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wreck.
    It was a friend who had managed to get him this job. Others had told him not to take it, because his house had been around
here, not far from the gate itself. That was why he liked it, though. He walked down there at every opportunity, past the
alley where his children had died, where his wife had lived with him happily, before that dread evening. It was his daily
pilgrimage.
    The gap where his house had once stood remained, shut away behind a wooden paling fence. Now, as he wandered down the alley,
he saw the broad gap where his family had once lived. It made him feel – not
sadness
exactly, more a sort of emptiness. He had long ago grown accustomed to the fact of their deaths; that was something any man
must learn to cope with. But passing the space he was reminded againthat it seemed out of place, as though he still almost expected his house to reappear.
    This month was always hardest. It was at this time of year that his children had died, and the chill in the air, the naked
trees denuded of leaves, the ice in the lanes, all reminded him of them.
    He couldn’t help but stop and stare at where the house had been. Leaning on his staff, he gazed hungrily, as though the intensity
of his regard could bring them back to life. But nothing could. Turning to continue on his way, he stumbled, and nearly fell
headlong.
    Over the body in the alley.
    When the keeper of the gatehouse heard the pounding on his door, his immediate thought was that his blasted son had been on
the sauce again, and he threw off his bedclothes with an angry curse at the thought of what the damned fool could have been
up to this time.
    Old Hal was not a particularly ill-tempered fellow. Certainly, many would agree that he tended towards a melancholy humour
at the best of times, but more often than not he could be amusing, and good company when a group got together in the tavern. His jokes were risqué, his songs filthy, his mind invariably lewd, so men got along with him enormously well – provided that
they never mentioned his good-for-nothing son Art.
    Art. It was ironic that he and Mabel had named the little devil after Hal’s grandsire, for if ever a man was unlike his namesake,
it was Art. Where old Art had been reliable, responsible, honourable and dedicated, young Art was the opposite. He wouldn’t
wake on time, he was always late and blaming others for his failings, and when he did turn up of amorning, it was invariably with a headache and a pathetic, shaking demeanour. Twice in the last month Hal had been called
to have him released from the gaol after drinking too much and fighting. He hated to think what else the little bastard had
got up to without being discovered.
    ‘Why do you fight?’ Hal had demanded after the last escapade.
    ‘It’s not that I want to … when I’ve had too much ale, it just happens.’
    ‘You’d best stop now, before someone stands on your head too hard,’ Hal had said unsympathetically, looking at the wreckage
that had been his son’s face. Now it was a mass of bruises and scabs. The trouble was, Art was born with more sense than he
now had. He couldn’t assess odds, apparently. If he was drunk and his dander was up, he’d pick a fight with a man in armour.
    Reaching the door, Hal threw aside the bar and pulled it wide. ‘What’s he done this … oh, Will? What is it? Christ alive,
man, it’s hardly daylight yet!’
    Will entered hurriedly, and from the look on his face Hal knew it wasn’t good news.
    ‘Murder – there’s been a murder!’

South Dartmoor
    Simon Puttock’s journey to Tavistock was eased considerably by the memory of Stephen of Chard’s face the night before when
he realised that Simon’s recommended inn was a place frequented by gamblers, sailors and whores.
    Even this early, a little after dawn, his mood was sunny because he would soon be seeing his children and his lovely Meg. It seemed such a long time since he had last been with her. That was when he had first heard of