A Moorland Hanging Read Online Free PDF Page A

the King’s Peace in Crediton, and he often entertained guests at his small Manor. Though Simon knew this, he preferred not to enquire too deeply.
    “So,” Simon mused after a time, “the Pope wants to see peace as well, does he? That could be helpful. Maybe he can persuade the Bruce to stop his raiding.”
    “Do not place too much store on his ability to bring an end to the wars, my friend.” Baldwin smiled wryly.
    “The Pope has already excommunicated the Bruce, after all. And if you had been crowned King of the Scots, I doubt you would be pleased to receive a letter from the Pope addressed to ‘You, who call yourself King of Scotland!’ If Pope John wants peace, he will need to try harder than that!”
    They were still chuckling at this as they rode down a shallow slope from which the sweep of the moors could be seen. For Baldwin, unused to the area, it was an awesome sight. Bright grass gleamed in the sun, some thin and cropped by cattle, some long and spindly like reeds, both sliced apart in places by silvery trails of glistening water trickling to blue pools. Their path was a dark slash meandering between softly molded hillocks surmounted with moorstones, a landscape which would have been bleak in winter, Baldwin felt, but which now seemed full of promise with the high singing of larks in the dear sky and the constant tinkling music of the water.
    For several miles the knight and his friend saw no other person. The route was well-trodden, the grass flattened and in places worn away, but there was no sign of habitation. The ground became, if possible, even more profusely covered with the gray boulders. Their path took them into a low valley, and soon they were trailing around the fringes of a little wood on the steep hillside, where the trees grew among the litter of stones and boulders.
    “God above! Simon, what’s happened here?”
    The trees were unlike any the knight had seen before; it was as if each of the plants had been shrivelled. All were stunted, misshapen caricatures of the great boughs he knew from his own lands. None was more than twenty feet tall, and most were much shorter.
    “I’m glad it’s a surprise to you,” Simon smirked.
    “You’re always so pleased to amaze me with your tales of foreign countries, it’s pleasant to repay the debt, if only in part.”
    “But what has happened to these trees? Why are they so…deformed is the only word I can think of. These are oaks, aren’t they?”
    “I think so, yes,” said Simon, his voice thoughtful as he glanced at the trees near the track. “But they only grow so high out here, in Wistman’s Wood.”

    “What about other parts of the moors?”
    “I’ve heard there are some other places where the trees are similar, but I haven’t been to them yet. All the other trees I’ve seen are normal.”
    “They are certainly very curious. All the branches point in the same direction—had you noticed that?”
    “It’s as if they’re pointing to something, isn’t it? There are rumors I’ve heard…”
    “Yes?”
    “Well, you remember the stories, don’t you? About the Devil and his pack of wish-hounds baying after lost souls? This is where those stories come from, Baldwin, out here on the moors. They say that the wish-hounds are heard here when the winds blow hard.”
    Baldwin gave him a sour stare. “I suppose you think the hounds come here to piss on the trees? Diabolical hounds peeing on the branches kill them off, and that makes the oaks die on one side? Really, Simon, I—”
    “No, of course not,” said Simon, hastily holding up a hand to stem the knight’s ironic flow. ‘But I know I wouldn’t want to stay here after dark.”
    “No, I can see why,” said Baldwin reflectively, gazing at the trees. The atmosphere was oppressive, he thought, and it was easy to understand how people could imagine the worst of such a place, especially if the wind howled among the boughs as night fell. Baldwin did not believe in old wives’