The Marsh King's Daughter (28 page)

Miriel shrugged indifferently. Just now she did not want to talk about her family or evaluate the potential of her inheritance. There were too many treacherous cross-currents to negotiate.

When she did not answer, Robert nuzzled her wimple aside to kiss her throat and lowered his hands to her hips, pulling her against his crotch. 'I wonder if the bedchamber's comfortable,' he muttered.

Miriel clenched her eyes at the thought of enduring another bout of his vigorous lovemaking. 'I am a little sore,' she said.

His breath was hot in her ear. 'Aye, it's to be expected, but you'll soon grow accustomed.' He cupped her breasts. 'A bit of goose grease will ease the way. Don't refuse me, sweetheart, I've been hard all day just thinking of you.'

Miriel forced a smile. 'Could we not at least eat and refresh ourselves first, Rob?' She used the abbreviation of his name and stroked his beard, holding back by leading him on. 'I'm so hungry and travel-tired.'

He kneaded her buttocks for a moment longer, then released her with a reluctant sigh. 'If that's what you want, sweetheart. And in truth, I could eat a horse myself.'

Miriel was swept by a wave of relief, followed by anxiety. She had only put off the moment, not avoided it.

They sat down to a simple meal of bacon, eggs and bread, washed down with cider, although there was nothing simple about the pewter dishes and silver-gilt cups off which they ate and drank.

'You'll not be keeping that old man at the loom once you've found skilled weavers in Flanders,' said Robert as he mopped the last traces of salty grease and egg-yolk from his platter with a hunk of bread.

'Why not?' Miriel raised her head in surprise. 'Ham's worked here since before I was born.'

'Precisely. He's well past his prime. Small wonder that your stepfather's business was in decline. The man's half-blind, and what use is a weaver who cannot see?' He crammed the bread into his mouth and chewed vigorously.

'He has knowledge and skills to pass on, and he can still work on pieces that do not need great attention to detail.'

Robert shook his head. Swallowing, he wiped his mouth on a napkin, and then his hands. 'You need to clear out and begin afresh. Your Flemings won't want to work with him, and he'll only cause trouble. He'll think that he has the right to be cock of the dunghill because he's been here the longest.'

'Ham's not like that,' Miriel protested, her face beginning to flush.

'Allow me to know better, sweetheart. I've been a merchant for five and twenty years - longer than you've been born. It is one thing to be fair in your dealings, quite another to let your heart take over. I am sure your grandfather would agree with me if he were here.'

Miriel pushed the congealed remains of her food to the side of the platter. She was filled with anger and not a little dismay. That he was probably right did not make his words any easier to swallow. 'He is here, in me,' she replied. 'And I do not believe that he would have Ham thrown out on the street. If I allow you to know better, then you must allow me to use my instinct.'

Robert leaned back in his chair and half closed his lids. 'In truth, I do not have to allow you anything,' he said. 'In law you are my wife, and whatever is yours is mine also. I can, if I choose, ride roughshod over every decision you make. I can confine you to the hearth and the bedchamber and appoint my own man to oversee the weaving.'

Miriel blenched. 'You would not!' she gasped. The force of her shock and rage made her dizzy. 'I would kill you first!'

'Don't be a goose.' He gave a good-natured wave of his hand as if dismissing the tantrum of a loved but unruly child. 'I did but make a point, and a valid one at that. Many a husband would not hand you so free a rein.'

'I begin to wonder if I should have remained a widow.' Miriel tossed her napkin down and rose from the trestle.

'Oh, come now, sweetheart.' Robert pushed to his feet and advanced on her. 'I spoke in jest to see how you would respond, and now I wish I had not opened my mouth. By all means keep the weaver on if he means so much to you.'

'I intend to,' Miriel said stiffly, her back turned. The indulgent note in his voice was almost more than she could stand.

Robert set his hands on her shoulders and rubbed them gently. His lips sought her throat, nipping and nuzzling, and her tender skin was prickled by the wiriness of his beard and moustache.

'Be not wroth, Miriel, be sweet,' he muttered.

Sweet was the last thing that Miriel felt like being, but she was too tired to continue the argument. Robert had exposed disturbing facets of his personality and she did not want to see them emerge in any more depth.

And so she let him lift her in his arms and bear her above stairs to the sleeping loft, and place her in the bed where her grandfather had died and her mother had slept with Nigel.

She was so tight with resentment that, even with the liberal use of goose grease, he struggled to enter her, grunting and groaning as he forced his way inside. Miriel bit her lip and gazed over his shoulder at the rafters, tensing afresh at each forceful surge, willing him to finish, and praying desperately not to conceive.

Miriel had crossed the sea on a couple of occasions with her grandfather. She remembered the events as great adventures and had loved every moment. The weather had been excellent and she had stood for hours near the prow, inhaling the salt tang of the spray and watching the sun sparkle on the wave crests.

Now, even though it was raining and a summer squall had turned the sea to a churning, sulky grey, Miriel boarded the vessel with alacrity. Will ran about the deck, snuffling in corners and wagging his tail in a frenzy of excitement.

Robert watched them both with a superior smile. 'Wait until we're out of the harbour. You'll not be so eager then,' he said.

Miriel shrugged. She had not told him that she had sailed before, nor did she intend to. Let it take the wind from his sails when she showed him that she had better sea legs than he.

She mounted the ladder to the small castle built above the cog's rudder housing. The crenellations had been gaily painted with bands of red and yellow, and a banner fluttered from a socket in one corner, bearing the rather incongruous device of a chest with the lid thrown back. Probably it had to do with the fact that she was a merchant vessel. On the quay, two labourers worked the windlass on a wooden crane lowering a hooked sarple of wool into her hold.

'What's her name?' Miriel asked as Robert joined her on the castle, his eyes narrowed against the slant of the rain.

'Pandora's Daughter,' he said. 'I'm told it's from Greek mythology. Something about a foolish woman opening a box she was supposed to leave well alone.'

A jolt went through Miriel at mention of the name. That explained the open chest on the banner. 'Yes, I know the story of Pandora,' she murmured.

He set one heavy arm across her shoulders, his hand dangling relaxed, his body pressed front to spine against hers. 'You never cease to surprise me. Most women barely know anything beyond neighbourhood gossip, but you have a mind that would match many a man.'

Miriel gritted her teeth and smiled sweetly. She could not decide whether Robert was complimenting or belittling her. Either way she was irritated. Reminded of Nicholas by the vessel's name, she wondered what he had done with his life. She had a strong and not irrational fear that he might even be the master of this ship. He had told her that he came from a family of seafarers, and the cog's name was unusual. Most merchant vessels bore the names of saints who could be invoked in times of difficulty, and those that did not had warlike titles, inherited from their Viking ancestors, names like Serpent, Wolf, or Dragon.

Robert suddenly pointed. 'Here comes the master now.'

A tall, lugubrious man in his early thirties walked up the gangplank and on to the deck. His cropped brown hair stood straight up from his brow line and he had a wide, serious mouth, which broke into a smile as he saw the dog. Miriel felt a rush of relief and disappointment. What would she have done if the ship's captain had proved to be Nicholas de Caen? More to the point, what would Nicholas have done when he ' saw her? Perhaps it was just as well.

The man scooped up the dog in his long arms and bore him aloft to the castle, where Robert introduced him to Miriel as Master Martin Wudecoc.

'You like the little fellow then,' he said as he handed Will into her arms.

'I adore him.' Miriel gave the dog a hug and it wagged its tail and swiped a small pink tongue across her cheek. 'The best gift I've ever been given.' She twisted to bestow a soft look on her husband. Amongst her doubts and irritations, there still shone reasons like Will for her to have faith in him.

Robert smiled tenderly. 'Worth every penny,' he said.

'Me, or the dog?'

'Both of course.' He kissed her and ruffled the dog's coat the wrong way. Will showed his sharp little teeth and his chest rumbled. Robert prudently removed his hand. The smile stayed on his face, but his jaw muscles tensed with the effort of holding it there.

Bowing, Martin Wudecoc excused himself to his duties. Within the hour as the grey tide filled the Wash, Pandora's Daughter sailed out of Boston harbour, bound with her cargo of fleeces for the Flemish port of Antwerp.

With the promise of work for the looms and continuing wages to keep the wolf from the door, Ham Weaver had immersed himself in ale and celebration at Dame Gilda's alehouse in Grope Alley. The surroundings were not of the most salubrious, but the ale was the best to be had for miles around and a fresh brewing always attracted customers in their droves.

Ham gave a satisfied belch and reviewed the world through a golden haze induced by drink and failing eyesight.

'Mind, I've still got a few years left in me yet,' he told Walter the apprentice who had matched him drink for drink and now could barely hold his head off the trestle.

'Coursh you have.' The younger man tipped the rim of his cup to his lips.

'Made a good job of teaching you, haven't I?' 'None better.'

'I know Mistress Miriel. She won't throw me out . . . and her husband seems a decent sort.'

'Aye, decent short,' the lad repeated obligingly before laying his head on the trestle and closing his eyes.

Ham rose unsteadily and lurched his way out of the alehouse into the evening drizzle.

Sporadic torchlight flickered from the houses either side of Gilda's establishment, illuminating muddy puddles and soft, rutted surfaces, all a blur to Ham's vision. But he had lived in Lincoln all his life, had trodden the path to and from Gilda's alehouse twice a week for the past forty-five years. Irrespective of his failing sight, his legs bore him homeward, and he began to sing.

D . . . dronken -Dronken, dronken, dronken, ... dronken is Ham atte wyne Hay . . . suster, Walter, Peter, Ye dronke al depe And Ichulle . . .

The song never finished. As Ham lurched over a deep wheel rut at the juncture of an alley, soft footfalls stole up behind him. The first he knew of the danger was the moment that a muscular arm wrapped around his throat, choking off his voice and then his air.

His legs gave way and he went down into the mud. His assailant fell with him, but the pressure never let up. Instead of a squeeze, it became a steady, relentless push. Mud and water filled Ham's mouth and nostrils, then blotted the final flicker of vision from his staring eyes.

In the dawn, no one looked twice at the gong farmer's cart as it creaked out of the city gates laden with its noisome load of ordure and straw from Lincoln's gutters, privies and dung heaps. No one considered for one moment delving beneath the layers of excrement, the dead dogs and old floor rushes to look for the corpse of Ham the weaver, missing since last night or if they did, quickly thought the better of it. The gong farmer himself left it to his temporary assistant to unload the cart's contents into a rubbish pit. What the eye did not see was no grief to the conscience, and two shillings in silver pennies was a sum to turn any man's head in the other direction.

When the unloading was finished, the gong farmer returned to town, whistling, and his assistant unobtrusively slipped away, leaving the corpse of Ham Weaver to rot in its unquiet grave.