The Awful Secret

Prologue

March 1195

The disabled ship drifted rapidly towards the lee shore, a rugged coast seen dimly in the dusk. Although by the violent standards of the Severn Sea the weather was far from extreme, there was a strong north-westerly wind, sufficient to raise spume from the crests of the grey Atlantic rollers and partly obscure the towering cliffs with spray.

The short, stumpy vessel pitched and rolled at the mercy of the waves, having no steerage-way from the single sail, which lay collapsed on the deck. Neither was there a steering oar near the stern, both that and the steersman having been washed away. The little ship was now merely flotsam awaiting the inevitable impact with the northern coast of Devon. The great cliffs, where Exmoor abruptly tumbled into the sea opposite distant Wales, now loomed on the port beam of the derelict. Although all the land immediately ahead was lower than to the east, it still presented a jagged prospect of rocks, reefs and coves.

The knarr was a broader version of the Viking longboat, with high stem and stern posts, but no dragon carvings ornamented it. The forward and after thirds were decked in, but the centre was an open hatch for the cargo. The canvas cover was gone, as was the cargo, and the hold was thigh-deep in water, which shipped over the sides each time the knarr broached the waves in its uncontrolled plunge towards the rocks.

Although it was dusk, there was still enough light for the sole survivor to see the corpse of one of his shipmates lying alongside him, his feet tangled in a rope, which had saved it from being washed overboard. Terrified, the young seaman clung to a fallen spar on the deck and stared ahead through the spray at the grey bulk of the shore, which seemed to race towards him. He knew most of the landmarks between Penzance and Bristol and, even through his fear, recognised to his left the Great Hangman, England’s highest cliff, which towered more than a thousand feet above the end of Combe Martin Bay.

As the last few cable-lengths of open sea gave way to thunderous white surf, he glimpsed a dim yellow light high on the land, above the point where the vessel must inevitably strike. A few seconds later, with a shriek of terror, the youth felt a grinding crash as a roller lifted the hull on to a jagged reef at the foot of a cliff. The impact tore his feeble grasp from the spar and, as the vessel tilted almost on to her beam ends, he slid across the deck and was washed off into the surf by the advancing wave. The breaker rolled him up a narrow gully between the rocks and almost contemptuously spat him out on to a tongue of shingle that ended in a shallow cave. Sobbing with fear and only half aware of his surroundings, he scrabbled on hands and knees through the white foam that streamed back to meet the next wave and collapsed far enough up the tiny beach to escape being sucked back into the sea.

Wet through in the keen wind, he lay shivering for a while, then slipped into unconsciousness, unaware of the wavering gleam of a horn lantern and the scrunch of feet that came down a narrow path from above.