‘Who are you? And what do you want?’ she demanded.
I explained my errand. ‘Mistress Gifford invited me here. She hoped, I think, to buy some of my goods if there was anything that took her fancy.’ I favoured the woman with my most ingratiating smile, but there was no lightening of her rather sour expression.
‘Indeed?’ she queried. ‘She has said nothing to me about it.’
‘Ask Mistress Glover,’ I suggested. ‘She knows. She was present when the invitation was given.’
The housekeeper’s features set in lines of rigid disapproval. ‘I ask Mistress Glover no more than I have to,’ was the uncompromising answer.
‘Thank you, Mistress Tuckett,’ said a quiet voice behind her, making the housekeeper jump and spin round. Neither of us had heard or noticed Katherine Glover’s approach.
The two women glared at one another with such naked hatred in their eyes that I wondered how Berenice Gifford could tolerate the presence of both under one roof. But it was the elder of the two who eventually backed down and moved away, proceeding at a stately pace towards one of the outbuildings and vanishing inside it.
‘Berenice has been expecting you,’ Katherine Glover said. ‘Follow me.’
I supposed the familiarity was natural since they were future sisters; but at the same time, I couldn’t help wondering what the relationship between them might be if the marriage of Beric and his betrothed never took place. Would Katherine Glover one day find herself returned to the poverty and squalor of her parents’ cottage, all her erstwhile hopes and dreams lying in ruins?
The main entrance to the house led straight into the great hall with its high-raftered roof and old-fashioned, central hearth. Large, tapestry-covered screens stood at either end of the room. The one inside the door by which Mistress Glover and I had just entered was, presumably, to keep out the courtyard draughts, whilst I supposed that the second helped lessen the smells of cooking that emanated from the kitchens. A minstrels’ gallery ran the length of one wall, above the high table on its carpeted dais. The remainder of the floor was rush-strewn, with a couple of chairs and stools providing the only alternative seating to a stone bench set beneath the windows. These latter displayed the hall’s only attempt at modernization, the upper halves having been glazed to let in more light. The lower, however, were still covered with the original oiled parchment.
I had seen a greater parade of wealth and material comfort in ordinary gentlemen’s homes in any town that I had ever visited; and there was little evidence to suggest that Berenice Gifford had so far spent much of her recently inherited wealth on Valletort Manor. But then, I reflected, she had not expected to be the recipient of her great-uncle’s fortune and would have made no plans what to do with the money when it was hers. She was probably still getting used to the idea of being a rich woman.
Berenice herself was sitting in the single armchair that the hall boasted, close to the spluttering fire. Some logs had just been added, temporarily smothering the flames, and the smoke, rising towards the louvre in the roof, was causing someone to cough. As I approached, I saw that this someone was none other than Bartholomew Champernowne, leaning nonchalantly over the back of Berenice’s chair. I was somewhat discomfited. I had not expected to meet him there.
‘Here’s the chapman,’ Katherine Glover announced. ‘Nurse was doing her best to prevent him entering.’
So, I reflected, the housekeeper and the nurse mentioned by Jack Golightly were one and the same person, although the lady was neither as old nor as decrepit as he had described her. She looked, in fact, rather formidable. I wondered if the groom and the steward had suffered similar slander from the tongues of the gossips.
‘Ah! Chapman!’ Berenice did not rise, but, again to my surprise, extended her hand, this time in greeting. ‘I expected you before this.’ Without giving me a chance to reply, or to point out that I had arrived earlier than promised, she continued, ‘And, as you can see, I have persuaded Master Champernowne to await your coming. He feels he owes you an apology.’ She slewed around to smile up into the scowling face of her future husband. ‘Don’t you, my heart’s dearest?’
There was something so mocking in her tone that it very nearly turned the endearment into an insult, and for the first time, it occurred to me that her acceptance of Bartholomew’s proposal might have been solely in order to win her great-uncle’s approval, and not because she was in love with the young man. But if that were the case, why should she have persisted with the betrothal after Oliver Capstick’s death and after she had inherited all his money? Moreover, I could not help but remember Mathilda Trenowth’s description of Berenice at the time when the girl announced her forthcoming marriage: ‘I don’t recall ever having seen her look so happy. She was obviously very much in love.’
So I must be misreading the signs, a fact that seemed to be confirmed a moment or two later when Berenice lifted her hand and stroked Bartholomew’s cheek. ‘Say you’re sorry, like a good little boy. You promised me you would.’
I heard Katherine Glover give an impatient snort, but her mistress ignored her.
Bartholomew Champernowne said sulkily, ‘I’m sorry I sent my man to try to kill you, chapman.’
Feeling that there was no adequate answer to this, I maintained my silence. I saw Katherine curl her lip, and even Berenice suddenly seemed to realize that attempted murder could hardly be brushed aside with an apology, even supposing it to be sincere. She rose abruptly to her feet and, once more patting her betrothed’s cheek, said, ‘Go home, now, dearest. We’ll meet again tomorrow.’
‘It’s nearly dark,’ he protested indignantly. ‘I thought I was to stay the night!’
‘You haven’t seen your parents now for two whole days,’ she reminded him. ‘You were to stay until the chapman arrived, that was our bargain. Go home, Bart! Please.’ She kissed his lips. ‘We’ll be married very soon, then we can be together all the time. Goodbye, my sweet.’
‘Sweet’ was hardly the right epithet for young Champernowne, who took his departure in a very acid frame of mind. At the door, he paused and flung over his shoulder, ‘You may not see me tomorrow! It will depend on how I feel!’ The hall door slammed shut behind him.
The two women looked at one another, then Katherine said, ‘You’ll see him. While he can sponge off you, he’ll never stay away long.’
Berenice frowned. ‘Hush, Kate! That will do! Go after him for me and make sure that he leaves the manor. He’s quite capable of sneaking back again in an effort to persuade me to change my mind.’ She waited until the other woman had left the hall before turning to me. ‘Now, chapman, draw up that stool and show me what you have to sell.’
* * *
An hour later, I was sitting in the kitchen in the company of the groom and housekeeper, eating a belated supper.
Greatly to my astonishment, after buying all my ribbons and a length of Italian silk that I had carried in my pack all the way from Bristol, Berenice Gifford had insisted that I spend the night at Valletort Manor.
‘It’s far too dark now to make your way back to Modbury,’ she had said. ‘You would never find the track. You can sleep in one of the outbuildings. There’s plenty of clean straw in the stables that will make an excellent bed and keep you warm, as well. But first,’ she had added, ‘you must have food. Kate, ask Nurse to come here, would you, please?’
Katherine Glover had returned from seeing Bartholomew Champernowne off the premises some time earlier. I had noted, without seeming to do so, Berenice’s raised eyebrows as her maid had re-entered the hall, and the curt nod with which Katherine had answered the unspoken query. She had been absent for well above half an hour, if not longer, and I wondered what she could have been doing to detain her all that while. I immediately suspected that Beric Gifford was somewhere on the manor, and that his betrothed had been with him. So the last thing I had expected was an invitation to stay for the night.