“How many have you taken up?” asked Cadfael, when he had given an account of what had happened by the river.
“Seventeen. And it should have been eighteen,” owned Hugh grimly, “if I had not hauled Bellecote’s boy Edwy aside without witnesses, put the fear of God into him, and sent him home with a flea in his ear. Not sixteen yet! But sharp enough to know very well what he was about, the imp! I should not have done it.”
“His father was one of yesterday’s delegates,” said Cadfael, “and he’s a loyal child, as well as a bold one. I’m glad you let him away home. And young Corviser?”
“No, we’ve not laid hand on him, though a dozen witnesses say he was the ringleader, and captained the whole enterprise. But he has to go home some time, and he’ll not get in at the gate a free man. Not a hope of it!”
“He came lecturing like a doctor,” said Cadfael seriously, “and never a threatening move. It was when he was struck down that the wild lads took the bit between their teeth and laid about them. I saw it! The man who struck him lashed out in alarm, I grant you, but without cause.”
“I take your word for that, and I’ll stand by it. But he led the attack, and he’ll end with the rest, as he should, seeing he loosed this on us all. They’ll be bailed by their fathers, the lot of them,” said Hugh wearily, and passed long fingers over tired eyelids. “Do I seem to you, Cadfael, to be turning horribly into a crown official? That I should not like!”
“No,” said Cadfael judicially, “you’re not too far gone. Still a glint in the eye and a quirk in the mind. You’ll do yet!”
“Gracious in you! And you say this Bristol merchant struck the silly wretch down without provocation?”
“He imagined provocation. The boy laid a detaining hand on his arm from behind, meaning no ill, but the man took fright. He had a staff in his hand, he turned on him and hit out. Felled him like an ox! I doubt if he had the strength to knock the trestle from under a stall, after that. For all I know, he may be fallen out of his senses, somewhere, unless his friends have kept their hands on him.”
Hugh looked at him across the trestle on which their own elbows were spread, and smiled. “If ever I want for an advocate, I’ll come running to you. Well, I do know the lad, he has a well-hung tongue, and lets it wag far too freely, and he has a hot temper and a warm heart, and lets the pair of them run away with his own sense?if you claim he has any!”
The lay porter put his bald brown crown and round red face into the room. “My lord, there’s a lady here at the gate has a trouble on her mind, and asks a word. One Mistress Emma Vernold, niece to the merchant Thomas of Bristol. Will you have her come in?”
They looked at each other across the board with raised brows and startled eyes.
“The same man?” said Beringar, marvelling.
“The same man, surely! And the same girl! But the uproar was all over. What can she be wanting here at this hour, and what’s her uncle about, letting her venture loose into the night?”
“We’d best be finding out,” said Hugh, resigned. “Let the lady come in, if I’m the man she wants.”
“She asked first for a guest here, Ivo Corbicre, but I know he’s still out viewing the preparations along the Foregate. And when I mentioned that you were here, she begged a word with you. Glad to find the law here and awake, seemingly.”
“Ask her to step in, then. And Cadfael, stay, if you’ll be so good, she’s had speech with you already, she may be glad of a known face.”
Emma Vernold came in hurriedly yet hesitantly, unsure of herself in this unfamiliar place, and made a hasty reverence. “My lord, I pray your pardon for troubling you so late …” She saw Brother Cadfael, and half-smiled, relieved but distracted. “I am Emma Vernold, I came with my uncle, Thomas of Bristol, we have our own living- space on his barge by the bridge. And this is my uncle’s man Gregory.” It was the youngest of the three who attended her, a gawky, lean but powerful fellow of about twenty.
Beringar took her by the hand and put her into a seat by the table. “I’m here to serve you, as best I can. What’s your trouble?”
“Sir, my uncle went to see to the stocking of his booth at the horse-fair, it was not long after the good brother here left us. You’ll have heard all that happened, below there? My uncle went to join his other two men, who were busy there before him, and left only Gregory with me. But that’s nearly two hours ago, and he has not come back.”
“He will have brought a great deal of merchandise with him,” suggested Hugh reasonably. “It takes time to arrange things to the best vantage, and I imagine your uncle will have things done well.”
“Oh, yes, indeed he will. But it isn’t just that he is so long. The two men with him were his journeyman, Roger Dod, and the porter Warin, and Warin sleeps in the booth to mind the goods. Roger came back to the barge an hour ago, and was surprised not to find my uncle back, for he said he left the booth well before him. We thought perhaps he had met some acquaintance on the way, and stopped to exchange the news with him, so we waited some while, but still he did not come.
And now I have been back to the booth with Gregory, to see if by some chance he had turned back there for something, something forgotten, perhaps. But he has not, and Warin says, as Roger does, that my uncle left first, intending to come straight home to me, it being so late. He never liked?he does not like,” she amended, paling, “for me to be alone with the men, without his company.” Her eyes were steady and clear, but her lip quivered, and there was the faint suggestion of disquiet even in the unflinching firmness of her regard.
She knows she is fair, Cadfael thought, and she’s right to take account of it.
It may even be that one of them?Roger Dod, the most privileged of the three, perhaps??has a fancy for her, and she knows that, too, and has no fancy for him, and whether justly or not, is uneasy about being close to him without her guardian by.
“And you are sure he has not made his way home by some other way,” asked Hugh, “while you’ve been seeking him at his booth?”
“We went back. Roger waited there, for that very case, but no, he has not come.
I asked those still working in the Foregate if they had seen such a man, but I could get no news. And then I thought that perhaps?” She turned in appeal to Cadfael. “The young gentleman who was so kind, this evening?he is
