The Gallows Curse

The Corpse



Raffe pulled Talbot into the shelter of some willows on the bank of the river.

'I don't have much time, I must get back before I'm missed.' Raffe glanced over his shoulder in the direction of the manor. 'Hugh was supposed to be at court with his brother, but he left him on the road and returned here, some excuse about a fever, though I've never seen a man more fit and hale in my life.'

'Devil take him!' Talbot spat into the water. 'That queers things, 'cause I've come to tell you there's a ship in Yarmouth due to sail day after tomorrow, so you need to move your package downriver tonight. Can you do it with Hugh on the prowl?'

'I'll do it,' Raffe said grimly. 'Sooner the man's gone, the safer for all of us.'

Raffe was thinking of Lady Anne, but he had not mentioned her part in this to Talbot. Talbot loathed and despised every nobleman and woman simply by virtue of their birth and there was no point handing him information he might delight in selling.

A little way downstream, a boatman sat hunched in his craft, chewing a strip of dried eel and whittling away at a small piece of wood. From time to time he glanced over at the two men, but he knew it was safest not to be seen showing any interest in any business in which Talbot had a hand.

Talbot grunted. 'The boatmen'll be waiting near the jetty by the Fisher's Inn around the midnight hour. They'll take him down river to Yarmouth. Give the men this token. Otherwise they're liable to cut his throat. No one trusts any man, these days. See you get him to the inn tonight otherwise the ship'll sail without him. And with John's men keeping watch on every port, it could be weeks or months afore we find another captain willing to risk his neck.'

'He'll be there,' Raffe said. He turned to go, but Talbot grabbed his sleeve.

'Hold hard, there's something else. You know a man name of Raoul?'

'He's one of Osborn's men.' Raffe frowned. 'But now I think of it, I don't recall seeing him in the manor these past few days. I'm sure he didn't ride off with Osborn to court though. Why do you ask? What do you know of him?'

'I know he's dead, that's what, murdered. His body was found in the yard of the Adam and Eve Inn.'

'In Norwich? But what was he doing there?'

'Asking questions about that lass of yours. He seemed to think she was in the city.'

Raffe felt the blood drain from his face. He grasped Talbot's shoulder urgently. 'Did he find out where she was?'

'Now, that's hard to tell, but one thing's for certain, she found out where he was. It was your lass who murdered him.'

'No!' The word burst out of Raffe so loudly that the boatman's head jerked up and he stared at them, before he remembered he wasn't supposed to be listening.

Your lass as good as admitted it. And there's proof of it too.'

'This is madness.' Raffe felt as if he'd been punched in the stomach. 'She couldn't. How . . . why would she?'

'This Raoul came to Ma's the night he died. And your lass entertained him. She must have followed him after he left, for he stayed a while drinking in the guest hall after he'd finished with her and no one saw him leave.'

Raffe couldn't believe what he was hearing. "What possessed you to let him see her, never mind entertain him, when you knew he was looking for her?' He seized the front of Talbot's shirt, blazing with fury. You swore to me you'd keep her safe, you miserable little maggot.'

Talbot was unmoved. Even though Raffe was much taller,

Talbot had no doubts about who would come off best in any fight.

'I wasn't there. I was trying to find a ship for your friend,' he said pointedly. 'Luce was on the gate and she let Raoul in. But she'd no idea who he was for he didn't use his real name, who does? Even if he had, it would have meant nowt to her. Thing is, your lass was missing from the house that night and she knew exactly how this Raoul died afore she was told.'

'She could have heard someone talking about it or guessed . . .' Raffe protested feebly. 'But she couldn't murder anyone; she's just a young girl. She's so gentle she couldn't even kill a bird.'

'Murdered her own bairn, didn't she?' Talbot said gruffly. 'You and I, we've both seen plenty of women fighting to the death under the Cross in the Holy Land. There was that lass who took down a two-score of men with her long bow, afore the Saracens killed her, remember? Even Saladin admired her, though she was a Christian. When a woman's blood is up she's more ruthless than any man.'

'Not Elena.' Raffe felt as if the earth beneath his feet had suddenly turned to liquid. From the day she'd been accused, he'd tried to convince himself she hadn't murdered her child, yet hadn't there always been a tiny seed of doubt? Mothers did harm their children . . . But not Elena. He pictured those wide, innocent eyes staring up at him. Those were not the eyes of a murderer.

Then a thought struck him. 'What about you, Talbot? Where were you when Raoul died? You're always in the Adam and Eve, and if you discovered he was one of Osborn's men, you wouldn't think twice about killing him if you saw the opportunity.'

'I could ask the same of you. A man who's smitten with a woman would do just about anything to protect her, and if you found out this Raoul had tracked her down . . .' Talbot gave him a shrewd glance.

Raffe didn't answer. An even more alarming thought had occurred to him. 'Do the sheriffs men think it was Elena? Are they looking for her?'

Talbot eyed him for a moment or two. 'They say this Raoul was in debt, owed the dog fighters a deal of money.'

'And did he?'

Talbot grinned. 'Who's to know? A whisper planted in the right ear, and afore you count the claws on a cat the whole town is certain it's true though no man can remember who told him of it. It'll take them a while to untangle those whispers. Thing is, if this Raoul was one of Osborn's men, I reckon that means Osborn knows his runaway is in Norwich. He doesn't know where yet, else his man would not have been asking questions. But when Osborn returns and learns his man's been murdered, he's not going to take that kindly. And he won't be so easy to cod as those frog-wits the sheriff has working for him.'





Gytha was pulling her bucket up from the spring when she heard a furious grunting and crashing in the bushes behind her. She whirled round. A great boar was standing not a man's length in front of her, his flanks heaving as he panted for breath. The beast's red mouth hung open, and his long yellow tusks curled up over his cheeks, dagger-sharp. He lifted his hairy black head and snouted the air.

Gytha stayed quite still. She knew those tusks could rip the guts out from her belly in one swift jerk of his great head. They said that when it was hunted, a boar's tusks grew so hot they would burn the fur from a hound. She had a healthy respect for the beast, but she was not afraid. She lifted her hand slowly, palm open, reciting a charm under her breath calling on the ancient ones, on Freyr and Freyja, whose sacred boar with the golden glowing mane illuminated the darkest storm. The beast blinked his tiny red eyes.

'Whist now, whist,' Gytha said softly.

The boar turned a little and as he did, she saw the blood dripping from a gash on his hind leg on to the green blades of grass. Gytha had heard the distant calls of a hunting horn earlier that morning and the excited baying of the hounds. This beast had doubtless been their quarry. He had been wounded, probably by a spear. Gytha knew by now he would be tormented by thirst. That was all the poor creature wanted, water. He could smell it.

Moving as slowly as she could, she tipped her bucket, letting the water trickle out towards the boar. Most of the water soaked away before it could reach him, but it was enough to make him lower his massive head towards the muddy trickle. Gytha used that moment's distraction to edge away to the side of the spring, leaving a clear path for the boar. Pulled by his raging desire to drink, the beast lumbered forward, pushing his snout deep into the clear, cold pool.

A boar's eyesight is poor, but Gytha knew that he could sense any movement and if he did, he would charge. So she stood quite still, trusting that once he had sated his thirst he would move off.

Both woman and beast lifted their heads as one as they heard the sound of snapping twigs and blundering footsteps. Someone was crashing through the bushes towards them. The boar swung round with an agility that belied his great bulk and squared himself to the direction of the sound, snorting and lowering his head for the charge. Whoever was coming would have their legs ripped open by those tusks before they even realized what was thundering towards them.

As she bellowed a warning, Gytha snatched up a stone and flung it at the rocks behind the spring; it hit them with a resounding echo, then splashed into the water. The boar whipped round in the direction of the sound. Whoever was in the bushes had the sense to stand still. The boar charged towards the pool, then stopped, turning his head this way and that, snuffling the air.

Again, Gytha held up her hand and recited the charm. Then, in the distance, she heard the blast of the hunting horn and the far-off baying of the hounds. With a grunt, the boar turned, crashing off through the undergrowth away from the barking dogs. And Gytha finally let her hand drop.

The bushes parted and a man stepped out. Gytha could see at once this was no charcoal burner. His fine red leather gloves and boots were not fashioned by any cordwainer in these parts. Nor was he a man who needed to hunt to fill his family's hungry bellies, for the flash from the gold thread on the trim of his tunic was enough to alert any quarry for miles around. He was limping. Gytha guessed he'd been thrown from his horse, for a man like that would hardly enter the forest on foot, and there was a long, deep scratch across his cheek, which still oozed beads of blood.

He inclined his head, but there was nothing respectful in those iron-grey eyes. 'I believe I should thank you for your timely warning, mistress.'

'You were hunting that boar?'

'My men were trying to put it up, but the fools lost it.'

'And your horse?' Gytha asked him.

A look of anger born of humiliation flashed across his face. No man, especially a nobleman like him, cares to admit they cannot master a dumb animal.

'A barn owl flew right in my face, in broad daylight. I'd almost swear it had been trained to go for my eyes.' His gloved fingers briefly touched the gash on his face.

A thrill shuddered through Gytha's frame, but she tried to conceal her excitement. Instead her tone was grave.

'An owl at noon. 'Tis a bad omen. An omen of death.'

His chin lifted in a challenge. 'If you think to frighten me, woman, you've chosen the wrong mark. I've fought in battles that would turn men's guts to water. I'm not going to start trembling like an old village crone over some bird.'

But Gytha could read the flash of uncertainty in his eyes.

'There are some things that can't be fought with a sword, Hugh of Roxham.'

This time his grey eyes betrayed something bordering on fear. 'How do you know me?'

'Every soul in these parts has heard of you and your brother. But they say Hugh is the handsome one of the pair.'

Hugh laughed. 'You heard right, mistress.'

'Yet they say Osborn is the more powerful.'

'Is that what they say?' Hugh muttered savagely.

Gytha knew that baiting such a man as Hugh was as wise as baiting a wounded boar, but it is sometimes necessary to goad a beast into charging before you can ensnare him.

'Osborn was born afore you, isn't that the way of it? The elder receives the title and property, while the younger is tossed his brother's leavings.'

Fury blazed in Hugh's face. 'My brother is a fool and treats me like some halfwit child. He has all the power and wealth and knows nothing of how to use either. He follows in blind obedience whoever sits on the throne, even if it leads to ruin. He was forced to borrow a fortune to finance Richard and his own men in the Holy Wars and he won back not a half of it in spoils. And now John demands more money for more wars.'

'But what can you do?' Gytha asked innocently. 'It's the way of it, the natural order for the younger to obey the elder, and the subject to obey the king.'

'John didn't sit around waiting for his divine right to inherit the throne,' Hugh said, his eyes glittering with malice. 'If he had, it wouldn't be his royal backside sprawled across it just now. But I promise you, my brother won't...' He seemed to realize what he was saying and seized Gytha's wrist, yanking her towards him. 'What is this to you? What do you want?'

Gytha did not betray even by the smallest grimace that he was hurting her. She had mastered that art as a child. She'd had to, for the offspring of cunning women are seldom treated kindly by their playmates.

'It seems unjust that the fool should lord over the wise,' she said evenly. 'I could help you get what a man like you deserves.'

Hugh snorted, looking down at her stained homespun kirtle. 'And what can a beggar offer a man such as me — money, soldiers, power? What could you possibly do to help me?'

'I've already saved you from death today,' Gytha said. She slid her hand into her scrip and pulled out a long thin band of black fur with two leather thongs dangling from either end. 'This'll guard you against the owl's curse and aid you in gaining the power you seek.'

Hugh, as if he couldn't help himself, stretched out his hand and fingered the fur. Then, shaking his head to clear his senses, he pushed it roughly away.

'Don't you dare take me for a fool. Do you really think I'm going to buy a mangy old piece of fur from you? This is how you make your living, is it, cheating the gullible with fake charms? I could have you flogged bloody for this.'

Gytha shrugged and pushed the fur back into her scrip. 'How do you think I could stand so close to a wounded wild boar and come to no hurt?'

She turned back to the spring and calmly dipped her bucket back into it.

There was a moment's silence, then Hugh asked suspiciously, 'What are you asking for it? I warn you, don't try to cheat me; I know what these things are worth.'

Gytha placed a tight coil of cloth on her head and swung the full pail up, balancing it on the coil.

'Nothing. I ask nothing now. When you have the power you seek, perhaps you will remember me.'

Hugh gave a harsh laugh. 'So when I have my brother's estates, you think I will reward you handsomely, do you?'

Gytha thought no such thing. But she knew only too well that men are suspicious of anything which is freely given and anyone who gives it. She smiled, then set the pail down again.

'Show me your hand.'

Hugh hesitated, then peeled off the glove. Gytha ran her fingers over his palm, turning the hand this way and that to the bright sunlight, as if she was examining it carefully. She was not. She knew what lay there would tell her nothing. She had already decided what she would say to him.

'You are a king-maker, Hugh of Roxham. And kingmakers have more power than the sovereign himself.'

His eyes flew wide. You know this . . . you . . . you can see this?' He peered down at his own hand as if he had never noticed his arm ended in such an appendage before.

Gytha let his hand fall. Then she pulled out the strip of fur again, and held it up before his greedy eyes.

You must wear this as a girdle about your waist, next to your bare skin. It will guide you. Do whatever it leads you to do. Follow the desires it awakens in you, for as you satisfy them so your power will increase. You will feel the hunger, you will feel the strength grow in you, as soon as you put it on.'

Hugh was about to speak, but she held up a warning hand.

'Listen, your friends are coming this way.'

He turned his head towards the sound. She was right; the barking of hounds and crashing of the horses' hooves were growing louder, coming straight towards them. He turned to say something to her, but she had vanished. Puzzled, he looked down and started violently as he realized that he was holding the girdle of fur.

Hugh would wear the girdle of fur about his waist, Gytha was sure of that. He wouldn't be able to resist the temptation, not if he thought there was the slightest chance it would give him what he desired. And when he wore it, he would be forced to satiate the desires it would awaken in him. He would have to act. He would be driven to it. It was but one small step, but each step leads to another. You must raise the skeleton one bone at a time before you can set it dancing.





Darkness stretches time, as wetting stretches a woollen cloth. A man waiting alone under the stars feels each passing hour drawn out so far he can no longer trust even the hourglass to mark it faithfully, and Raffe had no hourglass in his hand.

He was squatting in the concealment of some trees, gazing out on the twisting black waters of the river, his ears straining for the splash of a paddle. His limbs were so stiff, he was beginning to think that if the boat came now, he would be unable to stir a muscle to meet it.

His mind felt more numb than his legs. Although he'd thought of little else all day, still he could not digest the news that Elena had murdered Raoul. It was impossible to think that such a fragile, innocent creature could have killed a man. Yet Talbot said she had as good as admitted it. If she had realized who Raoul was, if he'd threatened to take her back to Gastmere, she would have been terrified. If he'd hurt her, forced himself on her, she might have lashed out in panic, like a cornered animal, not meaning to kill him, an accident. But Talbot had said the corpse had been found at the inn and she'd been missing all night. That meant she must have followed him and . . . no, Raffe couldn't bring himself to think that. He wouldn't allow himself to think that.

Osborn would tear the city apart when he discovered Raoul was dead. Raffe's head was pounding. He couldn't think about this now, he would drive himself mad and he couldn't afford to lose concentration, not tonight, too much was at stake. He must focus on the priest. If the priest was caught and started talking, both Raffe's and Lady Anne's lives would be forfeit. And there was Gerard's body. This might be his only chance to obtain holy unction for Gerard. Raffe would not fail his friend.

No, before he could even think about Elena, he must deal with the priest first. As long as Osborn was at court, Elena was still safe where she was. Blessed Virgin, let John send Osborn to France, Flanders, anywhere, but just keep him far away from us.

A chill wind blew off the marshes and Raffe drew his cloak tighter about him. God's bones, why was it always so damn cold at night in England? Even in midsummer, as soon as night closed in, you felt yourself encased in cold as if you were entombed in a cave.

When he'd been a boy in the mountains of Italy he could lie outside on a summer's night staring up at the great bright stars and the air was as silky and warm as a perfumed bath. It had been just such a night when he'd first laid eyes on Gerard.

Gerard had ridden into the farmstead near sunset, with all the bravado of a youth of nineteen years, scattering chickens to the four winds. Four other knights clattered into the yard behind him, their horses foaming at the bit. Sweat had caked the white dust from the road to the men's faces so thickly that one of Raffe's little sisters had come screaming into the cottage that dead men were attacking the house.

All of the men and boys in the household had grabbed up pitchforks and stout sticks and run outside to defend their farm to the death if need be, but Gerard had wearily eased himself from the saddle and walked towards them, his hands upraised in a gesture of peace. One of the horses had a loose shoe, he told them, which the beast was likely to lose altogether if they continued to the next town. So he announced that this household would have the pleasure of their company for the night.

Raffe's mother and aunts had whispered to Raffe's father that the knights must be sent away. They had not enough food to spare and where would these gentlemen sleep for they could hardly be asked to bed down in the byres?

Raffe's father sadly hushed the scolding women. 'What we don't give them, they'll take anyway and more besides. Have you not seen their sign?'

He gestured to one of the knights who carried a lance from which hung a small pendant in the shape of a scarlet cross on a white ground. Crusaders! The women crossed themselves, muttering and spitting on the first two fingers of their right hands to ward off the evil eye, for if rumours were to be believed, and they always were believed in those parts, Crusaders were the very demons of hell made flesh. If they rode into a village they were likely to ride out again with the cottages in flames behind them, and their scrips bulging with the looted treasure from the village and its church.

Raffe's mother seized Raffe's younger brother. 'You take your sisters and female cousins through the cellar to the caves. Get word out to warn our neighbours.'

The cellars of every home and church on that mountainside led into a series of labyrinthine caves, once home to their ancestors, but which now served as storage chambers as well as an escape route for any who might need to disappear from view. A man might enter one cottage and while his pursuers were keeping watch on that door, he was slipping out of another house a mile or more away.

Raffe's brother knew well what to do. He herded the five unmarried girls down to the cellars along with his pregnant sister, for her swelling belly would be no deterrent to a soldier whose blood was hot. The old women would have to pray to the Blessed Virgin that the Crusaders were not desperate enough to want them, for they would be needed to cook.

The men dragged trestles and benches out into the yard and called to Raffe to bring wine, while the women heaped onions and olives dressed with olive oil into wooden bowls to stay the men's hunger and buy them the time to add more vegetables and beans to their family's own meagre pottage.

The Crusaders picked suspiciously at the proffered bowls. Then one scooped up a handful of olives and angrily threw them at Raffe's head. 'God's arse, what are these, sheep droppings? Are you trying to poison us?'

Raffe wiped the drips of oil from his face. 'They are the fruits of the tree, very good to eat.'

The man stared at him then roared with laughter. 'What are you, a maid or a man? I do declare I've never heard a girl's voice come from a man's body. Did your mother think to dress her daughter like her brothers to protect you from our ravishings?'

The others joined in the mocking laughter, for a moment forgetting their impatient demands for food. Even Raffe's own brothers giggled. Gerard alone didn't laugh, but met Raffe's dark eyes with his own sapphire-blue ones. His face creased in a grimace of pain as if he had felt the barb himself.

'Are you the maid's mother?' the knight asked. 'Tell me what you have bred here, for she's the mostly comely maid I've seen yet in this household, and I think I've a mind to warm my bed with her, if you've nothing better to offer me.'

Raffe's mother regarded her son with disgust. 'Do what you like with him, for he's neither man nor woman, and has brought us nothing but shame.'

'In that case, I'll throw him back, mistress. Once when I was a boy, I pulled a fish from the river that was covered in a furry white wool. "What's this?" I said, "Mutton you can eat on a fish day, now there's a miracle." But when I tasted it, it was fowl and I was as sick as a drunkard all night.'

The others snorted with laughter, but it only reminded them they were hungry and they roared again for food, banging with the hilt of their knives on the wooden table. Even the pottage did not satisfy them and they demanded meat. When Raffe's father protested they had none, two of the men went to the byre where the hens were roosting and returned with five of them dangling from their fists, their necks wrung. Raffe's mother wept as she plucked them.

The family spent the night huddled together in the byre while the Crusaders occupied their beds in the house. Raffe did neither. He could not sleep and wandered alone among the olive trees under the star-filled sky. What the Crusader had said had glanced off him like a deflected lance blade leaving only a flesh wound, nothing more. He'd swallowed such jibes ever since he had returned to the village. He scarcely separated the pain of each remark any more, for they merged like bruises. No, it was not the Crusader's laughter that made him punch his fists over and over again into the trunk of the olive tree. It was the burning pain of his mother's words that was tearing him apart from within.

'Can you beat a man with as much strength as you can strike that tree?'

The voice startled him and he turned around searching for the source, and eventually saw a man sprawling on the ground in the darkness under an almond tree.

'I can beat any man to pulp,' Raffe boasted through gritted teeth.

'Then don't wreck your hands on an enemy you cannot overcome. Ride with us, and try your strength on men who can be beaten.'

Raffe's face burned with anger. He took a step closer. 'Can you fight as well as you can mock? Get up and face me.'

'I have no wish to fight you.' The man held out one open palm towards Raffe. 'I am Gerard of Gastmere, and I don't mock you, my friend. I'm serious. I have no squire to ride with me.' He chuckled. 'Or rather I do, but I couldn't prise him from the arms of a doe-eyed beauty he discovered the first night we landed on these shores. I suppose I could have forced him to come with me, but I would have no man ride by my side or drink with me in a tavern who does not want to be there with his whole heart. So I told him to stay until he wearies of her or her of him.' He laughed again, an open, honest laugh and in spite of himself, Raffe felt drawn to this man.

'Now, what do you say, lad? Shall you stay here and be the whipping boy of your family for the rest of your life or do you ride with me and make men respect you for your courage and your fists? Oh, you'll hear jokes aplenty at your expense wherever you go. I'm not pretending you won't. Those men riding with me will torment you till you're ready to crack their skulls open, but if you hit harder, ride longer, and fight with more courage than any of them, those knights will come to call you brother and run any man through with their swords if they hear him say one mocking word about you.'

And Raffe had needed no other words to persuade him.

The two of them had stayed sitting side by side under the vast arch of stars. Gerard talked of the manor of Gastmere and his own beloved parents. His father had left him in charge when he rode off to the Holy Wars with King Richard. Gerard had been desperate to ride with his father, but his father would not hear of it. It was his duty to stay and look after his mother and the manor.

Besides, as his father confided when they were alone, 'I would not have your poor mother lose a son and husband in the same battle, if it should come to it, and it likely would, for I should be so distracted by marking your progress in the fight, I would surely fail to protect myself.'

'So why do you ride to the Holy Land now?' Raffe asked. 'Your mother, is she dead?'

Gerard shook his head, then hesitated. 'There is a woman in our village. I was . . . fond of her once. She has a gift of second sight. She told me that my father would soon find himself in mortal danger. His thoughts would turn to me and he would desperately need my help.'

You trust this woman?' Raffe asked him.

Gerard stared up at the bright stars for a long time without answering. 'Did you know that men call the stars by different names? Some look at the same sky, but see quite different shapes and creatures in it? I thought once that the names I knew were the true names of the stars, but if all men have different names for the same objects, how shall we know which of them is their real name? Do you suppose the stars have names that only they know?'

He turned and fiercely grasped Raffe's arm. 'My father needs me and I have to go to him. I could never forgive myself if I discovered that I might have saved him, but I did not. If there is any chance I can help him, I must do it, do you see?'

Raffe nodded, but in truth he didn't see at all. At seventeen he could not imagine feeling such love or loyalty for any man, certainly not for his own father. But now, after all these years, he finally understood what a man will do for love.

In the end, it had all been in vain. Gerard had arrived at Acre too late to save his father, but that night, that gloriously starry night, it seemed impossible to those two young men that they could ever fail. He and Gerard had sat together under the olive trees. The darkness throbbed with the rasping of the cicadas. The warm air rose from the earth around them, anointing them with scented oils of wild thyme and summer. And all the while they sat there, they talked and talked of nothing and everything, till weariness overcame them and they slept like infants cradled upon the moon-washed earth.

The Crusaders left the next morning, Raffe riding upon a mule until a better mount could be bought for him. Raffe's father had managed, if not exactly a blessing, at least a mumbled, Take care of yourself, bay. Raffe had not looked back as they trotted away; there would be nothing to see. His mother was already inside her house, trying to repair the devastation the unruly knights had brought to her home. When she and Raffe had said their curt goodbyes to each other, her eyes had been as dry and lifeless as the sun-scorched grass. She had finished weeping over the chickens. They were just bones in her stock pot now. What was the point of any more tears?

A shrill whistle startled Raffe out of his reverie, and he saw the black smudge of a low craft sculling towards him across the river. He rose and almost fell over as his legs were seized by a cramp. He jiggled them, trying to shake the feeling back into them. God curse the English weather.

The marsh-boy had borrowed a longer craft than his own light coracle, and despite the chill night his fingers were sweaty as he passed Raffe the rope. His passenger had evidently not helped him to scull the boat. But as Raffe grasped the priest's cold hand to pull him ashore, he realized that he would have been more a hindrance than help, for such soft delicate little fingers as these would have blistered before he'd made half a dozen strokes.

'The boy says you've got me passage on a ship. Where is it?' The priest shivered, and glanced around him as if he really thought some great sea-going vessel would be moored up in the river.

Raffe ignored the question and addressed the boy. 'Hide the boat on the other side of the islet. I'll bring the priest back as soon as he's done and I'll make an owl's cry. When you hear it, bring the boat back.'

He handed the boy the basket of food, which the lad had been gazing at longingly from the moment he moored up.

'Try not to eat it all, the priest'll want some of it for the journey.'

The lad nodded, but Raffe had no great faith there'd be anything but crumbs left by the time they returned. He smiled and patted the boy's shoulder. He remembered what it felt like to be constantly hungry as a lad and didn't begrudge him a mouthful, though the priest undoubtedly would.

'This way, Father. And keep your hood pulled up; though your hair's grown long, it still has the faint shadow of a tonsure for those with eyes to see.'

He helped the priest up the bank and on to the track that led to the manor.

'But where is the ship?' the priest repeated, peering nervously at every tree and bush as if he expected them to be bristling with soldiers.

'When we are done here, we'll return to the boat and get you to the ship.'

The priest stopped dead. 'We must go now, at once, we might miss it.'

'I told you that you will not be going anywhere until you've anointed Gerard's body.'

Seeing the priest was again about to protest, Raffe seized the little man's arm and hurried him forward, growling in his ear, 'Without me, you'll not get to your ship, so unless you want to spend the winter hiding on the freezing marshes or lying chained in some sodden, stinking dungeon I suggest you come with me, and quietly at that.'

He felt the priest resisting every step as he hurried him along, but Raffe pulled him as easily as a child might drag a rag doll. At the manor gate he stopped and opened the wicket gate as silently as he could, peering in to see if the courtyard was empty. It was. He pulled the priest inside and hurried him across to the vaulted arches under the Great Hall.

Raffe had taken the precaution of finding a woman to occupy the gatekeeper, promising to keep the watch for Walter in return for some invented favour he'd asked the gatekeeper to do for him. The woman was well past her prime, with straggly grey hair and a face ravaged by the pox, but Walter would not be looking at her face. The gatekeeper had gone off towards the village with a grin broad enough to split his wrinkled old face in two.

Walter in turn had assured Raffe that he could sleep soundly in the gatehouse, for the pair of hounds would bark loud enough to rouse him from his grave if any should approach the gate. And so they would have done, had Raffe not slipped them each a tasty piece of mutton with a pelt of poppy paste in each one. Now the only sounds which came from the hounds were deep and drooling snores.

Raffe led the priest to the back of the undercroft and lifted up the trapdoor and then the grid which covered the prisoner hole. As soon as the wooden trapdoor was raised, a stench rose up from the hole which was enough to make even a battle-hardened warrior retch. The priest drew the neck of his hood over his mouth and nose.

'I've unsealed the wall and opened the coffin ready for you,' Raffe informed him.

The priest shuddered in disgust. 'I can smell that. But it was unnecessary.'

The little man glanced uneasily round the dark and silent courtyard, his nose twitching like a frightened mouse that fears danger from all quarters.

'I'll say the prayers for the dead, but we must make haste,' he said, crossing himself rapidly as he knelt down.

But his callused knees had scarcely touched the flags when Raffe seized him by the arm and hauled him up again.

'What do you think I opened the coffin for?' Raffe whispered. 'Go down and give him the unction of God.'

The priest's jaw went as slack as a hanged man's. 'No! No! Holy unction is for the sick. If he were newly dead and the spirit might yet be lingering near the body, it is permitted.

But that man has been dead for months, you admitted as much yourself, and even if you hadn't, my nose would testify to the fact. Besides, unction is only permitted once confession has been heard and the sacrament of penance given, or, if a man is too ill to confess, that the priest is assured he has at least undertaken an act of sorrow for his sins.'

'Gerard lived in constant horror of his sins. Never did a man feel so much sorrow for what he had done.'

'That's all very well for you to say,' the priest protested, 'but how am I to know that?' Then he added petulantly, 'In any case, it is far too late to anoint a corpse that long dead and . . . and besides, I have no holy oil left.'

Raffe was gripped by such a rage that it was all he could do to stop himself wringing that scrawny, lying throat.

'Give me your scrip,' he ordered.

The man instinctively clutched tightly at the small leather bag that hung from his belt, but the look of fury on Raffe's face was so terrifying that when Raffe held out his great hand, the priest, with trembling fingers, unbuckled his belt as meekly as a bride disrobing for her husband. Raffe reached inside and pulled out a tiny flask of finely wrought silver, inscribed with an image of the crucifixion. He opened it and sniffed, holding the open flask in his hand.

'A miracle, is it not, Father? God has filled your flask with oil while you lay sleeping'

'But that is all I have,' the priest wailed. 'And if I should come across the sick and dying, what would I have to anoint them with? It's too late for your friend, but surely you would not condemn other souls to torment? Suppose it was your wife or child . . .' He gulped, plainly realizing too late that mention of wife or child to a man such as Raffe was like jabbing a stick at a roaring bear.

'Don't give me that,' Raffe snarled. 'You have no more concern for the souls of others than a dog has for its fleas. You just want to make sure you have oil enough to anoint yourself before death. Thought of a sea voyage scares you, does it, or worse, burning up with fever in one of King John's filthy cells?'

Raffe took a step nearer the prisoner hole. He held the flask above it.

'Anoint him properly and you will have some drops left for yourself. Or I shall do it by pouring the whole flask into his coffin.'

'No, please!' the priest whispered frantically. 'God in heaven, don't! I'll do it. I'll do it!'

Raffe closed the flask and placed it back in the shaking hands of the priest, who grasped it, pressing it tightly to his lips and kissing it fervently.

You'd better get on with it then,' Raffe urged. 'Ship sails with the tide and waits for no man.'

The little man fumbled hopelessly as he put the flask back in his scrip, rebuckled it about his waist and set one foot on the rung of the ladder. He paused, casting one more beseeching glance up at Raffe, but his expression was as implacable as granite. Slowly the priest descended into the stench of hell.

Raffe crouched on the edge of the hole, holding the lantern down inside. The priest stood in the damp earth, peering into the hole in the side of the wall in which the exposed coffin lay. His body shuddered convulsively as he retched and whimpered like a wounded dog.

He lifted his pale face to Raffe. There's... nothing to anoint. Just bones and bits of putrefying flesh and . .. and most of it is already melted to liquid. I can't touch him.' Tears ran down the man's face. 'Please, please, don't make me do this,' he begged.

'If he has bones you can tell where his lips were, his private parts, his hands,' Raffe said with a coldness he didn't feel.

It was taking every drop of self-control he had not to burst out screaming and sobbing at the sight of the foul, stinking abomination that had taken the place of his dearest friend's face.

'Do it, Father. Do it now or by God, I shall close these bars and leave you down there to rot until you look just like him.'

The priest bowed his head. Then, as a palsied man struggles to move a deadened limb, he stretched out his shaking hand into the darkness of the coffin. His fingers coated in the precious drops of holy oil, he made the three-times-five crosses — three for the Trinity, five for the senses — anointing eyes, ears, nostrils, lips, hands, feet and genitals, or at least the places on the rotting flesh where these organs which cause a man to sin had once existed.

'I anoint... I anoint thee with . . . holy oil in the name of the Trinity that thou mayest be saved for ever and ever.'

Raffe bowed his head, crossing himself, and so fervently did he pray that he almost missed the sound of the footsteps crossing the courtyard. But a man who has watched through many a long night waiting for that slight intake of breath that the assassin makes before he sticks the dagger in your back or slices his knife across your throat, can never again give himself over to prayer or sleep or even love-making without his sixth sense remaining ever watchful.

Quicker than an arrow flies from a bow, Raffe had withdrawn the lantern and closed the trapdoor over the prisoner hole. Below him, he heard a shriek of fear from the priest. Raffe stood astride the wooden door in the hope that his voice would carry downwards as well as across the courtyard.

'Who goes there?' he challenged as loudly as he could.

He prayed that the priest would have the sense to stay still and would not in his panic lose his wits so far as to cry out.

'What are you doing skulking in the shadows, gelding?'

Devil's arse! It was Hugh. The last man Raffe wanted to see that night.

Raffe strode as rapidly as he could into the courtyard to draw Hugh away from any sound the priest might be making down there, trapped in the darkness with the rotting corpse.

'Doing my rounds as a steward should, making sure that no one is helping themselves to the stores. And you, what keeps you awake at this late hour — can't find a woman to warm your bed?'

By the scowl on Hugh's face he knew he'd hit the mark.

'A bed-warmer is all the use you can put a woman to, isn't it, gelding?'

Raffe noticed with some satisfaction that Hugh was limping. The rumour among the sniggering servants was that he'd been thrown from his horse earlier in a hunt that day. His fall and the fact that the hunt had failed to kill a single boar had made him even more foul than usual.

Hugh nodded in the direction of the gatehouse. 'One of my brother's men, Raoul, has not returned from Norwich. I intend to rouse that bone-idle gatekeeper to learn if Raoul has sent word about his delay.'

So they didn't yet know about Raoul. Raffe muttered a rapid prayer of thanks for that. But he had to prevent Hugh from going to the gatehouse. If Hugh found the gatekeeeper absent it wouldn't just be Walter who suffered; sooner or later Hugh would be bound to discover who had sent Walter away and his suspicions would be thoroughly aroused.

But Raffe was careful to betray nothing of his anxiety on his face. 'If a message had come, word would have been sent to you straight away.'

'Walter would have sent a servant with a message, but since you never bother to school them in their duties, no doubt the numbskull would have forgotten what he was about before he was half-way across the yard. There's not enough wit between the whole pack of servants in this manor to animate a single slug'

He made to turn in the direction of the gatehouse, but Raffe blocked his way.

'I wouldn't go into the gatehouse if I were you. Walter's stricken with a fever. It might be nothing more than a touch of marsh ague, but if it's a contagion then it could spread. We won't know how serious it is till morning. In the meantime, I told him to go to his bed and I'd take his watch.'

Walter and his woman would be sow-drunk by now, and with luck he'd have a raging hangover by morning and would look sick enough to convince anyone he'd spent the night with a fever.

Hugh rocked on the balls of his feet, half of him plainly determined to see for himself, the other not wanting to go anywhere near a sick man for his own safety.

Finally caution won out. 'Bring me word at once, no matter what the hour, if there is word from Raoul. I trust you can get that much right at least.'

Hugh gestured towards the gate. 'Well, go on, gelding. If you're keeping watch, do it. Lie down and keep watch, with the other hounds. At least for once you know your place. I always said it was among the curs.'

Raffe had to force himself to keep silent, though it almost cost a tooth for he was clenching his jaw so hard, but he meekly walked across to the gate and sat down by the brazier, warming his hands.

Hugh stood watching, then, apparently satisfied, he climbed the steps up to the Great Hall. An unnerving silence descended on the dark courtyard. It was so quiet Raffe could hear the leaves rustling on the trees outside, but still he dared not move to release the priest from his tomb. A flicker of movement at one of the darkened upper casements told him Hugh was still watching him. Raffe prayed that the priest would not think himself abandoned, and start hollering and banging to be let out. Raffe wrapped his cloak tightly around himself and let his head gradually droop forward on to his chest as if he was dozing.

There he remained for as long as he dared. Finally he let his eyes flick up to the windows without moving his head. He could not see anyone standing there. Please God, Hugh had grown tired of watching and had at last retired to his bed. Raffe feigned a yawn, stretched and stood up, ambling round the courtyard as if he was merely checking all was well. Once he reached the arches under the Great Hall, where he could no longer be seen, he hurried to the prisoner hole and pulled up the trapdoor; the stench rolled out like a dense cloud of fog.

'Father,' he whispered. 'I've come to take you to the ship.'

There was no reply. Raffe lay on his belly and hung the lantern down as low as he could. The feeble light showed a crumpled figure lying at the bottom of the pit. His eyes were closed and he was not stirring. Sweet Holy Virgin, was he dead, suffocated?

As rapidly as he could, Raffe descended the ladder. There was scarcely room at the bottom for him to stand without treading on the prone form of the priest. Raffe bit his lip hard to stop himself from gagging and carefully avoided looking into the black hole in which the open coffin lay. Awkwardly he bent down and shook the priest, but there was no response. He pushed his hand inside the man's shirt and with enormous relief discovered a faint heartbeat, though the man's skin was fish-cold.

Raffe dragged the limp body upwards and crouched down so that he could hoist it across his shoulders. It wasn't easy mounting a ladder in such a confined space with the dead weight of a man on his shoulders and he repeatedly felt the priest's head bump and graze against the stone wall. They were almost at the top when the rung beneath his foot splintered under their combined weight and Raffe felt himself plunging sideways.

The ladder twisted, almost throwing Raffe off, but for once the narrow space proved his salvation. His shoulder crashed hard against the wall, but the ladder was prevented from falling any further.

Raffe balanced there, trying to get his breath, but the ominous creaking of the wood reminded him that the staves would not bear his weight for long. With a supreme effort he managed to push the priest's body up through the hole so that the weight balanced on the rim. Then, kicking against the ladder, he heaved himself up beside the man.

Raffe's limbs trembled with the effort, but fearful that the sounds might have aroused sleeping servants, he had no choice but to heave the priest's body back over his shoulder and stagger as fast as he could to the gate. He abandoned caution for speed; if Hugh was watching now Raffe couldn't bluff his way out of this one. His only hope was to reach the boat before Hugh could rouse his men and get to the gate.

At the bank of the river he sank to his knees, thankfully dropping the body to the ground. He gave the owl call to summon the boy. At first there was no answer, then he called again and this time a peewit cry answered. Almost at once he saw the dark smudge of the boat emerging from the lee of the islet.

'What happened?' the boy asked fearfully, catching sight of the body on the grass. 'Is he dead?'

'He lives. He's just fainted,' Raffe assured him.

'Fainted?' The boy prodded the body cautiously with his bare toe, as if he'd never heard of such a thing before, for the marsh-dwellers are a hardy lot and not given to swooning like milk-sop priests.

Raffe unceremoniously heaved the priest into the boat. Trying to find something with which to revive the man, Raffe reached for the basket of food he'd left with the boy. All that remained was the flagon of wine, and then only because the lad was unused to it and couldn't abide the taste, as he told Raffe, wrinkling up his nose. Between them, they managed to pour a little wine down the priest's throat, which at least made him open his eyes, though it nearly choked him.

Raffe glanced behind him towards the manor. All was quiet save for the rushing water of the river, no sounds of pursuit. Yet with Hugh on the prowl, Raffe dared not be found absent from the gate.

'I can't come with you, lad. You'll have to take him alone to the meeting place. There's an old jetty downstream of here by the Fisher's Inn. There'll be a boat waiting there with two men in it. Give them this as a sign.' Into the boy's grubby palm Raffe tipped the token Talbot had entrusted to him. 'And this,' he said handing the boy a small purse, 'is payment for the men who wait for you downstream. They'll know what to do. Can you scull him there yourself? It's not far.'

'Course I can,' the boy replied with disdain, 'but what about him? He's moon-mazed, he is.'

The priest lay curled up on the bottom of the boat, staring unblinkingly up at the sky, his teeth chattering with shock and cold. He was muttering to himself over and over, Sed libera nos — deliver us! Though it seemed he could remember no more of the prayer.

The boy eyed him warily. 'Suppose he attacks me or tries to jump from the boat? There was a man on our isle once got mazed by the boggarts and ran out into the mire though he'd lived on the marsh all his life and knew the mire would swallow him.'

'Just get him to the men. If he stirs, give him the rest of the wine. That'll calm him.'

The boy still looked doubtful, but he finally nodded and, taking a firm grip of his scull as if he meant to crack the priest across the head with it at the first sign of trouble, he steered the boat out into the centre of the river. In only a few strokes the boat had slid into the darkness and was gone.