Having escorted Ediva back to her home, Ralph Delchard and his two knights were still in the town when the commotion started. Men who had been given a name by Wulfgeat had now had a whole day to brood on it. Some had taken ale; some were intoxicated with revenge.
All of them could wait no longer to bring the malefactor to justice.
Arming themselves and gathering more people as they went along, they met in the market square at Bedwyn before riding off into the twilight.
“What’s afoot?” Ralph asked of a passer-by.
“They know the killer of Alric Longdon,” said the man.
“A wolf?”
“No, my lord. A dog that can savage like a wolf.”
“Who owns it?”
“The Witch of Crofton.”
“Who? ”
“Emma is her name. She can weave spells.”
“Can you be sure her dog was responsible?”
“No question of it, my lord.”
“What proof do you have?”
“A stranger rode into the town this afternoon. He met Emma on the road and stopped to speak to her. He says the beast attacked him and would have torn his throat out if he had not run away.” The man pointed after the horsemen. “They ride to Crofton to put an end to this terror we all feel.”
Ralph had seen an enraged mob before and he knew how easily it could get out of hand. Though there was a number of respectable burgesses in the pack, it also contained more headstrong and violent characters. Whatever this Emma had done or not done, her chances of a fair hearing were nonexistent. The best Ralph could do was to prevent bloodshed. He barked an order to his men and the three of them were soon leaping into their own saddles. It was not difficult to pick up the trail of the fury that thundered ahead of them.
Wulfgeat took no part in the communal vengeance and he was distressed to be its author. Emma’s dog might well have been the killer, but that did not necessarily mean that she had set it on to do the deed. It was often seen roaming on the edges of Savernake and was dispatched with a loud curse or a hurled stone. If the dog had strayed into the forest on the evening in question, its attack on the miller might have been a random act of madness or even provoked by his antagonism to the beast. A man who can beat a woman black-and-blue would not hold back his foot from kicking her dog.
There was another element in the situation which made Wulfgeat pause and showed him again how little he really knew and understood his only child. Leofgifu was alarmed when she heard how the other men had reacted that morning to the possibility-no more than that at this stage-that Emma of Crofton was implicated here, and she confessed for the first time that she had turned in extremity to the fearsome woman whom everyone called a witch. When her husband was slowly dying from a wasting disease, no doctor could find a medicine to soften his pain. It became so unbearable that he was ready to try anything, and Leofgifu sent to Crofton. Emma was quick to come and quicker still to prescribe a special potion for Leofgifu’s husband. His condition did not improve, but the pain faded away completely.
“If that is witchcraft,” Leofgifu had said, “then I welcome it, Father.
My husband had suffered so much.”
Those words were spoken at the start of the day. As it drew to its close, Wulfgeat and his daughter stood at the window and watched the horses ride past. The dog would be hacked down before its mistress was even allowed to defend it. Emma of Crofton was an eccentric and unappealing woman who eked out a life that disgusted God-fearing folk, but she did have someone to share her squalid and lonely life.
That partner was about to be cruelly taken from her and she herself not spared.
“Stop them, Father,” begged Leofgifu.
“It is too late, child.”
“Go after them and turn them back.”
“They would not listen to me.”
“Emma of Crofton may not be guilty,” she urged. “And even if she is, this is no civilised way to deal with her. Why does it take all those men to converse with an unarmed woman and her dog? That is bravery indeed!”
“They fear her witchcraft.”
“My husband did not.”
“Alric Longdon was killed,” he reminded her.
“Yes,” she retorted, cheeks aflame, “and there is not a man who gallops in that party who is not pleased with the death. They hated the miller and showed it in ways that beggar description. His widow has told me all.”
“She also told you that Emma had put a curse on him.”
“Would you not curse a man who beat you soundly?”
“A witch’s spell can murder any man.”
“Then why has she not murdered fifty or more who have reviled her these past years? Emma may be innocent.”
“The widow does not think so.”
“She speaks in sorrow and anger,” said Leofgifu. “Hilda and the boy are in despair. Their man has been taken away. She named Emma, but she has no proof.”
“Nor will they try to find it when they reach Crofton.”
“Her appearance alone will condemn her.”
Wulfgeat nodded and plucked nervously at his beard. He had been too swift to throw the name to the others. More evidence should first have been gathered against her and in a more discreet way. Wulfgeat was a hard man, but he prided himself on being a fair one. Setting a crazed mob on a lonely woman could not be construed as an act of fairness. He raised his shoulders in apology, but Leofgifu would not be appeased by that. If Emma and the dog were destroyed by the self-appointed posse, then she herself would be partly to blame for entrusting her father with what she had heard from the miller’s widow.
Another thought twisted a knife within her. Supposing that both woman and animal were subsequently cleared of blame when the real culprit was caught? Leofgifu and her father would be chained by guilt for the rest of their days.
“How can I make amends?” asked Wulfgeat.
“Speak to Hilda yourself.”
“No,” he refused. “That is asking too much. To give them shelter is one thing. But you promised me that I would never have to see either of them. Stand by your word.”
“Things have changed,” said Leofgifu. “See her, Father.”
“What purpose is served?”
“A form of reconciliation. It is bad enough to lose a husband without being spurned by everyone who hated him. We are the only place who would take her in, save the abbey.” She moved across to clutch his arm. “Listen to her for my sake. She rambles in her speech, but you will have a clearer understanding of it than I. It is not just his death that she talks about but the land that is now disputed before the commission.”
“What land?” he said.
“Two hides alongside the river. Their mill stands on part of it. The abbey claims the holding.”
“And so does Hugh de Brionne.”
“There is a new voice raised,” said Leofgifu. “She tried to tell me why but lost her way in tears. All I did gather was this. It was Alric who summoned the commissioners by letter. He started this debate.”
Wulfgeat pondered. Fierce arguments over land were part of normal life in a town like Bedwyn. Boundary disputes had enlivened its temper for hundreds of years. Each time they were settled, they were redrawn; each time a new disposition was accepted, along would come Viking or Dane or rebel Saxon to redefine it again. Edward the Confessor’s reign saw yet another shift in property, confirmed during the brief reign of Harold, but the whole process was started once again by the Normans. Ownership was at times a lottery. After the Conquest, when the invaders shared out the spoils of war, Wulfgeat had lost holdings of his own to the abbey and to Hugh de Brionne. It was a wound that had festered ever since. He had been dispossessed.
If Hilda knew anything that might challenge the rights of a Norman abbot and a Norman lord, he was very anxious to hear it. There might be personal advantage for him as well as deep satisfaction. He assessed the implications of the new situation. Undying hatred of the miller fought with bald self-interest.