Next day they marched downstream to Abbeville, location of the last bridge before the Somme widened into an estuary; but the burgesses of the town had spent money, over the years, strengthening the walls, and the English could see it was impregnable. So cocksure were the citizens that they sent out a large force of knights to attack the vanguard of the English army, and there was a fierce skirmish before the locals withdrew back inside their walled town.
When Philippe’s army left Amiens, and started advancing from the south, Edward found himself trapped in the point of a triangle: on his right the estuary, on his left the sea, and behind him the French army, baying for the blood of the barbaric invaders.
That afternoon, Earl Roland came to see Ralph.
Ralph had been fighting in Roland’s retinue for seven years. The earl no longer regarded him as an untried boy. Roland still gave the impression that he did not much like Ralph, but he certainly respected him, and would always use him to shore up a weak point in the line, lead a sally or organize a raid. Ralph had lost three fingers from his left hand, and had walked with a limp when tired ever since a Frenchman’s pikestaff had cracked his shinbone outside Nantes in 1342. Nevertheless, the king had not yet knighted Ralph, an omission which caused Ralph bitter resentment. Por all the loot he had garnered – most of it held for safekeeping by a London goldsmith – Ralph was unfulfilled. He knew that his father would be equally dissatisfied. Like Gerald, Ralph fought for honour, not money; but in all this time he had not climbed a single step up the staircase of nobility.
When Roland appeared, Ralph was sitting in a field of ripening wheat that had been trampled to shreds by the army. He was with Alan Fernhill and half a dozen comrades, eating a gloomy dinner, pea soup with onions: food was running out, and there was no meat left. Ralph felt as they did, tired from constant marching, dispirited by repeated encounters with broken bridges and well-defended towns, and scared of what would happen when the French army caught up with them.
Roland was now an old man, his hair and beard grey, but he still walked erect and spoke with authority. He had learned to keep his expression stonily impassive, so that people hardly noticed that the right side of his face was paralysed. He said: “The estuary of the Somme is tidal. At low tide, the water may be shallow in places. But the bottom is thick mud, making it impassable.”
“So we can’t cross,” said Ralph. But he knew Roland had not come just to give him bad news, and his spirits lifted optimistically.
“There may be a ford – a point where the bottom is firmer,” Roland went on. “If there is, the French will know.”
“You want me to find out.”
“As quick as you like. There are some prisoners in the next field.”
Ralph shook his head. “Soldiers might have come from anywhere in France, or even other countries. It’s the local people who will have the information.”
“I don’t care who you interrogate. Just come to the king’s tent with the answer by nightfall.” Roland walked away.
Ralph drained his bowl and leaped to his feet, glad to have something aggressive to do. “Saddle up, lads,” he said.
He still had Griff. Miraculously, his favourite horse had survived seven years of war. Griff was somewhat smaller than a warhorse, but had more spirit than the oversized destriers most knights preferred. He was now experienced in battle, and his iron-shod hooves gave Ralph an extra weapon in the melee. Ralph was more fond of him than of most of his human comrades. In fact the only living creature to whom he felt closer was his brother, Merthin, whom he had not seen for seven years – and might never see again, for Merthin had gone to Florence.
They headed north-east, towards the estuary. Every peasant living within half a day’s walk would know of the ford if there was one, Ralph calculated. They would use it constantly, crossing the river to buy and sell livestock, to attend the weddings and funerals of relatives, to go to markets and fairs and religious festivals. They would be reluctant to give information to the invading English, of course – but he knew how to solve that problem.
They rode away from the army into territory that had not yet suffered from the arrival of thousands of men, where there were sheep in the pastures and crops ripening in the fields. They came to a village from which the estuary could be seen in the far distance. They kicked their horses into a canter along the grassy track that led into the village. The one-room and two-room hovels of the serfs reminded Ralph of Wigleigh. As he expected, the peasants fled in all directions, the women carrying babies and children, most of the men holding an axe or a sickle.
Ralph and his companions had played out this drama twenty or thirty times in the past few weeks. They were specialists in gathering intelligence. Usually, the army’s leaders wanted to know where local people had hidden their stocks. When they heard the English were coming, the sly peasants drove their cattle and sheep into woods, stashed sacks of flour in holes in the ground, and hid bales of hay in the bell tower of the church. They knew they would probably starve to death if they revealed where their food was, but they always told sooner or later. On other occasions the army needed directions, perhaps to an important town, a strategic bridge, a fortified abbey. The peasants would usually answer such inquiries unhesitatingly, but it was necessary to make sure they were not lying, for the shrewder among them might try to deceive the invading army, knowing the soldiers were not able to return to Punish them.
As Ralph and his men chased the fleeing peasants across gardens and fields, they ignored the men and concentrated on the women and children. Ralph knew that if he captured them, their husbands and fathers would come back.
He caught up with a girl of about thirteen. He rode alongside her for a few seconds, watching her terrified expression. She was dark-haired and dark-skinned, with plain, homely features, young but with a rounded woman’s body – the type he liked. She reminded him of Gwenda. In slightly different circumstances he would have enjoyed her sexually, as he had several similar girls in the last few weeks.
But today he had other priorities. He turned Griff to cut her off. She tried to dodge him, tripped over her own feet and fell flat in a vegetable patch. Ralph leaped off his horse and grabbed her as she got up. She screamed and scratched his face, so he punched her in the stomach to quiet her, then he grabbed her long hair. Walking his horse, he began to drag her back to the village. She stumbled and fell, but he just kept going, dragging her along by the hair; and she struggled to her feet, crying in pain. After that, she did not fall again.
They gathered in the little wooden church. The eight English soldiers had captured four women, four children and two babies in arms. They made them sit on the floor in front of the altar. A few moments later a man ran in, babbling in the local French, begging and pleading. Four others followed.
Ralph was pleased.
He stood at the altar, which was only a wooden table painted white. “Quiet!” he shouted. He waved his sword. They fell silent. He pointed at a young man. “You,” he said. “What are you?”
“A leather worker, lord. Please don’t harm my wife and child, they’ve done you no wrong.”
He pointed to another man. “You?”
The girl he had captured gasped, and Ralph concluded that they were related; father and daughter, he guessed.
“Just a poor cowherd, lord.”