“Thank you for teaching me, Reeve Folsham. Here are your bow and arrows back.”
“You may keep them. I insist. Every peasant maiden should be able to defend herself against violent men or unwanted attention.”
“Every peasant maiden,” he said. But did his rule apply to every maiden who was not a peasant, but a ward of the king, told she must marry a man she found loathsome? Yes, Evangeline needed these skills even more if she was ever found by Lord Shiveley.
Westley discovered his father sitting at his desk in his study, a small room next to the family’s library.
“Father, I need to speak to you.”
He turned his attention from his task to Westley. “What is it, son?”
“Eva, the new servant girl—”
“The one who claimed to be mute and was accused of trying to poison everyone?”
“Yes, she said she saw John strike me and push me into the river.”
“And you still do not remember what happened?”
“I remember walking to the river to fish but nothing after that until I woke up in bed with Mother hovering over me.”
“Perhaps this girl is lying. What do we know of her?” The brow over Father’s one good eye lowered.
“She and her friend Mildred joined the men and me when we left Berkhamsted Castle on our way back here. Mildred claimed Eva was mute after being beaten by her former mistress. But Eva has admitted that was a lie. She said she was trying to get away from a man who wanted to marry her, and it was her way of disguising herself.” He decided not to tell Father that he suspected the man she did not want to marry was the Earl of Shiveley or one of his men.
“I thought it was Sabina who found you after you fell in the river. Did she say anything about seeing John push you in?”
“At first Sabina said nothing about anyone pushing me in. Eva said nothing because she was still pretending to be mute. But then Sabina said she saw two men running away after I fell in.”
“What else?”
“Eva said Sabina was lying, that she wasn’t there when I fell in. She said she was the only one around when John and his man, Roger Cox, approached me at the river. She said John and I exchanged angry words, then he struck me with a block of wood and pushed me in.”
“This is a grave matter. Why did she did not tell us this right away?”
“She said she asked Sabina to tell me that she saw two men running away after I fell in so I would be on my guard. But she did not know who the man was who struck me until she saw John and Roger Cox at the well two days ago. And then he showed up again this morning.”
“What did John want?”
“I don’t know.” Westley rubbed his temple, trying to bring back the memory that had flashed through his mind when he saw John scowling at Eva and her raised bow and arrow. “But it is strange that I have hardly seen John these past three years and now he is showing up so often. And John behaved strangely when she accused him.”
“She accused him to his face?”
“While aiming a bow and arrow at him.”
Father raised his brows.
“Reeve Folsham was teaching her to shoot.”
“Reeve Folsham? Did she not throw a scythe at him her first day here?”
“The scythe slipped out of her hand and gave the reeve a small cut. But that seems to be forgotten now.”
Father was still staring at him in disbelief.
“I believe she won him over when she saved him from a rolling barrel of ale that fell off a cart and nearly onto his head. And then when the other servants falsely accused her of trying to poison them, he defended her. I think he agreed to teach her because he wanted her to be able to defend herself.”
Father cleared his throat—something he sometimes did when he wasn’t sure what to say.
“I don’t like to think that John Underhill would try to kill me, but I had a strange little flash of a memory . . . a memory of his enraged face and his arm raised. I don’t know if it was a memory or just my mind playing with me. And then his answers to Eva did not ring true. And yet . . . it seems ridiculous to believe this girl over John, especially when she deceived us all.”
They were both silent for a few moments.
“When was the last time you had talked to John, before you fell in the river?”
“He met me one day a few days ago on the path through the woods near the oat field on the north side. He looked angry and he argued with me, saying his father was a good man and that it was our fault the villeins rose up and killed him.” Westley hated to tell his father that.
“You know that isn’t true, don’t you?”