The Illuminator (7 page)

The boy at least had the grace to look embarrassed, though he did not hang his head in shame. But neither did he flare back at her as a young Roderick would have done—though whether his temper was checked by discretion or affection, she couldn't say.

“I fear I've been too lax with you. From now on, you will be home by vespers.”

“Vespers,” he whined, his eyes sparking like flint on stone. He shook his head, loosening another shaggy curl. “I hate that priest. Is he—?”

“No, Alfred. Father Ignatius is not moving in. And if he were, I would hardly give him your father's quarters. We are to have lodgers.”

“Lodgers! By God's wounds, Mother, surely we are not so poor that we must rent out my father's—”

“Don't take that tone with me, Alfred. And you may indulge your temper and swear like a rogue while in the company of villeins but you will not do so in the presence of your mother.”

This time, he did hang his head. But in shame or merely to hide an insolent expression? Whichever, she resolved to soften her manner. A wise mother did not provoke her son to wrath.

“I have hit upon a plan to rid us of the priest whose company you find so confining,” she said. “Though a few prayers would not hurt any of us.
However, I don't see why we should be forced to pay for them. I don't recall that our Lord charged for his services.”

“Who is our lodger, then, and how will he keep the priest away?”

“
They,
not
he.
There will be two of them. A man and his daughter. The abbot at Broomholm has asked us to lodge them as a favor to the abbey, and what's more, he's willing to pay. Between the king's purveyances and the rising cost of prayers, you'll have nothing left to inherit if the bleeding isn't stopped.”

“But, I still don't understand. How will—”

“Don't be such a dullard. If we befriend the abbot, he will befriend us. The lodger is an illuminator of some renown who is coming to illustrate a Gospel for the abbey. He could not stay with the brothers there because of his daughter.”

Alfred's face lit up like sunshine breaking through a cloud. “How old is the daughter? ”

The light from the north-facing window poured over the boy as he hoisted himself up onto the desk and sat facing her, swinging his legs, curiosity chasing away any resentment at his mother's tongue-lashing. No wonder the girls flitted after him like swallowtails to bluebells. It lightened her own heart just to look at his merry eyes and toothy grin, but she would not let it show.

“It can make no difference to you. You will have nothing to do with the illuminator's daughter. Do you understand me, Alfred?”

He held up both hands in a gesture designed to halt the rising pitch of her voice.

“Just curious, that's all. She's probably ugly as a crow, anyway.” He laughed as he slid off his perch. The light behind him backlit his unruly mane of copper hair, making it into a fiery halo. He scowled petulantly. “Does that mean we have to go back to praying the hours, since we have a spy from the abbey?”

“I don't think so.” She absently fingered the jet beads of the rosary at her belt. “A small demonstration of our religious devotion is probably all that's required. You can manage a daily visit to the chapel, can't you? That should be enough. After all, the man's an artist, not a monk.”

“And nobody at Blackingham has need of a monk, right, Mother?”

Ignoring her son's impudence, Lady Kathryn turned her back on him and strode from the room.

The illuminator and his daughter came on Friday. At midday on every other Friday, Lady Kathryn met with Simpson in the great hall on matters of the estate. She rarely looked forward to these meetings, and today was no exception. But she had two important matters to discuss with the overseer, and she hoped to cover both before the arrival of her lodgers.

The first concerned a plea from one of her crofters. The woman, one of the weavers, had come to her, distraught and weeping. Simpson had taken her youngest daughter as a house servant. As steward, he was within his rights to do so, since both mother and child were serfs. The mother was not one of the free women who worked for rent and a pittance wage, so Lady Kathryn was her only recourse. Kathryn had promised the woman she would see that her daughter was returned. And so she would. The steward's action was intolerable. Not only was the welfare of the child at stake, but the mother, as one of Blackingham's best weavers, would pass the skill on to her daughter. Kathryn would have prevented it without the mother's tears had she known. She confronted Simpson before he'd completed his simpering greeting.

“A six-year-old child is not old enough to go into service. You will return her to her mother and find someone more suitable to empty your chamber pots and scour your boots.”

Simpson clutched his cap in his hands, kneading the velvet roll that banded it. She found his plumage and his overpowering perfume offensive. If he dressed up, as she suspected he did, for these Friday reckonings to impress her, it had the opposite effect.

“Milady, the girl is big for her age. And Sir Roderick was much opposed to coddling. He said it made for poor workers.”

“I should have thought you'd learned by now, Simpson, that I do not care what Sir Roderick said, cared about, or would have wanted. Your argument is not served by quoting him to me. As you are of yeoman status and are paid a generous wage, you should hire a groom out of your wages to attend you. Blackingham serfs are for service to Blackingham Hall and its lands. You will return the child to her mother. And you will not replace her with another.”

She watched with a mixture of satisfaction and apprehension his obvious struggle to curb his temper. It rankled that she needed this odious man, but she had none with whom to replace him.

“I do not mean to be unreasonable in this matter,” she continued. “If you wish to choose one of the crofters' wives, and if she is agreeable to working
for you, then I will pay her a small wage as an addendum to your salary. That is the best I can do. I will expect to see the child returned within the hour.” She leveled her gaze at him and lowered her voice, enunciating each word carefully, lest he misconstrue her peace offering as weakness. “In the same condition as when she left her mother's hearth.”

“As you wish, milady.” He lowered his head sufficiently so that she could not see his eyes and, giving a token bow, backed away.

“We aren't finished. There's one more thing. There is a shortfall in last quarter's accounting of the wool receipts.”

He stopped dead in his tracks and looked at her. She watched surprise, then resentment, register in his face. He closed his eyes briefly in a pose of remembering.

“Perhaps milady has forgotten the foot rot in the spring. We lost several sheep.”

“Foot rot?” She scanned the ledger that she'd brought with her from last quarter's accounting. “I see no expense in the accounting for tar.”

The steward shifted on his feet. “The shepherd did not report in time for us to buy the tar to treat the feet of the afflicted beasts I—”

“You are the steward. It was your responsibility, not John's. Anyway, you should have had enough tar on hand to treat a minor infestation. How many sheep did we lose?”

Simpson shifted his hulking frame and his left hand twitched. “Eight… ten head.”

Kathryn stiffened her spine. “Which is it, Simpson? Eight or ten?”

The steward clenched and unclenched his left hand several times, then mumbled, “Ten.”

250 pounds of wool lost! 250 pounds she'd been counting on.

She looked down, pretending to be occupied with binding the fasteners on the account book, but continued to watch him from beneath lowered eyelids.

“Well, at least you harvested some of the wool from the dead sheep.”

A sly look chased surprise across his features before he answered. “Unfortunately not, milady. We weighted the carcasses and threw them in the marsh. To keep the rest of the herd from being contaminated.”

She raised her head and met his gaze levelly. “How very judicious of you. Who knows how contaminated the pelts would have been from the foot disease.”

It was fortunate for the steward that at just that moment the sound of horses' hooves interrupted his interrogation. But the look Lady Kathryn shot in his direction, as she went into the courtyard to greet the arrivals, was clearly meant to say the matter was merely postponed.

The visitors were just coming to a stop in the courtyard. Kathryn squinted into the sunlight. She recognized only Brother Joseph from the abbey. A young girl of about sixteen rode on the back of a donkey being led by a tall man with an angular face. For a moment it was as though an apparition, a holy vision of the Virgin riding into Bethlehem, had graced her courtyard. But clearly this girl carried no child. Even the chaste cut of her dark blue kirtle revealed her slender form. Her dress was simple but of excellent cut and cloth. Kathryn's own weavers produced none so finely woven. The girl's only ornament was an exquisitely worked brooch of intertwining knotwork with a tiny pearl-encrusted cross at its center, which she stroked nervously with thin, pale fingers. The pendant hung from a crimson cord around her neck. A matching cord circled a gossamer veil covering hair black and shiny as a raven's neck. She had an exotic look: large almond eyes in an oval-shaped face, features so perfect they seemed to be chiseled in marble, and skin more olive than cream. Not the plain lump of a maid Kathryn had been hoping for. And she carried herself with a dignity that, like her dress, was far above her station.

That must be the father walking beside her, leading the donkey, watching its every step with sea-green eyes. He was tall, not brawny, sinewy in build. He leaned in toward the daughter protectively. He was clean-shaven and hatless, and Kathryn noticed his gray hair was thinning slightly at the crown. His tunic was knee-length, a light pale linen of good weave and spotless, its only adornment the small dagger hanging from a leather belt that girdled his waist loosely. Father and daughter could have been a tableau from a Christmas mystery play staged by the Mercer's Guild.

As he helped his daughter to dismount, Kathryn stepped forward to greet them. He smelled of Saracen's soap and some unfamiliar, subtle scent, linseed oil, perhaps. The hand that reached for his daughter's was narrow in the palm, with long, graceful fingers, and though the nails were carefully manicured, a hint of ocher-colored pigment clung to the cuticle of his right forefinger. He looked fastidious. She hoped he was not going to be a demanding guest.

Brother Joseph spoke first. “I've brought your guests,” he said, taking her hand. “But I fear that we—”

A cadre of mounted men clattered into the courtyard in a cloud of summer dust, drowning out his words. Surely it did not take so many men—one of whom she recognized as the sheriff—to escort one man and his daughter to their lodgings.

“Sir Guy,” she said, acknowledging the newcomer, “it has been too long.”

He had been a frequent visitor when Roderick was alive. With their falcons, they'd hunted together for sport in the meadows around Aylsham, and sometimes, with their bows, for wild game in Bacton Wood. He had not darkened her door since her husband's death. She was not happy to see him now.

He leaned down from his horse and raised her hand to his lips. “Indeed, it has, Lady Kathryn. I offer apologies for my neglect, and now I fear I must confess that this visit is an official one.”

She quickly surveyed the three mounted men behind him, looking for a familiar face as she scanned the courtyard in search of her sons. Had Alfred's temper involved him in some escapade that would embarrass her, or worse yet, prove costly?

“Official?” She forced a smile.

The sheriff pointed to a horse being led into the courtyard. At first glance it appeared to be riderless, but closer scrutiny showed what looked like a human form wrapped in a blanket and slung across the horse's back. A summer breeze lifted the edge of the blanket, and Kathryn wrinkled her nose in distaste. Whatever, or whoever, was wrapped inside was very ripe. The horse stamped its feet and whinnied as if wanting to be rid of its noisome burden.

The sheriff motioned to the man who held the horse. “Back him away. That's not a fit smell for a lady. She doesn't have to stand that close to identify the body.”

Identify the body!
Lady Kathryn felt the ground swirl beneath her. Again, she scanned the courtyard, urgently this time.
Alfred! Where was Alfred?
And she hadn't seen Colin since that morning.
What if it were Colin!
She moved toward the body on the horse, holding one hand against her chest to calm her heart.

Sir Guy must have seen the fear in her eyes; he put out a restraining hand. “I've frighted you for naught, Lady Kathryn. 'Tis not young Colin or Alfred. 'Tis only a priest.”

She thought she would faint with relief. The tall stranger standing beside Brother Joseph stepped forward and placed his arm around her to keep her
from falling. She leaned for the briefest moment against the illuminator, grateful for the strength of his arm. The feeling passed, and she disengaged, stepping away. He also backed away, a mere half-step, but enough to place an appropriate distance between them.