Sarum - Edward Rutherfurd [234]
It was all the worse for the knight of Avonsford, for he had secret plans of his own – plans which a civil war would ruin. As he looked down now at the little workman by his side he pursed his long lips and remarked in Nicholas’s own language:
“You’d better pray, then.”
The relationship between the two men was an easy one. When the descendants of Aelfwald the thane fought and lost at Hastings, they were deprived of most of their estates. The estate at Avonsford had been granted, along with dozens of others, to the great family of which William of Sarisberie was the present head, and they in turn had given it to the Godefroi knights as hereditary tenants. Though the thanes and minor landowners had lost their estates, the humbler folk – the semi-free villeins like the family of Nicholas – had suffered no particular harm. They now had a new lord of the manor to whom they owed services or rents and who held a summary court of justice over the estate; but this was little different from their status in the old days under Canute, Edward the Confessor or Harold. The family of Godefroi, though stern military men, had not been oppressive lords. Though they spoke Norman French, they had soon learned to make themselves understood in the local English dialect, and had treated the family of craftsmen with respect. It was Nicholas’s father who had helped to build the Norman’s house, and when Nicholas’s skill with his hands had shown itself, Richard had let him go to work on the castle buildings in return for a modest rent to cover the manual service he owed the manor, which was easily covered by the wages he received in the castle.
One thing that the family had acquired since the conquest was a nickname. It was because of their skill in building. For often, when the Godefroi knights could not be bothered to remember the individual names of Nicholas or his father before him, they would shout: “Here, do this, Masoun,” using their own Norman word meaning stoneworker’ – and though the villagers in Avonsford still called him Nicholas, they too, half in mockery at the Norman’s arrogant call, and half out of respect for his skill, would sometimes call after him: “Here, Nicholas – Masoun.”
Now he looked at the knight’s saturnine face thoughtfully. Although he had known Godefroi all his life, he still did not find it easy to gauge his mood; and it was important that he choose his moment carefully.
For the stoneworker had an important matter of his own on his mind, a subject that he wished to broach only at the right time. He glanced down at his short, stubby fingers while he considered whether to speak.
“You have a villein on your estate,” he said finally. “Godric Body.”
Godefroi knew the young fellow well – a meagre insignificant little serf of seventeen. The boy’s mother, he knew, had been Nicholas’s sister; his father a fisherman. Both were dead and he had no relations, so far as the knight knew, except Nicholas and a cousin of the boy’s father, who was something of a troublemaker.
“Well? What do you want?” His voice was sharp and cold; he had learnt that it was best to be severe when people asked for favours, as it was clear the fellow was about to do.
Nicholas cleared his throat.
But as he did so, the air was pierced with a scream.
Godric Body could not believe his luck.
In the first place, he had eaten meat the evening before. It was not a thing he often did, except when he snared a rabbit or received his modest share of the meat from the cullings of livestock that took place at midsummer and the start of winter. But his uncle Nicholas and his family, though humble villeins like himself with little land, were far better off. Thanks to his skill the stoneworker often received twice the normal labourer’s wage of a silver penny a day and his family not only ate meat, but on occasion shared it with their poor relation.
“My wife looks like a pear,” Nicholas remarked with satisfaction as the cheerful little woman with