The Green Man

Five

To my surprise, Albany seemed to be genuinely concerned by my story and interrogated me closely regarding the details. Did I think the attack had been deliberate? Where had I been standing exactly when the man had pushed past me? From which direction in the castle had he come? Was I sure that I had had no glimpse of his face? Was it certain that he had not been one of the mummers’ troupe?

I did my best to answer these and other questions, but my knowledge of the castle was as limited as his, never having set foot in it — never, indeed, having set foot anywhere north of Hereford — before the previous day. I had to admit to myself that repetition of the incident had convinced me how very trivial it had really been, and that I had built a mountain out of a molehill. What did it really amount to, when all was said and done? A man wearing a mummer’s mask — at a time when mummers’ masks abounded in the castle — had given me an ill-natured shove because I was in his way. That was all there was to it.

Or was it?

Later, when my bedfellow had fallen into what appeared to be an uneasy slumber, judging, at any rate, by his tossing and turnings, I found myself lying wakeful in the darkness. The mummer playing the Green Man had either mislaid or had his best mask stolen. But why? For what reason? Was there a sinister motive? And, if so, what was it? Did it really have anything to do with me? On reflection, wasn’t it far more likely to have been taken as a prank by another member of the group who had a grudge against the leading player? That was a much more plausible explanation. Clement, as ‘Mother Earth’ had named him, had struck me at once as a man with a large opinion of himself, and therefore one who had probably made many enemies amongst the troupe’s younger generation. Moreover, it was just the sort of silly trick a boy would play, and there was no doubt that the figure I had seen so briefly had been shortish and lacking in bulk.

With this finally settled in my mind, I heaved a sigh of relief and turned over, presenting my backside to my unquiet companion. Beyond the drawn bed-curtains, Davey gave the occasional gurgle and snort as he wriggled around on his truckle-bed, but other than that all was quiet except for the occasional shout of ‘All’s well!’ from the watchmen guarding the castle walls. The closed chamber door shut out all sounds from the ante-room where the two squires were presumably sleeping the sleep of the just.

I was slipping across the borderline of sleep, having lain awake for quite some time, when something roused me. I had no idea what it was, but it brought me sitting upright in the bed, every faculty alert, my ears straining, my eyes trying desperately to pierce the stuffy, all-embracing gloom. Then I was on my feet, the flagstones striking chill on my bare soles, and out into the room at large, where the page still slept peacefully at the foot of the four-poster, his young limbs sprawled anyhow, his mouth open, saliva dribbling down his chin.

I had grabbed my cudgel from the floor and now gripped it firmly as I stared around the chamber. I thought something moved behind me and whirled about, but no one was there, only a corner of the room, thick with shadows. I suddenly realized that I could hear Murdo and Donald snoring, where before all had been quiet, and I glanced in the direction of the chamber door. A line of less dense blackness showed that it must be standing slightly ajar. My heart beating unpleasantly fast, I tiptoed towards it, swinging the weighted end of my cudgel backwards and forwards, ready to strike whoever was lurking behind it …

It was abruptly pushed wide open and Donald Seton stood yawning and stretching in the doorway, his eyes still clogged with sleep.

‘Is something amiss?’ he muttered. ‘I thought I heard someone moving.’

‘You must have the hearing of a rabbit, then,’ I snapped, but keeping my voice as low as possible. ‘What are you doing up and about at this dead hour of the morning?’

‘I needed the piss-pot,’ he answered shortly. ‘What’s your excuse?’

I hesitated, not being at all sure what had roused me. I countered with another question.

‘Why was the door to the ante-room open?’

He frowned, puzzled.

‘I just opened it. You saw me. I thought I heard a noise.’

I shook my head. ‘It was ajar before you appeared. I was just coming to investigate.’

The squire glanced over his shoulder to where his companion was still snoring peacefully.

‘Couldn’t have been,’ he whispered positively. ‘No one’s been through here, I’m ready to swear. And the other door into the passageway is closed. You can see for yourself.’ Gently he pushed the inner door yet wider.

I crossed the ante-chamber, soft-footed, to verify the truth of this statement. The door was indeed closed and latched, but it wasn’t bolted, an omission I hastened to point out.

Donald Seton shrugged.

‘Why bolt it?’ he asked. His lips twitched in a small, mocking grin which I could see with eyes now grown accustomed to the darkness. ‘We’re amongst friends, after all. Or aren’t we? Perhaps His Grace is right to fear the Sassenachs.’

I bit back the retort hovering on the tip of my tongue; that the duke seemed more fearful of his late brother’s servants than he did of his English hosts. That would have been to put one of them on his guard — always provided, of course, that Albany’s suspicions had any sort of foundation.

Our voices, although pitched low, had finally aroused Murdo, who struggled up on his pallet to demand what, in the name of Saint Mungo, was going on.

‘I needed the piss-pot, only to find our friend the pedlar up and prowling about.’

‘Why?’

‘Ask him!’

‘Before I answer any of your questions,’ I hissed angrily, ‘what I want to know is why, ever since we left London and before, you two and Davey have pretended that you couldn’t speak anything but the raw Scots’ tongue, when all the time you can speak English perfectly well.’ I considered this statement. ‘Well enough, at least, for me to understand you,’ I amended.

‘We’ve had nothing to say to you before,’ was Murdo’s laconic answer; which I supposed, in its own way, was true. I had hardly sought their company. But their deception irked me, nonetheless.

‘So what’s the answer to my question?’ Murdo insisted.

‘Something woke me — I don’t know what — and then I discovered that the door between the main bedchamber and this one was ajar. Master Seton will vouch for that.’

‘Donald?’

‘It’s true. It was open, but I didn’t open it. And I’ll swear nobody could have come through here without rousing one of us.’

‘Impossible,’ his fellow squire agreed.

But it wasn’t impossible, not the way those two had been snoring. I reckoned more than one assassin could have walked into my lord’s chamber without disturbing either of his guardians in the room without. I wondered uneasily about that unbolted outer door. Was it just carelessness, an ingenuous belief that their master was indeed safe amongst his English friends? Or was it an alibi to cover their own tracks if they really did intend Albany harm?

Murdo rapped out something unintelligible and lay down again, pulling the blanket over his head.

Donald nodded. ‘He said let’s get back to bed before we catch our deaths of cold.’ He seized the chamber-pot and unrinated into it, a long, steaming, healthy-looking stream. ‘That’s better. Now, get back to sleep, chapman, and settle down. You’ve been dreaming. Your belly’s overfull and you’ve been riding the night mare.’

Copying his friend’s example he, too, lay down and pulled the blankets up around his ears. As he did so, something floated to the ground. Unnoticed, I stooped and picked it up, carrying it back with me into the main chamber where the object of my concern was peacefully sleeping, oblivious to the whisperings and shufflings in the ante-room. His earlier restlessness had abated, and Albany now lay quietly, one cheek pillowed in his hand, like an innocent child. Cautiously, I found the tinder-box and lit a candle, well away from where its light could shine on the bed, and held my prize towards the flame.

What lay in my palm was a silken leaf, green and veined with golden thread. A leaf come loose from a mummer’s costume — or a mummer’s mask.

The Green Man!

It was long before I slept. Dawn was rimming the shutters before I finally closed my eyes.

The night’s events had convinced me that Albany’s suspicions concerning his Scottish servants, however nebulous, were nevertheless founded on reason. They were not the figment of his overripe imagination that I had at first thought them. The explanation given to his immediate retainers for my constant presence — for my presence at all — had been that he feared treachery by the English. Yet his two squires were unimpressed enough by this threat to leave unlocked a door that, if they took their royal master’s fear even half-seriously, should have been carefully bolted. Moreover, while they had pretended to an ignorance of English, except as it was spoken in Scotland, I had presumed, as I was meant to presume, that their understanding of the tongue was equally feeble. I wondered what unguarded remarks I had made to Albany, and he to me, that the squires and Davey Gray, at least, had found perfectly intelligible.

But was the duke so ignorant of these men that he did not know this? Perhaps. When he addressed any of them it was in broad Scots, and they answered him in the same language. I had noticed that he kept them all at a distance, having no more converse with them than he was bound to. He certainly did not treat them with the camaraderie that he used towards me. And yet …

And yet the five of them had joined him during his exile in France, fleeing the wrath of King James after the Earl of Mar’s murder. If it had been murder …

But it was at that particular point that my tired brain refused to be teased any longer and, with the sun rising on another day, I at last fell asleep. Not for long, of course. All too soon the trumpets were blaring in the camp beyond Fotheringay’s grim walls, servers were hurrying up from the kitchens with jugs of hot shaving water and the whole castle wakened to life. Through a fog of sleep, I remembered that today we set out for York either under the command of the King or under that of His Grace the Duke of Gloucester.

To no one’s surprise, it turned out to be the duke who would lead us — eventually — into Scotland. As soon as King Edward entered the great hall after breakfast, it was obvious to all but the meanest intelligence that he was in no fit state of health to head a military expedition. His face had taken on an even greyer tinge than it had worn the previous evening and he was supported on both sides, leaning heavily on the arms of Lord Hastings and his elder stepson, the Marquis of Dorset. There was a sheen of sweat across his forehead; and the way in which he dropped thankfully into his chair at the head of the council table proclaimed that his legs were in imminent danger of collapsing under him.

His first words, therefore, were to announce that he was passing over command of the army to his dearly beloved brother, the Duke of Gloucester, whom we were all to obey as we would himself. Prince Richard, rising from his seat, knelt to kiss the king’s hand and promised faithfully to carry out the royal commands.

‘Berwick shall be yours again, my liege, if we die in the attempt.’

A cheer went up at these words from the assembled nobility. All very well, I thought to myself, but it will be the poor bloody foot soldiers who do most of the dying. Then a sense of justice made me revise this opinion. I knew Richard of Gloucester by repute to be a valiant soldier, not afraid to put himself in the thick of any fight should his presence be needed. As a young man he had fought valiantly for his eldest brother at the battle of Barnet, when Edward returned to England eleven years previously to reclaim his crown. In the vanguard of his men, he had helped to carry the day. And a month or so later, his actions on the bloody field of Tewkesbury had again brought the Yorkist faction victory and preserved his brother’s throne …

My wandering thoughts were interrupted by the general surge of movement as the council disbanded. The king had risen to his feet and was embracing his brother, tears of weakness glistening on his sunken cheeks. He held the duke tightly as though loath to let him go, and it seemed to me that no one who saw them could help but be struck by the contrast between them; one, once so handsome and athletic and strong, now a sad wreck of a man, worn out by a life of excess; the other, so fragile in youth that his life had more than once been despaired of, now a creature as healthy and lithe as a whippet, his skin tanned by wind and sun, his dark eyes alive and eager in his thin, sallow face.

The king next turned to Albany, his embrace more perfunctory than the one he had bestowed on my lord Gloucester, but warm enough and sufficiently prolonged to impress those watching with a sense of the duke’s importance. But although he addressed him fondly as ‘Cousin’ it was plain — to me at any rate — that true affection was lacking, as he adjured Albany not to forget, once he was crowned, the urgent matter of the Princess Cicely’s dowry.

‘Our coffers are not so full, my dear fellow, that we can afford to forgo its return.’

Albany smiled thinly; a smile that failed to reach his eyes.

‘I never imagined for a second that Your Highness had any intention of relinquishing his claim. Once my brother is deposed — ’ the words ‘and dead’ weren’t uttered, but I think we could all hear them, echoing in the air — ‘I shall, of course, be Your Highness’s liege man of life and limb.’

There was a snort of laughter, hastily suppressed. Heads half-turned, searching for the culprit, but every face was smooth and stern: there was no telling who had let his natural scepticism get the better of his credulity. But whoever it was, was being more honest than the rest. The king frowned and pretended not to have heard.

The company began to disperse. Duke Richard issued his orders that we were to be on the march by noon. There were some miles to be covered before nightfall on the first stage of our journey to York.

I returned with Albany to our apartments where James Petrie was overseeing the packing of the duke’s chests and jewel caskets with the help of two of the castle’s lackeys, acting under his mimed directions; for they, like me, were unable to understand his broad Scots dialect. I wondered if he, too, spoke better English than he let on, but had no means at present of finding out. His gaunt, seamed face was even more careworn than usual and he elbowed me out of his way with what I guessed to be a muttered curse as I attempted to collect together my own meagre belongings and stow them in my satchel.

Donald Seton appeared to say that the baggage waggons were waiting and that my lord’s gear must be taken out immediately if it was not to be left behind in the rush.

‘And John Tullo’s below in the courtyard, my lord, with the bay. He thought you’d wish to ride him today. The animal’s a bit restive, he says, from lack of exercise. He will be leading the other two.’

Albany nodded curtly, seated on the bed and watching almost absent-mindedly while the rest of us busied ourselves about his affairs. He had been thoughtful and inclined, most uncharacteristically, to be silent ever since we returned from the great hall.

‘Is everything ready?’ he asked abruptly as the squire turned to leave the room.

Donald looked faintly surprised at the question and, if the truth were told, a little offended.

‘Of course, Your Grace,’ he answered stiffly.

I noticed that he had given up all pretence at not being able to speak English, and also that Albany accepted this without question.

‘You’ve deceived me, my lord,’ I said as Donald left the chamber. I folded a clean shirt and stuffed it into my satchel on top of a spare pair of hose. ‘You and your henchmen.’

At first, I didn’t think that he had heard me, but then he raised his eyebrows in a haughty look. The friendliness had suddenly evaporated.

‘In what way?’

‘You all led me to believe that your squires and page could speak only Scots and were unable to understand English.’

He regarded me coldly.

‘I don’t think we ever gave you to understand that, Roger. That was your own assumption.’ He glanced across at his serving-man who was snarling something unintelligible at the two lackeys as they staggered out of the chamber, bearing the weight of one of the duke’s three great chests. ‘Although it’s true that James and John Tullo are most certainly not fluent in the English.’

‘But my lord,’ I protested angrily, ‘did it never occur to you that Murdo or Donald or Davey might have overheard your suspicions of them? And what they know, they can easily communicate to the other two.’

The duke’s face relaxed and he gave a little laugh. He slid off the bed and clapped me on the back.

‘No one’s overheard us,’ he assured me. ‘I’ve taken good care of that. Think back, my friend. There’s been no one about. And now who’s being incautious?’ He nodded at James Petrie, just disappearing through the door to the ante-room. ‘If you’re so suspicious, say nothing until we are alone.’ He added sharply, ‘Do you have anything to tell me? I had a feeling there was some disturbance during the night, but I may have dreamed it. I was too exhausted to do more than nod straight off to sleep again.’

I hesitated. ‘There was something, my lord, but it will keep. It might be of importance, but then, it might not. The trumpets are blowing. Your Highness had better make his way to the courtyard. It surely won’t do for you to be late. My lord of Gloucester will be waiting on your arrival. He can hardly set off without you.’

Albany grinned, his good humour restored by my flattery. I could never make out quite how cynical the man was about the chances of his becoming king of Scotland. Sometimes, he seemed to view those chances with amused detachment, looking upon this whole expedition as nothing more than an adventure; an opportunity to make life as difficult as possible for his hated elder brother. But then there were other times when he lapped up compliments and references to his future kingship as greedily and as eagerly as a child cramming its mouth with sweetmeats.

Fotheringay’s huge courtyard was crowded and exceedingly noisy, the babel of sound contained within the surrounding walls, like a cup filled and overflowing with water. Horses neighed. Trumpets blared. The Duke of Gloucester and most of the nobles were already mounted, gentling their steeds and glancing around anxiously for Albany’s arrival. A slight cheer went up as he finally emerged into the watery sunlight, a greeting he acknowledged with an ironical bow.

My lord of Gloucester was plainly unamused by such tardiness, but merely said, ‘Welcome, Cousin,’ with a dryness of tone that might have conveyed annoyance to anyone with a less thick skin than my temporary master. Albany laughed.

John Tullo led up the bay and stood ready to assist the duke into the saddle. The two squires were slightly to the rear, waiting to mount their own horses, while I and the patient beast, who had already borne me so many weary miles, eyed one another with mutual suspicion. As far as I could see, Davey Gray and James Petrie were nowhere in view, the latter, in any case, always riding with the baggage waggons. What Davey did was a bit of mystery. Sometimes he attended upon the duke, but a great deal of the time he went missing. I wondered where he was during these absences, and might have suspected him of gaining experience of life amongst the horde of camp followers who straggled in the wake of the army, except that he so obviously had little interest in women.

Albany waved John Tullo aside and vaulted, unaided, into the saddle, displaying at one and the same time his superb physical fitness and his splendid horsemanship. But as he did so, the bay, who had been fidgeting only a very little, suddenly reared, whinnying furiously and slashing the air in front of him with vicious, flailing hooves.

There was a flurry of movement, as those in the vicinity wrenched their own steeds out of the way, and cries of alarm as it seemed certain that Albany must be thrown, and thrown badly. John Tullo leaped for the horse’s head, but it was the duke’s own unrivalled skill that finally brought the bay under control, and his voice, whispering soft endearments in its ear, that quietened the outraged animal.

The groom, white-faced and trembling, muttered something that only Albany and the squires understood. The duke gave an uncertain laugh.

‘Fresh, indeed, John,’ was his answer, before turning to my lord of Gloucester and saying with bravado, ‘My groom warned me, Cousin, that the animal was restive after the inactivity of the past few days, but even he hadn’t counted on quite how restive.’ He made a sweeping gesture to include the other nobles, now crowding around him again in an admiring group, impressed, in spite of themselves, by his remarkable horsemanship. ‘There was no need for anxiety, my lords. None whatsoever. There was not a moment when I did not have the animal under control. You were in no danger, I assure you.’

There was a polite, if somewhat dubious murmur.

Lord Stanley said diplomatically, ‘The anxiety was not for ourselves, Your Grace, but for Your Grace’s own person. You might have been very seriously injured, had you been thrown.’

Northumberland nodded agreement.

‘Very seriously injured,’ he concurred, adding infelicitously, ‘If not killed.’

I saw the Duke of Gloucester’s sudden frown and quick glance round, the first swiftly smoothed away with a pleasant smile and the second curbed in mid-movement.

‘I’m sure there was no danger of that, my lord. Our Cousin of Scotland is noted as an equestrian of great style and flair. And now, gentlemen, we must set forward if the army is to be even halfway to Leicester by nightfall.’ There was a general murmur of assent. Duke Richard turned once again to Albany. ‘You are recovered, Cousin?’

‘Recovered?’ Albany’s tone was disdainful. ‘What is there to recover from, my lord? As you can see, the animal is perfectly well-behaved now. He has always had a little playfulness in his disposition.’

But playfulness, I thought to myself as I mounted my own placid steed, was not the word I would have used. The bay had been seriously put out by something. He had most definitely been harmed in some way; a dig, a prod, a cut, maybe, with the tip of somebody’s knife. I had seen the whites of his eyes as he reared. And I had seen the whites of Albany’s, too. There had been a moment, albeit fleeting, when he had been terrified.

I was not surprised, therefore, as we rode out through the great gates of Fotheringay, when he turned his head and said curtly, ‘Stay close, Roger.’

‘Yes, my lord.’

I took up my position a pace or two behind the rump of his horse, not caring who I jostled out of my path as I did so. I tried to picture to myself the scene as John Tullo had led up the bay for the duke to mount. The two squires had definitely been there, and either one of them could have made the animal rear. Any movement in that crush would have passed unnoticed, and I had been too busy contemplating the unwelcome ride ahead of me to pay Murdo and Donald any particular attention. It was inexcusable: I knew full well that after the events of the previous night, I should have been alert and on my guard against mischief. I was failing in my duty; and if any harm were to befall Albany, it would be the worse for me. I owed it to myself, as well as to the duke, to be more vigilant.

It was as the brilliant cavalcade streamed across the flat Northamptonshire plain, banners bravely waving and flapping taut in a freshening breeze, that I had a sudden, clear vision of that tableau in the courtyard. I could see again the two squires and the tension on Donald Seton’s face as John Tullo had led the bay forward for Albany to mount. I wondered that it had not struck me at the time that the man was as taut as a fiddle string. Had he been waiting for something to happen? Or had he simply been afraid that some mischief was brewing? I tried to recall the look on his companion’s face, but Murdo’s expression rarely, if ever, gave anything away.

I let my imaginary gaze roam over the rest of the crowd, but saw nothing except a blur of bodies. And then, suddenly, just as I was giving up on what I felt certain was a fruitless exercise, a face stood out from the throng; a delicate face with fair, wavy hair escaping from beneath a green cap worn at a rakish angle; large eyes that, close to, would prove to be violet-blue. A pretty, womanish face.

Davey!