The Holy Innocents

‘None at all!’ She gave a vigorous shake of her head. ‘I was in the parlour for the whole time the master was absent, and did not stir outside of it. I must have seen the children had they descended. Master Colet was not gone much above an hour. He liked his dinner promptly at half past ten o’clock and would not have been late returning.’

She had grown agitated, afraid that she was being accused of lying, and again I patted her hand.

‘I’m not questioning your word, Mistress Praule, only clearing the last shreds of doubt from my mind. When did Master Colet decide to close up the house and look for new accommodation?’

‘After the children’s bodies were discovered. Until then, you see, we all hoped and prayed that they would be found alive and well. And if they had made their own way home, they would have come straight to the house, so we had to be there in case that happened.’

‘And how did your master seem to you throughout that time of waiting?’

‘Oh, he was very upset. Wouldn’t eat much. Left half his meals, even though Agatha tried to tempt him with all his favourite dishes. He couldn’t sleep, either. I remember, several times, looking out from my room in the loft and seeing, across the courtyard, a chink of light between his bedchamber shutters, which meant his candle must still have been burning. And once, when he shouted at me for some silly mistake I’d made, he apologized and told me to take no notice: he wasn’t himself, he said. He said, too, that if anything had happened to the children, people would blame him because he was the only person to gain by their deaths. I told him Agatha and I both knew he could have had nothing to do with it, and if need be, so we’d tell the Crowner.’

‘What did he answer?’

‘He thanked me, but said that people would still try to blame him by accusing him of evil practices. Which is just what they did do. After it was known that the children had been murdered, even though it was plain to anyone of sense that the outlaws must have killed them, poor little lambs, the neighbours began to shun him, and make the sign to ward off evil if they passed him in the street. It didn’t seem to matter that the Crowner decided he was innocent, people still believed him guilty, including Mistress Harbourne. She was one of the ones who stirred up most hatred against him.’

‘You sound sorry for Master Colet, in spite of not really liking him.’

‘I am,’ Bridget retorted warmly. ‘I don’t care to see anyone wrongly accused. Liking or not liking has nothing to do with it.’

I smiled and squeezed her hand before releasing it. ‘You’ve a gentle heart, Mistress Praule, and a sense of justice. So, when Master Colet decided to shut up the house, you returned here to live with your grandmother, and he went to lodge with Mistress Tenter and her mother?’

‘Yes. It’s not easy to find new berths in a town this size, though I’m hopeful of a fresh place before the summer’s out. And the master needed a billet while he cast about him for a new home and sold the old one. He’d no friends in Totnes to turn to, and had no wish, he said, to stay at an inn. But neither did he want to quit the district altogether, so when Agatha offered to take him home with her, he agreed most readily.’

‘But surely Mistress Tenter and her mother – although I speak as one knowing nothing about them – surely they are unable to offer Master Colet any of the comforts he has been accustomed to?’

Bridget rubbed the tip of her nose with a forefinger stained brown from the constant peeling and preparation of vegetables.

‘I don’t think that would worry him. It’s… Well, I think it’s more what he was used to before Lady Skelton married him. He might even prefer it.’

She was far shrewder than her innocent, childish face suggested. Eudo Colet had very probably found solace in adversity in being with his own kind, as many another man had done before him.

I thanked her and stood up, glad to stretch my legs properly at last, but almost banging my head against the cottage roof.

Bridget giggled, and a voice from the far corner cackled, ‘Dang me, if you ain’t one of the tallest fellows I ever laid eyes on, chapman! What was your father? One o’ they Dartmoor giants?’

‘No, a small man, and dark with it if my mother was to be believed. Of Celtic stock. It was the men of her family who were tall and fair-haired.’

Granny Praule snorted. ‘I’d accuse no woman of playing her man false, but I’m willing to swear there’s no Celtic blood in you. Saxon, you are, m’lad, through and through.’ She added peevishly, ‘You’re not going already? Bridget, have you given the lad a cup of my damson wine?’

Bridget started guiltily and began to apologize for her oversight. I hastened to her rescue.

‘Granny, I need to keep a clear head on my shoulders at the moment, and I’m sure your damson wine is too potent to allow any such thing. In fact, I’ll wager yesterday’s takings against anything anyone likes to name, that you make the best and strongest damson wine this side of the Tamar.’