White Water (22 page)

‘We may find another further up,’ said Hugo. ‘We’ll watch for this one — he should show his nose if he’s here. He must come up for air. If not we’ll move on and most likely flush out another.’

‘Then this one will continue to haunt the fish pond,’ Maria reminded him. ‘This one is our arch enemy. I would sooner despatch the devil we know than seek out a new one.’

‘We’ll try. We’ve plenty of daylight yet. We’ll see who has the most patience, him or us.’

They sat there for nearly half an hour with only a few false sightings to break the monotony of the vigil. Hugo was on the point of suggesting a move when one of the dogs growled and sprang forward. In the middle of the water a dark snout broke the surface and a sleek head emerged. The dark eyes took one look at each bank where the dogs and hunters were recovering from their surprise.

‘Go Dido! Spanker! Jewel! After him!’

The dogs needed no urging. They were already in the water and encircling the otter whose shape could just be discerned below the surface.

‘This time they’ve got it!’ shouted Jon.

‘They’ve got it! They’ve got it!’ yelled Piers.

A life and death drama was being enacted in the middle of the river as first one and then another dog tried to close in for the kill. But the otter was not prepared to surrender and put up a tremendous fight, snapping at the dogs, diving below them and trying every trick to evade his tormentors. Bucher, determined to prove himself willing, began to wade into the water but Hugo called him to keep back.

‘It could go for your legs,’ he shouted. ‘They’ve a most fearsome bite.’

Bucher turned at once and waded out, giving Eloise a disappointed look that in no way deceived her but she said kindly, ‘We must return you to your homeland in one piece, Hans. You were wise to take Hugo’s advice.’

‘I thought to have him then,’ he said with a shrug and stood beside her to watch the struggle that continued in mid-river. The otter was more than a match for the three dogs. He managed to wound Dido, tearing a flap of skin from her shoulder. The river was at once coloured with blood and the sight and smell of it maddened the dogs still further. One of them — no one could see which one — sunk his teeth into the otter’s flank but a blow from the powerful tail half stunned it and it swam to the bank and staggered out, dazed and trembling. Piers ran to comfort it.

‘’Twill make a break soon if it’s going to,’ Hugo warned and the spears were once more raised. His instinct was correct. The desperate otter dived to elude the dogs and suddenly emerged at the water’s edge. Eloise threw first and missed by a foot or more. Allan pinned it by the shoulder, and as the dogs scrambled out after it Bucher’s spear flew wild of the mark and struck Jewel. The spear pierced the neck at the front and drove deep into the lungs. It was an unlucky but fatal blow and the little bitch, already exhausted and bleeding, sank down without a sound and gazed pathetically at Eloise who ran towards her.

‘Oh no, no! Dear little Jewel. Oh sweet heaven! Bucher, you fool, you’ve killed her! Killed her, d’you hear?’

The dog gave a deep sigh which suddenly bubbled obscenely and faltered. The bright eyes glazed over. Jewel was dead. The otter’s end was not so swift. The two remaining dogs set upon it and tore it to pieces. Hugo and Piers waded across the river, but by the time they arrived it was all over. All that remained of the prey was a mangled and bloody corpse. Eloise sobbed over the body of the plucky little hound while Bucher, ashen-faced, vomited a short distance away.

There was no more hunting that day. They returned slowly to Heron. Eloise was distraught; Bucher, pale and trembling, apologized again and again. Piers was resentful that he had missed the final drama which had taken place on the opposite side of the river. Jon, carrying all the spears, led the two surviving hounds. Allan carried Jewel and Maria kept pace with them on the far side of the river. It was a subdued hunting party which finally returned to Heron and Matt, greeting them, was secretly thankful that he had returned when he did. The afternoon was an unqualified failure and not one of the hunting party had the heart to pretend otherwise.

*

Minnie, stood at the table, a large sacking apron round her waist, her sleeves rolled up above her elbows. Beside her on the scrubbed table lay four eels, two large and two smaller. On the opposite side of the table Martin sat, watching her. He had drawn her, skilfully and without rousing her suspicions, on to the subject of her childhood. To her they were the years she spent at Heron as a girl, with Luke Kendal as master of Heron. Luke had rescued her from a brutish drunken grandfather.

‘Bought me, he did,’ she told Martin, her knife poised over the longest of the eels. ‘Bought me with a bag of gold. Mind you, he tried to send me back to the old buzzard but I wouldn’t have it. I refused to go home and just kept following behind him. Oh, he was a handsome man, your grandfather. A very handsome man. Even as an old man — even as he lay in his coffin — he was handsome.’

She sighed as she plunged the eel into a bowl of salt water. ‘Young Nat brought us these,’ she told Martin. ‘A gift, he said. Gift, my eye! Most likely poached from our own river, but what matter. Hugo likes a bit of eel and the mistress is not averse to it.’

Martin smiled and gave her a saucy wink. He knew now that his time spent with her would not be wasted. He would learn all that he wanted to know. At fourteen he looked sixteen and his charming manners won him friends and admirers with very little effort on his part. He was making it his business to discover all the facts relating to the Gillis family, with particular attention to Isobel and Marion. What he would
do
with the information was not quite clear to him. Tell Eloise, perhaps, or even Allan! It pleased him to think that his knowledge would give him a weapon. The accident of birth which made him second in line to the inheritance could not be overcome. Allan would always be heir to Heron, but Martin felt the injustice deeply. He had better blood in him than Allan, he was more handsome than his brother and he was altogether a more attractive personality — or so he believed. Allan would have Heron
and
the beautiful and desirable Eloise and Martin envied him both. He was helpless to change the natural order of things. Allan stood to gain all that Martin coveted — but if Martin could not stop him, at least he need not make life easy for him. Allan must inevitably win, but let him fight for his prizes. Martin did not hate his brother but neither did he love him. He knew of the deep friendship between Allan and Oliver and that hurt him, too. While he had been at school it had been possible to put such thoughts aside, but the holidays had never been easy to bear. Now he had left Winchester and would be ‘banished’ to Romney House. He was admittedly more fortunate than many second sons in that respect, but it was still a far cry from Heron.

‘Luke must have been a fine looking man to have two wives,’ he said innocently. ‘Did you ever see Isobel Gillis?’

Minnie shook her head. ‘I was a bit too young to know what was going on. Mind you, I listened at doors — ’

‘I’ll warrant you still do!’

Minnie laughed. ‘I shouldn’t tell you if I did,’ she said, ‘but I got my ears boxed many a time for that. Oh, I heard a lot, don’t you fret, but as to seeing Isobel, no. I never did. She never did come to the house — at least not to my knowledge — but they did say she was a rare beauty and most men would have died for her. But there, ’twas her that died, poor soul. All I can say is if Luke loved her then she wasn’t a bad woman, not by a long chalk.’

She patted the eel dry, laid it on the board and cut off the head. Then she pulled back the skin and scooped the guts into a bucket which stood on the floor beside her. The stuffing was already prepared in a stone bowl and Martin, pulling it towards him, sniffed it appreciatively.

‘Cinnamon,’ he said, ‘and nutmeg and something else.’

‘Anchovies — and all mixed with butter the way the master likes it.’

‘Shall I add the salt?’

‘’Tis done. Leave it be, Martin. You always did have meddlesome fingers.’

She grinned to soften the rebuke, but he was not really interested in the stuffing. He leaned his elbows on the table and cupped his chin in his hands.

‘I bet you didn’t see Marion ducked,’ he said slyly.

Minnie hesitated, torn between the desire to tell all that she knew and the knowledge that she had been forbidden to go to the river on that fateful day. She began to fill the empty belly with stuffing and then drew up the skin again and tied it where the head should have been.

‘Well, I did then,’ she said. She slashed the eel five times along its back and pressed stuffing into the cuts. Laying it aside, she reached for the next one and plunged it into the salt water. ‘I saw it all. Wormed my way to the front of the crowd and saw everything. Oh, she was a witch, no doubt at all. No matter what they did to her up she came again, bobbing like a cork tho’ the water was deep
and
fast. Cursing she was, you never heard the like! She cursed them all, the master, the constable, even the minister! They had a rope strung right out across the water from one bank to the other — down below the bridge, ’twas. I could show you the very spot. And she was tied in the middle of it and her hands and feet tied, too. How could she
not
drown without magic? That’s what they all said.’

‘So they knew she was a witch?’

‘Oh, aye. ’Twas proof, wasn’t it?’ The next eel was beheaded, gutted and stuffed, and she reached for the third. Martin put a finger into the bowl of stuffing and she tapped his hand sharply with the back of her knife. ‘Fingers out, young Martin! Aye, they knew she was a witch and they hanged her the next day.’

‘Did she confess it?’

‘Aye, and to all the terrible disasters that had befallen folks in the past year. A woman who’d lost her child; a man took in a fit; three horsemen drowned in a mire — she confessed to it all. And she had a familiar in the shape of a dog. A big black dog. I didn’t set eyes on the dog, nor ever wanted to for they’re part of the devil himself. His messengers, they do say, with special powers. If that dog had so much as looked at me I’d likely not be here now.’

‘What happened to it?’

‘I don’t rightly know. They say it howled by the gibbet where Marion was hanged, but I kept well away from that mournful place. There, that’s done and a right messy job but so tasty. They’ll roast a treat, they will.’ She began to clear away scraps and utensils.

‘Did Isobel have any other children?’

‘Not that I heard of.’

‘Any sisters or brothers?’

‘I can’t rightly say. ’Twas a long time ago. Now move your elbows — thank you kindly. She had a father but he moved away after his wife was hanged. Got too hot for him, I reckon. He took Isobel and they went to Tavistock. I don’t know about any family.’

‘But if the father took another woman then Isobel might have had half-brothers or sisters.’

‘I dare say.’

‘Or the father might have had a brother or sister. There might have been cousins, uncles, aunts.’

‘’Tis possible.’ She looked at him sharply. ‘You’re mighty interested, all of a sudden. Why all the questions?’

He shrugged again and smiled disarmingly. ‘Curiosity kills the cat, I know! ’Twas just a thought.’

She eyed him suspiciously. ‘All that’s in the past,’ she said, ‘and all over and done with. No one’ll thank you to go stirring up muck. You mind what I say, Martin, or there’ll be no good come of it.’

He stood up and pushed back the bench. ‘Now would I do that, Min? You know me better, I hope.’

‘I know that you only call me Min when you’re up to some trick or other. It was always so. You called me Min the day you turned up here in the middle of the night, run away from school!
And
when you lost all that money at cards.’

He laughed. ‘Your memory is
too
good at times! Well then, Minnie, I’ll be out from under your feet — before you throw me out. I promised Piers I’d take him hawking and try out his new bird.’

He gave her a quick peck on the cheek and was gone before she could say more on the sensitive subject. She watched him go, her face suddenly serious, and then carried on with her cooking. But her expression was thoughtful. She had the uneasy feeling that she had not heard the last of the matter and wished some of her reminiscences unsaid.

CHAPTER TEN

There were seven people under the Boord’s roof. Alec and Annie, John Jenkins, Rita Carp, Jake and Alfred Gillis — two of Annie Boord’s brothers — and John Greer. They sat on the straw which covered the earth floor and each one held a mug of ale in his or her hand. Their mood was surly and it showed on their faces, lit by the faint glow of the smouldering fire. They had all tasted the humiliation of unemployment and had given up trying for new employment. The Maudesley mine was not looking for new labour — in fact the rumour was spreading that soon the men would be laid off there also. It seemed more than likely, for although the quality of their ore remained high, the quantity was falling with every month that passed. It was now late August, and the summer would soon be over. Autumn and winter would come and they would be cold and hungry.

‘Bucher!’ hissed Greer and spat derisively. ‘What an apology for a man! Have you heard what happened a month or so back? Killed one of their hounds by mistake! Speared it instead of the otter!’

There was a roar of delighted laughter.

‘And the way he walks!’ cried Jake. ‘Mincing along on his toes like a damned wench! He’s soft, that’s what he is. More woman than man.’

‘And he comes to England full of fancy ideas, to tell us how to run a tin mine!’ Alf Gillis’s tone conveyed his contempt for the man. ‘And Kendal tells us he’s going to better things and what’s the first thing that happens? They close the mine down for ten days. A fine start!’

Alf Gillis was short and swarthy and had lost an eye ten years earlier in an underground accident and the closed eyelids were badly puckered and made him ugly. He had a temper to match but that had been an accident of birth. He had left mining and now cut turf for a living. His brother Jake was ten months younger and taller but his face, with its small dark eyes, wore the sly look of a fox. He was a water carrier in Ashburton and had no quarrel with Heron, but his sister Ann had wed Alec Boord and
he
was now out of work. The Gillises stuck together and when Alec sent word to them, they came willingly, and though nearer fifty than forty, were both eager for the fray. Rita Carp was a widow with three small sons. Her husband had been a tinner all his life and had died in a brawl on the way home from the morning shift. She had asked Hugo for her husband’s job — he loaded the ore into the wagons at the face. Hugo had refused but had put her to work in the washing shed. But she was a born troublemaker and many of the ensuing arguments and fights had been started by her slanderous tongue, so he had taken his chance to be rid of her troublesome influence.

John Jenkins was older than the others, nearing sixty, and a very sick man. His third wife had just given birth to a son and he had six other children, four by his second wife and two by the first. The youngest children had all arrived at intervals of less than a year, but his two eldest, twin girls, were sixteen and worked in the fields. They would be gleaning after the harvesting and that would mean a sack or two of grain, but apart from their meagre wages there was no money coming in. Hugo had sacked him reluctantly, but he had long since failed to give a fair day’s labour in return for his money. Barlowe had reported that the other men resented him, complaining that he was no longer fit and yet was paid the same as the rest.

‘But he’s paid them for the ten days,’ said Rita. She had no respect for Hugo Kendal, but even less for Alf Gillis who was scum in her eyes. Everyone knew the Gillises’ had bad blood in them and could be taunted for it, but it was never wise to go too far with them just in case the evil eye had been passed down through the blood. Their father was the son of Rob Gillis who was cousin to Isobel.

‘They’ve paid them for this ten days,’ Alf agreed, ‘but what about next time? I’ll wager ’twill be different next time.’

‘You reckon ’twill happen again?’

‘I’d swear to it. You mark my words, there’ll be others following us before the month is out.’

Alec held out his empty mug and Annie refilled it.

‘But do we want to wait another month?’ he asked. ‘Do we want to wait another week? Every day that passes is another day’s mischief hatched. I say Bucher should go now!’

There was a chorus of ‘ayes’.

‘’Tis all very fine talk,’ said Rita, ‘but how does it come about? Do we all go up to Kendal and say — we don’t care for your mining man, so would you send him home? He’ll die laughing.’

‘Aye,’ said Annie. ‘He’ll not see reason, and likely not even listen to us.’

‘There’s ways and means,’ said Jake. ‘The mincing man might — ’ he shrugged expressively, ‘disappear? Or he might trip and fall down the mine shaft. Accidents
do
happen.’

‘Not to bloody Bucher, they don’t,’ said Greer.

‘Someone might poison him,’ said Alf. ‘What a terrible thing that would be!’

‘Oh, terrible!’

They all laughed except John. ‘Wait a bit,’ he said nervously. ‘We’re going too fast for my liking. Poison and accidents? I don’t like the sound of it. Too high a price if we’re found out. I’ve no wish to hang.’

Annie, Alf and Jake looked at him as one.

‘There’s nowt to be ashamed of hanging,’ said Annie, ‘lot of good folk has died that way — and noble.’

‘And innocent, I dare say?’ Alec jeered.

‘Aye, and innocent!’ roared Jake, his fists clenched.

‘Is that so? Then if ’tis only good, noble and innocent folk as hang we should all be as wicked as we know how! That way we’ll escape the gibbet!’

‘Being wicked’ll come easy to you, Alec Boord!’

Annie flung her half-empty mug straight into Jake’s face and caught him across the mouth. ‘Don’t you miscall my husband under his own roof!’ she screamed. ‘You’re no saint, Jake, nor ever have been. I know things about you you’d rather forget.’

Rita shouted, ‘Quiet, you rabble. I’m not here to listen to you settling old scores. If we’re not talking about Bucher then I’m off home. I’ve an ailing mother and two babes to tend.’

The small commotion died. Annie’s mug was retrieved from the corner and she refilled it with a surly look on her face. She looked into the pitcher and said pointedly, ‘And that’s the last of it. There’s no more and since no one else brought any … ’

‘Let it go, Annie,’ said Alec. ‘They’ve brought nowt because they’ve
got
nowt so hold your tongue. Rita’s right. Our purpose is to talk about Bucher so speak up if you’ve anything to say.’

‘Are we all agreed he’s got to go?’ asked Alf.

They were.

‘And by fair means or foul?’

It was agreed reluctantly.

‘And we want the others to join us?’

There was a silence.

‘I say not,’ said Alec. ‘If ’tis foul means then the less that knows the better.’

‘A knife round his throat on a dark night!’

‘Drown the runt!’

‘Kidnap him, tie him up and leave him somewhere to starve.’

‘String him up to a tree. They’ll think ’tis robbers if we take his gold.’

John Jenkins held up a hand. ‘Too fast again, by far,’ he insisted. ‘You won’t give a thought to fair means, but must all risk your necks. Why not
frighten
him into leaving England. I’ll wager he’s the kind that jumps at his own shadow. Send him a letter threatening his life. ’Twill most likely be enough for such as him.’

‘A letter?’ cried Alec scornfully. ‘God’s teeth, man, who’s going to write it? Can you write? For I can’t even write my name!’

‘None of us can,’ said Rita. ‘If a letter’s the best you can come up with, John Jenkins, then foul it must be.’

‘A message by mouth then,’ said John Greer. ‘Send one of the lads with a message — Leave England or live to regret it.’

‘Send a lad?’ It was Annie’s turn to groan aloud. ‘Send one of yours, then, shall we? Let him get hauled off to a constable? Eh John?’

John shook his head slowly. ‘I don’t rightly know,’ he said, ‘but I don’t have a mind to kill a man.’

‘You couldn’t if you
had
a mind!’ cried Rita. ‘But I’ve no mind to do the deed and Annie’s no use. That leaves Alec and the Gillises.’

‘Oh that’s fine that is!’ cried Annie. ‘That leaves my husband and my brothers! My thanks to you, Rita Carp! I’ll have no family left if you have
your
way!’

The three men concerned then rounded on Rita and Alec bellowed for peace and quiet and they then turned on him. Rita stood up defiantly and glanced round.

‘That’s it, then,’ she snapped. ‘I’ve had a belly full of your snapping and snarling. You’re like a pack of dogs. I’ve better things to do with my time than waste it with the likes of you! Count me out of your fine schemes and I hope you all rot!’

She scrambled over and round them and, ignoring their protests, made her way out into the rain and departed for her own hearth.

‘And good riddance,’ said Alf somewhat sheepishly. ‘We’re better off without that silly little whore.’

‘You should know!’ said his brother and suddenly they both guffawed.

‘Not you and her!’ cried John.

‘’Twas a long time ago,’ said Alf. ‘She was fourteen and almost handsome in the dark! Almost but not quite! And she hasn’t improved with age!’

Now they all laughed, eager to break the tension and dispel the gloom. They talked again until the light faded and the last of the wood burned to ashes. Annie went outside to relieve herself, moving slowly on cramped legs and the men were left alone.

‘So are we agreed?’ Alec asked for the third time. ‘We go for his house — burn it down and him with it. But we go in a crowd — as many as possible. They’ll never hang us all. Never put us all in gaol — there’d hardly be room. We need a mob of men. We must get the rest of them, whether they be working or not.’

‘And we must make it soon!’

‘The sooner the better.’

‘Are we agreed on it?’

They cried ‘Aye’ and ‘We are’!

‘We’ll give him bloody Bucher!’ cried Jake.

‘He won’t mince when we’re done with him!’

John Greer looked at them wearily.

‘And if it goes awry?’ he asked. ‘If the plan goes awry?’ ‘We’ve got nothing
now
,’ said Alec harshly. ‘So what do we stand to lose?’

*

The afternoon was a mild one but dark clouds showed along the horizon, hinting at rain. The hay and most of the corn was already in, but one field remained. Eloise and Martin reined in their horses for a moment to watch the harvesters at work. An attractive sight as the wagon moved slowly along the rows, pulled by two heavy shire horses, one a dark chestnut, one a piebald with a light mane and tail. The men followed it and forked up the stooks, tossing them up to the men on the wagon who pulled them into place to keep the whole load stable. As the wagon moved on, the women scratched among the stubble, gathering the ears that had fallen from each stook and stowing them into whatever sacks, bags or baskets they had. Some of the grain would feed chickens, some be ground into a coarse flour. This field was one of Heron’s, part of the small home farm that supplied the family with vegetables, grain and fruit. One of the girls glanced up at the two riders and, recognizing them, waved cheerfully. Martin made her a small bow and Eloise raised her hand in greeting but neither spoke. Eloise was thinking that they made a handsome couple. Martin was wondering if the ride would end in the way he had planned.

‘There’ll be a big supper tomorrow evening,’ he told her. ‘We’ll go if you’ve a mind.’

She hesitated. Allan and Hugo were away in London on business, trying to raise the finance necessary for the new work at the mine.

‘But if Allan and Hugo are still in London,’ she said, ‘I think ’twould be unwise for us to appear together in their absence.’

‘You are too cautious. No one shall dare to doubt our integrity.’

‘I think we should not risk it. Let’s wait until tomorrow and hope they’ll be back.’

‘You will break my heart by your coldness,’ he told her with mock earnestness. ‘But if you do not accompany me I shall still go.’

She smiled. ‘I’m certain of it! And flirt most fondly with these wenches!’ She indicated the gleaners. ‘That one waves and smiles at you as to a familiar friend.’

‘Friend, mayhap, but familiar — no. I would remember it! She has a certain boldness in her eyes.’

Eloise laughed lightly to hide her true feelings.

‘Do you admire boldness in a woman?’ she asked.

‘It can be exciting.’

‘I’ll grant you that. Boldness in a man has the same effect.’

‘God forbid you shall look for it in Allan!’ cried Martin, then, fearing he had gone too far, he turned his horse and called, ‘Come, we have far to go.’

She rode after him and, catching up with him, said, ‘Far to go? Why, where are we going? I thought we were just taking the air and exercising the horses!’

‘So we are,’ he agreed quickly. ‘But if we dawdle over every pleasing view we shall hardly exercise them at all for we are surrounded by beauty.’ He stared into her face as he said this and she blushed delightedly.