Knight's Acre

by Norah Lofts

  ‘That’s how it is sir,’ the builder said, and waited politely for the word of dismissal.

  ‘That’ll be all then. And try to have it done by Christmas…’

  Making no promises, Master Hobson mounted his old nag and plodded away.

  Sir Godfrey stood for a moment and looked out over the little village, this time with a more seeing eye. Smoke rose from the smoke holes of the little low houses and the fields were lively, men, women and children scything, stocking, gleaning. On this bright day the river looked like half a silver necklace. In the woods behind him doves called softly.

  He indulged in a rare, far-forward-looking sort. Quiet old age in his solid house. He though—I can be happy here…

  ‘The man is a rogue! A hundred and ten pounds! And you agreed! Didn’t you realise he meant ninety and expected you to beat him down?’ Exasperation rendered Sir James almost incoherent. He cursed his gout which had prevented him riding to Intake and putting some sense into Hobson. He blamed himself for not asking the builder to come here in the first place.

  The fact was that in all concerned with ordinary living, Godfrey was a witless fool. Charming of course, everybody liked him, but he had no sense. Like a child in the world of men and like a child, headstrong and stubborn. Look at his marriage!

  Look at his marriage, indeed.

  For a poor knight—but famous, handsome, popular and well-connected—a good marriage had seemed to be a matter of course. There were hundreds of heiresses in England; so many families had seemed to have lost the trick of breeding boys, the great Earl of Warwick had only two daughters. And Godfrey moved in the right circles. For years all the family, except unworldly William, had been finding and displaying likely young women. He’d remained single until he was twenty-eight and then gone and fallen in love with a sixteen-year-old orphan without a penny. The family grieved over such reckless improvidence and one member of it never forgive him. That was his sister Mary, the clever, dominating Abbis of Lamarsh—who had had charge of Sybilla FitzHerbert since she was orphaned at the age of two. The Abbess had seen in the girl some quality, seldom apparent to others, and had convinced herself that if only the girl could be persuaded or forced into the right mould, she would make a splendid successor to herself. Sybilla FitzHerbert was very clever; she could learn anything—reading, writing, needlework, domestic skills, work in the infirmary. She would, when the time came, be fit to govern. All she lacked was the sense of vocation; and the very frankness with which she denied having any simply added to the Abbess’s certainty that here was a young woman of unusual promise. God would recognise it…

  All ruined! A whole edifice of hope and endeavour brought crashing down because that stupid Godfrey looked in to pay his respects to his sister and saw Sybilla. It was enough to make angels weep.

  Apart from the Abbess and a few disappointed ladies, everybody soon accepted this most unfortunate marriage and most people liked Sybilla, modest, tactful, helpful, so devoted to her husband that she constituted no threat where other men were concerned.

  Sybilla’s attitude towards Sir Godfrey was tinged with a kind of adoration. He had come to her rescue; he was her saviour and if she lived to be sixty she knew that she could not possibly express her gratitude to him. When she thought of the cold cloister, of the essentially lonely life that every nun lived while seeming to be part of the community, she was so grateful that the idea of criticising anything he said or did, any arrangement he made or failed to make, was utterly unthinkable. She was no fool and the Abbess’s training had already shaped her judgement; there were times when she saw Godfrey Tallboys as feckless, extravagant, easily imposed upon, unobservant and insensitive but such clear-sighted moments made no difference; she loved even his faults. And one of the reasons why she ruled her two naughty boys so badly was that they were his; and so like him as he must have been before the discipline of life tamed him to some extent. To Henry, to Richard would come all too soon the cuffs and the beatings, the rules and the rebukes; but they would come from other hands and from other voices.

  At Moyidan Sir James said, trying to make the best of a bad job: ‘Well, my summer gout ends next month.’ He suffered two kinds; one in hot weather, June to September, one in cold, November to March. ‘And I will ride over to Intake and see what Hobson is about. Builders have a bad habit nowadays of getting one job underway and then taking on another, playing put and take. But I assure you, Godfrey, if I find any slackness I will light a fire under Mr. Hobson. A hundred and ten pounds! Have you got it?’ The question was an afterthought.

  ‘A hundred. I thought that might be enough. I’ve never built a house before,’ Godfrey said. That was the kind of thing that was so endearing about him, a kind of downright simplicity.

  ‘But I’ll get some more. There is talk of the war on the Welsh border. It might pay better than tourneys. Would you be so kind, James, as to take charge of this?’ He tumbled his money out. He had a vague idea that a hundred pounds would build a house and partly furnish it. Apparently he had been wrong.

  Sir James said he would gladly take charge of the money and pay Hobson in stages. And he would see that the house was ready by Christmas. It would be, if he had anything to do with it.

  And Emma, no less eager to see Sybilla in her own house for Christmas, said, ‘I am sure, Godfrey, that I can help with the furnishing. I will look forward to it.’

  ‘That is extremely kind,’ Sir Godfrey said. He rode happily back to Beauclaire to report the success of his mission.

  TWO

  September-December 1451.

  In no time at all, it seemed, she was seeing him off again, this time to war. Such partings were always heart-wrenching but she had learned self-control in the convent and from experience the need for keeping a cheerful face and manner. Once, soon after their marriage, he gone to fight on the Scottish border and she had cried and cried. He had been greatly distressed and said, ‘Sweetheart, you knew when you married me that I was not a shoemaker plying his trade at home.’ He had also explained to her that for a knight who knew his business, who was well armoured and well mounted, the risk of death in battle was small. ‘Plainly, a knight is worth more alive than dead. Think of the ransom!’

  So now as he was about to leave—this time for Wales—she reminded herself that his armour was good, Arcol, his warhorse, an exceptional animal, so especially well-trained that his price had kept them poor for two years. He was also lucky in his squire, a distant Tallboy’s cousin and completely devoted. Any hardships of the campaign would be mitigated for Godfrey by Eustace, who would shove and kick with the best and was not above a little cheating at times.

  Godfrey himself was in high spirits, certain of returning much enriched. There would be loot and ransom money. ‘All these Welsh chieftains call themselves princes; and any I take will pay a prince’s ransom,’ he said. ‘Then we can furnish our house fittingly.’

  One thing worried him; the house might be completed while he was still away. ‘In which case you would be advised to remain here until my return. Or, if you wish to move—with borrowed furnishings, you will have Walter.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ she said, ‘I have Walter.’

  Walter was God’s gift to an impoverished young couple. Five years earlier when they were in Dover, about to move on to Richborough, he had approached Godfrey and said that he wished to be their serving man. Godfrey had explained that useful as such a man might be, they were in no position to afford one. Walter said:

  ‘I’m not looking for a wage. I have a pension of four pence a week. If needs be I can provide my own provender.’

  To such an unlikely tale the natural, sadly human reaction was suspicion. The man could be a serf running away from his manor or a criminal; and a peripatetic yet respectable family like that of the Tallboys would provide perfect cover. And neither Walter’s appearance nor his manner offered much assurance. His clothes were noticeably neat and good quality but his face was scarred in such a way that it wore a perpetual snee
r and his manner was offhand, almost arrogant.

  Yet everything he said about himself proved, on enquiry, to be true. He was a freeman born—His name was Freeman. A younger son with no hope of inheritance he had gone, as an archer, to the French wars with Lord Bowdegrave of Abhurst; and when Lord Bowdegrave was unhorsed stood over him; hence the scar, hence the pension.

  Why such a man of independent means and markedly unservile nature should wish to serve them remained a mystery. Sybilla had a rather romantic explanation; Godfrey had done so well in the Dover tournament any old soldier, looking for a new master and with pay no object, might well have fastened upon him. Godfrey, very modest over most things, said that old soldiers like to be on the move. Most of those now tramping, hobbling, limping about the roads of England would have fared better, he said, had they stayed in one place where they had relatives or friends. But the habit of movement was so ingrained…

  So Walter joined them and not only served them well but saw that others did. In the vast, ill-organised households of the time there was a system of “vails”, presents given to servants. Those unable or unwilling to give substantial vails were remembered and when they came in again, ill served. Servants, from high to low, were in connivance and a bad vail meant, next time, inferior accommodation and neglectful service at table. Walter would not accept what Sybilla had taken for granted and Godfrey never noticed. ‘This will not do for my lady.’ And there was something about him, his size, his assurance, his sneer that made other servants give way. Nor was he an easy target for retaliation. More often than not, with his family installed and everybody properly intimidated, he would take himself off to eat, drink, sleep at the most convenient inn.

  In other ways he served Sybilla and Godfrey well. He had the sharpest eye for a bargain ever known. His expression was, ‘I happened on it.’ His happenings were always timely and ranged from the roll of blue-green silk, slightly scorched by a fire which had put a mercer out of business, to a four-year-old riding horse in tip-top condition which he had happened on in Winchester. And paid, he said, knacker’s price for.

  That bargain could hardly be accepted without question, horse stealing being a capital offence.

  ‘Like I say,’ Walter said. ‘There’s this man, leading a horse and howling like a baby. I asked him what ailed him and he said his master was just dead and had left orders for the horse to be destroyed. And he’d looked after it since it was foaled and couldn’t bear to take into the knacker’s yard but must, dead man’s wishes being law. So then… ‘ Walter hesitated a second. ‘Well, I said I was the knacker—at least his nephew, come to help him. I reckoned the real one might been known by sight. The fellow was only too glad to take the hoof-and-hide money and spare himself a nasty job. So I took the halter. You can tell the knacker’s by the smell. We went in, waited a bit, and came out.’

  Enquiries corroborated this fantastic tale. A rich old wool merchant had just died, leaving all his money to the church and ordering his horse to be destroyed.

  With his usual courtesy Sir Godfrey apologised to Walter for seeming, even for a moment, to doubt his word.,

  Walter said, ‘I’ve been thinking. It’d be worthwhile to somebody to nip along and ask about the harness. It might be a bargain there. It is likely be better than yours.’

  After that Walter’s bargains were accepted unquestioningly. So were his loyalty, devotion and ability. Sir Godfrey, riding off to join Lord Malvern’s punitive expedition, knew that he was leaving Sybilla in safe hands.

  Sir James kept his word. In his gout-free autumn, September and October, he rode to Intake almost every other day, acting and sounding like a dog dealing with a flock of laggard sheep. He started his campaign with the most acrimonious reproaches about overcharging and did not withdraw them when he realised that the price included a solar, still room and stool room. He and Emma exchanged some sharp comments on this latest proof of Godfrey’s stupidity and extravagance. Master Hobson accepted the rebukes in the proper respectful manner but took leave to point out that things had altered a bit since he last worked for Sir James. Apprentices now demanded meat three times a week and day workers’ wages had risen by a ha’penny a week; in fact, if bad weather set in and this job wasn’t completed by Christmas, he’d be out of pocket.

  Sir James went nagging; why this, why do that, why the other thing? If on any visit to did not see Master Hobson’s ancient grey mare tethered in her usual place, he would bark, ‘Where’s your master?’ and proceed to track the rascal down. On one memorable occasion he found the builder measuring up and preparing to give an estimate for another job. His rage so frightened the would-be client that he withdrew his order.

  Sir James did not accept as easily as Sir Godfrey have done the explanation for the comparative uselessness of the men he had lent. They had cleared the ground, done a lot of work on digging foundations, they carried stuff but they were not, in their master’s opinion, fully occupied.

  ‘Gods blood!’ He exploded, one day early in October, ‘they could do the stables and outbuildings. No skill needed there. Set them to work, man! Make use of them!’ In another, craftier, calmer mood he asked, ‘Is there a guild of well diggers, Hobson?’ Master Hobson was obliged to confess that if such a thing existed he had never heard of it. ‘Then set my fellows to work on a well.’

  The harassing tactics were effective; the house grew apace. It acquired its name. All those early settlers, suddenly emancipated, frenziedly trying to clear land and make a living on a subsistence level, had been very conscious of the word acre. Most of the little farms, though now wider than an acre, were known by the names of their makers; Robin’s Acre, Martin’s Acre, Will’s Acre. It was inevitable that Sir Godfrey’s growing house should be called Knight’s Acre.

  Coming up, echoing from an even further past, was something which nobody now, in the middle of the fifteenth century, was fully prepared to admit to, a superstition, older than memory. Nothing to do with the cheerful customer putting a green bough on the highest point of the new building, with a bit of ribbon maybe, and somebody saying, ‘God Bless This House.’ Nothing to do with the equally cheerful custom of spilling a little wine or ale on the newly-set doorstep in order to make sure that plenty would be the rule here. Old customs died hard and they died patchily. Master Hobson, a bit of a sceptic, was fully prepared to fix a bough, spill a drop of ale because, like almost everyone else who had come into close contact with him, he had liked Sir Godfrey.

  About the other ritual, Master Hobson was not so sure. And when he was not sure, he said to himself, ‘Ah… and waited. Wait; see how things went, see how the men felt.

  Early in November, Sir James’s winter gout set in, exacerbating his temper but not preventing him from doing his duty although he reduced his visits to two in a week. On a day when early mist gave way to a curious and beautiful luminosity, he arrived at Intake. The grey mare was not there and, to his critical eye, the thatching seemed to have made little progress since his last visit. At the front of the house there was a young man on a ladder, doing something very peculiar. The space between the upright beams had been plastered for at least a fortnight, well ahead of the onset of frost; yet this young man had a bucket of plaster slung from the rung of the ladder. He dipped into it, spread it on the space between two of the upper windows, smoothed and pressed it with his hands and then applied to it what looked like a thick wooden dish. He wiped around the dish very carefully, flicking bits of exuding plaster away and waited; and then withdrew the dish, surveying what was revealed with smug satisfaction.

  Sir James shouted, ‘Hi there! You fellow! What do you think you’re doing?’

  The young man looked down and said, mildly, ‘Pargeting, sir.’ Despite the mildness there was something cocksure about his manner, about that brief, downward glance and then back to his work that was infuriating.

  ‘Come down off that ladder.’

  The young man obeyed, not with alacrity but with a kind of weary patience—what now? As soon
as he was on the ground he studied the inside of the dish-like thing, took an oily rag from his apron pocket and began to rub. Altogether too much!

  ‘Stand up when you speak to me. Take your cap off! Where’s your master?’

  ‘Dead, sir.’

  For a moment, rage gave way to another emotion. Younger than me and in good health!

  ‘Hobson. Dead? How? He was here on Monday.’

  ‘Master Hobson is not my master. I served my time with Master Turner. Then I set up on my own.’

  ‘Where’s Hobson?’

  ‘Gone to Marshmere to complain. The thatchers found straw mixed with the reeds.’

  Reasonable; indeed, praiseworthy. But anger must be vented.

  ‘Now, what’s this pargeting?’

  ‘As you see, sir.’ He looked up, drawing Sir James’s gaze to the three completed panels.

  The design was based on the family badge. A hare, up on its hind legs, defying some invisible enemy, in defence of a little leveret, crouched low behind her.

  The badge fitted exactly the family motto—‘I defend my own’—for the hare, though usually a timid animal, had been known to fly at the nose of a bullock in defence of its young.

  The silver gilt light of the morning brought out the shape and contours of this white-on-white decoration, revealing a beauty which Sir James was not in a mood to appreciate.

  ‘A lot of nonsense,’ he said. ‘You can stop it at once and find a job of work.’

  ‘Pargeting is work, sir.’

  The mould, cut into solid beechwood, had taken five days to complete. Allowed more time he would have carved the motto, too, and the date. But Hobson, pressed by Sir James, in turn pressed his son-in-law and, apart from the hare and the leveret both most lifelike in their postures of defiance and terror, all he had added was what looked like some blades of grass, just in front of the hare’s hind feet. The intertwined grass blades were in fact his signature. His name was Walter Weaver.