There were twelve hours of the same length in the army day, measured from dawn to dawn, and those hours were twice as long, on the average, as the hours used by the regular clergy. The monks used twelve hours for their day, and then twelve more for the night, but since the length of day varies with the season, the length of their hours varied as well.
Chapter Fifteen
From the Journal of Josip Sobieski
RITTEN FEBRUARY 2, 1249, CONCERNING MAY 26, 1248
I FELL quickly to sleep, despite the fact that the sun was still up, and I slept soundly enough. Yet, I was still tired when Lezek woke me up, even though the sun was again well above the horizon.
Over breakfast I noticed that everyone had bags under their eyes, and I said that they all looked about the way I felt.
"Maybe it's got something to do with the air, this far north," Father John said.
"More likely, it was all the excitement yesterday, not to mention all the work of getting the war cart all the way up here," Sir Odon said.
"I don't think so," Fritz said. "We have often been a lot more excited than yesterday, when we didn't even get drunk or laid, and we've done more work than that on most days of our lives. I think we're all maybe a little bit sick."
"Well, we'll all have to be a lot sicker before we can let ourselves start sloughing off. First off, we need to look at the surrounding area, in case there's anything dangerous out there. For today, I want Lezek and Kiejstut to take the canvas kayak and cross the river. Then I want you to map the coastline east of here. Do as much as you can, but be back here by nightfall. Taurus and Fritz, I want you to do the same thing on the coastline to the west. Besides mapping, I want you all to try to find some of the local inhabitants and try to make friends with them, if you can. Take some money and a pocket full of trade goods with you, for presents."
"Should we carry a full weapons load?" Fritz asked.
"I think one rifle for the two of you ought to be enough. But take the rest of your personal weapons with you. Father John and I will do some mapping and searching along the riverbank, heading north of here. Josip, you were complaining about the lack of fresh bread last night at supper, so you have the honor of making up some sort of oven today, and I will expect fresh bread with my supper tonight. Zbigniew, we won't talk about your sins, but you'll spend the day building a really sturdy latrine, a two holer, if you please, at the east end of the campsite. Questions? Then let's get to it."
Those going out each took a pouch of money, a bigger pouch of various trade goods, and a third belt pouch of dried food, mostly fruit, cheese, and meat. Armed with sextants, compasses, and sketch pads for mapping, they set out, trusting to the length of their pace for distance measurements.
Taurus took an axe with him rather than a sword, which I considered wise. A sword is good against an armored man, and against a man with another sword, but for all else, an axe is much better, and it's a useful tool besides. Of course, a sword is also a status symbol, and when I'm out in public, it's my weapon of choice.
The clock said it was a half hour past dawn when I started working on the oven. There was clay to be found in the stream, and there were plenty of flat limestone rocks around. With a bit of help from Zbigniew carrying over the biggest ones, I had the oven almost completed by three.
What you need to bake bread is a hot hole in a rock. The easiest way to make one is to build something like a very deep bookcase out of flat rocks, seal it up as well as you can with clay, and then bury everything but the front of it with dirt. The one I made was big enough to bake a dozen loaves at a time.
To use it, you build a fire inside each of the holes until the whole oven is hot enough. Then you put the risen bread dough in using a long paddle, and close up the front holes with some more flat stones. If you've done it properly, the bread will be baked, but not burned, before the oven gets cold. Knowing how to do this exactly right is called "skill."
I got some bread dough mixed and rising and then cooked lunch for the two of us.
My lunch partner refused to talk about whatever it was that he had done to merit spending the day building an outhouse, but he would talk about the outhouse that he was building.
Zbigniew's plans for the outhouse were a little on the grandiose side, a small log cabin made out of thin logs. It would be light enough to move when the shit hole filled up, but with all of the joints cut wedge fashion, it would be sturdy, especially since all of the joints were to be carefully lashed together.
I didn't think there was any hope of his finishing by evening, so once I got the oven built, and small fires going in each of the baking holes to slowly bake the clay and heat the thing up to bread-baking temperature, I went over to give him a hand.
By seven o'clock we had seen no sign of the others, and the sun was still disconcertingly high, but I put the bread in to bake, and since I was fussing about the kitchen, I cooked supper as well, a stew made of dried beef, carrots, and potatoes.
By eight o'clock the food was done and in danger of either getting cold if I took it off the fire, or of burning if I didn't. I called Zbigniew over to eat, since it didn't make sense to ruin our supper, even if the others were late. I told him I was worried about the other men in our lance.
"One team could have gotten into trouble, but not all three," he said. "The sun is still high. They have plenty of time."
I said it was after eight o'clock.
"Then there must be something wrong with that clock. The sun isn't anywhere near setting. Look. Just put the stew and this good bread you made into one of the empty cases, and it will stay warm enough for the others once they get back. For now, come and help me with the latrine. With two of us working, we might get it done before sunset."
I asked him again what he had done to offend Sir Odon, and this time, since I was helping him, he told me.
"You know that yesterday's latrine was just a small trench with a couple of flat rocks on either side of it. Well, when I used it last night, I found that it was infested with stinging ants, so I dragged the two rocks a few yards farther back and used them there."
I asked why Sir Odon should be angry about that.
"Because he used the latrine right after me. He could see the white limestone rocks in the dim moonlight, but he didn't notice the old trench, which he stepped in."
I laughed and said that was Sir Odon's fault, not his.
"I agree," Zbigniew said, "but Sir Odon thought I was playing the old outhouse joke on him, you know, where you pick up and move the whole outhouse back a yard, so the next person out there falls into the shit hole, which is usually about neck deep."
I laughed and said that Sir Odon sometimes takes himself too seriously, even if Zbigniew had tried to dirty his boots.
"But I didn't do it on purpose, and our noted leader wasn't wearing his boots."
I said that just made it funnier, and Zbigniew didn't answer. Then I said now we knew why Sir Odon wanted a really sturdy latrine. He wanted it to be too heavy for Zbigniew to move, without the help of his friends, anyway.
"I suppose you're right, but we'll have to wait a few months before we can do anything about it. We can't have him falling into a dry hole, after all."
Well, we had everything done except the roof when Sir Odon and Father John got back. I told them about the food in the box, and we made a fair start on getting the outhouse thatched by sunset.
The others had gotten back safely by then, and were complaining about the cold food when we joined them.
"Blame it on a broken clock," Zbigniew told them. "Josip cooked your dinner according to the clock that was set this morning. I just looked in on it, and it claims that it is half past ten right now."