“I bought a shroud. I’ve no one to carry ’im to churchyard, though.”
“Your brothers will not do even this for their father?” I asked.
“I will not ask them,” she replied.
“You will not need to,” I told her. Midnight or not, I strode to the first of the brothers’ huts and pounded on the door until an angry face appeared. This visage was not, I suspect, any more inflamed than my own.
I told the fellow in few words what I thought of his filial devotion, and in my remarks managed to insert announcement of my new authority as bailiff at Bampton Castle. He was a tenant, as was his father, of the Bishop of Exeter, but I knew he would prefer to be on good terms with Lord Gilbert’s bailiff. I ended my tirade by telling him what I expected of him and his brother when the new day dawned. He tugged at his forelock in acquiescence, and I turned and stalked back to the girl and the vicar. I had rather enjoyed telling the fellow what I thought of him, and what I required he do. This, I recognize, showed a lack of humility and is a sin. I enjoyed it, nevertheless, as I think did Father Thomas. It is the nature of sin to be pleasurable, else we would have less trouble avoiding it. The vicar grinned at me as I returned to Alice’s door. My words must have carried through the still night, which meant that other cotters in the Weald heard the scolding as well. This, I reasoned, was probably a good thing.
Father Thomas, his work temporarily complete, went out into the snow to the vicarage. I would have stayed to sit up with the girl but she would not hear of it. “I will wash him and stitch him in his shroud. You can do naught for him in death.” She did not add, although she might have, that I had done little for him in life, either.
The funeral was set for the sixth hour. I determined to attend: the man had been my charge, and I was eager to learn if Alice’s cantankerous brothers accepted my authority.
Late next morning, after a maslin loaf and a pint of ale, I walked out the castle gate, and a few steps later turned from Mill Street to the Weald. Fifty yards down the path I saw mourners preparing for the procession to the church. Henry atte Bridge lay on the ground before his hut, his body sewn into a crude homespun hempen shroud. The plant and its seeds, I mused, had eased the man from this life, and would accompany his bones to the next.
As I approached two men lifted the body to a crude bier: two rough planks supported at either end by two short poles. Two more men stood silently, ready to assist the others at the ends of these shafts. One I recognized as the brother who had received my wrath twelve hours before. He studied the overflowing banks of Shill Brook intently, refusing to meet my eyes.
Alice stood behind the bier, her head high, and as she saw me turn into the lane I thought I saw the flicker of a smile — no, a smirk — cross her lips. Behind her stood Thomas de Bowlegh’s curate and a cortege of mourners, including what must have been the brothers’ wives and children. The assembly, for a cotter’s funeral, was quite acceptable.
I stood away from the lane as the four bearers bent to their burden, then set off for the church. They had, I realized, been waiting for me, on whose orders I know not. I found myself, after Alice, in the position of chief mourner. I dropped in beside her as the bier passed and silently, but for the deceased’s frolicking grandchildren, we traveled up Church View Street to the Church of St Beornwald.
The procession stopped at the lych gate for prayers, then entered the church through the porch, and Henry on his planks was laid at the entrance to the chancel. Thomas de Bowlegh said the mass, and preached a brief sermon. This met the approval of most, standing about in the nave on cold feet as we were, but I think Alice was peeved that her father could draw no more from the vicar than a few sentences about the brevity and uncertainty of life.
The grave-diggers had troublesome work until they chopped through the topmost layer of frozen soil, but we eventually got Henry atte Bridge laid properly away, his bones joining the hundreds, perhaps thousands, who went before, each generation raising the level of the churchyard a few more inches above the surrounding soil.
In scattered groups the mourners departed. It was time to speak to Thomas de Bowlegh about the child. I asked first what heriot he would demand of her and the brothers.
“They have little enough,” the vicar answered. “A good hen, or perhaps a sheep, will be all I shall get from them.”
“And what will you do with the child? Her older brother inherits, little as that may be.”
“She must be put out to work…somewhere. I have servants enough.”
“I will employ her at the castle, if that suits you,” I replied.
The vicar was, as I suspected he might be, pleased to have the matter so neatly resolved. He wrung my hand enthusiastically.
Alice observed this conversation from the gate in the churchyard wall, far enough away that she could not hear our words, but close enough that she could read my face as I turned from the vicar and advanced to her place. Tears yet found their way from her eyes, but she smiled through them. “He will release me?” she asked.
“Aye. Now run to your home and gather your possessions, everything you can carry, whether it be yours or your father’s. Your brothers will gather their wits soon enough and collect all. You must do so first. Take your goods to the castle straight away. Do not hesitate. Once your chattels are within the castle, your brothers may chafe, but that will gain them nothing. Run, now!”
She did, her feet throwing up fountains of snow as she sped past Galen House and disappeared around the curve of Church View.
I made my own somewhat slower way back to the castle, with more gravity, I hoped, and once there found Cicily and told her to prepare a place for Alice atte Bridge. There! I complimented myself, you have discharged your Christian duty to an orphan, and may now turn with single mind to the business of Thomas Shilton and Sir Robert Mallory.
That business must wait. The sun came out next day, the snow melted, and the road to Oxford turned to mire. I decided on a bath.
I had at Galen House an old barrel I had sawn in half, the seams of which I then smeared with pitch. But at Galen House I had no opportunity to put this tub to use. Now I would. I sent Uctred and his son to retrieve it, and had them place it in the midst of my apartment.
I required of Cicily six buckets of hot water, which, with raised eyebrows, she agreed to provide. Both eyebrows were lifted. It is as I thought: elevating one eyebrow is a noble trait.
Alice was assigned the honor of fetching the buckets. As she hauled the third bucketful through the hall to my room, Lord Gilbert entered from the solar. He watched her labor under the steaming load, then, his curiosity aroused, asked what I was about. I told him.
“A bath?” he said incredulously. “It’s winter, man! You’ll die of…of…of something.”
“I stink,” I told him frankly.
“So do we all. What of it?”
“I stayed three nights in verminous inns.”
“Ah, yes, I forgot. But still, you will catch your death, bathing in winter. A corpse smells worse, you know, than either you or I alive.”
“I will live,” I assured him. He flashed the uplifted eyebrow at me, as if to say, “You have been warned.”
“Very well, but just in case, who do you recommend as bailiff in your place?”
I laughed. It was a good joke. Lord Gilbert, however, was not laughing. “I will think on it,” I replied, “while I soak the dirt away.”
Alice had overheard much of the conversation as she made her way between my room and the kitchen. She grinned broadly as she dumped the fourth and fifth buckets into the barrel. I thought to remonstrate with her for lack of respect, but decided against it.
Next day Lord Gilbert and his retinue departed on muddy roads for Goodrich. I was on my own now. I watched the party — Lord Gilbert, Lady Petronilla, Richard, Lady Joan, their valets and grooms, horses, wagons, and carts — pass through the castle yard to Mill Street and east, then north, through the town. There was much jangling of harnesses, squeaking of cart-wheels, and stamping of horses as they got under way. The silence when they were gone was as complete as the noise of their departure.
Lord Gilbert had delayed his move until the issue of the bones found in his cesspit was resolved. Although there had been no trial and no finding yet of guilt, it was clear to me that he assumed these were but a formality. To Lord Gilbert, Thomas Shilton was already a dead man.
Not all the castle residents departed with Lord Gilbert. Some must remain to work the manor in his absence. An hour later I took three of these — John, Arthur, and Uctred — as my escort and we four made our way through
