‘Just us fools, Serjeant.’ Walkelin was rash enough to make the jest.
‘Don’t you be including me and the lord Undersheriff, young Walkelin,’ Catchpoll chided, but then he smiled, and it lengthened across his face.
‘Well, I have no wish to take Baldwin’s corpse with us to Worcester when all was to do with this place. Let him have his six feet of Lench earth. We need not see the dead buried, and so there is no reason to remain. If we leave now, I can relieve my lady of worry, reach Worcester so we can report to the lord Sheriff and be home to eat in my own hall.’ Bradecote stood, moved the fingers of his left hand and pulled a face. ‘I do not want to ride at the gallop all the way either.’
‘If we did, Walkelin here would most like fall off, or just get lost behind when his beast would not keep up. Yes, my lord, we will ride back at a gentle pace, and be glad of our own beds this night.’
It was late in the afternoon hour when Hugh Bradecote and his companions entered the bailey of his own manor. A child ran swiftly into the hall, and the undersheriff had no doubt his wife had given instruction that she was to be alerted the moment he returned. She emerged even as he dismounted, with a grimace and catch of breath. The smile froze upon her lips as she took in the binding about his forearm.
‘My lord! You are hurt!’
‘It is nothing serious, just a cut.’
‘Yet the binding runs from elbow to near wrist.’ She was a little pale.
‘A slight wound, no more. The healing girl saw to it before we departed Lench.’
‘A mere girl? But—’
‘Their healing woman died.’ Bradecote did not elaborate. ‘The girl knew her craft well enough to salve and bind.’
Catchpoll and Walkelin dismounted, and stood a little to one side of their superior.
‘It is none so deep as to weaken the sword grip, my lady, not when it is healed,’ offered Catchpoll.
‘Oh good.’ The lady now had colour returning to her cheeks, but it was an anger pink, and her tone was sarcastic. ‘My mind is now eased.’
‘I swear it is nothing that need upset you, my lady.’ Bradecote smiled at his wife. ‘You need not fret upon it. It was just what happens in matters like this.’
‘But look at Serjeant Catchpoll. He has been involved in such matters for what, a score years or more, and he is still standing and looks to be hale and whole.’ She ignored Walkelin’s muttered comment on the serjeant’s knees and continued with barely a pause for breath. ‘You have been appointed barely more than a year, have a scar across your chest, nearly drowned in the Severn and now have this. Stop being some foolishly brave warrior … some haeled who throws himself thoughtlessly into danger.’
Catchpoll could not quite hide his grin, but Christina rounded upon him, pointing her finger accusingly.
‘And what were you about, Serjeant, allowing him to get into that danger?’
‘Well, on this occasion, my lady, I was in a fair way to being dead had not my lord arrived most timely and taken up the fight. I was stunned, and besides, I cannot be for ever holding him back for fear of a little scratch and …’ Catchpoll realised his mistake as the words left his lips.
‘You call that a little scratch?’
‘Could be a lot worse, my lady.’ This was also not the right response, for the lady took a sharp breath but then spoke very deliberately.
‘Yes. It could. So know that I hold you responsible for my lord’s safety, since he will not have a care to it himself.’
‘I do not need a nursemaid,’ objected Hugh Bradecote, half amused and half irritated.
‘Be quiet. This has nothing to do with you.’ She was trembling a little, filled with anger, and an even greater fear of what might have been.
For a moment all three men looked stunned, then their eyes met, questioned, and finally answered.
‘I will do as you command, my lady,’ replied Catchpoll at last, in the colourless voice Bradecote was used to hearing when Catchpoll had no intention of obeying.
‘It would be nice to be met by a solicitous wife,’ opined Bradecote, softly, and then she turned back to him, her eyes filling with tears. ‘Might I enter my hall and take a little wine?’
His regretful tone and plea did what remonstration could not.
‘Oh, my poor lord. Yes, yes. Lean upon me and …’ Suddenly the termagant was the epitome of the caring spouse, though in the event it was more that she leant upon him. Catchpoll and Walkelin did not follow. Catchpoll had a fair idea he and Walkelin would be offered good ale by Alcuin the Steward, and besides, this was a time for lord and lady to be alone.
‘Not a soft lady, is she?’ murmured Walkelin, more than a little in awe.
‘A fine one, and caring. Better that heat than cold in a marriage bed.’ Catchpoll, many years married to a woman who had reacted in a not dissimilar fashion in days long past when he had returned with less than a whole skin, was appreciative.
‘But I doubt she is truly obedient.’
‘If you wanted just obedience you would have a dog, not a wife, and you need a care. The Welsh are soft of lilting voice, if you can bear it, but swift of temper. When you take that Eluned of yours to wife, as
