Ellis Peters - The Potter's Field

‘Britric, is it? Yes, he put up here with me through the fair. Came heavy laden this year, I let him put his bits and pieces in the loft. Why not? I know he slips his abbey dues, but the loss of his penny won’t beggar them. The lord abbot doesn’t cast too harsh an eye on the small folk. Not that Britric is small in any other way, mind you. A big lusty fellow, red-haired, a bit of a brawler sometimes, when he’s drunk, but not a bad lad, take him all in all.’

‘Last year,’ said Hugh, ‘he had a woman with him, or so I hear. I’ve good cause to know he was not lodging with you then, but if he did his drinking here you must have seen something of them both. You remember her?’

Wat was certainly remembering her already, with some pleasure and a great deal of amusement. ‘Oh, her! Hard to forget, once seen. She could twist herself like a slip of willow, dance like a March lamb, and play on the little pipe. Easy to carry, better than a rebec unless you’re a master. And she was the practical one, keeping a tight hold on the money they made between them. She talked of marriage, but I doubt she’d ever get him to the church door. Maybe she talked of it once too often, for he came alone this year round. Where he’s left her there’s no knowing, but she’ll make her way wherever she is.’

That had a very bitter ring in Hugh’s ear, considering the possibility he had in mind. Wat, it seemed, had not made the connection which had already influenced the widow’s thinking. But before he could ask anything further Wat surprised him by adding simply: ‘Gunnild, he called her. I never knew where she came from—I doubt if he knew it, either—but she’s a beauty.’

That, too, had its strange resonance, when Hugh recalled the naked bones. More and more, in imagination, they took on the living aspect of this wild, sinuous, hardworking-waif of the roads, darkly brilliant as the admiring gleam she could kindle in a middle-aged innkeeper’s eyes after a year and more of absence.

‘You have not seen her since, here or elsewhere?’

‘How often am I elsewhere?’ Wat responded good-humouredly. ‘I did my roaming early. I’m content where I am. No, I’ve never set eyes on the girl again. Nor heard him so much as mention her name this year, now I come to think of it. For all the thought he seemed to be giving to last year’s fancy,’ said Wat tolerantly,’she might as well be dead.’

‘So there we have it,’ said Hugh, summing up briskly for Cadfael in the snug privacy of the workshop in the herb garden. ‘Britric is the one man we know to have made himself at home there in Ruald’s croft. There may have been others, but none that we can learn of. Moreover, there was a woman with him, and their mating by ail accounts tempestuous, she urging marriage on him, and he none too ready to be persuaded. More than a year ago, this. And this year not only does he come to the fair alone, but she is not seen there at all, she who gets her living at fairs and markets and weddings and such jollifications. It is not proof, but it requires answers.’

‘And she has a name,’ said Cadfael reflectively. ‘Gunnild. But not a habitation. She comes from nowhere and is gone, nowhere. Well, you cannot but look diligently for them both, but he should be the easier to find. And as I guess, you already have all your people alerted to look out for him.’

‘Both round the shire and over the border,’ said Hugh flatly. ‘His rounds, they say, go no further, apart from journeys to the towns to buy such commodities as salt and spices.’

‘And here are we into November, and the season for markets and fairs over, but the weather still fairly mild and dry. He’ll be still on his travels among the villages, but I would guess,’ said Cadfael, pondering, ‘not too far afield. If he still has a base in Ruiton, come the hard frosts and snow he’ll be making for it, and he’ll want to be within a reasonable few miles of it when the pinch comes.’

‘About this time of year,’ said Hugh, ‘he remembers he has a mother in Ruiton, and makes his way back there for the winter.’

‘And you have someone waiting there for his coming.’

‘If luck serves,’ said Hugh, ‘we may pick him up before then. I know Ruiton, it lies barely eight miles from Shrewsbury. He’ll time his journeys to bring bom round by all those Welsh villages and bear east through Knockin, straight for home. There are many hamlets close-set in that corner, he can go on with his selling until the weather changes, and still be near to home. Somewhere there we shall find him.’

Somewhere there, indeed, they found him, only three days later. One of Hugh’s sergeants had located the pedlar at work among the villages on the Welsh side of the border, and discreetly waited for him on the English side until he crossed and headed without haste for Meresbrook, on his way to Knockin and home. Hugh kept a sharp eye on his turbulent neighbours in Powys, and as he would tolerate no breach of English law his own side of the border, so he was punctilious in giving them no occasion to complain that he trespassed against Welsh law on their side, unless they had first broken the tacit compact. His relations with Owain Gwynedd, to the north-west, were friendly, and well understood on either part, but the Welsh of Powys were ill-disciplined and unstable, not to be provoked, but not to be indulged if they caused him trouble without provocation. So the sergeant waited until his unsuspecting quarry crossed over the ancient dyke that marked the boundary, somewhat broken and disregarded in these parts but still traceable. The weather was still reasonably mild, and walking the roads not unpleasant, but it seemed that Britric’s pack was as good as empty, so he was making for home ahead of the frosts, apparently content with his takings. If he had stocks at home in Ruiton, he could still sell to his neighbours and as far afield as the local hamlets.

So he came striding into the shire towards Meresbrook, whistling serenely and swinging a long staff among the roadside grasses. And short of the village he walked into a patrol of two light-armed men from the Shrewsbury garrison, who closed in on him from either side and took him by either arm, enquiring without excitement if he owned to the name of Britric. He was a big, powerful fellow half a head taller than either of his captors, and could have broken away from them had he been so minded, but he knew them for what they were and what they represented, and forbore from tempting providence unnecessarily. He behaved himself with cautious discretion, owned cheerfully to his name, and asked with disarming innocence what they wanted with him.

They were not prepared to tell him more than that the sheriff required his attendance in Shrewsbury, and their reticence, together with the stolid efficiency of their handling of him, might well have inclined him to think better of his co-operation and make a break for it, but by then it was too late, for two more of their company had appeared from nowhere to join them, ambling unhurriedly from the roadside, but both with bows slung conveniently to hand, and the look of men who knew how to use them. The thought of an arrow in the back did not appeal to Britric. He resigned himself to complying with necessity. A great pity, with Wales only a quarter of a mile behind. But if the worst came to the worst, there might be a better opportunity of flight later if he remained docile now.

They took him into Knockin, and for the sake of speed found a spare horse for him, brought him into Shrewsbury before nightfall, and delivered him safely to a cell in the castle. By that time he showed signs of acute uneasiness, but no real fear. Behind a closed and unrevealing face he might be weighing and measuring whatever irregularities he had to account for, and worrying about which of them could have come to light, but if so, the results seemed to bewilder rather than enlighten or alarm him. All his efforts to worm information out of his captors had failed. All he could do now was wait, for it seemed that the sheriff was not immediately on hand.