“Not to Baldwin. He’s a sly bugger. And when Matthew behaves like a fool, we pay no attention to him either.” Hancock sniffed and pointed to the gingerbread, which lay forgotten on the table. “Is someone going to eat that, or can we pitch it into the fire? Between Matthew’s scent and Charles’s cooking, I feel ill.”
“Given our approaching visitors, our time would be better spent devising a course of action than talking about family history,” Walter said impatiently.
“Jesu, there’s no time to come up with a plan,” Hancock said cheerfully. “Matthew and his lordship should say a prayer instead. They’re men of God. Maybe He’s listening.”
“Perhaps the witch could fly away,” Gallowglass murmured. He held up both hands in mute surrender when Matthew glared at him.
“Oh, but she can’t.” All eyes turned to Marlowe. “She can’t even conjure Matthew a beard.”
“You’ve taken up with a witch, against all the Congregation’s strictures, and she’s worthless?” It was impossible to tell if Gallowglass was more indignant or incredulous. “A wife who can summon a storm or give your enemy a horrible skin affliction has certain advantages, I grant you. But what good is a witch who can’t even serve as her husband’s barber?”
“Only Matthew would wed a witch from God-knows-where with no sorcery to speak of,” Hancock muttered to Walter.
“Quiet, all of you!” Matthew exploded. “I can’t think for all the senseless chatter. It’s not Diana’s fault that Widow Beaton is a meddling old fool or that she can’t perform magic on command. My wife was spellbound. And there’s an end to it. If one more person in this room questions me or criticizes Diana, I’ll rip your heart out and feed it to you while it still beats.”
“There is our lord and master,” Hancock said with a mocking salute. “For a minute I was afraid you were the one who was bewitched. Hang on, though. If she’s spellbound, what’s wrong with her? Is she dangerous? Mad? Both?”
Unnerved by the influx of nephews, agitated parsons, and the trouble brewing in Woodstock, I reached behind me for the chair. With my reach restricted by the unfamiliar clothes, I lost my balance and began to fall. A rough hand shot out and gripped me by the elbow, lowering me to the seat with surprising gentleness.
“It’s all right, Auntie.” Gallowglass made a soft noise of sympathy. “I’m not sure what’s amiss in your head, but Matthew will take care of you. He has a warm spot in his heart for lost souls, bless him.”
“I’m dizzy, not deranged,” I retorted.
Gallowglass’s eyes were flinty as his mouth approached my ear. “Your speech is disordered enough to stand for madness, and I doubt the priest cares one way or the other. Given that you aren’t from Chester or anywhere else I’ve been—and that’s a fair number of places, Auntie—you might want to mind your manners unless you want to find yourself locked in the church crypt.”
Long fingers clamped around Gallowglass’s shoulder and pulled him away. “If you’re quite finished trying to frighten my wife—a pointless exercise, I assure you—you might tell me about the men you passed,” Matthew said frostily. “Were they armed?”
“No.” After a long, interested look at me, Gallowglass turned toward his uncle.
“And who was with the minister?”
“How the hell should we know, Matthew? All three were warmbloods and not worth a second thought. One was fat and gray-haired, the other was medium size and complained about the weather,” Gallowglass said impatiently.
“Bidwell,” Matthew and Walter said at the same moment.
“It’s probably Iffley with him,” remarked Walter. “The two of them are always complaining—about the state of the roads, the noise at the inn, the quality of the beer.”
“Who’s Iffley?” I wondered aloud.
“A man who fancies himself the finest glover in all England. Somers works for him,” Walter replied.
“Master Iffley does craft the queen’s gloves,” George acknowledged.
“He made her a single pair of hunting gauntlets two decades ago. That’s hardly enough to make Iffley the most important man for thirty miles, dearly as he might covet the honor.” Matthew snorted contemptuously. “Singly none of them are terribly bright. Together they’re downright foolish. If that’s the best the village can do, we can return to our reading.”
“That’s it?” Walter’s voice was brittle. “We sit and let them come to us?” “Yes. But Diana doesn’t leave my sight—or yours, Gallowglass,” Matthew warned.
“You don’t have to remind me of my family duty, Uncle. I’ll be sure your feisty wife makes it to your bed tonight.”
“Feisty, am I? My husband is a member of the Congregation. A posse of men is coming on horseback to accuse me of harming a friendless old woman. I’m in a strange place and keep getting lost on my way to the bedroom. I still have no shoes. And I’m living in a dormitory full of adolescent boys who never stop talking!” I fumed. “But you needn’t trouble yourself on my account. I can take care of myself!”
“Take care of yourself?” Gallowglass laughed at me and shook his head. “No you can’t. And when the fighting’s done, we’ll need to see to that accent of yours. I didn’t understand half of what you just said.”
“She must be Irish,” Hancock said, glaring at me. “That would explain the spellbinding and the disordered speech. The whole lot of them are mad.”
“She’s not Irish,” Gallowglass said. “Mad or no, I would have understood her accent if that were the case.”
“Quiet!” Matthew bellowed.
“The men from the village are at the gatehouse,” Pierre announced in the ensuing silence.
“Go and fetch them,” Matthew ordered. He turned his attention to me. “Let me do the talking. Don’t answer their questions unless and until I tell you to do so. Now,” he continued briskly, “we can’t afford to have anything . . . unusual happen tonight as it did when Widow Beaton was here. Are you still dizzy? Do you need to lie down?”
“Curious. I’m curious,” I said, hands clenched. “Don’t worry about my magic or my health. Worry about how many hours it’s going to take you to answer my questions after the minister is gone. And if you try to wiggle out of them with the excuse that ‘it’s not my tale to tell,’ I’ll flatten you.”
“You are perfectly fine, then.” Matthew’s mouth twitched. He dropped a kiss on my forehead. “I love you, ma lionne.”
“You might reserve your professions of love until later and give Auntie a chance to compose herself,” Gallowglass suggested.
“Why does everyone feel compelled to tell me how to manage my own wife?” Matthew shot back. The cracks in his composure were starting to show.
“I really couldn’t say,” Gallowglass replied serenely. “She reminds me a bit of Granny, though. We give Philippe advice morning, noon, and night about how best to control her. Not that he listens.”
The men arranged themselves around the room. The apparent randomness of their positions created a human funnel—wider at the entrance to the room, narrower at the fireside where Matthew and I sat. As George and Kit would be the first to greet the man of God and his companions, Walter whisked away their dice and the manuscript of Doctor Faustus in favor of a copy of Herodotus’s Histories. Though it was not a Bible, Raleigh assured us it would lend proper gravitas to the situation. Kit was still protesting the unfairness of the substitution when footsteps and voices sounded.
Pierre ushered the three men inside. One so strongly resembled the reedy young man who had measured me for shoes that I knew at once he was Joseph Bidwell. He started at the sound of the door closing behind him and looked uneasily over his shoulder. When his bleary eyes faced forward again and he saw the size of the assembly awaiting him, he jumped once more. Walter, who occupied a position of strategic importance in the middle of the room with Hancock and Henry, ignored the nervous shoemaker and cast a look of disdain at a man in a bedraggled religious habit.
“What brings you here on such a night, Mr. Danforth?” Raleigh demanded.