Part 3 (1/2)
Susanna continued to watch them as they ate. Jennet cast wary glances over her shoulder every few minutes, obviously expecting to see some supernatural manifestation. Susanna could understand her uneasiness. She had to guard against becoming fanciful herself, for the atmosphere in this abandoned house was undeniably eerie.
”There is nothing here to fear, Jennet,” she said to rea.s.sure her maid. Then, having noticed the speculative look on Mark's face, she informed Jennet that she would share the chamber above while they were at Appleton. Both the warmth and the company would be welcome in the bed left behind by Robert's father, but in truth Susanna's real motivation was the sense of responsibility she felt toward her servants. Left alone, Jennet's fears would doubtless drive her to seek the illusory protection of Mark's arms. No conscientious chatelaine could knowingly permit such goings on. If Jennet wanted to marry Mark, Susanna would wish them well with all her heart, but she would not condone the sort of careless coupling that led to unwanted children and loveless marriages.
”This is a perilous cold place,” Jennet said, rubbing her hands together as she held them closer to the fire. ”I vow there is less draft out of doors than in.”
”Nothing so unusual in that.” Susanna studied the thick stones surrounding them. ”These walls were meant to keep the inhabitants cool in the heat of summer.”
”I do not believe summer comes to these parts,” Jennet declared. ”And I do much wonder that any survive the winter.”
”And yet they must. Do not forget, Jennet, that Sir Robert lived here as a boy. The climate had no ill effect on him.”
A sudden sound from the dais end of the hall undid in a moment all that reasonable words had achieved. Every face turned in that direction, wide-eyed with antic.i.p.ation. The noise was not repeated, but in the breathless silence that followed, they all saw the same thing. The filthy cloth that covered the refectory table fluttered once, twice, three times, and then was still.
Jennet screamed. An answering wail, long and loud and mournful, issued from beneath the table.
”The ghost!” Jennet cried.
Susanna's heart was beating as fast as her maid's but she had to stifle a smile as she rose from her stool. She moved cautiously toward the table, not because she was afraid of what she would find but because she did not want to startle the only living creature, aside from a few mice and that one spider, who'd chosen to remain at Appleton when the servants fled.
”Good evening, Master Cat,” she said as she lifted one corner of the grimy linen tablecloth and peered beneath.
Unblinking topaz eyes stared back at her.
”Will you join us?” she asked the cat.
With regal dignity, a large, ginger-colored feline emerged. Susanna hastily amended her words of greeting.
”Your pardon, for it is surely Mistress Cat, or perhaps even Dame Cat.”
The creature was obviously female, so heavily pregnant that her belly was nearly dragging on the floor. And yet, with all the dignity of a queen on progress, she made her way to the hearth, circled it once to a.s.sure herself that she'd selected exactly the right spot, and then curled into a ball just as close to the warmth as she could get without having her tail catch on fire.
Chapter Eight.
Jennet squinted at the morning sun and s.h.i.+fted restlessly, trying to get comfortable on the leather cus.h.i.+on. ”I do not like this Lancas.h.i.+re at all,” she grumbled.
Neither did she like riding apillion, even behind a man as courteous as Mark. The cus.h.i.+on did little to pad the hard wooden frame beneath, not when it was strapped to the back of a horse that took perverse pleasure in bouncing and jouncing over every uneven roadway in the kingdom. Jennet's backside had been taking a beating all the way north from Leigh Abbey. Already bruised and sore, she was not happy to have to travel yet another bad road, even if it had been built by the Romans and ran nearly straight from Stockport to Manchester. Given a choice, Jennet would have preferred to walk all the way to the nearest village.
In front of her, using a saddle that appeared to be no more comfortable than her own perch, Mark was turning his head from side to side, alert for danger. He did not reply, but Jennet knew he'd heard her complaint. He was aware of her in other ways, too. Although her feet rested modestly on a footboard hung from the offside, she was obliged to cling to Mark's waist to keep from tumbling off the horse. She'd been gently torturing him for nigh onto one hundred and eighty miles.
”Not much farther now,” Lady Appleton called back to them. ”I can see a few houses from here.”
She was the one who had insisted they ride to Gorebury, the nearest hamlet. Jennet wondered if her mistress was trying to impress the villagers, or if she'd simply been uncertain of the distance they would have to travel. Either way, Lady Appleton's arrival would start tongues wagging. That much was certain. She sat sideways on her horse, just as Jennet did, but Lady Appleton rode alone, resting both feet on a velvet sling and supporting one knee in a hollow cut in the pommeled saddle.
Jennet frowned. The fact that Lady Appleton had dressed for her own comfort argued against any calculated effort to impress the yeomen and husbandmen of Gorebury. She'd brought better gowns with her, but this morning she'd instructed Jennet to help her put on her old russet-colored riding dress, the one with the wool worn thin from frequent laundering. Both the little round face ruff that fastened with aglets and the ruffled cuffs had long since yellowed, and Lady Appleton had not even bothered with a safeguard to protect her skirts. So, Jennet decided, she was not interested in impressing anyone. She simply preferred to ride rather than walk.
The houses, close up, were as disappointing as Appleton had been. A poorer collection of dwellings Jennet had rarely encountered. She and Mark dismounted at the communal village well and looked around. Much alike, all the buildings were timber-framed, their roofs thatched with straw. Through doors customarily left open in the daytime, Jennet could see that the floors were beaten earth covered with rushes. Peat fires burned on raised stone hearths, creating a permanent haze, for like the hearth at Appleton, they were vented only through holes in the roof.
In one cottage a pot of porridge simmered on a trivet. In another Jennet caught a glimpse of stools drawn up to a trestle table. Every house seemed to have herbs, storage bags, and baskets hanging from the rafters, and in one place she spied a ham, but nowhere was there any hint of great prosperity.
The entire village consisted of fewer than two dozen buildings, including the mill. At least three stood empty, with holes in the wattle-and-daub infill and rot in the roof straw. Such places were likely to harbor rats, as well as hornets and wasps, and Jennet kept her distance from them.
At least there were people here, and their livestock. Pens and fences contained chickens, pigs, and cows. From somewhere out of sight, Jennet heard the bleating of sheep and when she inhaled she caught the noisome scent peculiar to puering hides in preparation for tanning.
Two women had looked up from their laundry as the riders pa.s.sed them, but they'd not ceased their labor. Now they removed clothing that had been soaking in lye to beat and scrub the pieces, then hang them over nearby hedges to dry.
A middle-aged man in what appeared to be the uniform of the place, a short, belted tunic worn with long, loose hose and leather shoes with heavy wooden soles, was the first to acknowledge the presence of newcomers. He finished knocking acorns off an oak tree for his pigs, then sauntered toward the well. He did not doff his cloth cap. Neither did he speak a word of greeting, but soon others came, men and women, drawn by curiosity. Gradually, a small crowd gathered.
Still mounted, looking every inch the gentlewoman she was, Jennet's mistress studied the villagers, ignoring their rude stares and waiting for the right moment to address them.
There was no danger. Even Jennet was certain of that. She was equally sure that these people were not going to help them. As Lady Appleton began to speak, introducing herself to her new neighbors and explaining that she wished to hire servants and purchase foodstuffs, Jennet sensed invisible barriers going up, dense as any stone wall and just as impervious to sweet reason.
”We've our own work, and no need for more to do,” said one of the women who'd been was.h.i.+ng clothes. She and her companion were as simply dressed as their menfolk, in long, loose, dirt brown gowns belted at the waist. The speaker had covered her head and neck with an old-fas.h.i.+oned wimple, but her feet were bare and her face was brown and wrinkled from exposure to the sun. Jennet tried to guess her age and could not. She might be anywhere from twenty to sixty.
The excuse she'd given struck Jennet as an odd one. October was a busy month in the south, even though the harvest season was officially over by Michaelmas. Here in the north the crops would have been in earlier. Only the slack winter season lay ahead. These people should have been glad of the prospect of employment.
”I will pay well,” Lady Appleton said. ”And there will be more work in the spring, honest work for any able-bodied man who can lift a stone or raise a roofbeam.”
The suspicious expressions that had enlivened a few of the stolid country faces were now replaced by looks of dismay, but no one voiced any objection. The village folk remained taciturn and unhelpful, saying more by their silence than they could have with words.
”This Gorebury is a strange place,” Lady Appleton told them when she'd tried again to sway them and had once more failed. ”It is plain you grow barely enough to live upon, yet you show no interest in a generous offer of gainful employment.”
”All the young folk are gone to Manchester,” a man muttered, as though that explained his own unwillingness to work. Begrudging every word, he added, ”In Manchester there be good jobs in the cloth industry.”
”I will offer better working conditions and higher pay.”
No one volunteered to send for a son or daughter.
”Have you a curate here?” Lady Appleton asked abruptly.
For a moment it seemed as if no one would answer. Then a new voice sounded. ”Be no curate. Naught but a lay reader for the likes of us.”
”And who might you be?” she asked.
”I be the new reeve what took office at Michaelmas.” He puffed out his chest. ”I be ale taster, too.”
Jennet poked Mark in the ribs. ”That great lout does not look any different from his fellows. Surely he's not clever enough to be a reeve.”
”A reeve need not be lettered,” Mark whispered back. ”It is possible to keep accounts with a tally stick.”
Solemn and pompous, the reeve explained that Gorebury's tenants paid their rents to the lord of Manchester and thus had no obligation to anyone at Appleton.
Jennet felt herself grow warm on her mistress's behalf, but if Lady Appleton was taken aback by this rudeness she gave no sign. Instead her voice went all soft and cajoling. ”And you, sirrah?” she asked him. ”I can see you are a fellow who seeks to better himself. What would you say if I offered you John Bexwith's old place?”
Mark's fingers tightened on Jennet's arm. She understood his reaction, but she knew, too, that he had no need to worry. She was certain Lady Appleton had no real intention of hiring this reeve to be her steward. She did but test the waters.