Pietro, there will be another time to see her.” The youth shrugged his hand away irritably, but followed his father.
There was a farcical scene in the doorway. Torre was returning, and just as they reached the doorway, he was in their path. Antonio barged past, and Torre turned, arms outstretched as if to demand the reason for such rudeness. An instant later, Pietro also tried to thrust him aside.
But a tin miner was not so easy to push. Torre rotated slowly to study the younger man. Reading the menace in his features, Pietro stepped back and dropped his hand to his dagger, fumbling to unsheath it. It would be demeaning to back down before such a peasant. Torre looked at the knife contemptuously, then brushed past and strode back to his table, sitting by Holcroft.
They had left behind them the dismayed novice standing with the equally confused friar.
Torre took a swallow of his ale. “What’s put the wind in their sails, eh?” Then he saw the monk and muttered, “Oh, by the cross, it’s one of them! You – come here!”
The monk was startled, and Holcroft saw him jerk in surprise at the hostility in Torre’s voice. “Me?”
“Yes, of course you! Who else?” Torre sneered as the youth unwillingly approached. “What’s your name?”
“Peter.”
“Well, Peter. What are you doing here? Are you sent here to spy on ordinary workers for that bloodsucking leech of an Abbot of yours?”
“My Abbot…?”
“Is as dark a thief as ever stole a man’s livelihood!”
Holcroft stared from his companion to the flushed features of the monk. “Roger, what in Christ’s name are you talking about?”
“Haven’t you heard? Abbot Champeaux has decided to steal from me, now he’s got the power. He’s demanding money for the right to stay where I am, and if I don’t agree to pay, he’ll take my land from me.”
“Surely he wouldn’t do that?”
“I only farm it as a bondman. Now the Abbot wants to change things so the land is a tenement held from him by lease. He wants twelve shillings a year from me just to stay on my own land.”
“Can you?”
“Pay twelve shillings? No, of course I can’t. My tinning only brings in a little, and I have to pay tax when it’s coigned. The land I farm from the Abbot is poor. It produces barely enough to keep me alive.”
“You could complain.”
“Who to – the Warden of the Stannaries? That’s the Abbot now, or hadn’t you heard, port-reeve? He’s going to steal from us and force us from his land by charging too much. It’s just theft, plain and simple. He’s devious, like all politicians.”
“No, he’s not,” the monk called Peter declared hotly. “Abbot Champeaux is a fair man. If you speak to him and explain…”
“Speak to him? He’s a politician – a liar and a thief. If I were to go and see him, I’d be thrown in his clink.”
“The Abbot is reasonable, sir,” the monk protested again. “He’s always upheld the rights of tinners.”
“You would say that – you’re not suffering because of his greed.”
Holcroft saw the monk’s face whiten with anger, and the lad took a step forward. “Uh oh,” he muttered, and quickly stood between them. “Brother, I think this is something we can’t resolve peacefully, and I’m sure you wouldn’t want to be hauled in front of the good Abbot for brawling in a tavern. Please leave, and I shall keep this man quiet.”
“He’s insulted the Abbot with no reason. It’s villainous! He’s lied,” the monk hissed.
“Yes, but it wouldn’t suit the cut or color of your habit to fight, would it? Come now, let’s forget it. It was only the ale talking; everyone knows the Abbot is good and honorable.” Muttering, the youth backed away, then spun around and stamped from the room.
Holcroft gave a sigh of relief. “What’s the point of picking on a beardless youth?”
Torre gave him a cynical leer. “So you want to protect your position as port-reeve, do you? Does the office matter so much you’ll forget your friends for a few more days in power?”
“Roger, if the truth be known, I am heartily sick of the job, and whoever is elected to it is welcome.”
“Yes, you’ll give up the money, and the free rent, and the right to arrest and hold people who upset you, with pleasure.”
“All I can do is what I am told,” he said frankly. “And it’s little enough, heaven knows. But I’d prefer to see you free to go to the fair tomorrow and not being held in the clink for libelling the Abbot.”
“You’d take his side against your old friends.”
“No. But I’ll be glad to give up all this responsibility and be able to get home at a decent hour like I used to.” And maybe then Hilary would be more friendly, he thought. His wife had been cold and unresponsive for so long now, it was hard to remember when she had last been a true wife to him.
“Oh, yes! You’ll be happy to lose all the profits of your work, no doubt.”
Holcroft shook his head. What Torre could not understand was the pressure of the interminable record- keeping, the late hours checking tolls with the prior and others, the planning and administration.
“I can’t sit here with you. For all I know you’re recording everything I say to report to the Abbot himself!” Torre declared, rising.
“Roger!” Holcroft pleaded, and gestured. “Come on, sit down. I wanted to see you to relax.”
“Relax with someone else. I’m going to.” Torre stumped away.
“Come, now, Master port-reeve. You’ll try some ale? That was good work, keeping Torre and the monk apart. There would have been too much grief from that.”
“Mistress Agatha, I don’t know why I bothered,” he said, gratefully taking a fresh ale. He noticed Elias sitting with an unknown companion. Putting the cook from his mind, Holcroft assumed that Elias’ friend was someone who had arrived for the fair.
Agatha looked down at him sympathetically. She knew that David had been working madly for the last few weeks, and was about to offer him some words of comfort when she saw new arrivals.
Arthur peered inside, searching for the Camminos.
“Well? Are they there?” his wife demanded.
“Not yet, my dear, but I’m sure they will be,” Arthur assured her. He led the way to the bench recently vacated by the Venetians. It had been a mistake to bring his wife with him. She had wanted to remain at their rented house and supervise its decoration, but Arthur wished her to recover from their long ride, and hoped a pot or two of wine would ease her temper.
At home, he was used to surrendering to her will. Marion was the daughter of a knight, and if it hadn’t been for her father’s need for ready money, and Arthur’s willingness to extend a loan, they might never have wed. In matters of business he could insist on her aid, though, and he was sure that Cammino could be useful. Any contacts with wealthy foreigners were to be fostered, and the mention of a fleet, together with evidence of the acquaintance of an Abbot, meant that Cammino wielded some power. Marion’s presence might be useful. “Come, dear. Would you like some wine?”
Avice sat decorously at the end of the bench, accepting a pot of wine. The Venetian man had looked so dashing in his foreign clothes, she thought, like a squire from a royal court. As her parents spoke, her eyes kept flitting to the doorway.
After serving them, Agatha stood back and surveyed her domain. When she saw Torre talking to Lizzie, saw his hand on her arm, and the way she giggled and nodded, the alewife’s eyes shot to Holcroft. Agatha could see his pain when he saw Lizzie leaving with Torre. It wasn’t the first time a man had fallen for Lizzie, and it wouldn’t be the last, but Agatha had a soft spot for the port-reeve, and his dismay saddened her.
There was a soft belch at her side, and she turned to see the friar gazing thoughtfully into the distance. At first she thought he was simply drunk, but when he noticed her, he said apologetically, “Sorry, I wasn’t thinking – thought I recognized someone.”
Lizzie straightened her skirts and smoothed them before sitting at the edge of her palliasse to tighten her
