Pilgrimage of Death Read online

  The truth, then, was that one quick glance around the room was enough to convince me that the host’s idea had not met with the universal acclaim he might have hoped for. Certainly the rougher elements were all in favour of it, but the more gentile folk clearly had their doubts.

  The five guildsmen sitting all together at one of the far tables - and shaking their heads in unison - were a good case in point. They were all dressed in the full livery of their guilds, as if they were taking part in a civic parade rather than making a humble pilgrimage to Canterbury, and I had no doubt that under most circumstances they would have welcomed the chance to become the centre of attraction when telling their tales. But this was not to be normal circumstances. They would be entering a contest, and if they were to lose it to the cook they had brought with them – or, indeed to any pilgrim they considered of lower social standing – it would stand as a great affront to their dignity and prestige.

  The host seemed shocked by the lack of response. As well he might. The inn was his own little kingdom, in which his words had the force of law. And no monarch can afford to allow even a temporary subject say nay to him.

  I could see now that he wished he had never spoken. But he had spoken - and once having uttered his challenge there was no choice now but to press on.

  ‘Well, good folk! Do you not approve my jolly little scheme for your amusement?’ he persisted.

  But there were others, aside from the guildsmen, who could still not give their hearts entirely to the plan.

  The prioress – a fine lady, despite her humble attempts to disguise her origins under a veil – looked doubtfully at the great, red-haired man in the corner who downed his ale as though he feared a sudden drought.

  He was a miller; a grinder of other men’s corn, who stole only what would go unnoticed; a jolly ginger rogue who had no enemies in the world save for those men who detested him deeply. Good company, perhaps, with whom to spend the rougher sort of evening. But would the words which spewed from his broad mouth as he told his tale be the sort it was seemly for a woman in holy orders to hear and even – God forbid – to be amused by?

  ‘Well?’ said the host impatiently. And as he spoke, he glanced with a sudden nervousness over his right shoulder, as if he feared that the Devil himself were creeping up behind. ‘What is your answer? Have none of you an opinion? Do you all seek to make a fool of me, by letting me prattle on so without comment from your good selves? If so, you do be me wrong. A hare may stew in his own juice, but is right that the landlord of a fine inn should suffer the same fate?’

  We all wished to answer him – to save him from his embarrassment - yet none of us, not even the valiant knight, seemed to have the courage to do so. Then one man found the resolve, and stood up.

  He was a parson – a man of great dignity, though he had neither the stature nor the finery which so often went with such a position. Here was a man, I realised, who would not hesitate to look all the fiends of hell squarely in the eye. Here was a man who tended to his flock, instead of fleecing it for all the wool he could obtain.

  The parson cleared his throat as though he were standing in his pulpit. ‘Good sir,’ he said, ‘I am sure you mean well, but...’

  ‘I do mean well,’ our host protested.

  ‘ ... but I am not convinced you know quite what you propose,’ the parson continued. ‘The world is full of ills, and, like the plague, we spread them the more when we breathe them out.’

  The host affected a puzzled look, but I could see that it was only to hide his glee, because - like a fox which has been trapped in some dark corner - he had suddenly spied the route for his escape.

  ‘Breathe out ills?’ the host repeated. ‘Why should you say that, good master parson? Do you intend to tell a tale full of ills?’

  ‘Nay, not I,’ the parson said firmly.

  ‘So it is others of the company that you fear, then?’ the host countered cunningly.

  And what could the parson say? He had seen the miller, he had heard the pardoner’s throaty chuckle, and had no doubt already formed an opinion of both of them and of their tastes in entertainment.

  Yet as a man of God…

  ‘I will judge no man until his case has been heard,’ the poor parson said defensively.

  ‘You may not yet be willing to judge, but you already suspect, do you not?’ the host pressed.

  Within the parson’s breast, discretion battled with honesty.

  ‘There are more tales of ill in this world than there are of tales of virtue,’ he said finally.

  ‘And there are more sinners in the world of ours than there are holy men,’ our host said, allowing a slight smile to form in the corners of his mouth. ‘Is that not so, sir parson?’

  ‘Yes, it is so,’ the parson agreed regretfully.

  ‘And yet we still have faith that good will triumph in the end, do we not?’ the host demanded.

  ‘Indeed we do,’ the parson replied.

  ‘Then say that some tales which are told will breathe ill, as you believe,’ the host said, surreptitiously winking at the jolly miller. ‘Will not one good tale defeat a dozen bad ones? Will not a single shaft of true light drive all the darkness out of the world?’

  Oh, he was a cunning one, that Harry Bailey.

  For now what could the pilgrims say? What choices had he left them with?

  Those pilgrims who knew they lacked virtue already needed little persuasion to tell their tales.

  And the rest? Those who did have virtue - or at least like to pretend to the world that they had?

  They could not but agree to tell their tales, too, for fear that if they refused, the others might think those untold tales were of a vicious nature.

  And so the consent the host had so earnestly sought was obtained.

  It was not a second too soon - for the moment we had all nodded our agreement, a woman entered the room. She was a formidable creature, with upper arms the size of sides of beef, and blazing eyes which would burn holes in the thickest armour. That she was our host’s wife there could be no doubt, for when she turned her fiery gaze on him I saw his chin begin to quiver and his body start to shake.

  ‘A plague on you, Harry Bailey!’ the woman said, without the slightest preamble. ‘And a plague on me, too, for disregarding the advice of a wise and loving father and foolishly consenting to marry a man like you.’

  ‘My dear...’ the host began, the confidence he had shown earlier quite deserting him.

  ‘Is it not enough that I must work from dawn to dusk like a common skivvy?’ the formidable woman demanded. ‘Must I now also work throughout the night, to make up for your idleness?’

  ‘My dear, our guests...’ Bailey said weakly.

  ‘A pox on them!’ countered the battle-axe to whom he was married.

  Then, as if suddenly remembering where she was - and who was listening to what she said - she had the grace to blush.

  ‘I meant a pox on you, Harry Bailey, not on them,’ she continued, some of the wind taken out of her sails. ‘Will you never learn to act in a manner befitting a good landlord?’

  ‘But that is just what I have been doing with these pilgrims,’ the host protested, wheedlingly. ‘And in recompense for my pains, they have insisted that I accompany them on their journey to Canterbury.’

  ‘They have done what?’ his wife retorted, disbelievingly.

  ‘It’s true, my dear,’ the host said. ‘I swear on Christ’s bones that I told them I cannot leave because I have my inn to run, yet still they insist that I should go with them to the tomb of the blessed St Thomas.’

  And with that, he looked desperately around the room, searching for a friendly face which would confirm his account of what had passed.

  ‘Aye, that’s true! We insisted on it,’ said a voice, coming – so it seemed to me – from a very unexpected quarter.

  *

  Later, as I lay in my bed, I began to consider the significance of what had occurred in the common room below. I had always p
lanned to have the pilgrims appear in my new work. Indeed, that was the very premise on which the work had been planned. Yet that night, life had anticipated art, and instead of my having to create the pilgrims’ tales myself, I had only to mould what I heard from their own lips into my overall structure.

  I found I was chuckling to myself.

  And why should I not have chuckled? Was it not funny that a man like Harry Bailey - who could probably not read at all - should have unknowingly furthered my artistic endeavour?

  Was it not even more deeply comic that he had done so not in the interests of literature, but merely to free himself, for a few short days, from the tyranny of his wife?

  Yes, dear reader, that was what I thought.

  That the contest was nothing more than a device to ensure that all those who had gathered at the inn rode to Canterbury together.

  That this device itself served no other purpose than to make it possible for Bailey to accompany us.

  I did not know – for how could have done? – that though Bailey would indeed welcome such an escape, he was no more than a puppet, dancing on strings pulled by invisible hands.

  I did not know – though I was later to learn – that there were others who had much stronger motives than those of a mere hen-pecked husband, in seeing the Pilgrimage of Death go ahead.

  Day the Second

  Morning

  Lacking the Lord God’s ability to see all things at all times, I cannot claim to know with any certainty what occurred in those few minutes before I awoke the next morning. Yet since the Lord has, in His infinite wisdom, granted me the gifts of observation, memory and imagination, I can at least construct a picture of what probably happened, and it runs thus…

  I picture the landlord’s prize cockerel awakening in the hen house. He yawns and stretches, then looks around him. He is a simple soul by nature, yet even his tiny birdbrain knows that he was placed on this earth to serve only two functions. The more important of these functions – feathering his paramours – he will commence a little later, but for the moment he contents himself with jumping from the perch in pursuance of the other.

  Once on the ground he scratches the earth with his claws, clears the overnight phlegm from his throat, and gulps in the air he will need to sustain him through his task of heralding the dawn.

  And then?

  And then, before he can emit his first triumphal crow, he hears a hammering and a banging such as he might have expected with the coming of the Apocalypse.

  This cock has some professional pride, and will not share the announcement of daybreak with a bungler. Thus, instead of crowing as he had planned to, he puffs out his feathered chest and strides haughtily into the yard to see for himself who has dared to usurp his prerogative.

  What does he see? Why, he sees his master – our host – frantically knocking on the doors of his guests’ bedchambers and shouting it is time for them to rise. And when the landlord has completed this task, what should he do next but rush down the steps to the stables, intent on waking the poorer pilgrims who have bedded down for the night alongside the animals?

  The cock watches the scene through his beady eyes, wondering perhaps if he has a fever – for never before has he seen the landlord so active at such an early hour of the morning. Then, shaking his comb bewilderedly, he returns to the certainty of his coop, where his paramours are already waiting in anticipation of their first rattling of the day.

  *

  We drank some early-morning ale, then assembled with our horses in the inn yard. There is, as my reader probably knows, an etiquette to be observed in such gatherings. And according to that etiquette, it should have been the knight who led us out on our quest, as he had no doubt led so many others during his long career as a Christian warrior and plunderer. So it would have been on this occasion, had not the miller - who was already so drunk that he could scarcely mount his horse - barged his way to the front of the procession.

  ‘My lords, we are about to embark on a noble journey to the shrine of the Blessed Thomas,’ he announced, slurring his words. ‘And given that nobility of purpose, let us not leave guiltily-like, as thieves do, sneaking away in the night. Let us, instead, proudly proclaim our intention to the whole world.’

  And with that he reached down into his saddlebag and pulled out a set of bagpipes.

  There were those gentle souls present who objected to such a vulgar display. But the miller was deaf to their pleas, and puffing up his powerful chest he blew mightily into the tube.

  As we left the stable yard, the folk already out on the street looked up at us in amazement. And so might they well have done, for while, in the hands of an expert, these pipes - which the dark, dour people from north of the border bravely call a musical instrument - can produce what passes as a credible melody, the miller was no expert himself, and a cat, trapped in a sack with a weasel, would have produced a more tuneful sound.

  *

  We had soon left Southwark behind us. At first we rode in single file, following a narrow, twisting road through the treacherous marshes, but once we were clear of the sodden ground it was possible to become more sociable, and I found myself riding next to the franklin.

  He was an elderly man of some fifty and eight years. He had a white beard and full-red face. As any serious student of physiognomy knows, this should have meant that of the four elements, it was air which governed him - air which ruled that not only should he be tempted by most of the good things in life, but that he should surrender to those temptations. And that side of the man certainly existed – he did indeed enjoy the pleasures which the world provided.

  Yet there was another side to him - a far less sanguine side - which would only start to reveal itself after the first death on the road to Canterbury.

  *

  The franklin and I fell to talking, as any two men of similar background will, and he told me of his estates which, though he was not of noble birth, appeared nonetheless to be quite extensive.

  ‘And what is your profession, good sir?’ he asked.

  ‘I am a servant of the crown,’ I answered.

  ‘Ah, a servant of the crown,’ the franklin repeated - as if this admission on my part had somehow diminished me a little, as if it meant that we were no longer quite equals.

  It was not, of course, strictly accurate of me to describe myself in this manner. As I have mentioned earlier, I had been a controller of customs and excise until my patron, John of Gaunt, had left the country on his mad Spanish adventure. Now, however, with the Duke of Gloucester’s party in the ascendancy at court, I was nothing more than a pensioner, living off the monies granted me by Gaunt himself and the late King Edward.

  ‘And what is your name, if I might be so bold?’ the franklin asked.

  ‘Geoffrey Thatcher,’ I replied.

  I flatter myself that I am an honest man by nature, but there was a purpose quite other than viciousness in my concealing my true identity. I had attained some modest fame as a poet by that time, and though it was unlikely that the coarser members of the party would have heard of me, the more refined might well have been familiar with my work. And the knowledge that they had a chronicler riding with them might, I felt, have influenced them to act in an unnatural way. Thus, I lied in the interest of my art – which is a far better reason than most men have for lying!

  There were fields on either side of the road now, and through the morning mist we could see the ghostly shapes of serfs already bent over at work.

  The franklin sighed. ‘You are perhaps a little too young to remember the days of the Great Plague, Sir Geoffrey,’ he said.

  ‘You flatter me, sir,’ I replied. ‘I was only a child at the time, it is true, but I remember it well enough.’

  Who, having lived through that plague, could ever have forgotten it? It swept across Europe like the wrath of God, then crossed the Channel and ravaged the whole of England.

  ‘No other single event in our long history has had such an effect on our English
way of life,’ my companion said wistfully. ‘My father never needed to concern himself over who would labour on his land. There were hands enough – and more. Now the villages are half-empty. Some are deserted altogether. I must pay higher wages than my sire did – and receive less work in return. And if life is difficult for me, imagine how much harder it must be for others in my position.’

  ‘Why should it be harder for others?’ I asked.

  ‘Because not all landowners are as able as I am,’ the franklin said. ‘Nor are they held in such high regard by their peasantry. No man on my estates would ever think of taking an important decision without consulting me first. In some ways, I have more power and influence in my domain than the king does in his.’

  When a man talks so openly about his own ability, I always start to wonder whether it be me – or himself - that he is hoping to impress. Still, it was certainly true what he had said about the shortage of labour. The Great Plague had killed something between a third and a half of the population – no one was quite sure of the exact number. My own grandfather died as a result of it, and had the rest of the family been in London instead of in Southampton, where my father was Deputy to the King’s Butler, it would probably have taken me, too.

  ‘The peasants act as if they are the masters now,’ said a thin reedy voice to my left.

  I turned to look at the man who had spoken. He was an old fellow, with a closely shaven beard and hair so shorn it was as a field which had been doubly scythed. He was very thin, with legs like sticks and almost no calf at all. A choleric man, I guessed, ruled by fire.

  ‘Yes, the serfs would be lords themselves - if we were to allow it,’ the thin man continued. ‘Fortunately, there are still enough good men left in the country to show them who’s boss.’

  ‘Are you a landowner yourself?’ the franklin asked dubiously, looking down at the new arrival’s rusty sword.

  ‘No, I’m nothing but a humble reeve,’ the other man answered with a dry, throaty chuckle which sounded far from amused. ‘I manage my lord’s land on his behalf. And I am good at my work, of that I can assure you. Oh yes, there is not much that gets past me.’