Michael Jecks - No Law in the Land

She went outside, pulling the shutters open, then scattered some grain for the chickens, letting them free from the coop, and took some scraps to the pig, before returning to the house and setting about starting the fire.

It was a miserable morning, and the day would grow worse, she knew. But she must do all she could and keep the house running. There was nothing else for it. It was what Bill would have wanted.

‘Mistress?’

She was feeding Ant when the knock came, and soon Hoppon was in the room with her, his cap in his hand, while other faces she recognised peered at her from outside. Why did all these churls live, when God had taken her own precious darling?

‘You’ll be needing someone to take Bill up to the church, we reckoned. You want for us to help?’

She looked at him with fleeting incomprehension. There seemed no reason to take Bill anywhere, and then her mind allowed her to recall that he was dead. Anger flooded her, anger at God, at Hoppon, at the world — but most of all, anger at her husband. How could he dare to die and leave her and Ant all alone? How dare he!

‘Yes.’ She rose, shivering, and suddenly felt as though she must fall down. Her legs seemed as insubstantial as feathers. ‘Yes, please help me,’ she said, in a voice bereft of all but misery.

Sourton Down

Up at the edge of the moors, Simon felt more cheerful. It was always good to be here on the high ground, looking down on God’s own country. West he could see Cornwall, with Bodmin gleaming in a burst of sunshine, while northwards was the lowering mass of Exmoor.

‘So what’ll you do, then?’ Sir Richard asked as they breasted the hill’s western flank and could stare ahead towards Meldon and Oakhampton.

‘I think I have little option. I’ll ride on to where the bodies were all found, up near Jacobstowe, and then see if I can learn anything about the men who died. With that sort of money involved, somebody must have seen or heard something. If a small gang of felons took it all, they’ll have been celebrating ever since.’

‘True enough. There never was an outlaw born who had the sense of a child,’ Sir Richard said. ‘A man would have thought that most of them would realise that sprinkling coins about the wenches in a tavern, when all their lives they’ve been as wealthy as a churl on alms, would make a few people suspicious. But they never do.’

‘Are you riding straight back to Lifton?’ Simon asked. He felt a slight trepidation. The idea of spending too much time with the coroner was alarming, because the man was undoubtedly one of the very worst he had ever met when it came to giving him sickly hangovers. On the other hand, he was a loyal, amiable character with a shrewd mind, when it was free of thoughts of wine, women and food.

‘I was thinking about that. I wouldn’t want to leave you all alone. Performing an inquest on a matter such as this is hazardous, my friend. And you are all alone.’

‘I am here!’ protested the man behind them.

This was the clerk whom Cardinal de Fargis had commanded to join Simon in order to record all he learned. Brother Mark was a skinny little fellow, but he had the humorous face of an imp. He reminded Simon of some of the figures that adorned the church at Lydford. But he did not merit consideration as protection against a man such as the one who could beat a reeve to death, let alone a gang that could kill a band of nineteen travellers.

‘Yes. I would be glad of someone to help defend me,’ Simon admitted.

‘What of me?’ Brother Mark asked plaintively.

Sir Richard sniffed. ‘I suppose it is fair to say that since this money was the king’s, and was deposited with his officers, it is reasonable to suppose that I would be failing in my duties to him were I not to aid you in this inquest.’

‘I can do that!’ Mark stated with vigour.

Simon agreed. ‘It is plainly the king’s service. It would be to his advantage were you to help me in this matter.’

Sir Richard nodded, looked westwards reflectively, and then threw a glance at the clerk behind them. ‘What? No comments? No arguing? No protestations of your ability to help us?’

Mark gave him a look of contemptuous disgust. ‘I see no further reason to waste my breath.’

‘Good. Perhaps the rest of our journey will be all the more peaceful,’ Sir Richard said with a chuckle. ‘In the meantime, we should hurry ourselves if we are to make our way to a house in time for dark. Simon, you know this area better than me, I am sure. Which is our best direction?’

Simon pointed. ‘Straight up to Oakhampton, thence to Abbeyford. If there is anything to be learned, it will be up there.’

Their journey took them a little past the middle of the morning. Before noon they were already ambling along the roadway through the woods.

‘A good old wood, this,’ the coroner remarked, looking about him with an appreciative eye. ‘I would like a place like this myself. A man could make a lot of money from it.’

‘Yes. The people about here have good incomes,’ Simon agreed. ‘The charcoal burners make good use of it, and there is always enough for the coppicers to gather.’

That was obvious. No matter where they looked, little glades had been harvested. There was little that would go to waste in a wood like this. Even as they rode along, they could see wisps of smoke from some of the charcoal burners’ ovens. Simon glanced about him, and then picked a broad track that led them in among the trees.

The path was straight at first, and then curved to the left and round to the right until they were almost riding back the way they had come. At the end of their path there was an area of an acre or so, in which the trees had been cut back. Coppicing was an ancient art, and Simon could see that this little clearing was well maintained. The coppicer would cut back the stems from the trees initially when they had reached seven or eight feet in height. Naturally the trees would try to grow back by thrusting up with two or even three more stems, and after six or seven years the coppicer would return to harvest these too, and so the round of harvesting would continue. Each year enough poles would be taken for making handles, for building, for cropping to make faggots for fires, or for charcoal.

At the far edge of the clearing there was a charcoal burner with his tent. When making an oven to roast the poles for charcoal, it was essential that the burner remained at the site all day and night, watching and carefully helping the fire to cook the coals without ever catching light. A week’s work in cutting, and another in carefully building the fire could be wasted by a little carelessness. Simon had worked with charcoal burners in his time, and knew how difficult it was to make a good oven. The burners would build a large pyre of wood, with a chimney in the middle. About this large circular oven they would then construct a massive earthwork, first smothering all the wood with ferns, and then layering soil over the top, until the whole heap was a man’s height and twice a man’s height in diameter, with only a small hole in the top. At last when all was ready, and it was plain that there were no other holes from which any smoke could leak, they would drop burning coals down into the midst of the chimney, and once the fire was well caught they would block the top with more ferns and earth.

That was the fascinating time for Simon. He would watch as the smoke started to leach out from the soil. Sometimes there was a disaster, and a hole would appear in the earth, and when that happened, the burner would quickly shovel more soil over the top, sometimes sprinkling water too, to keep the soil together. Otherwise the entire crop of charcoal would merely burn like wood, and the burner would find only ash remaining when he opened the oven.