The Treason of the Ghosts

‘What’s your name?’ he asked the eldest girl.
    ‘That’s
Isabella,’ Samler replied. ‘She’s two years older than Johanna.’
    Ranulf
studied the girl. She was comely enough, with flaxen hair coming down to her
shoulders, thin-faced, sharp-eyed. Just a shift of expression betrayed her;
perhaps she knew more than she had told even her parents.
    ‘And
you know of no reason why she was killed?’
    ‘Why
should anyone kill a young woman like Johanna?’ the thatcher retorted. ‘I have
told you, sir, she had no secrets. Oh, she danced and she flirted but there was
no one special, was there, Isabella?’
    Ranulf
smiled across at the young woman, who sat on the stairs above her brothers and
sister.
    ‘But
she was killed out in the open countryside,’ Ranulf insisted. ‘Down near Brackham
Mere.’
    ‘I
have told you what I know, sir,’ Samler retorted. ‘One afternoon she was sent
on an errand to the marketplace and never returned.’
    ‘Will
you catch him, sir?’ Isabella Samler called out.
    ‘Oh,
we’ll catch him,’ Ranulf replied. ‘My master is like a hawk: sharp-eyed and
swift. He’ll float above Melford and, no matter where the killer hides, be it
the thickest bramble bush or the longest grass — ‘ Ranulf got to his feet gesturing with his hand. Isabella watched him — ‘he’ll swoop,
wings back, talons out, and he’ll clutch your sister’s killer in his tight
claws.’
    ‘You
are only saying that.’
    ‘No,
Mistress, I am promising it.’
    Ranulf
undid his purse and put a silver coin on the table. The thatcher made to
refuse.
    ‘No,
no, take it,’ Ranulf urged. He patted Chanson on the shoulder. ‘For you, your family.’
    He
walked to the door, gathered up his cloak and sword belt, then looked round. Ranulf felt a tug at his heart. They looked now like a group of
rabbits fascinated by a stoat.
    ‘I
mean you well, I really do. But you have nothing to say, eh? Nothing
more to tell me about Johanna’s death?’ He glanced quickly at Isabella.
    ‘She
was a comely lass .’ The thatcher’s wife spoke up.
    Ranulf
put his hand on the latch and turned. ‘And she had no love swain?’
    ‘No,’
Isabella answered quickly. ‘Only those she laughed about.’
    ‘And
a secret place?’ Ranulf urged. ‘Everyone has a secret place.’
    ‘The
same as Elizabeth Wheelwright’s,’ Isabella blurted out. ‘They used to visit the
copse on the hill overlooking Devil’s Oak. It’s not really secret.’
    ‘Could
you show me the way?’
    ‘It’s
dark,’ Samler replied.
    ‘No,
no,’ Ranulf smiled. ‘I meant if Isabella could show us the lane back to the
Golden Fleece.’
    Samler’s
daughter needed no second urging but grabbed her cloak from a peg on the wall.
Ranulf made his good nights, as did Chanson, his mouth still full of food. They
collected their horses. The lane was dark and muddy. Isabella walked ahead of
them.
    ‘Just
keep going straight on,’ she explained when they reached the end of the lane.
She pointed to an alleyway. ‘That leads to the market square.’
    Ranulf
indicated that Chanson walk on.
    ‘You’d
best go back then.’
    Isabella
watched Chanson lead the horses away. She drew closer and stared up at this
strange, green-eyed clerk. Isabella Samler had lived a sheltered life. She’d
never met a man like this before: tall, slim, smelling of horse, leather and
fragrant soap. His white chemise was undone at the neck, allowing the glint of
a silver chain, his sword-tip slapped against his boot. She felt frightened yet
excited. He was dangerous. If his master was a hawk then so was he.
    ‘Will
you really catch him?’
    Ranulf
chucked her under the chin. ‘If you tell me what you should, then it will be
sooner rather than later.’
    Isabella,
in a mixture of fear and flirtation, moved a little closer.
    ‘Did
your sister confide in you? Do you know why she went, whom she was meeting?’
    ‘We
often lay awake in our bed loft. We’d frighten ourselves with stories about
night-walkers.’
    ‘But
there are no night-walkers in Melford, are there?’
    Isabella
swayed slightly side to side as if she was enjoying her riddle.
    ‘You’d
be very surprised what walks the streets and lanes of Melford at night. Talk to Parson Grimstone. There’s more sin here, under the
cover of darkness, than in your great city.’
    Ranulf
took a silver coin out of his purse and held it firmly between his fingers.
    ‘I
gave one to your father but your sister had one, didn’t she? Is