The Forest - Edward Rutherfurd [8]
The party was making swift progress across the heath. Here and there she noticed small groups of sturdy ponies eating grass or gorse. ‘They’re all over the Forest,’ Walter explained. ‘They look wild but many of them belong to the peasants in the hamlets.’ They were pretty little creatures and, judging by the numbers she could see, there must be thousands of them in the Forest.
Cola and his sons led the way. If the king had reserved the New Forest for his deer, this was not only for his amusement. Of course, the sport was excellent. Not only deer, but wild boar could be hunted. There were a few wolves to be killed, too. When the king went hunting with his friends they normally used bows. But the underlying need for the Forest was much more practical. The king and his court, his men at arms, sometimes even his sailors, had to be fed. They needed meat. Deer breed and grow rapidly. The venison meat they produce is delicious and very lean. It could be salted – there were salt beds by the coast – and sent all over the kingdom. The New Forest was a deer farm.
It was a very professional one. Run by several foresters – some of them Saxons like Cola, left in place because of their intimate knowledge of the area – the Forest kept a stock of about seven thousand deer. When one of the royal huntsmen led a party out to kill deer for the king, as Cola was doing today, they would not rely on bows, but on a far more efficient method. Today would be a great drive, or drift, with this and other parties fanning out over a wide area and expertly driving the game before them towards a huge trap. The trap, which was being set up at the royal manor of Lyndhurst in the centre of the Forest, consisted of a long curving fence, which would funnel the deer down towards an inclosure where they could be shot with bows or caught in nets in large numbers. ‘It’s like a spiral seashell in the middle of the Forest,’ Walter had told her. ‘There’s no escape.’
Though cruelly efficient, it conjured up an image in her mind that was magical and strangely mysterious.
They began to descend a slope towards a wood. On her right, she heard a skylark singing and looked up at the pale-blue sky to find it. As she did so, she realized Walter was speaking to her. ‘The trouble with you,’ she heard him start, before she closed her mind to the sound of his voice.
There was always so much the matter with her, according to Walter. ‘You should try to walk more elegantly,’ he would say. Or smile more. Or wear another gown. ‘You’re not bad looking,’ he had been good enough to tell her the week before. ‘Even if some people would say you should be slimmer.’
This was a new fault. ‘Do they say that?’ she had gently asked.
‘No,’ he had replied after consideration. ‘But I should think that they might.’
Underlying all these criticisms, though, and the faint embarrassment her presence clearly caused him, was the one great shortcoming she was powerless to correct. I’m sure, she thought wryly, that if I had a huge dowry, he would think me beautiful.
She could see the lark now: a tiny speck high over the ridge, its voice descending, full-throated, clear as a bell. She smiled, then turned, as something else caught her eye.
The figure riding over the heath was catching up with them rapidly. He rode alone. He was wearing a hunting cap and was dressed in dark-green; but even before she could see more of him, it was clear from the magnificent bay he rode that this was no ordinary squire. With what an easy, powerful stride the big horse cantered towards them. It made her heart thrill to watch. And the rider, in a quiet way, seemed as impressive as his mount. As he drew closer she saw a tall, dark-haired man. His face was aquiline, Norman and somewhat stern. She guessed he might be thirty and he was obviously born to authority. As he passed them he lightly touched his cap in polite acknowledgement, but since he did not turn his head it was impossible to tell whether he had actually seen her.