Margaret the Queen (28 page)

At any rate, breathless and blood-spattered, Maldred grazed by a mace on one shoulder, Cospatrick limping from a hoof-kick, they eventually reached the haven of the wetlands and could pause and look back — with personal thankfulness but no least satisfaction. Whatever happened hereafter, it was all a major disaster by any standards. However many might survive, the Saxon army was destroyed as a fighting force, without any real battle having been fought. Men were fleeing in all directions, not all into the safety of the fens, the main force of the Norman cavalry and knights now reorganised and hunting them down efficiently. Edgar Atheling and the Earls Morkar and Waltheof were there, the first wounded, the latter, his horse killed under him, much shaken. Of Edwin of Mercia there was no sign, nor of most of his thanes and leaders.

It was while they were pantingly assessing the grim situation that a fenman, so plastered in mud as to seem barely human, found his way to Thurstan's side. He had come from Hereward, he said, and had been trying to reach them for long, but could not in the circumstances. He brought sore news. Hereward had moved northwards, as the Abbot had requested. He had reached the south end of this Pymore Fen, waiting for the Saxons to move. Then he had received the word. There was a second Norman army. Come up from the south, from the Cambridge area. Under the hated banner of Bishop Odo of Bayeux, William's fierce and notorious half-brother. It was clearly aiming at Ely itself, evidently to capture the fenmen's base.

"Odo!" Thurstan cried. "The greatest savage of them all! Bishop or none, an affront to Christ's Church. . . !"

"How many?" Cospatrick demanded.

"I do not know, lord. But the Lord Hereward thinks as many as has Abbot Turold. And all horsed."

"Come from Essex," Thurstan amplified. "William has given Odo Kent for earldom and Essex to govern. What now, then?"

"Hereward has gone back to Ely. Says you, my lords, should find your way there. To him. Through the fens. You my lord Abbot will know ways. As do I."

They eyed each other bleakly. Join Hereward in Ely? What else was there to do? If they could. Save as many as they might. For the moment. . .

Hereward at least knew how to fight.

* * *

Somehow the reeling, exhausted remnants of the Saxon host found their way to Ely, by devious, secret and wearisome paths and no paths, covering round-about miles to gain a furlong — and once there found little to their comfort. Bishop Odo had the place all but surrounded — that is, his forces had occupied all the half-moon of firmish land bordering on the belt of open water on west and south, for Ely was in fact completely islanded. And to add to the menace, a fleet of shallow-draught boats, laden with armed men, had come from the north-east, the Wash area, using one or more of the Ouse channels from salt water, some twenty miles. Indeed the refugees from Pymore Fen were only just in time; the motley collection of small craft which Hereward sent to ferry them over the final half-mile of water would have been intercepted an hour later.

Hereward could offer the newcomers little cheer. Odo was actually building a causeway out across the water, of thorn and willow branches, scrub, turfs, anything which came to hand. The water was shallow, even though muddy beneath, and the belt only about five hundred yards wide where he had chosen to build. He had plenty of men for his task. If they continued to work by night — it was sundown now — the chances were that it would be completed by next forenoon. A simultaneous attack, then, along the causeway and by boat at a number of points around the perimeter, and nothing could prevent a landing. He, Hereward, had not sufficient men to beat back any concentrated assault, especially when Odo's army was reinforced by Turold's force. He foresaw Ely being occupied before very many hours had elapsed.

His hearers listened, angry and depressed — Edgar, Waltheof, Merleswegen, Siward Biorn, Bishop Ethelwin and one or two others besides Cospatrick's group. Edwin was not there — indeed there was a story that survivors had actually seen the Earl being struck down by his own men, during the later shambles at Pymore, presumably blamed for that debacle. None, not even Cospatrick, had suggestions to make to deal hopefully with the situation — other than to ensure that they sold their lives dearly.

Hereward declared, then, that he had not defied the Conqueror for all these months by hanging on in hopeless entrenched positions. He was going to move out, before it was too late, before dawn indeed. His fenmen would melt away into their marshes, to reassemble in due course somewhere else. There were sufficient boats available around the Ely island to carry away most of those who might wish to flee. But they would have to go in ones and twos, to infiltrate in the darkness. No mass exodus would get through.

There was
little
enthusiasm for this course, much disagreement. Many of the Saxons declared that they were not going to scuttle off again like water-rats, into the unknown fens. They had had enough of fleeing cravenly. They would fight here, where they had at least some advantage, fight and die if need be, repelling the invaders. Also many were wounded and in poor state to face hurried and hazardous journeying in boats. Presenting a strong front, if they repulsed the first assault, they might well win not unfavourable terms from the Normans — so said Morkar, and most concurred.

Hereward was adamant. They could do as they would.
He
was for off. Already they had caused him much trouble and loss. And he advised against any bargaining with Odo, who would renege on any terms.

Thurstan agreed with his friend, and advised flight. He himself must remain with his abbey here, his simple duty before God.

Cospatrick, brows raised towards Maldred, nodded.

Hereward had the rights of it, he maintained. This was a campaign, not one battle. They must save what they could, to fight another day in better circumstances. The Scots would accept Hereward's offer to get them out of Ely as quickly as possible.

Surprisingly perhaps, Edgar, who was not good at making up his mind, came to a decision and threw in his lot with Cospatrick without being asked. No dou
bt the security of far-away Scotl
and beckoned him, however much he might deplore the company he must keep to get there. None of the Saxons sought to dissuade him.

So it was settled. Hereward reserved a few boats for his own use and then sent word that his people should disperse as best they could, in small numbers, to reassemble when they could, in the Wisbech area to the north. He, and those who wished to accompany him, would move off at midnight.

In the end, only Bartolomeo Leslie, the Hungarian, Merleswegen and the Thane Archil, chose to accompany Edgar, with the dozen or so surviving Scots. Farewells were brief, and save with Thurstan, with few regrets on either side. Defeat and disaster make for simplification of relationships.

Hereward led his little string of boats out on to the dark waters soon after the abbey bells had tolled twelve. Torches were glowing along the line of the building causeway, and campfires by the score gleamed all along the western shore. No doubt many of the Norman seaborne crews had landed by now to east and south, but in darkness on strange ground these were unlikely to mount any attack until daylight.

Hereward held close inshore for a while, waiting until he calculated that he was opposite a waterway to the north through Burnt Fen, actually one of the many channels of the Great Ouse. A quiet but steady row across half-a-mile of water brought them to this without challenge — or so their guides assured the visitors, for these could make out little or nothing in the gloom.

A
little
way up what was presumably the Ouse, however, they ran into trouble when the leading craft was suddenly confronted by a line of boats stretched across the river, only a few yards ahead. Hereward, as the shouts rang out, waved up his other craft on either side of him and drove straight in at the barrier, standing in the bows, sword swinging and yelling his own slogan. In a few hectic and confused moments of slashing and rocking and flailing, they cut their way through — for the barrier was only one boat thick — and rowed on little the worse. Hereward declared that here was something the Normans did
not
know how to do. Had the enemy boats been linked together by ropes, and held broadside on, and double-ranked, it would have been very difficult to get through. They had probably been alerted by previous escapers from Ely using these Ouse channels.

After that there were no further incidents, as they crept and crawled their way through the maze of nightbound waterways, reaches and channels which constituted the River Ouse's ultimate approach to salt water. Moving almost due north now, dawn did not seem greatly to expedite their progress for white mists now rose from the marshlands, to no improvement. Nevertheless, when at last the sun rose and dispersed the mists, Hereward assured that they had made good progress. This was St. Mary Magdalen Fen near Watlington, and they had covered some twenty-five miles — perhaps sixteen as the crow flew. This was all part of his own unconquered terrain and there was little chance of them being pursued now.

They rested and refreshed themselves at the village of Wiggenhall, where Hereward was received as a hero even if the others were eyed with suspicion. Quite a number of his men from Ely were already here. He was leading them, he told his passengers, as he left all but one of the accompanying boats there, to the port of Lynn, where they ought to be able to find a deep-sea fishing-vessel to put them at least some of the way back to Scotland. They would have to go carefully, for Lynn was probably where the Norman boat-fleet had started from — although it was not normally in Norman hands — and they might have left some of their people there. He would go on ahead and do what he could to And them a ship. But such would cost money. However, that was the one thing that they had sufficient of, was it not?

Hereward was as good as his word, and presently he came back to escort them into Lynn's west shore, where, with no sign of Normans about, he presented the fugitives to a surly East Anglian skipper, two-thirds Dane, who would take them as far north as Whitby Eskmouth, no further — for a price. They did not haggle, even though Cospatrick grumbled that they were not
buying
the ugly, smelly craft, only hiring it.

Gratefully they said goodbye to Hereward, telling him that he was the finest Englishman they had encountered, and wishing that there were more like him. Wishing him well in his warfare, they pressed on him a substantial contribution from their treasure, declaring that it could not be in better hands. Even so, that man was doubtful about accepting. He seemed to have a suspicion of gold, a rare affliction.

He was going back to continue the struggle, he said — and the travellers felt somehow shamed as they waved him farewell from the smack's deck.

They put to sea almost immediately.

11

Malcolm Canmore did
not like failures, and made the fact sufficiently clear as he stamped up and down his hall-floor at Dunfermline, glaring at the three returned travellers before him.

"I tell you, the Saxons' weakness and folly are no excuse for your own," he berated them. "You knew what to expect. You, Cospatrick, I set in command. You, Edgar, claim their obedience. You both knew my wishes, my
orders.
As did you, Maldred. Yet you allowed prideful half-wits and wilful dullards to over-rule you. To the ruination of all."

"I protest!" Edgar rose at the table. "I will not be spoken to so. Like some scullion . . . !"

"Sit down, man. Back to the board from which you are fed! Under this my roof in which you and yours are housed. Have you any other? Board or roof? Then think well before you lose these! In this realm I speak as I will — and do more than speak." He turned. "You grin, Cospatrick — you grin! I could make you grin much otherwise — and
should,
by God!"

"No doubt, Highness. I but relish your humour — you who speak so loud here, but scarce so loud in Saxon-land! They scarce hear you, there, I fear. Even the prince, here, had difficulty in making his voice heard. Those Saxons have deaf ears and a loud pride. Have you ever tried to lead a Saxon army, cousin?"

"From all I hear
none
led the Saxons. They were like the swine in Holy Writ."

Maldred blinked at that. To hear Malcolm quoting Holy Writ was new. So much for marriage.

"I am no swineherd," Cospatrick observed. "But we carried out your commands as best we could, lacking your royal presence. Which
might
have worked miracles! And if it had been a Scots fleet and host which sailed to Lynn and Ely instead of a Norman one, all might have been otherwise."

The King eyed him levelly. "No such Scots fleet was to be sent before I had word of some success."

"I sent word of the gold. And we have seen no sign of any fleet, any number of ships, assembled here in the Scottish Sea or the Firth. I fear that you were not anticipating that word of success!"