What deSteny found in the Forest
UNLIKE his men, Hugh deSteny bathed every morning, washing himself briskly in cold water. It was a habit he had picked up on Crusade and had not abandoned in spite of the odd looks he received from those who feared he had joined the followers of Mahamot, who were known to wash often, and who still desecrated the Holy Sepulchre, to the shame of all Christian chivalry. This morning was no different, and as he rubbed himself dry with a length of old linen, deSteny tried once more to prepare himself for what he feared lay ahead. Blocking the deep fright that rose in his mind, he did his best to concentrate on ordinary things. He had pulled on his leggings and tugged his acton over his head when he heard Nicholas at the door. “What is it?” he asked.
Nicholas entered without being bidden. “They are waiting for you in the courtyard, the men-at-arms and the warden. They are growing impatient. Also your clerk is in your study. He said you ordered him to see you away this morning. Why you should want him, I cannot guess. But he is there, nonetheless.” He scowled in displeasure, making it abundantly clear that he thought he should be the one so distinguished and not the clerk. “It’s not right, you taking him. I ought to go with you into the forest. You may need a page, or a messenger, not a scribbler.”
“Your father would not like it if anything happened to you and I cannot afford the blood-price. You are not going with me.” DeSteny reached for his tunic of chain mail and bent down to slide his arms and head into it. Then he rose, letting the steel links settle over him of their own weight. It was a technique he had perfected while in the Holy Land when he had no one to serve him as squire: men of his position and rank did not often have squires to arm them under the best of circumstances, and the campaign in the Holy Land was hardly that. “I don’t know how dangerous this will be, and you would be a hindrance in a fight.”
“What fight?” demanded Nicholas. “You are going to look at dead crofters. The men say that outlaws came and slit their throats. You’re taking men-at-arms. I would not be in any danger with you.”
“Possibly not,” said deSteny. “But if it came to a fight, you would be in the way, and that isn’t desirable.”
“What if I should ask Sir Gui to give me leave to go?” It was a blatant challenge, but deSteny was not willing to accept it.
“Sir Gui would think it very strange for you to want to examine a dead crofter, youngster. Sir Gui might hold it against you.” That was the least of it, for he had often heard Sir Gui upbraid his Bailiffs and Sheriffs for devoting too much time to the foresters and crofters. “It would not gain you the favor you seek.”
Nicholas pouted. “How am I going to advance if you hold me back this way? You never allow me to show my worth.”
DeSteny slung his scabbard over his shoulder and fixed the band diagonally across his chest so that he could easily draw his sword over his right shoulder with his right hand; he was no belted knight, to carry his sword at his hip. As he reached for his helm, he signaled to his page. “There are more ways for you to advance than risking your life against outlaws, or through force of arms.”
“They’re all slower,” complained the youth.
“But they’re safer, and where’s the use of advancement if you’re in your grave?” said deSteny. “Come. Bring me my gauntlets.”
Nicholas shrugged as he picked up the metal-studded leather gloves, fondling them with mingled respect and envy, longing naked on his young face. “How long do you think you’ll be gone?”
“We should return before nightfall,” said deSteny, leaving his chamber without ceremony. He was moving ahead of the page, going down the stone corridor toward the stairs. “If we are not back by noon tomorrow, a second party of men-at-arms will have to be sent to search for us. Be certain they have priests with them. Don’t attempt to rescue us without soldiers to escort you, and don’t separate in the forest. Simon has my instructions.” He hastened down the stairs, going quickly in spite of the weight of the chain mail.
In the courtyard twelve men-at-arms stood with their horses, ready to ride, their mounts fresh and impatient to be off. The leader of the men was a scarred veteran of the wars against the Saracens, a man nearly forty with a marked limp and three fingers gone from his left hand. He nodded to deSteny and touched the edge of his chain-mail coif in a show of respect. “God give you good day, Sheriff.”
“And you, Wroughton,” said deSteny. He looked around. “There’s Chilton, who will show us where we must go. Where is our Red Friar?”
“He’s at prayers,” said Wroughton in some disgust. “Getting his Holy Water and Holy Oil and all the rest of it.”
“Good,” said deSteny.
Chilton, already mounted on one of the two mules in the courtyard, regarded the men-at-arms uncertainly. “Yes. It is good.”
DeSteny glanced from Chilton to Wroughton. “Pay attention to what he says,” he recommended to the men-at-arms. “He has been where we are going, and he will guide us to the croft. Otherwise we may become lost in the forest.”
“Why do you want to make such a fuss about dead crofters? Crofters die all the time, just like the rest of us,” declared Wroughton, cramming his helmet onto his head and muffling the last of his remarks.
“Because they matter,” said deSteny, knowing his point of view was shared by few others in his position. “And if they were killed unlawfully, we are obliged to avenge their deaths.” He took a bit of pear from his wallet and held it out for his sorrel mare, smiling faintly as she ate it.
“You want to rid the forest of outlaws?” Wroughton asked and started to laugh. “Well might you hope to do so.”
“If outlaws are all we must rid the forest of, then we may count ourselves most fortunate.” There was a sharpness in deSteny’s reprimand that caught the attention of the other men-at-arms as well as Wroughton’s.
“Those who prey on the King’s game are not only men,” said Wroughton, beginning to look worried. “It isn’t fitting for us to hunt boar and wolves and bear. That’s for the King to order.”
“That it is,” said deSteny, and looked around for his clerk. “Simon,” he called out to the lean-faced Jew who kept his records for him. “Be sure that if we do not return, the message I wrote out last night is delivered to the Prince as fast as courier can reach him. Send the courier with an armed escort, to be certain he arrives at Windsor.” He pulled his helmet into place and adjusted the strap under his chin.
“I will,” said Simon, bowing with more respect than deSteny’s rank deserved.
“Yes. I know you will,” said deSteny before he swung into the saddle. “And keep that boy Nicholas out of my things. I don’t want to come back to disorder.” He indicated the page with a ponderous nod. “If he will not learn to read, he is not permitted to tamper with anything on my writing table.”
“As you wish,” said Simon, a bit more nervously, for it was known that deSteny’s tolerance of Jews did not extend itself to his men. “I will comply with your orders, on my oath.”
One of the men-at-arms spat.
“It is my order, and he is my clerk,” said deSteny. He was about to add something more when he saw the Trinitarian friar come bustling out of the side door into the courtyard, a silver pyx clutched in his hand.
“I regret arriving late, Sheriff,” he said hurriedly to deSteny with a quick, short bow. He held up the pyx, explaining, “I wanted to be fully prepared. In case we must tend to the crofters’ burial.”
“I am pleased you are so, for we may need all you have, and more,” said deSteny. “It is what I asked of you.” He indicated the second mule. “You know how to sit one of these animals, don’t you?”
“I’ve done it before,” said the monk with a resigned air. “You lead the way and I’ll strive to keep up.” He tugged himself into the saddle, placing the pyx ahead of him on the high pommel. “God bless our endeavors today,” he declared, crossing himself and waiting while the men-at-arms did the same.
The last to comply was Hugh deSteny. “If we are ready, then it is time to go,” he said, rising in his stirrups so that he could turn in the tall saddle. “All right, men. Single file, at the trot. That includes you, Friar,” he called out, then gave the order to the warder to open the gates for them.
Wroughton raised his hand to bring his men up behind him as the little party moved through the gates of Nottingham Castle, across the moat, and through the town toward the outer walls.
The gates yawned open to the encouraging cheers of the artisans and their apprentices who maintained shops near the gates as the Sheriff and the men-at-arms sallied forth to meet the dangers of Sherwood Forest that lay ahead of them, a vast green wilderness that stretched across the middle of England, from the fen country in the east to the Welsh mountains in the west, north to the city of York and south to Huntingdon and Cambridge. Few roads went through it, and few towns other than Nottingham and Lincoln flourished within its borders, for the forest held sway in the center of the island as no armed force or religious company could. The heart of Sherwood was so dense that it was said no sunlight reached it for months on end. Fortresses, castles, and monasteries were scattered through it, isolated and precarious, as well as crofts and hamlets, but for the most part, it was the realm of wild animals and outlaws.
“Watch carefully. We do not want to be distracted,” deSteny ordered as he led the way into the first ranks of the trees and the speckled, twinkling light. The shadows were long around them with the rising sun at their backs so that they rode in their own darkness. Their passing silenced the call of birds and the rustle of animals in the undergrowth, and only the clatter of their mounts’ hooves and equipment gave sound to the morning as they stormed the great, green stronghold.
They kept to the main road for nearly three leagues, and then Chilton indicated a narrow track turning to the northwest, toward the deeper part of the forest. “Down that way, a distance.” He trembled as he said it. “You will have to ride single file. The track is poorly cut.”
The men-at-arms slowed their horses from a jog to a walk, and left the main road for the path leading to the crofters’ hut.
“It is not far ahead,” Chilton was pale now, and he started at every noise. “We will come to the hut before we reach the hamlet.” He clung to the reins as if the leather would protect him.
“Is it on the path?” asked deSteny.
“No, just off, a furlong or so. The track is marked if you know to watch for it.” He looked around at the deep gloom under the green canopy and felt himself a stranger in the place, though he had been warden here for more than fifteen years. Now he was an intruder, and he strove not to shiver. “I will tell you when to turn.”
“I hope the track is no narrower than this, and no more wild than now,” said Wroughton, half in jest, half in earnest. “These branches are hazard enough. They could sweep a reckless man out of the saddle. Not one of us would want to be lost here on foot.” He glanced uneasily toward the end of their little group to where the Trinitarian rode, his face ruddy with the effort of keeping his recalcitrant mule moving at the same pace as the rest.
There was a rustle and snap of breaking branches, and then a doe with two half-grown fawns at her heels bounded effortlessly across their path, vanishing noisily into the undergrowth on the other side of the path. Four of the horses brought their heads up in alarm, one of them whinnying uneasily. “They’re nervous,” said Wroughton, patting the neck of his big bay gelding as the horse sidled.
“They’re sensing something other than deer,” said deSteny. He had had the crawly feeling of being watched since they rode into the woods. He guessed it was useless to look for the watchers, for they would not be readily found.
Finally, half a league or so further on, Chilton pointed to the left. “There’s the way to the croft, that little path there; you can see it just beyond the fallen beech tree,” he announced in a cracked voice, and swung the head of his mule in that direction. “It is not far now. The track to the croft isn’t long. The buildings are on the far side of the dell.” His relief was apparent, and deSteny wished he knew why.
The path was mottled with sunlight and well-kept, the underbrush nibbled back by the crofters’ two nanny goats who provided milk for cheese. These, along with a dozen pigs turned out in a fenced area to eat the acorns and new shoots under the oaks, constituted the entire wealth of the crofters, who had lived in a two-room tie-beam timber house with a small kitchen-and-creamery on the far side of the narrow court centered on a well. For a crofter, it was a prosperous establishment, one that many others might begrudge the holder.
DeSteny swung out of the saddle as the party drew up in the little courtyard. “We might as well water the horses and mules while we have the chance.” He removed his helmet and held his mare’s reins as he looked around the croft. Empty hardly more than two days, it already had that vacant, neglected look of abandoned places, and it made deSteny ill-at-ease to be here; in a year it would be overgrown and crumbling. Thrusting his worst fears out of his mind, he made himself attend to the task at hand, taking a brisk tone to ask Chilton, “Where did you find the bodies?”
“In ... in there.” The warden was still on his mule, as if he expected he would need to escape at any moment.
“In the house.” DeSteny pointed to the door, which stood ajar. “Inside, not out.”
Chilton nodded.
Wroughton was already drawing a bucket up from the well, and motioning to his men to dismount. “Horses first, then you,” he reminded the men-at-arms as the bucket came into view. “Men stand thirst better than their mounts.”
DeSteny pulled off one gauntlet and dipped his hand into the bucket, drawing out a cupped-handful of water that he held under his mare’s nose, and smiled as she licked his palm eagerly with her soft tongue. When she had got all the water, he filled his hand again and gave her more.
“You spoil that mare,” Wroughton chided him. “You treat her like another soldier. She’s just a horse.”
“She has taken good care of me. I will take good care of her.” He knew his men regarded his fondness for his mare as one more in a long list of eccentricities.
“How many were there? Bodies, I mean,” asked the Red Friar as he got off his cantankerous mule, taking care to hold the pyx protectively.
“Six.” Chilton ticked them off on his fingers, using his thumb twice. “The man, his woman, three children, and an old woman, probably the man’s mother, though she may be an older sister or an aunt.”
“And no sign of a fight,” prompted deSteny. “Nothing is overturned or disturbed, and not one of them has weapons in hand.”
“No, they haven’t—none that I noticed,” Chilton answered, dismounting reluctantly. “Nothing was disturbed. The furniture was not in disorder. I hauled the corpses away in their cart. I used the goats to pull it.”
“Did you know the crofter?” asked deSteny, realizing he should have inquired some time before now.
“I ... had met him a time or two,” Chilton lied clumsily.
DeSteny let this pass. “And you took the bodies to the White Friars in the hamlet nearby.”
“Yes, to Chefford,” he answered, becoming fearful again. “The White Friars have a chapel there, at their friary.”
“I know,” said deSteny gently, reminding the warden he was familiar with the area he was called upon to administer.
“Then you will know the way to the hamlet,” said Chilton, glancing around in distress.
“I suppose so. It is north of here, as I recall.” He motioned to his men. “Wroughton, you stay out here. The rest of you, come with me. You too, Red Friar.”
The crofters’ house was in fairly good repair, the walls not too sooty, and there were three big pots fronting the hearth, attesting to the success the family had enjoyed. There was a roll of rough blankets near the hearth that would serve one of the household, probably the old woman, as a bed at night. A sturdy table and four open-backed chairs stood in the center of the larger of the two rooms, another sign of prosperity, as was the long-handled rendering pan which the crofters used to prepare tallow. Half a dozen two-tined hayforks hung on the wall near the door, and beneath them, a large, square, brass-bound chest stood conspicuously locked.
“They can’t have been thieves. They would have carried that off,” said Hamlin, the most promising of the men-at-arms.
“Very likely,” said deSteny, his spine feeling chilly as he looked around the room again. “Let us go into the other room.” He nodded toward the length of woven cloth that separated the two rooms. It was divided into two levels, with a ladder leading to the loft where the children slept. There were piles of blankets to show where the crofter and his woman slept. Another chest held their few clothes.
“Chilton,” said deSteny in a flat voice. “Where were the bodies?”
“In the main room, all but the youngest child, who was in the creamery, turning the cheeses, or so I guessed,” the warden answered. “The man and his wife were laid across the table; the old woman was on the floor, in a heap, like cast-off rags. The other two children were in the chairs, bent backward.” He crossed himself, looking unhappily at the Red Friar. “There is no blood to mark the places. They hadn’t any left.”
The Red Friar opened his pyx and took out the Host, which he broke and placed on the center of the table, murmuring a prayer in bad Latin.
“This should not take long,” said deSteny, and signaled his men to leave the house. “Make sure you bless the hearth and the door, and any other entrance to the place, including the windows,” he added to the Trinitarian.
“Certainly,” said the monk, a little huffily at having his work explained to him. “I will not take long.”
The courtyard was not light enough to ease the sinking spirits of the men-at-arms. Hamlin spoke for them all when he said, “So it isn’t outlaws who killed them.”
“It would seem not,” said deSteny, watching the Red Friar pause in the doorway to make the sign of the cross in Holy Water on the thick planks, reciting prayers while he did.
“What about the pigs?” asked the warden. “What’s to be done with them?”
“Have them rounded up and turned over to Sir Gui, as death-taxes—that will save us a great deal of trouble,” answered deSteny, aware of how avaricious Sir Gui could become over such matters. “So that any relatives will not have to forfeit the holding to pay them.” As he said his, he thought it unlikely that anyone would want to keep this croft again, not after such deaths the crofters had suffered.
“Do we go to Chefford?” asked the warden, a bit too hastily. There was sweat on his brow and he was breathing as if he had just run two leagues over rough ground. He was holding the mule’s stirrup as if the animal might bolt without him.
“I suppose it would be wise,” said deSteny. “We must find out if the bodies were buried, and where.” He looked around the courtyard again. “We don’t want to be abroad late in the day, not this day.”
“No, we do not,” said the Red Friar with unmonk-like alacrity. He clutched the pyx to his chest and went to mount his mule.