They pulled her toward the courtyard. Evangeline’s feet dragged over the ground, and she lost her shoes.
“I’m going to tell them!” Muriel leaned into Evangeline’s face so she could hear her. “I will tell them who you are!”
“No! Don’t! Please!”
“If I don’t tell them, they will fasten you to the pillory and beat you.”
Evangeline’s stomach roiled at the thought of being beaten and at the sight of the pillory looming ahead. She could never fight them off.
Both men and women hurled accusations at her. Some large men, their faces red and contorted, shouted, “Devil’s servant! Poisoning us with Satan’s cap mushrooms! Take her to the pillory!”
God, help me! Please have mercy on me.
The man holding her left arm wrenched it nearly out of its socket as he jerked her up the pillory steps and onto the stage at the corner of the courtyard.
“Halt, I said!” A man’s voice rose above all the others.
Everyone quieted as they looked behind them.
Lord le Wyse strode toward them. Westley was beside him.
Evangeline stood on the wooden stage with the man still holding on to her arm. On her other side was the wooden board that was used to clamp a person’s neck and wrists and hold them long enough to serve their sentence of public humiliation, and sometimes a beating.
“What is the meaning of this?” Lord le Wyse’s voice was a steely scale, weighing the men surrounding Evangeline. “Do you dare seize one of my servants? A woman under my protection?”
“My lord, she tried to kill all of us with poisonous mushrooms in our pottage.”
Westley’s face was like a mask in the fading light of late day, hiding his thoughts as he stood beside his father.
“Let her speak for herself, if she can speak.” Lord le Wyse glared with his one good eye, holding his shriveled hand against his middle.
“I can speak.” The breath returned to her lungs.
“What is your name?”
“Eva, my lord.”
“Can you defend yourself against these accusations?”
“Sabina gave me the mushrooms. She said Mistress Golda told her to bring mushrooms for the pottage, and she begged me to put the mushrooms in the pot for her.”
“Did you know they were poisonous?”
“No, my lord.”
“Fetch Sabina.”
A few men ran off in different directions. While everyone waited for Sabina’s retrieval, Muriel stomped up the three steps to the pillory platform and shoved the men who were still holding Evangeline’s arms.
“Get off her, you fiends!” She slapped at their arms until they loosened their painful grips on her arms and let go.
The people talked low among themselves, sending furtive glances Evangeline’s way. She tried to ignore them. She tried to keep her eyes focused above the tops of the crowd’s heads, but her gaze kept flitting to Westley. Did he think she was lying again, that she had deliberately tried to kill the other servants with poison mushrooms?
Reeve Folsham arrived and pulled Westley aside and spoke with him at the back of the crowd. Then Sabina arrived, walking between two men, her eyes wide and her lips closed. The men prodded her forward, toward the pillory.
“Sabina.” Lord le Wyse’s voice boomed, silencing the already quiet crowd. “Did you give Eva the mushrooms she put into the pottage?”
“Me? No, of course not! Is that what she said?” Sabina turned wide eyes toward Eva.
“I saw her.”
Every head turned toward the back of the crowd.
Reeve Folsham strode through the crowd toward them. “I saw Sabina give Eva the mushrooms and heard her tell her to put them in the pottage.”
Several people gasped.
“Sabina,” Lord le Wyse said, “shall I ask you again?”
“I-I didn’t know, my lord. I was trying to hurry and do as Mistress Golda bid me and gather the mushrooms, and I didn’t realize they were the poisonous ones.” Sabina sobbed. “You must believe me. I would never hurt anyone.”
“What kind of mushrooms were they? Does anyone know?”
A woman’s voice rose above the others. “They were fool’s toadstools.”
Someone else said, “Fool’s toadstools are not deadly. They will only make you sick for a few hours.”
Another person added, “They look very much like the harmless moon’s caps.”
“It was just a mistake,” someone else called out.
Reeve Folsham reached the platform. He mounted the steps and stood beside Evangeline. “You all falsely accused this young woman. Now, Eva”—he turned toward her—“what must they do to gain your forgiveness?”
Eva rubbed her arm where she could feel a bruise, then stopped when she realized what she was doing. Everyone was staring at her while Sabina continued to sob nearby.
Eva drew herself up, straightening her shoulders. “Nothing. I forgive them.”
“They will at least ask your forgiveness, every man who laid a finger on you.” He glared at the men standing on the platform with her who had dragged her forcibly from the castle and across the courtyard.
The men looked sheepish, barely lifting their gazes from the ground. “Will you forgive me?” one man said, then the others followed suit, mumbling, “Forgive me.”
“I forgive you,” Evangeline answered.
Sabina cried more quietly now as everyone seemed to have forgotten her.
The crowd trickled away. Muriel took Evangeline by the elbow to help her down the steps of the platform. As soon as she took a step, she cringed at the pain in her ankle and limped down the steps.
“You are hurt.” Westley was by her side when she reached the bottom.
Evangeline shook her head. “No.” She kept her voice strong and steady and her head down as a tear dripped from her eye. She quickly willed away any more tears.
Muriel led her toward the manor house undercroft.
“You have not had your dinner,” Westley said, still following alongside them. “Come to the house. Let my mother see to you. I think you are hurt.”
“I am well. I can walk.” Defiance rang out in her voice . . . in her heart. He had not believed her, had at least half believed the accusations that she had tried to poison them. It was on his face. Why could he not simply leave her alone and let her go to her bed and cry her tears in peace?
She limped toward the manor house undercroft, clinging to Muriel’s arm.
Westley’s heart sank as Eva turned away from him. But he could not let her limp away without finding out how badly she had been hurt by that mob of angry servants bent on punishing her.
“Please.” Westley jumped in front of her to block her way. “I insist you allow me to take you to my mother.”
Eva and Mildred stopped. Eva lifted her head but refused to look him in the eye.
“Perhaps you should,” Mildred said to her. “Let Lady le Wyse make sure you have no broken bones from those evil brutes.”
Eva nodded, still not speaking.
They walked toward the castle. Eva continued to cling to Mildred and look straight ahead as he led them into the house and down the corridor.
His mother stepped out of the Great Hall where they had all been dining when they heard the commotion.
“Lord le Wyse told me what happened. Oh, you poor thing.” His mother, ever eager to nurse someone’s wounds, reached her hands out to Eva. “I shall take good care of you. And, Mildred, you can come too.” She put her arm around Eva’s shoulder and led her away.
Westley followed them, in spite of not being invited.
Mother and the other two women went into Mother’s sick room, where she sometimes treated the servants and other villagers. Mother’s care was an option for those who could not be helped by the village barber, who would bleed the sick person or sew up the injured, or Joan the herbal healer, who prescribed plants and dried herbs for just about everything that could ail a person or animal.
&n
bsp; Mother would be able to help her. But he had a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach that he could not have saved her the anguish of being wrongfully attacked by a mob—a horrendous thing to happen to a gentle maiden. And he felt even worse that initially he had not believed in her innocence. Thanks be to God for Reeve Folsham, who had been a witness and could vouch for the truth of Eva’s words.
What else might she have been telling the truth about?
Chapter Fifteen
Evangeline followed Lady le Wyse into a room with bandages and vials and small lidded pots on shelves on the walls.
“Mildred,” Evangeline said quietly, “I don’t want you to miss your dinner. Why don’t you go?”
Muriel hesitated.
“I will take good care of her.” Lady le Wyse smiled.
“Very well.” Muriel turned to leave.
Evangeline lifted her head to watch her go—and noticed Westley standing just inside the door. She jerked her gaze back to Lady le Wyse, who motioned for her to sit on a chair padded with cushions.
“Where do you hurt, my dear? The leg? Or ankle? I saw you limping.”
“My ankle, but it is not badly injured.”
Westley came closer as Lady le Wyse lifted Evangeline’s foot and examined her ankle. She pressed her fingers all around. “Does this hurt?”
“Not very much. I’m sure it will be better in a few days.”
“Nevertheless, I want you to rest it for at least tomorrow. What else did they do to you?”
“Nothing. I am not hurt.” Evangeline had managed to hold back the tears that had started to fall earlier, but Lady le Wyse’s kind attention and sympathetic looks were beginning to undo her efforts. She blinked several times to drive away the moisture flooding her eyes.
“I am so sorry, Eva. It isn’t like Glynval’s people to become so angry and violent. Let me see your arms.”
Evangeline wore her work dress with the floppy sleeves that hung to just below her elbows. She pushed up one, and Lady le Wyse covered her mouth and shook her head.
“You poor dear.” She pushed up her other sleeve and found more of the same little round fingerprints of purple and dark blue.
Westley leaned closer to see.
Evangeline suppressed the urge to slap his face and order him to get away from her. How dare he let those men grab her and drag her and threaten to beat her? Tears suddenly overflowed her eyes and ran down her face.
“Westley, fetch some cold water in a basin and some water in a cup for Eva.”
More tears slipped down her cheeks, and she hoped Westley had not seen them as he hurried out.
Lady le Wyse dabbed Evangeline’s cheeks with a cloth. “My dear, are you in pain somewhere you haven’t told me about?”
She shook her head.
“Only in your heart?”
Evangeline shrugged and nodded. Lady le Wyse let her take the cloth and wipe her eyes and nose. She had to control herself before Westley returned.
“I will not let anyone hurt you again,” Lady le Wyse said stoutly. “And from now on you will work only here in the house with me, where I can keep a close eye on you.”
“I do not want you to go to any trouble for me, my lady. I am—”
“It is no trouble. I am outraged on your behalf, and I want to make up to you the feeling of safety you have lost over this.”
She said the words so gently, warmth spread through Evangeline’s middle. Was this what it was like to have a mother? To have someone care what happened to you and concern herself about your feelings?
The warmth inside was replaced by an ache, a hollowness that hurt. Her mother had died in childbirth. Westley had a kind mother who loved him, but Evangeline would never know what that was like.
“Here is your water.” Westley entered the room, balancing a basin in one hand and holding a cup in the other. He handed the cup to Evangeline.
The hands that reached for the cup shook. She bit her lip at not being able to hide the weakness. Evangeline sipped the cold water and closed her eyes, again willing the tears away, trying to push down the memory of the pitying looks on Westley’s and his mother’s faces.
“I will wrap this ankle and make it snug so you won’t twist it or turn it walking back to the undercroft. And tomorrow, if you feel like walking, you can come back here and let me make sure it isn’t too swollen. Westley told me you enjoy reading our Latin Bible.” A smile graced Lady le Wyse’s lips. She was indeed a beautiful woman, even at her age. Westley resembled her quite a bit, but his hair was darker, and he had his father’s chin and jawline.
“Yes, I do. I did not have a Bible at . . . where I lived before.”
“We are pleased to let you read it”—she continued to wrap Evangeline’s ankle—“especially tomorrow since I do not wish for you to work.”
“I thank you, Lady le Wyse.”
Evangeline gave her back the cup, and Lady le Wyse stared as if something had caught her eye. Then she grabbed Evangeline’s hand, twisted it palm up, and gasped. She grabbed her other hand and did the same. “Eva! What happened to your hands?”
“Only blisters.” Evangeline’s cheeks burned, and she wished she could hide as Westley bent and stared down at her hands as well.
“Those look worse than ever,” he said.
“Get me my healing salve,” Lady le Wyse said, still studying her hands with a troubled downturn of her brows. “And some bandages. My dear, I’m so sorry.”
“It is only because my hands were too soft. I should have kept my hands wrapped after . . . after Westley put some salve on them two days ago. They will toughen up soon and be like the other servants’ hands.”
Lady le Wyse made a clicking sound with her tongue against her teeth. “You should have told someone. Westley should have told me. You don’t have to suffer wounds like this untreated. It is dangerous, besides. Open sores like these could become septic.”
Her hands were quite bloody and raw. “I am sorry. Forgive me.”
“Child, it is not your fault. There is nothing to forgive.” She took the pot of salve from Westley and smeared it on Evangeline’s palms.
“Mother!” Cate’s voice called from another part of the castle. “Mother, we need you! The little ones won’t stay in bed.”
Lady le Wyse wiped her hands on a cloth. “I’d better go see what is amiss with my children.” She smiled apologetically. “Westley, you can finish this task. You know what to do. He is very gentle.” She patted her son’s cheek and then hurried out.
Westley looked hesitant as he stood over her with the little salve pot in one hand and a roll of bandages in the other. Then he sat in front of her on the stool his mother had vacated.
“I’m very sorry about tonight. This should not have happened.”
Would he say it was just a misunderstanding, as the other servants had done? Did he believe Sabina was sincere in her tears and protestations of innocence, that she had not known the mushrooms were poisonous?
He looked into her eyes. “I don’t want to think what might have happened to you.”
“Yes, I am grateful your father and Reeve Folsham came to my aid. Those people would have fastened me in the pillory, at the very least.” There was that tone of defiance in her voice again. She wasn’t even sure why she was so angry at Westley. But she was. “I cannot blame them. They thought I was trying to poison them with Satan’s cap mushrooms.”
He was quiet as he took her hand in his, his skin warm and tingly. But she clenched her teeth, refusing to find his touch pleasant.
He smeared the thick yellow salve on her open blisters, his face tense as he concentrated on the task. The open wounds reacted to the cold salve with a slightly painful sensation that sent chills across her shoulders and down her back. But his hand was gentle and warm.
When he finished, he closed the jar, wiped his hand, and took up the bandage roll. He wrapped it around her hand.
“Can you make it tighter? I’m afraid it might fall off.”
He glanced into her eyes. Then he undid the bandage and started over. “I was trying not to cause more pain.”
“It does not hurt.” At least, not as much as you believing I would lie about your friend trying to kill you, or that I would try to poison people.
“I am sorry I did not check your hands again.”
“As I said before, it was my fault. I should have wrapped them. I can wrap my own hands, after all.”
“Well, I should have checked since I knew you had blisters.”
“It is not your place, as the lord’s son, to check the servants’ blistered hands.”
“I am only trying to be kind.” He tied the bandage snugly, then grabbed her other hand.
“Oh, you are very kind, my lord.” Evangeline bit the inside of her mouth at the sarcasm in her voice. Stop, Evangeline. Just stop.
He glanced at her face, then down again as he wrapped the second hand. “Is this not too loose? Too tight?”
“It is perfect, my lord.” Again she bit the inside of her cheek. She should not have baited him with the unwelcome address of “my lord.”
The moment he tied the bandage in place, she rose from the chair. But he held on to her hand, his fingers wrapping firmly around her wrist.
“I am sorry about what happened to you, Eva. It was wrong, and I am ashamed of my people for their violence and rush to judge.”
“You do not have to apologize for what they did. Their consciences are not your responsibility. Besides,” she said pertly, “I have already forgiven them.” She tugged her arm, trying to pull away from his hold.
“Then why will you not forgive me?” He kept hold of her wrist, drawing closer to her.
“Forgive you for what?” Her tone was still hard, but the breathiness betrayed the way he affected her when he was this near and she was staring into his blue eyes.
“For not believing immediately that you would never try to poison anyone. For not running up to that pillory and knocking those men to the ground and snatching you away from them.”
“And for not believing me when I said your friend tried to kill you?”
He hesitated, then said, “I was still upset that you had deceived us by pretending to be mute. And it is hard for me to accept such a terrible thing about my childhood friend.”