The Treason of the Ghosts

their horses. The groom’s
white face was a picture of misery, the sly cast in his eye even more
pronounced.
    ‘Sir
Hugh, I am freezing.’
    ‘You
should have sung,’ Ranulf teased. ‘That would have brought everybody hurrying
back.’ He patted the young groom on the shoulder. ‘The King’s
business.’ He added mockingly, ‘ We are all
freezing, Chanson.’
    ‘I
have given the horses a good rub down,’ Chanson muttered.
    Corbett
half listened. Chanson hated waiting almost as much as Corbett hated his
singing. Chanson wasn’t his real name. He’d joined Corbett’s service as
Baldock. Ranulf, as a joke, had rechristened him ‘Chanson’, a mockery of his
appalling voice. Ever since, the groom had insisted that Chanson would be his
new name and refused to answer to anything else. A fine groom with a talent for
talking to horses, Chanson was also a good knife-thrower, a skill he used to
win prizes at local fairs.
    ‘Can
we go back to the tavern, Master? My toes are frozen; my balls are freezing!’
    Corbett
gathered the reins and swung himself into the saddle. He watched whilst
Tressilyian, his hand on Sir Maurice’s shoulder, walked further down the lane
to collect their horses.
    ‘Ranulf,’
he ordered, ‘take Chanson and warm him up in some alehouse.’
    ‘And
then go snooping, Master?’
    Corbett
pulled the cowl over his head and narrowed his
    eyes .
    ‘Yes,
I want you to snoop. Find out as much as you can.’
    He
lifted his head and watched the others leave the church, Blidscote, the fat
bailiff; the two priests and Burghesh.
    ‘What
are you thinking, Master?’
    ‘I
don’t know, Ranulf. The pot’s beginning to bubble. Perhaps this is a beautiful
place on a summer’s day but now...?’
    A
sound behind him made him turn. An old woman was coming up the lane, resting
heavily on a stick. She approached, back bowed, head down. Corbett thought she
was about to pass them but she stopped and stared up, pushing away wisps of
dirty grey hair from her wizened face. She munched on her gums and wiped the
trickle of saliva from the corner of her mouth. She looked at Corbett with
rheumy eyes, as if she could learn from one glance who he was and why he was
here.
    ‘Good
morrow, Mother.’
    Ranulf
walked towards her. He opened his purse and took out a coin. The woman snatched
it.
    ‘Are
you the King’s clerk?’
    Her
voice was strong but rasped on the phlegm at the back of her throat. She turned
and spat, hobbled forward and grasped Corbett’s bridle.
    ‘You
must be the King’s clerk?’
    ‘And
you, Mother?’
    ‘Old
Mother Crauford, they call me. How old am I?’
    ‘Not
much older than twenty-four,’ Ranulf teased.
    The
old woman’s head turned as quick as a bird’s.
    ‘Now,
there’s a pretty bullyboy. I’ve seen you all come and go.’ She pointed a bony finger.
‘How old am I?’
    ‘Seventy?’
Corbett asked quickly.
    ‘I’m
past my eighty-fifth summer.’
    Corbett
stared down in disbelief. ‘You keep your years well, Mother.’
    ‘Go
and read the baptism accounts.’ Mother Crauford pointed to the church. ‘Born in the autumn of 1218. I remember the King’s father
coming here. Small and fat he was, hair as gold as wheat.’
    Corbett
stared in disbelief at this old woman who had seen the King’s father in his
youth.
    ‘And
so you’ve come to hunt the ghosts, have you?’ she continued. ‘Melford is full
of ghosts. It’s always been a wicked place.’
    ‘So
you think warmly of this town?’ Ranulf taunted.
    ‘I
think warmly of no one, Red Hair! It’s true what the preacher says. Men are
steeped in wickedness.’
    ‘You
mean the killings?’ Corbett asked.
    ‘Murders
more like it.’ The old woman let go of the reins of his horse. ‘There have
always been murders in Melford. It’s a place of blood. No wonder! They say a
town was here before even the priests arrived; little difference they’ve made.
Anyway, I wish you well.’
    She
hobbled on. Corbett watched her go. He’d seen the same in many a town or
village. The old, shaking their heads over the doings of
their younger, stronger ones.
    Tressilyian and Sir Maurice rode up.
    ‘I
see you’ve met Old Mother Crauford,’ Sir Maurice smiled. ‘The townspeople call
her Jeremiah. They heard a sermon eiven by the parson, how the prophet Jeremiah
would always be lamenting the sins of the people. Ever since then she’s been
called Jeremiah. She hasn’t a pleasant word for anybody or anything.’
    Corbett
watched the old