10 The man who knew everyone
That night the children found that a very important personage was to be a supper guest at their house. It was no other than Master Piers Belmont, Chamberlain to the Duke. Often enough had Giles and his sister gazed up at the great castle on the hill in the centre of the town. The Duke’s home! Great grey towers surrounded by lesser buildings, with all manner of different roofs, a chapel of its own, stables, smithies and servants’ houses, it was like a town in itself—a town within a town. It was the finest castle, folks said, in all that country—except perhaps it be the King’s; and he lived in a city a long way off. But, indeed, to the townsfolk the Duke seemed like a king himself. He had an army of his own and officers of the Household. And all the notices posted in the town, all the announcements cried aloud by the Town Crier, ended ‘By Order of the Duke’. It had even been hinted that the King was himself a little afraid of this great man who, while he was His Majesty’s subject and obeyed his commands, was also His Majesty’s cousin. But that was only gossip. Certain it was, however, that the Duke, being the most powerful of all the nobles in the land, had often greatly helped the young King’s father in his wars.
And now that a member of the ducal household was a guest in their home Giles and Anne were very excited. For hours they lay awake, at their old game of listening to the clatter of knives and forks and the bits of talk that floated up to the attic. Next day they pestered their mother to tell them all that had been said.
Well, it seemed their father had persuaded the great Chamberlain to come and talk over his business affairs with him. He was the Duke’s right-hand man in all matters of money and law. And he proved himself a learned gentleman and very wise.
‘I never heard anything like him,’ said their mother. ‘He’s been everywhere. He knows everyone.’
‘Was he able to help Father out of his money troubles?’ asked Giles.
‘Alas! No,’ said their mother, turning away sadly. ‘He could give us no advice that was helpful. Goodness! If a change of some sort doesn’t happen soon, I don’t know what is to become of us.’
The children now set out on a hunt for Agnes the Applewoman. One of the first persons they called on to question was Luke the Lame Boy. He lived in part of an old tumble-down stable which a horse-dealer let him use for his own. He often got odd jobs about the yard for the people who came to trade there, holding horses, carrying messages, and what not. This home of his was at least dry and comfortably lined with straw, even if it had been made for horses to live in. Indeed, Anne and Giles sometimes envied Luke his peculiar shelter, in the way young folk often do, thinking every place but their own home the finest in the world. Luke knew all the gossip of the town; and many a pleasant hour the children had spent sitting on his straw bed with him, chatting of this and that.
But today the lame boy could not help them in their quest.
‘I have not seen the Applewoman for many weeks,’ said he. ‘I wish I had. My leg is troubling me again.’