[Roger the Chapman 05] - Eve of Saint Hyacinth Read Free Page A

in the pocket. They're one of the best-known families in these parts. Honest, English-speaking people. Well, the menfolk are. Saw young Matthew only last week, just before he left for London. Said they'd been entertaining a travelling singer - same one as came here looking for food, I reckon - but as all his songs had been in French, he couldn't understand a word of them. But Lady Wardroper, now, she's different. She has a few words of the language.'  
    I gave him good-day, deciding that I would follow Mistress Gentle's recommendation, especially as a northeasterly direction must bring me eventually to Winchester, and so on to the London road. Moreover, I would need a berth for the night, which might well be found in the Manor kitchen. It was not long past eleven o'clock, so if I walked briskly, not stopping to sell my wares, I could probably reach Chilworth by late afternoon without much difficulty.
    I settled my pack more comfortably on my back, turned my feet in the direction of Southampton's East Gate, and as I walked, began to whistle in my customary tuneless fashion. For I have never had any ear for music and don't suppose that I ever shall.

Chapter Two

    The afternoon was well advanced by the time I approached Chilworth Manor. This lay a mile or two east of the ford, close to the banks of a small stream, tributary to the River Itchen.
    It was a beautiful day, the wind blowing fresh and sweet across the meadows. Smoke rose from cottage chimneys iridescent as a rainbow and the sky was a swimming lake of deepest blue, smudged here and there by soft white clouds.
    The clang of a blacksmith's hammer sounded a joyful carillon of anvil blows and the rise of pasture, away to the west, was rinsed by blue-veined shadows. The stream flowed softly between its fringe of rushes and I could see clear down to the bed of gravel underneath. Daisies and the golden cups of celandine starred the straggling grasses.
    Suddenly the flow of water began to diminish until it dwindled into the merest trickle. Rounding a bend by some willow stumps, I came upon the reason. A shepherd had dammed the stream in two places to form a pool and was washing his flock, assisted by a stout lad with hard red cheeks and a surly, disgruntled expression. It was the boy's job to drag the reluctant animals one by one into the water, where the shepherd stood thigh-deep, removing the foul and loose wool from around the udders and thoroughly washing the fleece. When he had finished examining the beast's mouth and ears, the sheep scrambled up the opposite bank to join its fellows, where it dripped and shivered miserably, regarding him with a wide and baleful stare for having been subjected to such indignity. The lambs, separated from their dams, cried piteously.
    I greeted the shepherd and his assistant cheerfully. 'God be with you both! Am I on the right path for Chilworth Manor?'
    The lad made no reply, but the older man paused in his work and nodded. 'You are that. You're on demesne land now. The house is about half a mile further on from here. Are you a chapman?'
    'I am. And hoping to sell some of my wares to Lady Wardroper, who was recommended to me as a likely patroness by a butcher's wife in Southampton.'  
    The shepherd laughed. 'Mistress Gentle, I'll be bound. A good woman, always willing to help others. Her daughter, Amice, did some sewing and embroidery for my lady at one time, before she went away from home.' He turned back to the ewe he was washing and began to prise her jaws apart. The animal, justly incensed by such treatment, tried to rear up and place her two front feet against his chest, but the man moved closer, skilfully frustrating the attempt.
    'Got to watch this one,' he said. 'She's old and up to all the tricks. Many's the soaking I've had from her in my time, when she was a bit younger and spryer than she is today.' When the ewe was done and had proceeded, stately with outrage, to the opposite shore, the shepherd signalled to the boy to halt