Each mile increased my sense of well-being. I was in no hurry to reach Aachen and, for the first time in my life, I felt I had some control over my destiny. I was gaining in confidence and the only precaution I took was to replace the makeshift bandage which covered one eye. Passing through a small market town, I found a saddler to make me a proper patch of soft leather with thongs to attach it firmly in place. When I came to pay, there was a difficulty. He refused Offa’s silver coin, saying it was not legal tender. He directed me to a Jewish moneychanger who offered, for a twenty per cent commission, to take in all my Mercian silver and give me King Carolus’s money in its place. Without a moment’s hesitation I tipped out the contents of my purse. While the Jew weighed and scratched each coin to test for purity, it occurred to me that this was the last time I was likely to see King Offa’s image. At least I hoped as much.
Our journey also altered Osric. Exercise and the long days spent in the sunshine began to improve his health and posture. He held his head a little straighter, and by slow degrees his limp became less obvious as his crooked leg strengthened. He became much more relaxed and out-going. Previously he would have restricted himself to a few words at a time. Now it became possible to exchange a few sentences with him, though he would rarely start the conversation.
‘Would you rather have stayed on and served my uncle Cyneric?’ I asked him. It was the third day after leaving Abbot Walo’s monastery and the two of us were seated on the grassy verge of the highway. Arnulf had called a halt in the noonday heat and was fussing over his oxen in the shade of a gigantic chestnut tree.
Osric rubbed a hand along his twisted leg to massage the spot where the bone was crooked. ‘There was nothing to keep me there.’
‘King Offa may yet arrange to have me done away with. What would you do then?’
‘That will be for fate to decide,’ he said with a shrug. ‘Right now I’m looking forward to reaching Aachen and seeing if what I’ve heard about King Carolus is true.’
‘What have you been told?’
‘He has strange habits. He doesn’t keep normal hours, takes naps in the afternoon, wanders about his palace unescorted and wearing normal everyday clothes, nothing to mark him out as being the king, sometimes even summons his council meetings in the dead of night.’
‘It sounds as though you’ve been talking to his servants.’
‘Abbot Walo was several years as an official in the palace administration. When he was appointed to the monastery, he brought his butler and cook with him. They enjoy talking about their time in royal service.’
‘Is that just gossip or did they meet Carolus in person?’
‘The butler claims he met the king once, in a corridor very late at night. Carolus stopped him and asked him a lot of questions about the palace staff, who did what, and where they were from. He apparently likes to know everything that is going on. His staff is in awe of him.’
I thought about Osric’s reply. My father had been respected at a distance by his people. King Offa’s subjects feared their overlord. King Carolus sounded like no monarch I had ever heard about.
‘About the royal family? What are they like?’
‘Carolus has an illegitimate son who, it is widely believed, will inherit the throne.’
Again that sounded unusual. Kings normally did not recognize bastard children.
‘Doesn’t he have anyone closer to him?’
‘He’s a lusty monarch, and has had several concubines and sired several children, most of them girls.’
There was something about the way Osric made the last remark that made me look at him questioningly.
He allowed himself the sliver of a smile.
‘I was told he likes to keep the girls very close. But that’s just gossip.’
With that enigmatic remark, Osric rose to his feet. Arnulf had started his oxen on their steady plodding advance along the highway, heading west.
*
We met other wayfarers along the road – beggars, itinerant craftsmen, pedlars trudging from hamlet to hamlet, their packs crammed with everything small and portable from knives to needles. Dirge-like songs in the distance warned of the approach of bands of pilgrims on their way to a shrine. On market days there were farm carts laden with produce, children running alongside, live chickens dangling upside down, pigs trussed and squealing in the back. Everyone overtook us if they were travelling in the same direction except for those on crutches or with toddlers in hand. Horsemen swore at us. They shouted at us to clear the road. Arnulf ignored them, and they were forced to find a way around us. As they drew level, his angry scowl and the ugly blotch on his face was enough to deter them from complaining further.