“I think I have.”

He grabbed the front of her robe. “Well, I’m not putting up with it!”

“Take your hands off me, you clumsy oaf,” she said.

At that moment, Brother Thomas came in. “You sent for me – what the devil is going on here?”

He stepped smartly across the room, and Ralph let go of Caris’s robe as if it had suddenly caught fire. Thomas had no weapons and only one arm, but he had got the better of Ralph once before; and Ralph was scared of him.

Ralph took a step back, then realized he had revealed his fear, and looked ashamed. “We’re done here!” he said loudly, and turned to the door.

Caris said: “What I’m doing in Outhenby and elsewhere is perfectly legitimate, Ralph.”

“It’s interfering with the natural order!” he said.

“There’s no law against it.”

Alan opened the door for his master.

“You wait and see,” said Ralph, and he went out.

67

In March that year, 1349, Gwenda and Wulfric went with Nathan Reeve to the midweek market at the small town of Northwood.

They were working for Sir Ralph now. Gwenda and Wulfric had escaped the plague, so far, but several of Ralph’s labourers had died of it, so he needed help; and Nate, the bailiff of Wigleigh, had offered to take them on. He could afford to pay normal wages, whereas Perkin had been giving them nothing more than their food.

As soon as they announced they were going to work for Ralph, Perkin discovered that he could now afford to pay them normal wages – but he was too late.

On this day they took a cartload of logs from Ralph’s forest to sell in Northwood, a town that had had a timber market since time immemorial. The boys, Sam and David, went with them: there was no one else to look after them. Gwenda did not trust her father, and her mother had died two years ago. Wulfric’s parents were long dead.

Several other Wigleigh folk were at the market. Father Gaspard was buying seeds for his vegetable garden, and Gwenda’s father, Joby, was selling freshly killed rabbits.

Nate, the bailiff, was a stunted man with a twisted back, and he could not lift logs. He dealt with customers while Wulfric and Gwenda did the lifting. At midday he gave them a penny to buy their dinner at the Old Oak, one of the taverns around the square. They got bacon boiled with leeks and shared it with the boys. David, at eight years of age, still had a child’s appetite, but Sam was a fast-growing ten and perpetually hungry.

While they were eating, they overheard a conversation that caught Gwenda’s attention.

There was a group of young men standing in a corner, drinking large tankards of ale. They were all poorly dressed, except one with a bushy blond beard who had the superior clothes of a prosperous peasant or a village craftsman: leather trousers, good boots and a new hat. The sentence that caused Gwenda to prick up her ears was: “We pay two pence a day for labourers at Outhenby.”

She listened hard, trying to learn more, but caught only scattered words. She had heard that some employers were offering more than the traditional penny a day, because of the shortage of workers caused by the plague. She had hesitated to believe such stories, which sounded too good to be true.

She said nothing for the moment to Wulfric, who had not heard the magic words, but her heart beat faster. She and her family had endured so many years of poverty. Was it possible that life might get better for them?

She had to find out more.

When they had eaten, they sat on a bench outside, watching the boys and some other children running around the broad trunk of the tree that gave the tavern its name. “Wulfric,” she said quietly. “What if we could earn two pence a day – each?”

“How?”

“By going to Outhenby.” She told him what she had overheard. “It could be the beginning of a new life for us,” she finished.

“Am I never to get back my father’s lands, then?”

She could have hit him with a stick. Did he really still think that was going to happen? How foolish could he be?

She tried to make her voice as gentle as possible. “It’s twelve years since you were disinherited,” she said. “In that time Ralph has become more and more powerful. And there’s never been the least sign that he might mellow towards you. What do you think the chances are?”

He did not answer that question. “Where would we live?”

“They must have houses in Outhenby.”

“But will Ralph let us go?”

“He can’t stop us. We’re labourers, not serfs. You know that.”

“But does Ralph know it?”

“Let’s not give him the chance to object.”

“How could we manage that?”

“Well…” She had not thought this through, but now she saw that it would have to be done precipitately. “We could leave today, from here.”

It was a scary thought. They had both lived their entire lives in Wigleigh. Wulfric had never even moved house. Now they were contemplating going to live in a village they had never seen without even going back to say goodbye.

But Wulfric was worrying about something else. He pointed at the hunchbacked bailiff, crossing the square to the chandler’s shop. “What would Nathan say?”

“We won’t tell him what we’re planning. We’ll give him some story – say we want to stay here overnight, for some reason, and return home tomorrow. That way, nobody will know where we are. And we’ll never go back to Wigleigh.”

“Never go back,” Wulfric said despondently.

Gwenda controlled her impatience. She knew her husband. Once Wulfric was set on a course he was unstoppable, but he took a long time to decide. He would come round to this idea eventually. He was not closed-minded, just cautious and deliberate. He hated to make decisions in a rush – whereas she thought it was the only way.

The young man with the blond beard came out of the Old Oak. Gwenda looked around: none of the Wigleigh folk was in sight. She stood up and accosted the man. “Did I hear you say something about two pence a day for labourers?” she said.

“That’s right, mistress,” he replied. “In the vale of Outhenby, just half a day south-west of here. We need all we can get.”

“Who are you?”

“I’m the ploughman of Outhenby. My name is Harry.”

Outhenby must be a large and prosperous village to have a ploughman all of its own, Gwenda reasoned. Most ploughmen worked for a group of villages. “And who is lord of the manor?”

“The prioress of Kingsbridge.”

“Caris!” That was wonderful news. Caris could be trusted. Gwenda’s spirits lifted further.

“Yes, she is the current prioress,” Harry said. “A very determined woman.”

“I know.”

“She wants her fields cultivated so that she can feed the sisters, and she’s not listening to excuses.”

“Do you have houses at Outhenby for labourers to live in? With their families?”

“Plenty, unfortunately. We’ve lost many people to the plague.”

“You said it was south-west of here.”

“Take the southerly road to Badford, then follow the Outhen upstream.”

Caution returned to Gwenda. “I’m not going,” she said quickly.

“Ah. Of course.” He did not believe her.

“I was really asking on behalf of a friend.” She turned away.

“Well, tell your friend to come as soon as he can – we’ve got spring ploughing and sowing to finish yet.”

“All right.”

She felt slightly dizzy, as if she had taken a draught of strong wine. Two pence a day – working for Caris – and miles away from Ralph, Perkin and flirty Annet! It was a dream.

She sat back down beside Wulfric. “Did you hear all that?” she asked him.

“Yes,” he said. He pointed to a figure standing by the tavern door. “And so did he.”

Gwenda looked. It was her father.

“Put that horse in the traces,” Nate said to Wulfric around mid-afternoon. “It’s time to go home.”