Romancing Robin Hood (11 page)

Her fingers hovered over the keyboard while she wondered how to reply. It had been a while since Grace had written an academic paper, and such things were very important for keeping your name known and respected in university circles. And if her novel ever got out there, she'd need all the respect she could get. But how could she possibly find time to do anything extra? She had to finish the novel and edit it; the textbook needed a serious sort out and a proper draft compiling – and on top of all that, she'd promised to give as much help as she could towards Daisy's wedding. Grace hit the reply button and settled for hedging her bets. Ignoring the voice at the back of her head which screamed at her to arrange to see Rob again as soon as possible, and telling her that working together would give her a chance to see if she really did fancy him, or if it was Daisy putting ideas in her head, she typed,

Thanks for inviting me. It was a great viva.

Christopher will go far. You and I had better look out for our jobs in a few years!

Would like to do paper – summer tricky as have book and wedding to sort.

Grace re-read it, and then added,

But would like to do a paper though. The Christmas or spring break would be better for me time wise. Are those times any good for you?

Best

G

Hitting ‘Send', Grace watched the email disappear into the technological ether and pulled herself off the chair. It was high time she had a shower and headed off to work.

From where she was sat at the edge of the hall, Mathilda considered her situation. She didn't really understand what she was supposed to do, but she knew it could be dangerous if she wasn't careful. As she waited to hear details of her first task, Mathilda thought about how she'd always been good at finding things out simply by virtue of being a good listener. But gossiping could get you into serious trouble. Not only was it frowned upon within the local towns and villages, it could led to being arrested and punished. How would she be able to gain information of the sort the Folvilles were alluding to, without endangering herself and those innocent informers that she spoke to?
⁷

‘You seem pensive, Mathilda,' Robert had finally emerged from the main hall, where he had been addressing the finer points of Mathilda's first task with Eustace, ‘positively demure, even.'

‘Thank you, my Lord.'

‘I am not fooled, however; what were you thinking about?'

He sat beside her on the long wooden settle which backed onto the wall dividing the hall from the kitchen. ‘I was wondering how I'd get the information you require safely, my Lord.'

‘You're only our messenger Mathilda; there is no reason for you to worry about your safety.'

‘Forgive me, my Lord,' Mathilda choose her words carefully, ‘but I must have misunderstood. I took it that I was to be an informer for you – a spy.'

Folville almost blurted out a denial, but thought better of it. This child was no child. At nineteen she was past the earliest marriageable age, and due to the loss of her mother had been used to the ways of adulthood for some years now. She was also no fool. ‘Mathilda, if you are sensible, then this is not a perilous job. Eustace laced the task ahead of you with an exaggeration of the danger involved. It is the thing he enjoys most; making a theatre of a situation and revelling in the anxiety it causes in others.'

Not at all surprised by his description of Eustace, but feeling far from relaxed about what lay ahead, Mathilda asked, ‘Do you have other messengers, my Lord?'

Robert looked uncomfortable for a second, but answered her squarely, ‘Not at the moment, although there have been, and will be again.'

Mathilda decided not to ask of the fate of the previous messenger. She has no choice in her position, and the detailed knowledge of her predecessor's death or imprisonment would not help. Anyway she was too busy trying to work out how to tackle the other issues which preyed heavily on her mind. ‘My I ask something more, my Lord?'

‘You seem to have developed the taste for questioning me, Mathilda.' A smile played at the corner of Robert's lips, but Mathilda remained cautious.

‘I dared not ask before my Lord Eustace, but no mention was made of my younger brother, Oswin.'

Robert spoke candidly. ‘We don't know where he is, and that's the truth of it.'

‘How so, my Lord?' Hope rose in Mathilda's chest, but she was afraid to show it too openly.

‘Richard tells me Oswin slipped through his fingers by the river, gone towards Lincolnshire we think. I can reassure you that he is not in the river. We checked for drowned victims.'

Relieved to know Oswin wasn't lost to the water, but still worried, Mathilda asked, ‘Will you pursue him?'

‘No, girl, you were our prize. Although without Oswin's help in the pottery, it will take your father longer to buy you back.'

While she digested the information, another idea drifted to her mind.

‘My Lord Eustace, sir,' Mathilda couldn't look at Robert now, a blush of embarrassed uncertainty on her face, ‘said I was to appear as your, well, your um … companion.'

Robert sat back down, ‘You fear for your reputation girl, your virtue, when you are already held here, when gossip has probably already spread and placed you as a group concubine.' Robert sighed as Mathilda's green eyes focused on his, not as meek in his company as she had been, ‘It is but subterfuge for your safety, Mathilda, it might cost you your blushes and some whispered remarks, but it could save your life. After all, only a desperate fool would attack the girl of a Folville brother.'

Mathilda had to acknowledge the truth of this, even if it was a truth she didn't like. In that one statement he'd as much as admitted she was open to attack after all. And yet, for all that, she still felt he wasn't telling her everything.

‘To that end, I have something for you.'

‘My Lord?'

Reaching into the leather bag he'd been carrying, Robert unrolled a delicate leather belted girdle. It was unlike anything Mathilda had ever seen, and as he passed it into her hands, she ran its length through her fingers, admiring the intricacy of the work. The leather had been punched into a latticework pattern of diagonal lines and tiny butterflies, and ended with a wide rectangular buckle, engraved to match the strap.

‘You are supposed, in the eyes of the world at least, to be my woman. It is fitting for our purposes that you wear a token from me that proves our link.'

‘It's beautiful, thank you, my Lord.'

‘Put it on, I want to see if it suits you.'

With reverence, and fumbling fingers, Mathilda undid her belt, and fastened the new girdle around her waist. ‘It will be hard to return this, my Lord, when my task is complete.'

Roberts face blackened in anger. The abrupt change in his appearance made Mathilda start in fear, ‘It is a gift, girl, do not insult me by suggesting it will need returning.'

Mathilda spoke hastily, ‘My Lord, I'm so sorry. I assumed, well … the subterfuge and everything my Lord. I never meant to offend, I'm truly sorry.'

He gave an almost guttural grunt, as he looked at her ashen upturned face, and spoke with the manner of a man not used to curtailing his anger so quickly. ‘I suppose your assumption is not strange in the circumstances. Come, you need food and rest. Tomorrow will be a long day.'

Having eaten a meal of stew and bread alone near the fire, Mathilda wasn't sure what she was supposed to do next. It was late, and only the boy servant, Allward, was bustling about at the other end of the hall, preparing the room for the coming of the new day, before bedding down behind the far screens for a night on his own straw mattress. Robert hadn't told Mathilda where to sleep, nor if she was to wait for him after she'd finished eating.

Pulling her cloak closer around her shoulders, Mathilda shuffled a few inches nearer to the fire place. Her finger ran along the length of the new girdle. It really was beautiful, a work of art, and she wondered where it had come from. She'd been worried for a while that it had been stolen, but Robert had implied it had been made especially for her, and Mathilda choose to believe that was the case.

Watching the dying flames, Mathilda decided that if Robert didn't turn up in the next few moments, she'd go and ask Allward where she should bed down for the night. While she waited, she prayed to Our Lady with every inch of her being, something, Mathilda hadn't done in earnest since the famine of a few years ago had so cruelly taken her mother from her.

Chapter Thirteen

He found Mathilda on her knees before the fire. Her lips were moving so fast that he could hear the rush of silent words she offered gallop straight from her mouth to heaven. Robert marvelled at how the girl could still have faith after all that had happened to her. The crop failures that had cost the whole country so dear, and many, including Mathilda, the loss of parents and children; the growing failure of her father's business; her missing brother; and now, her own kidnap and enforced service; surely any one of those events alone were enough to end any faith.

Robert shook himself. Of course she believed. Everyone believed; it was safer that way. Yet, the ferventness of her prayer had surprised him. Perhaps this girl wasn't so different from the rest. Folville waited for her to finish, before helping Mathilda rise from the cold floor. ‘I was surprised to see you appealing to the Almighty.'

‘My Lord?'

‘You have not exactly had it easy, child. Praying has obviously not helped you in the past.'

‘You speak blasphemy, my Lord.' Mathilda lowered her eyes from him.

‘And you think blasphemy, girl, I have seen it in your face.'

Indignant, Mathilda pulled her body to its utmost height, ‘Did not Robyn Hode, despite his defamed state, still risk capture, arrest, death even, to reach the shrine of Our Lady in Robyn Hode and the Monk, my Lord?'
⁸

Robert couldn't contain his grin ‘I forgot your memory for a tale, child. You are right, he did indeed.'

‘And I think, my Lord,' Mathilda spoke almost haughtily, the realisation that, at least for now, the Folvilles needed her so were unlikely to dispose of her at this stage of their plans, making her braver, ‘if I may be as bold as you say I am, and say that our charade as a couple would be more successful if you were to stop referring to me as a child.'

Folville studied Mathilda carefully, and inclined his head. What was it about her that made her so brave in the face of her own peril? He didn't for a second think it was because she was foolhardy.

Gesturing for her to follow him, Robert escorted Mathilda into the side room where she'd been bathed earlier. It already seemed a lifetime ago. ‘Sit down, Mathilda, we have much to discuss, and we need privacy to do so.'

Wiping a bench clear of the damp clothes that had been laid out to dry, a wary Mathilda waited for her master to speak.

‘You are going on a short journey to Bakewell, stopping at Derby on the way. Do you know the road to Derby?'

Mathilda gasped; going to Derby wasn't a short journey. It was many miles away. ‘I know of it, my Lord, but I've never travelled that far.'

‘You surely didn't think your message would need delivery within Ashby Folville? I could have taken such a missive myself.' He surveyed at her with an expression of amused derision, which Mathilda found unsettling, ‘The debt your family has to reply involves more than money, and therefore is going to take more than a quick trip or two into a local town or even Leicester.'

Avoiding the mocking look in his eyes, Mathilda asked, ‘And once I'm on the road to Derby, my Lord?'

‘You are to head to Bakewell. There you will ask for audience with Nicholas Coterel.'
⁹

Mathilda's face went white, and her palms clenched together. ‘I see you know the name, Mathilda. Tell me, how does a potter's daughter know of such a man?'

Mathilda swallowed, trying to ease the sudden dryness of her throat, ‘I heard the name in the spring, my Lord. I was in Leicester with my father. It was a name spoken of in hushed tones, in awe, my Lord, and with fear.'

‘Nicholas Coterel and his brother John are not men to trifle with, Mathilda. Nor, however, are they men to fear – unless you have particular cause to do so.'

Mathilda boldly fixed her gaze upon Robert's face, fear making her forget her position of inferiority in the hope of receiving more information about her task. ‘I see, my Lord.'

‘They are like us; my brothers and I. The Coterel family see the disintegration of our country and counties, and have taken steps to curb the worst excesses of those who abuse their positions of power too widely.'

Mathilda didn't respond to his statement, and as Robert stared at her tiny frame and delicate features, he seemed unsure for the first time, ‘I admit that John Coterel appears to have developed a taste for violence beyond the necessary. Even more so than Eustace and Richard have. That worries me. But, I tell you that in confidence. Do you understand, Mathilda? I am trusting you to keep my confidence.'

‘I am honoured, my Lord,' Mathilda was anything but honoured. With each word Robert spoke her shaky bravery was knocked away, and fear at what was being asked of her began to knock louder at the surface of her mind.

‘To you I can admit I am wary about Eustace's plan to work with the Coterel brothers, but I think he is right in one important respect.'

‘My Lord?'

‘Look at yourself, girl. Who would take you for anything but an honest worker, a highly placed servant of the family, doing her master's bidding? You are the perfect candidate to carry this message.'

Mathilda looked down at her unfamiliar clothes. He probably had a point. ‘What must I say, my Lord, when I reach the Coterel home?'

‘You'll be told in good time. Once you get there, all you have to do is pass the information on, and await a reply. Then you bring it back here.'