His thoughts were grim enough. When he had left England, the country was on the brink of disaster. The King’s rapacious advisers, the Despensers, father and son, were setting the entire country against themselves, and by association, against the King himself. Baldwin was convinced that the realm must force the Despensers from the reins of power, and he hoped it could be done without more bloodshed. The Despenser wars of two years before had demonstrated that the Despensers could only be removed by force; they were too firmly installed in the centre of power, like spiders in their webs: the King and his realm their prey. Yet those who had once possessed the strength and will to destroy them were now all dead or scattered. The Welsh March was in uproar: the Marcher lords, who once had controlled the dangerous borderlands, were crushed. The Despensers had tried to take over the whole of the Welsh territories, and when the Marchers had rebelled, complaining about the extortion and theft of the invaders, they were themselves broken, imprisoned or forced to flee the realm. There was no one left around whom an opposition could form.
And even if there were, Baldwin told himself, they would be keeping quiet. In the threatening atmosphere that pervaded the kingdom, no man wished to put himself forward as an opponent to the King or his favourite, Hugh Despenser the Younger.
The knight was roused from his gloomy reverie by a sudden movement. It was the master, who had snapped his head around and was staring up at the mast once more, a questioning glare on his face.
Following the master’s look, Baldwin saw that the sailor who had been lounging up at the mast-top was now peering out to the east, his whole posture one of vigilance. He roared something down to the deck and pointed.
‘God’s turds!’ the master swore, and reached for the nearest shroud. As agile as a monkey, he swung himself upwards climbing until he could stand at the side of the lookout. Then he dropped down, hand over hand, legs crossed about the rope, and as he came, he bawled with all his might.
‘Pirates! Breton pirates!’
A gabbled stream of commands followed, and the Anne turned her bows westwards. Immediately, the ship began to make heavier weather, the prow rolling and twisting against the horizon, but it apparently didn’t affect the master as he struggled with a heavy crate whose lid had jammed. He prised it off with a crowbar, and Baldwin could see it was filled with weapons.
‘So, Sir Baldwin. This should make your voyage more memorable!’ Gervase grunted when he noticed the knight’s glance.
‘Perhaps. I think I should be agreeably satisfied without excitement,’ Baldwin replied easily. He would not show a sailor that he could be alarmed by mere Breton thieves, and intentionally did not so much as glance behind to see what manner of boat was making towards them.
But although he wanted to hide his feelings, he could not help but feel his sword and make certain that the blade moved easily in the scabbard.
He had the feeling that he might soon need to use it.
On the island of Ennor, William of Carkill opened his door and peered out; a short, but thick-bodied man, he had a round head and almost no discernible neck. The wind was picking up, and the sea was turning a grey colour, the wavetops whipped white.
Born near the River Tamar, William had not seen the sea until he was more than five-and-twenty years old and already a priest. There hadn’t seemed much point in going to look at a mass of water. Then he had sailed here, first to St Elidius, and more recently to Ennor, to his little church of St Mary’s, and he had loved the place immediately.
The church was set at the western edge of Porthenor, the ‘doorway’ to Ennor, the place where a boat could put in or go out. Here the church stood, high above the water, so that it should be safe even if there were a storm. There was a monk on St Nicholas Island who remembered storms which had brought the seas up the beach as far as the doors of his church; the saltwater had washed through the priory’s main undercroft, and it was only the speed of the monks that had rescued their wine.
Those storms must have been terrible, William thought. Not that the idea worried him. He had an entirely fatalistic attitude to life. If God wanted to take him, He would, and that would be that. In the meantime, William intended making the best fist of his life as possible.
On the opposite side of the bay he could see the cottages of the fishermen and peasants in the little town of La Val, as the monks from Tavistock called it. La Val — ‘Down There’. It was a silly name for the place, but William rather liked it. It made him feel as though he was set apart, up here on his hillside, peaceful in his isolation.
In the bay in front of him, he saw a small boat come racing in on the wind. That was strange in its own right. Usually ships had to make their way laboriously against the wind when they came up into this bay. The fact that this vessel was speeding along must mean that the wind had changed direction again. William gazed back out to sea and felt the first prickings of concern.
Far off to the east and south, a mass of blackness loomed menacingly on the horizon. It was the sort of weather that broke doors, tore away roofs, slaughtered cattle, and dropped tree limbs on unsuspecting fools as they lay in their beds. Awesome, impressive, and as terrible as God’s rage. If this storm came here and struck the islands, William reckoned he would be called out to many a burial.
The melancholy thought made him decide. He had a small flock of sheep, and before this weather hit, he must bed them down. Otherwise the lot would disperse all over the island … and there were some people who were less trustworthy than others. Better that he should prevent a peasant from being tempted. One of his lambs would be enough meat for a month for most of the families here, and many would be pleased to accept such a gift without asking God why He had so enriched them.
A sharp gust blew at him, hurling salty mizzle at his face, and he glanced back at the sea, murmuring a short prayer. Before long night would fall, and then any poor devils out there on the water would be at God’s mercy. It would be a terrible death for those who were thrown against the cruel spurs of rock that surrounded the islands. William set his jaw at the thought, then marched off to the lean-to shed behind his church. Stabbing a forkful of hay, he thrust it over his shoulder and followed the mud-filled track that led upwards to the fields that were a part of his glebe behind the church.
Here, he whistled and called to his little flock. A boy from La Val was there to guard them, but tonight William commanded him to return home. If the foul weather came here, it would be cruel to keep the lad out in the elements. Besides, as William gathered up his flock and took them down to the little rough-walled shed at the bottom of the pasture, he reflected that there was little point in the lad remaining. Protection against animals was unnecessary here. There were no wolves, no foxes; the worst pests were crows and dogs, and neither of them would be out once the storm hit.
There was a rock set at the highest point of his wall, where he often sat to muse and plot his sermons. The view from here, over the seas towards Geow and beyond, was always fascinating to him, and he found his thoughts cleared even on his worst days. Here he could create sermons even when in a lousy mood. Just the sight of ships on the sea made his heart swell with joy, and the thought of their cargos made the words leap into his mind.
Today he gazed about him anxiously. Out to sea there was no sign of any sails, and that at least was a relief. William wouldn’t want to think of a ship approaching the coast in this wind. It was already pulling at his habit, snapping at his cowl, a chill, bitter wind that felt as though it held sparks of ice even though it was too early in the year for that. The whipping at his skin set his cheeks tingling, as though they were licked by a hundred tiny candleflames. ‘Pity the poor mariner,’ he thought aloud.