realized my mistake, I wasn’t really afraid of him, because he was nice and he said we were going to a surprise party. He was kind to me and he looked after me, always asking if I was warm enough and making sure I was comfortable when we slept out in the open.’
Her frown was back. Helewise wondered what she was remembering. She was about to prompt her when she spoke again. ‘He — I don’t know how to explain, but quite often he seemed to be talking to someone, and at first I thought there must be another person with us, somehow keeping just out of sight, but then, of course, lots of the time we were out in the open and there was nowhere for anyone to hide, and in the end I thought he must be talking to himself.’ She looked at Helewise. ‘That was quite frightening,’ she admitted.
‘I’m sure it was,’ Helewise said. Dear Lord, the poor child must have been terrified. ‘Could you make out what he was saying?’
‘Not really. He muttered quite quietly, although often he seemed to be arguing about something. It was almost as if whoever was talking to him was giving him orders, and he didn’t want to obey them.’
Helewise stored that away. She was beginning to develop a picture of Olivier de Brionne, and she did not much like what she saw. ‘You slept out in the open,’ she said.
‘Yes. He took me for a ride on his horse — he’s a lovely horse, black with a star on his brow and he goes like the wind — but we got lost. He — Olivier — was very good at making a camp, and we had a fire and some food, and I wasn’t really scared. I thought we’d just go home in the morning. Or, at least, that’s what I told myself.’
The child had courage, Helewise thought. Many girls of her age would have been out of their wits with fear, sobbing and screaming uncontrollably. And what would this Olivier de Brionne, who heard voices and believed it was appropriate to present an eleven-year-old child to a king, have done if Rosamund hadn’t been so calm and level-headed? She did not want to think about it. ‘But next day he didn’t bring you back,’ she said. ‘What happened?’
‘He had packed up our blankets and stamped out the fire and we were about to set off,’ Rosamund said. ‘We’d camped in the middle of a stand of trees, up on a slight rise above a bend in the river. There were lots of bracken and bramble bushes, and you could hide in there among the trees. We heard a horse in the distance and quite soon I saw a rider approaching, although he was too far away for me to see his face. He had a dark cloak with a hood. He was riding really hard, spurring on his horse. When he saw us, he starting yelling something and waving his arm.’
‘What did you do?’ Helewise asked gently. ‘Did you think he’d come to rescue you?’
Rosamund looked ashamed. ‘No. It was silly, but I felt really frightened of him, I don’t know why. Perhaps it was just that he was shouting so much, and I was worried because, although his horse was clearly very tired and doing its best, he was spurring it really hard. It had foam all round its mouth and blood on its sides,’ she added in a whisper.
‘Could this horseman have been Ninian?’ Helewise hardly dared ask the question.
Rosamund stared at her in amazement. ‘Ninian? No, no, of course not! Ninian loves all animals and he would never treat a horse like that!’
Helewise began to feel a warm glow of relief. But the story wasn’t told yet. ‘You said you weren’t afraid of Olivier,’ Helewise said. ‘It sounds to me as if your instinctive fear of this horseman was because you had no idea what he wanted, and he could have been more dangerous than Olivier.’
‘Yes, perhaps,’ Rosamund said. ‘He — Olivier — quickly told me to hide under the trees where we’d left Star. I ran and nestled down in the bracken. It was all dry and prickly, but I felt safe in there. I heard the horseman come galloping up the slope, and he must have drawn his horse up really harshly, because it gave a sort of yelp of pain, and I heard Olivier’s voice and another man’s. They were arguing. Then there was a thump, and then some sounds as if somebody was doing something strenuous, and some talking, then Olivier yelled something, and there was lots more angry shouting as the other man rode away.’
Helewise felt the harsh disappointment run right through her. As Rosamund told her tale, she had really started to believe that she had been given proof of Ninian’s innocence. Just for a moment, she had wondered if the unidentified horseman could have been Hugh de Brionne, hurrying to check on how his brother was progressing with the scheme to take the gift of Rosamund to the king. She had imagined the two brothers arguing, falling out, fighting. In her mind’s eye she had seen Olivier land the blow that knocked Hugh backwards, so that he fell and struck his head.
For one precious moment she had believed she knew what had happened. But she was wrong. The horseman could not possibly have been Hugh, for Hugh died there on the rise above the river and, as Rosamund had just so clearly stated, the horseman had ridden away, still arguing with Olivier as he did so.
If he was indeed Hugh, then it was perfectly possible that, soon after leaving his brother, he had encountered Ninian, desperate to find Rosamund and none too fussy how he went about getting information from anyone he thought might be able to help.
Proof of Ninian’s innocence was as elusive as ever.
Helewise could have wept.
FOURTEEN
Josse reached Hawkenlye Abbey around the middle of the day. Meggie had come with him as far as the hut. Not seeming to mind repeating the journey she had earlier done with Little Helewise, she had asked if he’d like company and he had said yes.
He guessed his daughter would stay in the hut for a while. She had wanted to go off with Ninian so very much. She had not said so, but he knew her well enough to read the yearning in her eyes as they parted from him. He wondered what he would have done had she simply fetched her horse and ridden after him. He was very glad he had not been put to that particular test.
At the abbey, he went into the infirmary to find a crowd of men around the recess where the king lay. Sister Liese came to greet him.
‘He is impatient to be gone,’ she said softly, with a subtle jerk of her head in the direction of the king’s recess. ‘He demands incessantly for transport, for even he admits he is not fit to ride, and those who attend him here are torn between obeying their lord and listening to we who have the care of him, who insist he is not yet ready to leave us.’
‘The wound is severe, then?’ Josse asked anxiously.
‘No, it is quite shallow and it heals well,’ the infirmarer replied. ‘However, we fear the dreaded infection, which can make a man’s blood burn like fire in the space of a day. He is more at risk if he sets out on a journey.’
Josse nodded. ‘How long before he can go?’
Sister Liese considered. ‘Perhaps tomorrow, all being well.’
‘Thank you.’ He stared at the curtains around the king’s bed.
‘He already has five men with him,’ the infirmarer said. ‘If you wished to speak to him you would have an audience, I fear.’
Josse made a grimace. He wanted to discuss the very delicate matter of Ninian’s innocence, and that was not a conversation to have when a handful of the king’s sycophants were listening avidly. ‘May I see Olivier de Brionne?’
‘You may,’ she said. ‘He is awake, although much disturbed.’ She gave Josse a sweet smile, lightening her serious face. ‘Perhaps you will do him good, Sir Josse. You usually appear to do that when you come visiting in here.’
Glowing from the unexpected compliment, Josse crossed the long ward towards the recess where Olivier lay. He heard voices as he approached, which, when he parted the curtains to look inside, resolved into a single voice. Olivier, his face screwed up with tension, was muttering agitatedly to himself.
He looked up and, in the first instant before he recognized Josse, there was abject terror in his eyes.
Josse walked up to the bed and said swiftly, ‘It’s me, Josse d’Acquin. I came to see you before, remember?’ He smiled, opening his arms in a vaguely benevolent gesture, hoping to reassure the young man.
Olivier’s lips were moving, but Josse could not hear what he was saying. ‘What’s the matter?’ he asked
