Crowner Royal

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‘Not half as good as Mary’s, but it will have to do us for now,’ grunted John de Wolfe, looking down into a wooden bowl in which a few lumps of meat floated in a pallid stew. Across the small table, Gwyn of Polruan was already slurping his food from a horn spoon, alternately dipping a hunk of barley bread into the liquid.

‘It’s not too bad, Crowner! At least it’s piping hot, though I don’t know that we need that on a day like this.’

He stopped eating momentarily to take a deep swallow from a quart pot of ale and wipe the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand. It was just past noon and the sun was at its highest, pouring down its stifling radiance on the lower valley of the Thames.

‘I wonder what my wife’s doing now?’ he added pensively. ‘Pouring better ale than this for her customers in the Bush, no doubt!’

His comment emphasised the nostalgic mood that both men were in at that moment. Though they were sitting in a relatively decent house in Westminster, their thoughts were a couple of hundred miles away. Sir John was contemplating his old dog in Exeter, his mistress in Dawlish and his former mistress now decamped back to her home in South Wales. Given the food situation, he also had thoughts to spare for his excellent cook Mary, who had once been another of his paramours. The only person for whom he had no nostalgia was his wife Matilda, who was sulking in self-imposed exile in a Devonshire convent.

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