Falconer's Trial by Ian Morson Page A

a pious air. That it was not a religious text, but a commentary by the Arab Averroes on Plato, and expressed a view that women were equal in all ways to men, would be unknown to Alexander. Like many of his sort, he was illiterate. He hesitated only for a moment before sighing with exasperation and retreated back the way he had come. He had been defeated again but would not let it rest there. Before his half-brother returned, he was determined to have his revenge for all the times he had been bested by Ann Segrim.
    As the evening of that day drew on, and the streets of Oxford began to empty of tradesmen and farmers, a curious sight was witnessed by old Peter Pady. He was one of the constable’s watchmen and, like Bullock himself, was advanced in years. In a town thronging with students, in a time when few toilers in the fields lived beyond their fortieth year, Peter – at sixty-one – was deemed a venerable old man. Aged he might be, but he was a sound man to stand at the East Gate and enforce the curfew. Peter Bullock chose his men carefully, with an eye to their experience and steadiness. Pady was a sober man, who took his job seriously. So he knew it was not excess of ale that caused the strange apparition lurching down the dusty road from the Cowley direction.
    It could have been a tent except it was in motion. It was adorned with trinkets and scraps of parchment that hung from it, and jangled and fluttered as the apparition swung along. Atop the decorated brown tent affair was a yellow conical capping piece running up to a spike with a knob at the end. It was only when the apparition got closer to the astonished Peter Pady that the cone shape tilted backwards, and a face emerged. It was a dark and dusty face with long locks and a black beard hiding most of it, but a face nevertheless. The brown tent that was a man stopped in front of the watchman and, as if by magic, a smaller figure emerged from behind the first. It too was similarly burdened. The larger of the two travellers spoke in passable English.
    ‘Is the town closed, sir, or may I enter?’
    Peter Pady was of a circumspect nature and, not being sure what or who this vision was, he erred on the safe side.
    ‘Closed,’ was his gruff reply. Just at that moment, the sound of a galloping horse came from the same direction the tent had come. The thunder of hooves increased with the same alacrity as the cloud of dust that accompanied the urgent rider. Peter pushed the foot traveller aside and stood nervously in the track. As the rider came closer, he saw that whoever it was did not mean to stop. His cloak billowed behind him and large saddle bags flapped maniacally on the horse’s flanks. Pady had meant to halt the horseman in the same way he had stopped the traveller, but discretion and self-preservation took over. He stepped sharply aside, pushing back the traveller and his little familiar at the same time.
    ‘Look out!’
    The horseman bore down on the group, and with a flapping of robes and clatter of weapons galloped past. Sweat from the overridden destrier splattered over them and dust flew up in a cloud, but Pady recognized the rider. It was Sir Humphrey Segrim of Botley, apparently back from the Holy Lands. And was, by the pale and petrified look on his face, being chased by a demon from Hell. Pady only recovered himself just in time to stop the swarthy foot-travellers from sneaking into Oxford in Segrim’s wake. He did so by swinging the gate in their faces. The taller one with the conical hat reeled back and cried out.
    ‘What’s this? The town was open for that rider, why not us?’
    Pady bristled.
    ‘Because he is a knight and a landowner here. And you are… well, I don’t know what you are.’
    ‘I am a saviour of souls and a bringer of cures. That’s what I am.’
    The man’s bold stance made Pady even more suspicious and he closed the gate firmly, drawing the bolt across. Only the wicket-gate stood open and he leaned through it to give his