Daniel and Garth went to the other side of the branch and grasped the free end of the long rope, taking up the slack until the noose was dragging Philip’s head erect. Simon moved towards the trio, holding his hand up in the air, ready to give the fatal signal.
‘Now, pull!’ he shouted, letting his hand fall. As Thomas made the sign of the cross in the air and despairingly chanted a last valediction, the two ruffians hauled on the rope together. Philip made a gargling noise as he was lifted from the ground by his neck.
The next moment there was a creaking groan and then an ear-splitting crack as the sturdy branch tore away from the trunk of the great oak and thundered to the ground in a blizzard of dust and leaves. There were screams from Daniel and Garth as the falling branch swept them aside like dolls. Miraculously, Philip was untouched, rolling well clear with the rope still around his neck. The further end of the branch landed on Walter Lupus, the foliage and smaller branches flattening him to the ground, bruising and scratching much of his body.
But it was Simon Mercator who fared worst, as he was standing midway between the two thugs and the manor lord. The half-ton of wood fell directly upon him, pinning him to the ground and breaking both his legs.
With much shouting and screaming, the onlookers ran towards the chaotic scene, though no one seemed in a hurry to tend to the steward. The bailiff and sergeant of the Hundred hastened to aid Walter Lupus, whose clothing was ripped and whose face and hands were bleeding from superficial wounds. He seemed to have been struck on the head, as though he was conscious he was groaning and unable to stand or speak.
Gillota and Matilda raced to help Philip, who was on his hands and knees, tugging to get the rope from around his neck.
‘Are you hurt?’ asked Gillota, who was first to reach him.
‘No, but it was a miracle! I thought my last moment had come,’ he gasped. ‘What happened?’
Thomas de Peyne put a helping arm around him as he staggered to his feet. ‘A miracle indeed!’ agreed the priest, still bemused by what had happened. He had suspected for some time that there was more to Matilda than met the eye, but as a devout Christian he had to eschew anything outside his faith, so he held his tongue for fear it might land her in serious trouble.
By now, more people had appeared, streaming down from the centre of the village, having heard the commotion. They stood and marvelled at the huge fallen branch. Several went behind the mass of foliage that lay on the ground and dragged out Daniel, who had a broken arm, and Garth, who was unconscious from a blow on the head. Then they attended to the steward, as the bailiff and sergeant were still fussing over Walter Lupus. The branch was across Simon’s legs, and it took eight men to shift it off him.
‘He’ll never walk again without sticks,’ said the blacksmith, the strongest man there when it came to lifting trees. ‘If he survives this, he’ll be no use as a steward or anything else. Maybe it’s God’s retribution!’
The injured men were propped against the bole of the great oak until it was decided how to move them, and together with some of the villagers Philip and Thomas stared up above them at the yellow-white scar where the branch had come away from the trunk.
‘It doesn’t look rotten, so why did it fall?’ asked Philip. He was thankful yet mystified at being snatched from the brink of death.
‘No rot there. The wood’s as healthy as me!’ declared the village wheelwright, an expert in anything to do with timber. ‘A little tug on a rope wouldn’t snap that! You should have been able to swing a pair of oxen from that branch.’
Matilda, now openly clinging to Philip’s arm, gave her daughter a look of triumph, and in return Gillota gave her a nod of secret delight.
‘I can hear the stone singing from here,’ she whispered.
A month later Emma’s cottage in Shebbear had a visitor. A docile pony arrived at the gate and an elderly man in a priest’s cassock under his black cloak gingerly slid from the saddle.
‘Father Thomas!’ cried Gillota in delight as she rose from her weeding to greet him. Inside the toft, he was regaled with food and drink, as he was introduced to Emma, who had recovered almost completely from her earlier stroke. Matilda and Gillota sat at his feet as he told her his news.
‘I’ve finished my penance in Kentisbury at last,’ he said. ‘The bishop found someone who was willing to live there permanently, so I’m on my way back to Exeter but came out of my way to see you, as I have news.’
‘We have news, too, Father Thomas,’ said Matilda proudly. ‘I am soon to be wedded to Philip and live here. That will make me and Gillota free women again, against any challenge!’
The canon smiled roguishly. ‘I am delighted to hear it, Matilda — but as to becoming free by that route, there is no need, for you are already free!’
He explained that, as he had promised some time ago, he had searched the county court records in Exeter for any evidence of a document of manumission for Matilda’s father. He found nothing, but by chance had spoken to a parish priest in Exeter who remembered witnessing such a document from Kentisbury when he was in Barnstaple several years before, though he could not recall the name of the freed man. The next time Thomas was in Barnstaple, he called on the chaplain of St Peter’s Church who, searched the archives and produced the parchment which confirmed that Matthew Lupus had indeed given Roger Merland his freedom!
Matilda threw her arms around Thomas’s neck and gave him a very un-ecclesiastical hug of delight.
‘That means we needn’t have run away again, if only we’d known!’ she exclaimed.
After the chaos and confusion of the miracle at the hanging tree, Philip had hustled Matilda and Gillota away before Walter Lupus or any of the surviving officials could recover their wits. Abandoning his house, he had set off with them for Shebbear that day, and after three days’ walking they had arrived at Emma’s croft, who welcomed them with open arms. Reunited not only with their aunt, but with their cow, pigs, cat and dog, they settled back into the life they had enjoyed for almost a year until Walter had kidnapped them.
Philip worked their croft with them and was negotiating to rent several acres more from the bailiff, having some money put by after his military service. For decorum’s sake, he was lodging with a family at the other end of the village until the wedding. Gillota was delighted to have him as a stepfather and teased her mother that he had only proposed to her because she was carrying the stone in her pouch at the time!
Before Thomas left to return to the city, Matilda asked him a question that had been worrying her ever since their second escape from Kentisbury.
‘Is Philip still in danger from the law? He was still under sentence of death when that branch fell.’
The little priest shook his head. ‘I think you can rest easy on that score. That evil steward is crippled for life. He lives in his nephew’s house — your house, really — and I doubt he’ll ever walk again. Walter Lupus seems subdued since then and has got himself a new steward, an older man who seems to have plenty of sense and tolerance. The villagers know well enough what the real truth was, and I have spoken to the sheriff about it, so if, God forbid, the matter should ever be raised again, it will go before the justices in Exeter, who will undoubtedly condemn what happened in Kentisbury.’
He would dearly like to have asked Matilda about the small stone he had seen her covertly take out of the hole in that oak tree and slip into her pouch when she thought no one was looking — but he decided to let sleeping dogs lie, though he noticed that it now sat in a place of honour on a shelf over the door lintel.
A little later, as he rode sedately out of Shebbear on his way home, he passed the great rock lying outside the church. He knew of the legend and of the pagan ceremony of turning it each year and hastily averted his Christian eyes.