you remember the name of that family in my lord’s Coventry case last year?”
‘The Coventry case? Last year?“ Master Durant pursed his lips in thought. ”Wasn’t it Godyng?“
‘Was it? That doesn’t sound right.“
As Robert understood it, both men were attorneys, with Master Durant on Lord Grey’s council for good measure and Master Hotoft frequently in Lord Grey’s service. Gowned soberly in three-quarter-length black houppelandes and dark hosen, with velvet caps that differed only in the garnet-set jewel Master Durant wore on his, they were a matched pair of men confident of their skills, at ease already with where they were, Master Hotoft turning to ask across the hall toward the clerks who had come with him and Master Durant, “John, do you remember my lord’s case in Coventry last year?”
Clumped in talk of their own with Geoffrey Hannys, the men all looked toward him and one offered, “Boteller, wasn’t it?”
‘That was the grazing case on the Leicestershire border two years ago.“
‘Was it?“ The clerks drifted across the hall to join their masters, the talk turning complicated over whether Master Durant meant the Coventry case at all or another one, while several servants circled with pitchers, offering more wine where it was needed. Robert, refusing with a small shake of his head, drew backward from among the clustered men to answer a question Master Skipton brought him from the kitchen about tonight’s supper and made no effort to rejoin the talk when the steward went off again but simply stayed close to hand as if paying heed.
Ned, turning aside to hold his goblet out to be filled, took the chance to say low into Robert’s ear, for no one else to hear in the general talk around them, “They’ll be here. It’s naught more than that the rains have made the roads slower going than we thought they’d be.”
Robert nodded agreement he wished he felt. Even when the matter of arbitration was fully in hand and going forward, Blaunche had gone on opposing any dealing at all with the Allesleys as fiercely as she had from the first, only adding bitterness to her anger. Then suddenly, giving it all up, she had agreed there was no help for satisfying the Allesleys’ desire to see Katherine. “If it has to be, it has to,” she had said, still bitter but finally near to accepting that the arbitration was going to happen. More near than Robert was to accepting that Katherine’s marriage to Sir Lewis’ heir was likely the price the Allesleys would demand for settlement.
Even so, with already too much to hand and everything happening too quickly, he had been simply grateful when Blaunche—to make amends for having made him so much trouble, she’d said—had offered to see to fetching her back, and blind and dull-witted he must have been, he thought bitterly now, to have trusted her change of heart without a second thought. Not until the day after she had gone, when Benedict was suddenly gone, too, had his first doubt stirred. There was no reason Benedict should not come and go at his choice and he had taken two yeomen with him, as was right, and left word that no one need expect him back until they saw him. It was so ordinary a thing that no one had seen reason to say anything to Robert about it and, busy at accounts that day, he had known nothing until suppertime.
His first thought then had been that if Benedict was not back before Blaunche was, she would be fierce when she found out. Then on that thought’s heels there had come a worse one: that Blaunche already knew where Benedict was gone because she had sent him.
Robert, despite that he knew too well how stubborn Blaunche could be toward having her own will, had seen too late this time that if she could not have Katherine for Benedict one way, she might well mean to have her for him by another. And what way would be more certain than to hand Katherine over to him herself, leaving Robert
‘The Coventry case? Last year?“ Master Durant pursed his lips in thought. ”Wasn’t it Godyng?“
‘Was it? That doesn’t sound right.“
As Robert understood it, both men were attorneys, with Master Durant on Lord Grey’s council for good measure and Master Hotoft frequently in Lord Grey’s service. Gowned soberly in three-quarter-length black houppelandes and dark hosen, with velvet caps that differed only in the garnet-set jewel Master Durant wore on his, they were a matched pair of men confident of their skills, at ease already with where they were, Master Hotoft turning to ask across the hall toward the clerks who had come with him and Master Durant, “John, do you remember my lord’s case in Coventry last year?”
Clumped in talk of their own with Geoffrey Hannys, the men all looked toward him and one offered, “Boteller, wasn’t it?”
‘That was the grazing case on the Leicestershire border two years ago.“
‘Was it?“ The clerks drifted across the hall to join their masters, the talk turning complicated over whether Master Durant meant the Coventry case at all or another one, while several servants circled with pitchers, offering more wine where it was needed. Robert, refusing with a small shake of his head, drew backward from among the clustered men to answer a question Master Skipton brought him from the kitchen about tonight’s supper and made no effort to rejoin the talk when the steward went off again but simply stayed close to hand as if paying heed.
Ned, turning aside to hold his goblet out to be filled, took the chance to say low into Robert’s ear, for no one else to hear in the general talk around them, “They’ll be here. It’s naught more than that the rains have made the roads slower going than we thought they’d be.”
Robert nodded agreement he wished he felt. Even when the matter of arbitration was fully in hand and going forward, Blaunche had gone on opposing any dealing at all with the Allesleys as fiercely as she had from the first, only adding bitterness to her anger. Then suddenly, giving it all up, she had agreed there was no help for satisfying the Allesleys’ desire to see Katherine. “If it has to be, it has to,” she had said, still bitter but finally near to accepting that the arbitration was going to happen. More near than Robert was to accepting that Katherine’s marriage to Sir Lewis’ heir was likely the price the Allesleys would demand for settlement.
Even so, with already too much to hand and everything happening too quickly, he had been simply grateful when Blaunche—to make amends for having made him so much trouble, she’d said—had offered to see to fetching her back, and blind and dull-witted he must have been, he thought bitterly now, to have trusted her change of heart without a second thought. Not until the day after she had gone, when Benedict was suddenly gone, too, had his first doubt stirred. There was no reason Benedict should not come and go at his choice and he had taken two yeomen with him, as was right, and left word that no one need expect him back until they saw him. It was so ordinary a thing that no one had seen reason to say anything to Robert about it and, busy at accounts that day, he had known nothing until suppertime.
His first thought then had been that if Benedict was not back before Blaunche was, she would be fierce when she found out. Then on that thought’s heels there had come a worse one: that Blaunche already knew where Benedict was gone because she had sent him.
Robert, despite that he knew too well how stubborn Blaunche could be toward having her own will, had seen too late this time that if she could not have Katherine for Benedict one way, she might well mean to have her for him by another. And what way would be more certain than to hand Katherine over to him herself, leaving Robert
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