Read Online The Treason of the Ghosts by Paul C. Doherty - Free Book Online Page B

leather, gleaming and polished. Corbett
noticed the rings on the men’s fingers and the velvet-tipped sword scabbards.
Both knights had taken these off and slipped them over the saddle horns.
Corbett had heard the King talk of the growing wealth of these country knights,
turning their fields of corn and barley into pasture for sheep, whose wool was
in sharp demand by the looms of the Low Countries. Melford boasted such wealth.
The marketplace was properly cobbled, with a pavement at one end. The stocks
and pillories were full of malefactors: vagrants, drunken youths who spent the
days in the taverns and whose raucous voices had threatened the day’s trading.
Market beadles swaggered amongst the stalls. They carried scales and specially
carved knives so as to weigh and test different produce. Outside one tavern the
ale-conners, or ale-tasters, had broached a barrel and were busy sampling its
contents to see if the taverner was selling lighter ale at the highest prices.
    ‘There’s
your hostelry!’ Sir Maurice called out, gesturing across to the Golden Fleece
which stood on the corner of an alleyway. A three-storeyed building,
black-timbered, its plaster washed a light pink, the tavern had windows of
mullioned glass that gleamed in the light of the lanterns slung on hooks along
the beam spanning the ground floor. ‘Taverner Alliot serves you well?’
    ‘He
keeps a fine house,’ Corbett replied. ‘Matthew Alliot lives high on the hog.’
    ‘Aye,
he does that,’ Chapeleys replied sourly.
    ‘He
was a witness at your father’s trial, wasn’t he?’
    Corbett
edged his horse forward. They were now on the edge of the square. Chapeleys
reined in, still staring back at the tavern. Corbett noticed how the noise and
bustle of the market, the cries of traders had faded as they entered the
square. Oh, there was the usual bustle and shouting, the cries of chapmen,
‘What do you lack? What do you lack?’ Dogs and children darted in and out.
Apprentices, still sharp-eyed for customers, swaggered about but Corbett felt
as if many of them were watching. Was it the presence of a King’s clerk and a
royal judge?
    ‘Sir
Hugh?’ Tressilyian leant over and gently touched Corbett on the shoulder. ‘I
can read your thoughts, master clerk, and, perhaps answer them. The townspeople
realise you are here because of the murders. It’s trade as usual but people are
worried.’
    ‘And
can you read Sir Maurice’s mind?’ Corbett replied. ‘It’s true, isn’t it?
Taverner Alliot was a witness against your father?’
    ‘Yes,
yes, he was.’ Chapeleys broke free from his reverie. ‘On the night Goodwoman
Walmer was murdered, my father went to the Golden Fleece to slake his thirst.
According to Alliot, my father said he was going to the goodwoman’s cottage.’
    ‘But
that’s not a lie, is it?’ Corbett asked.
    He
swore as a dog came yapping at his horse’s hoofs.
    ‘No
it’s not.’ Sir Maurice gathered the reins in his hand. ‘Oh, never mind. Let’s
go on, the light is fading.’
    They
went down a narrow lane, out along the back streets, past the garden plots,
piggeries and outside stables of the cottagers’ houses. They turned right up a
cobbled track and reached the crossroads, a slight rise providing a good view
of the surrounding countryside. A little of this was plough land but most of it
meadows, dotted with sheep. Small copses and lines of hedgerow broke the
greenery. To Corbett’s left, the beginning of a great forest which stretched
north. He shaded his eyes and caught a glimpse of the river Swaile.
    ‘Prosperous
land,’ he murmured. ‘Well cleared and watered. It makes me homesick.’
    He
wondered what Maeve was doing at their Manor of Leighton. Would she be in the
kitchen doing business with the steward and bailiffs, checking their accounts,
planning what they were doing tomorrow? Eleanor would be tottering around
whilst Uncle Morgan would be leaning over the crib-cradle tickling Baby Edward.
Or, if Maeve