There was something in that mocking tone that frightened Elena. In all her anxiety to get away, it had not occurred to her to ask Raffaele where he was sending her.
She half clambered back out of the boat. 'Where are they taking me?'
The men in the boat exchanged grins, but Raffaele ignored them, pushing Elena gently back in.
'To a friend of mine at Norwich, Mother Margot. She'll take you into her house. No one will think to look for you there.'
Elena breathed out in relief. Mother Margot, she would be the prioress of a nunnery. The boatman was right, she would be safe there. No one could search a nunnery, could they? She had always been a little afraid of nuns with their austere habits and even grimmer expressions, but if they could save her from Osborn and the noose .... she glanced up at the rising sun and shuddered. If Raffaele hadn't rescued her, by now she would already be strangling on a rope. Her fingers massaged her throat.
'Master Raffaele, I'll work, do anything. I'll repay the money somehow.' She touched his hand and gazed up at him with a grateful smile.
Far from being pleased, his expression suddenly changed to one of anger. 'I don't care about the money, but I told you that first day I brought you to Lady Anne that if you needed a friend you were to come to me. You should have told me about the child. I would have helped you. It didn't need to come to this. We are bound to each other, you and I. You should have trusted me, Elena.'
'But you have helped me more than I could ask. I —'
The boatman suddenly jerked upright. 'Horses coming this way, moving fast.' Before Elena realized what was happening the boatman had pushed her down flat in the bottom of the boat and was pulling a heavy, evil-smelling sail cloth over her.
'I'll come to you soon, Elena,' Raffaele whispered.
The men grunted as they dug their sculls into the water. Elena felt the craft inching slowly into the centre of the river. For a moment or two it hung there, then the boat gathered pace and slid quietly away into the dawn.
Walter was not at his post in the manor gatehouse when Raffe squelched into the courtyard, and as soon as he caught sight of the group of men standing beneath the undercroft, he knew why. He hesitated, trying to decide what stance he should adopt. Anger? Surprise? But he didn't get the chance to resolve anything for at that moment Osborn spotted him.
'Aah, here is Master Raffaele now. Perhaps he might shed some light on this matter.' He stared down at Raffe's sodden, muddy clothes. 'Have you been taking a bath, Master Raffaele? In the town it is customary to remove your clothes and use clean water, but perhaps you are more accustomed to bathing with the pigs in Gastmere. Or have you been doing more to those hapless sows than simply wallowing with them?'
It was a measure of the tension in the courtyard that no one laughed.
Raffe ignored the barb. 'I was searching the ditches for the thief, in case he was hiding from the hounds there. So, have you caught the rogue?'
Osborn took a pace forward, his ash-grey eyes narrowing as he searched Raffe's face. Raffe returned his stare without flinching.
'The girl that was to be hanged,' Osborn said dangerously quietly. 'She appears to have vanished. The bailiff swears he locked her in the neck iron, removed the ladder from the pit and fastened the grid above her. He says you were witness to this.'
Raffe glanced over at the bailiff's frightened face. 'It is as he says, and then we went to the kitchens together for a mug of ale.'
'If that is so,' Osborn said, 'someone came during the night and released her. She could not have escaped from the iron or that pit unaided. But if it was in the night, how did she get out of the courtyard without our faithful watchman hearing her?'
It was Walter's turn to look fearful, as well he might. A watchman who allows a prisoner to walk unchallenged through his gates could hardly expect to escape without punishment.
Walter twisted his hood nervously in his hand. 'Girl must have slipped out when I opened the gates for the men to give chase to the thief. I swear not a flea could have escaped afore that, 'cause my hounds