by Jason Vail
“I’m looking for a man named Symon.”
“I’m Symon.”
Stephen climbed the stairs, undoing a leather flask tied to his sword belt. He stopped two steps below Symon and held out the flask. Symon reached for it after a moment’s hesitation with hands that seemed too large for his arms, as if he was some strange sea creature and the hands were fins.
Symon uncorked the flask and sniffed the spout. His eyebrows rose in surprise. “Wine? What do you want?”
“Information.”
“And you’re paying with cheap wine?”
“Wine is wine. How often do you get it?”
“Not often, that’s true. A rich man’s drink.” Symon sipped from the flask and licked a ruby droplet from his upper lip. “What do you want to know?”
“Your employer, Abelard Morecok, I understand he had a practice of buying and selling villeins.”
The flask stopped short of Symon’s mouth. He jumped to his feet and stepped back, as if preparing to flee. “I had no part of that!” he snapped defensively.
“Not saying you did, and not interested in if you did.”
“You’ll say nothing to no one?”
“I don’t care about you,” Stephen said. “I only care about what you know.”
“You won’t turn me over to the sheriff?”
“Why, was what Morecok doing illegal?”
Symon regarded Stephen, then took a long swig. “Damned right it was. Enough to get an ordinary man hanged for it. I’ve your word on this?”
“You do.”
Symon leaned against the porch railing. He did not speak further until he had drained the flask.
“It started out innocent enough,” Symon said. “We got a contract to haul copper ore down from Hay. It was good business, and we have five boats on it now. It’s practically all we do these days, or did — bring the ore down the Wye, pick up random cargoes at Chepstow to fill out what space’s left, and bring the lot up to Gloucester. With Morecok dead, I don’t know what’ll happen now.”
“That’s the innocent part,” Stephen said. “What about the villeins?”
“What do you know about copper mining?”
“Nothing.”
“It’s hard work. They have to crawl inside on their bellies, the passages are so small and narrow. They lie on their backs and hack the ore out of the bare rock and drag it out in sacks. The mine’s in Wales. The operator can’t or don’t want to pay freemen to do the work. So he talked Morecok into buying villeins for him and shipping them up the Wye in exchange for ore.”
Stephen could now guess why Symon was reluctant to talk about this. Selling Englishmen into bondage out of England was a crime against the crown. It had been so since the time of the Conqueror, who had put a stop to that aspect of the slave trade.
“Were any of these villeins children?” Stephen asked.
Symon grimaced and nodded. “A few. They can get to the ore more easily than grown men. What’s your interest in this?”
“I’m looking for two boys Morecok bought a couple of months ago. Their names were Theobald and Johnnie — thirteen and seven.”
“I remember them. Handsome lads.”
“Where is the mine?”
“In Wales west of Hay. A place called Painscastle.”
“Stephen!” Gilbert called from the doorway. “The gate’s opening! Someone’s coming!”
“Keep the flask,” Stephen said to Symon. “I’ve got to run.”
Chapter 19
It was fifty miles from Gloucester to Hay, give or take, which should only have taken two days, but instead consumed two-and-a-half because of twisting roads, unmarked turn offs, and bad directions that forced Stephen and the others to backtrack several times — in short, it was the usual journey when you didn’t know the way. Bottoms were sore and tempers were short by the time they reached it, with Stephen walking his horse for the last two miles because she had thrown a shoe. Having to stumble through ankle-deep mud and assorted puddles did nothing for Stephen’s disposition.
Painscastle was an unknown distance beyond Hay, and since Stephen’s horse couldn’t go on until she was reshod, the consensus was to find a comfortable bed out of a rain that had begun to fall several miles out of Hay, and locate Painscastle in the morning. It was likely to be late before the mare could be attended to, and as eager as they were to get to their destination, no one wanted to blunder about in the cold, dark and wet, and probably get lost, with the unhappy result of having to spend a night shivering in some forest in a hostile country. The land across the Wye from Hay had been English until four years ago, but had been retaken by the Welsh and not won back, despite repeated campaigns by the earl of Hereford and Earl Roger Mortimer.
Hay was a substantial town with many choice inns. Most were around the marketplace outside the castle. But that was across at the south of town, and Gilbert was too irritated at the rain and in thrall to his growling stomach to go that far. Gilbert swerved into the stable yard of the first one inside the north gate, called the Grey Goose.
“The man thinks with his stomach,” Harry grumbled as he and Stephen followed Gilbert through the passage.
The ground was muddy, so to spare himself the discomfort of wet stockings, Harry allowed Stephen to help him from his horse and to deposit him at the doorstep.
His entrance caused a stir among the patrons by the hearth fire, as Harry’s sudden appearance often did. Conversations stopped. The proprietor behind the bar snapped a towel against his thigh.
Harry swung to a table and boosted himself onto the bench. He looked around at all the appraising and astonished gazes.
“What’s the matter?” Harry asked. “Haven’t you ever seen a man with no legs before?” Getting no response, he waved at the proprietor. “Bring on the ale!”
“Let me see your money first,” the proprietor said.
“Gilbert, show the man we have means,” Harry said.
“He’s with me and we can pay,” Gilbert said with some belligerence. Gilbert looking belligerent was a sight to behold; he bore a marked resemblance to a peeved bulldog pup. He put the satchels taken from the pack horse on the table.
Stephen remained at the door because his shoes were encrusted with mud from the road. Innkeepers could be particular about people tracking mud in. But he tossed Gilbert his purse. No sense in letting anyone know Gilbert had a small fortune in one of those satchels.
“Let it go, Ponce,” one of the men by the fire called. “Man like that’s harmless, and he don’t look like no beggar.”
“Very well,” the proprietor muttered.
“I need a farrier,” Stephen called to the proprietor as he turned to fill a pitcher with ale. “Where can I find one?”
“Ask at the Lion Gate,” the proprietor called back without turning around. “There’s a farrier just beyond it.”
He turned around with the filled pitcher and advanced on Harry’s table. “What’ll you have to eat, then?”
“You get something to eat,” Stephen said to Gilbert. “I’ll put the horses up and find a blacksmith.” He’d left the mounts tethered in the courtyard behind the inn since no groom had shown up to take care of them.
He unsaddled and untacked them, then led all but his mare into stalls, and wiped down the saddles and tack with a rag.
The rain had not let up by the time Stephen finished, and he stood for a moment in the shelter of the overhanging roof, not relishing having to go out into the wet again. His cloak provided decent protection against the wet, but his boots were sodden and squelched uncomfortably at every step. But it had to be done.
Stephen led the horse into the street. He had no idea where the Lion Gate was, but he found out from a man hurrying by, and located it without too much trouble. It was the main entrance to Hay and lay at the east side of town. They would have entered the town here if they hadn’t been misdirected on the final leg.
A question to a gate warden sent Stephen out of town along the main road t
o the east. “It’s by the brook,” the warden said. “Don’t worry, it isn’t far.”
The directions were right this time. The blacksmith’s house and work shed sat at a wooden bridge over a narrow, steep-banked brook. The smith had one horse in a shoeing stall when Stephen arrived, and five more awaiting attention tethered to a rail nearby.
The smith paused to look over the mare.
“Can you get to her today?” Stephen asked, anxious about the number of horses ahead of him.
“I think so, but it’ll be late this afternoon.”
“That’ll be fine,” Stephen said.
He walked back into town.
As he turned the corner of Lion Gate Street onto Broad Street, the town’s main street which ran along the river, four wagons rounded the corner coming from the direction of the Wye bridge. There was nothing much unusual about the wagons. Each was large and pulled by four horses, and heavily laden, although Stephen could not tell the nature of the cargo because canvas tarps covered it in each wagon.
But when the last wagon turned the corner to join the others plodding toward the Water Gate in the north, there was one thing that caught Stephen’s eye — four men sitting on the tailgate, as men often did. But these men were shackled at the ankles. And he caught a glimpse of the wagon’s cargo, for the tarp did not cover all of it: gray gravel shot with blue.
The stone looked a lot like that in the pile Stephen saw in Morecok’s warehouse.
Just so, Stephen thought.
He followed the line of wagons, forgetting about his growling stomach.
The wagons passed through the gate and turned left down a cart track. Stephen followed the track as it turned the corner of the town wall. The wagons had stopped at the top of the bank overlooking the town quay, which was nothing more than a pebble shingle where four boats had been pulled up out of the water.
A line of timber warehouses slouched against the riverside palisade. The doors were open in the second one, and three men armed with swords across their knees were seated on stools in the doorway, sharing a pot of ale, safe from the rain.
Two shackled workers dragged wheelbarrows out of the shed to the wagons, and then the manacled men started shoveling blue gravel into them, which they then manhandled down a cut in the bank to one of the boats and dumped the gravel into it.
Stephen watched as the shackled men unloaded two of the wagons, moving quickly for men who could only walk at a shuffle. Perhaps the fact they wore no protection against the cold and rain other than short woolen coats spurred them to greater effort than might ordinarily be expected.
But it must be tiring work because the manacled men began to flag as they unloaded the fourth wagon. Two men were manhandling a loaded wheelbarrow down the cut when one of them tripped and fell, tipping over the wheelbarrow. Gravel spilled down the path.
One of the guards — for they could be nothing else — threw down his sword and bounded from the doorway at the accident, cursing the negligent workman in English. The guard carried a baton of stout wood, and began to pound the fallen man with the baton as if he was chopping wood. The workman covered his head and curled up on the ground.
“Please, sir! I’m sorry!” the workman cried in English, as the others looked away.
The beating did not stop, however. It went on longer than Stephen thought was necessary to discipline a neglectful servant, if a beating was justified at all, until another guard rose from his stool, and caught the first man’s arm.
“He’s had enough, Wint,” the second guard said. “Cihric will have your ass if he’s so damaged he can’t work.”
Wint stepped away from the fallen man. The baton slapped against his leg as if itching to continue its work. “We’ll never get back by nightfall at this rate.”
The second man grinned. “You worried that Filomena will be screwing Bleddyn if we have to lay over?”
“You shut up about that!” Wint snarled.
The guard who had stayed in the doorway called, “She will be, too!”
Wint barked to the shackled men, “Get this mess cleaned up!”
The slaves scrambled on hands and knees to gather the fallen gravel, and the loading of the boat resumed.
Wint eyed Stephen standing at the corner of the wall.
“What the devil do you want?” Wint growled.
“Nothing,” Stephen said. “Just enjoying our pleasant weather.”
He headed back to the wagon track without waiting for Wint’s reply.
Chapter 20
Stephen shut the door to the Grey Goose Inn against a buffeting, rainy wind that had already left a puddle by the threshold. Under the proprietor’s watchful gaze, he sank onto a stool by the door and used a stick to scrape the mud from his boots before crossing to the table where Gilbert and Harry were sharing a pitcher of ale. He had been gone so long that the remnants of their dinner had been cleared away some time ago.
He stepped over the bench and sat beside Harry, who uncharacteristically was in an almost jovial mood. Well, jovial for Harry.
Stephen was about to ask Harry what he was so pleased about, but the proprietor asked over his shoulder, “You’ll be having the same, I suppose.”
“The same as what?” Stephen asked.
“The same as your friends had. The mutton pie, bread and so forth.”
“That will be fine,” Stephen said, turning back to Harry as the proprietor left for the kitchen.
“The pie’s not as good as Edith’s but it won’t kill you,” Harry said.
“Good to know that I won’t die tonight,” Stephen said.
While he wondered whether to tell Harry what he’d seen on the quay, Harry said, “Gilbert’s found out where Painscastle is.”
“Oh?” Stephen said, helping himself to some of the ale, rather relieved that the conversation gave him a chance to say nothing yet about the events on the quay. The casual brutality troubled him a great deal for what it meant for the fate of Harry’s boys.
“It’s not far, only about six miles. The mine is in the hills a mile or two beyond that,” Harry said.
Harry wiped his mouth. He looked happy, which for Harry meant his habitual scowl was not as pronounced as usual. “We should have the boys back before dinner time, don’t you think?”
“I wouldn’t let your hopes rise too high,” Stephen said slowly. He should say something now. He sincerely thought he should. But his tongue wouldn’t move, nor his lips to sound the words. Harry deserved the truth even if it destroyed what little good feeling he was able to enjoy at the moment. But Stephen could not tell him.
“We should get to bed early,” Gilbert said. “That way we can get an early start. It’s widely known that robbers never work in the morning. Too drunk the night before for robbery and murder, don’t you know.”
“What do you know about criminality apart from the filching of books?” Harry asked, a reference to the fact that Gilbert had taken a valuable set of the Gospels with him when he left his monastery at Greater Wenlock to marry Edith.
“My thoughts exactly,” Stephen said before Gilbert could reply to this insult.
“About the books?” Harry said, stuffing his mouth with the last of the bread.
“No, the time of our departure.”
“I hope it’s not raining,” Harry said. “We’ll make better time then.”
“Yes,” Stephen said softly. “We will.”
Painscastle was a small village of timber and thatch houses unprotected by a wall, an unusual thing in this part of the country, where raids and wars were as frequent as bad weather. The local lord was a Welshman named Hywel. The castle, from which the village took its name, was nothing much to look at: a timber motte-and-bailey fortress a hundred yards long by about thirty wide. Bored guards, who did not bother to rise from their stools in the gateway, watched Stephen, Gilbert and Harry as they rode by, although they stared hard at Harry. Harry waved, but none of them waved back.
Knowing that the copper mine lay somewhere a sho
rt distance out of Painscastle did not tell them how to find it, which meant a stop for directions, a piss and a cup of ale at an ale house that sat on rising ground at the north of the village, it being universally considered rude to ask directions at such a house without trying the local brew.
“Take the main road west out of the village,” their informant said when she collected their cups. She was a Welsh woman whose name Stephen failed to remember several heartbeats after she gave it. But she spoke English as if she had been born to it; a skill not unusual in this part of the border, where people had intermingled and changes of lordship were frequent. “In about a mile and three quarters, there’ll be a road that comes in from the right. It’ll be the first decent road you see, so don’t mind the tracks and paths. Go up it to the church. Ask for Father Hova. He’ll see you on the rest of your way.”
Stephen thanked the woman and stared into the west. He did not rise as Gilbert did and Harry started to set himself on the ground.
“What are you waiting for?” Harry said. “For the sun to go down?”
“Harry, I think it’s best if you stay here,” Stephen said finally.
“I’m going,” Harry said.
“Harry, I’m afraid that if you are there, the owner will sense your urgency to get the boys back. That will drive up the price, perhaps beyond what we’ve brought with us.”
Gilbert turned around. “Stephen’s got a point.”
“This isn’t up to you,” Harry said. “They’re my boys and I’m going to get them back.”
“But if we don’t have enough money, you won’t get them,” Gilbert said.
“We could always return with what’s wanted,” Harry said.
“Mining is dangerous business,” Stephen said. “If we have to go back to Ludlow for more money, the boys may not be alive when we return.”
Harry’s obstinate expression wavered. “Alright.”
“You stay here, too,” Stephen said to Gilbert.
“Me too?” Gilbert asked, surprised.
“Yes, and keep our money close. I’m not taking all of it.”