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here.’
    ‘Thy priests would say charity is ever right.’
    ‘You think not?’
    ‘Dost thou think Magda is a healer for her own amusement?’ The moonlight seemed to move along her multicoloured scarf and gown as she turned to him. ‘Dost thou mourn the loss of the babe?’
    ‘Why–?’ he stopped himself. Long ago he had learned not to answer Magda’s questions with questions, or she withdrew. And tonight he needed her wisdom. ‘I do mourn.’
    ‘Dost thou blame thyself?’
    ‘I was not in the shop when Lucie fell.’
    ‘Magda did not ask thee where thou wast.’
    He felt a tingling in the scar beneath his eyepatch.Without being aware of forming the thought, he said, ‘I should have been there.’
    Magda grunted. ‘Why? Dost thou no longer trust Lucie to go about her work?’
    ‘I should have arranged the shelves. She was with child, awkward …’
    Magda was shaking her head slowly. ‘Heal thyself and Lucie will heal.’ She shifted on the seat, looking down at her hands. ‘She is strong, thy Lucie.’
    ‘Every bow has a breaking point. This loss – it took her back to Martin’s death.’
    ‘But the bow did not break, eh?’
    They sat quietly listening to the wind sighing through the trees, dancing through the leaves already fallen.
    ‘Quiet thy mind and leave the women’s work to the women. Thou hast much trouble ahead of thee.’
    ‘What do you know?’
    ‘Know? Less than thou dost, but Magda senses an ill wind. Is she right?’
    ‘Aye.’ He told her how the woman had been killed.
    ‘Is this why thou art questioning thy wife’s charity?’
    ‘How will I tell her?’
    ‘Open thy mouth and speak. Thou canst not hide this from her. Describe to Magda how this poor creature looks.’
    Owen did so, surprised by how painful it was to recall his time in the shed.
    Magda let the night sounds settle about them before commenting, but Owen sensed her energy, knew she was thinking, not dozing.
    ‘Her burns sound far worse than his,’ she said at last. ‘So he came later.’
    ‘Do you think so?’
    Magda stood stiffly. ‘Come, Poins must be cared forso that he might tell the true tale.’ She headed towards the kitchen, her gown flowing behind her.
    Owen rose to follow. ‘I’ll sit with Poins for a while.’
    Magda did not respond, but moved on through the kitchen door.
    ‘A canny crone,’ Alfred said as Owen reached the door. ‘Only a fool would attack a house when she was within.’
    ‘Then let us hope there are no fools in the city tonight.’
    ‘Aye.’

Five
     
THE RUINED GIRDLE
     
    I n the kitchen, Magda bent over the sleeping man, her ear close to his mouth, then straightened, shaking her head. ‘The rhythm of his breath is not right.’ She handed Owen a cloth, gestured towards a bowl sitting near Poins. ‘Rub salt and vinegar on his temples while Magda attends to his burns.’ She took the bowl with the noxious concoction over to the fire to warm it.
    Owen eased down on the stool beside the injured man’s pallet, found it too low, sat instead on the edge of the straw-stuffed mattress, reached for the bowl. As he leaned close to the patient the smell of singed flesh conjured flashes of battlefields slippery with blood, men groaning, begging him to help them die. He crossed himself at the memories and then pushed them back before they sickened him. He wet the man’s temples, glad of the clean odour of vinegar. In a short while the man’s belly rumbled. The purge that was incorporated in the dwale was at last working, the poison leaving his body. When the sounds ceased, Owen lifted Poins’s legs and pulled the waiting cloth from beneath him.
    ‘It is good that he fouled himself,’ said Magda.
    Owen took the cloth out to the midden at the end of the garden, noting as he passed the corner of the house that Alfred was not at his post. Owen held his breath, listening. Gravel crunched near the roses, against the back wall of the garden. The night was still clear, with enough