In the glorious weather, long balmy evenings ran on from hot work in the fields, and couples went to drink in taverns and alehouses after slaving all day.
In retrospect, Surval was pleased that Mary’s last year had been so happy.
In the bright hall of his new castle, in the early spring of 1323, Sir Ralph de Wonson sat still a short while after his Reeve had spoken, and his face blanched as he took in the news. ‘But it’s monstrous!’ he thundered. ‘It can’t be true. Have you been there yourself? Have you seen the body?’
His son Esmon sniffed and looked bored, but Lady Annicia put a hand out on her husband’s wrist to calm him. She knew how his rage could explode.
Sir Ralph shook her hand off and glared at the Reeve. ‘Well?’
‘My Lord, there is no doubt. I haven’t been there myself yet, but I trust Elias. He’s no fool.’
‘CHRIST’S PENANCE! If I find this is true, I’ll take the man’s ballocks with my own knife and feed them to him!’ Sir Ralph bellowed and slammed a clenched fist into his left hand.
Then a thought struck him. His brother! The bastard had once killed a woman after getting her pregnant. That was why he had come back here to Gidleigh like a whipped hound, tail between his legs! Could he have taken Mary and realised that he couldn’t stay here if his second offence became known?
‘Christ Jesus!’ he swore. He felt numbed, broken.
Lady Annicia pursed her lips, for she was always distressed to hear the Good Lord’s name spoken blasphemously, but she curbed her tongue. It was only fair that her husband should be disturbed after hearing such terrible news, and in his present mood he was likely to strike her if she remonstrated with him.
‘What did Elias actually see?’ he asked, leaning forward in his new chair.
Piers Wike the Reeve was a slight man in his early forties, with narrow features and dark eyes. He had a strong cast in his left eye which lent him a somewhat piratical air that was entirely at odds with his nature. Shorter than the knight, he stood only some five and a quarter feet in his bare feet, but that might have been due in part to the bowed back, a defect granted to him at birth by a drunken midwife, so his mother said. ‘My Lord, Elias said he heard a shout in the late forenoon, while he was out at Deave Lane ploughing. Said he was turning, heading away from the moors, when he heard it.’
‘Heard what? Get on with it, fool! God’s precious wounds, you would take an hour to describe a nail!’
‘Elias said he heard voices, a man and Mary both shouting, and then she gave a scream, and there was a slap. There was silence for a while, and then someone ran off, up towards Throwleigh. He thought someone had been arguing, didn’t think more of it than that. Didn’t realise there could be anything wrong, what with no more shouting or nothing, so he didn’t make a move. Then, later, when he left with the ox team to settle them for the night, he found her lying in the roadway, poor chit.’
‘You mean to tell us that someone has killed one of our serfs?’ Esmon drawled. ‘Actually damaged our property? What a scandal!’
The knight stared at him and took a deep breath, his face growing purple. His mood was plain enough, even to an exhausted Reeve, and although Piers was tired out, he was no fool. He quickly continued, ‘As I said, it was Mary, the older daughter of Huward the miller. She was beside the roadway, as though she had crawled there to lie with her back to the wall. Her skirts were up, Sir Ralph, and there was blood all about her thighs.’
‘She’d been raped?’ the knight rasped. He strode over to Piers and stood with his head lowered, staring at the man. His voice dropped menacingly. ‘Is that what you’re saying? She was raped by some bastard while that cretin wandered about with his oxen for company, dreaming about cider?’
Esmon was gazing at Piers shrewdly. ‘You say that the old peasant heard voices shouting and so on. Who was the man?’
Piers glanced at his father, but Sir Ralph was clenching and unclenching his fists like a man with an anguished soul. ‘I spoke to Sampson,’ Piers said. ‘He saw the priest from the chapel going up there.’
Sir Ralph felt a momentary relief. At least it wasn’t Surval! But then his anger took over. He remembered seeing Mary at the priest’s door two years ago, and he recalled pulling the little monk to him and threatening him, should Mark ever go near Mary again. He hadn’t listened, though, had he? The little turd had gone ahead, and now he’d raped and killed her.
Esmon murmured, ‘Christ’s cods! A damned clerk raped and killed her!’
Piers found himself meeting Esmon’s gaze. The lad looked amused! It was awful, and Piers had to bite back a comment. He met Sir Ralph’s gaze, and his voice was hard when he replied, ‘No, Sir Ralph. Least, if she was raped, it wasn’t the first time. That young maid was with child.’
Chapter Four
Mark would have been grateful for any company, even if it meant his arrest and later death, he was so worn out from flight and mental torment after seeing her lying dead.
It was almost an instinctive thing at first, heading for the water, but as soon as he was in it, he knew he had to go where pursuit wouldn’t think of looking. That meant following the stream to its source, he reckoned, heading northwards. Surely the Hue and Cry would think he was going to head straight for the coast, maybe following the river south to the Teign and thence to the sea. No. He’d not make his capture easy.
He was soaked. Shortly after slipping into the sluggish brown water of the brook, he tripped and fell headlong, slamming down onto the flat surface with a force that knocked the air from his lungs. His head struck a rock, and instantly he was overwhelmed. It was as though his senses were destroyed in an instant. His eyes could discern nothing, his ears were full of a rushing noise, and his mouth was filled with water. There was no up or down, no north or south, only this perpetual immersion: nothing had happened before, and there was no future, only an all-enveloping now of noise. Although a part of his mind knew he must surely die if he remained here, that this would be his grave, it was comforting, somehow. He was tired, bone tired, and just the chance of closing his eyes and shutting out the horror of the world was so attractive, that he allowed himself to be dragged along for a short while.
But then the world impinged upon him once more. He was rolled over, and air struck his face, bright sunlight burst upon his closed eyes. Coughing and choking, he realised that the air was so much warmer than the water, it was like a waft of dragon’s breath.
The water pushed him gently into a shallow, and he felt his head bump another rock, but softly, as though the river itself was trying to stir him without alarming him, conscious of his suffering.
His suffering! What could water – yea, or earth or fire! – know of suffering? Mark felt as though he had been born to suffer, that his existence was marked by the endurance of pain and fear, overwhelming sorrow and misery.
Mark lifted himself from the river, shivering uncontrollably, and stumbled up to the bank, but he couldn’t carry on. He threw himself to his hands and knees, retching, and while there, all he could see in his mind’s eye was her: Mary.