‘Perhaps. But I don’t feel guilty. I feel that I may have saved a life,’ Cissy said. And it was true. She could see the acolyte’s face so clearly as they helped him climb into normal clothes and bundled up his habit.
‘Poor boy,’ she said. Gerard had looked so lost, so scared. Surely it was their duty to save him.
Baldwin and the coroner had travelled a good many miles in two days, and Sir Roger spoke for both when he said, ‘My arse feels like it’s been beaten with hazel for hours. I want a good, solid chair that won’t move and a jug or two of strong ale. Then I need a haunch of beef or pork, hot, and dripping with fat and juice. After that I might feel half human again.’
‘I see. Half human is as close as you feel you can ever hope to achieve?’ Baldwin enquired.
‘If I wasn’t so bruised, Sir Knight, I’d force you to regret your words,’ Coroner Roger said, grimly rubbing his behind. ‘But under the circumstances, I’ll forgive you if you only find a means of shoving a quart of ale in my hands.’
‘Come with me,’ Simon said. ‘I know a small tavern which keeps a good brew.’ He led the way from the gate and into the town itself. ‘Ah, I’d thought he’d have finished,’ he breathed.
Before them was the tavern outside which Sir Tristram had been gauging his recruits. He was still there, speaking seriously to the clerk who had been scribbling the names of the men he had recruited and which weapons they had brought with them.
Seeing Simon, Sir Tristram straightened. ‘You decided to come back, then?’ he said rudely. ‘This town has a poor number of men, Bailiff. Very poor quality. It must be the wet weather down here. The damp settles on the brain, I understand. Maybe that’s why these clods are so gormless.’
As he spoke his eyes passed over Baldwin and Roger, appraising them. His attention rested for a moment on their swords: Coroner Roger’s a heavy-bladed, rather long and slightly outdated lump of metal with a worn grip; Baldwin’s by comparison a very modern blade with a hilt of fine grey leather. Simon could almost hear the thoughts in Sir Tristram’s mind: one looked heavily used and was familiar to the wearer’s hand, while the other was new, which could mean that the knight was new to his status, or that his last sword was broken and he had chosen to replace it with the very latest model.
Simon hurriedly introduced his friends to Sir Tristram. ‘The King’s Arrayer,’ he added. ‘Sir Tristram is here to recruit for the King’s war in Scotland.’
‘I wish you Godspeed, then,’ Coroner Roger said. His eyes were moving beyond the knight already, to the bar in the tavern, and – joy! – to the serving girl who caught his eye even as he lifted his brows hopefully. She smiled and held up four fingers. The coroner hesitated, then gave a faint shake of his head and held up three.
Sir Tristram didn’t see his glance or movement. ‘I thank you. With some of these oafs, I’ll need it.’
‘Will you see more tomorrow?’ Simon asked.
‘There would seem to be little point. I have found forty men and two who could function as vintenars, so I am ready enough to fulfil the King’s requirements. I shall leave tomorrow or the next day, when I have provisions, and hope their feet will survive the journey. God knows but that I am doubtful. In the meantime, I shall stay at the inn, rather than abusing the abbot’s generosity,’ he added with a harsher tone. ‘I can collect my horse tomorrow.’
He left them, graciously taking his leave and bowing, and the three men watched him in silence as he passed off along the street.
‘What an arrogant…’
‘Master Coroner, there is no need to use language which could embarrass the serving maid,’ Baldwin said with mock severity.
‘Embarrass you? Could I?’ Coroner Roger asked archly as the girl appeared.
She giggled as his hand quested the length of her thigh. ‘If you worked hard at it, Master.’
‘I may just do that, my dear,’ he drawled as she walked away. Then his face fell and he took a long draught of his wine. ‘Trouble is, she’s the right age to be my daughter.’
‘Grand-daughter,’ Simon corrected.
‘Don’t rub it in. My wife does that often enough.’
‘How is the lovely Lady de Gidleigh?’ Baldwin asked.
‘The same as usual,’ Roger said glumly. ‘I think if I were to give her poison, it’d only make her stronger. She’s built like a mule, there’s nothing can knock her down. Even a simple disease gives up at the sight of her. She never loses her balance. Her humours seem as steady as a lump of moorstone. It’s not fair. Hah! No, if I were to find some poison, I’d be better off drinking it meself. It would,’ he added with a slow shake of his head as though in deep gloom, ‘at least end my suffering.’
‘My heart bleeds for you. You’d be terrified if the girl agreed to bed you,’ Simon said with a smile. He and Baldwin knew that for all his harsh words, the coroner was devoted to his wife.
‘You think so? I tell you, I’d take her tonight, except it’s hardly respectful to the abbot to take a wench back to his own guest room and use it for a bulling shop, and it would be a rude rejection of his hospitality to stay here the night with her.’
‘You are so thoughtful,’ Baldwin said with a straight face.
‘Some of us are. It is a hard cross to bear, though, old friend,’ Roger sighed.
Simon was desperate to find out what the abbot had wanted to see Baldwin about, but Baldwin avoided the subject. There was something about his manner which sent a tingle down Simon’s back. Baldwin
