He led the way into the hall, where the rushes had been swept away and left the hard earth bare. It looked a lifeless place, though wall and roof were both in good condition. It was simply wood and daub and stone. At one end was a table and a lord’s seat, and to one side two long benches against the length of wall. The steward invited Catchpoll to sit.
‘I am Guthlac, steward of Tredington. How can I help in anything to do with the death of the lord Osbern?’ The man was not challenging, but curious. ‘He has not been here since, let me see, a week after Easter that would be.’
‘Did he bring his lady?’
‘No. Haven’t seen her in nigh on three years. He came as usual with the messire Baldwin, though I must gets used to calling him lord now.’ He sighed and shook his head. ‘The lord Osbern was not an easy man to please, and the son—’
‘Aye, we have met the son.’ Catchpoll did not need to say more. ‘It was the son who has been here though, in this last week.’
‘He came to see the harvest was brought in but I had it in hand before he arrived. Cuthwin, who is the weather-feeler, he swore the weather would break within a week, as it did, and so I had everyone out early. Our neighbours might scoff and say every extra day improves the grain, but I would rather it was a little less plump but not ruined by the wet. We was all gathered in two days before the storm broke, and there’s no smile on the faces of those who mocked but have wheat all flattened and wet to rotting.’ Guthlac gave a small, grim smile. ‘Messire Baldwin berated me for starting too early, but better safe than sorry. I only wish my son Will was as cautious as I am, but it will come with years, no doubt.’
‘So he is not as like unto his father as the messire to the lord Baldwin then,’ observed Catchpoll, with a wry smile, indicative of age looking upon youth and finding it rash.
‘No, not like me.’ There was something, one note in that voice, that made Catchpoll wonder.
‘Takes after his mother then.’ The tone was cheerful, but the serjeant’s eyes missed nothing.
‘Aye, that would be it.’ Guthlac did not seem the least cheered, nor believing, but resigned. It was the same look Catchpoll had seen on other faces before, faces like Edmund’s in Lench.
‘And think on that, friend, for a mother who sees a son in her image is proud as a cock at dawn, and a happier woman for it. We all likes happy wives; they chide the less.’ Catchpoll thus set himself beside Guthlac in the unity of husbands.
‘Mine will neither chide nor comfort for long.’ Guthlac closed his eyes for a moment, then raised them. ‘Not a mite of fat on ’er, and can scarce take a breath. She says as she feels she is drowning to death, poor soul.’
‘Sorry I am then to make light,’ Catchpoll looked serious once more, ‘and I come at a bad time, but I has questions as needs answers, Master Steward, and only here can I find them.’
‘Then ask, Serjeant.’
‘The messire Baldwin came to the manor a bit over a week ago, he says. Was he here all the time?’ It was a thought that had been growing in Catchpoll’s mind as he rode.
‘No, that he was not. He came, and in a foul mood, but that was common. If he came alone, and that was most of the time, he came scowling and finding fault. The lord Osbern, God rest him,’ and Guthlac crossed himself, but it was perfunctory and a show only, ‘would rant and rave at him, and he do the same back, and then father would send son here to calm down. We was the ones who suffered his lashing tongue, and not just tongue neither.’
‘That also we have seen in Lench.’ Catchpoll nodded.
‘He has the Devil in him, that one. The Devil was in his mother, if ever she got stormy, which was often, but then she had a sort of life-fire about her when happy that was so bright, like sun at noon, that her temper was forgiven. I always thought as she died young because she lived all her life in few years.’ Guthlac gave a sigh.
Catchpoll noted the adoration, the same that they had heard from Walter Pipard. The lady had cast a spell, on men at least.
‘So the messire came, grumbled and did what?’
‘He sat upon his horse and watched the harvesting for a day, and then grumbled that sitting in the saddle so long made his arse ache.’ The steward gave a little snort. ‘Ask us all if we would exchange that for our aching backs and blistered palms, eh?’
‘You should not speak like that about the lord Baldwin.’ The young man, the son Will, stood in the doorway, giving his new lord his title straight away.
‘It is true, nonetheless, and to the sheriff’s man one speaks true, son.’
‘He will be a good lord,’ declared Will, firmly.
‘We hopes and prays so, but he does before he thinks and you need to be the voice that urges waiting.’
‘Old men wait, and all they find is cold earth.’ Will was clearly in the same mould as his new master.
‘But the messire did not wait about here in Tredington after seeing the harvest was being brought in.’
‘Not once he had complained and complained at me cutting early, no.’ Guthlac sounded not just downtrodden but actually a little resentful, since he clearly thought his actions had been right.
‘Did he go out riding in the day, or mayhap brought a hawk?’ Catchpoll was pretty sure that the answer would be negative but would bring forth the one he expected.
‘No, no. He left, and returned three days after, grim of face, which was unusual when he went off.’
‘So he did this when
