The Witch Hunter Read online

  Ignoring the salute from the sentry he hurried to the keep, stamped up the stairs and turned into the hall. The first thing that confronted him was a group of men clustered around the nearest table, some standing, others sitting down, but all looking expectantly at him as he entered, for one of the servants had signalled his arrival in the inner bailey. Their attitude was unnerving, and among them he saw John de Wolfe, Ralph Morin, the chaplain Brother Rufus, Sergeant Gabriel, the poisonous little coroner’s clerk and Morin’s steward Samuel. His eye was caught by someone sitting with his back to him, unmistakable from the shock of unruly red hair that sprouted from his massive head.

  ‘What’s that man doing here?’ he yelled, his anger flaring at the same time as an awareness of imminent disaster. There was something about the way these men were waiting for him which frightened him, but he put on a bold face, relying on his pre-eminence in the county to carry him through. ‘Morin, I ordered that he be locked up! Are you disobeying my direct order?’

  It was his brother-in-law who answered him, his dark face glowering across at the sheriff. ‘Do you want to continue this in private or are you content to let all these hear our discussion?’ He jerked a thumb over his shoulder at the score of people in the hall, who were straining their ears to pick up any juicy bits of scandal from the row that was so obviously brewing.

  Not deigning to answer, de Revelle wheeled around and walked stiffly to his door, which he unlocked with a key taken from his pouch. Although he made no invitation for them to follow, he left the door wide open and they all trooped in and stood in a half-circle around his table, reminding Gabriel of a pack of hounds holding a deer at bay.

  Richard jabbed a finger towards Gwyn, who was back in his usual amiable mood. ‘I asked, why is this thief still at large? You’ll answer for this, Constable – and you, Sergeant, if you’ve flouted my orders!’

  ‘Stop this nonsense, de Revelle!’ said the coroner, in a tired voice now that the crunch had come. ‘You’ve been caught red handed and you may as well drop this pretence of innocence and prepare yourself for what must inevitably come, when the King and his council get to hear of it.’

  Richard continued to splutter indignantly and try to shout down his brother-in-law’s measured words, but John turned to the clerk Samuel, took two parchments from his hands and laid them on the table before the sheriff. ‘These are quite short – and you always boast of your prowess in reading, Richard. So compare the two and tell me how a written, witnessed inventory of the contents of the Cadbury treasure chest made in this very keep happens to be identical with the list made in Cadbury?’

  As de Revelle rapidly scanned the brief documents, his face became ashen, but he still didn’t give up. ‘This must be some forgery – you are determined to ruin me, by whatever foul means you can devise.’ He seized the list made by Morin’s clerk and tried to tear it half. ‘This is what I think of this imposture,’ he snarled, but the tough sheepskin refused to rip and only crinkled in his hands. Furious and desperate, he held it to the flame of a small lamp that burned on his table for melting the wax for his seals, but again the leathery membrane only curled up and shrivelled in one corner.

  De Wolfe leaned over and pulled it from his fingers. ‘Stop wasting our time, Richard. That’s but an attested copy, made in the last hour. The original is in safe-keeping, ready to be taken to the King’s treasurer and the justiciar.’ He regarded the sheriff with something akin to pity, until he recalled how much mischief he had caused. ‘This is the end, Richard. There is no way in which I can overlook your stealing from our king. You must give up your shrievalty immediately and I will get the Shire Court to appoint a caretaker sheriff in your place until the will of the King is known.’

  The unspeakable prospect of being ejected from the most powerful post in the county, with all the power and perquisites that it carried, galvanised de Revelle into action. His dandified figure almost danced with rage behind his desk as he screamed vilification and denial at the sombre group around him. ‘Give up my position? Are you raving mad, man!’ he screamed. ‘I am the sheriff, I am paramount in this shire! No one can displace me here, no one but the King himself or the greatest men in his Council!’ He waved a shaking fist at the coroner and swung it to include the other disciples of doom clustered around him. ‘So get out of here! I am the sheriff and will stay the sheriff until Winchester or London decide otherwise. You have no authority over me, de Wolfe, you’re a mere coroner. You are as nothing, your useless job is to prod corpses and examine ravished women. And you, Ralph Morin, are just another soldier, my servant, a spear-waver, who has no say whatsoever in the running of this county. Get out, the lot of you, and keep out of my sight!’

  There was a silence. All looked at John de Wolfe to see what he would do or say.

  ‘Bluster will only delay the evil hour, Richard. I suppose I could have you dragged to the gaol where you were so keen to put Gwyn here. But I will content myself with attaching you to appear before the royal justices, when they next come to Exeter, charged with theft and treason, which is inevitably a hanging matter. However, no doubt before then Hubert Walter or perhaps the King himself will decide what should be done, as I will send word to London as soon as possible.’ He stood back and waved the singed parchment at de Revelle. ‘Until then, I suppose you may as well stay here and play at being sheriff, though I will at once make soundings as to who might take over as locum tenens.’

  As he walked to the door, de Revelle’s voice followed him, hissing like a snake, full of evil and spite. ‘You’re going to suffer for this, John! If I fall, then I’m taking you down with me!’

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  In which Crowner John visits his mother

  De Wolfe walked back to Martin’s Lane with mixed emotions churning in his head. He was a straightforward type of person, not overly blessed with imagination and certainly lacking the devious, crafty mind of his corrupt brother-in-law. He derived no joy from what looked like the final downfall of Richard de Revelle, but his somewhat blinkered loyalty to his office and his king made it inevitable that he go through with it. He knew that Matilda would be devastated and, strained as their relationship was, he had no desire to cause her any more grief than was necessary. She had looked up to her brother for most of her life until recently, with the hero-worship of a sibling five years older, one who had climbed to the elevated heights of county sheriff, rich from his marriage to the daughter of a wealthy Somerset baron. Matilda had closed her eyes to his misdeeds for several years, but since her husband had become coroner, his exposure of de Revelle’s repeated skirmishes with treason and his dishonesty had gradually caused the scales to fall from her eyes. Ironically, it was she who had persuaded John to accept the coronership, as she wanted to use his position in the governing hierarchy to elevate her position in the social scale, little knowing that his uncompromising honesty would be her brother’s undoing.

  Now, as he loped along towards their house, John knew that this would be the final straw that would shatter what little remained of her faith in Richard. He was sorry for her, but it would be kinder if she heard it from him rather than through the snide gossip of her friends at St Olave’s.

  His readiness for such compassion almost evaporated as soon as he put a foot through the door of his hall, as she immediately put her head around the wing of her hearth-side chair and attacked him. ‘So, I hear you took that dirty old crone down to the Bush. Now there are two evil witches in that den of sin!’

  John clamped his lips shut to keep in an angry reply and went to a side table, where he poured himself some wine from the jug that Mary had placed there for them. He filled another pewter cup and held it out towards his wife. When she rudely shook her head, he nevertheless advanced on her with the wine. ‘You’d better take it, Matilda,’ he said gravely. ‘I have to tell you something that may distress you.’

  ‘There’s little that can distress me further,’ she snapped sarcastically. ‘You’ve already done everything imaginable
to hurt me.’

  He lowered himself into the seat opposite and took a long sip of his wine. ‘This is not about me, wife. Once again, it’s about your brother.’

  The mention of her former paragon of Norman manhood brought her up short and she dropped her usual carping manner and stared at John uneasily. ‘What about my brother?’

  He returned her gaze steadily, nerving himself to drive home the dagger. ‘In the past, usually at your pleading, I have turned a blind eye to Richard’s failings – even when my loyalty and duty should have prevented me. But this time the matter is out of my hands, as even the King’s exchequer is aware of it.’

  Her hand fluttered to her throat, to lie on the silken wimple that enveloped her face. She knew from the gravity of his tone that this was no ploy in the eternal battle of words between them – this was reality. ‘Tell me what has happened, John,’ she said in a low voice, a tear already appearing in anticipation in the corner of each eye.

  He explained calmly and with no elaboration, how the sheriff had filched part of the Cadbury treasure, unaware that a detailed inventory of it had already been made – and when challenged, had tried to lay the blame on Gwyn, putting him in danger of a death sentence.

  Even at this eleventh hour, Matilda fought for her brother’s reputation. ‘But Cadbury is part of his estate – the treasure should be his!’

  John sighed and patiently explained once again that all England belonged to the Crown and that tenants, be they barons or bishops, had no claim to abandoned gold or silver left in the soil.

  ‘Then these lists must be in error!’ she cried wildly.

  He shook his head. ‘They were checked by no less than six people, four of them literate. I myself was present at Cadbury, and though I may not be able to read and write, I can count coins put in piles of ten.’

  Matilda was silent, her face drawn and ashen. ‘What will happen to him?’ she asked in a low voice.

  ‘That’s up to the chief ministers – Hubert Walter, the treasurer and the chancellor, though undoubtedly the King himself will be informed about such a serious matter involving one of his sheriffs.’

  ‘And the penalty?’ she whispered

  John shrugged, not out of indifference, but because he genuinely did not know. With Richard’s ability to squeeze out of tight corners, given the powerful friends he had in Prince John and some of the bishops, he might get off more lightly than he deserved. ‘There is no way in which he can continue as sheriff,’ he said slowly. ‘It depends on what the Curia Regis think of the matter when they consider it – and what the Lionheart wishes. Strictly speaking, Richard has committed treason, by stealing from the King. Added to the seditious leanings he has displayed in the past, his political career is finished – at least under the present monarch.’

  Matilda sat silently, a tear now coursing down each side of her nose.

  ‘I gain no pleasure from this, lady,’ John said suddenly. ‘I wish I could spare you the sorrow that it must bring. But the matter is not in my hands, the exchequer clerks must deal with it now. However, I am duty bound, as the next most senior law officer in Devon, to deliver the attested list of the treasure to Winchester, otherwise your brother’s false claim that it was stolen could lead to innocent men being blamed.’

  Matilda made no reply, but a moment later rose from her chair and made her way towards the door. ‘I must go to Richard and talk to him. I need to hear from his own mouth that what you have told me is the truth.’

  He followed her to the screens that sheltered the door. ‘You have not yet eaten, Matilda. Wait until after supper and I shall escort you.’

  She shook her head, not looking at him. ‘I am not hungry. I will call Lucille and she can walk with me up to the castle. It will not be dusk for some time yet.’

  She left, and he sat down in the gloomy hall to finish his wine and wait for Mary to bring supper. Tonight even the prospect of going down to the Bush seemed less inviting than usual, though he must go to make sure that Bearded Lucy was still hidden safely away in the brewing-shed.

  His old dog sensed that something was amiss and came to rest his drooling mouth on John’s knee. ‘It’s a strange world, Brutus,’ said his master with a sigh, as he stroked his head. ‘Why does everything always have to be so bloody complicated?’

  When de Wolfe returned later that night, just as the last traces of daylight were fading in the western sky, Mary told him that his wife had sent Lucille home with a message that she would be staying the night with her cousin, a widow who had a small house in the town. There was nothing unusual in this, but John suspected that she wanted to avoid him for the time being. Whether this was to hide her despair about her brother or because she suspected him of plotting the sheriff’s downfall, he could not decide. In any event, he found his way to their lonely bed in the solar and fell into a troubled sleep, partly because of concern about Nesta and the veiled warnings that Lucy had offered about his mistress’s safety. All had been quiet at the Bush that evening and the old crone seemed content to hide away behind a row of ale casks, comfortable enough on a straw mattress, with ample food coming from the cook-house a few yards away. In fact, she was much better housed and fed than she had been in her miserable shack down on the marshes at Exe Island.

  There was no sign of the mob that had chased Lucy earlier in the day, and John hoped that some of the novelty of witch-baiting was wearing off as time went on. What they were going to do with the old woman in the long term was something else that worried him, and he wondered whether the nuns at Polsloe Priory, a couple of miles outside the city, might be able to give her refuge, if she was cleaned up a little.

  Eventually he fell asleep and woke as usual some time after dawn to the novel luxury of being alone on the big feather-stuffed mattress on the floor of the solar. As there was nothing that morning which demanded his early attention, he lay indolently under the single summer blanket until he heard the cathedral bells ring for prime, soon after the seventh hour. He dressed in his linen undershirt and pulled on a pair of breeches instead of his usual hose, as he thought he might take Odin for a canter around Bull Mead, the tournament ground outside the city walls. He searched in his oak chest, which was the repository for his few clothes and took out a clean black tunic, a plain garment that reached from his shoulders to just below his knees. Buckling on the wide belt that carried his dagger and purse-like scrip, he slipped his feet into house shoes and went down the outside stairs to Mary’s kitchen-hut, where she lived with Brutus for company.

  A handsome woman in her late twenties, she was not married, a fact that John often thought strange, but he was thankful that she remained as the mainstay of their household, as Matilda was indifferent to any form of domesticity, being concerned only with her social life, her devotions at St Olave’s and an occasional bout of needlework.

  Being alone, John ate his breakfast in Mary’s kitchen, squatting on a milking-stool before the small table where she prepared the food. She had been out early to the stalls and had brought back several fine sea-fish, caught during the night from boats that worked the estuary between Topsham and Exmouth. Grilled and laid on a thick slab of buttered bread, they were delicious, especially when followed by a couple of new apples and a quart of best ale.

  The dark-haired maid stood over John and watched him eat with the satisfaction of a woman that knew she could please a man not only in bed, but also at the board. However, it had been a long time since they had lain together – and since Nesta had monopolised his affections, she was content to keep him at arm’s length, even though now and then he caught her in a quiet corner and gave her a good kissing.

  This morning they talked of recent happenings and John, who trusted her discretion, told her about the scandal that was soon to break over the sheriff. Mary had known that something was in the wind when Matilda, with a face like stone, had hurried away to the castle late the previous evening and had not returned.

  ‘The mistress will take this very hard, after the pr
evious troubles with her brother,’ she observed. ‘She has been loyal to him against the odds for so long, but this will finish it, I fear.’