The Handfasted Wife Read online

  ‘Guthlac,’ she said, dragging off the enormous linen apron she had wrapped around herself to protect her gown as she worked with herbs and oils. ‘Walk with me. I need some air. Come and see my garden.’ She pulled on her mantle and led her reeve away from the hall. In the garden seeds were already pushing up shoots. She could breathe here. The newly turned soil calmed her. The sun was shining and, as they glanced up at the pale blue sky, a flock of long-necked birds flew overhead.

  ‘Wild geese,’ Guthlac remarked. ‘Ah, the garden looks good.’ He walked up and down admiring her neat rows of planting. ‘By summer this will yield us great baskets of vegetables.’

  ‘Thank you. My ladies have helped me.’ It was pleasing that a man whose life belonged to the soil had admired her efforts here. ‘Guthlac, I’ve seen no merchants in Reredfelle,’ she said. ‘Tell me more.’

  ‘My lady, they did not know the value of anything. They knew nothing of the quality of linen and wool. Their own cloth was too fine for that of merchants. There were swords under their cloaks and they spoke in a foreign tongue.’

  She stopped sharply. ‘As they would if they come from Normandy. What have you told them?’

  ‘We said that it was too early in the season for us to trade and that they should go to Canterbury. All we have anyway is old wool. Our own women are using what we have. My lady, we sent them packing.’

  ‘You did well to send them away before they found a loose tongue in Brother Francis.’

  ‘Ah, and this is another thing; Brother Francis is meddling again.’

  ‘How?’ She sighed and began to walk again. Not this too; but it was no more than she had expected.

  ‘On Easter Day, my lady, on Easter Day he wants to process the relic into our village church and back again, us all following it, like they do in the towns. And he wants to say the Mass for the villagers. But Father Egbert always said our Easter Day Mass before, and we are used to him.’

  ‘We must reach a compromise.’ They had come full circle around the garden and were back by the chapel gate where they had started. Elditha thanked Guthlac for the villagers’ gift, saying she was glad of it. ‘I will speak to Brother Francis,’ she added.

  That afternoon she sought out Gunnhild from the bower, and told her that they would supervise the salting of the bacon. She could take some as a gift to Winchester. Gunnhild jumped up, laid her sewing neatly in her sewing basket and pulled her mantle from its peg.

  In the kitchen house the cook was already overseeing the chopping up of the carcass. With a big smile on his face, he gave Gunnhild the pig’s trotters.

  ‘Mama, what must I do?’

  ‘Watch me and pay attention. We can steep the trotters in verjuice to tenderise and preserve them.’ Elditha sought out a pot of verjuice from the shelves at the back of the kitchen. She lifted it out, set it on a bench and cut away the wax seal with her knife. Gunnhild wrinkled her nose. ‘So sour.’

  ‘You get used to it. You pour.’ She supervised as Gunnhild tipped the vinegar into a bowl. ‘Throw these sage leaves in too,’ Elditha said, trying to think of the task and not the parting that would come all too soon. The meat would be delicious. The rest of the pig, including the head, could be eaten on the Easter Day feast. She sent Gunnhild to the cook for cuts of flesh. Taking a key from the ring on her belt she opened up a small store behind the kitchen and brought out a wooden box full of salt. She would use a lot of it today and, although they produced salt in the Wessex salt pans near Winchester, it was precious. They barrelled the greater portion of the meat and set aside one of the two barrels of salted pork for Gunnhild to take to Winchester.

  ‘Your Aunt Edith will see that you learn everything quickly,’ Elditha said, knowing full well that Edith was not in the least interested in the arts of a kitchen. In Wilton Gunnhild would learn to read and write in foreign tongues and hopefully, one day, she would become a princess of whom her father would be proud, rather than an abbess to please Edith.

  Elditha began to choose garments for Gunnhild’s travelling chest. The village shoemaker made two new pairs of leather shoes. Her women chose woollen cloth from lengths that Elditha had ordered from Canterbury and commenced work on a new cloak. They promised Gunnhild silver threadwork on the hem. Gunnhild hemmed her own shifts perfectly and then set stitches on fine linen for a veil for her aunt, begging the leftover silvered thread the women had used for her cloak so that she could embroider it.

  ‘I’ll miss you, Mama,’ Gunnhild whispered as they sewed in the antechamber together surrounded by Elditha’s women.

  Easter would come and go and then Gunnhild would go too. She grasped Gunnhild’s hands. ‘You will learn many new things in Wilton, my love,’ she whispered back.

  6

  Easter Day

  Now must we praise the Guardian of Heaven

  Caedmon’s Hymn

  As Elditha’s eyes adjusted to the chapel’s dimness she saw that the ladders had been removed and the scaffolding taken down. Now she could see the finished wall painting behind the altar showing Christ’s agony on the cross. Elditha stared at the painting, thinking it was different to anything she had ever beheld before. Below the Passion, the Devil shied away, banished from Christ’s presence. Christ’s face, though fair, was sardonic and His mouth held the hint of a sarcastic smile. His blue eyes were hooded. She saw Brother Francis himself in that face. She looked down at the Devil and realised that although he spat fire and wore horns as always, he possessed a pigtail and features that uncannily resembled those of Padar the skald. Sighing, she closed her eyes. She heard everyone present gasp and fearing the worst opened her eyes again. This time she noticed that a star painted above Christ was uncannily similar to the long-tailed dragon star. Her household was mesmerised. The villagers stood outside Reredfelle’s newly decorated chapel shivering in the chill morning but her household had crowded inside, coughing and sneezing in a cramped space where the air was thick with incense, and were staring at the wall painting.

  Brother Francis turned and pointed at the star. He began to speak ‘That star is a warning to the people of England. We must follow the laws laid down by the Church. Saints’ days are to be observed with reverence and not with profligate feasting and coupling.’

  An angry murmuring quivered through the small chapel. Brother Francis raised his voice as the murmuring grew louder, ‘In future, there will be fasts on Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays and on those days Christ’s flock must remain celibate, as the Church decrees.’ He lifted his arms and appealed to his flock. ‘We must all make sacrifices … for the sake of our souls …’

  Elditha’s Norfolk thane, Osgod, called out, ‘Be careful of your own soul, Priest, and we can mind ours.’ Osgod shoved past the others back through the crowd and out of the chapel into the gathering of servants who began to cheer. Elditha pushed after him to the chapel entrance and said, ‘There will be peace among us and respect for the monk’s words. Osgod, you will do penance for your arrogance.’ It was enough. The others fell silent. And inside the small chapel Brother Francis began to chant the Easter Friday prayers.

  No one remarked on the paintings and she wondered if only she could see any likeness. Then she remembered Father Egbert speaking with the painter. He knew something of this. As for the painter, he had returned to his own home. On Easter Day Brother Francis carried the reliquary before him. Elditha and her children dutifully walked behind him, wearing their richest embroidered clothes and gold bracelets. Reredfelle’s house-ceorls and their women and children followed with their heads bowed. Elditha firmly insisted that Osgod walk barefoot among them, clad only in a white shift. Finally, a group of estate workers and servants trailed in their wake. Then, as they slowly entered the village, she saw the skald galloping along the track-way. He had returned. She stopped the procession and signalled to him. Padar reined up sharply.

  ‘I have news, my lady!’

  ‘That must wait, Padar.’ She looked over at Brother Francis, who had paused the procession. ‘
But join us and give thanks.’

  The skald fell in behind the procession. When they reached the great winnowing barn near the wooden church, he stopped alongside the blacksmith.

  ‘Where is Father Egbert? Why are we processing behind Brother Francis?’ he asked.

  ‘He had his way over that relic,’ the man whispered. ‘But the villagers love Lady Elditha. They’ll obey her. Look, the wheat is coming up – barley too. See how it shines green on the earth. Be a good harvest this summer. They’ll eat from her hand, see.’ He stopped speaking and shook his head. ‘But that black monk bodes ill. They all distrust him. Father Egbert is inside the church but the monk is running things there.’

  Padar snorted, wheeled his horse around and returned to the manor.

  After a brief sermon from Father Egbert, Brother Francis spoke on how the Reredfelle relic would be returned to the Chapel to Our Lady where soon he hoped it was to be placed in a crystal reliquary with silver decoration, a gift from the Archbishop. Though her villagers seemed impressed today, Elditha knew they really couldn’t care less whether the relic was revered or not. What mattered to them was a good harvest, an end to Lent and a generous Easter Day feast.

  Then it was over and the household strolled back through the noonday sunshine. There was to be a feast in her hall. Elditha took her place in Godwin’s chair halfway along the table, under her own swan banner. Beside this she had hung a copy of Harold’s fighting man. She might be angry with him but he was her husband and the father of her children. Also he was their king, so she honoured him by hanging his banner beside her own. Servants poured jugs of mead and ale. After the first course was served, she passed the pepper-horn and salt cellar down the table. Eating of flesh after a long fast always created excitement. Dish after dish came to the table and the centrepiece was the great boar’s head that the villagers had given her, their lady, as their Easter gift. She noticed Padar slipping into the hall. He took a place along the side with her thanes and, after they had eaten, Padar entertained them with stories. Even Brother Francis chuckled at his tales and laughed at his riddles. She studied him. The monk thinks he has subdued my people. For how long will the truce last?

  Later Padar came to her antechamber carrying two large leather saddle-bags he said were crammed with gifts.

  ‘What have you brought us?’ she asked pointing to the table. ‘Put them there.’

  Padar fished deep into the leather bags and withdrew a collection of parcels. ‘My lady, these are from the King, the Countess and your daughter.’

  He laid them on the oak table side by side, lumpy packages wrapped in soft leather and tied with plaited cords. She wondered who had prepared these gifts or if they were afterthoughts, tempting morsels thrown at those who were hungry and, were, like Lent itself, contrived to purge Harold’s guilty conscience. ‘Why does he send us gifts but does not come?’ She looked sternly at the skald waiting for his response. There were deep shadows beneath his eyes. She realised that he had ridden hard through the night to bring the parcels to her.

  Padar pulled at his wisp of a beard before replying. ‘My lady, the King says that he would come if he could but he cannot.’

  She reached for the soft leather wrapping of the gift nearest to her. ‘Why is that?’ She lifted the parcel and turned it over but did not untie the leather cord that bound it. She gave him a piercing look. ‘And do not lie to me.’

  Padar shifted uncomfortably. ‘The King has married in York and has held his Easter Court at Westminster. The northern lords have come south with their sister. Countess Gytha was present, along with Lady Thea and many noble ladies. The King cannot leave London, my lady.’

  Elditha dropped the package back onto the table as if it had scorched her fingers. ‘Go and rest. Thank you, Padar, for riding so hard to us with these … gifts.’ She added as an afterthought, ‘And for your honesty.’

  After he pushed out through the curtain, she stared at the package. Her future with Harold looked as glum as those gargoyles circling the great abbey in London. Slowly, one by one, she untied the cords that bound the gifts. She recognised the valuable herbal that had belonged to Gytha – one that she had admired in their companionable days, now past. Sighing, she recollected that together they had once poured over its delicate drawings of plants. ‘Just as I am planting my own garden,’ she said aloud. Gytha had also sent a prayer book for Gunnhild. Written on its first vellum page was Gunnhild’s name. Clearly it had been a commission since written in it were prayers to Gunnhild’s favourite saints. She opened the remaining gifts. Thea had stitched a linen tunic for Ulf. It was a fine shirt, just the perfect size for her little brother. ‘So Thea has settled down to her needlework at last,’ she said aloud, though there was no one to hear her.

  Her fingers trembled as she opened the last packages. These were wrapped in fine deer skins soft as wool. She lifted an accompanying note scribed by one of Harold’s priests. He had sent gold cloak pins shaped like sparrowhawks for the children, a purse for Gunnhild containing gold coin stamped with Harold’s own head, a small wooden Noah’s Ark for Ulf with tiny carved animals, a pair of silver bracelets for Elditha engraved with doves, and for a summer undergown, the scribe had written, a length of blue silk cloth. Despite herself, despite him, she was pleased with the gifts. They had been carefully chosen. She fingered the silk, thinking of all the Spanish worms who had provided it and the dyers who had so delicately given it such a wondrous colour – the shade of the Virgin’s veil.

  She summoned Ursula and showed her the gifts. ‘Retie the parcels that were intended for the children. It will be a joy for them to discover the contents for themselves.’

  Ursula gasped when Elditha held up the silk cloth, allowing the material to float in the air in a blue rippling cloud of silk. ‘My lady, it is a fabric of such beauty. Look how it catches the light. It is like butterflies’ wings.’

  ‘Catch a butterfly and it will die,’ Elditha said. ‘This silk has come from lands far away.’ In the candlelight, as she held it up, the silk reflected blues, greens and gold.

  ‘He must love you very much.’

  ‘Enough to wed another, it seems. The children are asleep, but tomorrow they shall have their presents and know that their father remembers them.’

  When later she lay down to sleep she twisted her pillow and thumped it over and over. The earls and their wives, all the great in the land who had once admired her as the wife of the Earl of Wessex, now gave their loyalty to a queen called Aldgyth. Unable to sleep, she climbed out of her bed and pulled on her boots. Wrapping her mantle around her, she stole past Ursula, who was fast asleep on her pallet in the antechamber, and climbed down the stairway. She slipped out through the hall’s back entrance to look up at the sky. There was no longer a dragon star spitting its wrath through the heavens. That night, as mysteriously as it had appeared, the dragon-tailed star had vanished from the sky. Perhaps, she thought hopefully, perhaps, if I pray hard, all will be well. I shall send Padar with our thanks after he returns from Winchester and with news of Gunnhild’s journey, but I shall never ask him to come to us. That, he must decide.

  7

  May 1066

  Fate is the mightiest; winter is the coldest,

  Spring the most frosty, it is longest cold,

  Summer most bright with sun, the heavens hottest.

  Gnomic Verses, in A Choice of Anglo-Saxon Verse, edited and translated by Richard Hamer

  Elditha folded the delicately stitched veil that Gunnhild had created as a gift for her Aunt Edith. She wrapped it in soft cloth and secreted it deep in Gunnhild’s saddle-bag. Her new clothes and shoes lay in a travelling chest that was crafted from pale ash wood. So Gunnhild set out for Winchester with her two ladies, escorted by Padar and protected by a small band of Elditha’s thanes.

  She said a tearful goodbye to Gunnhild but quickly, after the parting, told herself that life must continue. She sent again to Hastings for the painter and insisted that he erase the Devil’s pigtail, thou
gh she ignored the Christ. He must re-create the star into a firmament of stars. Brother Francis continued to lead services in the chapel. Elditha thought him more moderate in his homilies than before, but her villagers’ discontent with the monk was ever present, though never spoken. Though her thanes and house ceorls ignored him, Ulf liked Brother Francis and for that she was grateful.

  Padar returned from Winchester to Reredfelle in May, when she was setting bee skeps in the orchard, the woven hives and bleached cloth lying in the grass ready to be placed on stoops beneath the trees the moment a swarm arrived. When she saw the skald pushing his way through the garden gate, she signalled to him with a wave of her hand. Looking anxiously at the skeps, Padar hurriedly began to garble his news.

  ‘Gunnhild is happy with her aunt,’ he said.

  ‘Is there other news?’ Elditha asked impatiently, her attention on the palisade.

  ‘Queen Edith has Norman monks committing King Edward’s life to vellum. Already Edith allows the child to sharpen quills and dabble with inks.’

  ‘She will soon know more than her mother, for although I can read, I cannot write more than my name.’

  ‘Writing is monks’ work.’

  Elditha spun around and gave him a stern look. She said fiercely, ‘The work of men, Padar; the work of priests and scribes. There was a time when ladies of the Church wrote too, you know. Oh, of course, naturally, when a clever idea catches on it becomes the prerogative of men.’

  A stray bee buzzed around them. She smiled as Padar remained very still.

  ‘And my husband, have you news of him?’

  For a moment Padar didn’t speak. He twitched as a bee flew close to his face and flicked it away with the back of his hand.