Michael Jecks - A Friar's bloodfeud

‘Thank you,’ Adcock said as he took his place on a stool at Geoffrey’s side.

He was pale and anxious-looking. Geoffrey knew that since his arrival he had been looking more and more fretful, as though he suddenly realised he was among dangerous men. He looked like a lamb who had woken to find himself in the midst of a wolf-pack. Well, he’d best make the most of his position here. He would be here for a good long time. Lord Despenser had heard of his skills and wanted him here to help Sir Geoffrey, and if Lord Despenser wanted a man, he would have him.

‘Boy, you should learn to enjoy yourself more. This solitary life is no good for you. Perhaps we could find you a woman?’

Adcock flinched and looked away. In his mind’s eye he saw Hilda bending over her work, her lovely body encased in her old tunic, turning and smiling at him with that tender look in her eye … it was enough to make him want to weep. ‘I don’t want a woman.’

‘Aha! So you have one, do you?’ Geoffrey said with delight. ‘I’m glad to hear it. You should bring her here, then, show her to us, so we can see what she’s like. Tell me: is she fair or dark? Long in the leg, or a short-arse? Big breasted or small?’

Adcock felt himself colouring under his questions. It was demeaning to his memory of his woman that this knight should quiz him about her so crudely in front of all the men.

‘Answer me! What is she like?’ Geoffrey demanded.

‘She is my woman. Mine. That’s all you need know,’ Adcock stated flatly. He would not discuss the woman whom he intended to marry in this manner. She was worth more to him than his post here.

‘You won’t tell me about her?’ Geoffrey growled.

‘I do not offer her to you — why should I describe her to you?’

Geoffrey’s face blackened for a moment, and he leaned towards Adcock, but then the food was brought into the hall, and he relaxed. Adcock was sure that the older man’s hand had strayed to his dagger’s hilt, and his heart was pounding uncomfortably with the conviction that he had narrowly escaped death. He tried to sit a little farther away from Geoffrey without moving too ostentatiously.

The food was a loaf of bread, freshly baked that afternoon and broken into hunks. There was a wooden platter of cooked meats, with a pair of roasted pigeons on top, and Geoffrey took one and pulled it apart. He dabbed bread in the bloody gravy on the plate and filled his mouth, glancing at Adcock as he ate. Taking a great slurp of wine, he swallowed, then belched quietly, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. Realising Adcock was watching, he rubbed his hand on his tunic as though to stop showing himself to be uncouth, before reaching over to pat Adcock on the thigh.

‘You’ll do, boy. If you can stand up to me in my hall here, you’ll hold out against the vill’s people too. Well done.’

Adcock took a sip from the mazer of wine before him, his sense of near panic melting away to be replaced by a feeling of. . what? Acceptance? Perhaps that was it. Geoffrey had stirred him to see how far he could push, and to see what response he would get from Adcock if he threatened violence. Well, he had his answer.

It was a terrible situation, though. Ever since that first day when the men had ridden out from the place, and later Adcock had heard about the attack on the house owned by the neighbouring bailiff, he had understood the kind of manor this was. It was little better than a robber-knight’s hideaway. The men here were all strong, sturdy fellows who were good with their fists or weapons, but nothing else. No one in the hall could plant a field or harvest it; all they were good for was intimidating or killing. And Adcock now was one of them. It made him feel appallingly lonely; his dream of bringing his woman here to live with him was gone. He would rather die a bachelor than expose his Hilda to this malevolent household.

At least he had Geoffrey’s respect, he thought, shooting a quick look at his master. Geoffrey happened to cast a glance his way at the same time, and, catching Adcock’s eye, he gave a quick grin.

Just then a man walked into the hall. ‘Sir Geoffrey. There’s a messenger here from Sir Odo. He wants to talk to you.’

Sir Geoffrey grinned suddenly, a wolfish baring of his teeth that had little humour in it. He bent his head to his meat and chewed loudly, spitting tiny fragments as he bellowed: ‘Show him in.’

Every so often Simon Puttock created a need to visit his abbot in Tavistock.

His new job at Dartmouth as the abbot’s representative in the town, checking the customs and collecting all the money due, was hardly onerous on its own, if lonely for a gregarious man, but to have to do it without the support and companionship of his wife was very hard. He missed his Meg every moment of every day while he was there.

Margaret, his wife, was a tall, fair woman, with glowing blond hair that settled about her shoulders like a golden cloud. Her mild manner and calmness in the face of dreadful adversity had always buoyed his spirits, and living away from her for the first time in his married life had been very hard.

But it was unavoidable. She had to remain at Lydford for a little while. Their daughter, Edith, was a woman now, and although Simon would have preferred to have her close to him where he could keep an eye on her, the simple fact was that she wanted to remain in the old stannary town, near to the lad she claimed she wanted to marry.

Marry! She was far too young to think of that sort of commitment. She was only — what? Sixteen nearly? Christ in chains, where had all the years gone? And it was, he had to admit (if only privately), far better that she should be in a place like Lydford, which was secure, quiet, and not filled with drunken, whoring sailors who’d look at a wench and unclothe her in their minds even if their horny fingers didn’t try to do so for real.

So as often as possible, Simon would take advantage of the slightest excuse to travel up north from the coast, ostensibly to drop in on the abbot, and then to carry on to see his family. When he could, he would take his time. And he usually could: the new clerk at Dartmouth, Martin, was more than capable of seeing to the job. It did not need Simon’s presence to make sure that the money was brought in.

The first two or three times he’d returned, the good abbot had appeared to be amused to see his Keeper coming back, but old Abbot Robert was nothing if not a kindly soul, and he made no comment; he simply smiled easily and suggested that Simon might like to drop in on his wife since he was already more than three-quarters of the way home. It didn’t take more than that for Simon to bolt from the room and bellow for his horse.

But not this time. Abbot Robert was for the first time looking his age, and Simon stood in his room with an unpleasant feeling of being tongue-tied. He had never seen his master looking unwell before, and to be confronted with a man who was plainly very old was somehow shocking. It forced Simon to consider what might happen to him, when this generous-hearted individual did eventually die.

‘Come, join me near the fire,’ the abbot croaked.

He sat swathed in thick rugs at the fireplace, a low table at his side bearing a goblet of strong spiced wine. When he cocked an eyebrow at Simon, he looked again the person whom Simon had grown to love and respect over the years. Abbot Champeaux was much more than merely his master: he was a man whom any would be happy to follow.

The abbot had been master of this abbey for thirty-nine years. When he was elected, Tavistock was in debt, and he had been forced to borrow heavily to keep it afloat. After a lifetime’s struggle, he oversaw an expanded demesne, with more churches incorporated, more rights added: the farm of the stannaries on Dartmoor, and the money from Dartmouth too, now he was Keeper. What had been a bankrupt little institution on the boundaries of the moors had become a thriving community, with the valuable asset of the town of Tavistock built up as a profitable venture in its own right.