Free [Roger the Chapman 04] - The Holy Innocents by Kate Sedley

might well be a half-dozen ways in which they could have escaped unnoticed; until I had the whole story from Grizelda, on the morrow, I was not prepared to accept the idea of witchcraft being responsible for their disappearance. Indeed, I doubted of my accepting it even then, for I had already discovered that much of the wickedness in this world has its roots in the hearts and actions of men, unaided by external forces.
    Nevertheless, I could not help but recall the sensation of evil I had experienced when, earlier on, I had stood in the second bedchamber, which I now realized must have been used by Grizelda and her charges. She was their nurse and had slept in the truckle-bed. It was amidst the wealth and comfort of the Crouchback household that she had acquired her taste for what she had called 'better things', as many another servant had done before her... And yet, was she a servant? Surely the innkeeper had referred to her as Rosamund's cousin, and Grlzelda herself had told me that she left her father's holding when she was nine years old. A poor relation! That, without doubt, was the answer; the daughter of an impoverished kinsman of Sir Jasper, taken in to be companion to his own, and only, child. I should be very surprised to find that I was mistaken.
    At the top of the stairs, I opened the parlour door and stood once more in the narrow space between the two bedchambers, the latch of each room within arm's reach. I could feel the sweat slipping icily down my back as, leaning my cudgel against one wall, I lifted the latch of the smaller chamber and stepped inside. Nothing had changed. Had I really expected it to? But, stupidly, I began to breathe more easily.
    My heart stopped thumping quite so strenuously, and the fingers clutching the candle-holder ceased to shake. Nor was there any recurrence of the sickness and panic of the afternoon.
    I raised the candle higher, seeing again the four-poster and the truckle-bed, the clothes chest supporting basin and ewer, the rushlight in its holder, the shutter dragging loose from its hinge. Placing my candle carefully on the floor, I put the ewer and basin beside it, then lifted the lid of the chest.
    It opened upon a chasm of darkness, the faint scents of dried lavender and cedarwood teasing my nostrils. Picking up my candle again and holding it so as to illumine the interior of the coffer, I saw a sad little huddle of children's toys.
    Reaching inside with my free hand, I withdrew, one by one, a wooden horse, with brown mane and crimson saddle, the paintwork much scratched by frequent handling; a cup and ball, the blue silk cord which should have attached them, frayed right through, leaving them in two separate pieces; a doll, whose wooden cheeks were still flushed with a high gloss of colour; some chessmen, roughly carved, and their chequered board; a small linen bag, drawn shut by a leather thong, which, when opened, revealed five smooth pebbles, used to play the game of fivestones. The floor of the chest was covered with some dark material, and this proved, on further investigation, to be a woman's gowns - two of them and obviously past their best, rubbed thin in places and patched in others. I hazarded a guess that they had once belonged to Grizelda, and that she had discarded them, when she left, as no longer fit to wear.
    I replaced the various items in the chest and closed the lid, then straightened up to my full height, almost brushing my head against the ceiling. I cast a final look around the room, but there was nothing more which would add to the innkeeper's story; no ghosts to trouble the warm, fetid air with their uneasy presence. Whatever had reached out to touch me, earlier in the day, had gone, leaving an unruffled calm behind it.
    I returned to the parlour. A three-quarter moon was rising, filtering through the glass top-half of the windows to lie in drifts of clouded silver across the dusty floor. I closed the shutters before going back to the chief bedchamber