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Both women shook their heads, momentarily confusing Ranulf, until Maloren spoke with her usual peevishness.

“That Eseld’s a drunken sot . She’s sleeping in the stables, where she’s been since breaking the fast. When my sweet lamb found the woman half-gone from drink, she offered to go in her place. ”

“Lady Beatrice isn’t a midwife,” Ranulf noted with a frown. “What use would she be?”

“My lambkin’s better than no one,” Maloren declared. “She’s learned a lot from Aeda and she talks to the apothecary every chance she gets, so Wenna could do worse—a lot worse. Despite what some people think, my lady’s a clever girl who knows a lot about medicine.”

Ranulf had often seen Bea chatting with the apothecary when he visited Tregellas, but he’d always assumed she was being more of a nuisance than anything else.

It had never occurred to him that Bea was learning something from the man, or that her presence in Constance’s chamber when she gave birth had any other motive than cousinly concern.

However, and despite Bea’s urge to help, the weather wasn’t favorable for dashing off to the village on a mission of mercy. “She went in this rain?”

Maloren frowned even more. “My blessed girl didn’t want the boy to go back without help.”

“How long has she been gone?”

“Howel came after the noon meal, my lord,” Tecca said.

“How many soldiers went with her?”

Tecca flushed. “None, my lord,” she finally ventured.

“She went alone? ”

“Not alone,” Maloren defensively replied. “I was going to go, too, but she told me to stay here and make sure that idiot of a cook prepared something other than fish for the evening meal. That Myghal said he’d take her.”

Before Ranulf had time to be relieved, the door to the hall banged open, sounding like a clap of thunder in the silence.

“What weather!” Bea cried as she hurried into the hall, alone and clad in a wet cloak. “I feared Myghal and I might get swept out to sea before we got to Wenna’s cottage.”

She threw back her dripping hood. “Oh, Ranulf! You’re back,” she exclaimed, as if he’d been the one who’d departed the castle without leave or a proper escort.

“Then it must be time to eat. Thank the saints, because I have to tell you, I’m starving.

I rushed off before I could finish the noon meal and poor Wenna doesn’t have much to spare, so I had only a taste of what she offered.

She’s really a very generous woman, Wenna. I quite like her.”

Ranulf sent up a brief prayer of thanks as he walked swiftly toward Bea, while Maloren scuttled toward her darling and declared, “You’ve got to get out of those wet things, my lamb, before you catch your death.”

“I’m not so very wet—just my cloak,” Bea replied. She took off her soaking garment and handed it to Maloren.

Bea’s round cheeks were flushed from her exertions, and slightly damp tendrils of hair had escaped from her braid to coil about her face.

As always during the day, she wore a simple woolen gown—this one of soft green—as well as a plain leather girdle, with her hair drawn back in one long braid and tied at the end with a leather thong.

Yet no queen in all her finery could look more vibrant, more luminous or more naturally beautiful.

“I have to talk to you, Ranulf,” she said, with unexpected determination. “Did you know there’s no midwife in the village?”

“I have recently been informed of that fact,” he replied, reminding himself that he was the castellan here, not a lover come a-wooing. “Now I suggest you do as Maloren proposes and get out of those wet clothes.”

And he would not think about her clad only in a damp shift, which would hide nothing.

“I’m not that wet,” Bea replied firmly, “and I won’t get sick. I need to talk to you.”

He wondered what she could possibly have to say to him that would warrant such resolve. “Village gossip is hardly a matter of urgency.”

The look she gave him then!

Perhaps the meal could keep a little and surely he could risk being alone with her for a short while. “If what you have to say to me is that important, my lady, we can go to the solar.”

The solar was a small, damp, musty room, but it had the virtue of privacy, and it wasn’t a bedchamber.

It was obvious Maloren wasn’t pleased with his proposal, but she could take her complaints to her mistress, Ranulf thought as he turned and headed for the stairs, with Bea following behind.

When they reached the solar, a quick survey revealed that this chamber had thus far been spared Bea’s zealous ministrations.

Even so, when he turned to face her, he found her looking around as if contemplating what she could accomplish with a bucket of water and some rags.

“Well, my lady, what is this matter of great importance?” he asked.

“The midwife here has died and no one has come to take her place,” Bea began, her bright blue eyes shining with eager interest. “The nearest one is in the next village, and that’s five miles away.

It would take half a day to send for her and get her back to Penterwell.

That’s why Wenna wanted Eseld—there’s really no one else.

“Fortunately, I’ve learned quite a bit from Aeda, and the apothecary at Tregellas taught me some things about medicine—”

“I remember,” Ranulf interjected.

She blushed, then continued staunchly. “So I went to see if I could be of help. There were other women in Wenna’s cottage, but they knew even less than I did.

All they seemed to want to do was talk about their own experiences rather than trying to assist Wenna.

I must say, some of those experiences sounded quite horrendous.

It would be enough to make most women determined never to bear children if they could possibly help it.

I thought Wenna was going to faint listening to them, so I shooed them out as kindly as I could until it was only Wenna and me, and then I told her not to mind them.

It’s like men after a battle, I said. They all want to compare wounds and brag about their own.

That got her to smile a bit and she calmed down, and in a little while, the pains ceased completely.

It was a false labor, you see. That happens sometimes. ”

Bea grew even more intensely determined. “She’s frightened, Ranulf, and I don’t blame her. Something may go wrong and nobody here will know how to help her.”

Ranulf remembered what it was like to be in pain and alone. “I’ll write to Merrick after the evening meal. Perhaps Constance can find a midwife who’ll come here.”

“That’s a fine idea,” Bea replied with approval, yet her brows remained furrowed. “Unfortunately, that will take time, and since I didn’t know you would make that kind offer, I…”

She took another deep breath, planted her feet and spoke as if about to announce that she was, in fact, a goddess. “I told Wenna that while I was no midwife, I would stay until the baby arrived and help her if I could. I gave her my word, Ranulf.”

She hurried on as if he had ordered her to leave Penterwell that very moment.

“I can’t abandon her and it should only be for another week, a fortnight at the most. I know I should have asked you first, but she was so upset and it seems such a little thing.

Please say you’ll let me stay and keep my word. ”

Her staying here was no little thing , yet to refuse any help to the young, grieving widow…that he couldn’t bring himself to do. And Bea was right. It might take Constance some time to find another midwife willing to live in Penterwell.

“All right,” he reluctantly agreed. “You can stay here until Wenna has her baby. I’ll inform Merrick of my decision when I write him tonight.”

Bea’s features lighted with relief and her eyes seemed to glow with joy. He feared she might embrace him, so he held up his hand and said, “You may stay only until Wenna has her baby. Then you must leave.”

“Oh, thank you, Ranulf!” Bea cried as if she hadn’t heard the last. “I knew you had a heart!”

Yes, he had a heart. A damaged one.

He began to back away. “You understand me, my lady? You may stay until Wenna has her child, and no longer.”

“Of course,” she said with another bright smile. “And in that time, I can help you in other ways, too.”

He took refuge behind sarcasm. “Should I expect to find you discussing the repairs with Merrick’s masons next? Or perhaps huddled with my garrison commander, planning the castle defenses?”

She didn’t look the least upset by his remarks. Instead, she laughed. “Nothing so practical, I’m afraid, Ranulf. But I can act as a sort of go-between between you and the villagers.

“Well, the women, anyway,” she clarified. “It isn’t only Wenna who wants to find out who killed Gawan. The other women want the guilty person caught, too, because they fear for their sons and husbands.”

“Then they think Gawan was deliberately killed?”

“Oh, yes, they seem quite certain of it.”

“If that’s so, and they’re worried, why don’t they tell me who they suspect?” he asked, thinking of the frustrating wall of silence that seemed to surround the village.

“I think they’d like to, but you’re you , while I’m me, if you follow me.”

“Not precisely.”

“Women find it easier to confide in other women,” she said. “And not only are you a man, you represent their overlord and even the king. I don’t. Not directly, anyway. I’m much less intimidating.”

“Apparently not to cooks.”

She flushed. “He was very insolent.”

“Perhaps I should hire another cook,” he suggested, quite willing to do so if she agreed.

“There’s no need for that,” she replied. “Much has learned his lesson. But I don’t want to talk about the cook. Wenna told me something much more important. She said she told you about the Frenchman and how Gawan went to meet him, but she didn’t tell you…”

Bea hesitated, went to the door, checked the corridor, then closed it.

No matter what she had to say, shutting them in here alone wasn’t wise. Not wise at all.

If he were wise, he’d run.

Unfortunately, Bea stood between him and the door.