‘1306? That’s sixteen years ago!’
‘Your arithmetic does you credit.’
‘Baldwin, Sir John has fought in all the tournaments he could. This is madness – you’ll be killed. Can’t I find another man to challenge him?’
‘I don’t think so. Not now, Simon. This is a judicial fight and I accepted his challenge.’
Simon looked at him despairingly.
‘Do not fear for me. The matter is in God’s hands, old friend. And I shall fight confidently, knowing that the cause is just.’
They had arrived at his own pavilion and in the doorway Edgar stood waiting. ‘Sir, I have all your arms ready.’
‘How did you know?’ Baldwin asked.
‘There is a certain amount of chatter in the crowds, sir.’
Baldwin entered. On the table was all his armour and clothing. He touched the heavy quilted fustian of his aketon and sighed. He had not expected to be forced to ride in a joust and fight to the death once more. It was a daunting prospect after so long a period.
‘Sir?’ Edgar brought him a mazer of wine.
‘Thank you,’ Baldwin said, drinking deeply and gesturing to Simon.
Edgar passed Simon the jug, having refilled the mazer. ‘Sir Baldwin, would you like to be dressed?’
‘Yes. And make sure every buckle and thong is secure. I don’t want to shed armour like an outlaw running from the hue and cry!’
Baldwin stood while Edgar pulled the thick aketon over his head. The padded cloth was designed to soften blows. When Baldwin was happy with it, Edgar lifted the hauberk of fine, linked mail, slipping it over Baldwin’s head. It covered the knight’s arms and reached almost to his knees. Then came the pair of plates, the leather coat with plates of steel riveted to the inside, that was buckled at the back. Baldwin stood while Edgar saw to the fastenings, before buckling the gutter-shaped plates to Baldwin’s arms.
Swinging his arms, Baldwin tried to get used to the restricted movement. Although the armour was very heavy, he could move his arms without difficulty. Over the top of this Edgar draped a long, clean white tunic with Sir Baldwin’s arms marked out on the breast, his coat armour, and finally Baldwin’s recent acquisition, a skull-cap of steel which rose to a sharp point to deflect axe or sword blows, with a loose, padded tippet of mail which hung to his shoulders. Hinged to the front to cover his face was a vizor, which he lifted away while Edgar pulled on bags of mail to protect his hands, then the heavy gauntlet, the main de fer or fist of iron, which would protect his left hand as it gripped the reins.
The dressing took longer than Simon had expected, and he sat on a stool while Edgar carefully checked each strap and thong, lifting an arm to bind the steel plates, tugging cloth into place. Baldwin lowered his head to help Edgar settle the tippet of steel links, stepped into the mailed footgear, pensively swivelled and bent to check the fit.
Simon could do nothing. The dreadful enormity of the occasion lent an especial solemnity to the process. He sat with drawn features, picking at a loose thread on his hose, praying for Baldwin’s safety, wishing there were something he could do.
‘Couldn’t I borrow some armour and fight with you? Or take your place?’
Edgar glanced at him but said nothing. Somehow his expression was a more definite rejection than Baldwin’s quiet, ‘No, Simon. You would die in minutes in the hastilude. Lance-play is too dangerous for people who haven’t practised the art. In any case, Lord Hugh would never permit you to joust. You are not chivalrous.’
Simon could do no more. He sat sunk in gloom. His friend would enter the lists on his behalf, putting his life in God’s hands in order that Simon could clear his name. It gave the Bailiff a terrible feeling of guilt. It should be him being covered in steel and reaching for the long, two-handed axe with the blade notched from use, muttering that it should be sharpened before he could use it in anger.
At last Edgar knelt and bound a heavy war-belt with enamelled pieces about Baldwin’s hips and lifted the front of Sir Baldwin’s tunic up and tucked it into the belt to keep it from tripping him. Then he slid Sir Baldwin’s great warsword into the scabbard and stood back. Baldwin met his gaze and nodded, then glanced down at his encased body.
‘Christ help me! If I manage to move in this lot it’ll be a miracle.’
Odo and the Coroner had not waited, but as soon as Baldwin and Simon left the hall, they hurried down to the place where the body had been discovered with a small force of Sir Peregrine’s men-at-arms.
‘Did you enquire of all the men whether they had heard anything?’ Odo asked the Coroner.
Sir Roger looked up at the sun, assessing the time. ‘Yes, I had all the men from here as a jury, and took down all their names, but none of them admitted to knowing anything.’
Odo grunted. He hopped down onto the shingle beach below where the body had been found and peered about him, hoping that there might be something, anything, which could give a clue as to who was responsible. Standing upright, he stood on tiptoe to look over the bushes towards the pavilions. Suddenly he gasped, ‘Coroner, the man who killed Sir William wouldn’t have carried him all the way here. He’d have made too much noise walking on the shingle, wouldn’t he?’
‘I don’t know. The river makes a hell of a din. It’d cover the noise of a man walking about down here.’
Odo glanced up- and downriver. ‘Then think of this: would you cross the water here, with slime and slippery stones underfoot, if you were carrying a heavy dead body?’
‘Couldn’t he have come along the bank?’
‘But the beach is very short; it runs out up there and below as well, where the water has cut into the banks. If the murderer carried William here, he’d have to have got his feet wet.’
‘True. So you think he was murdered here?’
‘Yes.’ Odo looked at the ground. ‘If that’s true, though, why didn’t anyone notice? It’s very close to the tents.’
‘It’s rare enough that a man dies without making a sound,’ Sir Roger agreed, ‘but here, with the water rushing past and the noise from people singing and dancing, drunks snoring, and others screwing, or dreaming that they were, it’s hardly surprising no one heard anything.’
Odo nodded, but then sprang lightly onto the bank and gazed about him. To left and right the river curved around the field, enclosing the tents. Pavilions and rougher tents lay all about, while to his right, some forty yards away, were the lines where the horses stood. Most were in paddocks and fields at the opposite bank of the river, but some of the more expensive mounts had been installed nearer their owners’ tents. Two bored-looking grooms idled about, brushing and rubbing down the horses which would be used later that day.
His attention returned to the pavilions. ‘Surely someone should have heard something? Shouldn’t we speak to all the people who slept here last night?’
Before Sir Roger could answer, a young messenger came hurrying. ‘Odo? The King Herald asks that you attend to the jousting.’
‘Tell him I’ll be along shortly.’
‘The King Herald was insistent.’
Odo swore softly. ‘I’ll be along as soon as I can.’
The lad looked worried. ‘You should. The Lord Hugh is in a foul mood; he’s furious that Simon the Bailiff must suffer trial by battle.’
Baldwin and Simon stood before the small portable altar in Lord Hugh’s chapel.
Like so many smaller places of worship, it had no glass in the windows, and while the priest intoned his prayers and sang his psalms, noises wafted up to them from the tented field at the foot of the castle’s hilclass="underline" voices raised in dispute, a shrieking, bawdy laugh from a woman, sudden rattling as a cart rumbled past.