‘Aye, look about you, my lord, as she did in Oldmother Agatha’s. This is not “tidy” by ’er standards. The bedcover thrown back we could take as just gettin’ out o’ bed to answer the knock at the door, but the chest at the bed end is not quite closed, so if we lifts the lid,’ Catchpoll suited the action to the word, ‘we can see things not neatly folded but disordered, like someone rooted about among ’em as a pig roots for beechmast.’

  ‘So the treasure was sought, but we should not discount that her remembering something was not also involved. After all, there are few if any in Ripple as observant or astute. Walkelin, whilst it would be useful to have you with us when speaking with everyone, family by family, we have to ensure nobody enters other than Father Ambrosius or us, especially not the reeve, or, being fair, Wilf the Worrier, since some possible suspicion lies upon him now. It will also be useful if we have someone at the bedside in case she wakes and can tell us who hit her.’

  ‘Understood, my lord.’

  ‘Anything she recalls may aid us, even if not a full picture. You have a good head for setting things in order, and will make the most of anything we learn.’

  ‘Let us just pray she wakes, first, my lord,’ cautioned Catchpoll. ‘You cannot always tell with them as is left senseless.’

  ‘Oh, I have been praying since we got here, Catchpoll.’ Bradecote was very earnest.

  ‘If’n she wakes and recalls nothin’, does I tell what we know? It might begin to bring some memory back.’ Walkelin was thinking ahead.

  ‘Aye, you do that.’ Catchpoll nodded. ‘Sometimes there is nothin’, not for hours afore the injury, and it never returns. Other times bits come back gradual like, in no order, and not even the most important.’

  ‘Wait. Could it even be that she was attacked late yesterday and has lain all night as we found her? She might have been ready for her bed and—’

  ‘If that had been so, my lord, she would be chilled to the bone, and although not bed-warm, she was cool but not overnight-cold.’ Catchpoll shook his head. ‘Also, anyone comin’ out late would ’ave had to give a good reason to their family, whereas in the morn, well, everyone does their tasks, be it fetchin’ water from the brook or takin’ a pail to the midden. Bein’ abroad a mite earlier than usual would not be odd.’

  ‘But in that case the assailant took a great risk of being seen by others, Catchpoll.’

  ‘Not if it were timed right, my lord. It would just need to be early enough for there to be few folk to avoid, and the healer still abed, but not so early as to be questioned.’

  ‘Well, we will not catch whoever did this standing here. You and I, Catchpoll, will go and ask if anyone saw or heard another abroad unusually early this morning.’

  ‘And does we say direct that the healer is dead, my lord?’

  ‘If we say she has been discovered, “left for dead”, we might avoid that specific question, and if asked we can say she is like to die, for she is – if not this day, then one day.’ A small smile played about Bradecote’s mouth. ‘The Law should not lie, but it need not reveal everything it knows, eh, Catchpoll?’

  ‘Oh aye, my lord. Many things is best kept privy.’

  ‘If, by some miracle, the healer wakes and is sure who hit her, Walkelin, send if you can to us by anyone you see about the village, but do not leave her.’

  ‘I will keep ’er safe, my lord.’ Walkelin looked resolute.

  In fact, those labouring in the Great Field had taken Mildred’s first cry that Agnes the Healer was dead as a certain fact, and did not think to question it, which made it much easier for Bradecote and Catchpoll. First of all, the pair gathered in the villagers like sheepdogs bringing in the flock for penning, though one man held back, and was allowed to do so. Wystan was not of any Ripple home. He was also in charge of the plough oxen for the first time, though Selewine had stressed he was on probation and would likely not be good enough, and he rather liked the idea he could continue without anyone paying him any attention, just in case his furrows were not quite straight, or his headland turns not tight enough. He was permitted the aid of one of Ulf’s sons to guide the beasts. Then Bradecote stood before them all, arms folded and expression very serious. He asked if anyone had been out early that morning, though no reason for this was given.

  ‘I was out early, my lord,’ volunteered Selewine the Reeve, before anyone else could speak. ‘I thought it my duty, as the reeve, to check upon the households without the protection of a man beneath the roof.’

  ‘Did you visit all of them, Master Reeve?’ Bradecote enquired, ensuring he did not sound too interested in the answer. Was the man volunteering information so that he looked innocent and helpful?

  ‘Selewine came and knocked upon my door afore I had twisted my plait.’ Widow Reed held up her hand as she spoke. ‘Fair scared me, it did, that great fist upon my door and ’im bellowin’ to ask if I stayed safe and well.’

  ‘So you did not cross any threshold?’ Bradecote looked at the reeve again.

  ‘Too early it were, my lord, and folk just risin’.’

  ‘I ask again. Did you visit everyone, and did they give an answer?’

  ‘Aye, my lord, but that were just the Widow Reed and Mother Agnes. I did and they did. Mind you, Mother Agnes did not thank me, just threw a patten, from the sounds of it, at the door. Cantankerous she be, though, so no surprise were it to me.’

  ‘I see. And did you see anyone else as you made your early rounds of the village?’

  ‘I saw only Wilf, my lord, as I were goin’ over first to the Widow Reed’s.’ Selewine the Reeve looked very serious. ‘But in fairness, everyone know Wilf sleeps light and wakens early, and ’e were only off to settin’ spade to earth in ’is garden afore field work.’

  ‘Mayhap ’e ’as somethin’ buried in the garden.’ It was a youthful voice, and accompanied by a snigger. Clearly the speaker did not think Wilf the Worrier a man likely to have secured the treasure and hidden it again.

  ‘No, I tell you, that ain’t true,’ Wilf the Worrier blurted out, his face at first paling then reddening.

  ‘’Twere but a jest, Wilf,’ came a woman’s voice, soothingly.

  Catchpoll, however, did not look at all soothing. His eyes were narrowed to a gimlet gaze and his lips drawn into the thinnest and most disquieting of smiles.

  ‘Not just vegetables lies in the earth, eh, Wilf. Even things as were lost can be found there.’

  ‘I does not ’ave the treasure.’ Wilf’s voice rose almost to a squeak. ‘I swears it.’

  ‘O’ course you doesn’t. You—’ The soothing voice began, but was interrupted.

  ‘Not treasure of silver, no,’ conceded Catchpoll, very slowly, his eyes not wavering. ‘But some things is worth more ’n silver.’

  ‘Gold?’ This was a child’s voice.

  ‘No, young ’un. A good mother, a good father – a good wife.’ The last was given weight.

  ‘My wife left me, and went to Worcester, last autumn.’ Wilf the Worrier’s cheeks were white, and his breathing as fast as if he had run. His voice was urgent, almost desperate.

  ‘You see, that is a thing as worries me, and I am not one as worries without cause.’ Catchpoll let his words fall slowly. This was almost too easy. ‘I knows Worcester as you all knows this field, where is the better ground and where the least productive, where it is the stoniest. I knows the folk of Worcester, and them as comes to live there, and no woman called Eadild of Ripple plies a trade or tends a cooking pot within the walls.’

  ‘She went off to be with ’er sister, Leofcwen.’ A woman’s voice came from the rear of the gathering.

  ‘And the trade that Leofcwen plied was the oldest, and she died three years past.’ Catchpoll revealed this without mirth.

  This news, of itself ideal for gossiping women to mull over for days, changed the atmosphere. Those about Wilf the Worrier stepped back a little, if not physically then in spirit. A seed of doubt was planted in the collective village mind.

  ‘Then she must ’ave moved on, findin’ her gone.’ Wilf tried to give the suggestion an affirmative tone, and failed.

  ‘Catchpoll, this is not for now,’ muttered Bradecote, casting the serjeant an angry look.

  ‘Things come to the surface when they is ready, my lord.’ Catchpoll was still watching Wilf the Worrier.

  ‘So we now have witnesses that saw you outside on the morning of the priest’s death, when he went to Oldmother Agatha’s, and also this morning, which is likely when Agnes the Healer was attacked. It looks – suspicious. Did you see anyone, on either occasion?’ Bradecote decided this was the only way to get back to the matter in hand.

  ‘Not the first one, my lord, and this morn only Selewine, who saw me as I saw ’im.’ The man sounded on the verge of panic, as if he were a drowning man come up for air.

  ‘But what of Eadild?’ The woman spoke up again and Bradecote gave up.

  ‘When we dig up your garden, Wilf, where will we find your wife’s remains?’ Bradecote sounded bored, not excited.

  There was a collective gasp at the bald question, and Wilf the Worrier’s eyes widened and then his eyeballs rolled up into his head and he fell in a dead faint upon the earth.

  Whilst Catchpoll, and now Bradecote, were sure the man had killed his wife, all that linked him to the other deaths and attack was being seen outdoors, not near the homes of either woman.

  ‘If’n he killed Eadild, a wolf in sheep’s clothin’ is Wilf, and like as not killed again. Yet, of all men in this village, he would be the last I would name as violent.’ This, from Selewine the Reeve, was met with mutterings of agreement, though another male voice added ‘after Thorgar, that is.’ Selewine scowled at that. Bradecote thought it one attempt too far to divert their thoughts elsewhere.

  ‘We will look deeply into this, but I say to all of you, still be careful. There is no connection of itself between the death of Eadild and the other deaths, and it may yet be another who has killed these last days.’ Bradecote could not simply tell everyone to avoid their reeve, but felt he would be remiss if he did not put everyone on their guard.

  Catchpoll, having motioned to the reeve to assist him, pulled the inanimate form of Wilf the Worrier into a sitting position, and tapped his face, not entirely gently, until he groaned and raised his head.

  ‘Now then, you can get up slow, and come with me.’ Catchpoll did not sound threatening, just very calm.

  Wilf the Worrier struggled groggily to his feet, focusing gradually. He swallowed hard and looked about him at his neighbours. What he saw was that these people were suddenly as cold as strangers to him. He shuddered as Catchpoll took his elbow and led him back towards the village. It was a troubled undersheriff who followed him. That there should be two murderers in the small community of Ripple might be unlikely, but if Eadild was, as he expected, to be found beneath the earth of the man’s garden plot, that death was differentiated by time and motive. He still felt it was a dangerous distraction, though he understood that it was not so long ago as might reasonably be left as simply for the judgement of God, and out of the hands of the Law.

  Wilf the Worrier’s home was far from homely. It was not dirty, nor particularly untidy, but had an air of lacking a woman’s attentions. Bradecote closed the door behind him as he entered the dim chamber. The man, still pale, was thrust onto a stool, and Bradecote, arms folded across his chest, regarded him dispassionately.

  ‘We will find your wife, even if it means digging up every spadeful of the garden behind your cott. Tell me, since we know when she disappeared, why it was that you killed her, and how.’

  Wilf the Worrier stared at the undersheriff as if he were speaking Foreign. Catchpoll made a growling noise in his throat, but did not touch him. After a few moments, Wilf heaved a great sigh, and unburdened himself. As he did so, he seemed to grow, sloughing off a weight upon his soul.

  ‘I loved Eadild. I did. She grew restless, though, always pursin’ her lips when I warned of problems, always complainin’ that I only saw the worst that might be. Well, I was right often enough.’ He gave a twisted smile. ‘The night she died she threw a beaker at me and said she had borne enough. She was goin’ to Worcester and would live with Leofcwen. I thought it mere words, but she took her second shift, better gown and cap, and began to pack them into her shawl. I-I don’t rightly know what happened. I cannot remember it now, just that I knew she could not leave me. I would not let her. I grabbed her and shook ’er and she slapped my face. Odd it is that some nights I wakes feelin’ the burnin’ of my cheek as if it is red still.’ He was speaking more to himself than to the sheriff’s officers. ‘Then I grabbed ’er by the throat, for she were shoutin’ at me and – then she went all limp. I realised she were dead and so I went out in the dark and buried her in the garden, next to the cabbages. None but me digs the garden.’ Wilf the Worrier looked less worried, and now ‘saw’ the lord undersheriff before him.

  ‘My lord, I did not want to kill my wife, but I did. God forgive me, I did. But the death of Father Edmund and poor Oldmother Agatha and Mother Agnes, those deaths are not at my door. What need would I have for treasure? You was right, Serjeant, I buried mine.’ His eyes misted, and then he bent his head and wept.

  Neither Bradecote nor Catchpoll doubted he spoke the truth.

  ‘There is nothing you can do for Eadild, but you can do something for your village, and those who need justice now. If you saw anything that has bearing on recent events, tell us.’ Bradecote spoke firmly enough to get through the man’s emotional outburst, but not harshly.

  ‘My lord, I can only say as I saw Selewine the Reeve this morn as I took my spade. I raised it a little in greetin’, though no response did I get. Not that it would surprise me, for Selewine more ’n often ignores me. I warned ’im last year, when he turned up a silver penny, aye, and it would be in the very strip that went then over to Thorgar, that all his burrowin’ in the earth like a little black mole would do is bring up death. Not that any more came to ’is fingers, but now I am proved right. Mind you, Selewine must be sick to ’is stomach that The Treasure came up to another, not his mighty reeve-ness, just for the fame of it. Well, you can keep that sort of fame.’ Wilf almost snorted. He clearly felt both vindicated in his view and affronted that his prognostication had been ignored. Just for a moment his own spiral towards death was forgotten.

  ‘So Selewine had held that land until the Court Leet. That is interesting.’ Bradecote frowned. It was customary for villages to reassign the field strips every few years so that no one person only had poor land, nor only the best. When he had made it known to all the village that Thorgar had ploughed up treasure, Selewine had not commented at all, and Bradecote’s reading of the man certainly agreed with Wilf the Worrier’s that Selewine’s pride, if not desire for self-aggrandisement, would have raised an exclamation. It was another hint that pointed the finger of guilt towards the man. The undersheriff, lost in his own thoughts for a moment, realised Wilf was watching him, awaiting his next pronouncement. It was nothing to do with Selewine, however.

  ‘You will get your spade and dig again, so that your wife gets a Christian burial.’

  ‘But after all these months in the ground …’ The man’s eyes grew wide and fearful.

  ‘We all has to face the results of our deeds. You put the woman in the ground so you can fetch ’er up again.’ Whilst he would not say it before the murdering husband, Catchpoll knew that it would not be the most pleasant of sights, and he did not relish it, but nor would he avoid it. ‘You just—’ Catchpoll was interrupted by a loud thumping on the door and a female voice screeching for admittance.

  ‘Oh, what now?’ Bradecote sounded peeved and went and opened the door himself. Osgyth almost fell over the threshold.

  ‘’Tis Baldred. Gone, ’e is.’

  Chapter Thirteen

  Osgyth wrung her hands together.

  ‘He is dead?’ Bradecote was stunned.

  ‘No, gone. Gone from the bed. Disappeared. Mother fears the grief be so bad he might throw hisself into the river.’ She began to sob loudly.

  ‘He was sick. He might feel better today and have just wanted some air.’ It sounded foolish even to Bradecote’s own ears, but his was a mind in confusion. There were but three of them to deal with the deaths, and Walkelin was guarding Agnes the Healer and now someone would need to guard Wilf the Worrier, not, realistically, from absconding, but more likely from doing himself an injury, and there was a missing child, but still a killer to be found.

  ‘When did he go missing?’

  ‘Mother is not sure, but she fell asleep, since sleep ’as been poor these last days, and when she woke up Baldred were gone. My little brother Odda went back to fetch a sack to put about his shoulders, middle forenoon, since the cold got into the bones of ’im, and Mother were awake then, but Odda says she were sleepy.’

  ‘So perhaps a couple of hours have passed. He could be well hidden by now.’ Bradecote did not suggest ‘drowned’.

  Another figure appeared at Osgyth’s shoulder. It was Wystan the wheelwright’s son.

  ‘My lord, I need to speak with you.’ He sounded sincere.

  ‘Why? We have many—’ Bradecote was cut short, which was unusual.

  ‘I looked when you drew the village on the earth, and now I sees proof which way round they is, I am sure.’

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘I saw a man at a door, my lord, a door I thought his own, after I left Osgyth and ’er mother, yesterday afore dark, offerin’ to work their land. But the man were the reeve, and the door were that of the oldmother as were found dead a mite after.’

  ‘Then we need to speak to Selewine the Reeve, even before we help find your brother, Osgyth. Osgyth?’ Bradecote’s brows drew together. The girl had gone from sobbing to silence and her hand was across her mouth, her eyes fixed in a blank stare. She swallowed and managed the words in a whisper.