[Norman Conquest 02] Winter of Discontent (52 page)

“How many are there?” asked Alan.

“How many fleas are there on a street-dog?” Sven replied with a shrug. “Enough to take York anyway. The word in the city is
there were
about
3,000
Danes and slightly more Englishmen. A lot of men have come
to join the rebels
from the
Midlands, East Anglia and the s
outh
, as well as the Northumbrians
. At least that means so as long as we’re away from the ship we won’t need to pretend we’re all Norsemen
!
”

“There’s a big difference in accent and dialect between Northumbria and Essex,” interjected Brand.

“True,” replied Sven. “But there’re so many
Saxons
from the s
outh in the rebel army, mixing with Midlanders, Northumbrians, Scots, Danes- even a few Welsh and a few Irish- that you’d really have to draw attention to yourself to be noticed. But we need to remember that not many men from Essex could explain why they
’
re on a Danish longship
,
and keep
our mouths firmly shut when we’
re close to the ships.”

Alan nodded his agreement and said
,
“So, there appears to be no intention to either hold York against King William or attack him as he moves towards York, and that means we don’t need to try to make a report. So what do we do for the next week?”

Lars scratched at the thick blond beard on his chin and replied with a question
,
“What are we supposed to be doing up here?”

“A very reasonable question,” replied Alan. “One
thing
is to keep an eye on the Danes and let the king know whether they are. As Sven said they’re never far from their ships. If we know where the ships are
,
we know where the Danes are. As they’re half of the Aetheling’s army
,
the other half will be nearby. The other thing we do is to provide communication with the spies that the king has in the Danish and English camps. We’ll be quaffing ale in Durham, Hartlepool and Scarborough more often than in York, waiting for strange men in dark cloaks to approach us! One thing we need to look at is where do we base ourselves?”

After a long pause Sven
replied,
“
I suggest
Flamborough Head, at the far end of Bridlington Bay.
It
’
s h
alf way between the Spurn at the mouth of the Humber River and Hartlepool
. It’s a
very distinctive formation
with c
halk cliffs
300
or so feet high. Bridlington is a very small village some distance from the Head itself. I know a cave… several caves… just north of the point of the Head. The whole of Flamborough Head is riddled with caves.
Several
are at sea level between outcrops of rocks that jut out and provide protection from the weather. The gaps are only
50
or so paces wide but a good captain will have no difficulty,” he said with some smugness. “You can row your ships right into the caves, at least on the top half of the tide.”

“Where do we
camp
?” asked Brand.

“In the caves,” replied
Sven with a shrug. “They’re dry- c
halk cliffs. The local pirates have built living quarters, although with our numbers we may need to expand them a little. There’ll be dry wood gathered ready for us
, as is the usual practice of ‘t
he Brethren’, and we’ll leave it as we found it. I doubt very much that with the Danes about that the local pirates will be in occupation. We’ll be neat and snug, and very well hidden.”

Alan was tempted to ask Sven about how he’d gained his detailed knowledge of the hiding places on the east coast
. I
nstead
he
just asked
,
“How long to get there?”

Sven looked at the early-afternoon sun. “Down the Ouse to the Humber
and
out past the Spurn. We’ll have the outgoing tide to help us. Then north to Flamborough Head. I’ll get us there just before dark. At worst we can heave-to off-shore and spend the night
at sea
, but I’d suggest we get moving now if we want to have a fire and a cooked meal tonight.”

The sun was low in the
western
sky as Sven conned
Havørn
towards a gap in the chalk cliffs and gestured to Lars to take
Alekrage
into the darkness of the cave that loomed at the end of the narrow passage
.
The mast was lowered and Sven
took
Havørn
a further thousand paces or so north and turned into another narrow passage. The tide was on the ebb and Sven shouted
,
“
Pull
you lousy bastards! Do just what I tell you or we’re all dead men! Larboard
side, hold one oar-beat and resume!
Hold! Row!
” The ship passed into the darkness of the cave. “Now! Pull! Good! Good! Slow! Slow! Heave oars!”
T
he ship grounded on sand
inside the deep cave
. “You and you, jump overboard and tie those ropes to the bollards
over
there. When the tide comes in later tonight, we’ll shift her further up. You lot, start carrying the bed-rolls and supplies over there. Light some damn torches so we can all see what we are doing! You! Run down the cliff-line to the cave Lars rowed into and tell him to come up here. No, you arsehole! It’s mid-tide so you can get there easily without having to climb the cliff! Just watch your step on the way back if it’s dark.”

Alan sat back and watched as the ship was tied up, aware that he had witnessed a virtuoso performance over the last few hours and that Lars was worth every shilling he received in pay, and more. The Norseman had driven the two ships fast downstream on the Ouse, using what late-autumn river flow existed, supplemented by the men at the oars. When the Ouse had joined the Humber, he’d used the outgoing tide and a westerly breeze to speed them along
,
rest
ing
the oarsmen
as he
kn
e
w they’d be needed later. The flat muddy banks of the river had sped by, then after passing the low sandy spit of the Spurn at the mouth of the river they had rowed north up Bridlington Bay with the ships rocking in an easterly swell that made it hard for the oarsmen to keep their beat and the landsmen to keep their stomachs in order. Alan had spent nearly two hours hanging over the lee side feeding the fish. He’d learned from past experience to avoid the weather side
,
so that the vomit wasn’t blown back in his face.

He took his pants and boots off before jumping over the low s
ax
board and onto the sandy ground to walk the few paces to dry land. Again, he’d leant in the past that a few moments of wind a
round
the privates was better than hours spent wearing wet clothes. Boots took days to dry properly. You learn from past mistakes.

There was a small sandy beach inside the cave, now being lit by torches made of pitch-soaked moss held by the men. Beyond was a small area cut into the chalk walls of the cave. From what could be seen in the torchlight the cave appeared to be about sixty paces deep,
twenty
paces wide and thirty feet high. Just where sand met chalk, flame was being put to a pile of dried wood that had been left in place. Obviously the previous occupants had obser
ved the usual local courtesies.

Supplies were being broached, meat being placed in pots with vegetables and put above the fire to cook. Smoke rose to the ceiling of the cave above their heads before trickling out of the cave
mouth. A barrel of apples was broached along with a cask of ale. A table was set up and loaves of slightly stale bread from two days before, together with cheese and slices of smoked ham and jars of pickled vegetables, were placed on it for men to help themselves. Men were quickly claiming the sleeping places that had been cut into the chalk walls one above the other
,
three
places
high. Alan noted that Leof had appropriated two places and put their sleeping rolls in place, standing guard to ensure that none usurped them.

“Well done, Leof!” said Alan, giving the boy a gentle buffet on the shoulder.

The food was nearly cooked when Lars arrived and he and Sven spent considerable time talking quietly mouth to ear in Norwegian, with Alan only able to catch the occasional word- just enough to annoy him that he was being excluded from the conversation.

After they had finished eating Alan walked up to Sven and Lars and sat on a rock next to them, saying
,
“Right! The plan for tomorrow is we find where the Danes are. One ship
goes
north and one ship south. Rendezvous back here at night. When we know where they are we send a ship to sit and wait to hear from the spies. The idea is to have two ships, so that our ships aren’t hanging about like a bad smell and the spies aren’t seen talking to the same people all the time.”

“And who are these spies?” asked Lars.

Alan sighed. “Lars, you don’t need to know and you won’t know. If you knew we’d have to kill you! You’re ‘Transport’. I’m ‘Intelligence’
-
I hope. We’ll each do our own jobs, right? You and Sven put the ships in the right place at the right time. I’ll do the rest.”

Alan spent an uncomfortable night lying on a shelf cut into the cliff wall, which had several lumps in uncomfortable places. As he rose stiff and sore in the morning he promised to get himself a well-stuffed mattress and blanket that day. He chose to accompany Sven north to Hartlepool as he also thought that the Danes were unlikely to be at Skegness.

It was mid-tide and the ship had to be man-handled into the water using
round logs of timber
as rollers that were also apparently part of the fittings of the cave. With the ship safely afloat the twenty crewmen doubled up on the oars,
using
five oars a side,
and
followed Sven’s shouted instructions. Once out of the cave, even when still sheltered by the fingers of chalk that jutted out from the land and created a small natural harbour, the ship began to rise and fall in a heavy swell. As the southerly wind was trying to push the ship sideways some careful manoeuvring was needed to extract the ship from the narrow passage.

Despite the stiff breeze the air was heavy with the smell of bird-droppings and the sound of thousands of birdcalls. Looking at the cliff and the nearby rocks it was hard to tell what was chalk and what was guano. Whole sections of the cliff were absolutely smothered in birds, raucously pushing and shoving each other. Puffins, with their distinctive large red and orange beaks, could be seen hopping comically about on the rocks and flapping their short wings at a furious rate as they flew low over the water. Gannets, kittiwakes and guillemots were present in their thousands. The dark-plumaged adolescent gannets showed clearly against the white of the cliffs, while the adult birds dove from the air from surprising heights to plunge deep into the water to seize small fish. The puffins and guillemots were more circumspect
,
flying low over the water or floating before disappearing below t
he
surface to use their short wings to ‘fly’ underwater as they chased their prey. High above the cliffs, riding the up-draughts, were several larger raptors waiting to swoop down and take the smaller birds. The
se
were too far away for Alan to be able to make o
ut their species. S
kuas
in their dark-brown plumage
could be seen harassing other birds, trying to make them drop their catch, so that the skua or its mate could snatch an easy meal. Alan found the highly eroded cliffs quite remarkable with their stratified horizontal layers and pitted weathered appearance quite dissimilar to the chalk cliffs he had seen near Dover.

Just north of Flamborough Head, Filey Bay had a low coastline with a wide beach, open to the strong seas that swept in from the north-east, causing the coastline to
erode
west
ward
year by year. Alan saw a
small
group of local
people
‘bird fishing’
on the north side of the Flambourgh cliffs, standing on ledges bel
ow the cliff top and using hand
nets a yard across and attached to stout poles to try to catch the low-flying birds.

Alan pointed them out to Sven who commented
,
“
They’re c
atching puffins. Quite tasty and cook up well. They can be smoked, dried or salted for the wint
er. The gannets taste like shit- they’re t
oo fishy.”

“Any risk of them locating our camp?”

“No. There’s a walkway along the top of the cliff, but we’re several miles from both Bridlington and Filey.
There’s n
o reason for the villagers to go there. The only way anybody could get down the cliff would be on the end of a rope. The climb would be too dangerous. They know that there’s nothing there for them and that they may meet some men using the caves who prefer to have their presence unknown. No
, w
e’re safe enough.”