‘This is a lot better than the last place, Sir John,’ she said in her broad local accent. Though she had a fair grasp of Norman-French, they always spoke in English together, except when Matilda was present, who insisted upon using her allegedly native French.
Mary had a palliasse in one corner, a table and a couple of stools near the small central fire-pit where she did her cooking.
Brutus was already comfortably installed on an old sack and John could see that both the dog and himself were more likely to have a homely welcome here than in the gloomy hall inside the house.
He sat on one of the stools and Mary poured him a mug of ale from a pitcher. She then took a couple of flat cakes from the bake-stone that sat on the edge of the fire and slid them on to the scrubbed boards of the table.
‘Here’s butter and some honey — see if you approve of my cooking,’ she said firmly, with the implication that she would brain him with the ladle that hung nearby, if he failed to appreciate them. They were delicious and he rolled his eyes at her, his mouth being full.
‘A word of advice, Sir John,’ she said softly. ‘Beware of what you say before that Lucille, for I’ve heard servant’s gossip that she is too ready to carry tales and tittle-tattle.’
When he left the shed after finishing all the drop cakes, his spirits had been lifted a little, as he had found both a good cook and a friendly ally. Reluctantly, he went back to the Bush to collect his few possessions to take to St Martin’s Lane. A large cloth bag was sufficient to carry his spare undershirts, hose and two grey tunics, together with the wolfskin cloak that he had won from a Bohemian mercenary in a jousting match in Germany.
For a few minutes he sat with Nesta, who was sad to see him leave. He even fancied there were tears glistening her eyes as he left, but he promised that, whenever possible, he would be back there each day.
‘I’ve got to exercise that big dog, haven’t I?’ he said with false jollity. ‘Most times Brutus will probably want to come in this direction — in fact, I can guarantee it!’
Back at St Martin’s Lane that evening, he felt a sense of depressing anticlimax. It was very cold and the wind was whistling through the roof shingles and penetrating the shutters. There was oiled silk stretched over the inside of the window, attempting to keep out some of the draughts, but the lofty hall was still chilly, the tapestries shifting slightly in the breeze.
Most of the light came from the fire, where a pile of chopped logs lay at the side of the chimney to replenish the blaze. He sat in a cowled seat at one side of the hearth, Matilda in the opposite one. She was wrapped in a heavy woollen cloak, her feet wrapped in a shawl, resting on a low stool.
After some desultory words about the house, they fell silent, she dozing and he scowling into the fire. In the flickering flames from the oak logs, he imagined he saw pictures, including some of the bleak roads through the Alps that he had travelled a year ago and others conjuring up images of King Richard still in captivity. He thought of Prince John, waiting to displace his king from the throne, aided by scoundrels like the bishops and greedy men such as Henry de la Pomeroy and Richard de Revelle. He looked across at his wife, her jaw drooping as she breathed noisily during her slumber. Was this how the rest of his life would be, slumped in boredom night and day?
John almost envied the peasant and the artisan, who at least had honest toil to occupy them between the cradle and grave. But he was a knight, brought up since a child as page and squire, to have no skills except with lance and sword. He had no other talents except fighting and no need to seek more money, as he had sufficient for all his needs.
What was he to do with his life, stuck in a loveless marriage and without even the solace of religious belief to offer Heaven at the end? Though it was obligatory to believe in God, he never gave it any thought, it was just part of the fabric of life, drummed into everyone since infancy. He had no interest in the ostentatious panoply of the Church and though he was sometimes dragged to Mass by Matilda on special occasions, he felt it was just a meaningless ritual.
After a while, he shook off his dismal thoughts and bent to put a couple more logs on the fire, resting them across the curled iron supports of the firedogs. This was the first time he had seen it lit and he was glad to see that there was sufficient draught up his new chimney to take the smoke and sparks up and away from the interior of the hall. As he settled back, he fondled the soft ears of Brutus who lay at his feet, swooning with the new luxury of lying near a fire.
‘We’ll go for a walk as soon as the mistress takes herself to bed,’ he murmured to the old hound. He knew that Matilda loved her sleep, almost as much as eating, drinking, new raiment and grovelling on her knees before a priest. She went to her bed early and got up late, so he should have plenty of opportunity to take a stroll down to Idle Lane.
An hour later, he walked down to the Bush and enjoyed Nesta’s company, though the inn was busy and she was bobbing up and down from his table to help her serving girls and make amiable conversation with her regular patrons. He watched her admiringly, as she laughed with some, scolded others and fended off wandering hands without giving offence. A very popular landlady, many of the customers appreciated her good looks and her shapely figure, but she had the gift of being friendly without encouraging their lechery. Even the drunks, who often caused a nuisance, were usually placated or evaded without provoking a fight. When they became too obstreperous, some of her loyal customers would always help Edwin to push them out into the street.
Nesta wanted to ply John with more food, but Mary had served them an excellent spit-roasted duck at the noon dinner and then cold meats, bread and cheese for an early evening supper, so he settled only for a mutton pasty in the Bush.
Gwyn came in later, as he had brought his wife and boys down to spend the night with Agnes’s sister. His only news was that the two nuns who had been involved in the attack had now been sent off to Glastonbury, with a much larger escort of men hired by the cathedral chapter. ‘I hear that all the canons are buzzing with anger at the death of their brother from Tavistock,’ he said.
‘Though they seem grateful to you for saving the Huns and for dealing with both Arnulf and Walter Hamelin, they are calling for some official action to combat the rising lawlessness.’
De Wolfe grunted. ‘Some hope, with no proper sheriff! I presume that the royal judges still come on their circuit to the Eyres of Assize?’
Gwyn turned up his huge hands in doubt. ‘I suppose so, someone has to try the cases and send men to the gallows. Though the Eyres were always so irregular that half the prisoners either died of goal fever or escaped before they could stand before a court.’
Eventually, with Nesta being so busy, John decided to make his way home again, leaving Gwyn continuing to drink the vast quantities of ale that he was able to swallow without any obvious effects.
Whistling to Brutus to leave the bone that Nesta had given him, they went out into the cold night air. The sky was clear and the stars bright as he walked across to Priest Street, named after the large number of lodgings used by vicars choral, secondaries and lay brothers from the cathedral. A half moon was rising in the east and he could see his hound zigzagging ahead of him, as he explored the ever-changing smells of the sewage in the central drain and the piles of rubbish in the side alleys.
Priest Street rose to become Sun Lane before meeting Southgate Street and it was here that he saw Brutus stop dead and point with his outstretched head towards a house on the right, in a row of moderate-sized burgages belonging to local merchants. As John came up to the dog, he was aware of a disturbance inside the house, a crash followed by a yell of pain, then a woman’s scream.