The Wicked Winter

Chapter Three

I must have lost consciousness for a moment, because the next thing I knew I was lying on my back with a face swimming above me, illuminated by the pallid glow of a rushlight. It was a narrow, etiolated face, with very pale blue eyes and lashes so fair that they were almost white. The impression of the skull was very strong beneath the paperthin skin and a few tufts and strands of hair, as colourless as the eyelashes, grew from the balding pate. Yet those seemingly fleshless arms needed to have a greater strength than their appearance suggested in order to have shifted my bulk.

I lifted myself on to my elbows and tried to get up, but immediately my left leg protested and I sank back with a groan.

'Still! Still!' the man ordered in a hoarse voice which barely rose above a whisper. 'Wait.'

He turned, setting down the rushlight and its holder on the ground. Then with a little help from me, he pulled off my left boot and began gently to prod the ankle, grunting softly to himself as he did so. At last he raised his head.

'Swollen,' he said. 'Bone not broken. Rest two days. Maybe three. All right then.'

He picked up the rushlight again, holding it above his head, and so perilously close to birch boughs which supported the heather thatching that I cried out in alarm. He seemed unperturbed however, pointing with his free hand to the farther wall. I twisted my body to look behind me and, my eyes now having grown accustomed to the darkness, I saw a bed of dried straw in one part of the semi-circular embrasure dug out from the bank.

'You lie there,' my rescuer invited.

And while I dragged my painful way across the floor, he gathered up my pack and cudgel, placing them carefully in a corner. After that, he made his way to his storage shelves, three of them, also cut out of the bank, one above the other.

From the top one he took a small earthenware pot; then indicating to me that I should remove my jerkin and hose — a feat I was unable to accomplish without his assistance — he knelt beside me, dipped his fingers into the jar and began to rub some of its contents into my burning flesh. I instantly recognised the salve from its smell. My mother used to make it, a mixture of rue, borage and honey; an ointment invaluable for reducing swelling. My ankle began to feel better almost at once.

'What's your name?' I asked.

He did not answer immediately, and I was just beginning to wonder if he had heard me when he glanced up and muttered briefly, 'Ulnoth.'

'That's a Saxon name,' I said.

'Yes. Saxon,' he repeated.

'And what was your father's name?'

After another silence he grunted, 'Wolf. Me Ulnoth Wolfsson.'

I nodded. 'And do you have children?'

There was yet further delay before he answered, as if it took him a while to absorb and understand words. But at last he muttered, 'No. No kinder. No Ulnothsson. No Ulnothsdaughter.'

I had met one or two people like him before on my travels.

Although it was now many hundreds of years since our Norman masters had conquered us, and although in general Saxon and Norman blood had become so mixed that only the bastard word 'English' would do to describe our race, here and there, in isolated places, could still be found true descendants of the Saxon tribes.

When he had finished attending to my ankle, Ulnoth helped me back into my clothes before gathering up an armful of brushwood from a pile stacked against one of the outer stone walls. After rekindling the fire on the hearth, he erected an old and rickety tripod from which he suspended an equally ancient iron pot, seemingly already filled with water from the rill which trickled sluggishly down the bank outside. Into this he threw various dried herbs, which hung in branches from the ceiling, followed by the dismembered carcass of a rabbit taken from his larder, a hole in the freezing ground.

The resulting stew was delicious, and I swallowed it down along with any scruples I might have had about eating meat on a Friday. I suspected that my host did not even know which day of the week it was, but I was wrong. When we had both eaten our fill — in my case three bowls of stew to his one — Ulnoth took the dregs of home-brewed mead with which we had washed down our meal, and poured them as a libation on the threshold of the hut.

'For Frig,' he said, noticing my curious stare. 'Today Frig's day.'

Of course. Frig, mother of the Nordic gods. And the wife of Woden? I didn't know. I couldn't remember. Furthermore, I did not at that moment care. My eyes were beginning to close and my body felt heavy. The straw bed on which I lay, though verminous, was warm, and the salve had soothed away the worst of my pain. Before I knew it, I was sound asleep.

Ulnoth proved to be right. My ankle had sustained no serious injury; I had merely given it a bad wrench when I fell. Under his gentle ministrations it was better within two days, but that bringing us to the Sabbath, I waited until the following day and then lingered one more, in order to make sure that I was really fit to continue my joumey. But on Tuesday — or, as Ulnoth called it, Tiuw's day, Tiuw being the ancient god of war — I could tarry no longer. For one thing I was rapidly eating my host out of house and home, and for another the silence and inactivity were becoming oppressive.

The sparseness of Ulnoth's conversation, the fact that he was obviously unaccustomed to using words fluently, had at first made me believe him a simpleton, but as time wore on I realised that this was not so. One day, talking idly to him about my visit to the neighbouring village and not certain whether he were listening or no, he suddenly interrupted me with, 'Miller. You visit mill.'

'How do you know that?' I asked him.

For answer, he put out a hand and brushed my sleeve.

Then, holding the rushlight closer, he showed me the tips of his fingers which were lightly powdered with flour. On another occasion he said, 'Your wife dead.' It was not a question, and once again I demanded how he came to his conclusion.

He smiled his faint smile. 'You speak of child. Daughter. You speak of mother. Not speak of woman. Why?' He shrugged his thin shoulders. 'Because dead.'

It was, I suppose, something that anyone might have worked out for himself, but in Ulnoth I had not expected such powers of deduction, for he mingled hardly at all with his fellow men. This was plain from the way he shrank back into the farthest recesses of the house and waved me to silence whenever any traffic passed on the road. It was very light at that time of year, but only that morning, we had already heard the slap of shoes on the iron-hard ground and, a little later, the clop of hoofs as someone rode by in the opposite direction.

He lived on small animals and birds which he trapped in the woods, but he attended to his snares and filled his water pots at the rill very early in the day, before anybody else was about.

But when he was forced into company, as he had been into mine, he revealed a kindliness and sweetness of disposition often found lacking in a lot of people who have more to be grateful for than he. He did not forgo companionship because he doubted others — on the contrary, I thought him if anything too trusting — but because solitude was his way of life. I managed to prise out of him that his parents had died 'long, long time gone'; probably, I surmised, when he was still a child. There was no means of telling how old Ulnoth really was, and it was likely that he was younger than he looked. Nevertheless, he had spent many years on his own, and it was only natural that after all that while he should prefer it.

Before I said my farewells I asked for directions to Lynom Hall. Ulnoth led me outside and pointed back along the track, the way I had come four days earlier.

'Road,' he said, pointing to the right, and I recalled that other track which, as I approached the boulder house, had branched off to my left. 'There along.'

I thanked him for all he had done, my gratitude the deeper because he had refused to accept any payment from me, eitherin money or in goods from my pack.

'What need?' he had asked, spreading wide his skeletal hands. And indeed, I could see that by his standards he wanted for nothing. Nature and his own ingenuity provided everything, including homemade needles and thread.

I embraced him, hoping that I might perhaps claim him as a friend; but I had gone only a yard or two along the track when, turning to glance over my shoulder, I found the road behind me already empty. Ulnoth had not waited to see me on my way, but scuttled back into his house like a frightened coney into its burrow. I smiled to myself with a little shake of my head, then set out, my left ankle as strong as ever, to discover Lynom Hall.

It was as cold, if not colder than it had been on Friday, and I was thankful not only for my thick, hooded frieze cloak, but also for my leather jerkin, lined with scarlet, which a widow woman had parted with some years earlier in exchange for necessaries from my pack.

I retraced my steps to that other, south-bound track and turned the corner, searching the landscape ahead of me for any sign of habitation. But the last in a range of hillocks obscured the view, causing the path to swerve first right and then left as it curled around its base. Once this double bend had been negotiated however, a broad plain opened up in front of me, and the sharp, salt tang of the sea was borne inland on the wind. In the near distance I could see the outbuildings of what promised to be a sizeable building and which I thought must certainly be Lynom Hall.

And so it proved. A moated, stone-built house with a large undercroft and surrounded by bakery, dairy and laundry, chapel, stables and byre could be no other. A wooden drawbridge, wide enough for the passage of a large wagon, spanned a moat which I discovered to be very deep and filled with brackish water. Two men, who were busy carrying hay from the undercroft to the stables, gave me a cursory glance as I crossed it.

'Is your mistress at home?' I called.

One said, 'She is, but you'd best not disturb her, Chapman, at this present,' and looked at his companion and sniggered.

There was plainly some significance in the remark.

'Then maybe I can see the housekeeper or the cook or one of the maids,' I suggested. 'Any woman of the household will do. I've plenty still in my pack to interest her.' The man who had so far not spoken put down the sheaf of straw he was humping.

'I daresay the old lady 'ud be glad to see you,' he admitted, and his fellow nodded in agreement.

'Always glad to see anyone, she is. Finds the days hang heavy. Well, they do when you're old and confined to the house I reckon.' He eyed me up and down, his head tilted consideringly to one side. Wisps of red hair protruded from beneath his hood. 'You're a big, stout-looking lad. Give us a hand with this hay and we'll introduce you to the housekeeper ourselves, with a recommendation that she takes you up to see Dame Judith. What's your name?' I told them, and in return learned that the red-haired man was called Hamon and the other Jasper. I laid down my pack and stick, seized a bale of hay and carried it easily enough into the stables. A fine red chestnut with a pale mane and tail fixed me with a beady eye and blew gustily through its nostrils as I entered.

'Better leave Belle Amie to us,' Hamon said over his shoulder. 'The mare's Mistress Lynom's pride and joy, but to my mind she's a nasty nature. Feed the cob and Jessamine there.' He indicated a raw-boned grey. 'They're both quiet and gentle.'

'What about him?' Jasper demanded with a jerk of his head towards a big handsome black with white stockings and a white blaze on its forehead. 'Did we ought perhaps-?'

'Nab!' Hamon interrupted decisively. 'Why should we waste our winter fodder on a stranger? He'll have hay enough waiting for him in his own stable. Great overfed brute!'

'The mistress might expect it,' Jasper demurred. 'How long's he going to be here?'

Hamon gave a ribald chuckle. 'How do I know? As long as his master, and how long's that? In such circumstances, there's no saying.' And they both laughed immoderately, nudging one another in the ribs.

I made no inquiries as to their meaning, judging it wisest to remain ignorant, but half guessing at the truth. Had not Joanna Miller informed me that I might meet Sir Hugh Cederwell at Lynom Hall? 'Gossip has it that the widow is his mistress.' But if that were indeed the case, the less I knew about this illicit liaison the better. I hoped, the weather holding, to travel as far as Cederwell Manor.

When the horses had been fed, Jasper dropping a little hay into the black's manger while his companion wasn't looking, and I had again taken up my pack and cudgel, the two men led me around to the back of the house and into the kitchen. In contrast to the extreme cold outside, the heat in there was almost overpowering, emanating from a huge fire on the central hearth and a number of ovens set into the thick stone walls. A big woman in a gown of grey burrel and a linen coif and apron, wielding a large ladle as if it were her wand of office, as in a way I suppose it was, dominated the room and sent the kitchen-maids scurrying in all directions to carry out her orders.

'What are you two great oafs doing in my kitchen?' she demanded, when she saw Hamon and Jasper. 'Out, before you carry the muck from the yard and stables all over my swept and scrubbed floor!'

'Here's a chapman,' Hamon said sulkily, 'come hawking his wares. We thought the old lady might be glad of his company.'

I stepped forward with meekly lowered eyes for inspection by this she-dragon, who gave me a basilisk stare: But after a moment her expression softened somewhat and she nodded.

'Very well.' Her blue eyes narrowed. 'Are you hungry, my lad?' And when I assured her that I was, she instructed a tow-headed girl to give me one of the apple pasties which were cooling on a marble slab close to the half-open door.

'Best give him the large size with a frame like his.' The child shovelled a pasty on to a wooden platter and handed it to me with a self-conscious giggle. Hamon and Jasper immediately began to moan that good looks and a fine physique gave a man an unfair advantage over his fellows.

'Oh… give them a pasty apiece, Bet,' the cook instructed at last, pursing her lips in exasperation. 'But you eat them outside, the pair of you. You reek of horses!'

The two men seemed to take no offence at her tone but, grinning broadly, accepted their apple pasties from Bet's hands and vanished through the kitchen doorway. I was allowed to eat mine in peace, sitting beside the fire and warming my chilled bones by its leaping flames. When I had finished, not even a crumb of pastry remaining, Bet was told to conduct me to Dame Judith.

'The late master's mother,' the cook explained, basting a couple of fat chickens which were roasting on the spit, 'complains of being neglected since her son died, three years since. And it's true that there's not much love lost between her and the mistress. But,' she added judiciously, 'old people do tend to exaggerate their hardships in my experience.'

'Is Dame Judith upstairs or down?' asked Bet, and was told that the old lady was in the solar.

She led me out of the kitchen and into a narrow passageway where the draughts from open doors lifted the rushes on the flagstones; and the sudden chill, after the heat we had just left, made us both shiver. As I followed Bet, I could see into the various rooms on the opposite side of the corridor, the counting-house, justice room and parlour, all their windows facing frontwards to the track beyond the moat.

The reason I was able to see this was because the shutters in the parlour had been set wide in spite of the inclement weather, and Lynom Hall had no surrounding walls for protection. In this remote comer of the world they plainly did not fear attacks from their neighbours.

'Someone in this house is fond of fresh air,' I remarked to Bet as she preceded me up a twisting staircase.

'Oh, that's the old mistress,' she said with another giggle. 'She don't seem to feel the cold, not even when it's bitter. Leastways, she says she don't, but it's my belief she's just nosy. She likes to sit by the window and look out to see what's going on. Makes the young mistress fair mad, I can tell you. I'd best close them shutters when I come down again, before she discovers they've been opened. Dame Judith was ill the parlour earlier,' she added by way of explanation.

At the top of the stairs, I was conducted into the solar, as dank and chilly on this bleak winter's day as the rest of the house. But it was a comfortable room with many indications of wealth from the candelabra of latten tin, supporting a number of pure wax candles, to the tapestries which decorated the wails and the cushions strewn across the window seat.

Two of the windows were glazed — a greater rarity then than nowadays, when you, my children, take so many of these modern luxuries for granted — and a third had panes of horn.

A fourth window of stretched and oiled linen had been set wide to the elements. Bet at once hurried across and closed it.

'You d' know what the mistress says about openin' windows this weather, Dame Judith,' she scolded. 'You'll catch yer death, you will surely.'

The upright old woman, seated in a chair near the fire, sniffed scornfully.

'And what if I do, pray'? That's what she hopes will happen. The lying jade just pretends to be concerned about me, but nothing would suit her better than to be rid of me. Where is she, eh? Not a soul's been next nor nigh me since I was brought up here earlier this morning. What's she up to? Why hasn't she been to see me?'

'The mistress is busy,' Bet answered, colouring. 'Look, here's a chapman come selling his wares. I've brought 'im to visit you.'

Dame Judith peered at me with short-sighted, laded blue eyes, but for the moment evinced no further interest.

'Don't change the subject,' she ordered Bet sternly. 'You tell my daughter-in-law to come and see me.' She added to the network of wrinkles already lining her face by screwing it up in disgust. 'I know what she's at, the harlot! She may think she's pulling the wool over my eyes, but you can tell her that she ain't. I wasn't born last September! That Sir Hugh Cederwell's here again. It's no use your denying it, girl! I saw him ride in this morning not long after breakfast, while I was still downstairs in the parlour.' She gave a sudden grin, grinding her toothless gums together. 'I see a lot of things that people don't reckon on me seeing.'

'That's 'cause you sits with the shutters wide open,' Bet reprimanded the old lady. She beckoned me forward. 'Here's the chapman, like I told you. You talk to 'im fer a bit and look at what 'e's got to sell you.'

Bet whisked herself out of the solar before Dame Judith could protest or hinder her further. I was left alone with this indomitable old lady whose fragility made me feel even gawkier and more overgrown than usual. In her grey gown and slippers, untidy locks of white hair pushing out from beneath her hood, she was like a wisp of smoke waiting to be blown away by the first puff of wind. She eyed me sharply.

'They think I don't know what goes on in this house,' she snorted. 'But I do. Oh yes, I do indeed. That Sir Hugh Cederwell! Lovely young wife by all accounts, but he prefers a maturer woman with more experience between the sheets.' l felt the blood steal up under my skin. Dame Judith saw it and laughed. 'Embarrass you, do I? Why does a little plain speaking make you uncomfortable? I'm sure a good-looking lad such as you is no virgin, and you must have exchanged plenty of ribaldry in the alehouses and taverns. But you don't care to hear it on a woman's lips, is that it? Ah well! I shouldn't chide you. It's good to know that you hold womankind in such esteem. So!' She clapped her dry, fleshless hands together. 'Show me your wares. I promise I'll buy something, even if I don't really want it. It'll be payment for your time and company, which are the two things I chiefly need.'

She was seated in a high, carved armchair and instructed me to draw up a flat-topped oaken coffer which stood against one wall. It would serve, she said, as a table on which to display my goods. But when I had spread them out, she showed no immediate inclination to look them over, but folded her hands in her lap, leant back in her chair and began to reminisce about her youth; a youth spent, as a young and beautiful woman, at King Henry's court before what she called 'all the troubles and upheavals'.

'From time to time he was completely mad, poor man, like his grandsire, the French king that his father beat at Agincourt. And when he wasn't mad, he was on his knees praying, or exhorting all us women to cover our breasts.

Low-cut gowns, he said, were the work of the devil. And Queen Margaret wearing the most daring of any of us! When he first saw his son, Prince Edward, him who was killed a few years back at Tewkesbury, he said the boy must be the child of the Holy Ghost.' Dame Judith cackled with amusement. 'The child of the Earl of Wiltshire or of Somerset more like! At least, that's what the rest of us thought. We '

The door of the solar opened and the old lady broke off her narrative at once, snapping her jaws together like a pair of tongs cracking nuts. An authoritative voice demanded, 'Mother, what are you up to? Who is this man? And what is he doing in the solar?'