Winter’s Children: Curl up with this gripping, page-turning mystery as the nights get darker. Leah Fleming

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СКАЧАТЬ lodgings in this bleak weather, a long walk for a child and a widow. In the name of our Lord and His Virgin Mother, be merciful. We must all answer at the Day of Judgement.’

      ‘Silence, priest. This be my parish and I decide how best to humble the proud. The mother must be taught a lesson in humility and the child be shown that all yuletide celebrations are forbidden by law. This lesson she will never forget.’ His lips curled into a tight line. Nonie peered out from behind her mother, not understanding the man’s words. Her blue eyes filled with tears.

      The black crow man looked long and hard at her as if fighting some inner weakness within himself. ‘I will show mercy on the maid, but she must first walk five miles for her penance.’

      Father Michael turned back, holding his hand up in protest. ‘Shame on you. Be wary, man of the cloth, that you do not wander too far from the path … I see a cold end for you if you proceed with this business.’

      The crow man laughed in his face. ‘I take no heed of your devil’s words.’

      Mother wrapped them warm against the weather but it started to snow again an hour into their journey. Even the thick wrapped cloaks were no match for the swirling storm.

      At first Anona set out gaily, thinking this some game, but as the storm blew them in all directions at once, she began to cry out with cold and whimpered under the shelter of her mother’s cloak. They took refuge in a barn close to an inn where there was the noise of merriment and ale drinking. Then they were housed as common criminals and she cried for her warm mattress and feather quilt.

      ‘We must make do with straw, tonight. Tomorrow will be a better day,’ Mama promised hopefully. ‘I will give the guard our fine lace collars to buy us some food. You will soon be on your way homewards to Aunt Hepzi.’

      Father Michael looked weary and ill, but slept fitfully by their side, guarding them from rude enquiries and jeers.

      Anona sunk into the folds of her cloak, not understanding why the black crow was so angered by a goose roasting. Her hems were sodden with melted snow and there was a stench of dung and hay. Mama tried to shame the constables who escorted them from Bankwell House into helping them. How could they sleep easy knowing how in times past Papa had helped their families? Mama was kind to old Will Carr and kept him in his cottage long after he could not do a day’s work.

      Thomas Carr kept glancing in their direction.

      Nonie watched as Mama fingered the gold ring on her finger, set with seed pearls, the only ring she had left in her jewel box. It was always kept on her left hand. Then she beckoned to Carr in the darkness and held out the ring. ‘Miss Anona must go no further on the morrow, five mile or no,’ Mama whispered. ‘She’s but eight years old and feels such hunger and cold. By all that is holy, Thomas Carr, please take her back to my cousin at Wintergill. The ring is yours for your trouble. Do what you must to secure her release, I beg you. It is all I have of value but if you do my bidding I will reward you tenfold.’

      He moved forward and nodded and she could see that he was sore tempted by the offer and his own discomfort. ‘'Tis less than four miles back over the moor towards Settle and beyond on the high road. Miss Anona must be safe housed at Wintergill with my kin.’ Mama was pleading now, sniffing her daughter’s golden curls that frizzed up in the damp air.

      ‘I don’t like it here, Mama,’ she wept.

      ‘I know, but think about that first yuletide when the Holy Mother laid her baby in a manger for there was no room for them at the inn. Here we are in a stable just like them and you smell like a new-born calf, not of our hearth and home or fresh rosemary water. Father Michael will take care of us,’ Mama cried.

      That was no comfort, for he was old and sick, but Nonie thought of Jesus in the stable and tried to take heart. They were close enough to the night brazier to glean some warmth for chapped hands and feet. It would be a long night and she was so tired as she lay now strangely at peace with the world in her mother’s lap.

      ‘Hold on to hope, little one. When Aunt Hepzi hears what has become of us, she’ll noise abroad what this parson has done. Surely the Justice will be lenient, especially if he is in sympathy with the King’s lost cause. There are many such hidden in these northern hills. We will not be harmed.’

      She watched the goose feathers of snow settling over carts and rooftops, across the courtyard where the sound of a fiddle rent the chill air. How quickly the white covered their muddy tracks. She could not believe that they were come into this sorry state. Surely it was all some terrible nightmare and she would wake up with the curtains of her four-poster bed tightly drawn against the draughts?

      Thomas shook them both at first light. ‘Mistress Norton, I’ve found someone who travels northwards with a cart. He says that they will relay your daughter but only to the inn at the crossroads by the marketplace. She must make her own way from there to Wintergill. It is the best I can do, but no word of this to anyone and I shall say she has slipped away in the night.’ The man turned from her in shame, speaking softly. ‘I thought that this was but a prank to shock you, mistress, not to lead us all abroad on fearful business in such fierce weather.’

      ‘Thank you, Thomas, I shall not forget your mercy. Wake up, little one, wake …’ Mama roused her daughter into life. ‘Now listen to Mama … you will go back with the carter to Settle and make your way to the wise woman’s house down the passageway into Kirkgate. Tell Goody Preston, the seamstress, what has happened and ask her to send word to Wintergill. Lodge with her until Mistress Snowden sends for you and wait for me there. Do you hear what I say? Do not venture out on your own. Tell the goodwife I shall pay her for all your care when I return.’

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