Page 93 of The Evening and the Morning

After an hour the travelers reloaded their horse and Edgar poled them across the river.

When he got back he found Blod hiding inside the half-built brewhouse. She was crying, and there was blood on her dress. “What happened?” he said.

“Those two men paid to fuck me,” she said.

Edgar was shocked. “But it’s not two weeks since you had the baby!” He was not sure how long women were supposed to abstain, but surely it would take a month or two to recover from what he had seen Blod go through.

“That’s why it hurt so much,” she said. “Then the second one wouldn’t pay the full amount because he said I spoiled it by crying. So now Dreng is going to beat me.”

“Oh, merciful Jesus,” Edgar said. “What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to kill him before he kills me.”

Edgar did not think she should do that, but he asked a practical question. “How?” Blod had a knife, as did everyone over the age of about five, but hers was small, like a child’s, and she was not allowed to keep it too sharp. She could not kill anyone with that.

She said: “I’m going to get up in the night, take your ax off its hook, and sink the blade into Dreng’s heart.”

“They’ll execute you.”

“But I’ll die satisfied.”

“I’ve got a better idea,” said Edgar. “Why don’t you run away? You could sneak out when they go to sleep—they’re usually drunk by nightfall, they won’t wake. This is a good time: the Welsh raiders are only two days away. Travel by night and hide by day. You could join up with your own people.”

“What about the hue and cry?”

Edgar nodded. The hue and cry was the means by which offenders were arrested. All men were obliged, by law, to chase after anyonewho committed a crime within the hundred. If they refused, they were liable for the cost of the damage caused by the crime, usually the value of the goods stolen. Men rarely refused: it was in their interest to capture criminals, and anyway the chase was exciting. If Blod ran away, Dreng would start a hue and cry, and in all probability Blod would be recaptured.

But Edgar had thought of that. “After you’ve gone, I’ll take the ferryboat downstream and beach it somewhere, then walk back. When they see that it’s gone they’ll think you must have used it to escape, and they’ll assume you will have gone downstream, to travel faster and put the maximum distance between yourself and them. So they’ll search for you along the river to the east. Meanwhile, you’ll be headed the opposite way.”

Blod’s pinched face lit up with hope. “Do you really believe I could escape?”

“I don’t know,” said Edgar.

It was not until later that Edgar realized what he had done.

If he helped Blod escape he would be committing a crime. Just days ago he had stood up in the hundred court and insisted that the law must be obeyed. Now he was about to break it. If he was found out, his neighbors would have little mercy on him; they would call him a hypocrite. He would be sentenced to pay Dreng the price of a new slave. He would be in debt for years. He might even have to become a slave himself.

But he could not go back on his word. He did not even want to. He was sickened by Dreng’s treatment of Blod and he felt he couldnot let it continue. Perhaps there were principles more important than the rule of law.

He would just have to make sure he did not get caught.

Dreng had been drinking more than usual since the hundred court, and that evening was no exception. By dusk he was slurring his speech. His wives encouraged him, for when he was drunk his punches often missed their target. At nightfall he just about managed to undo his belt and wrap himself in his cloak before passing out in the rushes on the floor.

Leaf always drank a lot. Edgar suspected she did it to make herself unattractive to Dreng. Edgar had never seen the two of them embrace. Ethel was Dreng’s choice for sex when he was sober enough, but that was not often.

Ethel was not as quick as the others to fall asleep, and Edgar listened to her breathing, waiting for it to fall into the steady rhythm of slumber. He was reminded of the night four months ago when he had lain awake in his family’s house at Combe. He felt the pain of grief as he remembered how exciting the future had seemed with Sunni, and how bleak it turned out to be without her.

Both Leaf and Dreng were snoring, Leaf in a steady drone, Dreng in great snorts followed by gasps. At last Ethel’s breathing became regular. Edgar looked across the room at Blod. He could see her face in the firelight. Her eyes were open, and she was waiting for a signal from him.

This was the moment of final decision.

Edgar sat upright, and Dreng moved.

Edgar lay back down.

Dreng stopped snoring, turned over, breathed normally for aminute, then scrambled to his feet. He picked up a cup, filled it from the water bucket, drank, and went back to his place on the floor.

After a while he resumed snoring.