Michael JECKS: The Oath

To distract himself, he urged his rounsey into a slow walk across from their tent so that he could look out over the men in the camp.

In the past he had ridden with the King’s host from Leeds in Kent up to Scotland, and over all the lands between. He had seen enthusiastic forces gathered; he had seen the shattered remnants of all-but-destroyed ones. The cheery, the furious, he had seen them all. But never before, not even when he had ridden back with his men from the north, when they had been roundly defeated by The Bruce, had he seen their mood so sombre.

Here the men moved about the remains of this village like lost souls. Such a small number… When they left London there had been hundreds. Now, perhaps one hundred remained. No more. They stumbled as they walked, exhausted. Cold and wet, they had taken every item of wood from this vill, even down to the cottage doors, in order to feed their fires, but the flames would not give them any cheer. This force was defeated before a single sword had been drawn.

Second Saturday after the Feast of St Michael[8] 11 October 1326

Near Marshfield

Paul yawned as he came out of his little cottage. He had run out of bread and had to walk down to the vill, as the Abbot was most insistent on maintaining his rights here.

It was the Abbot of Tewkesbury who owned the benefice of this vill, the manor, and the mill; all those who lived here must take their grain to his mill down near Marshfield. The miller, generally a hated individual and viewed by all with suspicion, would take his tenth of the flour after milling, and from his efforts each year, a due was given to the Abbot.

Paul had only a small sack with a few pounds of grain in it, but he hoped it would be enough for two or three loaves. With fortune, he would be able to acquire some more flour before long, but there was no doubt that this would be a very thin winter. Not so bad as when he was a youth and the great famine had struck at the kingdom, but still not good.

It was almost noon when he set off on the short walk to Marshfield. It was only some three miles to the mill, and he was in no hurry, but the act of walking did at least keep him warmer. He had to loosen his neckcloth after the first mile or so.

The lands here to the north of Marshfield were uniformly flat and tedious, he always felt. His little church was in the midst of them, and while there were excellent pastures, there was no protection from the wind that came from the north and east. He had already grown to hate that wind. It cared nothing for obstacles, whether flesh, clothing, or even wattle and daub. Whatever it struck, it chilled.

South from the vill, the land was more pleasing to his eyes. It was rolling farmland, leading to good woods, and hills undulating into the distance. This scene never failed to please him as he took it in.

On his way, he had to pass a cottage with a blackthorn bush tied into a bundle and bound to a pole above the front door – the universal sign of a home with ale to sell. Paul went to the door and knocked.

‘Yes? Oh, Father, do you want a drop?’ Anna asked.

She was a short, plump woman with a cheery face and thick, powerful hands. Paul smiled as Anna fetched him a large earthenware jug, and he drained a cupful in a moment standing by her fire.

‘Come, Father, you can sit. You’re an honoured guest for us here, you are. Please, take the stool.’

‘Anna, I spend my life sitting and kneeling. Do you want me to grow as fat as the Abbot?’

Speaking of the Abbot in such a derogatory way was not seemly, but he knew the peasants here detested the man for his taxes. There was nothing so mean that the Abbot wouldn’t take it. Whether it was the leyrwite , the tax for adultery, or the heriot when a peasant died, the local people were fleeced like sheep. It was cruel to take so much from those who had the least.

There was a sudden crash at the door, and it rasped open slowly, Anna’s little husband entering with a small sack upon his back. He carried a couple of faggots of twigs in one hand, both balanced on a billhook’s blade.

‘Father,’ he nodded, letting the sack fall to the ground. It contained three cabbages which had been badly mangled by slugs, and two little turnips. ‘You staying for some pottage? Anna makes the best in Marshfield, I’ll vow, and with weather like this, you’ll need something hot for your belly.’

‘I thank you, but the ale and the fire are all I need,’ Paul said untruthfully, for the odours from the little pot by the fire had made his belly groan.

‘Really?’ Anna said mischievously. She lifted the lid and sniffed with appreciation. ‘Marrow bones, some meat from a chicken, with all the garbage, and the last of the peas went into that. Sure you don’t want any?’

It was later, when Paul was sitting replete, that the peasant looked at his wife and remarked, ‘Old Puddock was in the vill this morning. He had news of Bristol.’

Paul smiled to hear that. He was still unused to the broad local pronunciation, and the word ‘Brizzle’ made him feel alien, but strangely comfortable too.

‘Puddock is the Abbey’s steward,’ Anna said. ‘He often comes on tour to see we’re not living like lords on the money we manage to save from them.’

‘Little enough,’ her husband grunted. He picked up a stick and prodded at the fire.

‘I really should get off to the miller,’ Paul said unenthusiastically.

‘Puddock,’ the other man said solemnly, ‘he was telling of a terrible murder in the big city. An ’ole fam’ly killed.’

‘Terrible!’ Anna said, while Paul crossed himself sorrowfully.

‘There are many evil men in the world,’ he opined.

‘Because of that silly maid of theirs, the Capons have all been killed. Even the daughter’s pup.’

Paul felt the blood drain from his face and throat, just before he heard a roaring in his ears, and the ground came up to strike him.

Second Sunday after the Feast of St Michael[9] 12 October 1326

Chapel near Marshfield

The floor’s little ridges and gravel were agony to his knees as Paul knelt, head bent, hands clasped tightly near his nose, but that physical pain was nothing compared with the agony of his spirit.

‘Could You not have let me suffer for them? Why did You let that evil man kill them? There was no need for them to die. And my child was blameless, surely, in all this! Why should You punish him?’

He knew the answer already, of course. The child he and Petronilla had conceived was born out of an adulterous relationship. That ‘petit treason’ was itself an abomination. If another man had committed such an offence, it would be cause for an enraged husband to seek him out, and if he were to slay the offender, he was sure to be released. No man could be expected to endure such shame. Paul was fortunate that he was a priest. Holy Orders protected him.

The child had been born in sin, and was taken to prove to all that such evil behaviour was as obnoxious to God as to all right-thinking men.

He sobbed, his head falling forward until his elbows were on the ground, his brow on the chilly, clay soil. His heart felt as though it had been twisted and torn at the loss of his lovely Petronilla, the gorgeous, winsome maid with whom he had fallen utterly in love. There was no other emotion that had filled him so entirely. Even when he had felt the hands of the Bishop on his head at his service of ordainment, the thrill had lasted but fleetingly, and by the time they had left the great church, his excitement was more or less dissipated.

That was not the case with Petronilla. He had met her one day when she and her husband arrived at his chapel near Hanham, and it had been just as though a dart from Cupid’s bow had stabbed his heart. Instantly he was aware of no one else. Her face radiated perfection: it was like seeing the Blessed Virgin come down from Heaven to his little chapel, filling the place with light and warmth and love.