The Christmas Wassail by Kate Sedley

Author:Kate Sedley [Kate Sedley]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Severn House Publishers
Published: 2013-03-06T05:00:00+00:00

ELEVEN

There was a moment’s complete silence while we all stood, rigid with shock, staring upon the poor man as if he were holding the head of the Medusa.

I think I moved and spoke first, my voice coming out in a kind of hoarse croak ‘Whose … Whose body?’

The steward shook his head. ‘Sergeant Manifold didn’t say, sir. Just … just that a body had been found.’ He turned again to Cyprian. ‘Do come, master. Do come and hear what the sergeant has to say.’

But I was already out of the door before he had finished speaking. Richard was waiting at the bottom of the stairs, his face looking haggard in the flickering light of the fire burning on the hearth of the main hall. He glanced up as I started to descend, a shade of annoyance marring his not unhandsome features as he realized who it was.

‘You!’ he exclaimed. ‘What are you doing here?’

I was saved the trouble of replying by Cyprian’s arrival hard on my heels.

‘Sergeant Manifold,’ he quavered, ‘is the body that of my father?’

Richard shook his head. ‘I don’t know yet, Master Marvell. It was still being hauled out of the water when I left. I thought it right to inform you straight away so that you could prepare yourself for the worst. I didn’t wish you to hear the news from anyone else.’

I reflected silently that such an action was somehow typical of the man: earnest, dedicated, anxious to please but never quite getting his priorities right; always prone to do the wrong thing.

James, joining his father at the foot of the stairs, said furiously, ‘Then why bother us, Sergeant, until you were certain? The shock to Lady Marvell and my mother has been profound. And may prove to be unnecessary. Where is the body?’

‘Saint Nicholas Back,’ was the reply as Richard flushed angrily at this rebuke.

‘Then we’d better waste no more time and go there at once.’ James addressed one of the servants who had crowded into the hall, telling him to fetch his and his father’s cloaks. ‘The warm ones with the fur linings.’ He turned to Bartholomew who, with his mother and Joanna, made a small, huddled group in the middle of the stairs. ‘Bart, look after the women while we’re gone. Try not to imagine the worst.’ He spun round again. ‘Master Chapman, I’d be more than grateful if you would accompany us.’

I didn’t tell him that nothing on earth would keep me away, merely inclining my head graciously. (I caught Richard’s quickly suppressed snort of amusement.)

The cloaks having been brought and I having wrapped myself up warmly in mine, Cyprian and James Marvell and I followed Richard out into the cold December night. The month was ending as it had begun with sharp flurries of wind and sleet.

The four of us half-walked, half-ran through Bear Alley, along Redcliffe Street and across the bridge, turning left into St Nicholas Back, by which time we were having to force a passage through a gathering crowd.

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