The Ploughman's Apprentice

©2008 Ian Hobson

I am in no way connected with the accused, John Barley and, although I am of the legal profession, it is not my job to record the proceedings of his trial. Though I was present on the day he gave his testimony and find myself compelled to write an account of what he, in his mumbling and inarticulate way, claimed to have happened.

He is, by his own and his mother's account, twelve years of age. None too bright perhaps but, prior to the terrible incident, hard-working and willing to please; and he had been taken on, this very spring, as an apprentice to the ploughman, Henry Goodman who, in turn, worked for James Wainwright of Towton, south-west of York.

Wainwright, having decided to turn his lower pasture over to vegetables to meet increased demand, had instructed Henry Goodman to plough the whole of the field in readiness for planting; and it is here in this very pasture that, according to the accused, John Barley, this tale of bloody murder begins.

***

'Steady now, steady!' Ploughman, Henry Goodman, shouted words of encouragement to his two horses as he skilfully guided his wooden plough, cutting and turning the sod. There was a gentle slope to the field and the uphill stretch was just a little harder on both man and beasts, especially as the field had not been ploughed since Saxon days. Goodman’s apprentice, John Barley, ran ahead looking for stones that might damage the plough. He was a scrawny lad, of average height for his age, and as he scanned the field ahead his keen young eyes caught sight of something white laying close by in the previously cut furrow; a large stone by the look of it, he thought.

He ran to it, wishing he had noticed it before and hoping that no damage had been done to the plough and that he would not get into trouble; for he knew that every ploughman had to make his own plough and was responsible for its maintenance. But as he took a closer look at the smooth round white thing and bent down to lift it, he made a gruesome discovery: it was not a stone at all, it was a human skull. He dropped the skull and jumped backwards, shuddering at the sight of its grinning jaws and earth-filled eye sockets that seemed to be staring straight at him.

'Move, boy, move!' The two plough horses were almost on top of him, but heeding Goodman's warning just in time, John scampered out of the way and ran on to continue his search for stones. But yet again he came across something white, not a scull this time but a bone of some sort; perhaps a leg bone from a dead sheep. Then he noticed that the plough horses had stopped and, as he ran back to find out why, he saw that Goodman was stooping to examine something turned up by the plough.

'Did you see that skull back there?' Goodman asked without looking up.

'Yes, maister,' John replied, fearful of rebuke for his negligence. 'But it didn't do no 'arm did it?'

'No, lad, and nor did this'n.' Goodman held up another skull and then a pair of long white bones. 'There's bodies buried in this 'ere pasture. I think thee best go and fetch Master Wainwright. I don't want to be ploughin' up no graveyard.'

***

The landowner, James Wainwright, ordered the ploughing to continue, but he stayed close by, riding his mare up and down the length of the field and watching as more bones were unearthed. He had brought along his eight-year-old son, Daniel, and he and John Barley had been given the task of collecting the bones and skulls as they were unearthed and carrying them to the corner of the field.

Late in the day, Wainwright sat astride his horse and surveyed the growing pile of bones. It had begun to rain heavily and any skeletal remains that were still caked in earth were gradually being washed clean.

'Maister.' Wainwright turned in his saddle as John Barley approached with another two skulls and an armful of bones. His son Daniel was not far behind, similarly loaded. Both boys were soaking wet and covered in mud, almost from head to foot. 'What about this, maister?' John asked. He dropped one of the skulls as he held up a rusting strip of metal. 'It's a sword, maister.'

'Is it, by God.' Wainwright swung down from his mare and strode towards the two boys. He was a small man, in his mid-thirties, with a potbelly, and a bushy beard.

'And I found this, Father.' Daniel dropped his load of bones onto the grass and then carefully pulled a well-rusted, but dangerous-looking, dagger from his belt. Wainwright took the dagger from his son, and then the sword from John, and examined them both closely.

'Are there any more weapons?' he asked.

'Just them so far, maister,' John replied. 'But there's a cartload more bones, an Maister Goodman ain’t ploughed all t'field yet.'

'I can see that for myself, lad.' Wainwright looked over to where the ploughman and horses were still toiling. Less than a fifth of the field had been ploughed and with the thickening clouds it would soon be too dark to work. He turned back face John. 'Go and tell Master Goodman I said to make this furrow the last for today. Then there'll be bread and pottage at the house, if you want it.' He looked up at the rain-filled sky. ‘And you'd both be best sleepin' in the barn with the horses tonight. Then we'll make an early start tomorrow. I reckon this storm'll soon pass over.'

'But where's all this lot come from, father?' Daniel asked as he picked up the bones he had dropped.

'War, boy. War.'

***

The Master was right about the weather, because the next morning the rain-clouds had all but moved away and, after a hasty breakfast, the ploughman and his apprentice were able to lead the two horses back to the lower pasture to begin ploughing again; though without the help of young Daniel because his mother had insisted that he had caught a chill.

Though Daniel had been lively enough the previous night, when there had been much discussion as the Wainwright family, together with Henry Goodman and John Barley, sat down to supper around the huge oak table in the dinning room at the rear of the farmhouse.

Wainwright's wife, Mary, and his twin daughters, Anne and Jane, wanted to hear all about the skeletal remains. 'But where can they 'ave come from?' Anne had asked. She and her twin sister, Jane, were both sixteen, and usually took little interest in workaday subjects like ploughing.

'War,' their father had answered. 'War. Seventy or eighty years ago, at least.'

It was left to their paternal grandmother, Meg, to explain further. 'Them bones must have lain there since the War of the Roses,' she said, as she slurped down a second steaming bowl of pottage. 'There was a great battle in these parts: the battle of Towton. Thousands of men died, thousands! And they say the pastures down towards the river ran red with blood.'

The twins pulled faces at the mention of blood, and then screamed when their brother, Daniel, produced a skull from under his chair and chased them around the table with it.

But they would scream much louder before the week was out.

As the second day’s ploughing began, Wainwright was not there to supervise. After breakfast he had mumbled something to Henry Goodman about church authorities and then saddled his mare and ridden off, not returning until midday, with his mare in a lather, and himself in a foul vexation. He stopped and glared at the growing pile of bones and skulls; it had almost doubled in size since the day before. He rode on past John as the lad, now pulling a small handcart, hauled another load up towards the top of the field.

'Is there some't amiss, sir?' Goodman asked as Wainwright approached. He could see that his employer looked distressed.

'Dammed clergymen!' As Wainwright reigned in his mare, she stamped and snorted. 'I take the trouble to ride over and inform the dean of what we've found here, and he insists that the remains be delivered to the church for Christian burial!'

Goodman slowed the plough horses to a stop and looked up at Wainwright. 'What, all of 'em? But that'll mean...' he scratched his head and looked first towards the pile of bones and then at the remaining unploughed field, 'well, a fair few cartloads.'

'You're dammed right, a fair few cartloads, and if the dean thinks I'm goin' to pay fort' cartage he better think again, by God! The man even suggested I pay for the diggin' of the graves! He can dig his own graves, and if he wants that pile of old bones, he can come and fetch 'em 'imself, afore I burn the whole lot!'

***

The ploughing and bone collecting continued for another four days, until Saturday afternoon; and it was then that James Wainwright carried out his threat, or tried to. Ignoring the wishes of the church, he ordered his farmhands, and members of his family, into nearby woods to collect firewood, and by late afternoon a huge stack of dead and newly chopped branches, at least twice the height of a man, stood in the field close to where several heaps of the bones and skulls of hundreds of dead fighting men, lay.

'We'll need the kindling now,' said Wainwright, addressing John Barley and his son, Daniel. Earlier the two lads had been sent to the barn for armfuls of hay, which Wainwright now thrust into a hollow beneath the woodpile and ignited. It took a while for the fire to take hold but soon the timber was well alight, and when he judged the time to be right, Wainwright threw the first few bones into the fire and grunted his approval as they vanished into the flames.

'Now lads,' he said to his farmhands, 'not too many at once, we don't want to put the fire out. I'll leave you in charge, Master Goodman.' So with the fire blazing, the farm workers began to throw on the bones and skulls while Wainwright walked home with his family.

'What will you tell the dean if he asks about the bones?' his wife asked.

'I'll tell 'im to mind his own business,' Wainwright replied.

***

Feeding the fire with bones was hard and thirsty work, and with the master gone home, the farm workers began to complain and say that they too had homes to go to; though in truth they had a mind to get to the nearest alehouse. They had used up the last of some surplus timber dragged from the woods and, as one of the older hands pointed out, the fire was beginning to die down and would soon go out if many more bones were added. So, one by one, the men began to slink away until, as daylight faded, only Henry Goodman and his apprentice remained.

'You may as well get off home, lad, before it gets any darker,' Goodman suggested. 'I'll tend the fire a bit, and then check on the horses, and then I'll get off home myself.'

'Thank you, maister, and goodnight to you.’ John turned and began to walk away. He had earned his first weeks wages and was keen to get home to his mother and younger siblings, but a loud crackling from the fire made him turn and look back; and to his amazement the skeletal figure of a man, wreathed in flames, came staggering out of it.

He was a tall man, and though there was no flesh on his bones and his head was just a grinning skull, he carried a shield on his left arm and a sword high in his right hand, and he was striding after Goodman who had turned away to pick up more bones to throw on the fire.

'Maister, look out!' John cried. 'Look out!' But before Goodman could heed John's warning, the swordsman was on him, slashing and hacking with his sword until Goodman lay lifeless at his feet. The swordsman thrust down with his sword once more, striking Goodman through the heart, as if to be sure he was dead. Then he turned back towards the fire and, raising his sword high, he beckoned to his dead comrades, who came staggering out of the flames as though from the depths of hell.

***

'Now, who can that be?' exclaimed James Wainwright, irritably. He had just lit the candles, poured himself a jug of ale, and sat down to eat with his family, when there was a loud hammering at the back door.

'Whoever it is, send them away,' said his mother. 'We don't want no disturbance at this hour.'

Wainwright's chair scraped on the stone floor as he reached for one of the candles and went to see who was there. The door opened directly into the room and as soon as he pulled back the bolt, it was thrust open by John Barley who came stumbling in with a terrified look on his face.

'What ever is the matter, boy?' Wainwright asked.

'They're comin', maister, they're comin!' John gasped, as he turned and slammed the door closed. He was exhausted from running the quarter of a mile from the lower pasture to the farmhouse, but found the strength to push home the door bolt then turn and run past Wainwright's incredulous family, where he shrank down against the wall, mumbling and quaking as though he had some kind of fever.

'Comin? Who's comin? Are you mad, boy?' Wainwright unbolted the door again and looked out, holding the candle aloft, but there was nothing and no one to see. But as he turned back to face his family and the obviously insane John Barley, who had now backed into a corner behind a heavy oak dresser, the master stumbled forward as though shoved from behind, and then, with a look of disbelief on his face, he shrank to his knees and fell forward with a thud.

It was then that the screaming started, for an arrow was stuck in Wainwright's back, encircled by a growing patch of bright red blood. Mary was the first to scream, and her chair fell backwards with a crash as she hurried over to her husband, while Wainwright's mother, realising they were being attacked, looked for a weapon to defend her family with. The two rusty relics, the sword and the dagger, that had been found in the pasture at the start of the week, still lay on a side-table where Wainwright had left them. So Meg grabbed both of them, one in each hand, and turned towards the door, from whence the threat surely came.

It was then that the hollow-eyed, skeletal leader of the long-dead warriors appeared in the doorway, striding forward and slashing down with his sword, just as Mary looked up from her husband's lifeless body. The sword cut deep into her neck and blood sprayed, fountain-like, turning her attacker's bones red, as she fell on top of her husband. Then, accompanied by the screams of the children, there was a tremendous clattering of bony feet as more skeletal warriors came striding into the room.

For a moment Meg stood transfixed as the grinning wraiths approached her, some of them prodding towards her with their swords and pikes; then with the courage of a matriarch protecting her offspring, she flew at them, striking with both sword and dagger, but was immediately overwhelmed and slashed to death by a dozen blades.

The three Wainwright children, still screaming, shocked and frightened almost beyond sanity, had at last found their feet and were backing towards a door at the far end of the room. But as Jane fumbled with the handle and wrenched the door open so that the three could make their escape, two of the skeletal intruders rushed forward and grabbed Anne's arms. For a while there was a tug of war as Daniel and Jane tried desperately to pull their sister through the open door, but as more grinning wraiths came to help their comrades, Anne too was grabbed by bony hands.

'Run, Daniel, run!' Jane managed to shout and then she and Anne screamed as they were lifted high and passed, hand over hand, and then dropped onto the oak table, scattering pewter cups, plates and candlesticks, which fell noisily to the floor.

The room was much darker now, lit only by the glowing embers of the log fire and a single candle on a bracket on the opposite wall. And there was relative silence as the two girls, having screamed themselves hoarse, lay head to head on the table, surrounded by a sea of grinning, candlelit skulls, and twitching as they were nipped and prodded by bony fingers. The leader, still dripping with Mary's blood, dropped his sword and shield and climbed up onto the table and leapt onto Anne, straddling her and leaning forward until his skull was touching her face.

Anne began to scream again, but Jane, ignoring the prodding and grasping of long bony fingers, struggled to her hands and knees. 'Leave my sister alone!' Bravely she tried to wrestle with the bloody skeleton, tugging at his bony arms. But this just enraged him and, taking hold of Jane's hair and snatching a dagger from one of his comrades, he slit her throat and shoved her back along the length of the table with such force that she slid off the end and crashed to the floor.

The leader turned his attention back to Anne and, still straddling her, he waved the dagger in front of her face. Anne whimpered and struggled but the leader held her down, while his comrades banged on the table as if applauding his actions. But then the ghostly figures around the table froze, and slowly their heads turned towards the outside door. With a start, the leader stopped what he was doing and turned and looked over his shoulder. In the semi-darkness of the doorway there stood a hideous-looking man, if man was the right word, for though he stood on two legs, his feet were cloven hoofs, he was covered in hair, horns protruded from his head, and a long forked tail hung from his rear; he was evil personified, he was the Devil.

Rattling with fear, the leader climbed down from the table and cowered away from the Devil's evil gaze. Then as miraculously as he and his followers had appeared from the flames of the fire, they and their weapons simply melted away, into the walls and floor, and were gone. Making animal-like grunts, the devil made his way to the table where Anne still lay. She lifted her head then, as though waking from a nightmare, and began to scream again as the devil leapt, cat-like, onto the table.

Somehow, John Barley had been overlooked as he crouched in the corner of the room beside the dresser. He had seen or heard a lot of what had happened, despite having had his eyes shut and his hands clamped over his ears for much of the time. But now, Anne's screams seemed to pierce his soul and he could take no more.

He crawled out from his hiding place. There was just enough light to see that the room was littered with overturned chairs and dead bodies. Whatever was happening on the tabletop, John did not want to know. Not daring to stand, he crawled past Jane, unable to avoid the pool of blood in which she lay. He was trembling with fear but he continued on under the table, and had crawled almost the full length of it when the screaming above his head stopped and was replaced by a horrible sucking noise that sounded like a stuck boot being pulled from a bog.

Fearing that the creature would hear him, John crawled slowly towards the end of the table then scrambled out from under it and ran towards the door, only to slip on spilled blood and fall flat on his face. Terrified, he rolled over and looked back. The Devil was crouched over Anne’s dead body, and in his hand was her still beating heart. The devil flashed John an evil grin and then stuffed the heart into his mouth. John's stomach heaved and he almost vomited but, spurred on by sheer terror, he managed to find his feet and stagger outside where, by the light of the moon, he kept on running and did not stop until he was home.

***

I said that I was in no way connected to the accused, John Barley, which is true enough; though my client and close friend, Charles Green, as James Wainwright's cousin, is and looks likely to inherit the Wainwright farm. Unless of course the boy, Daniel, regains his wits. He was found, the morning after the murders, cowering in a barn at a neighbouring property. Apart from a few scratches, he was unharmed, but since that day he has not spoken a word, and if anyone tries to take him back to his father's farm, he seems terrified and cannot be made to go there. Perhaps it would have been better if he too, like his kin, had died that terrible night.

As for John Barley; he will surely hang. His story of skeletal warriors rising from the flames, though fascinating, is of course, quite ridiculous. One need only consider the evidence: the boy's bloodstained clothes, and the rusty but deadly sword and dagger found at the scene. I can only conclude that the handling of so many bones must have awakened some hitherto concealed lust for murder. Though I have advised my friend, Charles, that if he should take over the farm, it might be best to follow the wishes of the church and have the remaining bones buried in hallowed ground - and to consider rearing sheep.

*****

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