Michael Jecks - The Tolls of Death

‘What else can I do? He’s into everything right now, and I can’t do anything but smack him to warn him.’

‘He’d be happier with a little gentle persuasion, I expect.’

‘Father, you stick to what you know and I’ll look after this one. He’s a little animal, just like any other, and he needs training.’ She chucked the fellow under the chin. ‘In’t that right, Ned? So keep off the fire, you little devil, or I’ll tan your hide for you.’

She plonked him down again and fetched a griddle, sitting it straight on the embers. There would be enough heat to cook Father Adam’s egg. She broke it onto the warm disk, and waited until it was whitened through, the yolk a pale yellow in its midst, and then picked the griddle from the fire and brought it to him, using a knife to prise the egg from the metal and slide it onto his platter. Then she sat on his bench and watched him eat.

He was an odd fellow, this young priest. When he’d asked her if she’d like to cook for him, she assumed he was after her body, thinking she was a typical desperate woman who would be prepared to turn harlot to satisfy his whims. Well, at the time she wasn’t! She was a young mother, but her man was happy to support her, so he said, and the last thing she needed was a randy vicar trying to get into her skirts. No, thank you ! But her man told her not to be daft, the priest was helping them, and she ought to go cook for him.

And so she did. But more recently, when she learned that her lover, the father of her child, had lost interest in her and their boy, she suddenly had no means of supporting herself, and then of course she was glad of her place here in the priest’s house. It didn’t matter if he’d wanted to bed her then — she’d have accepted him as she would accept any man who might protect her. He gave her food and shelter — who was she to refuse his advances if he needed something in return? No mother could turn her nose up at food and a warm bed for herself and her child.

But early on it became obvious that her lover had been right: Father Adam showed no interest in her. He knew of her lover, and was content to let her come and go as she wanted. Perfect. Yes, and her man could visit, too, out in her room, so they were all happy.

She’d never forget that first day. Adam had offered her a job in his home, but there was no unsubtle hint about his virility or her beauty such as she had anticipated. Instead, on her first night, he had directed her to the little haybarn beside his house.

‘Bring hay from there and we’ll make you a palliasse.’

As good as his word, when she brought in an armful of hay, he had already put a blanket on the floor. He spread her hay on it, then draped a second blanket on top. He himself was to sleep in his chamber, a tiny room constructed high in the roof.

Once, much later, when her lover had grown bored with her and moved to his next woman, she had watched Father Adam climb the ladder to his own bed, and then, from gratitude but also with some curiosity and in acknowledgement of her debt to him, she followed him. When she reached the top, she began to untie the thongs that held her thin dress about her, but he put a hand up and shook his head.

‘There’s no need,’ he said softly. ‘You may return to your own bed.’

And, vaguely confused, she had done so. She huddled in her cold bed with a strange sense of discomfort. No man had ever rejected her before, and the experience of first her lover and now this priest refusing her was not pleasant. She found herself touching her arms, feeling her waist, cupping her breasts, reassuring herself that there was nothing wrong with her. No, all seemed well. And if that lad yesterday was anything to go by, men could still fancy her. He, Ivo, had sat at the table and watched her as she went about her cleaning and tidying, at last offering to help when she had to fill the bucket from the well. As she filled it and he bent to pick it up, his hand touched her breast, then her thigh, and he grinned at her when she drew away, slapping at his hand. He had no shame, that much was certain. But he had a nice smile.

Her life at Father Adam’s house had been smooth and easy, and it was only now, with the death of Athelina, that there was an undercurrent. Julia had felt it as she entered the room yesterday with those two strangers here, before she’d even heard of Athelina’s death. The tall knight, he’d been suspicious. She’d seen it in his eyes as soon as he caught sight of her. Thought she was some mare with an itch in her tail for a priest. Well, he could think all he wanted, but as far as Julia was concerned, at last she’d found some peace and she wasn’t going to give it up just because some stranger got the wrong idea. Although she wouldn’t want him to think badly of Adam. That wouldn’t be fair. No reason for the priest to suffer just because he’d been kind to her.

Poor Athelina. Adam was pained by her death, she saw. It wasn’t right to kill her poor sons — she shouldn’t have done that. Christ, the thought of killing her own little Ned … it was just unthinkable, a nightmare. No, she loved her little boy. Didn’t matter that his father was a shit and bastard, who had refused to marry her. She’d lost her reputation already, sleeping with a man who wasn’t yet her husband and then, when she began to show the pregnancy, she lost her home too. Father John, the priest at Temple where she used to live, had told her that there was no place in his flock for a fornicator, and said she should leave — go to the parish where her child’s father lived. So here she’d come, and Adam had taken her in.

Athelina had asked for no help from him. She had her house already anyway, somewhere to put her head. But she was widowed, and her lover had abandoned her. Perhaps that was why she felt so bad. She’d got used to having a man in her life, and when he left, that was that so far as Athelina knew. There was nothing now but the steady, unrelenting demands of motherhood.

Julia could all too easily understand that desperation, that loneliness. She had to — it was she, after all, who had stolen Athelina’s man from her; it was she who had enjoyed his money for that little while. Yet now, that too had dried up. It was fortunate that Adam seemed to like having her in his house to keep it clean and warm.

Yes, Julia would have liked to comfort poor Father Adam, but she knew, after that last time, that any approach by her would be misconstrued. Best to leave well alone.

Anyway, why bother the priest when there was a happy-go-lucky ostler at a loose end? Ivo was a good name, she decided, and she wondered idly what his surname was.

Letitia found the mill operating slowly; the wheel and the stones graunching together, making a steady, rhythmic din that she could only assume emanated straight from Hell. It took the fourth bellow of ‘Serlo!’ to attract his attention, and at last he peered down at her from a trapdoor in the ceiling, his face smeared with flour, his hair prematurely grey from the fine dust that permeated the entire building.

‘What?’

She coughed from the mist that seemed to clog her nostrils and throat. ‘Come down here! I can’t bellow at you all the time. Where are the boys? I’ve come to take them back to my house. You can’t look after them here.’

He disappeared for a while, then reappeared and clambered heavily down the ladder. At her insistence, they left the mill to talk, and once outside he grunted, ‘They’re fine. I’ll see to them.’

‘Don’t be a fool! You can’t keep an eye on them here. You’ll end up with them getting hurt as well.’ At least here in the open the noise was dulled to a thumping and shaking that she was sure she could feel through the soles of her feet.

‘My wife ought to be looking after them. That bladder of pus who knocked her down, he ought to pay,’ Serlo blustered. ‘He could have killed her! Fucking Coroners!’