The Forest (9 page)

‘The New Forest?’ The Lady Maud looked faintly startled. ‘I don’t think I’d want to go there.’ She gave Walter one of her little smiles, as if Adela had said something socially inappropriate. ‘The people who live there are very strange. Have you been there, Walter?’

‘Only once or twice. With the royal hunt.’

‘Ah. Well that’s rather different.’

Adela saw that Walter had just given her a disapproving frown. Obviously he wanted her to change the subject. But it also irritated her. Why should she be treated like an idiot all the time? He was going to despise her anyway. ‘I ride in the Forest alone,’ she said blithely. ‘I’ve even hunted there.’ She paused to let that sink in. ‘With your husband.’ And she gave Walter a smile of cheerful defiance.

But whatever reaction she might have expected, it was not the one she got.

‘Hugh?’ The Lady Maud frowned, then went a little pale. ‘Went hunting in the Forest?’ She looked at him questioningly. ‘Did you, my dear?’ she asked in a strangely small voice.

‘Yes, yes,’ he said quickly, with a frown. ‘With Walter here. And Cola. Back in the spring.’

‘I don’t think I knew that.’ She was looking at him with a silent reproach.

‘I’m sure you did,’ he said in a firm tone.

‘Oh. Well,’ she replied softly, ‘I do now.’ And she gave Adela her twisted smile before adding with a forced playfulness: ‘Men will go off hunting in the Forest.’

Walter was gazing down at his food. As for Martell, was
there a hint of impatience in his manner? A slight shrug of the shoulder? Why would he not have told her? Was there some other reason for his visit to the Forest? Were there other absences, perhaps? Adela wondered. If he escaped from his wife from time to time, she was not sure she blamed him, whatever he got up to.

It was Walter who came to the rescue. ‘Speaking of things royal,’ he calmly remarked, as though nothing awkward had occurred, ‘have you heard …’ And a moment later he was relating one of the latest scandals from the royal court. As they so often did, this concerned the king’s shocking words to some monks. Impatient of religion himself, Rufus could seldom resist baiting churchmen. As usual also, the Norman king had contrived to be both rude and funny. Shocked though she felt she must be, the Lady Maud was soon laughing as much as her husband.

‘Where did you learn this?’ Martell enquired.

‘Why, from the Archbishop of Canterbury himself,’ Walter confessed, which made them laugh all the more. For it was a fact, quite amusing to Adela, that Tyrrell had somehow managed to ingratiate himself with the saintly Archbishop Anselm too.

And then, having got into his stride, Walter started to entertain them. First one, then another, the stories rolled out. Witty, amusing, mostly about the great figures of the day, frequently accompanied by the admonition ‘Don’t repeat this,’ Walter told his stories well. No one could have failed to be delighted, flattered, fascinated by such an amusing courtier. For Adela it was a revelation. She had never seen Walter being charming before. He certainly never is to me, she thought. But you had to admit he had the skill. Despite herself she was impressed.

And it occurred to her too – if he was impatient with her, could she entirely blame him? This clever Walter Tyrrell, who had married into the mighty Clares, was a friend of the
great – could she really complain if he was ashamed of her as she did one gauche thing after another?

When, some time later, the contented party broke up and prepared to retire early to bed, she went to his side and murmured: ‘I’m sorry. I keep doing the wrong thing, don’t I?’

To her surprise, in reply, he smiled at her quite kindly. ‘My fault too, Adela. I haven’t been very nice to you.’

‘True. But I can’t have been a burden you wanted much.’

‘Well, let’s see if we can do something for you in Winchester,’ he said. ‘Goodnight.’

She woke early the next morning feeling wonderfully refreshed. She opened the shutters. The day was beginning, the pink of dawn already fading from a clear blue sky. The damp cool air tingled on her face. Apart from the gentle twittering of the birds, everything was quiet. Some way off a cock crowed. She thought she detected the faint smell of barley in the air. No one was stirring yet in the house, but across the ridge she saw a single peasant making his way along a path. She took a breath.

She couldn’t wait in the chamber until the household started to appear. The day was too inviting. She felt too excited. Pulling on her chemise and a linen overshirt, tying her girdle, sweeping back her loose hair with both hands and with only slippers on her feet, she went quickly out of the house. If she looked a little wild, she thought, it didn’t matter. No one would see her.

Just beyond the house was a walled garden entered by a gate. She went in. It would be some time before the sun invaded that silent space. Herbs and honeysuckle grew there. Three apple trees occupied a patch of lawn, their half-ripened apples still hard, although they had put on their first blush of colour. Wild strawberries showed among the grass too, spangling the green with tiny specks of red. There were cobwebs in the corners of the wall. Everything
was drenched in dew. Her mouth widened with delight. Why, she might have been in some castle or monastery garden in her native Normandy.

She remained there, drinking in the peace of the place for some time.

There still did not seem to be anyone about when she came out. She considered walking across to the stables, which were in the big square of outbuildings, or perhaps the field beyond where some of the horses had been put out for the night. But as she came along the side of the manor house her attention was caught by a small door set low in the side wall, with three stone steps leading down to it. She assumed this must lead to an undercroft and that it would be locked. But as it was her nature to do so, she went down to try it and, to her surprise, it opened.

The undercroft was large; the low cellar extended the whole length of the building. Its ceiling was supported by three thick stone pillars down the centre, which divided the area into bays. The light from the door, which she left open, was supplemented by a small barred window set high in the opposite wall.

Her eyes took a few moments to accustom themselves to the shadows but she soon saw that it contained the sort of items she would have expected – although unlike the jumble one often found in such storage places, everything here was stacked in an orderly fashion. There were chests and sacks; one bay was taken up by barrels of wine and ale; in another hung some archery targets, unstrung bows, arrows, half a dozen fishing nets, collars for hounds, falconing gloves and hoods. Only as she came to the furthest bay on the left, where there were wood shavings on the floor, did she see something strange – gleaming faintly, a tall form in the shadows so like a man that it made her jump.

It was a wooden dummy. The reason it shone softly was that it was wearing a long coat of chain mail and a metal helmet. Behind it, she now saw, was a second dummy
wearing the leather shirt that went under the chain mail. On a stand was a high-pommelled saddle, against which rested a long studded shield; on a frame next to this, a huge broadsword, two spears and a mace. She gave a little intake of breath. This must be Hugh de Martell’s armour.

She knew better than to touch anything. The chain mail and the weapons had all been carefully oiled to keep them from rusting; in the faint light she could see that everything was in perfect readiness. Not a link in the armour was out of place. There was a mingled smell of oil and leather, metal and resinous wood shaving that she found strangely exciting. Instinctively, she moved close to the armoured figure, smelling it, almost touching.

‘My grandfather used a battleaxe.’

The voice came so unexpectedly, not an inch from her ear, that she almost screamed. Her slippered feet left the stone floor. She whirled round, all but brushing against his chest as she did so.

Hugh de Martell did not move but he chuckled. ‘Did I startle you?’

‘I …’ She tried to get her breath. She could feel herself blush wildly. Her heart was palpitating. ‘Oh,
mon Dieu
. Yes.’

‘My apologies. I can move softly. I thought you were a thief at first, in this light.’ He still had not shifted. The space between them seemed only enough for a shadow.

She realized suddenly that she was only half dressed. What could she say? Her mind would not focus. ‘A battleaxe?’ It was the last word she seemed able to remember.

‘Yes. We Normans are all Vikings, after all. He was a big, red-headed man.’ He smiled. ‘I get my dark hair from my mother. She was from Brittany.’

‘Oh. I see.’ She saw nothing, except his leather jerkin and the sleeve of his long arm. She was aware, only, that there was a pause before he spoke.

‘You’re always exploring, aren’t you? First the Forest, now here. You have an adventurous spirit. That’s very Norman.’

She turned her face up towards his. He was smiling down at her. ‘Aren’t you adventurous?’ she asked. ‘Or perhaps you don’t need to be.’

His smile went, but he did not look angry, only thoughtful. He had understood her, of course: the settled manors, the rich wife; her little challenge to suggest he had lost his Viking ancestors’ spirit. ‘I’ve plenty to do, as you see,’ he answered quietly. There was a sense of calm authority, of power that emanated from him as he spoke the words.

‘I am put in my place,’ she replied.

‘I wonder where your place is.’ His look of amusement had returned. ‘Normandy? England?’

‘Here, I think.’

‘You are going to Winchester. That’s a good place to find a husband. So many people go there. Perhaps we shall see you again in this part of the country.’

‘Perhaps. Do you go to Winchester?’

‘Sometimes.’

He took a step back now. His eyes, she realized, had automatically taken all of her in. He was about to turn away. She wanted to say something, anything to keep him there. But what could she say? That he had married a rich woman unworthy of him? That he’d have been better with her? Where, where on God’s earth could anything between them possibly lead?

‘Come.’ He was offering to escort her out. Of course, she should go and dress herself properly. She did as he indicated, walking in front of him towards the light at the door. Only just before she reached it did she feel him take her hand, firmly raise it and brush it softly with his lips.

A courtly gesture in the shadow. Unexpected. She turned to him. Something like a pain seemed to stun her across the chest. For just a second she could not breathe. He
bowed his head. Like a sleepwalker she went through the door into the bright world outside, almost blinded by the light. He had turned to lock the door. She walked on, not looking back, into the manor house.

The rest of the day passed quietly. Most of it she spent in the company of the Lady Maud. When she saw Hugh de Martell, he seemed polite but somewhat cold and aloof.

And when she and Walter parted from him the next morning to make their way to Winchester he remained formal and unapproachable. But at the top of the ridge she glanced back and saw his tall, dark figure, still watching after them until they passed out of sight.

Autumn comes with kindness to the Forest. The long light of summer slides into September; the spreading oaks are still green; the peaty humus of the heath retains a soft, seaside warmth; the air smells sweet and tangy.

In the world outside it is a mellow time. The harvest is done, the apples are ready to fall, the mists on the bare fields a damp reminder to men to gather in all they can as the sun begins its gradual recession towards the ending of the year.

But in the Forest nature takes a different form. This is the season when the oaks shed their green acorns and the forest floor is covered with their falling. Men like Pride turn out their pigs to eat the acorns and beech nuts – the mast as this feed is called. It is an ancient right, which even the Norman Conqueror had no wish to stop. ‘If the deer eat too many acorns when they’re green,’ his foresters reminded him, ‘they get sick. But the pigs love them.’ As the days pass, the beech trees begin to yellow; yet, just as this sign of gentle decay is seen, another almost contradictory transformation also takes place. The holly tree is either male or female and it is now, as though to welcome the future coming of winter, that the female holly bursts into berries whose thick, crimson clusters gleam against the crystal-blue September sky.

As the equinox passes and all nature becomes aware that the nights are starting to be just a little longer than the days, further changes are seen. The heather flowers having turned into a haze of tiny white dots, the heathland goes from its summer purple to autumn brown. The brown of the bracken stem climbs into the drying ferny leaves until, in certain clumps, they catch the autumn sunlight like polished bronze. The acorns lying in the fallen leaves have rolled free from their cups and they, too, are brown. The evening mist brings a damp chill. The cold dawn has a bracing bite. Yet in the Forest, these signs mark not an end but a beginning. If the sun is now departing, it is only to cede his place to a yet more ancient deity. Winter is on the way: it is the time of the silver moon.

It is the time for the rutting of the deer.

The buck stalked down the centre of the rutting stand. It was dawn. There was a light frost on the ground. Around the edge of the stand, on ground marked by their slots, as the tracks of the deer’s cleft feet are called, eight or nine does were waiting to be serviced. Some of them were moving about making a wickering sound. There was tense excitement in the air. The pale doe was also there. She was waiting quietly.