play, he’s our leading man even, so we have to put up with him.’ Oliver took a deep breath. ‘Haydock and his Cornisea Historical Society are after the castle.’
It was a short terse statement with a lot of implications.
Oliver said, ‘They believe they can do a better job of exploiting it. Open it to the public.’
‘It would draw people in droves. It’s so beautiful.’
‘It’s also private property. People should respect that.’ Oliver tapped her shoulder. ‘Watch your step now; it’s very uneven in places.’
They reached a large room with metal cage constructions along the wall. There were four of them on either side. Each cage had metal rings in the wall to which the prisoners used to be shackled. In one of the cages there was a table and a chair.
Dolly managed to squeeze herself through the bars and dashed under the table. When she ran out on the other end, she touched the chair, and it tottered, almost falling over.
‘Come here, girl,’ Guinevere called and added to Oliver, ‘The floor is really ragged there.’
‘Yes, the cells were never meant to have furniture in them. But Haydock claimed that by the time of the Branok trial these cells weren’t what they had once been. He wants to sit at that table, writing up his last will. History does say Branok wrote a will in here, or a map with directions to his hidden stash, whatever you like to believe, but I bet he did it shackled to the wall. If he could write at all, of course. Over time he must have become larger than life, while he might just have been a lawless scoundrel.’
‘But he was steward at the castle, right? Shouldn’t a steward have been able to read and write?’ Guinevere asked curiously.
‘Not necessarily. Branok might have been appointed because he was shrewd and knew how to play people. A clerk may have kept the accounts. Many orphans who had been raised at monasteries could read and write and they found positions at keeps like this one.’
‘If Branok had a clerk who knew about all his dealings, and some of them were unfair, that clerk must have been his accomplice,’ Guinevere mused. ‘Was he heard at the trial?’
‘A partner in crime?’ Oliver winked at her. ‘I doubt that Branok shared his illegal transactions with the clerk who kept the official records for the castle. He probably went about that business alone.’ He scanned her expression. ‘You sound like you know something about trials.’
‘More about murder investigations. We’ve been rehearsing a play set in the roaring Twenties about a murder at an estate where young ladies are groomed for high society. I helped working out some kinks in the scenario.’
‘In the scenario?’ Oliver frowned.
‘Yes, some clues were too obscure. And one motive didn’t make sense at all. The audience does need a fair chance to unmask the killer, you know.’ She looked at the cell Haydock was going to use. ‘Only one way in – through the door. But there is a sort of hole in the wall?’
She pointed at a square, large enough to put a man’s fist through. Light seeped in, but the outside world couldn’t be seen clearly as the walls were so thick that her view was obstructed by the stone she looked upon.
‘It’s like something is moving on the other side,’ Guinevere said, squinting. ‘The light isn’t flowing in naturally.’
‘Probably bushes,’ Oliver said. ‘That’s the garden out there. I think …’ He frowned as if conjuring up the plan of the castle in his mind. ‘Rhododendrons.’
‘So these dungeons are not like cellars?’
‘In part,’ Oliver said. ‘You may have noticed that the castle’s entry door has steps in front of it. The whole castle is built a little higher, as it were, and the room below was used for these dungeons and for cellars to keep food. The dungeons did not need to be deep underground as escape was virtually impossible anyway. Just look at it. You were shackled to the wall. Then the cage was locked. The door through which we just entered was bolted from the outside. And there were always people around.
‘So even if a prisoner miraculously made it out of the dungeon, he’d not be out of the castle yet. He would most likely be spotted. At night the gate was closed, and a gatekeeper kept watch over it. Also keep in mind that the island’s cut off from the mainland during high tide. So a prisoner would have to know exactly when he could use the causeway or have a boat ready for his escape.’
‘It could only have been done with an accomplice,’ Guinevere said. The silence made her lower her voice. ‘If someone came from the outside, to lure the guard away, made sure a boat was ready and waiting along the beach … Maybe even delivered the key of the shackles to the prisoner.’
‘In a homemade pasty?’ Oliver grinned. ‘We should have forgotten about re-enacting this boring trial and gone for a daring escape instead. It would have been so much more fun.’
He made a movement as if he brandished a club over his head. ‘Knock the guard down, sneak through the dark passageways …’
Guinevere had to laugh. ‘I think the historical society would not have approved. That’s not how Branok’s story played out.’
‘Well, sometimes to sell something you need a little fiction to make it juicier. Ah, the lighter. Can you open the lanterns’ doors for me? They’re slightly crooked and never stay open when I want them to.’
They had to stand closely together to make it work. Guinevere looked at Oliver’s features as the lighter’s flame threw shadows across it. She couldn’t make any sense of him. What he was about. If he really disliked his father and the castle, or only pretended he did.
And if so, why.
‘Hello?’ Oliver tapped her shoulder. ‘Are you there? We’re all done. Father can come down to lock Haydock in. My part as judge will be a disaster of course. I haven’t had time to rehearse, and Haydock will be livid when my stumbling ruins the flow.’
He leaned over to her, whispering, ‘Who knows, I might condemn that scoundrel to death anyway.’
***
The flickering light of a few candles illuminated the group gathered in the tall room.
Oliver sat on a carved chair, holding a broomstick by way of wand of office. His father had said he would only produce the real wand, which was part of the castle’s collection, for the actual trial. That one special night when everybody would be present.
Kensa, grave in her plain garment, had given her testimony to condemn Branok for killing two innocent children when he had ordered the house to be set on fire.
‘But he never knew the children were in there,’ Leah had just said. She was a witness to defend Branok and plead his innocence. ‘You yourself had left them, being a bad mother who neglected her brood. You were at the inn meeting men and inviting them to the attic above the horse shed.’
‘I am not proud to say I made money that way in the old days,’ Kensa replied, ‘but not any more after I wed Merek.’
Leah laughed. ‘We all know Merek is a weak man who drinks too much. He may earn money but he spends it on stout and ale, not on your children. If you wanted them to have anything, anything at all, you had to return to your old trade.’
Oliver lifted a hand. ‘Do we know,’ he asked in an exaggerated baritone voice, ‘where the accusing party was when her house burned to the ground? Was she really at the inn with men?’
‘I have witnesses to confirm it,’ Leah said eagerly, gesturing to where Tegen and Bolingbrooke were waiting for their turn.
‘All liars, for gain!’ Kensa cried. She beat her fist on the wooden table before her.
‘You