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her for so long.’
    ‘It is the way of children that they are put to their work,’ said Clarice, who had left her mother and home when she was eight. She patted her mistress’s hand sympathetically. ‘You did all you thought best for her.’
    ‘And now whenever I go to celebrate Mass, he’s there, watching me with his piggy little eyes, like a demon,’ Matilda said. ‘He killed her, and now he claims the protection of the altar in my own church. Even Father Abraham supports him.’
    ‘It is the law.’
    ‘Stuff the law! I want
revenge
!’
    It was a relief when August came and Baldwin could see how well his crops were doing. To him this time of year was rewarding and reassuring, proof of Dame Nature’s fruitfulness.
    There was always much to be done, but at least his manor was heading towards the culmination of the annual effort. Soon the men would be trooping off to the fields to rake the corn for the harvesters. Those with scythes would be sweeping the great blades from side to side, mowing the slender yellow stalks; women in thick fustian aprons would bundle up the sheaves and stack them in stooks, while the children, chattering and laughing, their slings or bows in their hands, would prepare to shoot the rabbits and hares that would bolt from the fields as their cover was cut down. Afterwards, while the threshers flailed the grain from the stalks, the gleaners would crouch among the stubble, picking over the dirt to gather as much of the fallen grain as possible before the birds got it all.
    And overnight many would celebrate, drinking heavily from cider or ale jars, snoring under the stars, both because walking home was too strenuous, and because Baldwin’s haywarden would willingly pay them to stay in the fields to prevent thieves taking the precious crop – and nine months later the parish priest would have a rash of squalling children to baptise.
    But Baldwin was not content. Although his land was fertile and the harvest looked to be good, he heard that the fighting in Wales was spreading and he wanted more, much more: enough to fill his granaries and give him the confidence that his people would have plenty of food for the winter in case war came to his lands.
    He had altered his routine now. Rising soon after dawn, he practised with a sword or cudgels on the flat grass before his house. It was normal for a man-at-arms to perform such ritual dances with weapons of all types, but Baldwin knew that many of his peers did not bother. They relied on the cavalry charge, the weight of steel, chargers and knights welded together in an unstoppable phalanx.
    Baldwin had seen the shattering effect of a troop of heavily armoured knights on horseback, but he was not convinced that modern fights would be won that easily. He had kept in touch with developments across Europe where resolute Swiss farmers had destroyed an Austrian army at Morgarten and Flemish peasants had massacred France’s elite at Courtrai, while nearer home the Scots had slaughtered the English at Bannockburn. There was an unpleasant sense of the natural order being overturned, if the chivalrous could be killed by villeins.
    Whatever nasty surprises battle might hold, Baldwin intended to ensure that his own lack of preparation would not be a contributory factor. That was why he spent his mornings swinging weapons in the guard positions while balancing solidly on both legs, moving to protect his right flank then his left, striking at imaginary foes, thrusting, parrying, stepping quickly to one side or another. Sometimes his servant Edgar joined him and the two would cautiously dance about each other, their sword-blades shimmering and gleaming in the sun. Both men gathered fresh scars. They only used unrebated weapons, and if one or the other lost concentration for a moment he was likely to regret it.
    After a bout or two, whether with a real or an imaginary opponent, Baldwin would go for a ride, usually up over the hill towards Bickleigh but