“Yes, of course. I’d better come with you. Wait here, I’ll just go and get my things,” Simon said. As bailiff, he was his lord’s representative in the court at Lydford, in charge of the local constables. Clearly, if by helping Tanner he could see thieves arrested, he was performing his duty. Even though Lydford did not cover Tanner’s area, it was every man’s responsibility to help catch felons. He walked out to the yard at the back of the house, shouting instructions to Hugh to saddle up a fresh horse, then swiftly kissed his wife and daughter before snatching up his sword and leading Tanner out to the front of the house.
There they paused, waiting for Hugh. Simon fretted at the delay and when Hugh arrived with his horse he snatched the reins from him and was quickly in the saddle. Tanner mounted his great old beast more slowly, heaving his massive frame up with slow inevitability. The sight reminded Simon of watching a tree falclass="underline" there seemed the same slow beginning, the same initial faltering, followed by a sudden acceleration, until, at last, peace. The tree lying on the ground, the constable sitting in his saddle, with a small smile of achievement on his face, as if he too had doubted his ability to mount. Then they were on their way, gently cantering off to the Clanton farm.
“So did he say anything else about these people?” Simon asked.
“No. Seems they were travellers, but that’s all I know.
The boy, he was tired out when he got to my house -couldn’t hardly talk. I left him with my wife.“
“We may have to call up a posse,” said Simon reflectively. “When we get to the barton, we’ll find out where they were robbed and what happened. If we need the posse we can organise it from there.”
“Yes, that’s what I thought. We may have to ride straight past the men’s houses anyway, if they came back this way.”
They rode on in tense expectation, hardly talking for the rest of the journey, Tanner sitting stolid and imperturbable on his mount and Simon warily casting around as he went. He was staggered that this should have happened -especially so soon after his position had been granted. In all his years in the area he had only heard of three robberies, and the last was months ago. It seemed an appalling forewarning of his tenure of office that this should have happened so soon – especially after Brewer’s death. And for some reason he had a vague presentiment of evil, a suspicion that this affair would not be as easy or as straightforward as Tanner’s message seemed to imply.
It only took them a matter of an hour to get to the Greenfield Barton, or farm, a solid building of granite blocks with the dark red mortar showing clearly between each. A fire was obviously lighted inside, the smoke was pouring out of the chimney, lending an apparently tranquil air to the surroundings.
The two men dismounted quickly and tethered their horses, then Simon strode to the solid wooden door and rapped loudly. He could hear voices inside, and stepped back a little. There was a shuffling, and then the door was opened a little and a square, whiskered face peeped out, holding a suspicious frown in the old, faded blue eyes. Seeing only Simon, the door opened wider and he could see that it was Greenfield, a farmer whose fair hair, rumoured to have come from his Viking ancestors, had lost its colour and was now a pastel grey. The eyes peered out cautiously at the bailiff from around the edge of the part-opened door. Normally a calm man, easy-going and casual, the extent of his caution at the knocking of a stranger was concerning. His lined and worn face only cleared when he saw Tanner standing behind.
“Ah, Stephen. Hello, so my boy got to you, then?”
“Yes, John, I left him at home warming himself in front of the fire. He was worn out by the time he got to my house.”
“Ah, well. At least he made it. So, it’s Mr. Puttock, isn’t it?” he said turning to him. Simon nodded.
“He’s the bailiff now, John. That’s why I waited before coming over. I wanted to bring him.”
“Ah. Best come in, I reckon.”
They followed the old farmer through the doorway and into the screens: a wide corridor, lit by a series of sconces set into the wooden walls, built at the end of the hall to partition off the parlour and animal quarters. A heavy tapestry gave into the large, dark hall beyond, where four men sat ranged around the roaring fire, watching the farmer’s wife as she stirred a pot and prepared food over the flames.
“Here’s the bailiff and the constable,” Greenfield said as he led the other two through the door, and as he entered, Simon recognised the men with a sudden shock. They were the four monks he had seen walking with their abbot while he was on his way to Furnshill.
“Where’s the abbot?” he asked as he walked over to the men. They all gazed up at him, their faces lit by the fire, and as he looked at them, waiting for an answer, he saw that they were all frightened, as if fearful of his question. He looked enquiringly at the farmer. “Well?”
Greenfield shrugged, as if he had no knowledge of an abbot, that these were the only men that had appeared.
With a frown of concern on his face, Simon turned back to the monks. “Where is he?”
At last one of them dropped his eyes and looked at his lap. “We don’t know,” he said sadly, and then his breath caught in his throat as if he was close to sobbing. “He was taken from us. He was taken hostage.”
Simon walked over to lean against the wall not far from the fire, his eyes flitting from one to another as he crossed his arms. “Tell me what happened,” he said gently.
At first it was difficult to get any sense from them. It took long enough merely to persuade them to talk. It was not only the shock of their experience, it was also the miserable night they had spent in the open, with no shelter from the bitter wind and rain. The oldest of them had completely lost his smile and genial appearance. He seemed to have suffered more than the others, he looked close to collapsing from fear and shock, and could hardly keep his hands from shaking as if he had the ague, his eyes downcast as though he wanted to avoid the bailiff’s gaze. Seeing this, and sensing his pain, Simon directed his questions to the youngest-looking, a man almost as old as himself, who seemed the least affected of them all.
He began fitfully, with many pauses and sidelong glances at his companions to check that he was not leaving out any points of importance. “We… we were going on to Oakhampton…”
“Why did it take so long? I left you days ago, you should have been there by now.”
“We… the abbot wanted to rest and the… we stayed at the church at Crediton. We only started out again yesterday and… We got to Copplestone-”
“Where were you when it happened?” Simon asked quietly, his hand toying with his sword hilt as he tried to control his impatience and the urge to make the man speak faster and get to the point.
“Out beyond the village. We had left the village… must have been two hours before-”
“Were you still on the road?”
“Yes. Yes, we were-”
“And you were all together?”
“Yes, we were all walking, except for the abbot on his horse. Two men came up from behind us… they had swords. They rode through us – we had to get out of the way. They got to the abbot and… and Simon stepped forward softly and crouched in front of the man, looking at him gravely. At first the monk dropped his eyes as if embarrassed, but then, gradually, his eyes came up again with a kind of defiance, and he spoke directly to the bailiff, his eyes staring straight into Simon’s and his voice losing its nervousness and slowly gaining strength from the sight of the grim officer in front of him, who listened as though with his whole body and soul in silent intensity.