’Tis eleven miles or thereabouts from Bampton to East Hanney. Arthur and I arrived well before noon, having met few travelers on the way, and none since Marcham. Again we entered the convenient forest at the north edge of the village, and there I donned my shabby disguise and powdered my beard and hair with the flour.
I had brought with us a bag containing two maslin loaves and a small cheese. We shared one of the loaves and a bit of cheese, and so fortified I set out for the village.
According to Osbert’s map Sir John’s manor lay to the west of the village, and to find it I must turn to the right when I reached a chapel dedicated to St. James. As I walked I affected a limp, hoping to further convince any observer that I was poor and harmless and not worthy of their interest. This seemed effective. Although I was a stranger passing through a small village, where folk knew one another, few bothered to give me a second glance when I passed.
Sir John Trillowe’s house was indeed fine. He had done well, I think, pocketing fines when he served as Sheriff of Oxford, which post he lost when King Edward tired of complaints from Oxford burghers and replaced him.
There had been little rain for several days, but a muddy road does not soon dry in November. As I limped past the manor I turned my face from the house, partly because I feared that, even in disguise, Sir Simon, if he looked from a window at an awkward moment, might recognize me, and partly because I sought the mark of a broken horseshoe. Sir Simon did not see me, but I found the mark.
This print of a broken horseshoe had not been recently made, but it was clear enough that I had no doubt it was the print I had followed on other roads in days past. And the beast which made it turned from the road at the gate which led to Sir John’s manor. Somewhere beyond that gate was Amice Thatcher. I was sure of it. And also there were two men who had beaten another man to death and threatened my wife and child. It might be easier, I thought, to find and free Amice than prove the guilt of John Thrale’s assailants.
I continued my limping progress past the manor house, and as I did I considered some course of action. Would a King’s Sheriff, even one replaced in some disgrace, hold an ale wife hostage in his house, or allow a squire to do so? I could not think it of the man, venal as I knew him to be.
Sir Simon was a different matter. From what I knew of him, he would take coins from a beggar.
If Sir John’s squires were the men I sought, it seemed unlikely that they could hide Amice and two children in the manor house. Sir John would soon know of his guests. Amice would be held someplace Sir John was unlikely to visit.
If Amice and her children yet lived, they must be fed. I continued past the manor for a distance of two hundred paces, then, at a place where the wall which bordered the road was joined to another which ran perpendicular to the road, I glanced around to see that no one was about, then scrambled from the road to follow the second wall.
This wall divided a fallow field from another which had been planted to grain, now harvested. I followed this wall to another, intersecting wall, fifty paces or so from the road. Behind this wall was a forest, a part of the same wood where, at its eastern end, Arthur awaited my return. Beyond the wood, visible now through leafless trees, flowed a small stream.
Unless some villager prowled the forest seeking fallen branches for fuel, I was not likely to be seen if I squatted behind this wall. From the wall I could see the enclosure behind Sir John’s manor house — the barns, coops, stables, sties — all was visible. I could watch to see if any man took a bundle which might contain food from the house to some other building.
No man did. I had set before myself a fool’s errand. Perhaps, even if Amice and her children were held, like Sybil Montagu, in some outbuilding, they were fed but once each day, in the morning. I would not crouch here behind a wall for a day to see was it so. And my wounds began to ache, bent over as I was. Alfred’s cotehardie and surcoat were threadbare, and a cold wind cut through the thin fabric.
Osbert spoke true. Plague had emptied many houses in East Hanney. Might Amice be held in one of these? I could not enter them in daylight without a chance of being seen. That an impoverished vagrant might seek shelter in an abandoned house would surprise no one, but if I was seen entering one of the decaying huts Sir John’s bailiff or reeve or the village beadle might be told of it, and I would be run from the village at the point of a dagger. I could not then re-enter the place, disguise or not.
I retraced my steps to the road, having wasted an hour behind the wall. I limped back past the manor house, through the village, paying special attention to the vacant houses. I saw four near to Sir John’s manor. It seemed to me that if Amice’s captors had imprisoned her in an abandoned house they would choose one close by the manor.
Pretending an injured leg meant that I could pass slowly by the empty houses and study them without causing interest in those who might see me. Two of the houses lay close by other, occupied dwellings. Soon or late, two children would make noise neighbors would hear. A squire might demand silence of the neighbors if they discovered Amice, but I know tenants and villeins well enough to know that gossip would soon fill the village with news of the woman and children held against their will. Osbert had heard no such rumor. I crossed the two houses from my mental list.
Another house was so decayed that its roof was partly collapsed. If I were a felon who wished to hide a captive, would I choose such a place? No other house was near, and I might not care if rain fell upon my prisoner. The discomfort of such a dilapidated house might bring her to tell what I wished to learn, so as to escape the cold and wet. But a roof open to the sky would let out the cry of an infant as well as allow rain to enter.
The nearest neighbor was forty paces from the place, but living the past year with Bessie has taught me that an aggrieved babe can make her displeasure known beyond forty paces. And one shutter hung askew, so that anyone confined, unless they were bound, could peer through the opening, which had lost its skin, their face visible to those who passed by. I dismissed this house, also.
Beyond the chapel, on a narrow path which led south, was another unoccupied dwelling. It was a hundred paces from the chapel, the only house built along the little-traveled lane. The priest who served this chapel lived in a small chamber built away from the porch. This placed the chapel between his quarters and the distant house. If a squalling infant was hid in the house he’d not be likely to hear it, or if he did, might assume the racket came from some house nearer the chapel in the opposite direction.
This house was not so decayed as the one with a fallen roof, but it was missing chunks of daub, the thatching was rotting and no doubt inhabited by legions of mice, and one of the gable vents was nearly plugged where a rafter pole had given way and allowed thatch to cover the opening.
I hobbled past the house and saw in the mud a curious thing. Fresh footprints turned from the path to disappear in the overgrown toft. The house had surely been uninhabited for many years, I think. All around it was grown up in weeds and thistles. These obscured the footprints a few paces from the path so I could not follow them to see if they led to the door.
I glanced to the house, turned back to the path, then looked to the house again. Across the door, fastened to the jambs, rested an iron bar. This bar was not designed to keep folk out of the house, for it was held in place on one side by an iron lock large as my hand. This bar was in place to keep someone in the house, and other folk out. The bar, hasp, and lock were worth more than what might be left in an empty plague house.