The Medieval Murderers - The Deadliest Sin

Henry saw one man dart into an alleyway. Catching a glimpse of Despenser’s arms on his tunic, and full of ale and cockiness, he chased the fellow until he managed to crack him over the head with his club. The man fell, tumbling to the ground, and Henry kicked him a couple of times for good measure before cutting his purse free. It had a pleasant heft to it, and he opened it to find plenty of coins.

Later, he went with his new-found wealth to the stews of Southwark, and there he met the woman.

God alone knew what her name was. She must have told him, but he couldn’t remember the morning after. He was brutally drunk: as fighting, swearing, rotten drunk as any man had ever been. And while he was stumbling into walls, shouting and laughing, he yet wanted a woman, this woman.

She was a saucy-looking little slut, with a head of thick straw-coloured hair and eyes the colour of the cornflowers he used to see in the fields about his home when he was young. He used to pick them for his mother. She liked to receive little gifts like that and, seeing the whore, he was reminded of those little acts. He wanted to find her something pleasant. There were no flowers here in the muddy, noisome streets. Little could survive amongst the cart tracks and faeces. Human, cattle, swine, dog and cat excrement lined the ways. Any plants would be trampled underfoot in no time. But he wanted to get her something.

He had plenty of money in his purse, he remembered blearily.

‘Maid, come with me. I’ll buy you a drink. I’ll buy you a new coif or something…’ he blurted.

‘You’re too drunk,’ she said.

‘I am. You come with me, and you can be too. I’ve money, look!’

He held up his purse and jingled it so she could hear the coins inside.

Her eyes widened. ‘I’ll come with you.’

‘Which is the best tavern in the street?’

She indicated a building with a large bush tied over the door, and he walked with her to it, stumbling only a little as he went, but as they drew nearer, he was shoved, hard, and a man pulled the woman away.

‘You bitch! You don’t leave your place over there. You know my rules!’ the man shouted.

He was a big man, heavy in the belly, but with the thin, wiry frame of a smith.

Henry pushed himself to his feet. When he felt his head, there was blood running in a thin trickle where he had struck a stone as he fell. He stared at the blood.

‘Get back, bitch!’ the man said again, and shoved her.

Henry was too full of ale to take care of the likely outcome. He drew his knife and struck the cock-bawd. Later, he heard that he slammed the blade into the man more than twenty times, but for all he knew it could have been once or a hundred times. He didn’t know what he was doing. The ale was driving him.

That was the end of his apprenticeship. He realised, as he stood looking at the crumpled body before him, that he must flee, that this was the end of all he knew. The whore, after giving a muffled squeak of alarm, began to shriek like a banshee, claiming that someone had murdered her husband, and men began to appear in the street. A horn was blown, and men began to gather.

Henry had to run faster than ever before in his life. He didn’t take the risk of returning home to collect his meagre belongings, he just ran and ran, up to the river, over along the shoreline, until he found a wherry and begged the oarsman to take him to the other side. A handful of coins persuaded the man. Within a few hours, Henry was safely on board a cog, feeling the waters roll her side to side, bound for Gascony.

He had never looked back.

There were many men in the army with irregular marriages. These women who joined the men in the camps were known as ‘marching wives’. Some of them were keen to stay with just one man; some were enthusiastically promiscuous, perhaps because they felt safer knowing that several men would look after them. There was less risk that their investment in time and effort would prove to be pointless. After all, it took only one arrow to remove their asset.

Janyn had never taken a woman. He had seen them, the sad, grey-faced widows and children, tagging along after the fighting men. Some put on a show of courage and enthusiasm, but for the most part they were weary, shocked, terrified women, many of whom had seen their menfolk hacked to death in front of them. Janyn had early on sworn that he would never force women like them to share his blanket with him. Yet there were times, as he listened in the darkness to other men grunting and rutting, when he envied them.

For certain, some of the women did enjoy their status. Sometimes the younger ones could be prickly and acerbic, but when they chose their mate, they were enthusiastic. So long as they hadn’t witnessed the slaughter of brothers and parents. That did tend to change them.

Many of these marching wives were happy to join the army. They came not from villages that had been pillaged, but from towns further away. Their lives were already mapped out for them: marriage with a local boy, life under a despotic mother-in-law, a patriarchal father-in-law, who would often hold incestuous desires, all of them ready and waiting to force the young wives into prolonged servitude. And for what? So that they could become brood-mares for the village. Nothing more. They were valued as highly as a bitch in whelp – not even as highly as a cow in calf, for a cow brought milk, meat and money. A bitch would only bark and snap. Little surprise, then, that the more enterprising young women would slip their leashes and run to join the army. There, they were valued as companions and lovers.

But Janyn would not take them. He was content with a simple financial relationship with one of the many whores, but he would not become emotionally entangled. It would take only a moment’s reflection on a husband’s, brother’s or child’s death for a woman to turn into a knife-wielding avenger, and he had no wish to share his bed with a vengeful harpy. Sex with a woman who might bear a grudge for her man’s death – that was a risk he could happily live without.

For that reason, when Pelagia joined him in the camp the day after the three had been scared away by Bill and Walter, the men of his vintaine were surprised. They knew their vintener’s opinions about the marching wives. But none dared say anything. The grim expression on Janyn’s face was enough to dispel any potential humour.

He had come across her lying huddled beside a tree that evening, already cold, shivery, suspicious and wary. She had no cloak to cover herself, nor yet a thick tunic. Instead, she huddled for warmth closer to the tree. It was like clutching ice in the hope of heat.

‘If you don’t find a man to protect you soon, you’ll be taken by someone less understanding. If you’re not careful, I’ll wake up one morning and find your body. I don’t want that,’ he said, and shuddered at the thought as though it were a premonition.

She gave him a long, slow stare. ‘What do you want from me?’

‘I would have you live. That is all,’ he said. ‘There has been enough death about these fields. Just live, woman, and I will be content.’

She rose stiffly, and shivered again. He led the way without turning to see if she was behind him. She could have slid away into the welcome concealment of the surrounding trees, for all he knew, but he continued traipsing on until he reached the circle of his men. There, he turned, and found that she was a mere four paces behind him.

‘Lie down there,’ he said to her, indicating his own blankets. The thick fustian was scratchy and rough, and he saw her eye it doubtfully. ‘It’s all there is,’ he said. ‘If you want to keep warm, you must roll yourself up in it.’

He said nothing more that evening. As she settled herself, wrapped in the coarse cloth, he sat nearby, his back to a tree, his steady gaze fixed on a point in the distance. Walter brought him a little pottage, but for the most part the men left him to his bleak meditations. Only one person didn’t seem to hold him in awe. When he glanced down, he saw that her eyes were still fixed on him. Feline, she seemed, and he could not tell whether, like a cat, she appreciated his protection or doubted his intentions.