Dispensation of Death

Chapter Three

Friday after the Feast of St Hilary¹

The Tabard Inn, Southwark, Surrey

Jack atte Hedge woke before dawn, as was his wont, and did not move in the dark as he listened to the breathing of the others in the room.

This was not the inn where he rested from choice. He had left most of his belongings and his horse over in Chelchede², to the south and west of Thorney Island, but he needed to study the place from this, the Surrey side of the river as well. There could be a useful angle which could be seen from here.

The inn was filled with travellers on their way to London, and the snoring and grumbling of the tranters, carters and men of some wealth was loud to his ear. He was used to sleeping apart from others and being so accustomed, he found the noise of this party almost deafening.

In the past he would have woken beneath a tree or beside a stream with the sound of birdsong as the thrushes, robins and blackbirds began to warm themselves for the day’s work. But that was in the days when he was more hardy. Truth be told, more recently he was grown soft. It had been many years since he had last slept in the open in winter. No one would do so from choice, and he found now that he couldn’t face the idea at all. Far better that he should sit in a warmer environment and stop his joints from aching, even if it did mean he must endure the row.

He rolled from the bed, a rough palliasse stuffed with straw, and the man who had shared it with him grunted and swore in his sleep. Dressing quickly, Jack pulled on his belt with his purse, then drew his knife’s cord over his head so that the small blade hung at his belly, down inside his shirt. This was his assurance of protection, a small knife that others might not notice. The second dangled from a leather strap, and he pulled that one over his head, feeling it as a comforting weight against his hip. No man with a brain would ever go unarmed, especially here near London. Then he had his purse on another belt, and his horn in case of troubles. With a horn a man might call for help at any time of the day or night. To walk abroad without one was almost a sign of irresponsibility. He took a few moments to stuff his pack, bind it, and then he was off.

The door was opened as he reached the hall, and he went straight out, thrusting his staff through the thongs binding his baggage to carry it more easily. It was a short walk up to the great bridge, less than a half-mile, but he chose to walk along the line of the Thames first, heading upstream as though idly. There was a track which looked as though it was a shepherd’s path; it meandered a little too close to the river, but was less muddy than some of the flats about.

It was a very wet part of the country, this. He muttered bitterly when his boot slipped through a thin crust of ice and he felt the first prickling of freezing water at his toes. Looking west from here, he could see some low hovels, but generally this close to the river there was nothing but mudflats and sodden, reeded marshland.

Over at the turn of the river he could see the little vill of Lambeth in the Marsh, a small cluster of houses with a couple of little orchards. He bent his path in that direction, eyeing the far bank as he went. The river here was a good width — almost impossible to cross without a boat or taking the bridge. He had once been a strong swimmer, but looking at the angry ripples on this water, he knew that was no possibility. Since the bridge’s building, the river had been effectively slowed, but that only made the currents more hazardous. No, he could not hope to escape by the water unless he stole a boat.

At the vill, a second path led south along the line of the river towards the Archbishop of Canterbury’s palace. Another path led about the palace’s walls, and he wandered along it idly. Near a gate in the Archbishop’s wall there was a landing stage, with five small boats moored. Jack stopped, set his staff on the ground, then thrust his thumbs in his belt and stared out over the water. On the other bank he could see the new chapel on the left, the two-storeyed quarters for the Queen, then the King’s own rooms, and his own, newer chapel of St Stephen, before the mass of the Great Hall. The two jetties were clear enough, and so near it looked as though a man might almost reach his hand out and touch them from a boat down there.

But there were problems. A man stood upon the wall behind him. Jack had heard the fellow sniff, hawk and spit a few moments ago, and the whole way over the river would be in plain sight of every guard here in Lambeth and over there at the island. If he were to try anything involving boats, he’d be better served to escape quickly, in any case. Rowing across the flow of the river was no good. It could only slow him, while guards on both banks loaded their bows and sent flight after flight to chase him.

However, perhaps he could use the river to his own advantage? He peered back the way he had come. There, just at the bend, was another little jetty with moorings. It was quieter, with only one boat, for this was by the vill he had passed through earlier, and Lambeth in the Marsh did not justify an enormous flotilla; however, that one little boat could be his saving. Perhaps he could use the landing stage for an escape if necessary? He could leave the island, let the current draw him away, increasing his speed quickly, and then hop off up there. It should be easy enough to escape without too much risk. They’d need boats to reach him, but he could cut the moorings before leaping into the last …

No. That would be the act of a much younger man, he grinned wryly to himself. He picked up his pack and shouldered his staff once more, setting off back the way he had come.

He only managed to cover fifty or sixty yards, and was some ten yards from a thicket, when he suddenly felt a hand grasp his shoulder.

‘Wait there, you. I saw you back there, staring down at our boats. What were you thinkin’ of, old man?’

Jack found himself pulled around to face a man of maybe two- or three-and-twenty. The fool had a leather cap, and a coif that was stained and marked with sweat. He was a man of no importance, that much was obvious, just a scruffy guard in the pay of the Archbishop, probably.

‘Friend, I am just a traveller. I wanted to look at the river, that’s all.’

‘That’s all, eh? I saw you staring out at the river, all right, but you were mainly watching what was happening all about here, weren’t you?’

‘Why should I want to do that?’

‘No honest man would, that is certain,’ the man said, standing back a little and eyeing him doubtfully. ‘But we’ve had some things stolen in the last weeks, and my master told me to stop anyone who looked suspicious.’

‘Me? Do you think I look suspicious, then?’ Jack chuckled. He rolled his eyes. The palace was in full view behind this interfering guard.

‘No, master. I suppose not. But you can’t blame me for checking, can you?’

‘Of course not. But …’ Jack paused, clutching at his chest, the breath hissing from clenched teeth.

‘Master? Christ’s ballocks … Master? Are you all right?’

‘Please, I need to sit under those trees. Their coolness will … ah! The pain!’

The guard threw an anxious look over his shoulder. Then, slipping his gauntleted hand under Jack’s armpit, he half-carried him to the thicket. There was a log, and he took Jack to it, helping him to sit down on it.

‘Thank you.’ Jack smiled up at him, and then slammed his right forearm upwards, the hand cupped back. As soon as the palm and ball of his thumb met the fellow’s chin, he straightened his arm and simultaneously launched his whole body up with all the power in his legs. There was a snap as the man’s teeth crashed together, and then a louder, harsher crack. The body was thrown back, and Jack caught him before he could hit the ground, gently turning him over and feeling the neck to make sure. There was a slight tension there, and he could feel some spasms in the thighs making the torso move, so he set the guard on the ground, put his knee in the small of his back, gripped the head, and pulled sharply backwards and to the side.

There was no one about. He took a rock and eyed the guard speculatively for a few moments, and then brought it down hard on the man’s left temple. The rock was tossed to the side of the roadway, and he picked up the guard and set his body down so that the head met the rock. Taking another large stone, he put that near the guard’s feet, as though he had tripped and pitched headlong onto the rock, and then he pushed the guard gently until he rolled slowly away from the road and into the drainage ditch at the side of the road.

There was no snow about here yet, but a thick layer of ice crunched and crackled as the body landed on it. There was enough blood on the roadway about the rock to show what he wanted.

And then Jack took up his staff again, and with a quick glance about him, he set off for the bridge once more.

He wanted no one left about either bank of the river who could remember him.

Furnshill Manor, Devon

Sir Baldwin de Furnshill was a tall man in his early fifties, and although he had the aches and pains which were the natural concomitants of his age, he was still proud enough of his past life as a fighter to practise each day with his sword and to ride and hunt as often as possible. He liked to remind his wife, when she remonstrated with him for his over-enthusiastic training, that there was little use to a knight, were he to be unpractised with his most valued weapons.

Not this morning, though. Today he had been asked to join the Bishop Walter Stapledon in his little house at Bishop’s Clyst, and the knight knew that he would be well advised to heed the summons.

For some little time past the Bishop had been trying to persuade him to accept an invitation to become a member of government. There were many who would be keen to accept such an advancement, if for no other reason than it gave them an opportunity to visit the realm’s first city and see with their own eyes the magnificent court which the King was building about himself. And naturally, most knights would be enthusiastic in case they might be noticed by Edward. There was much that a man might do with the King’s patronage.

Baldwin had no interest in any of these matters. Until the year of this King’s coronation³, he had been a contented warrior for the Poor Fellow Soldiers of Christ and the Temple of Solomon — a Knight Templar. But then came the appalling catastrophe. Late in that year, all the French Templars were captured in their preceptories and held. Over the next few years, many were tortured to force them to confess to sins they could not have committed, and several were burned at the stake for resiling.

Since the deaths of his Grand Master and his other comrades, Sir Baldwin had been keen to avoid politics and all other worldly affairs. Instead, he journeyed down here to Devon, where he took up the life of a rural knight, living on his small manor, and avoiding all great affairs of state so far as he possibly could.

Gradually, as he felt the pain and resentment at the injustice done to him and his companions begin to fade, he had befriended Simon Puttock. The result of that was that, with the aid of Bishop Walter II, he had been given the post of Keeper of the King’s Peace in Devon. Charged with the responsibility to seek out and capture felons, he had discovered a new interest: to prevent any injustices such as that perpetrated upon the Templars being replicated elsewhere.

And in the last few years he knew that the worst injustices being perpetrated upon a weary and fearful population were those which came from the King himself. There was little an ordinary person might achieve against the tyranny of King Edward II and his atrocious confederate, Hugh le Despenser.

It was that which in the end persuaded Baldwin that he should accept the Bishop’s proposal and take up a position with the parliament. He might be able to achieve little in the face of the bullying and dishonesty of so many others in the King’s councils, but if he could make even a small impact, that would be some good.

The journey to Bishop’s Clyst was not too taxing. He must ride along the line of the river from his home and pass around Exeter. The Bishop’s residence was some four or five leagues south and east of the city. Usually it was a fairly easy ride, which would take Baldwin a half-morning to complete, but today, with some ice on the roads, he was less sanguine about the journey.

‘You will be careful?’

‘My love, I am always careful,’ he smiled. His wife Jeanne was exhausted. For once she did not demand to join him on his journey. She had given birth to their son, also named Baldwin, a short while after midnight on Martinmas, and even a month later, she was still too weary to consider a ride to Exeter and back. The child was so demanding, her body had appeared to be sucked almost dry in the first fortnight. Baldwin had been shocked to see how her cheeks began to hollow, how her hair became bedraggled and greasy, and her eyes lost their sparkle.

Now, with God’s grace, she was a lot better. Her body had begun to fill out once more, and her eyes had regained their gleaming intelligence, although still with a certain red-rimmed exhaustion about them.

‘I shall be home before lunch tomorrow, I pray.’

‘Do so, husband. We miss you when you are abroad.’

‘Be glad, then, that there is no parliament yet. By the time it is called, I hope you will be able to join me. A journey to London or York would be a fine way to bring the colour back to your cheeks.’

She smiled at him, but shook her head. ‘I cannot even dream of such a journey, Baldwin. I am so weary, so weary. The child is strong, though. He thinks nothing of waking two or three times in the middle of the night to suck my pap.’

‘He will be strong,’ Baldwin assured her, peering down into the cradle where his son lay.

‘You should leave, not stand goggle-eyed at the sight of your son.’

‘Woman, I am gazing down at my firstborn son and marvelling at his perfection. Which is in truth a proof of the sire’s beauty.’

‘And nothing to do with the dam’s, I suppose?’

‘Madam, you merely own my heart,’ he swore, his hand on his breast.

‘Then stop letting your eyes slide to him, then,’ she laughed weakly. ‘Go!’

His horse was already waiting, and he was able to make the journey in good time, even with the hazardous roads. In less than a half-day, he was cautiously trotting over the icy wooden drawbridge to the Bishop’s well-protected manor. Soon afterwards he was in the Bishop’s hall, cupping his hands about a mazer of warmed and heavily spiced cider.

Bishop Walter II was a tall, stooped man in his sixties. His eyesight, never good, must now be supplemented with strong spectacles, which he was forced to hold over his nose with one hand while poring over documents. Still, he was a strong man, and although Baldwin knew he suffered dreadfully from piles, he had few other ailments to show how old he had grown.

‘I am glad you were able to come, Sir Baldwin,’ he said. For a moment or two he peered at Baldwin through his glass lenses, his eyes enormous and staring, and Baldwin was reminded of a man gazing in terror, until suddenly the Bishop threw the bone spectacles down with a petulant gesture.

‘My Lord Bishop? Is there something I can do to help you?’

‘Only one thing: I would have you travel with me to see the King. Sir Baldwin, there are matters which are being discussed, and I have been called to give my advice, such as I may. I should like you to join me. There is a need for sound heads. Dear God, yes.’