The Elixir of Death Read online

  'A fine woman, that Hilda! She'll have no trouble in getting herself a new husband in double-quick time!'

  John scowled across at his lieutenant as they rode along side by side. 'Are you trying to tell me something, you old rogue?'

  Gwyn innocently shook his head, his wild hair swaying like a corn stook in a gale. 'Just saying, Crowner, that's all! I'd make a play for her myself, if I wasn't a married man!'

  'You mean just like me, don't you? Don't fret, Gwyn, I'm not going to throw a leg over her the minute I get inside her house. I've got Nesta breathing fire down my neck - and Matilda never misses a chance to remind me of my sins in that direction.'

  His officer decided that he had better leave the subject alone and subsided into silence as they covered the last few miles to the little harbour. In the village, Gwyn diplomatically took himself to one of the two taverns, where John could pick him up when he had finished his business, innocent or otherwise. The coroner walked Odin down the lane that led from the creek where boats were beached and tied him to a hitching rail outside the solid stone dwelling that Thorgils had built.

  Again the young maid was surprised to see him at the door, but with half-concealed giggles, simperingly she led him up the stairs to Hilda's solar. The widow had given up her mourning grey and looked elegant in a long kirtle of blue linen with a shift of white samite visible above the square-cut neckline. As usual indoors, her hair was uncovered and the honey-blonde tresses fell down her back, almost to her waist. John found it hard to remember her as the rosy-faced urchin with whom he had played in Holcombe many years before - and later as a lissom girl when they furtively kissed and coupled in the tithe barn. Looking at her now, serene, beautiful and self-confident, it was also difficult to accept that she was but the daughter of a manor-reeve, an unfree villein in his brother's employ - as she herself had been unfree until she had married Thorgils.

  Hilda came towards him, her hands outstretched to take his, a smile of genuine pleasure on her face.

  'John, it is so good to see you, no one is more welcome in this house!' She came close and, like iron chippings to a lodestone, his arms automatically came up to embrace her, though somewhere in his head warning chimes pealed as loudly as cathedral bells. Hilda's blue eyes and her full pink lips were inches away from his and he felt her breasts pressing against him as he held her. She stood immobile and he knew she was waiting for him to make the next move - or not make it. He realised that she was giving this old soldier the chance to attack or retreat, not forcing the issue but establishing where the watershed lay between prudence and abandonment. As he felt the heat growing in his loins, he groaned with longing and indecision, but then the vision of another pair of eyes, lips and breasts swam into his fevered mind. With a sudden movement, he pecked at her cheek with his lips and stood back, his hands sliding to hold her upper arms as they looked at each other gravely, the moment of decision reached - for now.

  'I came to see if all was well with you, dear Hilda,' he croaked, then cleared his throat in one of the catch-all mannerisms he used to cover awkward pauses. Standing back, he saw that the maid was gaping at them, looking rather disappointed that they had not fallen to the floor in a frenzy of lust. Hilda led him to a chair and then sat opposite in another, after sending the maid scurrying to fetch wine and pastries.

  'Tell me all your news, John. I have been quite out of touch since I came home from my stay in Holcombe.'

  As he drank some of Thorgils' good Normandy wine and ate heartily of the pork and turnip pasties - for Hilda took little notice of the Church's edict regarding Friday fish - he brought her up to date on the plan to use the three ships to ferry goods from Exeter to other coastal ports, and especially those across the Channel. He wanted more details of the other two ship-masters, for in spite of his excuses to Nesta, he was not all that sure where they were to be found. The conversation flowed easily for an hour, though underneath was always their simmering awareness of their sexual attraction. The Saxon woman enquired after Matilda and patiently listened to John's bitter recitation of the hopelessness of their marriage, and his wish that the social gulf between them had been smaller before he had been forced into marrying de Revelle's daughter.

  Then carefully, she asked about Nesta, whom she knew slightly and liked very much - though now she knew that the Welsh woman was an added barrier, in addition to Matilda. She suddenly came to appreciate that in fact if Matilda ceased to exist, she - Hilda - would be in a far better position to capture John de Wolfe than a lowly alewife, as there was no real reason why a Norman knight could not take her, a freewoman and the widow of a quite rich and respectable merchant, in marriage. Still, Matilda did exist and, being a sensible, realistic person, she felt no jealousy towards Nesta in a situation that was immutable.

  John sat more easily as affection and admiration gradually replaced his lust and he settled down to enjoy the sight of her lovely face and body and the pleasant company that she afforded him. Eventually, the need to find the shipmen and to collect Gwyn from the alehouse before he became too drunk to sit on his horse drove him reluctantly to the door.

  'Come to see me again very soon, John,' Hilda said without any trace of coquetry as he was about to leave. 'Let me know how our new venture is progressing and if you need a contribution to restoring poor Thorgils' vessel, you have only to ask.'

  At the front door they kissed, and though this time it was fully on the lips, it was somehow chaste, as if a signal that for now they were as brother and sister. As John stalked away to untie Odin, he wondered whether Hell was a place where he was doomed to bounce for ever from one to another of an infinite number of women.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  In which Crowner John examines some arrows

  Though the cold persisted, the snow cleared away and bright crisp weather set in over the weekend. The sky remained blue, but dark clouds rolled in over John de Wolfe late on Monday afternoon, for not only did Matilda return, but she was accompanied by her brother Richard and his wife Eleanor, a haughty woman whose nature matched the frosty climate.

  They were on their way to Richard's other manor near Tiverton at the eastern end of the county. He fervently thanked God that his house had no space for them to stay that night. Instead, they went to the New Inn in High Street, the best accommodation in the city, even if the cooking was inferior to that of the Bush. However, John did not get off scot-free, for Matilda invited her brother and sister-in-law to dinner on the following day.

  'They provided me with bed and board for well over a week, John,' she snapped. 'The least I can do is to give them a good meal before they leave for Tiverton.'

  Within minutes of his wife's return, his free-and-easy life had reverted to the familiar old pattern of silences at table, scowls at his every absence from meals and ill-tempered orders barked at Mary or Lucille. To avoid aggravating the situation on the very first evening, he desisted from his usual visit to Idle Lane and sat glumly at supper while Matilda, unusually loquacious, expounded on the luxuries of her brother's manor at Revelstoke, the excellence of his cooks and even the fertility of his fields. Her previous disillusionment with Richard seemed to have evaporated. He was now her idol once again, Matilda having conveniently forgotten his manifold sins and wickedness. By contrast, she was implying that her husband was all the poorer in substance and spirit for having treacherously stabbed her brother in the back when he finally denounced him to the Chief Justiciar. She now seemed to ignore the fact that Richard had committed the common crime of theft and the even worse one of treachery, both of which should have carried the death penalty, but which had been avoided by John's intercession.

  Thankfully, Matilda was so full of her visit to the utopia of Revelstoke that she failed to make any enquiry about his own activities while she was away – but John knew that sooner or later she would get around to interrogating him about his journey to Dawlish and his scandalous attendances at the Bush Inn. After supper, she fired instructions at Mary concerning the lavish dinner th
at was to be prepared for the de Revelles the next day, then stalked off to bed, claiming fatigue after her journey that day from their night stop at Buckfast. Lucille pattered after her to get her undressed and settled for the night, leaving John to sit by his hearth, glowering into his ale-pot and bemoaning the end of his brief week of freedom. Even his hound Brutus looked miserable as he lay at his master's feet and rolled up his eyes so that the whites showed, in an expression of doleful sympathy.

  The following day John de Wolfe spent the early part of the morning in glum anticipation of the approach of the noon dinner-time, but thankfully fate stepped in at literally the eleventh hour. It took a murder to avoid the ordeal of sitting down to a meal with three of the de Revelle family, but even Matilda must surely accept the urgency of attending another dastardly assault upon one of her beloved Norman county families. It began with the clatter of iron-shod hoofs on the cobbled floor of Rougemont's gatehouse arch, heralding the arrival of a messenger from Shillingford. This time it was one of the young stable grooms, perhaps chosen for his reckless speed on a horse. He gabbled his news to the soldiers in the guardroom and without delay he was hustled up the stairs to de Wolfe's chamber.

  All three of the coroner's team were there. Thomas, having performed his paid Mass at an early hour, was now at his habitual task of making manuscript copies of cases for the next Shire Court. Gwyn was aimlessly whittling a piece of firewood with his dagger and whistling tunelessly through his drooping moustache. John was sitting moodily behind his table, but looked up as the groom came in, touching his shapeless woollen cap in hurried obeisance.

  'It's the young master, Crowner,' he gabbled. 'Wounded real bad in the arm and the bloody steward killed stone dead!'

  It took a few moments and ajar of Gwyn's rough cider to get a coherent story from the young fellow, but the upshot was that, early that morning, William le Calve had been walking with their steward, Adam le Bel, along the waste beyond the village fields.

  'They were looking at the edge of the forest, deciding where the best place was to start felling trees, to assart more land for the livestock, as the strip-fields are now pushing well into the pasture,' explained the young man - in unnecessary detail, as far as the impatient coroner was concerned.

  'So what happened, damn it?' he snapped, but the groom was hazy about the more vital parts of the story.

  'Don't rightly know, sir, not having been there,' he muttered lamely. 'But they brought the old steward back dead as mutton and Sir William had a big wound in his arm, with a cross-bow bolt lying near by.'

  An hour later, de Wolfe was listening to a more detailed account of this sketchy story.

  The younger son of the lately deceased Peter le Calve was lying on a couch in one of the side rooms of the hall in Shillingford. It was a moderately comfortable chamber with a good fire in the hearth, clean rushes on the floor and some hanging tapestries to relieve the grimness of the grey stone walls. William was very pale and had obviously lost a lot of blood. His left arm above the elbow was expertly bound with a clean linen bandage and in the background the handsome lady whom John had glimpsed on his earlier visit was standing with an old serving woman, who clutched a pitcher of hot water and a towel. Godfrey le Calve was standing alongside his younger brother, solicitously resting a hand on his other shoulder, his face almost as pale as that of the wounded man.

  'It was meant for me, you know!' he said shakily. 'The bolt that killed my steward.'

  De Wolfe raised his eyebrows questioningly and William answered from his couch, in a voice tight with pain.

  'I fear he's right, Sir John. No one would want to slay poor Adam, for the sake of Christ! Surely he was mistaken for Godfrey here.'

  John mulled this over and felt inclined to agree. Two men shrouded in winter cloaks walking together, one recognisable as William le Calve - it might easily be assumed that the other was his brother, as Adam le Bel was about the same height as Godfrey.

  'How severe is your wound, William?' he asked solicitously. The coroner noticed that the new linen around his arm was already becoming stained with blood. The lady in the dark brown kirtle stepped forward and laid gentle fingers on William's brow. Godfrey hurried to introduce her as Lady Isobel of Narbonne, a 'friend' of his late father.

  'The bolt went right through the muscle, Sir John, and tore out sideways, so that there is a big open flap,' she said in a low, rather husky voice. In spite of the circumstances, de Wolfe's interest was aroused. He saw that she was about his own age, slim and good looking, with a dark beauty suggesting that she came from southern France or even Spain. However, with his amorous life already far too complicated, he pushed aside certain thoughts with a conscious effort and concentrated on the wound.

  'He has lost much blood, I suspect,' he said. 'Was it much fouled?'

  He well knew that the danger with any wound was that even if the victim survived the shock and blood loss, dirt carried in might lead to a fatal purulence. In fact, many archers deliberately stuck their arrows in ground contaminated by animal or human filth to increase the eventual killing power of their weapons.

  Gravely, Lady Isobel shook her head. 'One can never tell, but it seemed quite clean and at least the bolt had fallen out. I washed the wound with hot water, then poured some brandy-wine into it, which I have heard can help to neutralise any poison.'

  William looked up at her and winced, recalling his screaming agony of an hour ago, when the strong spirit cauterised the naked flesh inside his arm.

  'You have been kindness itself, madam,' he whispered. John turned to the anxious elder brother, eager to get on with the story.

  'So what happened? Tell me from the beginning.' Godfrey took the coroner's arm and led him across the room, to where Gwyn and Thomas were waiting just inside the door.

  'My brother is shocked. I do not want to distress him more than we must. Come and see the other poor fellow first.'

  He led the way into the main hall, past muted servants and a few manor officers, some of whom John remembered from his last visit to this tragic place, including the falconer and the houndmaster. They went outside and down into the undercroft, the semi-basement that was used as a storehouse. Here, on a couple of planks laid across some boxes, were the pathetic remains of Adam le Bel, the steward of Shillingford. Covered with his own cloak, the old man still appeared dignified, even in death, when Godfrey uncovered his face.

  'William and Adam here went out to decide where the men should start assarting later today. We need more arable land and pasture, so must push back the forest in places.'

  'Were they alone?'

  'The bailiff and the reeve went after them, but were some distance behind, as they stopped to chase some loose sheep back into a pen. They say they were a few hundred paces away by the time William and Adam reached the edge of the trees.' Godfrey stopped and gulped. He seemed a mild man and this revival of violence on his manor had unnerved him.

  'So what did they see then?'

  'The reeve says that suddenly our steward here seemed to stagger and fell against my brother. He thought he had had a seizure of some sort, as he was an old man, not in the best of health. Then a moment later, William yelled out and clasped his arm, before sinking to the ground himself.'

  'What then? They ran to them, I suppose?' demanded de Wolfe.

  'When they got to the pair, William was on his knees, grasping his arm with his other hand, trying to stanch the blood that was pouring out. Old Adam here was lying dead in the grass alongside him.'

  'Did anyone see the attackers?'

  Godfrey shook his head. 'I made particular enquiries of the bailiff and groom, but they saw nothing apart from the two victims falling. The bow-shots must have come from within the trees, as it was all open waste and pasture in the other direction.'

  'Did anyone give chase in the forest?' demanded the coroner.

  'Not until later - naturally, my two servants were more concerned with stanching the flow of blood from my brother's arm and then getting hel
p to bring him back here.'

  'But later?' persisted de Wolfe.

  'All this happened less than a few hours ago - you arrived so quickly, thank God. I sent the reeve, the houndmaster and half a dozen grooms and labourers up there about an hour ago. They are still there, but I have had no report of them finding anything or anybody.'

  John turned his attention to the still shape lying on the planks. He nodded to Gwyn and his officer took off the cloak and peered at the dead steward's left side.

  'A quarrel sticking out just below his armpit, Crowner.

  Buried in about half its length, I'd say.'

  As Gwyn lifted the corpse by its shoulder to offer a better view, John, Godfrey and Thomas bent to look at the side of Adam's chest. A thick rod of hard wood, about a hand's span in length, was projecting from the bloodstained yellow cloth of his tunic. The last few inches carried three flights of thin leather set symetrically around the shaft.

  'The tip must be in his heart,' said Gwyn with grudging admiration.

  'I wonder what the range was ... it looks an expert shot.'

  'We need to get it out. It may give us some clue as to its origin,' muttered de Wolfe to his officer. Gwyn nodded and moved around so that his great body was blocking the view of the less hardened Godfrey.

  Thomas, who had been hovering behind, knew what was coming and retreated to the doorway of the undercroft as Gwyn reached behind for his dagger and pulled it from its sheath. With de Wolfe watching closely, he slit the tunic on either side of the arrow and ripped aside the torn undershirt beneath. An experimental pull on the shaft told him that there was considerable resistance inside, so with two bold slashes he enlarged the wound made by the crossbow quarrel and ran his blade down alongside it. With a few hard tugs and some more manipulation of his dagger, there was a squelching sound and the projectile suddenly slid out of the wound.