‘And don’t forget that if you’re not careful, you might be arrested for killing your master,’ Daniel added pointedly.
Edmund glowered, and for a moment Baldwin thought he would be silent, but then the farmer lifted his head defiantly. ‘Sir, I’d seen a dead rabbit in the road. It’d only just been killed – maybe by a sling or something. I picked it up, and then I thought I’d better take it to the manor, so I rode on, but there was no one there.’
‘Liar! I was at the gateway and saw you ride straight past. You never made any attempt to leave a rabbit or anything else.’
‘I was going to leave the rabbit, but I dozed, and the pony found the road home.’
‘You poached the manor’s rabbits!’ Daniel asserted.
‘I never poached anything – someone else killed it. I was going to take it in… Anyway, if I hadn’t, it’d only have been stolen by a dog or a fox,’ Edmund protested sulkily.
Seeing the scandalised steward taking breath, Baldwin swiftly said, ‘I think we can forget about rabbits, Daniel. Let us draw a veil over such matters; in trying to hide them, people may be forced to conceal other facts which could help us. Now, Edmund, you stopped your wagon and collected up this tiny cony-corpse. You then rode on towards the manor, is that right?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And saw what?’
‘Nothing, sir. I was tired: I rode back dozing, and saw nothing else until I turned off to go back to the village.’
Baldwin shook his head. ‘What of other carts?’
Edmund stared confusedly. ‘Oh, there was only the one, the fishman’s cart. I saw him on the road heading north, some while before I got to the fork and noticed the rabbit.’
‘So if he had knocked the boy down, you would have seen the body on the road?’
‘I… Yes, I suppose…’
‘So he hadn’t, had he?’
Edmund was silent, his nervous gaze going from one to another.
Simon finished his pot and gave him a not-unfriendly look. ‘We’re not here to arrest you, farmer. All we want to do is clear up what actually happened to the lad.’
‘But I don’t know!’
‘Did you see anyone else up there?’ Baldwin asked after a moment.
Edmund was alive to the possibilities and dangers of his situation. If he admitted whom he had seen, he could be dealt with severely; yet if he held his tongue, he would surely be at risk of losing his life. He took a cautious glance at Daniel. The old steward was frowning fixedly at him, as if daring him to make any comment about the people he had seen up on the moors that day. Edmund swallowed quickly.
‘Sir, I did see some folks. I saw the girl, Petronilla, the young maid from the hall. And I saw Anney, Lady Katharine’s maid, walking further up on the moors. No one else.’
And as he told the lie, Edmund stared guiltily at his feet.
Chapter Twelve
While James van Relenghes supped his wine by the fire, Godfrey slipped out through the screens and left the hall by the great door to the yard.
Striding quickly, he crossed the court and paused a moment at the wide-open stable. People were always bustling about in here, shouting to each other, oiling and polishing saddles and bridles, gentling the horses, grooming them, taking the great animals from their stalls to be set into harnesses to go to the fields, or preparing them for exercise. One idle weapons master went more or less unnoticed.
He saw the man he wanted, and moved around the room, always keeping his target in view. As he came closer, he reached under his jack and eased his concealed knife in its sheath before covering the last few yards at speed. He gripped Nicholas’s arm and beamed into his face.
‘Well, now, old son! Isn’t this a nice thing, eh? Christ’s wounds, but it’s been ages. Last time we met was in France, wasn’t it?’ he babbled, pulling the startled servant towards the doors. ‘How long has it been – what, seven years? No, must be more than that – say about ten. Still..“
By now he’d brought his quarry out to the open air, and his wide eyes lent his smile a somewhat manic air as he brought his face close to Thomas of Exeter’s right-hand man.
‘… It’s never too late to renew an old acquaintance, is it, Nicky boy?’
‘He was lying,’ said Daniel bitterly.
The steward was peevish. He’d hoped for greater things from the famous knight of Furnshill; Sir Baldwin was supposed to be almost omniscient, and yet to the steward’s mind the knight had just had the wool pulled over his eyes by an unscrupulous serf. He could have got more from Edmund himself if he’d been left alone to question the sod, without the supposed benefit of the knight’s presence.
Baldwin sighed. “The man’s mere appearance on the same road as that on which the boy died is no proof that he was present at Herbert’s death, let alone that he had an active part in it. What of your own fish- seller?‘
‘Sir Baldwin, you yourself pointed out that if the fish-seller had run Herbert down, Edmund would have seen the body’
‘Very well, then. Let us suppose that Herbert was run down by Edmund,’ Baldwin said. ‘But was the man awake? He admits going to the inn, admits to returning after a few ales – how often have you seen a man in that condition? If the boy ran out from the side of the road and fell under his wheels, despite the bump he might not know anything about it.’
‘His wagon was empty, and he’s only got a light one. If he ran down the boy, he’d know all about it,’ Daniel asserted.
Baldwin was even more convinced that the steward was determined to implicate the villein for some unknown reason, and the knight wasn’t prepared to be a willing accomplice in the destruction of Edmund for a crime of which he might well be innocent. ‘There is no evidence to suggest that he was guilty of anything,’ he said strongly. ‘Even if, as you say, he was aware of riding over a child, you couldn’t expect him to run straight to the manor, where people like you would assume he was guilty of murder.’
‘Of course we would! Who else had a wish to attack my Lady Katharine’s family!’
Baldwin stopped his horse and stared.
Simon looked as baffled as he felt. ‘Why on earth would a nonentity like him want to hurt the likes of her?’
‘Because she’s reclaimed him as a villein!’ Daniel burst out. While the two men stared, he explained the legal loophole by which Lady Katharine had trapped Edmund back into her service.
‘But that’s outrageous!’ Simon cried. ‘She is taking advantage of her position – and doing so to overrule her husband’s express wishes.’
Daniel suddenly felt very old, and almost regretted calling the bailiff back. He had no choice: he must explain how the manor he served could unfairly treat its tenants.
‘We’re trying a new system here -just like the Earldom of Cornwall,’ he began defensively. ‘If someone else offers more money than the existing tenants, the highest bidder wins the land.’
‘You mean serfs are evicted when their lord is offered a good sum?’ Simon asked.
‘Urn… not only then. This is for free tenants as well. The tenants on our lands have a lease for only seven years, and when it is due for renewal, anyone who can offer more money may have it.’
Baldwin and Simon exchanged shocked glances. Tenants were either freemen or serfs. The former paid fixed rents, while the latter had the burden of labour owed to their lords as well as the expense of the feudal taxes: the merchet, paid by women when they wished to be married, chevage, paid by serfs who wished permission to live away from the demesne, plus a range of other arbitrary charges that could be imposed by a greedy lord. But this very arbitrariness only affected those who were servile, not the free.
Daniel pointedly avoided their eyes while he explained how the system worked. Every seven years the
