The Reeve's Tale

Chapter 19

In the pause after she had dismissed Mary, as she watched her walk away, Frevisse considered her, so mean-spirited a woman that her grief was only for herself and her lost hopes, her concerns only for the wrongs done to her, not more than a jot for the wrongs done to her husband or her lover.

To put both murders onto her would be no grief at all…

Frevisse pulled back from the thought’s ugliness. Dislike was proof of nothing in this matter and, besides, she could see no way that Mary profited by Tom Hulcote’s death.

From her husband’s, in some ways, yes…

Glumly Perryn said, now Mary was out of hearing, “You were wondering who didn’t wish me well. There’s one. Nor Gilbey neither. She’d see us both hung and like it.” And before Frevisse could answer that, “Here be Bert and the rest.”

The four men were coming out of a narrow way between two messuages, probably the straightest way in from wherever Dickon had found them in the fields, Bert Fleccher first, rake over his shoulder, and Walter Hopper not far behind him with Hamon trailing after, carrying two rakes and a water bag, and finally John Rudyng, talking to Dickon trotting beside him.

Longer-strided, John overtook the others as they reached the oak, all of them red-faced with hurry, pulling off their broad-brimmed hats respectfully and bowing as they came into the shade. With the sun higher, there was less shade than there had been, and to be in it they had to stand nearer to the bench than Frevisse liked, but disappointed in herself to find she had grown nice over sweat nor wanting to put them off answering her easily, she kept her discomfort to herself, thanked Dickon for his service, to which he awkwardly bowed and went to sit aside on the shady grass, eager to listen, while Frevisse turned to the men and said, “Did you indict Gilbey Dunn for the crowner this morning?”

‘Pah!“ The exclamation was Bert’s but all their faces agreed with him as he went on disgustedly, ”Not likely. We told him what we told him yesterday, that there wasn’t enough to warrant finding anybody guilty of anything.“

‘Outlander.“ John Rudyng put fulsome scorn into the word. ”Coming in and making it seem we’d no sense over something as fool as that belt and hood.“

‘He went to arrest Gilbey Dunn anyway,“ Frevisse said.

Bert’s jaw worked as if he was about to spit while Walter Hopper answered, “So the boy said.” He nodded at Dickon. “But it wasn’t by our doing.”

‘We knew that’s what he was about, though,“ Bert said. ”It’s why we went fieldward, so Gilbey wouldn’t see us and grudge against us the worse for it later. He would, the…“ He thought better of what he had been about to say.

‘But the boy says Gilbey’s gone off?“ Walter asked.

‘To Banbury, according to his wife,“ Frevisse answered.

‘ ’T’wouldn’t stick anyway, the arrest, without there was a jury said so, and we didn’t,“ John said.

‘Nay,“ Bert agreed, regretful. ”Not but it’d be sport to see old Simon and Gilbey sweat it a bit.“ He gave Perryn the side of a grin with teeth missing from it. Perryn gave him a stare back that made Bert’s grin widen. ”Not worth giving that crowner fellow the pleasure of it, though.“

‘Hauled us in there like none had aught to do in a day but him,“ John Rudyng said resentfully. ”Then jawed at us because we wouldn’t do what he said. Sent us off, saying maybe he’d look to arrest us next.“

‘Pah!“ said Bert.

‘When you found Tom Hulcote’s body,“ Frevisse said, ”you saw the hood and belt there with it?

‘Oh, aye,“ said Bert, and the other three men nodded agreement.

‘Where?“ she asked.

They looked at each other to see who would answer and left it to Walter to say, “The belt was beside him.”

‘How?“ Frevisse asked.

‘How?“ he repeated blankly.

‘How was it beside him? As if it had fallen there, or as if it had been put where it was?“

‘What would be the difference?“ Hamon asked.

For answer, Perryn unbuckled his own leather belt before Frevisse could explain. “Like this,” he said and stepped forward, letting go of the belt so it fell away behind him to lie long across the grass. “Or like this.” He turned and picked it up, wound it deftly into a coil that would have fitted easily into a belt pouch, then tossed it away from him. It uncoiled as it fell but when it had fallen was still was looped around on itself at one end.

‘Do it again,“ Walter said.

Perryn did, coiling and tossing his belt three more times. The pattern it fell in was different each time, but every time it stayed more looped on itself than less.

‘Now, just let it fall again,“ Walter said.

Perryn did, three times more, and every time it fell stretched out, no looping.

‘It was coiled and tossed then,“ Walter said, ”because I mind me it was looped where it lay.“

John and Hamon nodded agreement to that, and Bert said, “Besides, how could a belt like Gilbey’s have come undone enough to fall off? The way it’s run through the buckle, then the end wound around and through on itself and hangs down to his knees, the daft man, how would it come loose enough to fall and him not notice his tunic hanging around him? But we already thought the belt was no evidence anyway.”

‘Best to be sure,“ Perryn said. He looked at Frevisse. ”My hood was lying by him, too, when Dickon found him.“

‘ ’Twas over his face when we came,“ Hamon said.

‘Dickon put it there,“ Frevisse said. ”Was he wearing a hood of his own? Tom, I mean.“

‘No. In this weather, who needs a hood most of the time?“ Bert asked back.

‘Which of you took the belt and hood?“

‘None of us. It was Father Edmund did,“ John Rudyng said, ”and told us to say naught about them to anyone.“

‘Why? Why say nothing about them?“

Uneasy looks passed among the men, with sideways glances at Perryn, and no one seeming willing to answer.

‘Well?“ Frevisse prodded.

Walter, staring at the oak trunk somewhere above her head and well away from Perryn, said, “I suppose it’s because we all knew whose they were, soon as we saw ‘em, and so did Father Edmund. Didn’t look like a good thing to be putting about the village, with nothing that could be done about it anyway until the crowner was here, Father Edmund said, and ’Be quiet about this,‘ he said, and we could all see the sense to it, so we did.”

‘What Father Edmund said,“ Bert put in less moderately, ”was we were all to keep closed about it or there’d be penance on us like we’d not believe.“

Frevisse had been close to asking how-no matter that it was good sense to keep quiet about the hood and belt- they had managed to do it, but threat of penance from their priest and their certainty that he meant it was answer enough. It had even sufficed to stopper Bert, and her estimation of Father Edmund rose.

But she still had little more than what she had already guessed about the hood and belt and had been already fairly certain how illegal Montfort’s move against Gilbey was. Unhappily, she could think of nothing else to ask and thanked the men and dismissed them back to their work.

‘To the alehouse for me,“ Bert said as they began to move off. ”I’ve had my haymaking for the day.“

‘No more need to lie low, that’s it, now you know there’s going to be no dust kicked up over Gilbey,“ Hamon mocked.

‘Aye,“ Bert mocked back. ”And when you’ve learned to duck as well as I have, you’ll look a fool less often than you do, Hamon Otale.“

‘Hamon,“ Frevisse called after him, remembering something. ”And Walter. A moment more, if it please you.“

Quick looks passed between all four men before Bert and John Rudyng kept on their separate ways, though Bert with long backward looks until the alehouse doorway took him while Walter and Hamon, taking off their hats again, turned back into the shade.

‘The day before Tom Hulcote’s body was found, what did you go to the reeve’s house for, Walter?“ Frevisse asked.

Walter regarded her blankly a moment, the question taking him by surprise, before he answered, “To find out when Simon would want my work this week.”

‘A half-day’s weeding of the lord’s beans yesterday,“ Perryn said, ”that you still owe, what with being a juror instead.“

Walter gave him a narrow stare. “Might change my mind about that hood not being evidence,” he said, but it was in jest and he added easily, “This afternoon then, if that’ll serve.”

Perryn nodded, equally easy about it.

‘Why did you let Hamon go to Gilbey’s looking for work that morning?“ Frevisse asked.

‘Hamon’s been grumping on about how he’s no chance to earn money in hand. I thought Gilbey was likely to be short-handed, with Tom not working for him any more, and told Hamon to see if he could earn a bit of something there, me not needing him that day once I knew Simon didn’t want me just then.“

‘And his wife was wanting to know how things were going at Gilbey Dunn’s,“ Hamon said, ”with the sick brats and all, but didn’t want to go herself, Gilbey’s wife being the way she is. ’Have a look in the door if you can,‘ she said, so Walter said I could go.“

‘Hamon,“ Walter said with no particular heat, just a wish he would be quiet and resignation that he wouldn’t.

‘Well, that’s how it was,“ Hamon said. ”She said I was to tell her everything about it afterwards.“

‘Did you?“ Frevisse asked.

‘Wasn’t much to tell.“ Hamon sounded as wronged by that as Walter’s wife had probably felt. ”I never hardly got past the doorstep. That old thing her servant sent me off to Gilbey in the barn. He didn’t want me, and I never laid eyes on Gilbey’s wife at all.“ Which he seemed to feel was an equal wrong.

Unhopeful of learning more, Frevisse let them go with careful thanks, then sat watching them walk away while her mind tracked back through what she had found out, none of it seeming of particular use, but she nodded at Perryn to sit with her on the bench, and when he had, they both sat in silence, Frevisse staring into the distance, Perryn at the ground, with nothing to say between them until Perryn roused with a deep sigh and, “About Mary. I’m sorry for the way she was to you.”

Frevisse had let go thinking of Mary. Even the fact that, besides Gilbey Dunn, she was the only strong link between the two dead men seemed to be of no matter in finding why they were dead. But she was Perryn’s sister and mattered to him-or at least her ill manners did, and Frevisse said, “No matter. It’s forgotten.”

But not by Perryn who said, still heavily, “She’s a trouble and always has been, ever since she was little. There’s never been a halfway about her in things. When she loved Matthew, it was the only thing in the world for her, and when she stopped loving him…” He left the sentence hang, no need to finish it. “The trouble is, she’d not stopped loving Tom Hulcote yet. It’s made it worse for her than losing Matthew was.”

‘She didn’t look to be much grieving just now,“ Frevisse said, but that sounded unkind even in her own ears, especially when said to Mary’s brother, and she added, ”Though she was wild enough with grief at first, by what I’ve heard.“

‘Oh, aye,“ Perryn agreed wearily. ”Mary’s always enjoyed a good howling when she has the chance.“

As when what was left of her husband’s body had been brought back to be buried, Frevisse remembered. Back to what mattered, she said, “The question we keep coming short against is who would want Tom Hulcote dead. What happened that someone killed him? By all I’ve heard, nobody cared enough about him to mind even whether he stayed or went, let be whether he was alive or dead.”

‘Nobody but Mary,“ Perryn said.

‘And she was telling him to go,“ Frevisse said, impatient that Perryn would not leave off about what was no use to them.

But he had reason for it, it seemed, frowning at the ground between his feet as he said, “It’s not right, her doing that. Telling him to go. She’s never been one to let go a thing until she’s done with it. Not Mary. And with Tom gone, she’d have been without a man and she’s never liked that. Not since she was old enough to want one.”

‘She still has Father Edmund,“ Dickon said.

Sitting on the grass aside and a little behind them all this while, he had been out of sight and-Frevisse realized belatedly-out of mind. With a smile as rueful as her thought, Perryn gave her a side wise look, then looked past her to Dickon and said in what was very much a father’s forbearing tone, “She does and that’s good. But Father Edmund’s not the same to her as Tom was.”

Stiffly, showing he knew he was being talked down to, Dickon said, “He kisses her the same way.”

Perryn’s gaze met Frevisse’s, the same, sudden, harsh question in both before Frevisse slowly turned to Dickon and asked, carefully keeping feelings out of her voice, “Does he? How do you know?”

Dickon shifted a little, suddenly uneased, looking from her to Perryn and back again before he said, with equal care, “There’s a place up on the wood edge.” He pointed vaguely toward where Crossfield made a low rise into woods. “It ridges out some and you can see…” He gestured along all the north side of the green.

‘I know the place,“ Perryn said. ”Every boy knows it. Its the best place along the woodshore for…“ He reconsidered what he was going to say. ”… not snaring rabbits.“ Because any kind of hunting in the lord’s woodland was mostly a forbidden thing. ”My grandfather used to not snare rabbits up there, too. And my father and me. None of us ever used to set snares there when we were your age, nor eat the rabbits we never caught neither.“

Frevisse saw what he was at and left him to it as Dickon began to grin with a shared understanding that had everything to do with Perryn having been a boy and nothing at all to do with him being the reeve and answerable for keeping village laws.

‘That’s it,“ Dickon agreed. ”Adam showed me.“

‘From up there you can see most of the back way that runs behind the messuages that side of the green, and into some of their byre yards, too,“ Perryn explained to Frevisse. ”You saw them from up there, did you?“ he asked Dickon.

Dickon nodded. “They didn’t think anyone could because there’s a shed angled between the byre and the back gate, and the byre in the next yard has its back to there, and even if they’d looked, they’d not have seen me because I was down in the long grass.”

‘Dawn this would have been?“ Perryn asked.

He made no more of it than he had of the snaring so that Dickon went on easily, “Half light, maybe. No more. They came out of the byre together, her and Father Edmund, and they… kissed.” And something more than kissed, guessing from Dickon’s sudden hesitation and then the way he went on quickly as if he did not want to be asked more about it. “Then she went to see out the back gate that everything was clear, nobody about, and there wasn’t and he left, back to his own place.”

‘It’d be not far to go,“ Perryn said to Frevisse. ”There’s maybe two messuages between her place and the back way into his.“

‘When was this you saw them?“ Frevisse asked.

Dickon was well into enjoying himself now and answered eagerly, “Two mornings ago. Just after I’d taken the cows to pasture. You have to go out early to snares, before the crows find them, if you’ve caught anything,” he explained to her.

Frevisse forebore to tell him she had known how to snare rabbits and what to do with them afterwards when she was half his age.

‘That was careless of them,“ Perryn said grimly. ”To be out like that when it was light.“

But Frevisse had thought of more than that and asked, “Dickon, how is it you know she and Father Edmund kissed the same way she and Tom Hulcote did?”

Dickon squirmed and said with sudden interest in his kneecap, “I saw her and Tom at it a couple of weeks ago.” He looked up quickly. “But they were right out in the open, and it was daytime when they did. They didn’t care if anybody saw them. I wasn’t looking for it, either time. It just happened. Nor I’m not the only one who’s seen them. Her and Tom, and her and Father Edmund. Adam even saw…”

He stopped, his mouth open, his eyes shifting widely aside in search of something else to say.

Gently but too firmly to let him think she would let him off, Frevisse said, “This matters, Dickon. You’ve listened to enough of what’s passed here to understand how much we’re in need of answers. What else has been seen between Mary Woderove and Father Edmund and Tom Hulcote, by you or anyone else?”

Dickon looked to Perryn who nodded he should go on, and Dickon took a deep breath and said, “Once Adam happened on her and Father Edmund. They were out beyond that field her husband lost to Gilbey. In among the trees. They were…”

There was small likelihood a boy his age did not know what happened between men and women, but he also knew the limits of what was properly not said aloud and, embarrassed, he stopped.

‘You mean,“ Perryn said quietly, ”they were doing what only man and wife should do together.“

Dickon nodded gratefully.

‘They never knew Adam was there, did they?“ Frevisse said to set him going again.

Dickon shook his head. “He drew off and went away, and they never knew he’d seen. But he told me about it afterwards. And some of the other boys.”

And, being boys, they had probably laughed over it.

Very far from laughter but holding her anger out of her voice, Frevisse asked, “When was it he saw them?”

‘Before Midsummer. A little before. He said the next time he saw Father Edmund and Mary was at the court then, and he kept wanting to laugh because he kept remembering…“

Dickon broke off, embarrassed again, and Frevisse pushed him for no more. He had said enough, and still keeping her feelings from her voice, she told him, “Thank you, Dickon. You’ve done well, telling us this. Can you keep it to yourself a while longer? Both what you know and that you’ve told us?”

‘Of course,“ he said, sounding in his certainty very like his father.