by L. C. Tyler
‘Well enough,’ I say. Then I add, because I am sure the Colonel would wish me to say it: ‘Colonel Payne asked me to thank you for helping to carry Mr Smith to the church.’
‘Them thanks don’t come with any money, I takes it?’
Ah yes – money. I realise that, in trying to be fair to the Colonel, I have deprived Harry of payment. I reach into my purse and, though I can ill afford it, take out the King’s shilling. There’s no reason why Harry should suffer for my negligence.
‘That’s kind of the Colonel,’ says Harry, pocketing my silver. ‘Or better than usual anyhow. He were called Smith then – that fellow we took to St Peter’s?’
‘So Ben says.’
‘Friend of your’n?’
‘Not that I know of.’
‘Did you owe him some money then?’
‘Not unless he’s a Cambridge tailor.’
Harry pauses. He’s not sure whether to tell me something, but my shilling tips the balance. ‘You know he were axing a’ter you?’
‘When?’
‘Heard him at the inn, yesterday a’ternoon, axing Ben Bowman. Wanted to know if a John Grey lived in the village.’
‘What did Ben say?’
‘Not much. Just looked a bit mazed, like he’d never heard of you.’
‘Maybe Ben misheard.’
‘I heard clear enough, and I’m twice Ben’s age.’
‘Why should a Royalist spy ask after me anyway?’
Harry pauses again. ‘Couldn’t rightly say for why. But I just thought you should know. I’m not planning to tell anyone else of course. Not unless you want me to.’
‘No,’ I say. ‘I don’t want you to.’
I wish him good morning and continue on my way, but a little more slowly than before.
Midday
‘As long as you are safe,’ says my mother, patting my arm affectionately.
‘Yes,’ I say.
I would be happier in some ways if my mother were scolding me for my drunken habits in which I so resemble my father as to make me scarcely fit to be a part of humankind, let alone to be a gentleman, as her father was and her grandfather before him. But in most ways I am happy that she is not. Perhaps she has indeed already expended her wrath on the messenger. Or perhaps, now my studies at Cambridge are complete and there is a distant prospect of my earning money as a lawyer, her view of me is a little more tolerant than before.
As it is, not a word of reproach has passed her lips since my return. Even the state of my hat has prompted only a passing remark, and that mild enough. She herself is bedizened in a new velvet gown, a sort of mustard colour and laced all over, with a fine lawn collar that is big enough to resemble a small white cape. Glittering in her hair is an emerald set in a circle of pearls – the sight of which must have made Martha wonder why it is inconvenient for my mother to pay wages.
In short, all seems well. And yet I worry, because I cannot help feeling that some flood is being dammed back that will burst forth sooner or later when I least want it.
‘Martha has prepared a chine of beef for dinner,’ she says. ‘And four fat pullets. Sir Felix has kindly consented to join us.’
Thus all is revealed and made open to me. In return for scandalising the village with my behaviour, I am condemned to spend two or three hours with that debauched and useless cavalier and watch him stuff our beef and chicken into and around his blubbery lips. Four pullets! And in return for my mother’s not complaining about my expenditure on ale – which, unless I have a magic purse, was very, very little – I am not to object to her feeding this penniless and prating parasite until his threadbare doublet is fit to burst.
‘Sir Felix does us too much honour,’ I say.
‘And his daughter, Aminta,’ says my mother quickly.
I say nothing, but my face is clearly a sufficient protest.
‘She has grown into a lovely girl,’ says my mother, ignoring the fact that she is the runaway Bess Clifford’s daughter. ‘She has truly blossomed since you were home last Christmas.’
Did I see her last Christmas? Precocious little Aminta Clifford? The Cliffords are not people I seek out, and we live at opposite ends of the village. I doubt I did more than catch a glimpse of her in church.
‘You hid up the apple tree to avoid her,’ continues my mother.
As with so many things my mother says, I have to think hard to make sense of it. ‘Mother,’ I say, ‘I was ten, and Aminta was about six. That is not recent history.’
‘It is scarce a dozen years ago,’ says my mother. ‘And there is no point in making a face like that. The invitations are already issued.’
To avoid having to dine with Sir Felix, I would be willing to make any sort of face at all. But, instead, I retire to brush the worst of the dust off my new suit. I can at least eat dinner without a hat.
Sir Felix wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and almost succeeds in suppressing a belch. He has already stuffed himself full but shows no sign of ceasing to eat up my meagre inheritance.
‘They say, John, that you have returned from Cambridge more than half a Puritan. The University was not thus when I was there twenty or more years ago.’
‘I assure you, Sir Felix . . .’ I begin, but Aminta has already launched a new attack from across the table. She looks at me coquettishly over a chicken leg, which she holds neatly between her ladylike fingers.
‘It would appear that you Cambridge Puritans waste a great deal of time in alehouses,’ says Aminta. ‘That’s what Roger Pole tells me at least. He can be quite amusing about you, cousin John. I do hope you encountered no loose Puritan women in Cambridge.’
I am not, by any manipulation of our respective genealogies, her cousin. Nor am I, however notionally, a Puritan. And I refuse to acknowledge Pole’s insult in any way whatsoever, though he shall be made to pay in some manner that is not yet clear to me.
‘Loose women? There were none in Cambridge in my day,’ says Sir Felix, and he gives my mother a lewd wink that turns my very stomach. He strokes his black moustache, which is caked in grease from the pullets.
‘À d’autres, Father,’ says Aminta, putting the bone down on her plate and searching the table with her eyes for some other dainty morsel. She helps herself to cucumber slices dressed in oil.
My mother smiles vaguely, as though she really has the first idea what Aminta is talking about. Sir Felix guffaws. ‘You sound just like your brother,’ he says to Aminta.
‘You speak almost as if Marius were still alive,’ I say. ‘Is there some fresh news of him?’
Sir Felix stops himself in mid chuckle, and his face is serious again. ‘No,’ he says with a sigh. ‘No. If he escaped after the Battle of Worcester, which we doubt, he almost certainly died somewhere of his wounds. We have sought news of him in France and the Low Countries but to no avail. I wish that I could give you better tidings, since he was your friend as well as my son. We resigned ourselves long ago to his sad loss, much as Will Cobley has resigned himself to the loss of his own son in the wars.’
‘My father means,’ says Aminta, leaning across the table, ‘that Marius and I, having shared a tutor for so long, acquired many of the same turns of phrase – do you not, my dear father? Just as cousin John, having studied in the alehouses of Cambridge, must have learned to swear and curse like a Puritan fishwife.’
‘Of course he must,’ says Sir Felix tolerantly. ‘Whereas I attended upon my tutor at all hours and stayed away from tobacco, women and foul language. Ha! As if I’d swive some poxy Cambridge whore!’
My mother, who is cutting thick slices of meat with a practised hand, pauses for a moment and then says: ‘You met your wife, Bess, at Cambridge, surely, Sir Felix?’
And the three of them burst out laughing in such a silly way that they risk choking on Martha’s excellent chine of beef.
‘Martha is an excellent cook,’ says Aminta. ‘Your mother is fortunate.’
We are walking in the garden, whither my mother has sent u
s. We have inspected the damson tree by the house, which looks likely to produce a good harvest this year. Aminta has observed that the Cliffords’ own damson tree is similarly fecund. Our cucumbers compare well with those at the Steward’s cottage, though are not as advanced as Ben Bowman’s in his vegetable patch behind the inn. I do not ask after Ben Bowman’s damsons, because I wish to stay awake, and no answer Aminta could possibly give would fail to induce slumber. We are now proceeding along the avenue of overgrown pleached limes, which Nathaniel planted and trained many years ago but which nobody has tended properly since my father departed. Their outline is ragged and unpleasing, but at least you can’t eat them, as far as I know. Aminta holds my arm lightly but firmly as we walk – a precaution, she says, against stumbling on the uneven path. I feel the warmth of her little hand through my sleeve, and I have to confess that it is not unpleasant.
I steal a glance at her. When did she metamorphose from a gawky little girl into the young woman beside me? She is dressed for this visit to our house very simply in a gown of soft grey wool, the skirt fashionably open in front and bunched back to display a light-coloured petticoat embroidered in silver. Her collar is plain and, unlike my mother’s ridiculous mantle, of a modest size. Her lace cuffs are neat and gleaming white. Some might perhaps call her pretty with her small stuck-up nose and her bright blue eyes. But my ideal woman would have greatness of soul rather than a cute nose – and a meek and obedient disposition. Aminta’s disposition is far from meek or obedient. She is sadly her father’s daughter in too many ways.
‘Martha? Yes, my mother is lucky to have her,’ I say. ‘We can afford to pay her very little. We are quite poor.’
I stress this last word because the thought has occurred to me that Sir Felix’s interest in my mother may be founded on some notion that she has money. I want to ensure there is no mistake on that score.
‘Like us then,’ says Aminta cheerfully. She gives my arm a conspiratorial squeeze. I try not to enjoy the sensation.
‘Perhaps not quite as poor as that,’ I say, wishing to be wholly accurate. Though in fact, as I have said, my mother pays Martha absolutely nothing. Generations of Martha’s family have worked for generations of my mother’s family. Being paid nothing is an improvement on the contractual terms that many of Martha’s distant ancestors enjoyed.
Aminta nods at this and smiles sweetly. I have seen that smile before. She wants something from me. Flight is point-less; she has possession of my arm and, in any case, she knows where the apple tree is now. ‘So, tell me about this body that you found,’ she says.
I had thought that I had covered that subject adequately over dinner – at least so far as I could with two ladies present.
‘As I say, I was out early this morning . . . on some trifling errand . . . when I came across the poor fellow with his throat cut. That’s more or less all there is to it.’
Aminta screws up her small, cute nose. She does not entirely trust my account.
‘Roger Pole says it was slashed from side to side in a hideous crimson gash. He also says that you had been out all night because you were too drunk to find your way home.’
‘Does he?’ I say. Then I add: ‘I’m not sure how he is in a position to know that.’
‘The Colonel told him,’ says Aminta. ‘He tells Roger most things.’
I resist the temptation to say ‘Does he?’ because I have already said it. I hope that my silence will convey my contempt, though at the same time I fear it may not.
‘I don’t think the Colonel quite understood the significance of the dew under the body,’ says Aminta. ‘I also think he made too little of the cipher that you found.’
Of course, it is pleasing that somebody agrees with me that the cipher is of significance, even if that person is Aminta. And her informant was Pole.
‘So, you saw Roger Pole this morning?’ I say conversationally. Not that I care much.
‘He too was up early,’ says Aminta. ‘Though unlike you, he had gone to bed beforehand. Now, tell me again about the wound the poor man suffered. Roger’s account was merely second-hand and, I felt, lacked colour.’
I sigh and describe the wound as best I can: the size, the depth, the very clean edges. Somebody clearly possessed a sharp knife and was skilled in its use. Aminta nods. She seems sorry not to have seen it. ‘And you told the Colonel all this?’
‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Perhaps the Coroner will take more interest in such matters. The Colonel paid little attention; he is convinced that it was footpads on the highroad to Cambridge.’
‘Meaning the man was killed close to where he was found. You told us over dinner that Ben was mortally offended when he thought you were suggesting the man was murdered at the inn – but that is not impossible, is it?’
Ben’s outrage was, I thought, one of the more amusing details of my account – at least, the way I told it. I can still see Ben’s face reddening at the idea that a reputable establishment such as his would host a murder. There is, however, a more solid reason than reputation why it simply cannot be.
‘But think, Aminta – the killer would have had to take the body from the inn, past the crossroads, where I was . . . standing . . . then up the Cambridge road in the moonlight. The risk of being caught was too great.’
‘Have you also considered the path across the meadow, behind the inn, my dear cousin? It is a convenient shortcut, and whoever was standing at the crossroads would not have seen anyone passing that way.’
‘That is always boggy and often impassable.’ And I am not her cousin.
‘It is usually dry enough in summer,’ says Aminta. ‘The path leads almost directly from the dung heap to Ben’s stables.’
‘But you wouldn’t use it at night, you know. The ground is too rough.’
‘There was a moon, as you say. And people do have lanterns, dim though their light may be.’
‘Yes, but you would also have to wade across the stream. There are no stepping stones as there are on the Cambridge road.’ This is, I think, an irrefutable argument.
‘A murderer might be prepared to get his breeches wet,’ says Aminta, ‘if the alternative was being hanged. Do watch that branch, cousin! I fear your mind is elsewhere at the moment.’
I duck and say nothing. I have no intention of conceding how right Aminta is. Aminta is insufferable even when she is completely wrong.
‘Well, if anyone did go that way,’ I point out, once we are clear of the limes, ‘I doubt there will still be much to show now for their night-time journey.’
‘It would still be worth looking. Not as worthwhile as it would have been first thing this morning, but quite worthwhile nonetheless, don’t you think?’
It might, though more likely I’ll just spoil an almost new pair of boots in the mud. Aminta is good at giving instructions but less good at considering the consequences. Like when, many years ago, she dared me to drink a whole bottle of her father’s Rhenish that she had stolen from the cellar. I didn’t touch another drop of wine until I was almost twelve.
‘And did the Colonel say if he was planning to search the inn?’ she continues. ‘The inn would be a good place for him to begin his investigations, don’t you think?’
More instructions. For the Colonel this time.
‘Colonel Payne says he will question those who were at the inn last night,’ I say. Then I add: ‘I suppose Roger Pole also told you about the rider I saw.’
‘No,’ says Aminta. ‘Who did you see?’
This is a surprise. I would have thought that Pole would have enjoyed recounting that part of the story. So I tell Aminta, stressing that I was less drunk than some may have claimed.
‘And I suppose you don’t believe me about the horseman either?’ I add on completion.
Aminta, who has been listening to me with a frown of concentration, suddenly gives a little laugh. ‘Of course I believe you, cousin John.’
She doesn’t then. Why, in view of the general credulity and idiocy of the village, is a st
raightforward man on a horse so difficult to believe in? Harry Hardy claimed to have seen the devil riding a goat round the village pond one Halloween, and nobody doubted him for a moment.
‘He threw me a shilling,’ I say.
‘Then, cousin, you are certainly richer than us,’ says Aminta, taking my arm again. She pulls me closer to her as we continue our walk. For a moment I am aware only of Aminta and the scent of lavender and clean linen. Her skirt brushes against my leg.
I do not deny what she has said. I have given the shilling away, but I do have others.
‘Everyone in the village is richer than us,’ Aminta continues, ‘for we really have nothing at all. You must find it amusing that the wheel has come full circle for the Cliffords, do you not, cousin John?’
‘In what way?’ I ask.
‘Why, because Colonel Payne has dispossessed us in the same way that we dispossessed you. You don’t mean that you never think of that? It must please you at least a little to see us humbled.’ She releases my arm and stands back to look at me, a strange specimen that she needs to study properly.
‘No,’ I say. Because, to be honest, I haven’t thought of it and, having thought of it now, I am neither pleased nor displeased by it.
‘You never recall that your family owned the manor before us?’
‘My mother’s family,’ I say. ‘Yes, of course I do. Sometimes. But that was in Queen Bess’s day – almost sixty years ago.’
‘And you don’t want the manor back?’
‘Not especially.’
‘Surely your mother does?’
‘She hasn’t mentioned it lately. And she scarcely stops talking about one thing or another. She finds the New House very convenient. The Big House is . . . well, big. Too big for us. And the park costs money to maintain and brings in little revenue. No, I don’t think she regrets the loss of the manor.’
‘Well, we do. We’ll sit outside the park for the next two hundred years if we have to and wait for the last of the Paynes to die. Then we’ll sneak back in.’
‘That would not necessarily give you lawful title,’ I point out.