The Best British Mysteries III

Living with the Gilt by Judith Cutler

Simon de Rougemont reined in his horse the better to gaze with pleasure upon his newly acquired domain. It was his reward for services rendered to William the Bastard. Every prospect pleased: the rich pastures, the wooded slopes teeming, no doubt, with game, and the glittering river promising fine fishing. And the settlement, of course. He sighed. Only man, in the form of his reluctant tenantry, was vile.

Beside him, Claude Villeneuve, the interpreter foisted on him by necessity, sniffed audibly. ‘To think that they call this a village!’ Claude’s finger led his lord’s eye to the cluster of low wooden huts, reed-thatched, from the roofs of which smoke meandered through more orifices than the builder had presumably intended. ‘Animals!’ the young man added tersely ‘In fact, worse than animals, which know no better.’

Simon raised a minatory hand. ‘Only think how much greater will be the joys of civilising them. First of all, we will build a church worthy of the name of the Almighty. And then we will introduce them to a proper legal system -’

‘Fortifying your castle is the best way of civilising those beasts.’

Simon chose to ignore the interruption. Somehow this invasion – no, this just retrieval of lands willed to William – had contrived to bring to the fore men who would never in earlier days have achieved any prominence. Some of his fellow barons were behaving in the most ungodly ways, in the interests, they insisted, of the rapid subjugation of their English cousins. To Simon’s mind, they were little better – and sometimes regrettably worse – than the savage Saxons whose confiscated fiefdoms they had been granted.

‘Not just wooden palisades,’ Villeneuve continued. ‘Good stone walls. The sort of building to show who’s boss.’ He dropped his whip ostentatiously. ‘Oy! You. You there!’ he slipped off his right glove to click his fingers.

A broad-shouldered man in his early twenties walked unsmilingly, and unhurriedly, towards them. He picked up the whip, reaching up to restore it to Villeneuve’s grasp. If he did not expect largesse, he certainly would not have expected the vicious cut across the cheek to which Villeneuve treated him. But he neither flinched nor swore, merely stepping back a pace and regarding his assailant steadily, as if to fix Villeneuve’s face in his memory.

‘Enough of that,’ Simon said sharply, as even their escort of soldiers shifted uneasily. ‘Law enforcement is one thing, brutality another. We are here -’

‘I know, to civilise and secure. But they’re like dogs, my lord – they need to be shown who’s in charge.’

‘So you say. With undue frequency, if you will permit the observation.’ Simon raised an acid eyebrow. He was Villeneuve’s senior not just in rank but also in age: Why should the wretched man not show him due respect?

Villeneuve was unmoved. ‘Now, how about that for a game piece?’

He pointed with the offending whip at another villager.

‘For God’s sake, man, can you think with nothing but your fist or your pizzle?’

The young woman in question, though, like all the villagers, thin to the point of emaciation, was extremely pretty, and her shabby, shapeless gown couldn’t conceal her magnificent breasts. But her occupation declared itself all too clearly as her charges trotted in front of her.

‘You’ll be forbidding access to the forest, no doubt, my lord?’ Villeneuve suggested.

It would be pleasant to believe that Villeneuve had only good husbandry in mind.

‘Only if my land agent recommends it. But there is nothing like pigs for keeping down undergrowth: I welcome them back in my estates in Beaune.’ He almost expected Villeneuve to protest that those were French porkers, these merely swine. ‘And remember the pig’s nose for truffles.’

‘I have a nose for something else,’ Villeneuve declared, swinging down from the saddle, contriving, as he landed in the mud, not to hear his lord’s rebuke. He set off briskly after the swineherd, slipping an arm round her to pull her face to his. His free hand was ready to pull her shift from her breast.

Simon swore in exasperation. There was no law to say a soldier couldn’t kiss pretty damsels. Kiss and more. It was almost de rigueur. Young men had appetites. And many a girl had a gown to her back and food in her belly she’d have lacked but for the generosity of the man who’d bedded her. But Villeneuve, old enough at twenty-five to know better, didn’t differentiate between a supposedly welcome frolic and what was seemly in the confines of the stockade, for example. At least in his lord’s sober company, however, he must no doubt show a little restraint.

Simon swore again, but this time with anger. Restraint! Well, if Villeneuve didn’t show it, at least the young woman did. Even from where he sat, Simon could see her pull back her hand to strike the face now so offensively close to hers, but hold off from the final blow. Not, Simon thought, from cowardice – though she could have been excused for fearing that she would not strike a conqueror with impunity – but, from the expression on her face, distaste at the prospect of having her wrist captured, as inevitably it would be. However thin and ragged the woman – and what Saxon after the long campaign would be sleek and smart? – and however lowly her function, she possessed a dignity that appealed to the older man, and he spurred his horse forward to deal with Villeneuve. But he was not the only one. One of the pigs, almost as if responding to the girl’s choked cry, turned sharply and, head down, charged, its evil little eyes like blazing beads. Villeneuve was too absorbed in extracting a kiss to notice. But the young man who might have been expected to relish a terrible injury to the Norman stepped swiftly forward, bringing down the shaft of his axe hard enough to stun the pig in mid charge. It reeled drunkenly away. Simon dismounted, elbowing Villeneuve sharply back to his mount. He dipped into his purse. The coins he proffered needed no interpretation, nor did the silent doffing of the man’s cap as he accepted them. But for all the goodwill in the world, Simon could not frame in the man’s own tongue the words of gratitude he sought, and he was a man of few gestures. At last the young woman stepped forward, pointing at the pig and making from her own breasts to the bottom of her belly a sign they all understood – the pig was in fact a sow and was enceinte. She waved her hands vigorously from side to side, pointing back to the sow. This, she gave Simon clearly to understand, was not the moment to upset a female.

Villeneuve was, alas, too highly born for Simon to condemn him to a public beating for disobeying orders. But he had to endure a veritable tongue-lashing, and lost his privileges for many days. Simon would have sent him home in disgrace immediately had he not needed him so much: to discuss the plans for the improvement of the stockade, to find the best timber, locate the purest springs. And to recruit – if that was not too mealy-mouthed a term – the local workmen. Simon was entitled to enslave the entire populace and work it to death if so he wished. Many of his brother barons certainly did. But he was a soldier, not a slave master, and though he didn’t think anyone had ever accused him of lax discipline, he preferred to temper force with fairness. And, like every good soldier, he prided himself on knowing not just every man in his command but also what that man’s function was and where he might be found at any time.

Most of the men were serfs, unskilled men with little to commend them except their numbers and their – enforced -willingness. But others – the scaffolders, the carpenters – had an expertise that Simon found himself respecting. One of the latter was the young man who’d saved Villeneuve from the pig. They would greet each other with a silent nod. Simon had no desire to encourage insubordination; no doubt the carpenter – Beom – didn’t want to toady. At least, however, it was a greeting. Perhaps, Simon reflected, it wasn’t just his new hilltop castle that was being built, looming over the countryside with threatening grandeur. Perhaps a bridge was being slowly built between the rulers and the ruled.

Except that even as he turned to inspect the next section of bailey, he could see Villeneuve still going his best to chop the imaginary bridge off at the foundations, harrying, striking, cutting with his glove. Would he never learn?

‘Enough!’ Simon shouted. ‘If you spent more time on your own function, less on interfering with others’, I should be better satisfied. I said, enough! Present yourself to me tomorrow morning, after prayer.’

The animals were hungry. Well, the people were hungry, and devoured scraps which would normally have been the swines’ almost by right. So Aedburgha had let her charges wander deeper than usual into the forest, rooting through beech mast and snuffling for acorns. Aedburgha could still hear them, would be able to gather them together when dusk came. She sat against the south face of an oak tree, huddling in what little sun penetrated the gloom, and wished that there was more bread. Not that she was unhappy. She was handfasted to Beom, a good man seemingly well respected up at the castle. And now she was with child – her breasts and latterly her belly assured her this was so – they would soon be married. As for living – well, he would build them their own place as soon as he had the chance. And the few groats the Normans doled out would help.

Maybe if Beom spoke well of her, she might find work up there herself. But when she asked if he’d done so, he always found some excuse, and the village rumours suggested he was right. Better be poor with your pigs for company than poor with unruly hands to fend off. But there were other more welcome hands. She smiled to herself. It was about this time that Beom would be making his way back through the forest. He told his masters he was discussing with the forester which trees to fell next, which would season well. And because he was an honest man, she was sure he did. At the end of the day he would help her gather the swine together and herd them back to shelter. But between the forestry and his herding, there was time for the sort of moment that made her lean back against the tree, a smile softening her face.

She was waiting for him. Look at her: not so much waiting as positively inviting. Villeneuve’s eyes relished her face as he imagined pushing apart those soft lips. But the lips weren’t his target. Oh no. Much lower down. Which would he do? Take her by surprise? Or enjoy the thrill of the chase, see her eyes flare, see her run from him, falling as he caught her and watch her face contort as he took her? Some men said women liked force. Like it or not, that was what she was going to get. He thought with his fist or his pizzle, did he? Well, as he slipped from his horse, he knew just what he was thinking with today.

No one up at the castle took much notice when Villeneuve was late for the evening meal. It wasn’t the first time, probably wouldn’t be the last. Not unless Simon chose to make a real example of him. Yes, this time he must. The man’s swaggering insolence set a bad example to men all too ready to follow it. As for his fornication, the Lady Rosamunde, who would be joining Simon as soon as the living quarters were ready for feminine company, would demand an end to that. She’d been ready to embrace a contemplative life when her father had preferred a more earthly union for her, and she brought to Simon’s circle an air of delicacy and refinement he could see was sadly lacking now. Tomorrow morning, then, Villeneuve would be flogged and sent on his way. If Simon himself still found it impossible to get his tongue around the agglomeration of alien diphthongs these Saxons insisted on calling a language, many of his men had devised a rough lingua franca which enabled them to communicate. Another interpreter they would surely need, but they could make shift – wasn’t that the term he’d heard Beom using? – until the replacement arrived. Tomorrow. So be it.

How dare the wretched man disobey a direct order? There was no sign of him at the time Simon had appointed. When asked, his colleagues shuffled awkwardly. Perhaps he was dealing with a thick, mead-filled head? For whatever reason, he hadn’t appeared in the chapel, nor had he broken his fast with the others, either in the hall or in the guardroom, where he was wont to boast of the previous night’s amorous adventures. It wasn’t the first time his servant had to admit that his master had not returned at all – perhaps he had found a congenial bed to wait in till curfew was lifted. Rutting when he should have been begging his lord for mercy? Simon slammed his fist into his palm with anger. When noon had come and gone, however, he despatched search parties. A Norman – even one intent on dalliance – did not go far without armour, but all Villeneuve had taken, his servant admitted, were his helm and his hauberk.

‘Has his horse returned yet?’ Simon demanded. Perhaps he was being unjust. The man might simply have taken a toss and be lying unconscious.

The answer was negative. But that was inconclusive, too: a foot in a rabbit hole could injure a horse as well as a man. More ominously, the ability of the Saxons to spirit away a valuable horse was legendary.

The search parties returned with nothing to report.

‘No tracks? No signs of a scuffle?’ he demanded. ‘Did the dogs pick up no scent?’

‘Only the smell of pigs, my lord. That young woman’s let the damned animals range the whole forest.’

‘Come, the man couldn’t have vanished into thin air! Have you questioned the villagers?’

‘Villeneuve was the only man who could talk to them,’ came the predictable reply.

Simon knew what Villeneuve’s counsel would have been. It was standard, if illegal, policy. They kill one of ours, we kill as many of theirs as we can lay hands on. But what was the point of such measures if those punished didn’t know what they were being punished for? A baser thought struck him. Mass executions would delay the building of his private quarters, and the Lady Rosamunde was joining him on the understanding that the nearest he could achieve to civilisation was awaiting her. Damn Villeneuve: an irritation in life, and now irritation in what was almost certainly death.

There must be some in the team of workmen who spoke French well enough to assist him in the interrogations he knew he must carry out. He summoned Luc, his clerk of works, a man, like himself, of middle years.

‘It’s hard to tell, my lord. There’s plenty that understand without wanting to let on, if you see what I mean. Sullen, some of them. But there’s one that’s grown into a sort of foreman -thickset man, early twenties. Listens more than he talks, it’s true. But there’s a look about his eyes, if you know what I mean – like a good alert dog.’

‘And he speaks French?’

Luc shook his head. ‘I don’t say that. I do say he’ll understand enough to find someone who does or just to get the whisper going round that you’re going to torch the village if they don’t come up with news of Villeneuve. That’ll bring some action.’

‘I don’t like making threats I can’t fulfil,’ Simon said, almost to himself.

The clerk looked at him. ‘Ah, you’re the sort that’d rather build up than pull down! And…’

‘Go on, man.’

To his astonishment, Luc blushed. ‘I’ve – well, I’ve got my own reasons why I don’t want the village destroyed.’

‘The usual?’ he asked tolerantly.

‘She’s what they call a comely wench, my lord.’

‘So you can speak their tongue?’

‘Who said anything about speaking, my lord? But we’ve got one on the way, and to my mind – well, isn’t conquest by the cock kinder than conquest by the sword?’

‘So it’s a political bedding, is it?’ Simon laughed. ‘Go and fetch your foreman, Luc, and we’ll see if we older ones can achieve what the younger ones can’t.’

Within a few minutes a familiar figure bent a polite but not obsequious head. Beom. So that was the foreman. Simon wasn’t surprised. Beom listened with an air of calm dignity, but, as Luc had predicted, gave little away. Little – apart, perhaps, from a tiny frisson of – of fear?

Surely not. Within the tiniest of moments, his face was phlegmatic again. Nodding, he listened to Simon, raising a hand to his ear when he wanted a phrase repeated.

‘You know this knight of mine?’ Simon asked at last.

Beom’s features assumed a sneer, and he mimed the big-balls swagger of a man set on sexual conquest. Oh yes: He knew him, all right.

‘And does he have enemies?’

Beom’s disbelieving shrug would have put a Norman’s to shame it was so expansive. Such a man undoubtedly had enemies. Beom even managed an ironic smile, pointing to the scar left by Villeneuve’s whip.

‘Did you kill him?’

Eyes meeting his lord’s, Beom shook his head.

‘Do you know the man who did?’

The same response.

‘Tomorrow morning I shall question every man in the village, and you will tell me their answers. If the murderer confesses, I shall spare the rest of the village.’

Beom nodded. Simon waved him away. But he stood his ground, and for the first time spoke. He had to repeat what he said several times before Simon could understand him. At last it seemed to make sense: ‘Have you found this man’s body yet?’

Simon decided to treat the man honestly. He shook his head.

Was it relief that flashed across Beom’s face? Ah, a man like him would know the law, wouldn’t he? Wherever a Norman body was found, the nearest village would find itself paying a punitive fine.

Simon had no compunction in ousting what had been the thegn from his hut and appropriating his chair. The only chair. My God, no wonder these people shuffled round older than their years if they squatted all the time! He asked each villager, freeman or serf, the same questions, making them lay their hands on his Bible as they replied. And Simon, even without this, would have believed them. There was an air of bafflement about them, not to mention the terror of losing more of what little they had.

At the end of a tedious morning, Simon waved them all away. ‘Beom, get them all back to work. My wife will be coming next week: everything must be ready for her.’

It was the sort of day that you wished you could cram into a flask and keep forever. The sun was warm on his back, the air full of birdcall. And the news, that the Lady Rosamunde had but this morning whispered that she was soon to offer him another pledge of her love for him, still sang in his ears. Simon rode gently down to the village. Another hut was being built: Beom had told him it was his and his new wife’s. Aedburgha was nowhere to be seen. She must be near her time now. The squeals of her charges told him where he might find her, and he never had any objections to being smiled on by – what was the term? – a comely wench. He reeled in shock when he saw what she and another woman were doing to the young pigs they’d penned immovably in a tight wattle tunnel. It was all very swift, of course, but the very thought brought tears to his eyes.

If Beom was now speaking a little of his tongue, Aedburgha still relied on sign language. She pointed to the sows, the sleekest and best looking he’d seen since he’d come over from Beaune. Then there came piglets. She mimed a fierce boar, then a snip. She smiled, waving her hands to show all fierceness was over, and that the desexed animals would grow big and fat and healthy. Next came a fearsome pregnant sow. She gestured a slit: The female ones, untroubled by pregnancy, would do the same. Suddenly she reached for one and held it up, still bleeding after surgery. Heavens, she was giving him a pig.

He took it graciously, but handed it swiftly to the soldier escorting him. He hoped and he trusted that the villagers were coming to appreciate his humanity and realise they could get a man six times worse in his place, but he didn’t take risks. This, however, must be the ultimate peace offering – a woman who had been insulted by one of his henchmen giving something she could ill afford. She waved away the coin he offered. A good woman. The sort who might attend the Lady Rosamunde when her time came.

‘Pig?’ he said carefully, pointing at the wriggling animal. No, it would be another word for the female. ‘Sow?’

She shook her head. ‘Gilt,’ she said. She pointed to an animal which had not yet been on the receiving end of her ministrations. ‘Sow.’ Then she pointed to the one she’d given him. ‘Gilt.’

Lords might do as they liked, and if Simon chose to visit a small wattle enclosure to check his animal’s daily progress, there was no one with the temerity to laugh. In fact, it was while he was scratching her ears and speculating on the quality of the meat she would produce that Luc came up to him. One look at his face told Simon he’d rather not hear his news.

Luc produced from his tunic a ring. ‘Found it when I was casting a line yesterday evening. Villeneuve’s, isn’t it, my lord?’ He polished it before he handed it over. ‘See – that’s his crest.’

Simon took it. Yes, it looked like it, didn’t it? ‘The river you say?’ He held Luc’s gaze. ‘The man must have dropped it and tried to save it. The water’s very swift, and of course his helm and hauberk would weigh him down. Even Villeneuve wasn’t so stupid as to go round without them. Drowned, swept away. Poor bastard. Still, it’s good to have the mystery solved. I’ll get the priest to write to his family. Thank you, Luc.’

Alone once more, Simon stared at the sow, currently tucking into scraps from last night’s venison and some mouldy bread. Her little eyes were contented, almost benign. Not like those of the raging sow that had almost done for Villeneuve. The pregnant ones were dangerous under provocation. Aedburgha had shown him. He shivered. Provocation? What if Villeneuve had renewed his assault on Aedburgha? What if the sow -? Or, God help him, what if pregnant women were equally dangerous. God knew she’d been provoked…but sufficiently provoked to kill? There was no doubt how she’d have disposed of the body – her pigs would have fallen readily upon anything they thought edible.

He buried his face in his hands. He represented law and order and justice here. If there was a crime, it must be punished. But Beom had told him only two days before that he was now the proud father of a hopeful son, and Simon had offered to be a sponsor at the child’s christening. In his mind’s eye he could see the little family, the newborn suckling at its mother’s breast – a breast that he’d hoped would nourish his and Rosamunde’s own child when the time came. Could such a woman really have killed a man and fed his flesh to those remarkably healthy sows? If he ordered Beom’s hut to be pulled down, would they find the contents of Villeneuve’s purse buried under the foundations? He looked at the ring.

The armour! That would provide the answer.

But a woman who knew the forest as she did would have had no difficulty hiding a helm, even bulky chain mail – up one tree, inside another.

Simon looked across at the mass of green, pulsing in the gentle wind. The sky was blue again, with fluffy clouds. The pastures were dotted with sheep and cattle cropping their way to a prosperous future. Wheat and corn were greening the fields.

No, he told himself, there’d be no reopening of the inquiry. If wrong had been left unavenged in his life, the Almighty would deal with it in the next. And if he felt a tremor of remorse as he called for the priest to convey his condolences to the Villeneuve family, he knew he’d just have to endure it. He’d live with the guilt.

And with the gilt. He leant over and scratched her ear again.