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“In that case, I would like to ask her the questions,” Lizzie said. “It may help with my memory as well.”
No one had any objections to that, and, with the plan of attack decided, they set to work, propping Maud in a semi-reclined position on one of the straw mattresses they used for throwing and grappling. Lizzie sat on a low stool next to the mattress while Lucinda stirred the brew into Maud’s mug. What if it all went wrong? If the dose was incorrect? If Maud had a bad reaction?
“Are you sure you wish to go through with this?” Lucinda asked before handing the mug to Maud.
“I am sure. From what Rosalind said, all will be well.”
It only took a few minutes for the brew to take effect.
“Start at the beginning,” Lizzie said. “Where you were just before the man came upon you, and what you were doing.” Her voice was encouraging and soothing, showing a side to Lizzie they had not seen much of before. Her modus operandi was more often crash, or crash through.
After a little while Maud’s shoulders softened into the straw pallet. The faint frown on her forehead that first appeared in the act of remembering gradually faded, and she began talking without needing much prompting at all. Both Maud and Lizzie had their eyes closed as if Lizzie was joined with Maud in her trance. The gist of what Maud said was much the same as she had related to Lucinda when her father took them to his forge. Maud reached the part in her story where she was blindfolded and tied to the post, with the dirk held to her back.
“Then I felt his bare hands—”
“Stop! Stop!” Lizzie suddenly cried out over the top of Maud’s account. “I see something. I am on my back. He is on top of me, hammering as hard as he can. Then he finishes and fetches his scissors and snips a piece of my hair. As he pulls his hand away, I look down and I can see his hand. The blindfold must have shifted. It is the right hand. Yes, the right. His smallest finger has a piece missing from it, where the nail should be. If you divided the top part of his finger into quarters, the top outside quarter is gone like the corner has been snipped or bitten off.”
Moll exchanged a glance with Lucinda.
“Yes,” Maud joined in, “I cannot see his hands, but I can feel them. I know the gloves are off because he runs them over my skin.” She gave a shudder. “Then his fingers dig into my flesh and the pressure is different, the shape is different on the right compared to the left. Then he puts the gloves back on and cuts my hair while he is humming that awful tune. I was so scared he was going to kill me.”
Rosalind came to sit between the two of them and held each girl’s hand. She started to hum the tune out loud while she stared straight ahead to the opposite wall, looking but not seeing, for she was looking into the recesses of her mind. First Lizzie, and then Maud, joined her in humming the tune. At the start Maud was sobbing quietly and Lizzie’s voice quavered, but the longer they were joined hand to hand, and the longer the tune went on, the stronger their voices grew as if they drew strength from each other and sang to take control of the tune.
Rosalind stopped singing but did not let go of their hands. A lump stuck in Lucinda’s throat, and she had to turn away. Lizzie had run out of questions. Maud had run out of talk. Rosalind had run out of song. With the huddle of her damaged friends behind her, Lucinda’s eyes swept around the room, over the broad spaces, the long pistes, the storerooms packed with gleaming weapons, the protective leathers hanging on the wall; this place she had long called her home. So many men had come to train here, to test their strength, courage and skill, but none of those men were as brave as these three women, hands linked in misfortune, sharing memories they would rather forget.
They left Maud to sleep off the effects of the brew while the rest of them took to their swords. Never was their focus so intent or their reason for being here so acute. Instead of the usual chatter, the only sound which filled the training room was the clash of metal-on-metal, and the dull repeated clang of blade upon shield.
Moll lingered behind after the others had gone.
“You know who it is, don’t you?”
“No. I do not know,” Lucinda said.
“Suspect then. I am sure I have seen someone with a finger like that, but I cannot place who it is. I think you can. Is it one of the fencers?”
Moll was so insistent it was impossible to fob her off. “Yes, it is true. There is a fencer with a finger that matches Lizzie’s description, but I have other information that would suggest he is not the man we seek. I need to be sure before we go and accuse someone falsely. Suspicion is not enough. We need some proof.”
Moll was still helping out at the fencing academy where everyone accepted her as “Mal“. She mostly did the drudge work of fetching and carrying which eased Lucinda’s load, occasionally stepping in as a sparring partner. Her language was often foul but always inventive, which only served to endear her in the sweaty competitive masculine gathering at Whitefriars. She could out-curse the crustiest old soldier, sing bawdy ballads that brought men to tears, hurl insults that had the place in fits of laughter, but most of all she delighted in throwing out jibes to put the cockiest of fencers off their game.
“I do not know how you get away with it,” Lucinda said after Moll told one of the Scottish courtiers that if he was any slower to bend down and pick up the sword he had dropped, King James would be right up his case.
“I said case,” Moll protested. “Nothing wrong with that.”
“Apart from the long pause you left for everyone to fill in the gap,” Lucinda said.
“My point exactly,” Moll said with her usual grin. “If you don’t hurry up your gap gets filled.”
“Moll! Enough!” Lucinda gave her a light punch on the arm. It was hard to maintain any indignation around Moll. She did not care in the slightest the offense she might cause or what anyone else thought of her. A childhood blighted by stares and ridicule had turned her skin into the thickest of hides.
“I haven’t spotted the finger yet,” Moll said, changing the subject without warning, a technique of hers that often resulted in people telling her more than they normally would.
“The Spanish are not here yet,” Lucinda said half out loud.
“Ah ha! So it is one of the Spaniards? I thought it was, but I could not be sure.”
Lucinda had blithely walked into Moll’s trap. “Don’t you go saying anything until I am sure,” she warned, hoping for once Moll would heed her and do what she was asked.
In the early afternoon the Spaniards arrived at Whitefriars, about half a dozen in all. DeGuerra was among their number as well as Corvacho and several other fencers she knew by sight but not by name. She hurried to remind the fencers who were currently using the longer piste that it would soon be needed for the Spanish and their rapier bouts. She spent a lot of her time lately playing diplomat. At times it seemed there were more delicate affairs of state going on in the confines of Whitefriars than there were in Whitehall, which was where the official treaty negotiations were going on. She for one would be glad when the treaty was signed, and all the troublesome Spaniards went home. Except perhaps for one.
