‘Standing there in the yard with his eye on me. I offered to carry the bags up, thinking he’d want them high and dry in the loft, and he said he’d do that himself later. I was glad enough; saved me the extra work. Looked narrow, not easy to get the load up there. Branoc took the ladder away to make more room down below. Then I –’

‘Wait. He took the ladder away?’

‘Mm-hm. Here, drink your tea, you look like you’re seeing ghosts. I unloaded the sacks, stacked them on the floor.’

‘With Branoc still watching?’

‘He’d gone off by then. When I finished I went back out. Most folk give me a bite to eat after a long trip, but I didn’t like the feel of the place. Decided to take the cart down by the lake to have my bread and cheese. Branoc came back over, I asked him for Scannal’s payment, he went off to get it. He paid me, I left.’ He stared into his cup for a moment. ‘One more thing. Rats.’

‘Rats?’

‘Up in the loft. Heard them scuttling around. Mentioned it to Branoc, joking-like, and he took offence.’

Rats. Black Crow save me. ‘Grim,’ I asked carefully, ‘this loft, the one Branoc didn’t want you to climb up to – did it have any kind of opening? I don’t mean where the ladder came down, but toward the front of the barn. A window, a trapdoor, a crack in the boards.’

Grim stared at me. ‘You mean up above where the cart was? But . . .’

‘Was there anything?’

He frowned in concentration. ‘Might’ve been a window at the front. It’s a high barn, there’d be quite a bit of room up there. You saying . . . ?’

‘That the kerchief might have come down from that window onto the cart, and you might not have seen it until you got back to Scannal’s. That’s possible, isn’t it?’

Grim frowned into his brew. ‘Could be. But why? Who’d be up there, and why would they drop a kerchief? If they wanted me to look up, why not just call out?’

‘Perhaps they were afraid Branoc might hear.’ The chill sensation was being replaced by a terrible anger. A miller, a miller’s daughter, a baker. By all the gods, I hoped I was wrong about this. ‘When folk are truly frightened, when they’re cowed and beaten down, asking for help can be almost impossible. You and I know that, Grim.’

‘You’re saying the rats weren’t rats at all,’ Grim said in a shocked whisper. ‘The fellow’s got something else up there.’