Michael Jecks - The Outlaws of Ennor

While Simon stared down into the shallow, short hole dug for the boy he felt he had betrayed, Baldwin could not help but stare across the gulf at Tedia. She stood chastely, hands before her apron, hair bound up, eyes downcast, and yet Baldwin could not help but remember the sweet taste of her, the soft roundness of her breasts, the tough corded muscles of her arms and thighs. He must bring his mind back to the burial as the priest intoned the last prayers.

Afterwards Simon clearly wanted to be left alone, musing at the graveside of Hamo. Baldwin left him there and made his way to the beach, avoiding Tedia’s home. On the beach he sat staring eastwards, his heart heavy.

He desperately wanted to be away. Being here was tearing at his soul: the discovery of the murderer, David, the ferocious pirates, the acquisitive and immoral master of the islands, Ranulph, with his clear ambition to absorb even St Nicholas into his demesne, all repelled Baldwin. The islands had never looked so beautiful, but he felt like a man whose soul had been wrenched from his body.

It was not only the murders and the unnecessary deaths, nor the subsequent escape of the murderer. No, it was the loss of his own hope and happiness.

When he and Simon set off from Galicia, he had thought that their adventures were at an end; he had had no idea that they would be blown so far from their course as to arrive here on these islands. All he had hoped for was a short trip to Dartmouth or a similar port, a canter to his home, and the opportunity of sinking into the arms of his wife. Now Jeanne seemed much further away even than she had while he was in Galicia.

Tedia had kept away from him. That made him feel the prickings of guilt too. He dared not consider how his wife would view his behaviour. Perhaps she would understand the loneliness and longing he had felt: she had lost her family to outlaws, so maybe she would comprehend how worried and battered he had been, thinking that Simon was dead. All alone, he had made love with a woman who sought the same comfort and compassion as he did himself. Yes, perhaps Jeanne would understand … but Baldwin would never be able to tell her. This was one more secret he would keep. The secret of his own shame.

Later, when he returned to the priory, the sight of Simon made him feel a renewed guilt.

His old friend’s eyes were red from weeping. His face was marked with soil where he had rubbed tears away, and as Baldwin looked at him, he thought that Simon had never appeared so vulnerable.

‘I don’t know why, Baldwin,’ he said at last, ‘but I feel as though I have just buried my son again.’

‘Peter is long dead,’ Baldwin said gently. Simon’s first son Peterkin had died of a fever many years ago. At the time, Simon had been ashamed. He once told Baldwin that the sound of pitiful crying had gradually scraped at his nerves to the extent that he was glad when they slowly grew quieter, until at last they stopped. ‘Hamo would have been proud to call you “Father”, Simon.’

‘I would have been happy to call him “son”,’ Simon said, and let his face drop into his hands as he started to weep again.

Now at least the sunshine and the fresh breeze were giving him a new vigour. He looked more like the Simon whom Baldwin had known so well for so many years.

‘I suppose this is the last leg of our pilgrimage,’ Simon said musingly. ‘I had not expected it to last so long, nor to have been so moved by the things that happened. God’s feet! I hadn’t expected so many things to happen!’

‘Yes, I hope it is the last part of the journey. I want to see Jeanne again,’ Baldwin said, with a burst of shame exploding in his breast. He had betrayed her. It was the first time he had done so, and now he was terribly afraid that he had damaged his relationship with his wife. He could never forget Tedia.

‘Yes,’ Simon said, but without enthusiasm. ‘But when I return, I shall have to move house and start a new life in Dartmouth. I do not look forward to that.’

‘It will be a good life, you will see,’ Baldwin said with a heartiness he did not feel, his mind still fixed upon his wife.

‘I hope so. I hope so,’ Simon repeated, staring out blankly at the mist on the horizon.

William of Carkill was there to welcome the new Prior when he arrived: a tall, thin man, with eyes that protruded like a frog’s in so definite a manner that William suspected that, should he open his mouth, there might be a long tongue inside, ready to flick out and catch a fly.

‘You are William, the priest at St Mary’s?’ he asked as he came along the rickety gang-plank.

‘Yes, that’s me,’ William said. ‘And you are the new Prior.’

‘You may call me Prior John,’ the man said, gazing about him with a pained expression. ‘What a place!’

‘Indeed, Prior. The islands are-’

‘Beyond the fringe of civilisation. This is indeed the limit of Man’s ambition. What else could one imagine?’

‘It’s beautiful in the sunshine,’ William said loyally, prompted to defend his islands. In fairness, he accepted that the islands in this weak, grey light were not being shown to their best advantage, but that was no reason to be so insulting.

‘I suppose it looks better — marginally. My God, what have I done to deserve this! At least I should only be here for a short while.’

William smiled nastily. ‘Oh, aye, Prior? I’ve only been here about fifteen years myself.’

With a shudder, Prior John stared about him again. ‘My God !’

It was two weeks after Cryspyn’s death that Thomas was deposited at Penzance. He walked down to the harbour among the thronging crowds with a sense of disbelief as he was pushed from side to side, jostled by the eager stevedores. He almost stepped on a rope as it was being drawn away by a sailor on a ship moving off from the harbour, and had to dance to one side to avoid being pulled into the water.

This was his life now, he knew. He had the clothes he stood up in, a pack of some items which he had taken from the priory, a little ink, reeds, parchment, and other tools which he fervently hoped would help him earn a living of some sort, but that was all. His wealth, all of it, had been confiscated by Ranulph. His ship: gone; his belongings: stolen. All his profits from the last years of effort were gone. Nothing was left.

He walked out along the harbour to the main town. Here he stopped, and stared up the road blankly. There was nothing for him here, a poor man with skills in penmanship. What could he do?

There was a tavern nearby, and he entered, using one of his last coins to buy a jug of wine. Sitting, he morosely gazed into his pot, wondering what the next day would bring for him, but he could not think. Instead he slowly drank his wine. There was an alley alongside, and when he was done, he walked into it, pulling his tunic up to urinate, but then there was a harsh chuckle and he suddenly felt a knife prick at his throat, a rough hand on his back.

‘I have nothing. Take whatever you want,’ he snapped.

‘Oh Thomas, what could you have that I would want?’

Thomas frowned. It was a voice he recognised — someone he had known. He tried to recall their identity, but then the voice said, ‘Extraordinary to meet you here. I’d prefer your master, but he isn’t about, is he? So you’ll have to do.’

A few moments later, Sir Charles left the alley with a new spring in his step. He glanced up and down the road, and then set off towards an inn near the harbour-front. He would teach a man to keep him confined, bound. With a soft chuckle, he entered and ordered a jug of wine.

In the alley, there was a slow gurgling sound, followed by a sad little tapping sound as though a man’s bare heel was rattling on a loose cobble. A rat heard it and scuttled across the way to investigate, but the heel lashed out at it, once then twice, and the rat decided to return to the cat’s corpse under a loose box.