Chapter Four
Hugh brought the axe down one last time, wiped his brow with the back of his hand, and set the axe by the side of his pile of wood. Gazing about him, he grinned as he told himself that he had never been so happy as since he started to live with Constance.
This old tree had collapsed during the year before last, when he’d first come here. Over time the other larger boughs had been cut out, but this one had, for some reason, survived. And then a foul storm had struck and it had collapsed, taking a lot of the old Devon hedge with it.
It was a problem with older parcels of land in this area. The little holding where Hugh and Constance lived was once part of the Priory of Belstone’s demesne, but when Constance had been sent here by the prioress it had been empty for some years. The hovel which had stood here had been all but derelict, and when Hugh first saw it his temper had if anything grown more sour.
‘Best work on that first,’ he had declared, and stood staring at it while Constance gazed at him anxiously. She had been anxious a lot of the time back then, he remembered. About her baby, about her life, whether she had made the right choices, whether she should be here at Iddesleigh at all … there were so many concerns for a young woman with no vocation.
What else could a moorman do, though? Hugh knew that a place like this needed a man to look after it, just as a woman needed a man to provide for her. It was all well and good to say to a woman like Constance, ‘Woman, there’s a place at Iddesleigh. There’s a house and some acres. Go and take it. You can live there,’ as though that was an end to the matter. But no one who’d ever farmed would think that. No, as Hugh knew, a farm which was left fallow for any length of time would soon be overwhelmed with weeds and brambles, the coppices overrun with small, useless stems, and the house … well, it would look as this one had.
Constance was lucky the prioress had given her anything, of course. It was proof of the regard in which she was held by the prioress — but God’s ballocks, it was fortunate that Hugh had been here to see to it.
The scowl on his face lightened a moment. Being born on the moors lent a man a suspicious nature, and for a moment Hugh wondered whether that could have been at the heart of the prioress’s suggestion that Hugh should travel here with Constance … the old woman was certainly crafty enough to see that this servant was already attracted to the former novice. Only it was more than that. Hugh felt the same adoration for Constance that a sheepdog feels for its master. There was no denying it: he loved her. She was … well, there weren’t words for her.
He’d even given up his master, Simon Puttock, and his family for Constance. Perhaps if he hadn’t met her, he’d still be in service with Simon, living with him at Dartmouth. When Master Simon had been given that post — the Abbot Robert’s representative in the town with full authority under the Abbey of Tavistock’s seal — Hugh had known so many doubts, it had felt as though his heart was being torn in two; but there was no choice as far as he was concerned, not really. He’d seen Constance’s new home by then, and although he’d rebuilt the worst of the hovel, there was too much to be done on the land about it for him to leave her alone yet. Simon, who knew him so well, had given him a small purse and wished him Godspeed when they last parted. There was no pointed comment, no demand that he ought to continue to serve his master as he had before, no bitterness: only a wholehearted and generous wish for his happiness.
Hugh could remember that last meeting.
‘Hugh, make her happy — and I will pray that God makes you as content with her as I always have been with my darling Meg. Constance is a good woman, and she deserves a man who’ll honour her, so look to her, protect her, and you can always send a messenger to me if you are in want. Remember that!’
And with that, Hugh could remember the glistening at his master’s eyes. Simon had actually wept at losing Hugh’s company. It made Hugh feel terrible, but there was no choice. Not really. Hugh hefted the axe again and let its weight draw it down into a long branch.
No, Master Simon could always find a new servant. He’d said that he had one already — a lad called Rob — who was efficient and ever cheerful. That was what Master Simon had said: the lad was always cheerful. It was a daft comment. Hugh had always been cheerful enough, God’s blood! He normally greeted his master with a respectful duck of the head of a morning. He scowled, remembering: what more could anyone ask?
He swung the axe again, glancing up at the sky. It was darkening in the way that it did in the late winter, deepening to blue overhead with pink in the west. Looking at the remaining trunk, he sniffed, then slung the axe over his shoulder. There would be time enough tomorrow to finish the job, and then it would be a matter of carrying all the logs back to the house. He had a small hurdle which he’d made from the smaller branches, and he reckoned he could lash the logs to that, and hitch it to an ox. The beast would drag the lot back home.
Mulling over his plans for the next day, he wandered slowly through the gathering gloom to the house. Soon he could smell the fire, and he snuffed the air happily. It was good to know that he was nearly home. The mere idea of ‘home’ was enough to make him smile. When he’d been a youngster he’d had a home, of course, but then he’d become a shepherd, and that lonely life had marked him profoundly.
His path took him over the line of the hill, along the lane westwards, and thence down to the cottage. He stopped once, gazing along the sweep of hills to the south to where, in the distance, he could see his old haunt: Dartmoor, sitting like a brooding animal preparing to pounce on the far horizon, dark and dangerous. Sometimes he liked to think of himself like that: a man of action who rested at present, but only like a moor viper, coiled, alert and ready to attack.
Tonight all he wanted was a quiet evening, and then his bed. The house looked shabby and in need of a fresh coat of limewash and a new roof, but he stood still and smiled at the sight of it. It was all he had ever wanted. A good, solid house, when all was said and done, with space for the animals at the bottom of the slope so that their filth would drain through the hole in the wall, while he and his woman and child slept in the northernmost portion, up the hill. It was a sight to warm an old shepherd’s heart.
Sighing happily, he strode into the yard, and had gone six paces when he realised that something was wrong; terribly wrong.
There was a smell of burning pitch, and he had none here at the farm. He could smell the fumes as though they were very close, and it was a few moments before he realised that the odour came from a torch, and that the breeze was behind him.
A warning flashed in his mind, and he began to turn, but he was already too late. There was a shout, a command, he heard a whirling like a nearby flight of geese, and his head was slammed forward as something smashed against his skull.
He could feel sparks strike at his skull, and as his cheek crashed against the dirt of the yard he smelled the stench of burning hair, rank and disgusting. A second blow, then a third, and his head was a mass of pain. There were cries, but they seemed to come from afar, perhaps on the next hill? In front of him he could see the house, and he knew that if he could reach it, all would be well. He would be safe in there. Constance would come to him and make his head better. He knew that.
There was no strength in his arms or legs. It was only a short distance, made hazy by the smoke and the roaring in his ears. He lifted his head, and he heard a man cry out. A boot kicked his temple, and then his chest, and he lay wide-eyed and unblinking, utterly spent.
He could see the open doorway. At the threshold lay his woman. He saw a man drop to his knees in front of her. There was a muted cry, a sound of grief and terror, and he saw the man finish, rise, kick, spit, laugh, draw a dagger, reach down. All was a whirl. Hugh was sure he ought to do something, but his limbs were another man’s, not his. There was nothing his mind could do to command his body.