King's Gold

CHAPTER THIRTY

Worcester

It felt stifling.

Agatha had been to Worcester several times in her life, to markets and twice to see the executions, but today was different as she continued with Father Luke on towards her goal, the huge cathedral that stood in the middle of the city.

‘Let us enter and pray before we go to see him,’ Father Luke said as they reached the massive west door. He looked up, she saw, as though in profound piety, like a saint about to enter his named church, but it didn’t impress her. When they had entered the city, she had seen the way that he had eyed each tavern and low ale-house. He was no better than any other man, and was as keen on a drink as her own Ham had been.

Ham had loved coming to the market. There was always a good profit to be made, he reckoned. Not that Agatha saw it. He’d come, sell his produce, make money, and then spend it in a tavern and doze on the cart on the way home. She said he was a purse, accepting coins from one man and passing them on to another within the day.

He had been so enthusiastic when he was young, had Ham. He had plans then, for making money. It didn’t matter that he wasn’t a free man, he would say. Others had managed to build good flocks; buy houses and rent them — take a field or two and charge for pasturage. And he was right. Even the Bishop here at Worcester would be pleased with a serf who made money, for the Bishop took a tenth of everything the serf earned, as well as the best of his animals when he died. The system worked for everyone.

But then his enthusiasm waned. He was too comfortable, that was the trouble. He liked an easy life. That was why Agatha found the idea of Ham stealing the priest’s money so believable. He would have taken that opportunity if it fell into his lap.

In the thirty-odd miles to walk here, away from the vill and Jen, away from the daily drudge of milking, cleaning the sty, seeing to the chickens, preparing food and drink, listening all the while to Jen’s chattering, Agatha had had time to reflect, and not all her thoughts were comfortable.

For instance, she had always bemoaned her fate, thinking that her husband had cost her a better life. Alice shone as an example of how her life could be improved. Yet now she wondered whether Ham had ever felt the same. Maybe he thought that he could have done better without her. There were women who inspired their menfolk, she knew. They would flatter and cajole, promise favours later in their beds, and in other ways persuade.

Not all succeeded, for there were three women in the vill who were thought either to be shrews who deserved a thrashing, or foolish chits who should be regularly beaten. In Agatha’s mind, all were equally stupid. A woman who didn’t expect her husband to treat her with respect was a fool. If Ham had ever tried to beat her, she would have made him regret it. Without a doubt some of Ham’s friends looked down on him because he couldn’t cow her. So be it. If a man tried to thrash her, she’d soon give him reason to regret his temerity!

Father Luke was at the door now, and she came to with a start. For a moment there, she had been back in the past with her memories. Now she recalled that there was a sterner purpose to her visit here. She nodded and walked in after him, and stood in the vast, echoing nave.

It was busy. Three merchants stood at the side, arguing loudly about a sale, while a peasant with two grey raches stood, head lowered, brows beetling as he stared truculently towards the altar. A woman knelt on the stone floor, weeping and pulling her hair while two boys and a young girl stood at her side looking baffled and anxious. A couple at the back of the church were holding hands, he pretending to be entirely unaware of the woman at his side, while she gazed adoringly up into his face. Two old men sat on the floor, backs to the wall, playing a game of knucklebones, one chuckling throatily and holding out his hand for a penny.

A priest was trying to catch two boys who darted in and out among the congregation, but he was too fat and slow to make any headway. The boys ran laughing loudly, while the incense soared up to the roof and priests mumbled their incomprehensible words. It was enough to make a body give up on the Church, she told herself.

They prayed, and then waited until Father Luke could speak to a cleric. Soon Luke was beckoned, and he followed the cleric out.

Agatha did not mind. Women would not be welcome in the Bishop’s Palace, she knew, and she was content to leave Father Luke to conduct the interview. He was too simple to think of bilking her and trying to get out of the arrangement. For it was in his interests to find that money now, too. He was an old fool, to be sure, but he seemed to think he had the vill’s future to think of. He would work hard to bring the money back to Willersey.

‘Well?’ she demanded as he strode back to her where she waited outside, some while later.

Looking up, he registered how far the sun had moved across the sky. ‘Past noon already,’ he muttered.

‘Well?’ she repeated. ‘What did he say?’

‘He said, if I thought he had time enough on his hands to call on the posse and organise a search for one cart and one horse, no matter what was on the cart, I was a fool and didn’t deserve my living at Willersey. He let me understand that if I didn’t find enough to occupy me there, he would find someone else who would be happy to take my place, and further, there were posts in much colder, less pleasant places, where recalcitrant priests could be sent. Then he told me that if no one had reported the theft of the horse and cart when Ham was found, perhaps neither was there in the first place. And if it was true that a horse and cart were stolen, then the vill had been trying to evade their fair taxes.’

‘Did you tell him about the money?’

He looked at her. ‘You see this church?’ he asked rhetorically. ‘It costs a lot to run. If he heard of any money, that would be the last the vill would see of it.’

‘Oh.’ She sighed. At least that meant that only she and Father Luke knew of it. The secret was safe. ‘So we must return, then?’ she wondered. And then what — just leave the cart to whoever had stolen it?

‘I will not,’ Father Luke said. ‘The good Bishop has no time for such matters, but your husband is dead. The man who committed that murder and stole your cart and horse deserves punishment.’

‘What now, then?’

Father Luke stared at the altar as though seeking inspiration. Slowly, he said, ‘We could go to our lord and beg his aid.’

‘To Berkeley?’

‘Yes. My Lord Berkeley owns our manor. It would be reasonable for him to send men to hunt down this thief and murderer.’

She looked at him, and then slowly nodded. ‘If you are sure.’

‘I am.’ His face showed a stern determination. Agatha could not see that within his soul, he seethed at the way the Bishop had spoken to him.

‘Why do you seek this cart, Father?’ the Bishop had demanded satirically. ‘What is so fascinating about it?’

‘It is a matter of distress to Ham’s widow,’ Father Luke said.

‘Ah, see — and is this widow buxom? Has she a good broad hip to take hold of?’ the Bishop laughed.

‘My Lord Bishop, she is only recently widowed, and besides, my vows would not permit me to consider her in that light!’

‘So you say, so you say,’ the Bishop said easily. He had a mazer full of wine, and now he drained it, studying Luke over the brim. ‘But you listen to me, good Father Luke. I will not have my priests attempting to take advantage of the women in their care, you understand? If I hear you’ve been trying to get under her skirts, you will find yourself in my gaol faster than a drawlatch on Christmas Day.’

Agatha caught a little of his black mood. ‘What did he say to you?’

‘Nothing that matters,’ he lied. He had seen the clerk and asked that a priest be sent to Willersey for some days while he was away. He hoped only for a matter of a week or so, but it was impossible to say. ‘What does matter is that we should make our way down to Berkeley now. It should only take us two or three days. And there, with fortune, we may be granted a little justice.’

Friday before Palm Sunday

Near Tidintune

Harry le Cur heard the man roll over. There was a quiet moment, in which Dolwyn opened his eyes and glanced about him, and then he tried to sit up, and groaned loudly.

‘You should rest yourself,’ Harry said. He walked over to stand at Dolwyn’s side. ‘You’ve been very ill.’

‘It feels like I’ve been squashed against a wall by an ox,’ Dolwyn said gruffly. ‘My whole body aches.’

‘Aye, well, you should be glad you have any feeling. You ought to be dead,’ Harry said.

‘What happened?’

‘You were stabbed in the side, remember? We came across you in the road, but you collapsed. We’re lucky that the woman here was prepared to help and nurse you. She saved your life.’

‘I am grateful,’ he said. His eyes were still dulled with the fever that had ravaged his body for the last days. ‘Is she here?’

‘She sleeps,’ Harry said, pointing to the palliasse on the floor a few yards away. Helen was exhausted and deeply asleep, snoring very faintly and whistling. ‘She’s nursed you for three days. Without her, you would have died.’

Dolwyn nodded and sank back on his bedding. He shivered slightly, and pulled a blanket up over his body. ‘You said three days?’

‘Yes.’

‘That cannot be.’

Harry looked down at him. ‘You can take my word on it.’

‘But I must get away!’

‘To deliver your weapons?’

Dolwyn went quiet, watching like a rabbit who fears the snare. ‘Weapons?’

‘We found everything. Why would a carter have need of so many weapons?’

‘I don’t think. .’

‘It interests us. But I suppose it’s none of our business.’ Harry looked at him doubtfully. ‘We found a casket there, too. Filled with riches beyond my dreams — and my dreams are vivid.’

‘It isn’t mine,’ Dolwyn stated blankly. Riches? A treasure? Who had put that there?

‘I was sure of that already,’ Harry said drily.

‘I was taking provisions to Kenilworth with a purveyor, but there was a fight when we arrived, and he ran off. I had to hurry to ride away myself, too, and all the load remained. It must have been his, I suppose,’ Dolwyn said, still confused, thinking, What was that carter doing with a box of money?

Palm Sunday

Llantony Priory

Their journey had been a lengthy one, but they were making good time, Edgar thought as he jogged along behind Sir Baldwin.

They were approaching the abbey of Llantony-next-Gloucester, which was where they intended staying for the night after two days of steady riding. Edgar was wary whenever he was riding about country he did not know — and today he had a firm conviction that they were entering a place of danger. It was not the location that was threatening: it was the fact that all those in the party guarding Sir Edward felt so secure. The guards were confident that no one would try to attack them while inside an abbey, and that meant they were unconscious of the potential dangers. Because of this, Edgar experienced a nervous tension that he had not known since the days when he and Sir Baldwin had been in flight in France after the arrest of their companions in the Templar Order.

Llantony-next-Gloucester was a small abbey that nestled to the south of the great city of Gloucester, a daughter-house of the priory in Wales, and one in which Edgar felt sure they must be moderately safe, but it was this last stage before reaching it that made him anxious. The houses began to crowd in upon them, and instead of the broad swathe of open verge, where he felt secure from all but a crossbow bolt, now they were riding in among buildings that overlooked the road. Assassins in those jettied rooms would find it easy to brain any number of the men in Sir Edward’s guard.

Not that Edgar himself was fretting. His tension came from an appreciation of dangers, not a terror of them — unlike Sir Edward himself. All had seen how the man who had once been their King was bowed down with troubles.

Edgar had seen a man like that before, and for the last day or two he had tried to bring the man’s face or name to mind, but there was nothing to spark a connection, until he saw Edward glance around at a sudden crash. The noise was caused by a horse slipping on a wet cobblestone, but in Edward’s eyes Edgar saw a sudden terror mingled with a kind of hope, as though this could at last be the end. That was what Edgar saw in his eyes: a longing for it to be over.

Baldwin was nearby. ‘What is it, Edgar? Something wrong?’

‘No, I was just reminded of the servant who stole the bread at Acre.’

Baldwin winced at the memory.

It had been a dreadful siege. Although the Christians held on, all knew that they would not be able to keep the Mameluke forces at bay for ever.

And then the lad — what was his name? Balian or something similar, a lad of some seventeen years like Edgar and Baldwin themselves — had given in. He tried to steal a crust of mouldy bread, and when he was seen, he drew his knife in a frenzy of hunger, and slew the owner.

Yes. Sir Edward wore the same look as Balian had as he was dragged away to execution: a look of mingled terror and relief. Terror to be slain, but relief to know that at last the long wait was over.

But Sir Edward’s torment was not over.