughed. ‘We’ll see. And now I must get up or my mother will have usurped my position at the breakfast table and my prerogative of speeding our overnight visitors on their way. The brothers at least will have enough gossip to take back to Glastonbury to keep the entire abbey agog for a month.’ He yelled, ‘Humphrey!’ and threw a pillow at his still snoring henchman. ‘Clothes, razor, man! Quickly!’
While the servant, half asleep, pulled on shirt and hose, and went off to the kitchen to fetch hot water and soap, I took the opportunity to ask my host if I might stay a few more days until my ankle had completely mended.
‘Stay as long as you like,’ was the careless answer. ‘You have my permission and that’s all that need concern you. I shall give instructions that you are to be treated like any other guest. You can continue to share my bed at night. In fact, I think I shall feel safer if you do.’ He eyed me shrewdly. ‘I have a suspicion that you’re not here just because you’ve hurt yourself; that you’ve some purpose in mind. No, no! Don’t bother denying it. I’m not accusing you of anything. You don’t worry me. I’ve told you. You can remain at Croxcombe as long as you wish.’ As Humphrey reappeared, weighed down by a pail of steaming water, he repeated with even greater emphasis, ‘I’m the master here now.’
It was several hours later, when the departing travellers had been sped on their various ways, when not only breakfast, but dinner also had been eaten, and after the chaplain had led us in morning prayers and the household officers had been summoned to Anthony’s presence to receive their instructions for the day, that Rose Micheldever sought me out to remind me about our visit to Wells. Not that I needed any reminding, my one reservation again being that I might not be able to walk the three miles there and back without proving a drag on my companion.
‘That’s all right,’ Rose said, smiling. ‘Dame Audrea keeps two donkeys for jogging about the countryside, and she’s said that I may borrow them. She sometimes does so when I go into Wells. Your dog can run alongside.’
‘Does she or your husband know that I’m going with you?’
Rose was evasive. ‘They know somebody’s going with me, naturally. It wouldn’t do for me to ride about on my own.’ Her underlip protruded defiantly. ‘Edward thinks it’s one of the grooms,’ she admitted. ‘I expect the mistress thinks the same.’
I hesitated, but only briefly. I had no desire to cause trouble either for myself or Rose. On the other hand, I urgently wished to meet her brother and she seemed to have no qualms about the consequences of her invitation. So I went.
As readers of these chronicles already know, beasts of burden and I do not get on well together, but a donkey was a great deal easier to manage than a horse, although its plodding gait meant a slower journey and therefore protracted discomfort. By the time we reached Wells, I was thankful to dismount and stretch my aching legs.
It was many years since I had been in the city itself, and I had forgotten how awe-inspiringly the cathedral’s domineering presence diminished the buildings round about. Wells was, as it had always been — and for all I know, always will be — first and foremost the great Church of Saint Andrew. Everything else huddled in its shadow and paled into insignificance. The conduit still brought water into the marketplace from the wells, bubbling up from beneath the earth, that gave the city its name and where, as a young boy, I had gathered with my friends to play fivestones and catch-as-catch-can or to sail stick and leaf ‘boats’ in the water. The usual clutch of beggars had congregated beneath the porch, where they had taken shelter ever since it was completed earlier in the century, under the auspices of Bishop Beckington. That indefatigable builder had also overseen the row of houses and shops adjacent to the porch, one of which displayed an open counter on which reposed a butcher’s block, knife and saw, with joints of meat swinging on metal hooks beneath an awning. Two men, in bloodstained leather aprons, were attending to a regular supply of customers, the sure sign of a prosperous community.
The elder of the pair glanced in our direction with a delighted smile as Rose, without waiting for my assistance, slid from the back of her donkey with a cry of ‘Father!’
I have frequently noticed throughout my life that butchers are big, jolly men (well, I suppose you need a sense of humour if you’re cutting animals into collops all day long), and Master Bignell was no exception. He had a round, red face with twinkling blue eyes, a mouth that curled upwards at the corners in a perpetual smile, and even his nose seemed to be nothing more than a circular dab in the middle of his other features. I could recognize a certain likeness between father and daughter, and suspected that, later in life, when her present prettiness had faded, Rose would probably grow plump and matronly with only an echo of her former good looks.
The second man, whom I assumed — rightly, as it turned out — to be Ronan Bignell, the person I had come to see, was taller and somewhat leaner than either his father or sister, but with the same friendly, happy disposition; a fact that made him an obvious favourite among the women, and went some way to explaining the popularity of this particular butcher’s stall. He greeted Rose affectionately, leaning across to plant a smacking kiss on her cheek, while his sire, abandoning a customer in the middle of serving her, came out from behind the counter to wrap his daughter in an all-embracing hug.
‘You’re looking well, my girl.’ He patted her belly. ‘Not increasing yet?’ But when she shook her head, he seemed less disappointed than resigned. ‘Well, well! These things won’t be hurried. Where’s Edward? Not with you? And who’s this?’
He eyed me with a certain amount of suspicion, and I guessed that he was under no illusion as to his daughter’s predilection for men. She had made a good marriage both for herself and her family, and Butcher Bignell wanted nothing to spoil it.