were late home they’d blame her. Usually it was just that the men had drunk too much and had to sleep it off for a while, or they’d fallen down in the gutter. It wasn’t Judith’s fault.”
“Any in particular?” Baldwin probed.
“I don’t know. Widow Annie, over at New Barton, she has always resented Judith, but that’s because she has a thing with the Constable, and Annie never believed him when he said he was late because of some other reason. Annie was always the jealous sort.”
Baldwin thought of the widow – he had met her a few times – and shook his head. Annie was too respectable to think about murder, though her bitter tongue and taste for gossip and malicious rumors could shock sometimes. “Anyone else?”
“Only…” She stopped and frowned. “Mary Butcher, I suppose. She was always spreading nasty tales about Judith. And you know what they say.”
It was a confident comment, issued with a knowing look and prim wink, but Baldwin was lost. “No, I do not,” he said simply.
“Oh! Well, this captain, the one who did that to Judith – they say he met with Mary too. Seems like it was that close… Could have been Mary, not Judith who was with child.”
“Ah! Really?”
20
Later, as they made their way back through the dirty alley toward the welcome brightness of the road, Baldwin glanced thoughtfully at his friend. “Why would all the women hate her so much?”
“I think it’s partly because of the chance that their husbands might bring home diseases, but also because prostitutes are seen to be evil. Why else would they not be permitted burial in consecrated ground? This poor woman will be buried out of the town somewhere. Everyone is a little scared of them in a small place like this, because they represent something different.”
“Not that different, surely?” Baldwin was puzzled. “Many women must have understood that she had no other way to support herself.”
“They would expect her to prefer to starve.”
“Her boy as well?”
“Yes. These people,” Simon said, stopping and staring about him, “have so many children, they place little or no value on an extra mouth. A death means more food for the survivors, and they can become quite hard about it. It is the way of the poor.”
“I suppose so.”
They had come to the street. Turning down it, they crossed over and walked to the butcher’s shop. The apprentice sat on the stool in the doorway, plucking chickens and stuffing the feathers into a small sack. He looked up as they approached. Picking up a knife, he broke the legs of the fowl in his lap and sliced round them before pulling the feet off, drawing the long, white tendons with them. Then he cut the head off and pulled the skin back to expose the neck.
“Where is your master?” Simon asked as they got to the doorway.
The boy looked up. “He’s out, sir,” he said, and bent back to his task, cutting quickly round the vent.
“When will he be back?”
“I don’t know, sir. He’s often out collecting beasts. Sometimes not back until late.” He pushed a finger inside the neck cavity, loosening the organs, then hooked two fingers in from the vent and drew the entrails free, dropping them on the roadside. “Today he’s delivering.”
“What of his wife… Are you going to clear this mess away?” Baldwin could not help himself asking it; the flies were maddening.
“She’s staying with her sister in Coleford. Left on Tuesday, sir.”
“Tuesday?” Baldwin frowned.
“Yes, sir. She had a blazing row with my master, and left just after.”
“When will she be back?”
“I don’t know, sir.”
“You don’t know much, do you? Do you know that you are going to clear up this mess?” Baldwin said pointedly.
“Yes, sir.”
“You ought to have all this meat in the cool, too. It’ll fester out here in this heat.”
“As soon as my master is back, he’ll put it all in the store.”
“Why don’t you put it there?” asked Simon.
“My master thinks he’s been robbed recently. Some meat’s been disappearing. I think he blames me, because he’s locked the storeroom. I can’t get in.”
“Well, when your master gets back, tell him I want to see him,” Baldwin said. “I will be at Peter Clifford’s house.”
They left the apprentice languidly reaching for another chicken corpse, and made their way back across the road to the jail, silent as they mulled over the boy’s words. Tanner was awake this time, and stood quickly when he realized that they were going to enter.
“How is he, Tanner?” Baldwin asked.
“Fine, sir. Nervous, but that’s no surprise. You want to see him?”
Cole had reduced. His frame, once so large and powerful, had shrunk, and his shoulders were bent as if from hard effort. The eyes which Simon had first been so impressed by were now sunken and had lost their glitter.
Seeing his emaciated appearance, Simon shot a glance at the Constable, but the look of compassion on Tanner’s face showed that it was not caused by maltreatment; it was simply the effect of days of not knowing what might happen, the fear of pain and death.
The knight recognized that look only too well. So many of his friends had carried the same unbearable torment etched hard into their features as they underwent the agony of watching comrades suffer torture, knowing that the same pressure would be brought to bear on them when the inquisitors lost interest in their present target. Baldwin had hoped never to see such anguish again.
“Be seated, Cole,” he muttered. “We have some questions for you.”
“Is this my trial?” The young man’s eyes flitted from one face to another, desperately seeking assurance.
“No. We are merely continuing our enquiry. Have you heard about Judith?”
“Who?”
“Another woman has been killed.”
“But I was here! I couldn’t…”
“Be still! It might mean you are free from suspicion of the murder of Sarra, but it does not mean you are innocent of the robbery of Sir Hector’s silver. Just answer our questions honestly, and tell us all you know.”
Cole nodded glumly. “I’ll tell you everything.”
“Good. You joined the company on Sunday, yes?”
“Yes. I found them there when I arrived in the evening.”
“It was the Tuesday that you were attacked, and that night when we found you with Henry the Hurdle and John Smithson?”
“Yes.”
“What had you been doing that morning?”
He screwed his face up. Of all the things he had considered during the long hours of darkness in the dank little underground cell, those few last, precious hours of freedom before the momentous event of his arrest had not been uppermost in his mind. He had concentrated on the afternoon. Now he tried to remember what had happened before. “I was awake early – Henry woke me – and spent some time with him after breakfast, learning what the company had in the way of weapons. Then he sent me to the stables to help with the horses. He said, ”A good
