‘There, Robin,’ she said blandly, ‘you can go back to your dull old papers now.’
Lady Widdrington was the first to recover her senses.
‘Sir Robert,’ she said formally, ‘I believe I should congratulate you on your Deputyship. I hope you don’t miss London and the Court.’
He made a little bow and laughed with delight.
‘Only you,’ he said, instincts reasserting themselves, ‘could have brought me here so quickly to the land of cattle-thieves. I’d hoped I could find an excuse to chase a few raiders into Northumberland and catch them dramatically on your doorstep...’
‘And if necessary you would have paid them to go that way,’ said Lady Widdrington drily. Carey laughed again.
‘Absolutely.’
‘Of course, I’m only here for my Lord Scrope’s funeral. Your sister invited me.’
Philly managed to look both smug and shocked. ‘It was Sir Henry I invited.’
‘In the certainty that his gout would prevent him coming,’ said Robert. ‘Honestly, Philadelphia, your plots are transparent.’
‘Who cares so long as they work,’ said Philly. ‘Will you come to dinner, Lady Widdrington. I’m hoping my brother remembered to bring some new madrigal sheets with him, and if he didn’t I’ll make him listen to one of our border minstrels instead.’
‘No, please, save me,’ said Robert. ‘I brought the madrigals and they’re well beyond my voice so good luck to you.’
‘You’re invited too, Robin,’ said Philly inflexibly. ‘We need a tenor. Now...’
What she was about to suggest next nobody ever found out. There was a sudden shouting and commotion further down the street, near the drawbridge gate.
A woman had come riding in at a gallop, sandy red hair flying. She hauled her horse back on his haunches when she saw Dodd’s men staring at her from the gate. Then she leaped from the saddle and caught one of them by the front of his jack. She let fly with a punch and booted him in the groin for good measure. The man tried to defend himself, hurt his hand on her stays, got another boot in his kneecap, and rolled away. He ran limping up the street with the woman in full pursuit, her homespun skirts kilted up in her belt, and Carey saw it was Bangtail Graham and that his enemy was Janet Dodd.
Automatically he stepped out of the courtyard into the street.
‘What the...?’
Bangtail ran behind Carey and dodged another punch.
‘It wasna me, it wasna me...’ he was shouting, ‘I only told my brother...’
Janet Dodd sneered at him as she circled round. ‘Get out from behind that man, Bangtail, you bastard, you lily-livered git, you’ve lost me five horses, a house and half a field of grain trampled...’
‘Mrs Dodd, Mrs Dodd...’ Carey tried to remonstrate.
‘I’ve no quarrel with you Deputy but if ye protect yon treacherous blabbermouthed...’
‘What’s he done?’
Behind Janet, Carey could see Sergeant Dodd sprinting down from the Castle yard.
Bangtail unwisely made a break for it from behind Carey’s broad back, and Janet was on him. Philly, Lady Widdrington and Young Henry Widdrington watched with open-mouthed curiosity. Bangtail tried his best, even marked Janet’s cheek, but he was borne down and kicked again before Dodd came up behind his wife and grabbed her round the middle, swung her about like a dancer in the volta, dodged a fist, and roared in her ear, ‘Goddamn it wife, what’s wrong?’
‘He sold us to Jock of the Peartree,’ she shouted. ‘That filthy bastard Graham told Jock...’
‘I never...’ protested Bangtail.
‘What? What happened?’ Dodd was shaking his wife’s shoulders. ‘Are you saying Jock raided us last night?’
‘Five horses,’ shrieked Janet, ‘five horses, Clem Pringle’s house burned again, half the barley trampled into the mud, poor Margaret miscarrying her bairn with the fright, Willie’s Simon with an arrow in his arm because yon strilpit nyaff couldna keep his mouth shut...’
‘Jock of the Peartree did this?’
Carey watched with interest. Dodd perpetually looked as if he had lost a shilling and found a penny, but he was beginning to suspect that that often denoted good humour. Now the long jaw and surly face were darkening and the thin mouth whitening with rage.
‘I talked to him from the wall,’ Janet said catching her breath. ‘Courtier’s his horse, he called him Caspar. You said you’d know if he was reived from this country, you said you’d know... Stay there, Bangtail, or I’ll gut you...’
‘You never gave him Courtier,’ shouted Dodd.
‘I had nae choice, he caught Little Robert and ransomed him for all the horses except poor Shilling,’ Janet wailed. ‘He said Courtier was his and he said he was proof you’d killed Sweetmilk...’
‘Jock of the Peartree has Courtier...?’
‘Oh Christ,’ muttered Carey under his breath, having listened to Dodd boast about the beautiful stallion most of the way back to Carlisle that morning.
‘Wake up, Dodd, wake up. It’s not just the horse, it’s the Grahams thinking you were the one who murdered Sweetmilk. Ye think it’s bad now? What will ye do when they come and burn the tower and us all in our beds...?’
Looking at his Sergeant, Carey could already hear the hooves thundering and the lances clattering. Dodd’s face was now completely white.
‘Mrs Dodd, Sergeant,’ Carey appealed, stepping between them with his hands out and his most courtly appeasing smile on his face. He managed to have got between both Dodds and Bangtail who was nursing a bleeding nose and his groin and looking terrified. ‘Please. If you’ve been raided...’
‘What business is it of yours?’ demanded Dodd. ‘I’ll have my own justice. Janet, did you send to your father?’
