Michael Jecks: The Death Ship of Dartmouth

Sieur Pierre de Caen would have taken her with him. He longed to. But she would have none of it. She was a woman of honour, and the shame of fleeing the realm with him would have been too much, even if the alternative would cost her life. It was a price worth paying, she said.

No! He had tried to reason with her, to show that she was mad to think of staying, and he toyed with the other possibility, of capturing her with hired men, and taking her away by force … but that would have made her hate him, and he couldn’t bear the thought of her reproach.

Escape would have been so much easier from London. He could have joined a ship to leave for France, if there were any vessels from his homeland in port. If not, he had money enough to bribe his way on a small craft … But he wasn’t in London. He had been with her in the household at Taunton when they had heard the news.

A man had to protect himself, and sometimes, just sometimes, he had to protect those who were dearest to him by leaving them. That was the truth, and he was glad he had chosen to flee. With luck, she would be safe, and he could take news of the King’s actions — or Despenser’s, if the truth be told — with him back to France.

There was a rasping sound behind him, and his heart began to pound. All the long journey here, he had feared betrayal and pursuit. He dared not turn, because to do that would prove to any hunter that the suspicions about their quarry were right. No one could see his face and doubt that he was guilty.

Yes, had he been in London, this journey would have been so much easier and safer, for a man in the Queen’s favour could still, just, gain immunity from the devils who obeyed the King’s advisors, an immunity that was entirely lacking at a distant town like Taunton. There were too many places in the countryside where a man could be waylaid, with no one the wiser as to his name or title, let alone his position as a noble knight from the Queen’s own household. Isabella had little authority in the land now.

There was another noise from behind him — the clatter of a heavy boot slipping over cobbles — and he smiled to himself grimly. It had taken him so long to lose the men he was sure would be following, he hadn’t thought that others could catch up with him again so speedily, but everyone was so fearful of upsetting the King or his favourites that mouths could be opened without bribes. The mere threat of the King’s displeasure was enough to make any peasant confess to what he had seen: a rider clad in dark blue and scarlet, riding a powerful black stallion.

So instead of making for the nearer coast, up to Bristol as they’d have expected, he’d thought it wiser to escape to the south, to Dartmouth.

At the time it had made perfect sense. Better by far to hurry south and seek a quiet little port which had reliable sailings. Dartmouth was not among the largest, where the King’s officers would have too much control and interest in foreigners, but nor was it the smallest, where any stranger would stand out. He had been here before, and knew that the port had a deep haven from which ships could always sail with ease.

It was the delay in Exeter which had given him the problem. While he walked the streets of the old walled city, prayed on the hard stone floor of the Cathedral, or rested in a tavern near the Close, someone had seen him and sold the news of his arrival. Since Exeter, he had been sure that his steps were dogged. Well, it was no surprise. The King was convinced that Pierre was his sworn enemy. All because Pierre had fallen in love.

The shame of it! To know that he had won the heart of a nobleman’s wife, a man to whom he owed his livelihood and fortune, that was appalling. There was no more contemptible crime than petty treason, but now he was guilty of it in his heart. And as soon as the opportunity provided itself, they were guilty of it in fact.

He hurried along the darkened street, then down a side alley, and thence back up to Lower Street and to a second alley. This he bolted down at full speed, hoping against hope to rush the man from behind. He would have managed it, too, if some lazy householder hadn’t left a pile of trash lying in the middle of the alley. He saw it at the last moment and tried to leap it, but his foot caught, and he was sent sprawling. The noise wakened a dog, and he heard it barking furiously. Footsteps hurried towards his alley, and he made a swift decision to go on, racing at full pelt back up to the top road.

At the alley’s entrance, he stood panting, his sword already in his hand as he cautiously set his shoulder to the wall and peered round, but there was nothing.

The silence was broken by rumbustious singing, and he saw a group of tattily dressed sailors half shuffling, half rolling in that curious manner they had when on firm land. They were all plainly more than a little drunk, from the songs they were singing and, as they passed him, Pierre was assailed by a gust of warm, ale-sodden breath. He thrust the sword back in its scabbard and slipped in behind them, trying to copy their gait. As they passed by the entrance to an inn, he left them and walked inside.

It was a poor enough place, with the thin scattering of reeds on the floor barely covering the packed earth. In the middle sat a smoking fire, with a trivet set over it, while at the farther end of the room were five barrels of ale.

Pierre made his way to the host, who stood with a thick apron over his enormous gut, and asked for a pint of ale. While he fingered a few pennies, he enquired whether there was a room available.

These Englishmen were pigs! In France, a man of quality might assume that if an innkeeper had no single room adequate that was free, a lesser fellow would be evicted. Here, he was told, and the man kept a straight face while he said it, there was only one room with two large beds, and all the clients could use them. However much Pierre fiddled with his cash, increasing the sum eventually to a shilling, the response was the same. It was unnerving to find a man like this innkeeper prepared to challenge a knight’s instruction. Heaven forfend that such arrogance could come to the French peasantry!

It was surely a reflection of the trouble between France and England. A war made for bad manners.

He had hoped for a quiet room alone, but if that was impossible, he had other options. He agreed loudly to the room, paid up the full sum and then wandered to a table, his ale in his hand, and waited.

Three men soon entered one after the other. The first, clad in faded green tunic and worn hosen, with a knife hanging from a cord about his neck, was so plainly a sailor, from his horny hands to the weather-beaten face and grizzled beard, that Pierre could disregard him instantly as a spy. A paid assassin, perhaps, but not a spy. The second looked more the part: he was oddly clad in a good red jack over a fine woollen tunic, with a hood sitting far back on his head to show an eye with a devilish squint. Short and hunched, he looked desperate and dangerous, but as Pierre eyed him covertly, the newcomer roared sociably in welcome at a group of men near the bar and was soon engaged in raucous conversation.

The third seemed unlikely to be a spy. He wore a thick leather apron like a joiner or mason, and Pierre heard several men mutter something that sounded like ‘paviour’. He strode past Pierre without a glance in his direction, to a table at which two others sat, one older, one apparently an apprentice.

Pierre was beginning to wonder whether he had been followed at all, for here it was at least thirty miles from Exeter alone, and surely he would have noticed someone on his trail … when a fourth man appeared in the doorway. He was an older fellow, and well used to rough living from the look of his shabby hosen and jack.