“They do look unmatched,” he had said, and had been surprised by his guest’s chuckle.
“More than a little. Any moment now John will lose interest. Ah, there it is!”
John had faltered, a foot dragged and made him stumble, and immediately the guard was on him. But as soon as he moved forward, the squire feinted to the right, then swung his buckler, knocking the man to his knees. Before he could move, the heavy sword had chopped downward, and he had collapsed, rolling in the dirt of the yard in his pain and clutching at his neck while John sauntered over to the bar and thrust his sword into the ground, casually tugging his gauntlets free.
“So, Father. I fear your guard missed my little trick.” His eyes were partly lidded, and Sir William had not been sure what expression they held. “Still, he has learned not to trust a swordsman who trips.”
“Did you have to hit him so hard? There was no need…” Three men had rushed to the rolling figure, and helped him to his feet as Sir William watched, stunned. Even when propped upright, his head dangled loose as though his neck was broken.
“Of course there was,” John said imperturbably. “If he was not hurt, how could he learn? It is only by thrashing dogs—and servants, too!—that they get the point of their lesson. He’ll be all right. Just have a headache for a couple of days.” And then he had stared at Sir Ralph, who met his gaze evenly. “Anyway, the main thing is, I won. Winning is all that matters when you hold a weapon, isn’t it? Winning and surviving.”
“John, that’s not the way of a knight. It’s not only victory that matters, it’s the honor of the match,” his father had protested.
“Perhaps, Father. But sometimes the honor doesn’t matter,” John had said, and Sir William had been shocked into silence by his cynicism. Half-shrugging, John had walked away, leaving the two men standing and watching him go. As he was half-carried away to recover, the wounded man also watched John go, and cast a baleful glare at him.
But more than the distaste which he felt for his son’s words was his shock at hearing the knight beside him murmur, “Your man should be grateful. If his sword had been real and edged, John would still have struck him.”
Now, a day later, Sir William could still recall the strange sadness in the northern knight’s voice. It was as if Sir Ralph had, with those words, confessed to himself how poorly he had trained his squire. Though a warrior should be resolute and determined in battle, he should still be loyal, honorable and courteous—to those beneath his station as well as his superiors. John’s behavior showed no chivalrous qualities whatsoever. That, Sir William felt sure, was why Sir Ralph looked so unhappy, so distressed, as if for the first time he had understood the nature of the squire he had created.
A noise at the gate made him look up, drawn once more to the present. It was the bailiff and his friend, back from their visit to Thomas Smyth. Anxiety surged through him as he watched them enter and dismount, but there was nothing he could do. If Thomas had told them, he would soon know about it. Then he drew himself up sharply. Sir Ralph could have had another reason for his black mood the day before, he thought. There was no indication of when Peter Bruther had died: Sir Ralph might think John had played a part in the villein’s death.
Simon saw the figure of the old knight slowly making his way up the stairs and nodded toward him. “This has hit him hard. Sir William looks older than when we first came here.”
“Yes. He feels his responsibilities. It is strange how death can remind a man about his own weaknesses—or those of his family.” Baldwin’s face was pensive, his eyes fixed on the now closed door.
“Should we leave him alone for a while, do you think?”
“We must question him at some point. It might as well be now,” said Baldwin, setting off for the hall.
Inside, the old knight and his wife were resting in front of the fire. Simon could see how exhausted Sir William was when he raised his eyes to the four men. “Bailiff, Sir Baldwin—please come in and have some wine.”
“Thank you,” Simon said, reaching forward to take the proffered goblet, then settling on his bench. Baldwin sat beside him, while Edgar and Hugh took their seats unobtrusively some feet behind.
“Have you had a useful morning?” asked Matillida Beauscyr graciously, and Baldwin smiled at her as he sipped some wine.
“Very, thank you,” he said. “Yes, we have been to see Thomas Smyth, and the miners’ camp. And, tell me: we saw a man on the moors near your mining camp with cattle. Are there many who use the moors for pasture?”
Sir William nodded. “There are some. It’s not the same as it used to be before the famine—then we had five thousand head or more, but there’s less than half that number now…But there are still some farmers who use their rights of pasturage. The man you saw was probably Adam Coyt. He lives over west of here. I think he’s been on the moors all his life, which has been a hard one. His wife and son are both dead, and he’s kept his little farm going alone ever since.
Baldwin said, “It must be hard for a man like him. Working all alone, and with no one to leave it to.”
“It happens all too often, I fear,” Sir William sighed.
“The moors are harsh on all those who choose to live here. To be a moorman you must be as hard as the moorstone itself.”
“But your Manor is not like that!” Simon protested.
“It is successful, with good crops and growing herds.” As bailiff, he knew; he saw the records of production each year. Sir William shot him a glance as if expecting an immediate tax increase.
“We have been lucky so far, bailiff. Luckier than some,” he admitted heavily.
“You must be glad you have two strong sons to leave all this to,” Baldwin continued.
“Of course. It would be difficult if I had no heirs,” and Sir William shrugged.
Baldwin did not meet his look. “Thomas Smyth has no son, does he? Could you tell us anything about him?”
Sir William stared at the fire for a moment. “I should have thought,” he said dryly, “you could have found out all you needed to know from the man himself while you were with him. Anyhow, he is not a local man, as you probably guessed. I think he came from the north somewhere, and moved here back in ’86 or ’87. He was only a lad then, of course, but enthusiastic. Well, he began mining and was lucky. Many men go for ages without finding anything, but he was one of the fortunate ones. He happened on a piece of land which bore a good quantity of metal, and he was shrewd with it, getting other men to look after it for wages while he searched for more. Soon he was not satisfied with just finding tin. He had to aim for better, more efficient ways of refining it. Most men are pleased to find tin and smelt it once, but not he.”
“Smelt it once?” asked Baldwin. It was Simon who answered, resting his elbows on his knees.
“There is a first and a second smelting, Baldwin. When miners find ore, they break it into small chunks and melt out the tin over their fires. That’s called ‘first smelting.’ There are lots of impurities in it from the charcoal and other rubbish, so it has to be smelted again to produce ‘white tin,’ which is clean enough to be coined at the stannary towns.”
“I see. And Smyth was not satisfied with that?”
Sir William gave a sour grin. “Oh no, not old Thomas. He’s too sharp. He had to build his own blowing-house. The furnace is so clean he can smelt tin faster and recover even more, and it’s all white tin. There’s hardly any dirt mixed with it. He can produce as much as he wants, and smelt other men’s metal too, so he charges them to use his fires, and that makes him even more powerful here.”
Simon stated the obvious inference. “You do not like him Sir William.”
“I do not. It is wrong for a man like him to be able to live like a lord. He is only a commoner—I don’t even know if he’s a free man. He could well be another runaway peasant like Bruther, someone who managed to escape to the moors. Just because he has accumulated money does not make him any better.”
“He told us you were with him on the night that Peter Bruther died. What were you doing there if you dislike him so much?”
Sir William stared at him, anger flaring briefly, only to be washed away by a kind of tired acceptance. “For a guest you are very inquisitive, bailiff,” he sighed. “No matter. I was negotiating: I was there to agree terms with him so that he would not damage my lands.”
“So you went to pay him not to come here?”
“Yes. If I didn’t, he promised a small army of miners, taking my water, digging on my pastures, and cutting down my trees for charcoal. They have the right, after all. We settled on a sum.”
“I see. The men who found the body, they were riding with you, were they not?”
“Yes. But I sent them off before I went in to speak to Smyth.”
“Why?”
“I wanted to talk to him without two inquisitive men-at-arms listening.”
“Were you alone with Smyth for the discussion?”
“Apart from his man, George Harang.”
“You had no men with you?” Simon’s voice was openly amazed.
Sir William looked up, frowning. “And who should I have had with me, bailiff? A son like Robert, who loathed the fact that I must negotiate with a blackmailer? Or perhaps John and his master, who travelled with me, but…Ha! Each would prefer to slice his own throat than deal with a commoner. They left me when we arrived at the miner’s house. I sent the men-at-arms back so they would not hear what I was there to discuss with Smyth. How could I let one of my guards hear that kind of talk? It would take no time at all for news to travel all round this fort that I, the master of the Manor, was being threatened by a common tinner and forced to pay up. How could the men here respect me if they heard that?”
His wife put her hand on his shoulder and William gradually subsided, sinking back into his chair exhausted. Surely, he thought, the bailiff must understand. A fortress like this was only as strong as the men inside it. If the guards all felt unsure of their master, they might run off and desert him or, worse, decide that he was too old for his responsibilities. Weak lords did not live long—there was always someone prepared to organize a mutiny among the common guards. It was not like the old times when honorable men worked for their master for life; now castles like Beauscyr had to rely on hirelings, on paid mercenaries. That was why this castle, like so many other new ones, had dormitories for the men-at-arms separated from the solar where the family lived. In the past all would have slept in the same hall, but mercenaries were not to be so well-trusted as guards, and it was not rare for a lord to find himself having to fight his own men, defending his solar from the very soldiers he had trained for war. Surely, the bailiff could understand that, too?
His wife looked at Simon coldly. “Is it not enough that we must demean ourselves in front of this miner? Do you have to rake this up and embarrass us with it?”
“I am sorry, my lady, but though Peter Bruther was only a villein, it does seem he was murdered, and we must ask everyone who could have been involved.”
“Who
could have been involved
? Are you saying that you suspect my husband of involvement?” Her brows rose in angry disgust. “I do not wish to hear more, sir. You are our guests, but there is no need for us to accept insults. I would like to be left alone, now. Please leave us.”
It was not a request. Feeling ashamed, and not a little saddened at upsetting the lady of the Manor, Simon led the way from the room.
“This is how I used to feel when I was a small boy and my nurse sent me from the room for misbehaving,” Baldwin murmured to raise his spirits, and Simon smiled gratefully.
Once they had left, Matillida knelt at her husband’s feet, her hands in his lap. “You see how their minds are working? That whoreson Smyth has them on his side already. You have heard about the corruption of officials—well, obviously the bailiff thinks about his purse more than he does about justice! You must do something to make Puttock realize what a danger the miners are out there.”
Sir William looked old and tired, and for the first time she could see how the years had exacted their toll on his spirit. Resting one hand on hers, the other in her hair, he smiled weakly. “Poor Matillida! All you want is the family strong and secure, and all you find are threats on every side. What do you want me to do? Have Thomas Smyth murdered? Or maybe just have him tortured until he admits to killing young Bruther?”
“Don’t be foolish. No, we need to keep him with us, that’s certain. We cannot allow this affair to get out of proportion, to turn Smyth against us. You know that Robert is set on Alicia?”
“What! My son wants her? But he hates Thomas…”
“Of course he does, but that means nothing, not when it comes to the girl. And she would be good for him. She is intelligent and should bring a good dowry.”
He gave a harsh bark of a laugh. “A good dowry? Yes, very good! It will be our own money which is returned to us.”
“Yes, husband, but better that it should come back as a dowry than be lost to the family forever. And the girl would make him a good wife, as I say. Especially with me helping and training her. So we must ensure that her father is not at odds with us, mustn’t we?”
“But you said we need to make the bailiff realize how dangerous the miners are. How can we—”
“We must help the bailiff understand how unsettling it is to have outlaws and thieves masquerading as miners, of course. We do not object to freemen coming here and working, only the brigands and cut-throats. And if they are allowed to remain, is it surprising that people sometimes get killed by them? Of course not! That is the point you must make to the bailiff and his friend, that it is hard enough surviving here without having murderers and outlaws living nearby in a miners’ camp.”
He stood and sighed, looking down at her. “I will see what I can do.”
“You must! We have to try to keep Thomas Smyth happy so that he will smile on his daughter’s marriage to our son. It will make sense for him, to marry into a good family, and it will be good for us to have the use of his power and wealth. But he needs to be curbed a little. He must be made to realize that his power ends at the border of our lands, and he must not try to extort money from us again.” Nodding, Sir William made his way to the door, but before he could leave, her voice stopped him. “And if the bailiff listens to you, we might be able to break the power of other miners like him forever, and get control of the land for ourselves.”