Crispin_ At the Edge of the World - Avi [30]
I did not let a day pass—sometimes with Geoffrey, sometimes alone, sometimes with Troth—without looking to see what ships had come in. As I learned, before the French and Castilian attack, many vessels had come. Now, though fewer, enough arrived for me to study them.
There were smaller boats used by fisher folk. And once I saw a huge hulc. But the ships that drew me most—perhaps because of their colorful sails and mariners speaking so many tongues—were the cogs, which were the seagoing horses of the coastal fleet.
These cogs were some seventy-five feet in length, twenty-five at the widest. They were built of huge beams with smaller overlapping boards—“clinkered,” as it was called—for a hull. A single tall mast—thick and forty feet in height—set somewhat forward of midship, bore a cross spar from which hung a great, square canvas sail. Rough oak planking made for a deck.
The front of the boat—they called it a bow—was sharp and poked up. The rear of the boat was higher and called a “castle.” At the castles highest point was a great steering oar—a rudder they named it—so heavy it took a strong man to shift it.
A cog could carry all manner of goods, mostly in barrels—they called them tuns—for trade. They carried people, sometimes soldiers and horses. The attacking soldiers had come in cogs.
Not only did the ships hold my fascination, they fed my fancy of becoming a mariner.
One evening Benedicta told us about the death of her husband in France. “It was at a siege,” she said. “Or so I was told. I don’t know where. Nor how.”
Bear said he had taken part in more than one such siege, which was something I had not heard before. “For the most part they can be tedious,” he said. “But then they turn brutal.”
“Like the French?” asked Benedicta’s son.
At a loss for words, Bear ruffled his beard and shook his head. “I don’t like to say.”
The room was filled with a painful silence, after which Bear stood up and left the room.
Later that night, when I realized Bear had not come to sleep, I went outside. Bear was sitting with his back to a wall, staring up at the star-filled sky.
“Is something wrong?” I said.
“No,” he said curtly.
“Bear,” I said, “why don’t you say what happened when you were a soldier?”
He did not respond.
“Why won’t you tell me?” I asked.
At first he did not speak. Then he said, “It is hard to tell myself”
“What do you mean?”
“Crispin, war is another world. To be a soldier is to be another person.” He was breathing painfully, as if it were hard to speak. “I sinned much. In my heart I cannot even ask forgiveness for what should not be forgiven. I can only pray that my Lord will have mercy on me.”
“What did you do?” I asked, much troubled.
“Go to sleep, Crispin,” he said with weary irritation. “I don’t wish to speak of it.”
I returned to the room where we slept. As I lay down I heard Troth say, “Crispin, is something the matter?”
“I don’t know,” I said, and told her of my conversation. After she had listened, Troth said, “Aude used to say there are places in people we can’t see. But they are there.”
I thought for a while and then I whispered, “Troth, once, when Bear was ill he talked about a chained bear that was kept in captivity—as if the links of the chain were his sins. He told me he took his name from that bear. And another time he said, ‘To love a man, you must know his sins.’”
“Crispin,” she said, “you know Bear. You know he’s good.”
Lying there in the darkness, I thought: is that what it is to be older—to know there are things you are afraid to know?
22
WHILE BEAR WORKED at the inn with Luke, Troth and I spent much time together. We often wandered about Rye, looking upon its world.
Troth was like a chest that had become unlocked. There was so much she wished to know. For her, Rye was a vast place full of new things. I marveled at what she noticed,