The Christmas Wassail by Kate Sedley Read Free Book Online Page B

you care to attend.’ He grinned broadly, adding, ‘There will, of course, be a collection for the players at each one.’
    â€˜I thought the city fathers were paying you!’ yelled a voice, which I recognized as Jack Nym’s, from somewhere to my left.
    The young man answered drily, ‘This is Bristol, master.’ There was a delighted roar from the crowd. He went on: ‘The mayor and aldermen are giving us free lodgings in the castle.’ He cast a disparaging glance around him and nodded in the direction of the roofless guardhouse. ‘The very best, as you can see’ – another roar – ‘but we have to keep body and soul together, so all donations will be gratefully received.’
    He got down from the ‘stage’ and resumed his place beside the girl preparatory to driving forward into the inner ward, where one of the castle stewards was waiting patiently for him by the gate. Before the two carts disappeared from sight, however, I took quick stock of his companions. Apart from the young woman, there was another man of perhaps some thirty summers sharing the box seat with them, and whose features bore a sufficient resemblance to the girl’s to convince me that he was probably her brother.
    The second cart was driven by a much older pair; a man and woman both well over sixty, and maybe nudging seventy if I were any judge of the matter. In spite of it being December, with a cold, nipping bite to the wind, the woman’s arms were bare to the elbow and, like her face, her skin was the colour of hazelnuts. Her clothes were nondescript and shapeless, while the hands which held the horse’s reins were remarkably large for her sex and appeared extremely strong. Around her head she had tied a broad strip of faded cloth from beneath which a few strands of grey hair were escaping, and between her teeth she clenched a long piece of straw which she chewed with slow, deliberate movements of her jaws. At first glance and until I noticed her skirts, I had mistaken her for a man.
    Her companion on the box seat was undoubtedly male, bald but for a fringe of almost white hair which grew nearly to his shoulders. These were rounded and suggested a once tall man who was now permanently stooped with age. His skin was as brown as the woman’s, indicating, as did hers, the wandering, outdoor life. But his most distinctive feature, which I noticed as he turned his head in my direction, was the puckered skin around his right eye, drawing the corner upwards as though, at some time, it had been seared with a red-hot brand. At least, I thought that this was his most distinctive feature until he put up his right hand to flick a strand of hair from his cheek and I saw that the first two fingers were missing.
    The leading cart had by now disappeared through the gate into the castle’s inner ward and the second was preparing to follow suit when a disturbance beyond the archway and voices raised in anger caused the woman to pull on the reins and bring the horse to a standstill. People, including Adela and myself, who had begun to disperse, came to a halt, craning over our shoulders to discover the cause of the commotion.
    â€˜Oh, no!’ groaned a voice in my ear. ‘Not him again!’
    But it was indeed Sir George Marvell riding out from the inner ward, together with another man, and loudly cursing the mummers’ carts which were impeding his progress.
    â€˜Get out of my way, you idle layabouts!’ he shouted. Then, turning to his companion, he demanded in ringing tones, ‘What’s this riff-raff doing here, Robert?’
    I knew Robert Trefusis by sight, although I knew very little about him. He was a tall, very upright, grey-haired man of roughly Sir George’s own age, and I understood him to be, again like Sir George, a man of inherited wealth. He was, I believed, an alderman who, on occasions, acted as one of the sheriff’s deputies, a role I