Epic Historial Collection (8 page)

He stopped outside a stone house that looked in dire need of repair. The mortar used in building it had been too weak, and was now crumbling and falling out. Frost had got into the holes, cracking some of the stones. If it were left for another winter the damage would be worse. Tom decided to point this out to the owner.

The ground-floor entrance was a wide arch. The wooden door was open, and in the doorway a craftsman sat with a hammer in his right hand and a bradawl, a small metal tool with a sharp point, in his left. He was carving a complex design on a wooden saddle which sat on the bench before him. In the background Tom could see stores of wood and leather, and a boy with a broom sweeping shavings.

Tom said: “Good day, Master Saddler.”

The saddler looked up, classified Tom as the kind of man who would make his own saddle if he needed one, and gave a curt nod.

“I'm a builder,” Tom went on. “I see you're in need of my services.”

“Why?”

“Your mortar is crumbling, your stones are cracking and your house may not last another winter.”

The saddler shook his head. “This town is full of masons. Why would I employ a stranger?”

“Very well.” Tom turned away. “God be with you.”

“I hope so,” said the saddler.

“An ill-mannered fellow,” Agnes muttered to Tom as they walked away.

The street led them to a marketplace. Here in a half-acre sea of mud, peasants from the surrounding countryside exchanged what little surplus they might have of meat or grain, milk or eggs, for the things they needed and could not make themselves—pots, plowshares, ropes and salt. Markets were usually colorful and rather boisterous. There was a lot of good-natured haggling, mock rivalry between adjacent stall holders, cheap cakes for the children, sometimes a minstrel or a group of tumblers, lots of painted whores, and perhaps a crippled soldier with tales of eastern deserts and berserk Saracen hordes. Those who made a good bargain often succumbed to the temptation to celebrate, and spent their profit on strong ale, so that there was always a rowdy atmosphere by midday. Others would lose their pennies at dice, and that led to fighting. But now, on a wet day in the morning, with the year's harvest sold or stored, the market was subdued. Rain-soaked peasants made taciturn bargains with shivering stall holders, and everyone looked forward to going home to a blazing fireplace.

Tom's family pushed through the disconsolate crowd, ignoring the halfhearted blandishments of the sausage seller and the knife sharpener. They had almost reached the far side of the marketplace when Tom saw his pig.

He was so surprised that at first he could not believe his eyes. Then Agnes hissed: “Tom! Look!” and he knew she had seen it too.

There was no doubt about it: he knew that pig as well as he knew Alfred or Martha. It was being held, in an expert grip, by a man who had the florid complexion and broad girth of one who eats as much meat as he needs and then some more: a butcher, without doubt. Both Tom and Agnes stood and stared at him, and since they blocked his path he could not help but notice them.

“Well?” he said, puzzled by their stares and impatient to get by.

It was Martha who broke the silence. “That's our pig!” she said excitedly.

“So it is,” said Tom, looking levely at the butcher.

For an instant a furtive look crossed the man's face, and Tom realized he knew the pig was stolen. But he said: “I've just paid fifty pence for it, and that makes it my pig.”

“Whoever you gave your money to, the pig was not his to sell. No doubt that was why you got it so cheaply. Who did you buy it from?”

“A peasant.”

“One you know?”

“No. Listen, I'm butcher to the garrison. I can't ask every farmer who sells me a pig or a cow to produce twelve men to swear the animal is his to sell.”

The man turned aside as if to go away, but Tom caught him by the arm and stopped him. For a moment the man looked angry, but then he realized that if he got into a scuffle he would have to drop the pig, and that if one of Tom's family managed to pick it up, the balance of power would change and it would be the butcher who had to prove ownership. So he restrained himself and said: “If you want to make an accusation, go to the sheriff.”

Tom considered that briefly and dismissed it. He had no proof. Instead he said: “What did he look like—the man who sold you my pig?”

The butcher looked shifty and said: “Like anyone else.”

“Did he keep his mouth covered?”

“Now that I think of it, he did.”

“He was an outlaw, concealing a mutilation,” Tom said bitterly. “I suppose you didn't think of that.”

“It's pissing with rain!” the butcher protested. “Everyone's muffled up.”

“Just tell me how long ago he left you.”

“Just now.”

“And where was he headed?”

“To an alehouse, I'd guess.”

“To spend my money,” Tom said disgustedly. “Go on, clear off. You may be robbed yourself, one day, and then you'll wish there were not so many people eager to buy a bargain without asking questions.”

The butcher looked angry, and hesitated as if he wanted to make some rejoinder; then he thought better of it and disappeared.

Agnes said: “Why did you let him go?”

“Because he's known here and I'm not,” Tom said. “If I fight with him I'll be blamed. And because the pig doesn't have my name written on its arse, so who is to say whether it is mine or not?”

“But all our savings—”

“We may get the money for the pig, yet,” said Tom. “Shut up and let me think.” The altercation with the butcher had angered him, and it relieved his frustration to speak harshly to Agnes. “Somewhere in this town there is a man with no lips and fifty silver pennies in his pocket. All we have to do is find him and take the money from him.”

“Right,” said Agnes determinedly.

“You walk back the way we've come. Go as far as the cathedral close. I'll walk on, and come to the cathedral from the other direction. Then we'll return by the next street, and so on. If he's not on the streets he's in an alehouse. When you see him, stay by him and send Martha to find me. I'll take Alfred. Try not to let the outlaw see you.”

“Don't worry,” Agnes said grimly. “I want that money, to feed my children.”

Tom touched her arm and smiled. “You're a lion, Agnes.”

She looked into his eyes for a moment, then suddenly stood on her toes and kissed his mouth, briefly but hard. Then she turned and went back across the marketplace with Martha in tow. Tom watched her out of sight, feeling anxious for her despite her courage; then he went in the opposite direction with Alfred.

The thief seemed to think he was perfectly safe. Of course, when he stole the pig, Tom had been heading for Winchester. The thief had gone in the opposite direction, to sell the pig in Salisbury. But the outlaw woman, Ellen, had told Tom that Salisbury cathedral was being rebuilt, and he had changed his plans, and inadvertently caught up with the thief. However, the man thought he would never see Tom again, which gave Tom a chance to catch him unawares.

Tom walked slowly along the muddy street, trying to seem casual as he glanced in at open doorways. He wanted to remain unobtrusive, for this episode could end in violence, and he did not want people to remember a tall mason searching the town. Most of the houses were ordinary hovels of wood, mud and thatch, with straw on the floor, a fireplace in the middle, and a few bits of homemade furniture. A barrel and some benches made an alehouse; a bed in the corner with a curtain to screen it meant a whore; a noisy crowd around a single table signified a game of dice.

A woman with red-stained lips bared her breasts to him, and he shook his head and hurried past. He was secretly intrigued by the idea of doing it with a total stranger, in daylight, and paying for it, but in all his life he had never tried it.

He thought again of Ellen, the outlaw woman. There was something intriguing about her, too. She was powerfully attractive, but those deep-set, intense eyes were intimidating. An invitation from a whore made Tom feel discontented for a few moments, but the spell cast by Ellen had not yet worn off, and he had a sudden foolish desire to run back into the forest and find her and fall on her.

He arrived at the cathedral close without seeing the outlaw. He looked at the plumbers nailing the lead to the triangular timber roof over the nave. They had not yet begun to cover the lean-to roofs on the side aisles of the church, and it was still possible to see the supporting half-arches which connected the outside edge of the aisle with the main nave wall, propping up the top half of the church. He pointed them out to Alfred. “Without those supports, the nave wall would bow outward and buckle, because of the weight of the stone vaults inside,” he explained. “See how the half-arches line up with the buttresses in the aisle wall? They also line up with the pillars of the nave arcade inside. And the aisle windows line up with the arches of the arcade. Strong lines up with strong, and weak with weak.” Alfred looked baffled and resentful. Tom sighed.

He saw Agnes coming from the opposite side, and his mind returned to his immediate problem. Agnes's hood concealed her face, but he recognized her chin-forward, sure-footed walk. Broad-shouldered laborers stepped aside to let her pass. If she were to run into the outlaw, and there was a fight, he thought grimly, it would be a fairly even match.

“Did you see him?” she said.

“No. Obviously you didn't either.” Tom hoped the thief had not left the town already. Surely he would not go without spending some of his pennies? Money was no use in the forest.

Agnes was thinking the same. “He's here somewhere. Let's keep looking.”

“We'll go back by different streets and meet again in the marketplace.”

Tom and Alfred retraced their steps across the close and went out through the gateway. The rain was soaking through their cloaks now, and Tom thought fleetingly of a pot of beer and a bowl of beef broth beside an alehouse fire. Then he thought how hard he had worked to buy the pig, and he saw again the man with no lips swinging his club at Martha's innocent head, and his anger warmed him.

It was difficult to search systematically because there was no order to the streets. They wandered here and there, according to where people had built houses, and there were many sharp turns and blind alleys. The only straight street was the one that led from the east gate to the castle drawbridge. On his first sweep Tom had stayed close to the ramparts of the castle. Now he searched the outskirts, zigzagging to the town wall and back into the interior. These were the poorer quarters, with the most ramshackle buildings, the noisiest alehouses and the oldest whores. The edge of the town was downhill from the center, so the refuse from the wealthier neighborhood was washed down the streets to lodge beneath the walls. Something similar seemed to happen to the people, for this district had more than its share of cripples and beggars, hungry children and bruised women and helpless drunks.

But the man with no lips was nowhere to be seen.

Twice Tom spotted a man of about the right build and general appearance, and took a closer look, only to see that the man's face was normal.

He ended his search at the marketplace, and there was Agnes waiting for him impatiently, her body tense and her eyes gleaming. “I've found him!” she hissed.

Tom felt a surge of excitement mingled with apprehension. “Where?”

“He went into a cookshop down by the east gate.”

“Lead me there.”

They circled the castle to the drawbridge, went down the straight street to the east gate, then turned into a maze of alleys beneath the walls. Tom saw the cookshop a moment later. It was not even a house, just a sloping roof on four posts, up against the town wall, with a huge fire at the back over which a sheep turned on a spit and a cauldron bubbled. It was now about noon and the little place was full of people, mostly men. The smell of the meat made Tom's stomach rumble. He raked the little crowd with his eyes, fearful that the outlaw might have left in the short time it had taken them to get here. He spotted the man immediately, sitting on a stool a little apart from the crowd, eating a bowl of stew with a spoon, holding his scarf in front of his face to hide his mouth.

Tom turned away quickly so that the man should not see him. Now he had to decide how to handle this. He was angry enough to knock the outlaw down and take his purse. But the crowd would not let him walk away. He would have to explain himself, not just to bystanders but to the sheriff. Tom was within his rights, and the fact that the thief was an outlaw meant that he would not have anyone to vouch for his honesty; whereas Tom was evidently a respectable man and a mason. But establishing all that would take time, possibly weeks if the sheriff happened to be away in another part of the county; and there might still be an accusation of breaking the king's peace, if a brawl should result.

No. It would be wiser to get the thief alone.

The man could not stay in the town overnight, for he had no home here, and he could not get lodgings without establishing himself as a respectable man somehow. Therefore he had to leave before the gates closed at nightfall.