carry on the family name.
Rollo was a likable boy, and Edith thought he was the perfect playmate, but Margaret could not take him into her family. She would always be expecting him to meet her own exacting standards, and if he failed, she might lose her temper and remind him he was motherless. In any event, if she were later, as she hoped and prayed, to be able to conceive and bear a son for Simon, he must feel deserted again. The cuckoo would be supplanted.
“May I join you?”
“Of course,” she smiled, and patted the bench beside her. Stapledon dropped gratefully on to the log, and studied the children with interest.
“They appear to get on very well together,” he mused.
“Yes. It is nice for Edith to have a child of her own age to play with. I think she was bored before.”
“How is he?”
“He obviously isn’t over it, I would hardly expect him to be, but he seems calm enough so long as someone is with him. It’s when he’s alone that the fear comes to him again.”
“Yes.” Stapledon gave a grimace. “One shudders to think of what he saw. It would be enough to break the mind of many.”
“He’s young; youth often helps. There is a resilience in children which we adults often lack,” she said indulgently.
“Perhaps. But I cannot help but wonder what may become of him.”
In the pit of her stomach she felt the trembling nervousness. She dared not look at him, fearing that her eyes would give away her innermost thoughts. “Er…No, neither can I,” she said.
“It would be best for him to be looked after in a family, I suppose.”
“Yes-ideally, anyway.”
“But the right sort of family…It is hard to find parents who would be suitable.”
“Very hard.”
“Not, of course, that there aren’t many very deserving people in this town. Very deserving, indeed…But so much more could be made of him.”
“Er…”
“And then there’s the financial aspect. Few in Crediton could afford an extra mouth, one would imagine.”
Margaret nodded glumly, steeling herself to reject the suggestion.
“So tell me, Margaret. What do you think of this for an idea?” Stapledon turned to face her, his brow wrinkled in thought.
And then the cudgel struck him and he crumpled at her feet.
Baldwin’s hand was already tugging his sword from its scabbard even as the shriek shivered and died on the late afternoon air. His eyes went to Simon. The bailiff shoved him aside as he began to run for the garden. “That was Margaret!”
He and Hugh rushed out into the garden. Simon felt his heart pounding as his sword came free of its sheath with a slithering of steel. His wife needed him, and he would not fail her. Not this second time. For weeks he had avoided her when she needed him; he had tried to escape his own sadness by excluding her and thus preventing her from reminding him of his loss. The shame of his behavior, freezing out the woman who depended on him alone for her life, when all she wanted was to give him her support and offer her comfort to him, burned in his veins like molten lead.
There was another sharp cry of fear, then a keening wail of absolute, chilling terror, and Simon felt his scalp contract in reaction. He gripped the hilt of his weapon and led the way down the short staircase to the herb garden, past the trellis up which the roses climbed, and through to the lawn overlooking the meadow.
Here they found the children. Stapledon lay sprawled beside the oaken log, and Baldwin ran to his side. He looked up at Simon, relief plain on his face. The Bishop was alive.
Simon went to Edith. She stood, shocked, staring at her playmate, and was pleased to be able to plunge her face in her father’s tunic to hide from the piteous child.
Rollo stood, eyes wide, mouth gaping, as scream after scream issued from his frail little body. He was incapable of speech, unconscious of the others all round. His whole being was one long, solitary screech of loss and despair. First the man had killed his mother, and now the kind lady who had looked after him had been taken away as well. Roger stood nearby, wringing his hands, unsure how to calm the child.
Passing his daughter to Hugh, Simon went to the little boy, holding him tightly in his arms, trying to control the crying with the strength of his own body, as if he could pass on a little of his own self-restraint by doing so. Gradually the sobs faded until, shaking and groaning with his misery, eyes streaming with tears, the little boy allowed himself to be taken by the rector.
But Simon did not feel his anguish dissipate. His wife had been here, and now she was gone. Stapledon, who was moaning to himself as he tried to sit upright, had been knocked down with as little compunction as Simon would expect in a man swatting a fly, and not treated with the respect accorded to a man of God.
“Roger, what in God’s name has happened?”
“Bailiff, I-”
“Where’s Margaret? She was here, wasn’t she? Where’s she gone?”
“Bailiff, it was the butcher, Adam. He struck the Bishop, then took your wife-”
“Where, man! Where did he go?”
A hand shot out, pointing the way. “There, toward the church. I saw him take her that way. To the church.”
“Daddy!”
He heard the terror in his daughter’s voice. “Come here, Edith. It’s all right.”
She rushed into his arms and he held her close for a moment, but then he lowered her to the ground. “You stay here, my love, you understand? I’ll go and get Mummy. We’ll come back here.”
Simon set off at a run. He was unaware of the others, of the way that Hugh thrust Edith into the arms of the dumbfounded Peter Clifford before chasing after him, or how Baldwin made haste to follow; he was only aware that Margaret was in mortal danger, in the clutches of a murderer who appeared able to kill without compunction and for no reason. Simon was determined to save her.
Up the garden he pelted, then into Peter’s hall and along the screens, his boots slapping hard on the flags. If Adam was heading for the church, this was the quickest way there. Out into the yard he ran, scaring a horse and making it rear so that the ostler cursed as he tried to bring it back under control. He skidded over the cobbles of the outer yard, and across the grass of the old graveyard, toward the scaffolding which encompassed the new building like a haphazard fence.
Vaguely he was aware of figures running behind him, but his concentration was fixed on the red stone edifice in front. He pounded over the turves and rubbish of the works, until a pair of figures up at the top caught his attention, and he stopped dead.
One he recognized immediately. With her golden hair, strawberry-tinted in the late sun, streaming behind her, her cap dangling from a string, Margaret was carefully ascending one of the topmost ladders. Behind her, as nimble on the slender planks, as sure-footed as a cat, a long dagger in one hand, was the butcher.
This would make them regret their corruption. They would know from now on that if there was one man they could not cheat, that man was him. He would make them realize that they could not avoid their duties. They would have to arrest the captain of mercenaries. He was obviously guilty. Adam had made sure that the evidence pointed to him, and they could not possibly have missed the proofs.
At the top of the highest ladder he halted, breathing deeply. It was strange that he felt so little fear. Usually he would be nervous standing on top of a small stool, but today he was up here, on top of a tall scaffold, with a view over the whole of the county, as far as he could tell. To the west were the hills rolling toward Barn-staple and the sea, while eastward the road disappeared on the way to Exeter.
He sighed with contentment. This was wonderful: marvellous! He felt superhuman, capable of anything. The dagger was as light as purest down in his hand, his feet were assured on the narrow boards which the builders used as flooring, and his mind was perfectly clear. He was rational and more aware of himself than ever before.
A workman sauntered round the scaffolding from the other side and stopped, open-mouthed, at seeing the
