World Without End Page 0,507

the best way of demoralizing the population was to burn the harvest in the fields.

"That will do," he said, quickly getting bored. He was irritated by Davey's insolence in planting this crop, but that was not the main reason he had come to Wigleigh. The truth was that he wanted to see Sam again.

As they rode back to the village he scanned the fields, looking for a tall young man with thick dark hair. Sam would stand out, because of his height, among these stunted serfs hunched over their spades. He saw him, at a distance, in Brookfield. He reined in and peered across the windy landscape at the twenty-two-year-old son he had never known.

Sam and the man he thought was his father - Wulfric - were ploughing with a horse-drawn light plough. Something was wrong, for they kept stopping and adjusting the harness. When they were together it was easy to see the differences between them. Wulfric's hair was tawny, Sam's dark; Wulfric was barrel-chested, ox-like, where Sam was broad-shouldered but lean, like a horse; Wulfric's movements were slow and careful, but Sam was quick and graceful.

It was the oddest feeling to look at a stranger and think: my son. Ralph believed himself immune to womanish emotions. If he had been subject to feelings of compassion or regret he could not have lived as he had. But the discovery of Sam threatened to unman him.

He tore himself away, and cantered back to the village; then he succumbed again to curiosity and sentiment, and sent Nate to find Sam and bring him to the manor house.

He was not sure what he intended to do with the boy: talk to him, tease him, invite him to join them for dinner, or what. He might have foreseen that Gwenda would not leave him free to choose. She showed up with Nate and Sam, and Wulfric and Davey followed them in. "What do you want with my son?" she demanded, speaking to Ralph as if he were an equal rather than her overlord.

Ralph spoke without forethought. "Sam was not born to be a serf tilling the fields." he said. He saw Alan Fernhill look at him in surprise.

Gwenda looked puzzled. "Only God knows what we are born for," she said, playing for time.

"When I want to know about God, I'll ask a priest, not you," Ralph said to her. "Your son has something of the mettle of a fighting man. I don't need to pray to see that - it's obvious to me, as it would be to any veteran of the wars."

"Weil, he's not a fighting man, he's a peasant, and the son of a peasant, and his destiny is to grow crops and raise livestock like his father."

"Never mind his father." Ralph remembered what Gwenda had said to him in the sheriff's castle at Shiring, when she had persuaded him to pardon Sam. "Sam has the killer instinct," he said. "It's dangerous in a peasant, but priceless in a soldier."

Gwenda looked scared as she began to divine Ralph's purpose. "What are you getting at?"

Ralph realized where this chain of logic was leading him. "Let Sam be useful, rather than dangerous. Let him learn the arts of war."

"Ridiculous, he's too old."

"He's twenty-two. It's late, but he's fit and strong. He can do it."

"I don't see how."

Gwenda was pretending to find practical objections, but he could see through her simulation, and knew that she hated the idea with all her heart. That made him all the more determined. With a smile of triumph he said: "Easily enough. He can be a squire. He can come and live at Earlscastle."

Gwenda looked as if she had been stabbed. Her eyes closed for a moment, and her olive-skinned face paled. She mouthed the word "No" but no sound came out.

"He's been with you for twenty-two years," Ralph said. "That's long enough." Now it's my turn, he thought, but instead he said: "Now he's a man."

Because Gwenda was temporarily silent, Wulfric spoke up. "We won't permit it," he said. "We are his parents, and we do not consent to this."

"I didn't ask for your consent," Ralph said contemptuously. "I'm your earl, and you are my serfs. I don't request, I command."

Nate Reeve put in: "Besides, Sam is over the age of twenty-one, so the decision is his, not his father's."

Suddenly they all turned and looked at Sam.

Ralph was not sure what to expect. Becoming a squire was something many young men