Page 196 of The Evening and the Morning

Ulf pointed at his wife. “It’s hers! I swear it! Wyn is Ironface!”

Den said: “A woman?”

Wyn suddenly dashed away, dodging the sheriff’s men near her. They turned to give chase and crashed into one another. Others followed, a few crucial seconds too late; and it looked as if she might get away.

Then Wigbert threw his spear. It struck Wyn’s hip and she fell to the ground.

She lay facedown, moaning in pain. Wigbert went to her and pulled his spear out of her body.

In the fall her left sleeve had been pushed up her arm. On the soft, pale skin at the back of her upper arm was a scar.

Edgar remembered a moonlit night at the farmhouse, only a few days after he and his family had arrived at Dreng’s Ferry. The farm had been silent until Brindle barked. Edgar had seen someone in an iron helmet running away with the piglet under his arm, and had brought the thief down with his Viking ax.

And Ma had cut the throat of one of the other two thieves. That must have been Begstan, the brother of Wyn.

Edgar knelt beside Wyn and measured her scar against blade of his ax. They were exactly the same length.

“That settles it,” he said to Den. “I gave her that scar. She’s Ironface.”

Ragna felt terrible. She had brought Agnes here from Cherbourg and had happily consented to her marriage to Offa. Now Ragna had to preside over a trial that could end in a death sentence for Offa. She was desperate to pardon Offa, but she had to uphold the law.

The shire court was a small affair this time. Most of the thanes and other notables who normally attended were away with Wilwulf, fighting the Vikings. Ragna sat under a makeshift canopy. The world seemed to be waiting for spring: it was a cold day, overcast and intermittently wet, with no hint in it of warm sunshine to come.

The big event was the trial of Wyn, now known to be Ironface. Offa was accused with her, along with Ulf, both clearly Wyn’s collaborators. They all faced the death penalty.

Ragna was not sure how much Agnes had understood of her husband’s crimes. In a moment of desperation she had shouted that Ulf was Ironface, so she must have suspected something; but she had named the wrong person, which suggested she had not actually known the truth. There was a generally agreed legal principle that a wife was not guilty of her husband’s crimes unless she collaborated, and on balance, Ragna and Sheriff Den had decided not to prosecute Agnes.

All the same Ragna felt torn. Could she now condemn Offa to death and leave Agnes a widow?

She knew she should. She had always argued for the rule of law. She had a reputation for scrupulous fairness. In Normandy they had called her Deborah, after the biblical judge, and in Outhenham she was Ragna the Just. She believed that justice ought to be objective, and it was not acceptable that powerful men should influence a court to rule in favor of their kin; and she had argued the point fiercely. She had been disgusted when Wilwulf condemned Cuthbert for forgery and let Wynstan get away with it. She could not now do a similar thing herself.

The three accused stood in a line, bound hand and foot to discourage escape attempts. Ulf and Wyn were dirty and ragged, Offa was upright and well dressed. Wyn’s rusty iron helmet stood ona low table in front of Ragna’s seat, next to the holy relics on which witnesses had to swear.

Sheriff Den was the accuser, and his oath helpers included Captain Wigbert, Edgar the builder, and Dreng the ferryman.

Both Wyn and Ulf admitted their guilt and said that Offa had bought some of the loot from them and had sold it in Combe.

Offa denied everything, but his only oath helper was Agnes. Nevertheless, a small part of Ragna’s mind hoped he would come up with a defense that would permit her to find him innocent, or at least give him a reduced sentence.

Sheriff Den told the story of the arrest, then recited the list of people who had been robbed—and in a few cases killed—by the person who had worn the helmet. The notables attending the court, mostly senior clergy and those thanes who were too old or infirm to fight, muttered their anger at the people who had terrorized the road to Combe, used by most of them.

Offa defended himself spiritedly. He said that Wyn and Ulf were lying. He swore that the stolen goods found in his house had been bought in good faith at jewelry shops. When he had tried to run away from Sheriff Den he had simply been in a panic, he claimed. He said that when his wife had named Ulf she was just picking someone at random.

No one believed a word of it.

Ragna said the consensus was that all three accused were guilty, and there was no disagreement.

At that moment, Agnes threw herself on the wet ground in front of Ragna, sobbing, and said: “Oh, but my lady, he’s a good man, and I love him!”

Ragna felt as if there were a knife in her heart, but she kept hervoice level. “Every man who ever robbed or raped or murdered had a mother, and many had wives who loved them and children who needed them. But they killed other women’s husbands, and sold other men’s children into slavery, and took other people’s life savings to spend in alehouses and brothels. They must be punished.”

“But I’ve been your maid for ten years! You have to help me! You have to pardon Offa, or he will be hanged!”

“I serve justice,” Ragna said. “Think of all the people who have been wounded and robbed by Ironface! How would they feel if I set him free because he’s married to my seamstress?”

Agnes screeched: “But you’re my friend!”

Ragna longed to say,Oh, very well, perhaps Offa meant no harm, I will not condemn him to death.But she could not. “I’m your mistress, and I’m the ealdorman’s wife. I will not twist justice for you.”