to help the grooms, but Mauger and Sancho emerged from the house, and Benedict halted.
'Where shall we put him, lord?' enquired one of the attendants between grunts for breath as he strove to hold the horse.
Mauger indicated Clothilde's small stable. 'Bring out the chestnut and the grey, and put him in their place,' he commanded.
'He'll kick the place to bits,' Benedict said, appalled.
Mauger strode up to his grooms. 'Mind your own business, I know what I'm buying.'
'An early grave by the looks of things,' Sancho declared with a curl to his upper lip. He watched the black stallion rear and buck, plunge and kick. 'Still, you do not need lessons from me,' he gave an exaggerated shrug, 'or so you say.'
'Mauger,' Benedict entreated, his hand outstretched. 'Don't be a fool. Swallow your pride.'
'Pride has nothing to do with it,' Mauger said through his teeth. It was obvious that rather than swallow he would choke. 'Take your horses and go!'
Benedict contained his anger, although it flashed in his eyes, and tightened his mouth comers. 'And so I will,' he said quietly, accepting the lead reins of Cylu and the mare from a groom. 'We have nothing more to say to each other, at least not without bloodshed.' He looked at Julitta. 'Go with God,' he murmured. 'You will be in my thoughts.'
'And you in mine.' Her lower lip quivered.
'Leave Julitta alone,' Mauger hissed. 'She is my wife, you lost yours.'
Benedict flinched from the fury in Mauger's bright grey eyes. He seemed almost as mad as the black stallion. 'Yes, she is your wife,' he answered. 'You ram it down my throat at every opportunity.'
'Lest you forget!' Mauger snarled.
It was too much. Benedict's resolve broke. 'How could I?' he attacked. 'We both know why she was married to you in the first place!'
The air between them was drenched with more than just the heat of the day. Mauger's right hand eased towards the hilt of his sword. Benedict was not wearing a blade, had only his meat knife at his belt. He wanted to seize it and plunge it into Mauger's arrogant body, but by a supreme effort of will, he clenched his fists and kept them down at his sides. 'This is foolish,' he said impatiently. 'There can be no winner from this.'
He mounted Cylu, held out the chestnut's rope for Sancho, and rode out of the courtyard. Although he did not look round, he could feel the stares striking his spine – Mauger's hatred, Julitta's love and anguish.
The sides of the horse shelter shook as the black stallion kicked and kicked again, the hollow drumming filling the world.
'He thinks he is better than everyone when he is nothing,' Sancho said contemptuously. And then he grinned, revealing the interior of his juice-blackened mouth. 'Your woman, she is very beautiful. Never have I seen such pretty hair.'
Benedict thought about murdering the little overseer. 'She is not my woman.'
'You think because I am old and I squint that I have no eyes?' Sancho snapped his fingers in front of Benedict's face.
'I think that because you are old and you squint, you should mind your own business.'
Sancho snorted. 'You are my business, lad.'
'Then leave me alone.' Benedict kicked his heels against Cylu's flanks and urged him to a trot, putting distance between himself and Sancho's gargoyle grin. But the overseer's words followed him, and so did the eyes, with their knowing squint.
CHAPTER 59
The September sea was a calm green-blue with the gentlest of swells as the Constantine sailed up the tidal estuary of the Garonne and entered the wide bite of the Bay of Biscay. White caps rolled shorewards and gulls soared above the slow wake of the galley, their cries piercing in the clear air.
Benedict descended the crude stairway from the hatch on the main deck, and entered the caulked-up hold where the horses he was bringing to Rolf were stabled. As an extra precaution, in case they met with rough weather, each animal was supported in a canvas sling so that it would not lose its footing and be cast over on its back. The animals had access to food and water, and there were two grooms with them at all times to deal with difficulties, should they arise.
The Constantine was ploughing her way north on the swell and they were making good time. Benedict anticipated that by evening they would enter the port of Royan, there to take on fresh fodder for the animals and give them a day's respite from the slings. From Royan, it was only three more days of sailing to the Normandy coast. The route was shorter than the overland one, less sapping of the horses' strength. Many traders did not trust the vagaries of the open sea, and no-one would have attempted the passage in winter, but here, at summer's end, the weather was still benevolent enough for Benedict to have few qualms. The overland route held too many memories, none of them pleasant.
He went among the horses, checking that their slings were secure and that the animals were comfortable. He spoke gently to each one, and laid his hands upon them, stroking, scratching, soothing. In his imagination, he saw Sancho sitting in the corner watching him with a mocking twist to his mouth and an approving look in his eyes. The feeling was so strong that he even flashed a wry smile into the lantern-lit darkness.
Even as Benedict had turned his eyes to the north, so Sancho had turned south, heading home to his duties at the stud of Bivar. They had parted on the wharfside at Bordeaux, the tide running high, slapping against the sides of the Constantine, a north-easterly evening wind ruffling Benedict's black hair and the catskin trim on Sancho's short cloak.
'God speed your path and look favourably on your dealings,' Sancho had said soberly, without the customary leer or salty remark. There had been affection in his eyes, and concern.
Benedict embraced the wiry old man heartily. 'Look for me in the spring,' he answered, affirming his intention of returning.
But spring lay on the other side of winter, a winter Benedict had to endure in Normandy and England. He had tragic tidings to bear to Rolf, and the wound-salt of the presence of Mauger and Julitta for some of that time. He did not think he would stay long at Brize. There was always his father's house in Rouen in which he could over-winter.
He finished making a fuss of Kumbi and went back on deck. The wind billowed the canvas sail and ropes creaked. The Constantine rode forward on the gentle swell, the steersman making occasional adjustments to the tiller. Out on the sea beyond them were the masts of other vessels taking advantage of the tide – galleys bearing salt from the pans stretched along the sandy coast, Spanish iron, and tun upon tun of Gascon wine for England and Normandy.
Benedict stared across the water at the other vessels. The Draca was out there among them, but he could not detect her sail. Beltran, its master, had come visiting as he and Sancho prepared the Constantine to embark, and there had been a troubled look in his eyes. Over a meal of bread and saffron fish soup, he had confided that he was not entirely happy about the cargo he was expected to bear back to Normandy.'
'Lord Mauger says that he wants me to transport that stallion he bought. I am a wine trader, I know little of animals. Yes, I have carried sheep before, and even once a cow, but it is not the same. I suggested to him that he should take the overland route, but he became angry. I think that he wants to arrive in Rouen before you.'
Benedict grimaced and laid down his spoon. 'And you think right,' he said. 'But there is nothing I can do. There is no foundation for reason between myself and Mauger. We parted on a quarrel, and whatever I say will only make him the more determined to go his own way.'
Beltran nodded. 'I do not expect you to talk to him. I know how it is between you. But if I have to take this horse, then I want you to tell me the best way of making him safe.'
'Knock him on the head,' Sancho advised. 'And every time he wakes up, knock him on the head again.'
Benedict darted him an amused glance, then turned back to Beltran. 'Make sure he is securely tied and hobbled, that he cannot break loose. And don't let him see that you are afraid, it will only increase his
