A King's Betrayal (18 page)

Twenty Five

The fair was a rare treat for the villagers, because it came but once or twice a year and set up in the meadow between Sir William’s land and the miller’s pond.  There were weekly markets at the small towns up and down the country and the nearest was but ten old French miles from the edge of Sir William’s estate.  However, it was too far for most to visit often, unless they had a horse or could beg a ride on the carrier’s cart, which made this fair so special.  Beth looked about her at the stalls, which were selling all manner of wonderful things.  The fairs brought exotic fruits to people who would otherwise never see figs or peaches, oranges or dates and rare spices. There were stalls selling holy relics, bead necklaces and rings of base metal that made your finger turn green when you wore them, but there were also belts of tooled leather, silver and soft leather shoes, pots and pans, silks, wool cloth and lace.

             
There were other marvels at the fair: men playing with fire, sword swallowers, tumblers and the archery contest.  It was the duty of every man to train at archery for at least a day each week, and they began from the age of seven for it took years of practice to draw a long bow.  There was also a wrestling contest and a team of men from the castle was entered in a fierce tug of war with the village men.

             
Beth lingered as long as she dare watching the fun but she had no money to waste on pretty trifles. Marthe had given her three silver pennies to buy a crock of honey, two pounds of flour and a block of salt. Nervous of having so much coin, Beth had tucked her purse inside her gown for it was dangerous to wear it hanging from your belt at the fair lest a cut-purse steal it. She had managed to purchase all she needed, even bargaining for two sweet almond cakes, which she and Marthe would have as a rare treat that night.

Beth noticed the man sitting by the side of the road as she returned from the fair. She was carrying her purchases in the large rush basket over her arm.  The man was dressed in the grey robes of a pilgrim but they were ragged and filthy, and his feet were bare.  She saw they were streaked with what looked like dried blood and as she paused, thinking to ask if he needed help, the man moaned and flopped forward in a faint.

             
‘Are you ill, good sir?’  Beth went to him, kneeling by his side on the ground, which was hard with frost.  He did not answer nor did he open his eyes as she bent over him, touching his face and hands, which she saw, were disfigured and crusted with sores.  She stroked his poor face and his hands, because he was clearly in some terrible affliction. His skin was very cold and she could see that he looked emaciated and ill.  ‘What ails you?  Can you tell me?’

             
‘Water…’ he begged through cracked lips.  ‘Pray give me water, mistress.  There is naught else you can do for me.’

             
Beth thought quickly.  She was not carrying a flask and the stream was still too far distant to fetch water quickly.  What she did have was a small vial containing a cure for a sore throat, which she had hoped to bargain for meat or cheese.  No one had been interested and so she had carried it home with her, but it was sweetened with honey and all she had to offer.  Taking out the stopper, she held it to the man’s lips. 

             
‘Take a sip of this, sir,’ she said.  ‘It will ease your throat for now.  I shall take my purchases home and then return.  I will bring water and a little food.  We do not have much to offer but you are welcome to share what we have. For the moment you may have this sweet cake. I must save one for Marthe, but you may have the other.  It will ease you until I return with more food.’

             
The man swallowed several gulps of her mixture and handed it back to her.  His eyes were open now and intensely blue.  His thin hand clasped her wrist.

             
‘Who are you, lady?  I asked at the fair for food but no one would give me any.  One of the men told me that if I did not leave he would take a stick to me.’

             
‘That was cruel, sir,’ Beth said and held his hand, stroking it with her finger in sympathy.  She felt a warm tingle up her arm but it was pleasant and she did not draw back or snatch her hand from him.  ‘Why should people send you away?  It is only common kindness to offer water and share what food you have with a traveller in need.  Especially with a pilgrim.’

             
The man withdrew his hand from her touch.  ‘Do you not know what ails me?  I am a leper, mistress.  Years ago I made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land and it was there that I contracted this foul disease.  People fear me and drive me away because they are afraid of taking it from me.  Now I travel from shrine to shrine and pray for a miracle but God hath not seen fit to grant me His Grace.’

             
‘I am sorry for your trouble, sir,’ Beth said.  ‘Yet I shall not run from you.  You are ill and need my help.  Rest here and I shall return with food and water, as I promised. Eat your cake for I promise you it is sweet and wholesome.’

             
Beth rose to her feet and began to walk swiftly towards her home.  Glancing back she saw that the man was eating the cake, thrusting it into his mouth as though he had eaten nothing for days.  She was thoughtful as she hurried home.  Beth had heard of leprosy, which  was still a much feared disease and rife throughout the land, though seldom seen in England these days.  Marthe had told her it had mostly died out here and it was unlikely that she would see a case of the foul sickness but to be careful and stay clear if she did.  Beth knew that she must wash her hands before she touched anything that Marthe might touch afterwards, but she was still determined to return with the food and water.

             
However, when she returned to the spot an hour later she discovered that the man had gone.  Lying on the ground where he had rested, she found a tiny pebble.  It was black and shiny and had an engraving of a man on its flat surface.  Beth picked it up and  looked at it before placing it in her pouch. If she guessed right the picture engraved on the stone was of a saint for he had a circle above his head – and she thought that perhaps it was a picture of Saint Christopher, the patron saint of travellers.   She was sure that the man had left it for her and wondered where he had gone and why he did not wait for her to return with food and water.

‘They are saying in the village it was a miracle,’ Mistress Grey said when she came to the hut three days later.  ‘Everyone saw him at the fair.  His face and hands were covered in sores and he wore a cloak and rang a bell to tell us that he was a leper.  John Blacksmith told him he must leave or he would beat him and he did, but later he returned talking of his vision of the Blessed Virgin and how she had given him a drink of something that had cured him.’

             
A trickle of ice slid down Beth’s spine.  Mistress Grey had described the pilgrim she’d seen sitting by the side of the road.  It must be a coincidence for she was not the Blessed Virgin.

             
‘But surely the scabs were still on his face and hands?’

             
‘No, they had gone, all of them,’ Mistress Grey said.  ‘I did not see him at the fair but I saw him the next day and his skin was as clean as yours or mine, Beth – do you not think it a great mystery?’

             
‘It is certainly a mystery.  Had he prayed at a shrine near by?’

             
‘No.  His tale is that he sat by the roadside and a young woman came up to him and asked if he were ill.  She did not seem to fear him, as others did, and she touched him and gave him a drink that tasted of honey.  She went away to fetch food and water, but he said that as he sat by the roadside a white light enveloped him and he felt it warming his skin.  When he looked at his hands the disease had gone – and it had gone from his face too.  He is praising the Blessed Virgin and telling everyone of his vision.’

             
Beth trembled inwardly.  Mistress Grey’s tale was so strange that she could scarce believe it.  It was not possible that she could have cured the man simply by giving him a drink of her mixture or by touching him.  Mistress Grey was staring at her oddly, as if she suspected that the vision the pilgrim had seen was Beth, but she held her tongue.  Her friend might not be able to resist telling someone else and people would think it strange.  They would whisper of magic and witches again.

             
Beth felt cold all over.  Had John the blacksmith done this?  Perhaps it was a fake miracle and meant to make people look at Beth with fear and suspicion? The more she thought of it, the more she was convinced that she had hit upon the truth.  The blacksmith and the priest had planned this between them because they wished to convince the villagers that she was a witch.  Only someone who practised the dark arts could cure a sufferer of leprosy – but of course the man had only pretended to be ill.

             
She would tell Marthe what had happened but must say nothing to anyone else, because it might be yet another plot to brand her as a witch.

             
Why did the priest hate her so much?

‘You paid him for his part in the affair?’  The priest looked at John Blacksmith, who nodded.  ‘See that people hear of the miracle and hint that you know who the identity of the woman .  She was too clever for us in the matter of the well, but one day we shall have her and her mother.’

             
‘Marthe is a witch and deserves to die,’ John Blacksmith said but felt uneasy. ‘Why do you hate the girl?  She has not harmed anyone.’

             
‘She is proud and believes herself above her station.  Women like her are the spawn of Satan, sent to tempt men to sin.’

             
John Blacksmith made no reply as he turned away.  He was thoughtful as he returned to his forge.  He knew well enough that the priest’s words were true.  The thought of Beth was like a thorn in his flesh, pricking at him, making him burn with the need to have her.  He had thought of waylaying her on her way home from the village and taking what he wanted, but the punishment for rape was to be hanged until dead, and at heart he was a coward.

             
He had the forge, which had been in his family for three generations, a wife and four children.  His wife was plain and lay like a block of wood when he took his ease of her.  He had taken her for the cow and pig she brought him as a dowry.  As one of the most prosperous men of the village, he hesitated to risk all he had for he sake of a woman – however tempting she might be.  If Beth were condemned as a witch and put to death perhaps he could forget her and rest more easily at night.

‘He is telling everyone it is a miracle?’  Marthe looked at her uneasily.  ‘What did you do to him – what did you give him?’

             
‘I told you, it was just the mixture for a sore throat that we make every winter.  I touched his face and hands when he was in a faint for he was ill and I wanted to see if he were still breathing.  I gave him the vial and he drank most of it – and then, when I offered food and water, he told me he was a leper.’

             
Marthe shuddered.  ‘May the dark lord protect you, child.  You touched him – you touched a leper.  Most fear to take a dread illness such as that…but Mistress Grey says he was cured?  How could that be?’

             
‘It could not,’ Beth said.  ‘You know it is impossible.  It would be a miracle indeed if a man was cured simply by touching him and giving him a cure for a sore throat. Only God could perform such a miracle.’

             
Marthe’s hand trembled as she turned away to her work.  ‘I heard of a lady who cured a lame man just by touching him once.  It was said that she was as great a healer as the Blessed Virgin, and her people set up a shrine to her. She made them take it down but they sold tiny pieces of cloth from one of her gowns and people said that to own one was to be protected from the plague.’

             
‘Who was she?’ Beth asked curiously.

             
‘It does not matter,’ Marthe muttered.  ‘Questions, always the child asks too many questions.’

             
Beth waited but Marthe had gone into one of her sulks and would say no more on the subject.  She knew that it was not possible that she had cured the pilgrim just by touching him, which meant he must have been a fake leper.  She felt cold all over for if John the blacksmith would go to such lengths to set people against her, he must truly hate her.

Twenty Six

William could not wait to leave London.  Almost a year spent kicking his heels at court was too long.  He had no taste for the jostling for power, the whispers and innuendo that went on about the court.  He was a simple plain man, more at home with a sword in his hand than a pen. Besides, an uneasy feeling had come upon him and he felt he was needed at home.  His steward ought to be able to manage well enough, but the sense of unease had been growing since the evening he supped with Raoul D’Avignon.

             
The man was friendly enough on the surface and claimed to be grateful that William had once aided him on the field of battle.  In the midst of his blood heat, he had attacked to left and right and seeing the English colours on the ground had defended the fallen knight without even knowing whom he helped.  The man was soon on his feet and able to defend himself, and though later in the cool of evening he’d thanked him for the service, William had not given it another thought.

             
Since then they had acknowledged each other and there was a wary friendship between them, but William did not trust the man.  D’Avignon’s expression gave nothing away but there was more to him than the polite courtier who gave lip service to the English King.  William would give much to know what he’d meant concerning the priest.  He’d heard his words clear enough though softly spoken, but he had been asking for clarification.  None had been forthcoming.  At supper that night D’Avignon had been generous and friendly, but though he discussed the gossip of the court, the rivalry between the English dukes who struggled for position and power at court, and the possibility of further warfare between England and France, he gave nothing away of himself.

             
Well, it could not matter.  Their lives lay in different directions and it was doubtful their paths would cross often – and yet William had this feeling of unease concerning the man. He could not rid himself of the feeling that D’Avignon would do something that might cause him pain or grief – though he had no reason to suspect him of being an enemy.

             
He shrugged off the slight irritation.  He would leave London and head towards Winchester in the morning.  If something was amiss at home he had best return and deal with it himself.

             
At the back of his mind the true reason for his chafing lay wriggling like a maggot in rotting meat.  He could not get
her
from his mind.  She haunted him day and night and he lay sleepless on his bed, his body burning for her, his soul sick with need and wanting.

             
‘The priest is right, I am bewitched,’ he muttered angry at his weakness.  He was a man who had endured hunger and pain on the field of battle, a man who had accepted the surgeon’s knife as an arrow was cut from his thigh, leaving a scar that still worried him at times.  Why then did this ache eat away at his insides, giving him a fever that only she could cure with her touch.

             
‘Fool!’ he cursed himself a thousand times and yet he knew that he must return because he was sick with love of her.