St. Peter's Fair by Ellis Peters Read Free Book Online

sound, noted the urgently waving arm, and half a dozen dishevelled youths
extricated themselves hastily from the fight, dropped whatever they were
holding, and made off at speed in several directions, some along the Gaye,
towards the coverts by the riverside, some up the slope into the tangle of
narrow lanes behind the Foregate, one under the arch of the bridge, to emerge
on the upstream side with no worse harm than wet feet. In a few moments the
sharp clatter of hooves drummed over the bridge, and half a dozen of the
sheriff’s men came trotting down to the jetty, while the rest of the company
swept on towards the horse-fair.
    “As
good as over!” said Ivo Corbière gaily. “Brother, will you lend an oar? I fancy
you know this river better than I, and there’s many a man’s hard-won living
afloat out there, and much of it may yet be saved.”
    He
asked no leave; he had selected already the smallest and most manageable boat
that swung beside the jetty, and he was across the boards and down into it
almost before the sheriff’s men had driven their mounts in among the
still-locked combatants, and begun to pluck the known natives out by the hair.
Brother Cadfael followed. With Compline but ten minutes away, by his mental
clock, he should have made his escape and left the salvage to this confident
and commanding young man, but he had been sent out here to aid a client of the
abbey fair, and could he not argue that he was still about the very same
business? He was in the borrowed boat, an oar in his hand and his eye upon the
nearest cask bobbingon the bright sunset waters, before he had
found an answer; which was answer enough.
    The
noise receded soon. Everyone left here was busily hooking bales and bundles out
of the river, pursuing some downstream to coves where they had lodged, abandoning
one or two small items too sodden and too vulnerable to be saved, writing off
minor losses, thankfully calculating profits still to be made after fees and
rentals and tolls were paid. The damage was not so great, after all, it could
be carried. Along the Foregate stalls were being righted, goods laid out
afresh. Doubtful if the pandemonium had ever reached the horse-fair, where the
great merchants unrolled their bales. In the stony confines of the castle and
the town gaol, no doubt, some dozen or so youngsters of the town were nursing
their bruises and grudges, and wondering how their noble and dignified protest
had disintegrated into such a shambles. As for Philip Corviser, nobody knew
where he had fetched up, once he shook off the devotees who had helped him away
from the jetty in a daze. The brief venture was over, the cost not too great.
Not even the sheriff, Gilbert Prestcote, was going to bear down too hard on
those well-meaning but ill-advised young men of Shrewsbury .
    “Gentlemen,”
said Thomas of Bristol, eased and expansive, “I cannot thank you enough for
such generous help. No, the casks will have taken no hurt. Those who buy my
wines should and do store them properly a good while before tapping, their
condition will not be impaired. The sugar confections, thanks be, were not yet
unloaded. No, I have suffered no real hurt. And my child here is much in your
debt. Come, my dear, don’t hide there within, make your respects to such good
friends! Let me present my niece Emma, my sister’s daughter, Emma Vernold,
heiress to her father, who was a master-mason in our city, and also to me, for
I have no other kin. Emma, my dear, you may pour the wine!”
    The
girl had made good use of the interval. She came forth now with her braids of
hair coiled in a gilded net on her neck, and a fine tunic of embroidered linen
over her plain gown. Not, thought Cadfael, for my benefit! It was high time for
him to take his leave and return to his proper duties. Hehad
missed Compline in favour of retrieving goods from the waters, and he would
have to put in an hour or so in his workshop yet