touch the edge of the discarded material, he caught sight of a fringe of dirty blond hair above an eye that could only be human.
“Come out,” he called softly. “I mean you no harm.”
There was no response. He hunkered down so as to be on the same level as the person who was hiding, putting his weight on his right foot to take the strain from the old injury in his left ankle. Reaching into the scrip at his belt, he extracted a silver penny and held it up in plain view. “If you show yourself,” he said quietly, “you may have this.”
Slowly the screen of dead tree limbs parted and a head came into sight. It was a young girl, her hair a dirty blond mat above an equally filthy face. She looked to be no more than six or seven years of age, and her fear was palpable, only overcome by the lure of the shining coin Bascot held in his hand.
Reaching towards her, the Templar held out the penny. The child’s hand, the fingernails torn and ragged, darted out and snatched it from his grasp. Before she could retreat into her hiding place, Bascot took another coin from his purse. “You may have this penny as well if you will talk to me. I promise I will not hurt you.”
Slowly the child pushed her head and shoulders into view. She was pitifully thin and reminded the Templar of the time he had first seen Gianni. Like the boy, this little girl had sores on her face and her eyes were devoid of hope. Compassion flooded through Bascot. There were many such children in every town in England and, indeed, all over the world, but their desolation never failed to instil a deep pity in him.
“What is your name?” he asked.
“Whatcher want to know fer?” the child said, her eyes suspicious.
“So I may call you by it,” Bascot replied. “But if you do not want to tell me, it doesn’t matter.”
“Me name’s Mary,” the child said grudgingly, her eyes still on the penny the one-eyed knight was holding.
“Do you live here all on your own, Mary?” Bascot asked.
The girl’s eyes grew hard. “No, I doesn’t. My bruvver lives here, too. He’ll be back any minute. And he’s bigger than me, much bigger.” Her voice faltered as she took in the solid muscular build of the man in front of her and the sword that hung from his belt. No matter how much larger her brother, he would be no match for the strength of a grown man trained to arms. Bascot had thrown back his cloak as he crouched down and the child’s gaze slid to the Templar badge on his tunic. It seemed to reassure her a little, but not much.
Not wanting to alarm her further, Bascot edged back a space. “If your brother returns while I am here, there will be a penny for him, too,” he said. “I only want to speak to you, Mary, nothing else.”
The small face relaxed slightly, but her eyes remained wary. “Whatcher want to talk about?” she asked.
“I want to know if you and your brother sleep here at night.”
Mary gave a slight shrug of her shoulders. “Most times we do. We ain’t breakin’ no law when we does,” she added defiantly. “The guards only chase us away if we stays inside the wall, not outside.”
Regrettably, what she said was all too true. There was a fair number of beggars in Lincoln, just as in most towns, but unless they could find a sheltered spot within the city walls where they would be safe from discovery by the town guards, they were forced to go outside.
“I know you are permitted to stay here,” Bascot said. “That is not why I wish to speak to you. I want to ask if you, or your brother, were here on the night of the snowstorm, just a few days before Christ’s Mass.”
“What if we were?” Mary retorted.
“Then I would like to know if you saw anybody down there, on the track by the shed.” As he spoke the Templar gestured behind him, toward the path that veered off Masons Row. From this vantage point, the top of the cliff face above the quarry could just be seen, as could the shack that sat atop it.
“We might o’ done,” Mary said, her confidence growing and her eyes still fixed on the penny.
The Templar extracted another coin from his scrip. “I do not want any