by Jason Vail
A flicker of movement caught his eye at the mouth of the alley between Mistress Bartelott’s house and the shoemaker’s: it had to be a startled Tad Thumper scurrying out of sight.
“You’ve been out of touch, Master Gilbert!” Stephen said over his shoulder.
“Of course I’ve been out of touch! You sent me to Wales! Tell me what I’ve missed!”
“I haven’t the time! I’ll have to tell you when we get there!” Stephen turned the corner onto Broad Street and started up the hill. The street was bathed in moonlight, each rock and rut sharply outlined as if drawn on canvas with charcoal.
Gilbert found it harder going on the slope than on Bell Lane’s relative flatness. He immediately fell farther and farther behind. His gasping receded as the distance between them grew. “Dear God, man, how do you expect me to be of any assistance when you keep me in the dark?”
When Stephen reached High Street, he encountered a pair of silhouetted figures in the middle of the street walking without a lantern in the direction of the castle — a man with his arm around a woman. They scuttled off at his approach, not wanting to be noticed. For they, like Stephen, were out after curfew.
He plunged into College Lane, which was in shadow due to the angle of the moon. In moments he was at the Baynard House door. He pounded on it with his fist, gasping to catch his breath. Gilbert finally came up behind him and opened his mouth to ask a question, but Stephen ignored him and continued pounding.
After a long wait, the door cracked open. The white blob of a face peered through the crack. It was one of the young grooms, a boy barely old enough to shave.
“Who is it?” a man’s hard voice asked behind him.
The boy peered at Stephen as if he was having trouble telling who it was in the dark.
“It’s Stephen Attebrook,” Stephen said to make things easier for him.
“What do you want?” the invisible man asked in a hostile voice.
Stephen recognized the voice. It belonged to Margaret’s retainer, James. He overlooked the man’s lack of respect and said, “I’ve come to see Olivia Baynard.”
“She isn’t here.”
“What do you mean, she isn’t here?”
“Just what I said. She’s gone.”
There was the sound of scraping feet on the tiled floor inside and the low hasty mutter of voices.
Then the door swung fully open.
Holding a candle, Margaret stood there with James and Walter beside her in positions that looked very protective. Stephen noticed that each man held a dagger barely concealed from view by his thigh.
Margaret wore a nightdress with a cloak thrown over her shoulders but not drawn together enough to conceal the delicious points of her nipples beneath the thin fabric of the nightdress. Her long blonde hair was undone and cascaded in ringlets over her shoulders. She was indescribably beautiful in the golden light of the candle.
She said, “Olivia isn’t here, Stephen.”
“Where did she go?”
“I don’t know. She was gone when I returned. No one knows what’s happened to her. It’s as though she’s vanished from the face of the earth.”
“She was invited for dinner at the castle Monday,” Margaret said. “She went out and never came back.”
Stephen stopped in front of the fire, which flared from the wood shavings the boy had thrown on the banked coals to restart the blaze. “And no one’s seen her?”
“We asked, Stephen,” Margaret said. “She didn’t reach the castle. She walked out the front door of the house and disappeared.”
“You’re sure she isn’t there after all?”
“Where?”
“The castle. It has to be Clement’s doing.” Briefly he told her about the pile of dung he had found. “We followers were ourselves followed, it seems. It had to be him or one of his people. He, more than anyone else, would understand the significance of Howard Makepeese hiding at Marlbrook.”
“What significance is there to that?” Gilbert asked, bewildered.
Margaret looked grim and answered Stephen instead of Gilbert. “And he beat me back to Ludlow.”
“With enough time to spare to snatch Olivia,” Stephen said.
Margaret put her face in her hands. “Oh, God forgive me for stopping for a drink.”
“How can it be Clement’s doing — if you pardon my asking,” Gilbert said.
Neither Margaret nor Stephen satisfied him now. Margaret looked up and said to Stephen, “I thought she might be at the castle. So I sent Walter to enquire if she was there, but she’s not. I trust Walter to be sure.”
“Damn,” Stephen said.
“What is going on?” Gilbert burst out.
“Clement is after the list in competition with Stephen,” Margaret said at last tiring of his interruptions. “The fact Makepeese was hiding at Marlbrook has to mean that she sent him there.” As she spoke, her eyes met Stephen’s. He nodded. She went on, “If she sent him there, she must be involved in the disappearance of the list and may know something about its whereabouts. Clement must understand this, so she is in terrible danger. Clement has convinced Valence to give him the power to arrest and question people. An unfair advantage, I’m afraid, and they will not be tender when they use it.”
“Oh, my,” Gilbert said. “No one is safe.”
“Quite so,” Margaret said with bitterness. “One is never safe from men with unchecked power. You can be sure they will abuse it.”
Stephen stopped pacing. “I think I know one place to look for her.”
Chapter 21
Stephen stepped out into the cold October night. He looked up and down College Lane. It was quiet and dark. He saw no one. Nor did he expect to. Not yet anyway.
He turned north toward Linney Gate at the end of the lane. It was a sally port, wide enough to admit only a man on horseback. Like the other gates through the town wall, it was barred for the night. But since this was a time of peace and to save money, there was no warden to guard it. Stephen lifted the bar, opened the door, and slipped through to the other side.
No bridge spanned the town ditch here because the gate was not supposed to be used except in emergencies, although a footpath dipped across the ditch and led downhill through a moon-washed field. Stephen closed the gate and pressed himself against the wall to one side and waited.
Presently, the gate door opened a crack. There was a pause, as though whoever had cracked it was looking out to see if the coast was clear. Then it swung a bit farther. Stephen sensed rather than saw the small thin figure that slipped through the opening.
Stephen grabbed a handful of collar, intending to sweep the boy’s feet from beneath him. But the boy avoided the sweep, kicked Stephen painfully in the leg, and raked Stephen’s hands away from his collar.
Then he ducked back through the door to escape.
Stephen rubbed his injured shin, embarrassed that the boy had got away.
The gate opened again, but this time there was no stealth in it. Gilbert stood in the gap. “The little tripe proved to be a bit too much for you, eh?” he said.
“Shut up,” Stephen said. His pride was too wounded for any other reply.
Gilbert stepped aside and Stephen could see the dark figures of James and Walter, who held Tad Thumper between them.
“Careful,” Stephen said. “It’s Will Thumper’s boy. He carries a knife and knows how to use it.”
“We found it,” James said. He handed the knife to Stephen, who stuck it in his belt.
Stephen leaned down to Tad’s level. Even in partial shadow, the boy’s face was knotted with defiance. “You know, Tad,” Stephen said softly, “these men are not gentle. If you don’t answer my questions honestly, they may become angry. They are not my men. They belong to Lady Olivia’s good friend, who worries about her welfare. I have no control over what they might do.”
Tad spat and told Stephen to place one body part into another.
“Your father has done a terrible thing, Tad,” Stephe
n said calmly. “I know he did it because Clement asked him to, but in this thing Clement is not acting for Valence. His lordship will be very angry when he finds out. Clement will not be able to protect him his time. Or you, or your family.”
Tad cursed him again, but his manner was a little less vigorous than before.
“But she has a good friend, who will take up her cause,” Stephen said. “And if the lady is not redeemed, your family will be killed — if not all at once, then one after another. Since we have you, I am afraid we will have to hand you over to James and Walter, here.”
The boy’s lips tightened, but he said nothing.
“But if you tell us what we need to know,” Stephen went on, “no harm will befall you or anyone.”
Tad was quiet for a moment. “You won’t hurt anyone?”
“I don’t want anyone to be hurt, if it can be avoided. We just want the lady back.”
Tad was quiet again. Then he said, “All right.”
“Is she at your dad’s house?” The Thumper house in Lower Galdeford, beyond the priory, Harry had said.
“Yes.”
“How is she?”
“I don’t know. She’s kept in one of the back rooms. I never see her.”
“But she’s alive.”
“Was this afternoon when I went to supper. I could hear her crying for a time before —” he broke off.
“Before what?”
“Before dad beat her some to make her shut up.”
“Well, at least she’s still alive,” Stephen said more to the men than to the boy.
Tad grunted. “That won’t last long. Clement said that tomorrow we’re supposed to take her out in the countryside and . . .” He hissed and jerked his head.
Stephen’s gut curled. Clement meant to have Olivia’s throat cut. If they didn’t free her tonight, she’d die tomorrow. “Show me the layout of your house,” he said. He knelt down and gestured to Walter to release one of Tad’s arms.
The boy traced the outlines of a roughly U-shaped structure with a finger in a patch of road illuminated by a spot of moonlight. At Stephen’s prompting, he indicated one of the wings as the storeroom where Olivia was a prisoner.
“Thank you, Tad,” Stephen said, standing up. “If you’re lying about this, though, you know I can’t protect you. It’s a hard world, and I’m sorry.”
“You won’t let dad know I told you?” Tad asked, suddenly anxious.
“Certainly not.”
“What do we do with him?” James asked.
“Take him back to the house,” Stephen said. “Better tie him up and have one of the grooms sit with him. He’s as slippery as an eel. It’s the only way we’ll be able to hold him.”
“Yessir,” James said.
They retreated into the gloom of College Lane, while Stephen and Gilbert waited at the gate.
When James and Walter returned, Margaret was with them, muffled in a voluminous cloak against the cold so that not even her face was visible.
“Margaret,” Stephen said worriedly, “this is no place for a woman. There could be fighting.”
“They told me what’s happened. Olivia will need aid and comfort you’ll not be able to provide her,” Margaret said stiffly. “Besides, I can use a knife as well as any man.” She gave a short laugh and added, “Ask James. He taught me how.”
James grinned ruefully and nodded.
“Good,” Margaret said. “Let’s be off. Time is wasting.”
“And we’re going – where?” Gilbert wheezed as Stephen led them into the town ditch.
“Thumper’s house.”
“Ah, of course. I should have known.”
Under the wooden bridge at Corve Street, they surprised three sleeping figures huddled by the remains of a fire: beggars or travelers who could not afford accommodations. The sleepers sat up in alarm at the group’s approach, but Stephen spoke to them in warning. “Stay where you are. We’re passing through and mean you no harm.”
Even so, the beggars scrambled out of the way and stood to one side, watching the group pass beneath the bridge.
The ditch turned sharply to the right, following the town wall, and in less than a hundred yards they were at Galdeford Road, which announced its presence by another wooden bridge over the ditch.
Stephen climbed out of the ditch to the road and took the right fork, which led southeast. As he passed the stone cross at the fork, he saw an owl sitting on one if its limbs. The owl raised its wings and hooted. Stephen brought a finger to his lips and shushed it. The owl regarded them gravely and did not fly away. Stephen was glad to see the owl. Owls always meant good luck.
After a hundred yards, the lines of houses on either side of the road ended abruptly. On the left was an open pasture, on the right an apple orchard.
Gilbert tapped Stephen’s shoulder. Stephen stopped to see what he wanted. Gilbert gestured at the orchard.
“You might want to go that way,” Gilbert said. “The back door is often better for this kind of work than the front.”
“Do you know the way?” Stephen asked.
“I wandered in that field a few times in my youth.”
Stephen grinned. “Stealing apples or chasing girls?”
Gilbert harrumphed and pretended to be offended. “Neither, my boy. Seeking spiritual guidance alone in the wilderness.”
“Let’s not waste any more time,” Margaret said behind them.
“Yes, my lady,” Gilbert said hastily.
Gilbert clambered with some difficulty over the wattle fence separating the orchard from the road. The others followed with considerable more agility, including Margaret, who proved she could leap a fence as well as any man even when encumbered by skirts.
Gilbert then led them single file through the grove, weaving among the trees, blobs of moon shadow beneath each one, stumbling occasionally on late-ripening apples the harvesters had not found in the tall grass.
Buildings loomed to the left. One of them looked like the tower to a church. As they crept on and the view changed, Stephen could see it was unfinished. Scaffolding clung to one side and there was a notch in one edge of the top where the stonework was not complete.
Presently they came to another wattle fence. A manure pile lay just beyond it, a gray hump in the bright moonlight. The pile and a shed beside it shielded them from view from the house.
“You’re sure this is it?” Stephen whispered.
“Quite sure,” Gilbert said confidently.
They hopped this fence, too.
“Are there dogs?” Stephen asked as they reached the edge of the manure pile and the house came into full view. It was a rambling, squat, timbered house beneath its tall cap. It looked as though it had been added onto several times, and some if it was so old that it seemed about to crumble before their eyes.
“How should I know that?” Gilbert asked. “We’ll soon find out if there are, won’t we.”
Stephen imagined a big mastiff bursting out of a shadow to fasten on his leg. He hefted the club James had given him at the town gate, wishing he had a sword instead. “I’ll go. The rest of you wait here.”
He was half way across the yard to the house before he realized that none of them had obeyed him. They’d only hesitated so that he got some distance ahead, then followed. He had a pang of anger at being disobeyed, but then, his little band wasn’t an army and couldn’t be expected to obey like one.
He reached the house and crouched beneath one of the rear windows on the wing Tad had indicated in his map. The window was shuttered of course against the night.
Gilbert knelt beside him. “Now what?” he whispered almost soundlessly. “Can’t exactly knock on the door now, can we?”
Stephen brought his finger to his lips in alarm, fearful that even that tiny sound could be heard indoors. The truth was, he hadn’t really thought out what to do once they had arrived. He hoped that the others besides Gilbert hadn’t guessed that yet.
Stephen stood up and examined the window.
Right away, he noticed something odd about it. Normally shutters opened outward. He had been expecting this and had thought he might pull the trick he had learned for opening hinged devices: forcing out the pins in the hinge and just removing the shutter. But since the shutters opened inward all the hinges were on the inside of the house. It was almost as if whoever had hung the shutters had anticipated that thieves might try to gain access that way.
He’d have to find another way in.
He ran his fingers along the plaster between the timbers that formed the frame of the house. An exploratory tap told him the plaster was unusually thick and solid. He’d need an ax to break through the plaster and wattle between the timbers and even if he had an ax, it would make enough noise to wake the inhabitants.
“Lift me to the roof,” Stephen whispered to James and Walter.
They looked at him as if he had lost his mind. A plan came to him then, and Stephen whispered quickly into James ear. James looked doubtful, then smiled and nodded. The two grooms each took a leg and lifted Stephen up so he could grasp a handful of thatch. He hung on, worried about sliding off because the roof was so steep.
Roofing thatch is nothing more than thick bundles of straw tied together and lashed to slat supports. Sometimes it was thick enough and strong enough that a man could stand on it without falling through. But often the bundling was not so thick, and it was not uncommon, when people ventured onto roofs, that they fell through to the rooms below. Stephen took out his dagger and began to dig through the bundles beneath him, hoping this was a thin roof but also concerned that it might give way, as had happened the last time he had tried climbing onto a thatched roof.
The cracking of the thatch made a lot of noise in the quiet of the night. Stephen cringed at the racket, but he was too committed now to slow down or stop.
Within a few moments, he’d dug a hole by cutting the cords holding the bundles together which was broad enough to slip through. Although he now had his entryway, he did not go through yet. He looked for James, who was trotting across from the shed by the manure pile.