The Christmas Wassail

EIGHT

For a few moments after waking, I was at a loss to know where I was.

A cock was crowing somewhere in the distance and through a hole in one corner of the roof, where a tile had broken away, I could see a single star shining high and far off in a patch of sky lightening towards dawn. The room stank of bad breath, stale sweat and unwashed bodies, while to my right someone was snoring loud enough to waken the dead. I forced my eyes wide open, staring at the rafters overhead and trying to remember where I was. Slowly, memories of the previous day’s events came crowding back to me, and I knew that I was in an outbuilding of the inner ward of Bristol Castle while young Dorcas Warrener slept in my bed at home. As for what day it was, I gradually and painfully worked out that it must be the twenty-ninth of December, the Feast of the Martyrdom of St Thomas Becket, the day on which, all those centuries ago, the ‘holy, blissful martyr’ was hacked to death in his own cathedral of Canterbury by four knights come from Normandy to carry out what they thought to be the wishes of King Henry II; that same Henry who had spent part of his boyhood in this very castle where I was now lying.

There was the sudden scrape of a flint and, seconds later, a candle flared into brightness. I rolled on to my left side to find Tabitha Warrener, fully clothed and seated on the edge of her bed, regarding me with some amusement.

‘You slept well,’ she said.

I grunted. ‘I don’t think I stirred all night.’ I pushed back the bedclothes and swung my feet to the floor, thankful that I had removed only my outer garments the night before. (I felt sure that Tabitha would have appreciated my manly charms, but there was a cynical gleam in her eyes that made me uncomfortable.) ‘My mouth is so dry I can barely speak. Is there anything in this barn of a place to drink?’

She laughed. ‘You don’t think they supply us with “all-night”, do you? We take our meals in the common refectory with the reeve and other castle officials, and I can tell you, Chapman, that they are meagre and generally undercooked. That’s why it was such a pleasure to eat with you and your dame and family yesterday. She keeps a plentiful table.’

‘Adela’s a good housekeeper,’ I agreed, swallowing hard to moisten my mouth. ‘Where do you go after Christmas, when you leave here?’

‘Back into winter quarters.’ Tabitha fished in the pocket of her ancient skirt and produced a small bottle from which she removed the stopper before handing it to me. ‘Try this. It’s strong but it’s wet.’

I sipped cautiously, recognizing the liquid as mead, a drink I generally found too sweet for my taste. But it eased the dryness of my throat. ‘Where are these winter quarters of yours?’ I asked, handing back the bottle.

‘’Tween Winchester and S’ampton. Sweetwater Manor. Master Tuffnel gives us all shelter there every year without fail twixt Our Lord’s Birth and Resurrection.’

‘This Master Tuffnel, you know him well?’

‘All my life. My father was warrener to his father. Ned worked on his land.’

‘You grew up together, then?’

‘In a manner o’speaking. Apart from him being the master’s son and me the warrener’s daughter — he’s a few years older ’n me. But he was always good to me and Ned. Helped us when we needed it most.’

I waited for her to enlarge on this last remark, but she offered no more information, getting abruptly to her feet, lighting a second candle and shuffling over to wake the other three men who were still asleep.

‘Wake up, you lazy bastards,’ she said affectionately, prodding each one in the back with a bony forefinger. ‘You’ll be late for breakfast.’

‘I’d better be getting home for breakfast, too,’ I remarked, pulling on my boots and tunic. ‘I’ll escort young Mistress Warrener back here as soon as she’s ready.’

Tabitha shook her head. ‘We won’t put you to so much trouble, Master Chapman,’ she said. She nodded at her grandson. ‘Toby and I’ll come and get her when we’ve eaten. We need to thank Mistress Chapman for all her kindness.’

‘As you please.’ My foot hit against something and, bending down, I picked up a battered tin plate on which reposed the remains of something black and sticky. A faint, sickly-sweet aroma drifted up to me. ‘What’s this?’

Tabitha smiled and held out her hand. ‘That’s my poppy seed and lettuce juice lozenges. Or what’s left of ’em. I always carry a supply when we’re on the road. Set light to them and they burn slowly all night. The perfume helps us sleep when the accommodation’s poor and the beds are hard.’

‘I wouldn’t have thought you needed them here,’ I said. ‘I’ve slept on far worse mattresses than these.’

Tabitha shrugged. ‘Force of habit. And Dorcas is finding it difficult to drop off just now. She’s getting to be an awkward shape.’

I said my goodbyes and went home to find our unexpected guest much recovered and anxious to be reunited with her husband. I assured her that he and Tabitha would be coming to collect her as soon as they had had breakfast and settled down to my own with a will. I also promised myself a change of clothes and a wash under the pump as soon as I had eaten. Adela, bustling around the kitchen, reminded me that she would need a further supply of apples fetched down from the loft.

‘You haven’t forgotten it’s Wassail Day, have you?’

I had, as a matter of fact, and my spirits lifted. This was the fourth day of Christmas and my neighbours and I would be calling on one another throughout the afternoon and early evening with bowls of hot, spiced ‘lamb’s wool’ in order to drink each other’s health; an ancient Saxon custom which the Normans had never quite managed to stamp out.

Waes Hael!

Drink Hael!

By nightfall we should all be as drunk as lords.

We went to church again that morning to celebrate the martyrdom of St Thomas Becket and to beg for his intercession in heaven, then walked home through a sudden, but brief flurry of snow. Adam wanted to know if we were going to see the mummers again in the afternoon but, much to his disgust, I said no. It wasn’t that I didn’t like them or find their plays amusing, but I felt that I had had a surfeit of their company for the time being. Besides which, I had a nagging headache. Adela left us at the street door, saying she had to walk on up to the market and to set the pottage over the fire to heat. ‘I might be a little while,’ she added — which meant that she had arranged to meet Margaret Walker and possibly other friends for a gossip. So I was astonished when, only a very short time later, she reappeared in the kitchen accompanied not only by her cousin, but by the latter’s two cronies, Bess Simnel and Maria Watkins, as well.

Before I could express my surprise at this intrusion, all four women began speaking at once, sending the three older children from the room with hands clapped over their ears. Luke began to yell in competition.

I picked him up. ‘What’s happened?’ I demanded. ‘For the Virgin’s sweet sake, Adela, speak one at a time!’

My wife indicated that the other three should be quiet for a moment.

‘It would seem,’ she told me a little breathlessly, ‘that Sir George Marvell has disappeared.’

‘What do you mean?’ I asked. ‘Disappeared?’

‘What it usually means,’ Maria Watkins said waspishly. ‘Vanished! Unable to be found!’

I ignored her and raised my eyebrows at Adela, but it was Margaret who answered.

‘The story is all over Redcliffe this morning,’ she said, ‘that he retired as usual last night, but this morning there’s no trace of him in his chamber and the bed has not been slept in.’

I handed Luke to my wife. (He was teething again and dribbling all down my neck.)

‘Where’s his horse?’ I asked. ‘Is the mare missing, too?’

The women looked at one another. ‘I don’t know,’ Margaret admitted at last. ‘I didn’t think to ask. I know Sir George uses the stables in Redcliffe Street … But I don’t think it can be or the family wouldn’t be so anxious.’

‘Are they anxious?’ Or was this just an incident blown up out of all proportion by the gossips — especially by the three now filling our tiny kitchen — just to make life a little less monotonous?

‘Word is,’ Maria Watkins told me sharply, ‘that the three other Marvell men have been out scouring the whole of Redcliffe since dawn.’

‘Since dawn,’ Bess Simnel confirmed, her beady gaze darting eagerly around the room, taking note of all that was going on. ‘Adela, my dear,’ she added, grinding her almost toothless gums together, ‘is that the remains of a bowl of plum porridge that I see?’

My wife sighed. ‘Help yourself, Bess. There’s a clean bowl and spoon on the chopping bench.’

While Goody Simnel was eagerly doing just that, Maria Watkins astonished me by asking, ‘Well, what are you going to do about it, Roger?’

‘Me?’ I replied indignantly. ‘It has nothing whatsoever to do with me. Moreover, it’s my guess that Sir George’s horse is also missing and he will come trotting home in an hour or so having been for an early morning canter across the downs. Has Cyprian Marvell enquired of the gatekeeper at the Redcliffe Gate if his father passed through at first light this morning?’

‘I’ve no idea,’ my former mother-in-law said thoughtfully. She nodded briskly at her friends. ‘I think we’d better go back and find out what’s happening. Put that Yule doll down at once, Bess, and come with us. You’re eating poor Adela out of house and home! You’ve finished all that plum porridge.’

The three elderly ladies then departed, leaving Adela and myself to enjoy a quiet laugh at their expense.

‘All the same, do you think there’s any substance in this story, Roger?’ my wife asked, setting Luke down again among the rushes while she stirred the pottage and set the table for dinner.

‘What was the gossip in the market?’

She shook her head. ‘I didn’t have time to find out. I met the three of them at the top of Small Street. They were full of the story and insisted on coming here straight away to tell you.’

I snorted. ‘What did they think I would do? Or could do? Nevertheless,’ I continued thoughtfully, ‘I’ll walk up as far as the High Cross when we’ve eaten, but not before. Going to church always gives me an appetite.’

We had barely finished our meal, and I was descending from the loft with a basket of apples for the ‘lamb’s wool’, when a knock on the street door heralded the arrival of Richard Manifold, looking harassed.

‘Ah, Roger!’ he said as soon as he saw me. ‘We need men to search the town. Sir George Marvell has disappeared.’

‘It’s true, then,’ Adela said from the kitchen doorway.

He turned towards her, his face lighting at the sight of her. ‘You’ve heard. Who told you?’

‘Margaret Walker, Goody Watkins and Bess Simnel.’ She smiled. ‘Come and have a cup of ale. Sit down a moment. You look tired.’

He shook his head. ‘I daren’t, my dear. We’ve been straitly charged by the mayor himself to discover what has happened to the knight as soon as possible. Roger, can you come? We need every able-bodied man we can muster.’

I nearly said, ‘And who asked you to call my wife “my dear”?’ but thought better of it. He did look exhausted and, besides, my curiosity was aroused. So I enquired instead about the horse.

‘Still in its stable,’ was the answer. ‘So he hasn’t left the city.’

‘He could have walked.’

Richard again shook his head. ‘None of the gatekeepers remember seeing him.’

That made me laugh. ‘There are half a dozen ways you can get in and out of this town at any hour of the day or night without being seen. You must know as well as I do that the walls are generally in a bad state of repair.’

Richard shrugged. ‘But why would he go anywhere on foot and in the middle of the night? It makes no sense. No, no! He must be somewhere near at hand. The fear is that he might have fallen into the river and drowned. In this weather the waters are freezing.’

I handed the basket of apples to Adela. ‘I’ll get my hat and cloak.’ Two minutes later we were striding up Small Street buffeted by an unpleasantly cold north wind. ‘What’s the family’s story?’

Richard grimaced. ‘They all tell the same tale. They wished Sir George goodnight at around his usual time for retiring and didn’t see him again. When one of the servants went in to wake him first thing this morning there was no sign of him and his bed hadn’t been slept in.’

‘Could he have left the house last night without being observed?’

‘Easily. At this time of year everyone — family and servants alike — goes to bed early on Sir George’s orders to save candles. If he’d waited an hour or so, he could have crept out and no one would have seen him.’

A large gathering of men was assembled by the High Cross, receiving instructions from Sergeant Merryweather. I recognized Burl Hodge and his sons, also Nick Brimble and Jack Nym, but foiled the latter’s attempts to attach himself to me by indicating that I was accompanying Richard Manifold. I wasn’t, but by giving Richard, in his turn, the impression that I was going with Jack and Nick, I managed to slip away on my own.

I made my way without hesitation to Marsh Street, to the Turk’s Head, and enquired for Humility Dyson. So high was my standing now in ‘Little Ireland’ since my appearance in Briant’s company, that someone offered to fetch the landlord for me. He arrived, cross and out of breath, a few minutes later from the Wayfarer’s Return.

‘What’s this all about?’ he panted angrily.

‘Where’s Briant?’

‘Gone.’

‘Gone where?’

‘None of your business.’

I gripped his arm and shook it. ‘It might be,’ I said. ‘Sir George Marvell is missing.’ And I told him about the incident on the bridge three nights previously.

The landlord called the Irishman a number of uncomplimentary names, some of which were new even to me. Then he ran a hand through his beard and drew me out of the ale-room into the street.

‘Word was brought late last night that the Clontarf was berthed at Rownham, near the ferry. Her captain wouldn’t bring her right up into the Backs: the river was too low. Said Briant could join the ship there at daybreak and they’d sail on the late-morning tide. But Briant announced he weren’t going to wait for morning and went straight away.’

‘On foot?’

‘They don’t come over here with horses, now do they?’ Humility scoffed. ‘Of course on foot. There’s plenty o’ways to get in and …’

‘Yes, yes! I know,’ I interrupted impatiently. ‘You don’t think …?’

‘No, I don’t!’ was the violent retort. ‘He’s a man of his word, is Briant. If he promised you he’d let Sir George Marvell be, then he will. The knight’ll turn up sometime, safe and sound. Mind you, it wouldn’t worry me if he didn’t. As nasty a piece of work as God ever made, and that’s the truth.’

‘Well, don’t go spreading that opinion abroad,’ I advised him, to which he demanded to know if I supposed he was a fool.

Having reassured him on that point, I took my leave and walked slowly back to the High Cross wrapped in thought. But the crowd had dispersed, each man now, presumably, busy searching every odd alleyway and corner of the city in the hope of running the knight to earth. This disappearance, coming as it did so soon after the murder of Alderman Trefusis, must be giving the sheriff and his men a collective headache that had nothing to do with the Christmas wine and ale.

I hesitated for several seconds, wondering where to start, before deciding on another course altogether and setting off across the bridge to Redcliffe.

I was shown into Drusilla Marvell’s presence by a servant almost as venerable as she was herself.

‘I’m sorry to disturb you, mistress,’ I said, careful to make my bow a deep one. ‘I was hoping to have a word with the other members of your family, but they are all out, looking for your brother. I understand he’s disappeared.’

The room, on an upper floor of the house, was plainly the old lady’s bedchamber, and although, today, she herself was dressed in funereal black, her surroundings fairly blazed with colour. What first drew the eye was a counterpane of scarlet silk covering an enormous bed draped with curtains of emerald velvet embellished with gold and silver thread. Even the woodwork of the bedstead itself was painted in shades of crimson and vermilion. There were no rushes on this floor, but the luxury of a carpet patterned in red and yellow, while the rest of the furniture, including the chair Drusilla sat in next to the window, was of the finest oak.

She regarded me balefully, striking an ivory-handled cane against the leg of her chair. ‘What is it you want? Who are you? I didn’t catch what my steward said.’

I realized she was deaf and raised my voice. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you, mistress …’

I was interrupted by another furious hammering. ‘You don’t need to shout! That’s the trouble with people. They think if you’re deaf you can’t hear anything! I’m able to hear you speaking perfectly well. I just find it hard to distinguish the words. The English are scared to death of moving their lips. For some reason we think it makes us look stupid. Use your mouth, young man! Use your mouth! Then I can see what it is you’re trying to say.’

Feeling much as I used to do when chastised by my mother or by my novice master at Glastonbury, I shuffled my feet, unhappily conscious of my dirty boots on the carpet, and repeated my message.

The dame snorted. ‘Disappeared, has he, my little brother? They needn’t worry. He’ll turn up again like a bad surprise. Those sort of people always do. There’s no getting away from them. They harass people, that’s what they do. Harass people! It wasn’t enough for George to stick his nose into what didn’t concern him and ruin my chances of happiness. Oh, no! He had to move himself into the house next to mine, instead of staying where he was in Clifton, so that he could spy on me some more. Said it was because he was concerned about me, the lying toad! Concerned about my money more like, and which of his precious sons I’m going to leave it to.’ She paused for breath, but before I could say anything in answer, resumed her tirade. ‘Mind you, it wouldn’t surprise me to know someone had dealt him his comeuppance. He’s made enough enemies in his life. And I’ll tell you this, young man!’ She thrust her stick at me and waved it about in the air. ‘It wouldn’t upset me if one of them had.’ She broke off suddenly and a beringed hand crept up to her mouth. ‘I wonder,’ she muttered, more to herself than to me. ‘Now, I wonder …’

She seemed momentarily to have forgotten my presence, plunged into some reverie of her own.

‘You wonder?’ I prompted after a moment or two, then repeated it more loudly.

Drusilla jumped, then treated me to a second diatribe about shouting at deaf people. Finally, however, she condescended to continue. ‘You say he went missing last night?’ No one, it seemed, had thought it necessary to inform her.

I nodded. ‘Sir George was first missed when his servant went to wake him this morning. His bed had not been slept in.’ I was careful to enunciate as clearly as possible.

The dame pursed her thin lips. ‘So my brother must have let himself out of the house sometime during the hours of darkness.’ She turned her head and stared out of the window. ‘He might,’ she mused, ‘have gone in answer to a summons.’

‘That’s possible,’ I agreed, and waited.

My patience was rewarded. After a few moments, she went on: ‘There was a man stood over there, opposite George’s house, yesterday afternoon. He stood there quite a long time, just staring.’

My pulse beat quickened. ‘What was he like?’ I asked eagerly.

Drusilla turned back to look at me and gave a cackle of laughter. ‘Can’t tell you that. He was wearing one of those masks young idiots adopt at this time of year. A bird mask with a great beak. Going about frightening old ladies like me,’ she added viciously.

I thought to myself that it would take more than a bird mask to frighten Drusilla Marvell, but merely said, ‘From what you could see of this man, did you get the impression he was young or old?’

Having watched my face intently while I spoke, she answered at once. ‘Young. Well, it wasn’t an old man’s body. More like yours.’

‘Did he enter the house?’ I asked.

She shrugged. ‘Don’t know for sure. I watched him for a while, but then I had to use the chamber pot. Your bladder gets weak at my age and if you don’t go when you need to, there could be a nasty accident. When I came back to the window he’d gone.’

‘What was he wearing? Apart, that is, from the mask.’

She stared. ‘What men usually wear. Boots, hose …’

‘A cloak, perhaps? It was very cold yesterday afternoon.’

The old lady considered this suggestion. ‘I don’t remember a cloak,’ she said at last. ‘But then, I don’t remember anything much except the mask. Maybe one of those thick coats that workmen wear. Not that I’d be sure about that.’

I could see that I should get little more out of her in the way of a description, so I changed the subject.

‘Dame Marvell,’ I said, ‘do you know about the murder of Alderman Trefusis on Christmas Day?’

‘Of course I know about it,’ she snapped. ‘I’m not that deaf! No one’s talked of anything else since it happened.’

‘Do you also know that the last word he uttered before he died was the name Dee? Does that mean anything to you?’

If I had not been watching her so intently, to make sure that she was reading my lips, I might not have noticed the slight tell-tale flicker of her eyelids. As it was, it was so brief that I almost missed it.

‘No, the name means nothing to me,’ she said sharply and with a shake of her head. ‘I know of no one called Dee.’

A sudden inspiration came to me, and I wondered that the thought had not occurred to me before. ‘It might, of course, have been just the beginning of a longer name; one merely starting with the letters D-E-E,’ I suggested.

This time, she shook her head even more vigorously. ‘No!’ she exclaimed, banging on the carpet with her stick. ‘I’ve told you! Now, go away! You’re upsetting me!’

She reached for a little handbell that stood on a table beside her chair, but before she could ring it I heard the bedchamber door behind me open and someone tread heavily across the floor.

‘Aunt Drusilla,’ said Cyprian Marvell, bending to kiss her cheek. ‘I’ve come to give you some disturbing news.’

‘I know it already,’ she snapped, ‘thanks to this man.’ She again stabbed at me with her stick. ‘None of my family thought it necessary to inform me that my brother is missing. Oh, no! It takes a stranger to do that.’

Cyprian Marvell turned and, somewhat hesitantly, held out his hand. ‘Master Chapman, is it? Yes, I thought so. You’ve been pointed out to me.’

I explained hastily that I was supposed to be a member of the search party looking for Sir George. ‘I called on you first, sir, but everyone being out, it occurred to me that Dame Drusilla might have some information that could be useful.’

He smiled pleasantly. ‘I don’t suppose she has.’

‘You would be wrong.’ I returned the smile. ‘Dame Drusilla did see something yesterday afternoon. But I’ll leave her to tell you all about it. I’ve trespassed enough on her time already. Now I must go and join in the search. I assume Sir George has not been found yet?’

Cyprian shook his head. ‘I’m afraid not.’

He didn’t strike me like a man who was very worried by his father’s mysterious absence, but then, I reflected, appearances can be deceptive.

The steward was summoned to show me out and, once in the street, I stood for several moments deep in thought. Then, instead of hastening to rejoin the search party, I turned my feet in the direction of Margaret Walker’s cottage.