Godiva

by Nerys Jones

‘He didn’t get close enough to see you. But he saw me all right. I slapped his head before he got away from me. Now he’ll go back to town and tell everyone I was here, in the closed area of the woods.’

  ‘Well, you have the right to be here. And in any case, he won’t do that. His father would thrash him for disobeying the order to stay out of here.’

  ‘But he could still put the word out – tell other children that he’d heard I was here on my own and up to no good. That kind of thing . . .’ He took her hand and squeezed it apologetically.

  ‘We could meet somewhere else,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t know. The woods are full of people trapping and hunting now.’

  ‘We could meet in the West Orchard, near the ruins of the old nunnery. People say they are haunted and no one goes there. Not even that wretched boy . . .’

  He took her in his arms and almost relented in his resolve not to make love to her.

  ‘No. I’ll send you a message when I think I am under less suspicion,’ he said. ‘In a few days.’

  He walked her to her horse, put the sword belt back around her waist and helped her to mount. For a moment she sat still in the saddle, unwilling to go, her beauty in sad tatters round her shoulders. Even before she uttered the words, he knew what she would say. She loved him. He felt like telling her, ‘I know you do, because love is blind, and you are the blindest of all. Don’t you know why you did not see Tom? Or hear him? Why not, Godiva?’

  But that would be too cruel. It would also be self-defeating. Anyway, she probably wouldn’t understand what he meant.

  ‘And I love you,’ he replied, not knowing or caring what he said.

  Parting from Bret so unexpectedly had jolted her and left her distracted as she rode home along the bridle path. It fell to the pony, a small mare she had ridden for many years, to act as a lookout for any sign of trouble. To Godiva’s surprise, only a few minutes down the trail the pony came to a standstill, pricked up her ears and refused to move another inch, not even swishing her tail against the flies. ‘What is it, May?’ Godiva asked, but got no response. She put her head down and placed her ear in line with the pony’s and listened. In the intense silence that hung round the still animal’s body she could detect soft sounds, at no great distance from where she and the horse now stood, sounds so low they could only have been made by some creature working away in great secrecy. ‘Sh! Stay still,’ she whispered in the pony’s ear. Then she dismounted without so much as cracking a twig and, leaving May untethered, began to walk, half-stooping, in the direction of the sounds.

  Moments later, as she crouched between thick ferns, she saw them. Two poachers had just killed a deer and were attempting to butcher it quietly on the spot. One was a thin boy of no more than fourteen; the other, a strong young man of about eighteen. She had never seen them before. They could only be drovers, she thought, entering the forest in defiance of the ban on cattle movements in the lordship. She wondered at their competence at butchering meat. She glanced round and noticed that the kill had happened at a place where there was no stream or other source of water to clean out the carcass. Nor did the bigger youth have a proper boning knife. Instead he was holding a small sword. As she watched, he plunged the sword into the animal’s throat and ripped open the belly of the carcass from gullet to tail. Entrails and vital organs spilled out together on the bloody ground, followed by the bolus, the great green steaming ball of semi-digested grass from the second stomach. The youth jumped back in disgust and kicked the carcass.

  ‘You, get over here,’ he shouted at the smaller boy. ‘Clean this shit and cut me some meat to cook.’

  Godiva, angry at the ruin of good venison when people were starving, pulled out her sword and weighed the danger of attacking the youths. Just then, though, May wandered over towards her and gave a soft snort.

  ‘Hey, a pony. With a nice saddle and all,’ the older boy exclaimed. ‘Go and grab her reins.’

  ‘Leave her alone,’ said the smaller boy. ‘Someone will come looking for her.’

  ‘I’ll be on my way down London Road and selling this beast before they even know she’s gone.’

  ‘Uncle will flog you if he finds out. Send the bloody horse away and let’s just smoke this venison.’

  ‘Hmm,’ the older boy rubbed his chin. ‘Perhaps you’re right. Well then, while we’re at it, we could kill the pony, too. We could smoke all the meat at the same time and take it back to camp tomorrow. I’ll warrant uncle don’t know deer from horse in his mouth.’ He wiped the deer’s blood off his sword.

  ‘You’re not going to kill it now, with that sword? You’re mad. You need a poleaxe. Send it away . . .’

  ‘No, look . . .’ The bigger boy made a slash at May, but succeeded only in grazing her neck. It was enough, though, for Godiva to rise out of the ferns in fury and charge him with her drawn sword.

  ‘Fucking bitch, who you?’ the older boy roared, waving his sword at her.

  Godiva paused, realizing that a corpse would raise too many questions about her recent movements. ‘I own that deer you just killed,’ she shouted. ‘You’re trespassing. Go away.’

  ‘Here, Alf,’ he shouted at the smaller boy. ‘Pick up a stick and help me beat the hell out of this bitch.’

  He came at her now, confident that between the two of them they could have her down on the ground in no time. But May reared up against the smaller boy, teeth bared and hooves thrashing, until he retreated to the edge of the clearing, leaving the big one to face Godiva alone. By now, desperate to secure his catch and livid that a woman with a pony was holding him at bay, he was ready to kill her and hide her body under a mound of leaves. He slashed with his sword, and felt the surprising strength in her arm as she parried, to left, to right, then in a circle. Each handled the sword better than the other expected, and the fight seemed as though it would end by accident, when one tripped over a root and the other pounced in victory. But suddenly Godiva spotted a branch lying nearby and, swooping, seized it with her left arm. Moving so fast that the youth could do no more than parry in retreat, she got closer to him and started slashing at the side of his head with the branch. It confused him more than it hurt, but it gave her the chance to cut his arm with her sword. He shrieked at the sight of his blood and dropped his weapon.

  ‘Spare me! I give up!’ he said, beginning to sob. ‘Keep the fucking deer.’

  ‘No, you keep it,’ Godiva said, picking up his sword. ‘You’ve ruined the butchering. Take the carcass with you. Go on. Put it on your back and go, and don’t ever come back to this lordship again.’

  If the two youths thought it odd that they were being allowed to keep the meat, they did not show it. In moments they had vanished into the forest and Godiva was left alone to recover her breath.

  ‘Come here, May,’ she whispered, and threw her arms round the pony’s neck. ‘We’ll get you back to your stable now and put a big salve on your neck.’

  The pony nibbled at her ear and for a moment Godiva could have sobbed with as much abandon as the youth she had seen off from the forest. But the moment passed and she straightened her clothes and hair, jumped into the saddle and set off once more for home.

  In the kitchen of the manor house Bertha, Agatha and Milly had their heads down as they busied themselves with the rabbit pies they were making for dinner that night. Bertha had claimed the right to do the most skilled job – rolling out the pastry and cutting it into large, flat discs, some of which were fluted at the edges to fit snugly on top of the pie. With ostentatious caution, she lifted each one and then laid the pastry carefully over the pie trays so that no holes or gaps appeared from which the stew would leak and spoil the dish. Milly had taken the job of making the second batch of dough, because she liked to dig her fingers in and out of it, just as when she was six years old. Agatha had the job of filling the pie cases with the stewed meat, still hot from hours of slow simmering in spiced wine, and passing the pies to the slave who handled the manor house’s kitchen oven. No one
saw Godiva enter the room.

  She stood for a moment, taking in the scene. So, she observed wearily, Milly was well again, and Agatha and her mother were on good enough terms, for the moment, to cooperate. Suddenly Milly raised her head from the kneading trough and saw Godiva.

  ‘Mother!’ she said in a raspy voice, still not fully cleared of her cold. ‘Whatever happened to you? You’re all mud and twigs.’

  Agatha and Bertha, startled, looked up too, so quickly that Bertha dropped a pastry base onto the floor.

  ‘Oh my!’ she said. ‘I never done that before. Mistress, what has happened?’

  ‘Nothing. Just a fall. May got startled and I wasn’t paying attention.’

  ‘Yes, I’m sure,’ said Milly. ‘You look as though you’ve seen a ghost. Anyway, at least you’re not as late as usual. I hear you go into the woods each afternoon for so long that everyone else has to have their evening meal an hour later than usual.’

  ‘Never mind that,’ Agatha said quickly. ‘Pies can be eaten any time. You could have yours in half an hour, Mistress Milly, if you be truly hungry.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Bertha said. ‘Better for you to go off to bed early, young mistress. She only just come out of the sick-room,’ she added, addressing Godiva. ‘But Gwen still be there, though not with a cold any more. She has bad headaches and says her limbs are weak on one side. Could be “the corgi” had a small stroke. From all the worry, I’d say.’

  Godiva sighed deeply. She would have to go to see her housekeeper as soon as possible. ‘Are you sharing Gwen’s work between you?’ she asked, looking round at their hot, flushed faces.

  ‘Yes, mistress,’ Agatha smiled at Godiva. ‘Mother knows Gwen’s duties and she is teaching me well. And Mistress Milly is helping out, too. With kneading and such.’

  ‘Only for tonight, though,’ Milly snapped, ‘and I certainly won’t be going to bed early, Bertha. I feel quite well, thank you. And anyway,’ she said, resuming her kneading and dropping her voice so that her mother could hardly hear her, ‘I want to sit with father when he eats with us tonight.’

  ‘What did you say?’ Godiva shouted. ‘Lovric will be home tonight? Why did none of you tell me straight away? Oh my God, he’ll have Harry with him! Why else would he come rushing back at such short notice? That’s more important than pies or housework or anything else.’

  ‘Really, mother?’ Milly asked blandly. ‘That’s good. I mean, it’s good that father is more important than anything else, for there will be no more walks in the woods each afternoon for you, not with father back home and telling you what to do all the time.’

  ‘Go and get some more flour,’ said Bertha quickly, and Milly, sensing she had overstepped the mark, went out of the room.

  ‘I need to be alone sometimes,’ Godiva said as though talking to herself, while Agatha and Bertha concentrated on the pies. ‘I have to have some interludes of peace during these worrying times.’

  Still there was no reply from Agatha and Bertha.

  ‘Have people complained of my short absences?’

  ‘No,’ said Bertha firmly. ‘No one even noticed you were going out to walk until Milly asked Father Godric to pray for her and he refused, saying he had to be with you. Then someone told Milly that Godric went to sleep in one of the barns every afternoon, and from that she reasoned that you were away from the manor. But no one told her you were in the woods, not me and not Agatha. Didn’t seem like it was Mistress Milly’s business where you were. She be a one that likes to go off a-strolling herself. Sulking and that. She just made it up, I reckon, about you walking in the woods.’

  Bertha’s eyes met Agatha’s, and for once mother and daughter were in perfect accord.

  ‘Well,’ Godiva said uncertainly. ‘We had better prepare for Lovric and the housecarls.’

  ‘Everything is in hand, mistress,’ Bertha said. ‘Not a real feast, what with me having such short notice, but there be food and ale in the hall already, and the big fire going, and the horse troughs filled with hay and water. We done all this in the last two hours, since the messenger arrived.’ She paused and looked across at Agatha.

  ‘True, mistress,’ said Agatha. ‘There be nothing for you to do but get yourself nice and tidy before master come home. I already put hot water in the small oak tub for you. It will be cool enough now. And I’ve put the flat-iron on a clean linen dress and laid it on your bed.’ Godiva was silent. ‘I could come with you now,’ Agatha said. ‘I’m nearly finished with these pies.’

  ‘No,’ Godiva said quickly. ‘I’ll bathe alone. Come up when I call you, to braid my hair and dress me.’

  Bertha butted in. ‘That’s right. You’ve plenty work left on them pies, my girl.’

  Agatha hurried to agree and the moment passed when it might have seemed too obvious that Godiva refused the usual help with her bath, because no woman who has lain with a man day after day would want another woman anywhere near her until she had bathed alone.

  Lovric’s horn sounded late in the evening, as twilight was verging on night. Recalling his rebukes the last time he arrived home to find her absent, Godiva went out into the yard with the best drinking horn full of mead. The hall servants and slaves, the stable boys and the manor’s staff stood round in a semicircle, torchlight flickering on the faces of those who stood in the shadows, everyone breathless with the excitement that always filled the air when the armed men returned home together.

  But it was not to be like that this evening. Lovric trotted in with only the herald and one other man beside him, and wearing the ordinary thegn’s clothing he had worn when he rode with Godiva through Wessex in secret. He was sweating and dusty, and looked like a man who had come home at top speed. Godiva stared past him as if she had not seen him, gazing at the entrance to the yard and willing Harry to appear. Lovric stopped his horse before her and shook his head.

  ‘You didn’t bring Harry home?’

  ‘No. Put that drinking horn away. Send everyone back to their duties.’

  He climbed down from his horse and handed the reins to a stable boy without a word. Then he turned to face her, unsmiling and angry.

  ‘We must talk at once, alone.’

  ‘Won’t you eat?’ she asked. ‘There is a good dinner waiting for you.’

  ‘Must I tell you twice?’ he fumed as he crossed the threshold.

  Godiva hurriedly told Agatha to keep the oven on a low heat, and followed Lovric into their chamber. She poured him a goblet full of red wine, which he took in his hand, but otherwise ignored.

  ‘The housecarls, where are they?’ she asked.

  ‘Please, Godiva. Just listen to me and ask your questions afterwards. Can you do that?’

  She had never heard him address her so curtly. Suddenly she wondered if he knew about Bret. She looked down at his dagger, and then at his gleaming sword. No, it was impossible. And yet her heart was thundering.

  ‘Yes,’ she replied breathlessly, and took a long draught of her wine while he still clutched his goblet in both hands. ‘Go on. I am listening.’

  ‘Harry,’ he began. ‘Obviously you will want to know about Harry first.’

  She slumped with relief that Bret was not the first word out of his mouth. Lovric noticed and stared at her, but with none of his usual interest. He seemed like a man who knew what he had to say and just wanted to get on with it. He coughed and started talking in a controlled but crackling voice, sounding as though he had suddenly aged several years. It frightened Godiva as much as his unexplained anger.

  ‘The king still says that Harry has a vocation as a monk. I know this is not true. But just to be sure I sent messengers to Siward and the reply I got was unequivocal: when Harry was with him he showed no interest in Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary or God the Father himself. He was instructed in the catechism, of course, and went to mass with the rest of the household, and as far as anyone knows he has had nothing to do with paganism. But as for having one splinter of holiness in him, let alone a vocation to lead the li
fe of a monk, it is utter rubbish and a lie.’

  ‘Did you tell the king that?’

  ‘Yes, but he just made more excuses to refuse to let the boy go. I even raised the subject of Harry’s relations with Edmund. I said that Siward and I both knew about this, and we countenanced their friendship as long as it remained restrained in public. Well, Edward knows that military commanders have always protected men like Harry and Edmund, and yet he pretended I was telling him about some unheard-of depravity. He ranted at me, accused me of degeneracy and then he said all our family was in danger of hellfire. Especially you.’

  ‘Me? I don’t understand this, Lovric. When he spoke with me in the cathedral he only talked of my sins in general ways. He talked passionately, and yet he was sympathetic, even encouraging.’

  Lovric said nothing and put his goblet to his lips for the first time. Then he drained it empty in one long gulp and went to stare out of the window at the black and starless night sky.

  ‘Well?’ Godiva asked at last. ‘What else was said? You are angry, Lovric, and you haven’t told me why.’

  Lovric now started pacing the room, occasionally glancing furiously at Godiva, who noticed that his hand was on the hilt of his sword and that he was squeezing it repeatedly.

  ‘For God’s sake, tell me what the matter is!’ she snapped, her fear blotting out her understanding of Lovric.

  Again he paced, and continued pacing while she stared at him as though he were a stranger she might recognize, if only she tried hard enough and kept her eyes fixed upon him.

  ‘I have nothing to say,’ he said at last, mumbling through clenched jaws so that it was hard for her to understand him. ‘But perhaps you do.’

  Godiva did not hear his last words. She folded her arms and braced herself for what now seemed like an inevitable escalation of their quarrel.

  ‘Well,’ she said coldly, ‘if you won’t tell me why you are angry, at least tell me how your meeting with Edward ended. Was anything at all agreed about Harry?’

  ‘No. Edward terminated the audience on just one word. “Filth!” Then he stalked out, leaving me standing there alone like a churl, to be shown the door by that Saxon traitor-priest of his.’