Sarum - Edward Rutherfurd [259]
“I hope I see you hang one day,” he called back to him; at which Le Portier only stared and gave his tight-lipped smile.
A strange fellow, the knight concluded. He knew nothing of Le Portier’s distant ancestry, and the idea that the agister’s Porteus ancestors had fought with the real King Arthur would have astonished him indeed. And so it was with a flash of insight that he murmured:
“As stiff and exact as an ancient Roman: but his only point of honour is the precision with which he takes money – anyone’s.”
As he rode to the castle of Sarisberie, his anger gradually subsided.
At least, he thought, he had saved the boy.
The meeting of the swanimote took most of the morning, but at last the court was convened.
It was held in a hall in the castle: Waleran presided. All the forest officers were present: the inspecting knights, the verderers, foresters, woodwards and agisters. Each wore on their tunic the badge of their office – a bow for the warden, a horn for the foresters. A jury of twelve was selected from those present and then the court was in session. Though it was strictly a private court, the doors were left open and a small crowd pushed their way inside. Godefroi stood at the front; Nicholas a few paces from him. Out of the corner of his eye, the knight saw both the girl Mary and William atte Brigge working their way through the throng as the proceedings began.
The warden lost no time. As Godric was brought in, he turned sharply to the agister.
“Make your statement, Le Portier,” he ordered.
Godefroi watched intently as the agister rose. His face was calm, and the knight thought he allowed the hint of a smile to cross his face as he glanced in his direction.
“The accusation is not quite as previously stated,” he began smoothly.
But he got no further.
For the court was interrupted by a shout.
On the morning before the trial, Mary knew very well that Godric Body was about to be hung; and as she considered her new situation, the future was bleak.
She was poor; she was ill-favoured, and soon she would have a child. If she had not secured Godric, perhaps she might have found another man, though it had always been doubtful; but who would marry her now? She knew the answer very well. And she was only fourteen.
Once again, she had to ask herself the questions she had pondered the midsummer before. Would her life be long? She thought she could see it. She might work in the manor dairy for another forty years if she was lucky; or she might work in the fields and probably die sooner. Meanwhile, there would be the child to support.
“I wish it would die,” she thought.
But she was sure the child within her was healthy.
Her situation was made all the plainer for her by the behaviour of the people in the village. Nicholas was too preoccupied with his own plans to have given the girl much more than a passing thought; most of the other villeins and their families, though they sympathised, instinctively avoided her, and even her parents were cool, fearing that she might be a liability to them.
“We can’t afford to keep you and the child,” her mother told her bluntly. “You’d have to keep yourselves.”
She had been allowed to see Godric two days before. He asked her to bring him some pieces of wood from his cottage so that he could fashion another shepherd’s crook to pass the time. But when she had brought them to him, he had been withdrawn: not because he had wished to hurt her, but from a feeling of helplessness.
“Is there a chance for you?” she had asked.
He had shaken his head; and soon afterwards she had gone.
On the morning of the trial, knowing nothing of Le Portier’s bribe, she went into Sarisberie; and as she had expected, William atte Brigge was in the little market place with the other men. When she asked if he were still offering the reward for information about the pig she had learned that he was. And so she told him all she knew, because, after all, she reasoned perfectly,