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away on a fine evening, these were bound
somewhere, in resolution and haste, the haste, perhaps, all the more aggressive
lest the resolution be lost. There might have been as many as five and twenty
of them, all male and all young. Some of them Cadfael knew. Martin Bellecote’s
boy Edwy was there, and Edric Flesher’s journeyman, and scions of half a dozen
respected trades within the town; and at their head strode the provost’s own
son, young Philip Corviser, jutting a belligerent chin and swinging clenched
hands to the rhythm of his long-striding walk. They looked very grave and very
dour, and peoplegazed at them in wonder and speculation, and
drew in at a more cautious pace after their passing, to watch what would
happen.
    “If
this is not the face of battle,” said Rhodri ap Huw alertly, viewing the grim
young faces while they were still safely distant, “I have never seen it. I did
hear that your house has a difference of opinion with the town. I’ll away and
see all those goods of mine safely stacked away under lock and key, before the
trumpets blow.” And he tucked up his sleeves and was off down the path to the
jetty as nimbly as a squirrel, and hoisting his precious jars of honey out of
harm’s way, leaving Cadfael still thoughtfully gazing by the roadside. The
merchant’s instincts, he thought, were sound enough. The elders of the town had
made their plea and been sent away empty-handed. To judge by their faces, the
younger and hotter-headed worthies of the town of Shrewsbury had resolved upon
stronger measures. A rapid survey reassured him that they were unarmed, as far
as he could see not even a staff among them. But the face, no question, was the
face of battle, and the trumpets were about to blow.

 
     
     
    Chapter Three
     
    THE
ADVANCING PHALANX REACHED THE END OF THE BRIDGE, and checked for no more than a
moment, while their leader cast calculating glances forward along the Foregate,
now populous with smaller stalls, and down at the jetty, and gave some brisk
order. Then he, with perhaps ten of his stalwarts on his heels, turned and
plunged down the path to the river, while the rest marched vehemently ahead.
The interested townspeople, equally mutely and promptly, split into partisan
groups, and pursued both contingents. Not one of them would willingly miss what
was to come. Cadfael, more soberly, eyed the passing ranks, and was confirmed
in believing that they came with the most austere intentions; there was not a
bludgeon among them, and he doubted if any of them ever carried knives. Nothing
about them was warlike, except their faces. Besides, he knew most of them,
there was no wilful harm in any. All the same, he turned down the path after
them, not quite easy in his mind. The Corviser sprig was known for a wild one,
clever, bursting with hot and suspect ideas, locked in combat with his elders
half his time, and occasionally liable to drink rather more than at this stage
he could carry. Though this evening he had certainly not been drinking; he had
far more urgent matters on his mind.
    Brother
Cadfael sighed, descending the path to the waterside half-reluctantly. The
earnest young are so dangerously given to venturing beyond the point where
experience turns back. And the sharper they are, the more likely to come by
wounds.
    He was not at all surprised to find that Rhodri ap
Huw, that most experienced of travellers, had vanished from the jetty, together
with his second porter and all his goods. Rhodri himself would not be far, once
he had seen all his merchandise well on its way to being locked in the booth on
the horse-fair. He would want to watch all that passed, and make his own
dispositions accordingly, but he would be out of sight, and somewhere where he
could make his departure freely whenever he deemed it wise. But there were half
a dozen boats of various sizes busy unloading, dominated by Thomas of Bristol’s
noble barge. Its owner