They were at the door of the porter’s lodge when Cadfael entered the court, and the porter had just come out to them. The light was not yet so far gone that Cadfael failed to see, and marvel, how the porter’s face, ready with its customary placid welcome and courteous enquiry, suddenly fell into a gaping stare of wonder and concern, and the words ready on his lips turned into a muted cry.
“Master James! How’s this, you here? I thought, Man,” he said, dismayed, “what’s come to you on the road?”
Cadfael was brought up with a jolt, no more than ten paces towards Vespers. He turned back in haste to join this unexpected confrontation, and look more closely at the lame man.
“Master James of Betton? Herluin’s master-carpenter?” No doubt of it, the same who had set out with the wagon-load of wood for Ramsey, more than a week ago, but limping and afoot now, and back where he had begun, and soiled and bruised not only from the road. And his companion, the elder of the two masons who had set off hopefully to find steady work at Ramsey, here beside him, with torn cotte and a clout bound about his head, and a cheekbone blackened from a blow.
“What’s come to us on the road!” the master-carpenter repeated ruefully. “Everything foul, short of murder. Robbery by cutthroats and outlaws. Wagon gone, timber gone, horses gone, stolen, every stick and every beast, and only by the grace of God not a man of us killed. For God’s sake, let us in and sit down. Martin here has a broken head, but he would come back with me...”
“Come!” said Cadfael, with an arm about the man’s shoulders. “Come within to the warmth, and Brother Porter will get some wine into you, while I go and tell Father Abbot what’s happened. I’ll be with you again in no time, and see to the lad’s head. Trouble for nothing now. Praise God you’re safely back! All Herluin’s alms couldn’t buy your lives.”
Chapter Four
“WE DID WELL ENOUGH,” said Master James of Betton, in the abbot’s panelled parlour an hour later, “until we came into the forest there, beyond Eaton. It’s thick woodland there south of Leicester, but well managed, as the roads go these days. And we had five good lads aboard, we never thought to run into any trouble we couldn’t handle. A couple of wretches on the run, skulking in the bushes on the lookout for prey, would never have dared break cover and try their luck with us. No, these were very different gentry. Eleven or twelve of them, with daggers and bludgeons, and two wore swords. They must have been moving alongside us in cover, taking our measure, and they had two archers ahead, one either side the track. Someone whistled them out when we came to the narrowest place, bows strung and shafts fitted, shouting to us to halt. Roger from Ramsey was driving, and a good enough hand with horses and wagons, but what chance did he have with the pair of them drawing on him? He says he did think of whipping up and running them down, but it would have been useless, they could shoot far faster than we could drive at them. And then they came at us from both sides.”
“I thank God,” said Abbot Radulfus fervently, “that you live to tell it. And all, you say, all your fellows are well alive? The loss is reparable, but your lives are greater worth.”
“Father,” said Master James, “there’s none of us but bears the marks of it. We did not let them put us down easily. There’s Martin here was clubbed senseless and slung into the bushes. And Roger laid about him with his whip, and left the print of it on two of the rogues before they downed him and used the thong to bind him. But we were five against double as many, and armed villains very willing to kill. They wanted the horses most, we saw but three they already had with them, the rest forced to go afoot, and the wagon was welcome, too, they had one, I think, already wounded. They beat and drove us aside, and off with team and wagon at high speed into the forest by a track that turned southwards. All the load, clean gone. And when I ran after, and young Payne on my heels, they loosed a shaft at us that clipped my shoulder, you see the tear. We had no choice but to draw off, and go and pick up Martin and Roger. Nicol gave as good an account of himself as any of us, elder though he may be, and kept the key of the coffer safe, but they threw him off the cart, and coffer and all are gone, for it was there among the coppice-wood. What more could we have done? We never looked to encounter an armed company in the forest, and so close to Leicester.”
“You did all that could be expected of any man,” said the abbot firmly. “I am only sorry you ever were put to it, and glad out of all measure that you came out of it without worse harm. Rest here a day or two and let your hurts be tended before you return to your homes. I marvel who these wretches could be, moving in such numbers, and so heavily armed. Of what appearance were they, beggarly and mean, or savage with less excuse for savagery?”
“Father,” said Master James earnestly, “I never before saw poor devils living wild wearing good leather jerkins and solid boots, and daggers fit for a baron’s guard.”
“And they made off southerly?” asked Cadfael, pondering this militant company so well found in everything but horses.
“Southwest,” amended the young man Martin. “And in a mortal hurry by all the signs.”
“In a hurry to get out of the earl of Leicester’s reach,” Cadfael hazarded. “They’d get short shrift from him if he once laid hands on them. I wonder if these were not some of the horde Geoffrey de Mandeville collected about him, looking for safer pastures to settle in, now the king is master of the Fens again? They’ll be scattering in all directions still, and hunted everywhere. In Leicester’s lands they certainly would not want to linger.”
That raised a murmur of agreement from them all. No sane malefactor would want to settle and conduct his predatory business in territory controlled by so active and powerful a magnate as Robert Beaumont, earl of Leicester. He was the younger of the twin Beaumont brothers, sons of the elder Robert who had been one of the most reliable props of old King Henry’s firm rule, and they in their turn had been as staunch in support of King Stephen. The father had died in possession of the earldom of Leicester in England, Beaumont, Brionne and Pontaudemer in Normandy, and the county of Meulan in France, and on his death the elder twin Waleran inherited the Norman and French lands, the younger Robert the English title and honour.
“He is certainly not the man to tolerate thieves and bandits in his lands,” said the abbot. “He may yet take these thieves before they can escape his writ. Something may yet be recovered. More to the purpose at this moment, what has become of your companions, Master James? You say all of them are living. Where are they now?”
“Why, my lord, when we were left alone, and I think if they had not been in such haste to move on they would not have left a man of us alive to tell the tale, we first tended the worst hurt, and took counsel, and decided we must take the news on to Ramsey, and also back here to Shrewsbury. And Nicol, knowing that by then Sub-Prior Herluin would be in Worcester, said that he would make his way there and tell him what had befallen us. Roger was to make his way home to Ramsey, and young Payne chose to go on there with him, as he had said he would. Martin here would have done as much, but that I was none too secure on my feet, and he would not let me undertake the journey home alone. And here at home I mean to stay, for I’ve lost my taste for travelling, after that melee, I can tell you.”
“No blame to you,” agreed the abbot wryly. “So by this time this news of yours should also have reached both Ramsey and Worcester, if there have been no further ambushes on the way, as God forbid! And Hugh Beringar may already be in Worcester, and will know what has happened. If anything can be done to trace our cart and the hired horses, well! If not, at least the most precious lading, the lives of five men, come out of it safely, God be thanked!”