distaff. She was fine-boned, graceful of carriage, with masses of black hair coiled upon her head, and almond- shaped green-hazel eyes. She was handsome now. In her youth, Benedict thought that she must have been quite beautiful.
'Did the same, thing myself with her mother,' Sancho declared, and took a noisy sip of the wine, washing it around the yellow stumps of his teeth. 'Leilah was Moorish — Christian convert married to a fat merchant. It was lust at first sight, the love came later.'
Benedict eyed Sancho. It was hard to imagine any woman falling for him, but perhaps he had been handsome long ago. Put the teeth back in his mouth, whiten them, add flesh and eyesight, banish the wrinkles and a presentable rogue might emerge. 'So you had a future together?'
'Oh aye.' Sancho ran his tongue around the inside of his mouth. 'We eloped in the middle of the night, with all our belongings in a bundle. Spent three months on the road running from place to place. It was hard, I tell you, especially on her. A respectable married woman going off with a stallion man. If they had caught us, I would have lost my balls, and her the skin off her back. Not surprising that we didn't know much tranquillity those first few years. It was worse after Lucia was born. Leilah was worried what would happen to her if we were caught. We never really had peace of mind, but we had each other.'
'Would you do it again?'
Sancho glanced at his daughter spinning, her face rapt with concentration. 'Yes,' he said gruffly, 'I would. But I don't know about Leilah. She's been dead these past twenty years. I think she would say yes, but you never know with women. That is their beauty, and their flaw.'
Benedict smiled wry acknowledgement, and saw that Lucia was smiling too, her look quietly indulgent on her grizzled father.
Two days later, Benedict finally made the decision that he must leave for Compostella before it became too difficult to leave at all, and from there return to Brize.
Inspecting one of the herds of brood mares with Sancho, he told the overseer of his intentions.
Sancho heard him out in silence, his jaws working on a piece of liquorice root, manipulating it from one side of his mouth to the other in search of teeth with which to chew. Black juice oozed on his lips. 'You must do what is necessary for your conscience,' he said. 'A man works best without a burdened soul.' He cocked his head on one side. 'But you will return here, I think, when you have shed your load.'
Benedict looked sharply at the old man. 'Are my thoughts so obvious?'
Sancho gave a laconic shrug. 'It does not take a grand wisdom to see that you have settled here, and when you talk of Normandy, your face grows troubled and you bite your thumbnail.'
Involuntarily, Benedict cast his glance down to the hands which gripped Kumbi's reins. With a grimace, he concealed his thumbs within his palms. Sancho saw and his lips curved in a black-stained smile.
'I have been wondering when you would go. You have been restless these past few days.'
'And yet you have said nothing?'
'I have watched and listened.' Sancho spat over his mount's withers and resumed his chewing. 'You cannot go alone,' he said after a moment. 'You will need protection and escort over the mountains.'
Benedict drew a deep breath. He did not want to think about that part of his journey, retracing his steps to the place of attack. 'I intended hiring soldiers from Lord Rodrigo.'
Sancho nodded. 'Wise,' he said.
Benedict thought that the conversation had ended there, but that evening as they sat over a game of merels, Sancho carefully positioned one of the small clay balls on the board and rolling another between his palms, said thoughtfully, 'I think I might see you part of your way home.'
Benedict stared. 'Why should you do that?'
'Why should I not?'
Bemused, Benedict shook his head. 'I could give you a host of reasons, but surely you already know them.'
'The dangers of the mountain roads, my advancing years,' Sancho said with a cackle of amusement. 'Let me tell you, I've been as far as the cities of Constantinople and Nicaea in my time in search of bloodstock. I have travelled throughout Andalusia and the Moorish kingdoms.'
'But that was long ago.' Benedict looked at the wizened, leathery face across from him, the milky eye and scrawny throat.
'Not that long. Even at my time of life, a man can still have itchy feet. Besides,' he added, 'there is no need to cross the mountains. Galleys are easily hired in Corunna to make the journey up the coast. There's a huge horse fair in Bordeaux before the summer's end and I want to do some trading. In previous years I've sent younger men, but I don't see why I shouldn't indulge myself one last time.'
'It might well be your last time,' Benedict could not help but say. And yet the thought of the old man's company was comforting, and there was no conviction in his protest.
Sancho shrugged and smiled. 'It is my choice.' He gestured at the merels board. 'Your move.'
CHAPTER 58
The Draca, one of Aubert's wine vessels, docked in Bordeaux, having sailed down the French coast from Rouen. The late summer journey had been beset by unseasonable winds and some minor squalls. Mauger, never a good ocean traveller even in the calmest of conditions, spent a great length of time leaning over the gunwale, his complexion a delicate shade of green.
Julitta, in contrast, revelled in the brisk weather and the freedom from being tied to the quiet domesticity of Fauville. She took up a favourite position on the raised decking by the prow, and stood for hours on end, watching the Draca carve her way through the glistening green waves with their white netting of foam. If conditions grew too rough and she found herself becoming saturated by the spume, she would retire to one of the benches in the hold which lay amidships, and keep Aubert's cargo company. He was exporting barrels of English mead, and hoped to bring home a cargo of leather and strong southern wine. Not that he was personally on board the vessel, but one of his senior overseers was – a black-bearded, hearty soul named Beltran who had been sailing these waters for the better part of twenty years.
Beltran took Julitta and Mauger to the lodging house where he himself usually stayed when he was in Bordeaux and within moments secured them a bed for the night and the promise of a substantial meal. At the mention of food, Mauger compressed his lips and excused himself, declaring that all he wanted was a bed that did not move.
Beltran and Julitta exchanged amused, pitying glances, and guided by their landlady, a talkative, tiny woman with sallow skin and beady black eyes, they descended from the sleeping loft and entered the main room below.
Gulls screamed overhead. The sounds of the bustling, dusty streets percolated through the cool stone walls, which kept out the worst of the day's burning heat. Their hostess brought them a jug of wine, a loaf, and earthenware bowls of steaming fish soup. 'Are you on a pilgrimage?' she asked curiously as she set the food down on the trestle.
Julitta shook her head. 'We are here to buy horses at the fair.'
'Ah.' The woman absorbed the information, and if anything, her curiosity increased. 'I think you are newly married then? He does not leave you at home with your children?'
Julitta half-smiled a response and curbed the impulse to tell the woman it was none of her business. Let her believe that this as a journey undertaken by an ardent groom and his new bride.
'You should travel down to Compostella,' advised their hostess. 'Ask his blessing.' She patted her belly, her meaning obvious.
Julitta reddened. At Dame Agatha's she had learned how to protect herself against the fate of pregnancy. Merielle, in one of her rare spurts of benevolence, had shown her the method employed by the cannier whores. You took a small piece of moss or sponge, soaked it in vinegar, and inserted it into your passage. So far the method had worked remarkably well and Julitta desired no intervention from St James.
'Me, I have eight sons, and twenty-four grandchildren,' the woman declared proudly, and proceeded to
