Bernard Knight - A Plague of Heretics

‘He thinks of nothing else but his purse and his treasure chest,’ grunted John after the front door had slammed. ‘He has two manors and a rich wife, so why is he always pursuing more wealth?’

Matilda hunched in her chair, unwilling to side with her husband any longer. ‘At least he is aiding the economy of the county and giving work to many men,’ she sniped.

‘And what d’you think I and Hugh de Relaga are doing?’ demanded John. ‘We ship almost half the raw wool that goes from the Exe and a goodly proportion of the finished cloth. It’s that that keeps those in this house warm and well fed!’

Matilda sniffed disdainfully, then returned to attack from a different direction. ‘You should not cast aspersions on Doctor Clement like that,’ she complained. ‘He is a professional man and, if he is so busy with his regular patients to attend to the poor, then that is his concern.’

‘He’s afraid of catching the yellow distemper, that’s what!’ countered John.

‘And who isn’t afraid?’ she demanded. ‘You and that perverted little priest might be foolhardy enough to risk bringing it home to your family and friends, but normal people keep well clear for everyone’s sake.’

Another developing row was averted by Mary coming in to ask if they were ready for their supper, as it was now virtually dark outside. John suspected that she had been listening at the inner door and had interrupted to save him becoming enmeshed in yet another futile shouting match with his cantankerous wife.

The prospect of food always mollified her, and soon they were sitting at the table in smouldering silence as they ate their way through venison in broth, carp and eels in a crust and finally frumenty.

Afterwards, John sat by the fire with a pot of ale and his wife dozed in her chair opposite, while a cold wind whined around the shutters and sudden draughts sucked showers of sparks up the wide chimney. It was not a night on which to expect visitors, and John was all the more surprised to hear an urgent knocking on the outer door. Mary usually answered it, but it took her a time to get around the side passage from her hut in the yard, so he went out into the vestibule and pulled open the heavy oak door. A horse was tied to the rail across the lane and a man stood before him, shivering in a damp riding cloak.

‘Sir John, it’s me, Alfred from Stoke!’

In the dim light from a pitch-brand guttering on the corner of the Close, de Wolfe recognised the reeve from the family manor at Stoke-in-Teignhead, where he had been born and brought up. Surprised and apprehensive, he ushered the man inside and, aware of Matilda in the hall, took him around to Mary’s kitchen-shed, where a good fire burned and the man could get warm and have some food. But first Alfred had to give his momentous news.

‘I have bad tidings, Sir John. The yellow plague has appeared in the village and two are dead and half a dozen taken sick. I am afraid that your brother William is one of them!’

At dawn next morning, three riders left the West Gate soon after it was opened and splashed through the ford across the Exe, heading for the coast road southwards. Grim-faced, John de Wolfe was in the lead, with Alfred and Gwyn close behind. Thomas had been left behind, as though he offered to come, he was an indifferent horseman and would have slowed them down on his pony. Even John had left his heavy destrier, Odin, behind and taken a swifter rounsey from Andrew’s livery stable to speed his journey. As they cantered down the track towards Powderham and Dawlish, John soberly recalled the events that had set them on this mission.

The previous evening, the reeve had explained how John’s mother, Enyd, had sent him to Exeter with the news that his elder brother had been stricken with the fever that had crept into Stoke over the past four days. So far, eight had been afflicted and two of those had died. William, whose solicitude for his free tenants and villeins was well known, had refused to hide himself away in the manor house, but had insisted on visiting the sick and arranging for food and firewood to be supplied to them.

‘He forbade the ladies to accompany him, though they both wished to help,’ Alfred had said. ‘Within a day and a night, he started shivering and soon was yellow, being brought back to collapse on his bed. Only God knows why he was so stricken, when myself, the priest and several others escaped, though we were also helping to aid the sufferers.’

‘What of my mother and sister? Do they remain in good health?’ demanded John. His mother, Enyd, was a sprightly woman in her early sixties, and Evelyn, six years younger than John, was a placid spinster.

‘They show no signs of the curse, thanks be to Christ,’ Alfred reassured him. There was no one else in the family to be concerned about, as William’s wife Alice had died of a childbirth fever three years earlier.

The horses made good time on the firm roads, as the slight frost that had followed the rain had hardened the mud without being severe enough to leave icy patches. In an hour and a half they reached Dawlish, and it was with reluctance that John trotted straight through the little port without calling on Hilda. A few miles further along the track that hugged the coast, they passed the turning into Holcombe, the other de Wolfe manor, where Hilda’s father was the reeve.

‘Do they know there about my brother’s illness?’ shouted John over the noise of the hooves.

‘I sent a message yesterday, but told them to stay away from Stoke in case they bring back the contagion,’ replied Alfred.

At Teignmouth the tide was ebbing fast out of the river, but they had to wait fretfully for half an hour until the water was low enough for their horses to safely navigate the ford to the sand-spit on the other side. From there it was only a few minutes’ canter to reach the head of the wooded valley that held John’s birthplace of Stoke-in-Teignhead. The village was unnaturally quiet; no work was being done in the strip-fields and the single village street was empty. Smoke filtered out from beneath the eaves of many of the tofts to prove that people were alive, but the villagers were shunning any unnecessary contact with each other. As they passed two of the small thatched cottages, John saw ominous boards nailed across the doors, with a black cross painted on them.

They neared the manor house at the further end of the village before they saw the first living person walking towards them, the priest of St Andrew’s Church. He held up his hand and John reined up alongside, fearful that Father Martin had been to the manor to administer the last rites. Thankfully, the sturdy priest was more reassuring.

‘Lord William is no worse, even if not improved, Sir John. He is weak, but still alive, for which I thank the Holy Virgin — as well as your mother and sister, who are tending him like a baby.’

The parson called William ‘lord’ as befitted the eldest son and holder of the manor title, whereas John was ‘sir’ by virtue of his military knighthood.

‘Is there more of the plague in the village?’ asked John.

‘Two more of the sick children have died, God save their souls,’ admitted Father Martin. ‘And two more have fallen ill in another house. I’m on my way to them now, to see if there is anything I can do.’

He looked exhausted, and John suspected that he had hardly slept since the yellow plague had come to Stoke.

They rode on and clattered over the small bridge across the ditch around the house, a defence which had not been needed since before John was born. Inside the stockade, almost an acre of ground held the square stone-built house and the profusion of sheds, huts and barns that made this a working farm as well as a family home.