‘And doesn’t he?’ Joan’s voice was harsh.
Catrin hesitated. ‘The weather certainly seems to be on his side,’ she said cautiously.
‘Unlike a lot of people round here,’ Joan put in sourly. ‘Especially the burgesses in Hay and the farmers. Like the Bedells. They are tired of having their fields and their businesses destroyed. They have mended and refortified the castle; once more it is held for the king and this time it will be secure.’
Catrin froze, the memory of her encounter with John Bedell’s reeve two years before coming back to her. ‘So I had heard.’ He had come up to the house once, looking for her again. Joan had told him Catrin was visiting neighbours up the valley. Had he come to warn her again? She didn’t know and he had left without leaving a message.
The women fell silent.
‘How will we know when they’ve gone,’ Joan whispered after a while. ‘One of us will have to go and look.’
From outside in the garden they both heard the alarm call of a blackbird, shockingly loud in the silence. Joan tiptoed back from the entrance and flattened herself against the back wall next to Catrin. In the distance someone was knocking loudly at the front door. They waited, heart in mouth, and then they heard the sound of men’s voices. Somewhere close to them a horse whinnied. Joan reached for Catrin’s hand in the dark. Catrin held her breath. They could hear the jingle of harness. The men had ridden around the side of the house and into the garden. They heard shouts now and the sound of cracking timber and swishing leaves. They were using their swords to slash at the plants in the garden as they rode up and down the vegetable beds.
‘There is no one here!’ They heard another voice in the distance. ‘Search the place, men.’ There was a sound of splintering wood as the back door caved in under someone’s boot. There was a long, long silence. The two women waited hardly breathing as they strained their ears, then at last they heard the sound of voices again, the neigh of a horse. ‘Shall we fire the place?’ A shout echoed round the garden.
‘It would never catch in this accursed rain!’ someone replied. ‘And anyway, we’ve no more time. We have to move on. They were clearly warned we were coming.’ The voices were close to the cave. The women could hear the snort of the horses, the stamp of hooves and the creak and squeak of leather from the men’s saddles. One of them raised his voice. ‘Ride on!’
They were so close to the cave the swinging haunch of a horse struck the brushwood over the entrance and it sagged inwards towards them. Joan stuffed her fist into her mouth to stop herself screaming. Catrin pulled her close. She could feel herself shaking. She prayed to the Blessed Virgin and all the saints: wherever her father was, let him keep quiet. If he stormed out now he would be lost and so would they. She felt Joan bury her face in her shoulder as they clung together.
‘It is a poor enough place,’ sneered one.
‘Peasants!’ cried another, the disdain plain in his voice. ‘Not worth looting.’
‘But the poet! There were orders to take the poet!’
‘Can’t take him if he’s not here,’ the first responded. ‘Come on, let’s away. I want to get out of this accursed rain.’
They heard the horses moving off, the shouts of the men growing more distant until the garden was silent again.
It was a long time before the two women dared creep to the cave entrance, which was half exposed now, the brushwood scattered across the floor. ‘They didn’t see,’ Catrin whispered. ‘They didn’t see what was in front of them.’ Her voice was cracked, her mouth dry with fear.
Joan tiptoed past her into the garden. The beds were a mess of hoof prints and broken plants. Their crops had been deliberately destroyed, the precious vegetables trodden into the mud. Cautiously they crept back towards the house. The back door was hanging open. They stood in the doorway and surveyed the kitchen. The pot had been pulled off the fire and thrown on the floor. Joan’s mutton stew was spattered greasily across the flags, filling the air with its rich smell. Everything had been upturned and broken.
Catrin let out a whimper of distress. She ran to the inner door and out into the great hall. The doors on the aumbry were hanging open, her beautiful glasses smashed on the flagstones, the silver spoons gone. She did not give herself time to think, heading towards her father’s study. His treasured books had been pulled to the floor and stamped on judging by the muddy footmarks all over them, his writing materials scattered and ink thrown on his manuscripts. Someone had tried to tear some of the pages, given up and a pile of his writings had been thrown onto the fire, almost extinguishing it. Catrin bent and pulled them off the glowing logs; the sheer weight of parchment had served to damp it down. She whirled round with a sob and headed back across the hall towards the staircase. ‘Did they go upstairs?’
They had ripped the bedding and mattresses with their swords; someone had pissed on her father’s bed. She wrinkled her nose in disgust then turned, heart in mouth, towards her own room. Her bedding had suffered the same fate; her combs and little pots of hand salve had been swept off the table and scattered, her gowns and her best cloak had been pulled from the hooks on the wall and torn into pieces, her few books pulled from the shelf on the beam, her precious glass window shattered, but the lock on her coffer seemed to have defeated them. Perhaps they assumed it contained nothing more than a woman’s clothing, or perhaps it had been at that moment that the officer had called them back downstairs. For whatever reason, it seemed to have been left untouched.
Joan puffed up the stairs behind her and peered over her shoulder. ‘Holy Mother of God,’ she breathed. ‘What a mess.’
Catrin stared round. She was in a state of shock. So much destruction and wanton hatred displayed in her own little sanctuary; such a mess in the whole house, such damage to her father’s study. They had known who lived here, the man in the garden had said as much.
Joan put her arms around her. ‘At least they didn’t fire the house,’ she whispered. ‘Good solid stone; it wasn’t worth them bothering.’
‘Only because they didn’t have time and because it was raining.’ Catrin felt her eyes fill with tears.
‘So, where is your father?’ Joan said at last.
They looked at each other bleakly.
‘Come on.’ Joan held out her hand. ‘We had better start to look. Then we have to clear up the house.’ It was time to become practical. She glanced up at Catrin’s little window and sighed; she knew how much that small triumph had meant to Catrin and how expensive it had been. She glanced round the room again. ‘Did they find your necklace?’
Catrin frowned. She had never mentioned it, never worn it – what chance had she to show off such finery – afraid that Joan would ask where it had come from. Obviously Joan had been poking about and found it. She walked across to the angle of the wall where two roof beams met. There, behind the pegs which held them in place, was a knothole in the oak. The necklace and the silver bracelet were still there, in their small leather bag. ‘They didn’t find it,’ she whispered.
‘Good. Then you can sell it and raise money to pay for repairs and food now our stores have gone.’ Joan was still doggedly practical. She turned and made her way back to the staircase. ‘The first thing I have to do,’ she called over her shoulder, ‘is clean up the kitchen. At least they couldn’t destroy good iron cooking pots. Then we will burn the bedding. You go and look for your father. I imagine he is cowering somewhere up on the mountain. When he hears the army has moved on through the valley he will come home. It’s a pity he didn’t think to warn his daughter there was danger on the way when he ran off to save his own skin!’
She clattered down the stairs leaving Catrin to survey the wreckage of her chamber. Only then did the tears begin to fall.
‘Andy! Andy, it’s morning. Wake up.’ The hand on her shoulder shook her gently. ‘Come on, sweetheart. Wake up. I’ve brought you some tea.’
Andy opened her eyes. She was lying on the sofa in the great hall covered by a rug; her father was standin
g beside her, a teacup in his hand. Outside, it was daylight. Her face was wet with tears. He put the cup on the little table beside her and produced a tissue. ‘Here, wipe your face. I had to wake you. I couldn’t bear the sound of your sobbing any longer. What happened?’
Andy sat up slowly and looked round in confusion. The room was shadowy, different. Modern. ‘The English army came through the valley. They were looking for Dafydd. They trashed the house,’ she stammered. She wrinkled her nose. She could still remember the cold rich smell of greasy mutton and the acrid fumes of urine on Catrin’s bed. She hugged herself, shivering. ‘You weren’t there. You didn’t come with me.’
‘I tried, girl.’ He sat down on the sofa beside her. ‘I’m sorry.’ He studied her face with a frown. ‘I’ve been thinking about this, Andy. I don’t think it’s such a good idea doing all this dreaming. Look at you. You were crying your heart out. Your mother would be furious if she knew I had encouraged it or even condoned it. She was really worried about you being here, all alone in this house. It’s not a good place to be. Why don’t you come back to Northumberland with me. Please. Let us look after you for a bit. Give the dreams, and Rhona, a chance to calm down.’
She lay back against the cushions. It was a tempting suggestion in so many ways. He passed her the cup without a word and watched as she took a tentative sip. She smiled at him. ‘In many ways I would love to, but you know I can’t. I have to find out what happened.’ She brushed her face with the back of her hand; it came away damp from the tears on her cheeks. ‘I’m sorry if I upset you by crying. It was only because I was so involved in the story. I wasn’t in danger.’
He frowned. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Of course I’m sure. It was a dream. I wasn’t there.’ She gave a wry smile. ‘I’m sorry you weren’t either. I was so sure you could come with me.’
‘Front row of the cinema,’ he commented wryly.
She gave a nostalgic little smile. ‘I used to love going to films with you. I could sit beside you in the dark in the cinema and know that you were there to look after me if the story got too frightening. But I’m grown up now. I know how frightening real life can be and you can’t always be there, Daddy, to make it all right, any more than you can comfort me after a bad dream.’ She sighed. ‘For good or ill, I have arrived in this house, I have stumbled upon a slice of its history and I want to see the story through to the end. Who knows, perhaps I’m going to write Catrin’s life history for her. You do understand, don’t you.’
He never had been able to resist that pleading voice. ‘And how are you going to deal with Rhona?’ he asked softly. He knew the change of subject was a sign of defeat.
‘I shall keep my doors locked and I won’t engage the woman in conversation on the edge of any more precipices.’ She smiled. ‘I promise.’ She handed him her empty cup. ‘What about one of your stunning breakfasts while I’ve got you here? Could you go and make it while I head upstairs for a shower?’
She watched as he walked across the room and disappeared towards the kitchen. She wished she felt as confident as she hoped she had sounded.
Bryn shut his laptop and pushed it away with a sigh. He had spent an hour scouring the Net to no avail, unable to find anything of interest about a woman called Rhona Wilson, or at least not one who matched the description of the woman he was looking for. He stood up and went over to his coffee pot, shaking it experimentally. Just enough to squeeze out another cup. Cradling it in his hands, he wandered over to the window and stood looking out at the little courtyard at the back of his cottage which stood at the bottom of a narrow alleyway below the castle in Hay. Small, stone-built, ancient, it suited him fine.
His ex had forced the sale of their modern house and taken most of the contents. He hoped she would never realise what a relief it had been. He had disliked the house intensely and most of the stuff in it. That should have warned him they would never make it past the first year of marriage. It had been a disaster. Their lust had carried them through for several months, then as it waned they discovered they had almost nothing in common. But at least they had managed to agree the fact fairly amicably and the split had been pretty painless once he had given her everything she wanted. He gave a wry smile at the memory. Luckily she had not wanted anything to do with the belongings he regarded as treasures, and thank all the gods they had not had a child.
This little terraced house was perfect, furnished with what he had salvaged from his parents’ old farmhouse after they died. It had upset them enough when he had chosen to go to university, sailed into Oxford and chosen a subject that had nothing even remotely agricultural about it. It would have broken his father’s heart to know he had sold the farm, but there was nothing else for it. Hill farms were hard work and made little money; you had to have a passion in your soul for the work, and his passion was for people, not sheep.
It had come as a terrible shock when his father had died so comparatively young, and even more so when his mother had followed him only two years later. After that there was nothing to keep him in the old place. It was sad that Sally had waltzed off with so much of the profit from the sale, but in a way it was a good thing. It kept him grounded and it had in the end brought him back to the soil he loved so much. Nowadays he was happy to pour his love into other people’s gardens; his own little yard was perfect when he returned home too tired to lift a finger. He had collected some old terracotta pots and olive jars and nurtured a few highly coloured tumbling plants to brighten the wooden seat which was placed in the sunny corner. That was all he needed.
He turned and surveyed his bookshelves in search of a volume on local history that he wanted to lend to Andy. He scanned the titles ruefully. He should have sorted them out by now, but he loved them like that, all jumbled together. It meant when he was looking for something he could be distracted by something else.
As had happened a couple of hours ago when he had pulled out a book on dysfunctional psychology. It secretly pleased him that his clients had no idea their gardener had been a practising psychologist. None of them had ever thought to ask – and why should they? He smiled to himself. Psychology was a deep and enduring interest, but not, he had discovered, one he wanted to spend his life pursuing. Obviously when push came to shove you couldn’t take the land out of the boy, however hard you tried. With his marriage over, so was his career. He only had to support himself now, and he had decided it was time to please himself and go back to gardens.
Opening the door he walked outside and sat down in the sheltered patch of sunshine with his mug. There were already four books stacked on the small round table out there, together with the Sunday papers. Normally that would have kept him happy for several hours, but today he was restless. The way Rhona Wilson had attacked Andy and later brazenly accosted him in the pub had filled him with foreboding. She had obviously followed him from Sleeper’s Castle; thank goodness he had not come straight home or she would know where he lived. He glanced at the top book on his pile. It was a survey of sociopathic behaviour in women. Rhona’s behaviour had rung warning bells with him from day one. Such calculated actions, to the extent of tracking Andy to Wales and following her, possibly with the intention of harming her, would almost certainly be part of a pattern, a pathology, maybe even dating back to childhood. His years of experience had not deserted him and he trusted his instincts. He reached for the book, took a sip from his cup and settled down to read.
Rufus took his daughter out to lunch at the River Café. He was still worrying about leaving her alone.
‘I told you, Daddy, I’m fine.’ She sounded irritated. ‘I have friends if I need anyone; I am in control of the situation; I have work to do, proper painting work, and I’m looking forward to a lovely stay here.’
‘And Rhona?’
‘I keep telling you: Rhona will get bored. She’ll get another bee in her bonnet. The moment we get a few days of really bad weather she’ll be off, if she hasn’t gone already. Why on earth should she waste precious time st
alking me?’
Rufus didn’t answer. To him the answer was obvious: the woman was a jealous obsessive. Andy was being disingenuous at best, blind at worst, about what was going on. He sighed. ‘I’m so sorry I have to go this afternoon. If there was any way I could cancel those meetings next week I would. It’s only that—’
‘I know!’ She leaned forward and tapped him on the arm. ‘Don’t worry. I know I have a famous architect for a father and buildings would fall down all over the north of England if he wasn’t there to monitor things.’
He laughed. ‘I wouldn’t put it quite like that.’
‘I would. And you have another family waiting for you up there. They need you. I’m grown up, Daddy. I’m supposed to be able to cope on my own. But’ – she held up her hand as he opened his mouth to protest – ‘I also know I can ring you. And if I need you, I will, I promise.’
They had not mentioned the night before. She had travelled into the past alone while he had slept untroubled on the sofa. When she awoke much later she found he had covered her with a rug and gone up to bed. She didn’t know how anguished he had been as he stood looking down at her, knowing she was far away, unable to follow her.
She held it together until he left at teatime, then she locked all the doors and cried.
Instead of making her feel secure, locking herself in gave her a sense of claustrophobia. She walked backwards and forwards round the ground floor, then opened the back door again and called into the garden for Pepper. He had obviously not approved of her father and had made himself scarce most of the time Rufus was staying there, but now, as if knowing that the coast was clear, he appeared almost at once.
Half an hour later she rang Sian, who arrived at seven with an Indian takeaway. ‘So, how are your various wounds?’ Sian doled out the assorted cartons on the table, poured some wine and produced a bag containing two poppadums.
Sleeper’s Castle Page 36