They checked on their horses in the stable and found that John’s grey mare had a loose shoe. After some pantomime with the ten-year-old who mucked out and fed the beasts, he led them through a powdering of snow on the ground to a farrier in a nearby lane where they left the horse to have the shoe renailed, while they went to the market. This was a large ramshackle shed in the main street, filled with a chaotic jostling of workmen, wives and urchins, all bargaining and buying a variety of produce. Some was being sold from stalls and booths, but mostly from peasants and old women sitting on the ground, with their wares all about them. Live geese, ducks and hens were alongside cheeses, river fish, meat, rye bread, bags of rough-milled flour and some winter vegetables.
With much pointing and gesturing, together with the display of quartered coins, Gwyn bought bread, cheese, and smoked beef and pork that would keep for many days in this cold weather. Together with a small skin of local wine, which like the food, was probably double the cost to them as foreigners, they made their way back to the farrier and picked up their mare, now with a restored hoof.
As they walked the animal back along the back lane towards the inn, Gwyn suddenly stopped. ‘I hear harness jingling and men shouting!’ he said, his big head tilted to catch the sounds. Since Udine, such noises had a sinister significance. ‘I’ll go ahead and see what’s going on!’
De Wolfe put out a hand to stop him. Giving him the bridle of his mare, he pulled up the hood of his grey cloak to shield his face. ‘No, that red hair and bush of a beard stands out a mile! I’ll go, you stay in the shelter of this hut and wait.’
With an ominous presentiment of disaster in his mind, John crossed the lane to another muddy alley opposite and made his way back towards the tavern from another direction. Standing unobtrusively on the corner, he looked down towards the inn and his worst fears were confirmed. A dozen mounted men and a similar number on foot were clustered outside the front door. They all had some sort of uniform, short green jerkins and brown breeches, with round iron helmets on their heads. The ones on horses carried swords or maces and the foot soldiers had guisarmes, like a billhook on a pole. To the rear of the armed men, two more elaborately dressed courtiers sat on horses, one each side of an august, portly man on a white mare. He was dressed in a fur-trimmed cloak and had a gold chain around his neck.
John’s horror was increased when he saw that one of the soldiers was holding Joldan, gripping him by the hair and forcing him to look towards the entrance to the inn. The lad had a black eye and bruises on his face and it was all John could do to restrain himself from a hopeless attempt to rescue the boy.
There was much shouting and jostling amongst the gape-mouthed onlookers who had materialized from somewhere. Then a more concerted shout went up and the soldiers stepped back a little from the doorway as two more men, one with a wide, flat cap with a large feather, came out, escorting an all-too-familiar figure between them. An icy hand seemed to reach inside John’s chest as he saw it was his king. A feeling of utter failure swept over him as he saw Richard, standing erect and proud, being taken to a waiting horse. The man with the feathered cap attempted to help him into the saddle, but the Lionheart pushed him aside imperiously and, in spite of his previous weakness, hauled himself up on to the horse’s back.
All the escort now closed around the prisoner and the whole group moved off towards the main street, roughly pushing the gaping crowd out of the way. As they disappeared from view, John de Wolfe was left standing in bitter anguish, the realization of his own failure weighing down his conscience like a ton of lead. He berated himself silently. He should have been there to save his king, to fight to the death if need be. Never would he forgive himself for leaving the great man alone, especially when he was ill. With leaden feet, he turned and trudged back to his squire.
‘Our king is taken, Gwyn! I should have stayed to fight them, though there were more than a score!’
The Cornishman was too aghast to answer and stood staring at his master, his normally ruddy face pale as John spoke again.
‘So we are alone, good friend! We must make the best of it, as there is nothing we can do for him now.’
On 28 December 1192, the Holy Roman Emperor, Henry the Sixth of Germany, sent the following letter to King Philip Augustus of France:
Because our imperial majesty has no doubt that your royal highness will take pleasure in all of these providences of God which exalt us and our empire, we have thought it proper to inform you what happened to Richard, king of England, the enemy of our empire and the disturber of your kingdom, as he was crossing the sea on his way back to his dominions. His ship was driven by winds on to the Istrian coast and there it was wrecked at a place between Aquileia and Venice. By God’s will, he and a few others escaped. A loyal subject of ours, Count Meinhard of Gorz and the people of the district, hearing that Richard was in their territory and calling to mind the treason, treachery and mischief of which he had been guilty in the Holy Land, went to arrest him. They captured eight knights from his retinue, but he escaped. He reached a town called Friesach in the archbishopric of Salzburg, where Friedrich of Pettau arrested six more of his knights. Richard himself escaped yet again, this time with just three companions and rode hard in the direction of Austria. But the roads were watched and guarded and our dearly beloved cousin Leopold, duke of Austria, captured the king in a disreputable house near Vienna, He is now in our power. We know that this news will bring you great happiness.
This letter is remarkable as it is between two European monarchs rejoicing over the capture of a third king, Their actions brazenly ignored the Papal directives that the persons and property of Crusaders were inviolate and though Pope Celestine III threatened to excommunicate Philip if he invaded Richard’s lands in Normandy, the French king went ahead with his plans.
PART TWO — The Homecoming Devonshire, July 1193
TEN
The trading cog Mary and Child Jesus glided the last few yards on the smooth flood tide of the River Exe and came to a stop with a slight bump as her prow touched the stone wharf at Topsham, five miles downstream from Exeter. Her bow hawser was thrown ashore to be lashed to a post, so that the tide could swing her around to keep her steerboard side away from the quay. As the half-dozen crew sang their traditional arrival hymn of thanks to the Virgin, three men stood on the aftercastle watching them, two of them mightily pleased that their voyaging was over.
‘Glad to be home, are you?’ asked the third, a leather-faced mariner who was both the shipmaster and owner of the vessel.
‘Thorgils, nothing personal, but I never want to set foot on a bloody ship ever again!’ replied John de Wolfe fervently. Alongside him, Gwyn grinned mischievously. ‘But we had six months on land before this little pleasure cruise across the Channel.’
It had been a rough trip from Antwerp, in John’s memory as bad as anything they had suffered in the Adriatic. Now he just wanted to forget the whole episode, both on sea and shore, though his failure to save his king was something which he could never forget — nor forgive himself for. Lifting his pack on to his shoulder, he gripped Thorgils by the forearm in farewell. ‘Once again, I am in your debt, good friend. God knows how otherwise we could have got from Flanders across the French lands.’
As Gwyn was giving his own thanks to the old seafarer, John had a second pang of conscience — this time because he had cuckolded the shipman many times in the past, as for years Thorgil’s wife Hilda had been one of John’s lovers.
As soon as the cog was secured, they clambered ashore and with one mind, made directly for an alehouse in Topsham’s single street.