Michael Jecks - A Friar's bloodfeud

The only parts of his body that felt hot were his forearms and his wound.

His breast was so damp, he pulled his shirt away suspiciously and stared down to where the foul, swollen pock mark stood so plainly, thinking for a moment that the damned thing was leaking once more. For the last two months it had seemed fairly well on the way to healing, but before Christmas every time he exercised it had wept a watery, unpleasant liquor, and even some little while after Candlemas it had bled just a little. It was enough to make a man concern himself over his health. Especially now that he had something to lose, Baldwin told himself.

The sun was quite high in the sky now, and Baldwin stood staring ahead. The hills of Dartmoor were licked with a bright orange-pink glow where the sun hit them, while the parts the sun could not reach were blue-grey, with small flecks of what looked like whiteness to show where the frost still lay thickly on the grasses. It was a perfect, marvellous sight to Baldwin, who had spent so many years abroad in hot countries which had no frost to stimulate them.

‘My husband? Are you training again?’

Baldwin narrowed his eyes and winced without turning at once. When he faced his wife, it was with an expression of bright cheerfulness. ‘My love! I had thought to leave you resting. I didn’t intend to wake you. I am sorry.’

‘Husband, do you mean you’ve only just risen?’ she asked.

‘Of course,’ he said with apparent surprise.

‘Then you haven’t been out here long enough to work up a sweat?’

He recoiled from the questing hand that snaked towards his back, growling. ‘Woman, please leave my person. Treat an invalid with a little respect.’

‘So much of an invalid that you can stand out here in the frost and the freezing air?’

‘I was looking at the view,’ he protested.

‘With your sword in your hand,’ she said with innocent deliberation.

‘May I not keep anything secret from your suspicious mind?’

‘Husband,’ she said sweetly, ‘do I hound you for all your secrets? I have no need. You give them up so easily and unintentionally.’

He scowled at her. It was impossible to be angry with her. Jeanne was perfection in his eyes, her round face framed by thick, red-gold tresses, blue eyes like cornflowers on a summer’s afternoon, a small, almost tip-tilted nose, a wide mouth with an over-full upper lip which gave her a stubborn look — all in all, he had never seen any woman more beautiful. He growled, ‘It is hardly comely for a wife to be so forthright.’

‘It is hardly sensible for a wounded man to be testing his scars in the cold like this, especially after sleeping so badly.’

He looked away guiltily. ‘It was nothing. I was thirsty.’

‘In the middle of the night, and you were forced to leave our bed and fetch water? And couldn’t return?’

‘I was not tired once I rose, Jeanne,’ he said, and then sighed. He picked up the scabbard again, thrust the sword home, and faced her. ‘You are right, though. It is this shoulder of mine. The thing hurts whenever I lie still with it, and there seems to be nothing I can do to alleviate it.’

‘You should rest it then, husband. Stop this foolish sword-waving in the early morning. Take things more easily; rest more.’

Baldwin nodded. ‘Perhaps you are right.’

‘Do not patronise me, Baldwin,’ she said tartly. ‘I won’t have it.’

‘I am sorry, then.’

‘You are still convinced that there will be war?’

Baldwin shot her a look. They had set off on the way back to the house, and her tone was light, but there was an edge to it. ‘Yes.’

‘I am happy here now,’ she said quietly. ‘I was not when Ralph was alive. He was so different when he realised that we wouldn’t have children. It made him bitter … bitter and cruel. You have changed my life for me. There are two men who have been consistently kind to me since I married Ralph: the Abbot of Tavistock, and you. I couldn’t bear to lose you, Baldwin. You do realise that, don’t you?’

‘What brought this on?’ he asked with some confusion. ‘You will not lose me.’

‘If there is a war, I may have to. You may be forced to ride to battle and leave me behind,’ she said quietly. ‘And when you ride away, you will go to find excitement. I don’t begrudge you that, but you won’t be thinking of me, will you? Nor of Richalda. You will be thinking of warfare and how to win renown by your prowess. Yet all the time I shall be here ready to mourn my loss … well, in truth, I will already be in mourning, because although I shall hope and pray that you will come home, it is possible that I shall never see you again, and that is a very hard thought to accept.’

‘Jeanne, I swear to you that Richalda and you will never be far from my mind if it comes to war.’ Seeing the doubt in her eyes, he took up his sword, and kissed the cross. ‘I swear it, Jeanne! I practise here because I want to ensure that even if there is a war, I am fit enough and experienced enough to return to my home. I do not wish to die because of a moment’s thoughtlessness. My training is perhaps all that can save me in a battle.’ He looked behind them, back at the moors. When he spoke again, it was in a reflective tone, more gentle. ‘You say that I ride for honour and excitement … well, it is possible that I could find myself honoured, but it is more likely that I would find myself dead. I have seen war. More men always die through starvation and pestilence than wounds won honourably on the field of battle. I fear that more than anything: a slow, lingering death at the roadside after the host has moved on, alone, without the opportunity to say farewell to you. If I go to war, Jeanne, my thoughts will be with you always …’

Jeanne was about to speak when there came an enraged bellow from the house. Jeanne closed her eyes and sighed, and Baldwin cast his eyes heavenwards. ‘Is there no possibility of sending her home, Jeanne? Or anywhere else?’

Friar John set his jaw as he made his way rather laboriously up the lane towards the church. He had found a temporary place of refuge last night, a charcoal burner’s hut in a coppice west of Iddesleigh, but after the foul discovery at the small holding he thought it might be better to move farther away as soon as he could. Friars were not usually so detested by the populace that they would be attacked, but a prudent man knew when to conceal himself, and a fellow who walked about after nightfall when there were plainly dangerous rogues abroad could soon become a target no matter how innocent.

There were two places on which John had counted in his life: churches and inns. In neither establishment was there anything for him to fear. Today, simply because the church was the nearer of the two, he entered that first, listening with a smile of gratitude to the creaking of the door hinges. To him, unoiled hinges had a sound all their own: the sound of comfort, holding the promise of warmth and dryness. There was a stoup of holy water by the door, and he dipped his fingers in it, closing his eyes and crossing himself fervently.

At times he’d been accused of play-acting. People said that a man who seemed so committed must by nature be more of a charlatan than a genuine man of God, but to that he answered that all must explain themselves before God when the time came. For his part, his conscience was clear. He had devoted his life to God and the spreading of His Gospel, and if men wished to mock, that was for them.

He turned to face the altar and stood a few moments studying the paintings on the walls. All were vivid — if lacking some artistic skill on occasion — and ideally suited to stirring the spirits of a peasant from an out of the way place like this.

That was half the battle. A man must always bear in mind the status and abilities of the folk to whom he was preaching. There was no earthly good in putting forward arguments that had been disputed in Oxford if the audience was a group of shepherds, carters, ploughmen and charcoal-burners. They wouldn’t understand the niceties. Now, if John spoke to them, he’d pitch the story at a lower level, curse a bit, give them more of what they heard each day in the tavern. And from that perspective, this little church was ideal. It made the uneducated look at the walls. They couldn’t retreat from them.