here and Yarmouth passes through your doors. I wager it'll be a falling out among thieves.'
The innkeeper's wife was about to retort to this wicked slander on her respectable establishment when something caught her eye.
'What's that?'
It was half concealed beneath the corpse's hand, but it stood out vividly against the dark muck and filth of the yard.
With evident distaste, the bailiff crouched down and wriggled the object out from beneath the cold fingers. It was crushed and wilted, but it was still recognizable. It was a single white rose.
As they stared at it, the buzzing in the air grew louder. It seemed that every fly in Norwich was swarming towards the corpse.
The candles on the walls bled drop by drop on to the twisted mass of wax below. Ma Margot sat enthroned in her snake chair, a goblet of wine untouched on the table in front of her. She stared hard and long at Elena, her bulging yellow-green eyes unblinking in the candlelight. Elena felt sick and she longed to sink down into the chair in front of Ma's table, but she dared not do so without being invited. She grasped the back of it, trying to keep herself upright. Her stomach had been churning ever since Talbot had said Ma wanted to see her. Not another gentleman, not so soon, she couldn't.
'Please, Ma, I can't! I can't—'
'Wait till you're spoken to, girl,' Talbot growled. Elena jumped, not realizing that he was still standing behind her. But Ma continued to study her without making any attempt to speak.
Elena's head was throbbing. Back at the manor she had once drunk too much cider at a harvest-home and remembered the same dizzy, nauseous misery the day after as she felt now. But she had scarcely drunk anything at all last night, just a mouthful or two of the wine when the man had insisted. Could there have been some herb or potion in it?
Ma's fingers caressed the carved head of the serpent on her armrest. 'Where were you last night?'
Elena gaped at her, wondering if she had heard the question aright.
'With the gentleman . . . you dressed me, you and Luce.'
'And after he left?' Ma's voice was low, but sharp as a dagger.
'I was here, asleep.'
'You're lying. Luce swears you were not in the women's chamber when she went to bed and she didn't retire until after the watch called midnight. Your gentleman had long gone by then. Talbot says you were not abed when he made his rounds when he returned. So I'll ask you again, my darling, where were you?'
'I ... I was sleeping out on the turf seat in the courtyard. I couldn't bear to be inside after . . . what he did.'
'Never mind what he did,' Ma snapped. 'It's what you did that matters.'
She beckoned to Talbot, the heavy blood-red ruby on her finger flashing like a warning in the candlelight.
Talbot lumbered round and stood beside Ma. His broken nose seemed even more twisted out of shape in the deep shadows cast by the candles.
'Tell her,' Ma ordered.
Talbot folded his thick, hairy arms, glowering at Elena. 'A corpse was found this morning in the courtyard of the Adam and Eve. Been murdered.'
'You know who that man was?' Ma asked.
Elena shook her head. They were both staring at her so intently that she found her cheeks burning with guilt even though she didn't understand why.
'The man's name was Raoul. He was in the service of Lord Osborn,' Ma said.
Elena's heart began to pound. 'Did he come to Norwich searching for me?'
Ma and Talbot exchanged glances.
'He'd been asking questions in the taverns about a runaway girl with red hair,' Ma said. 'He wasn't very discreet about it. But last night it seems he was just searching for pleasure.'
Elena's chest was so tight it hurt to breathe.
'And it seems, by chance, you were his pleasure,' Ma Margot added with relish. 'He was the gentleman you entertained last night.'
'But he never told me his name,' Elena said, horrified. 'I didn't know. I didn't who he was. He wore a mask, you know he did.'
'Told you,' said Talbot, 'no one ever gives their real name here. Not customers, nor girls. Now you know why. If he'd heard your real name last night. . .'
Elena clung to the edge of the table, her head reeling. She had been forced to pleasure one of Lord Osborn's men. Had Ma known who he was? But she couldn't have. Ma was trying to hide her,