skills, normally used for training young men in the art of jousting.
John watched with a critical eye as several excited, sweating youths galloped their horses towards these devices. One consisted of a long cross-arm pivoted horizontally on a post. From one end hung a shield and on the other a sack full of sand. As the coroner watched with a sardonic grin on his face, he saw a young man charging his heavy horse at the tilt, yelling at the top of his voice, his lance lowered and his shield held before his chest. He rammed the target with his blunted point and ducked, but he miscalculated, and as the beam swung the sack came around violently and struck him on the back of his neck, knocking him clean out of his saddle.
There was raucous laughter from a group of his friends watching the debacle and as the youth picked himself up from the dried mud he screamed abuse at them and stalked across to punch the ringleader in the face. A scuffle began immediately, but broke up as two stewards and a couple of men-at-arms began yelling at them. De Wolfe knew that this was the sort of bad tempered high spirits that could readily develop into a full-scale riot if not nipped in the bud, and he hoped that Ralph Morin would have enough men down here tomorrow to keep the peace.
He spent almost an hour on the field, watching the preparations and viewing the practice bouts with an experienced eye. The older knights were naturally more expert, many of them spending much of their time away from the battlefield going around the tournaments. Some had come from as far afield as France, the Low Countries and even Germany, all in search of winnings in the form of horses and armour. There would be no chance of ransom money in a small tourney like this, as there were no mock battles like those allowed near Salisbury and the other official tournament fields, but the professional jousters filled in between these events by visiting as many of the smaller events as they could manage.
A number of old soldiers were standing around the edge of the field, some of them aged and crippled in past battles. They were content to study these young men going through their paces, and watched with critical but dreamy eyes, seeing themselves long ago, when their joints were still supple and their eyesight keen.
John stood for a while talking to them, realising that he too would soon approach their condition, a spectator with only memories and scars to remind him of his former prowess.
Then he shook his head angrily, telling himself that there was plenty of strength left in his arm and iron in his soul, sufficient to show these callow youths a thing or two! He stalked off and, as if to confirm to himself his own virility, directed his steps purposefully towards the Bush Inn, where a pretty young woman waited to prove that senility and impotence were still well in the future.
Sir John de Wolfe spent a pleasant hour in Nesta's small room, a corner of the loft partitioned off from the rows of penny mattresses that were fully booked every night for the duration of the fair. They made relaxed, languorous love, the grim-faced coroner becoming a different man in the company of his amorous mistress. His lean, dark face softened and his eyes sparkled as he kissed and cuddled her - or 'cwtched' her, as they said in Welsh, for the pair always spoke in the Celtic tongue that was her first language and the one that John had learned at his mother's knee, for she was also of Welsh stock. Her mother had been Cornish, but her father was Welsh, so half of John's blood was Celtic in origin. Even Gwyn spoke this 'language of heaven' with them, much to Thomas de Peyne's annoyance, for the western Welsh of Cornwall was almost identical with that of Wales, and quite similar to that of the Bretons across the Channel.
In the early evening they made their way down the ladder again, as Nesta claimed that such a busy night needed her attendance to make sure that her girls and Edwin were
John watched with a critical eye as several excited, sweating youths galloped their horses towards these devices. One consisted of a long cross-arm pivoted horizontally on a post. From one end hung a shield and on the other a sack full of sand. As the coroner watched with a sardonic grin on his face, he saw a young man charging his heavy horse at the tilt, yelling at the top of his voice, his lance lowered and his shield held before his chest. He rammed the target with his blunted point and ducked, but he miscalculated, and as the beam swung the sack came around violently and struck him on the back of his neck, knocking him clean out of his saddle.
There was raucous laughter from a group of his friends watching the debacle and as the youth picked himself up from the dried mud he screamed abuse at them and stalked across to punch the ringleader in the face. A scuffle began immediately, but broke up as two stewards and a couple of men-at-arms began yelling at them. De Wolfe knew that this was the sort of bad tempered high spirits that could readily develop into a full-scale riot if not nipped in the bud, and he hoped that Ralph Morin would have enough men down here tomorrow to keep the peace.
He spent almost an hour on the field, watching the preparations and viewing the practice bouts with an experienced eye. The older knights were naturally more expert, many of them spending much of their time away from the battlefield going around the tournaments. Some had come from as far afield as France, the Low Countries and even Germany, all in search of winnings in the form of horses and armour. There would be no chance of ransom money in a small tourney like this, as there were no mock battles like those allowed near Salisbury and the other official tournament fields, but the professional jousters filled in between these events by visiting as many of the smaller events as they could manage.
A number of old soldiers were standing around the edge of the field, some of them aged and crippled in past battles. They were content to study these young men going through their paces, and watched with critical but dreamy eyes, seeing themselves long ago, when their joints were still supple and their eyesight keen.
John stood for a while talking to them, realising that he too would soon approach their condition, a spectator with only memories and scars to remind him of his former prowess.
Then he shook his head angrily, telling himself that there was plenty of strength left in his arm and iron in his soul, sufficient to show these callow youths a thing or two! He stalked off and, as if to confirm to himself his own virility, directed his steps purposefully towards the Bush Inn, where a pretty young woman waited to prove that senility and impotence were still well in the future.
Sir John de Wolfe spent a pleasant hour in Nesta's small room, a corner of the loft partitioned off from the rows of penny mattresses that were fully booked every night for the duration of the fair. They made relaxed, languorous love, the grim-faced coroner becoming a different man in the company of his amorous mistress. His lean, dark face softened and his eyes sparkled as he kissed and cuddled her - or 'cwtched' her, as they said in Welsh, for the pair always spoke in the Celtic tongue that was her first language and the one that John had learned at his mother's knee, for she was also of Welsh stock. Her mother had been Cornish, but her father was Welsh, so half of John's blood was Celtic in origin. Even Gwyn spoke this 'language of heaven' with them, much to Thomas de Peyne's annoyance, for the western Welsh of Cornwall was almost identical with that of Wales, and quite similar to that of the Bretons across the Channel.
In the early evening they made their way down the ladder again, as Nesta claimed that such a busy night needed her attendance to make sure that her girls and Edwin were
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