Figure of Hate Page 29

  'That damned whore from the laundry is the culprit, I'm sure of it!' snapped Richard de Revelle. 'The time has come to try her at the manor court and get her hanged out of the way, the dangerous bitch.'

  De Wolfe glared at him. 'That's utter nonsense, and you know it! She had neither the weapon nor the motive to repeatedly stab the victim.'

  He jerked his head at Gwyn to follow him towards the door.

  'I came to question your armourer and his assistant again. They will be required. in Exeter the day after tomorrow for a resumed inquest on the murdered silversmith. You will make sure that they are there an hour before noon at the courthouse in the castle. This man Longus failed to appear last time, but if he flaunts this attachment that I have placed upon him, you'll soon be looking for a new armourer!'

  With his team trailing after him he marched out, ignoring his brother-in-law completely. Out in the bailey, he stopped and rubbed his stubble thoughtfully.

  'Before we go looking for Longus and his crony, I may as well have a word with the girl Agnes. I suppose she'll be around the back of the house in one of those huts.'

  Gwyn was most familiar with the domestic arrangements, as at every place they visited he made a point of rapidly getting on good terms with the domestic servants, especially the cooks.

  'The wash house is next to the main kitchen,' he declared, striding around the side of the manor house. They found Agnes, together with another girl who worked at laundering and mending the Peverels' linen, dumping a batch of washing into a large wooden tub. A ten-gallon cauldron hanging on a tripod over a firepit supplied hot water, and Agnes was rhythmically prodding the soaked fabric with a club-like stick. The other girl, little more than a child, was throwing in a handful of crude soap, made from goat's tallow boiled with beech ash.

  When Agnes saw the men approaching, she dropped her dolly and came hesitantly towards them, wiping her reddened, crinkled fingers on her ragged kirtle. The big, dark man had been kind to her before, saving her from those bastards Longus and Crues, when they were dragging her from the church, so she felt no fear of him.

  'We just wanted to make sure that you were well, Agnes,' said John reassuringly. 'No one has tried to harm you, have they?'

  The girl shook her head, the untidy plait of hair swinging as she did so.

  'Thank you, sir, but I have been left alone. Though I fear that if you stop coming here, one day they will seize me again, because they need someone to blame.' She looked at him with eyes that held more than a spark of intelligence, belying her rather bovine face. John thought that for a young girl who had almost certainly never set foot outside this village in her whole life, she was far from being a simpleton.

  'You remember nothing more of that night when Sir Hugo died?' he asked, with little hope of any useful reply.

  Agnes's podgy face creased in a frown. 'I can't actually recall any more than I told you before, but ... ' She left the sentence hanging in the air and de Wolfe seized upon it.

  'But what, girl?' he rasped, then was afraid that he had spoken too sharply and might have frightened her words away.

  'That night, sir - and when you gave me questions - I was upset. Now I seem to remember hearing voices when I was leaving the ox byre, but I cannot be sure and I don't know who they might have been.'

  'You said "voices"? You mean there were more than one?'

  The girl look abashed, rubbing her bare toes in a half-circle in the dirt of the yard and twisting her fingers together in nervous concern.

  'I'm just not sure about any of it, sir! It's sort of come to me slowly - as I've thought about that terrible night. I seem to half remember hearing someone - maybe it was one, maybe two. Or maybe none at all!'

  She began to cry and Gwyn, the softest heart among them, went to kneel by her and put a huge arm around her shoulders. 'Don't fret, good girl! You just stop worrying about it, it may come back to you later.'

  He threw a warning look at de Wolfe, but the coroner could not resist one last question.

  'And you have no idea whose voices they may have been?' he asked, in what he imagined was his most gentle voice.

  Agnes sniffed and gulped, then shook her head.

  Gwyn wiped away her tears with a finger the size of a chicken thigh and, as they left her in peace, he slipped half a penny into her hand.

  'Interesting, but of little use, even if what she says was true,' muttered John, as they left the wash house. 'Maybe more than one assailant - and we presume men, not women.'

  'Never saw this stabbing as a woman's crime, Crowner,' growled Gwyn.

  'Two women had a motive - and everyone in the damned village had the opportunity,' retorted de Wolfe. 'Avelina thinks Hugo killed her husband - and Beatrice was tired of living with a philandering adulterer, when she was sweet on brother Joel.'

  They were walking towards another, larger open-fronted shed, set right at the back of the compound against the stockade. This was the forge and armoury, where they expected to confront Robert Longus.

  He was there, as well as his assistant, the heavy oaf Alexander Crues. Both were wearing stained and scorched leather aprons over their tunics and breeches, to protect them from the sparks and hot metal that spat from the anvil on which they were hammering at some small glowing objects. Behind them in the forge, an older man was tending a furnace and a small boy was pumping away at a bellows to keep the charcoal incandescent.

  Longus scowled when he saw the coroner and his three attendants. So far, poor Agnes seemed the only person in Sampford Pevere! who was not unhappy to see them. The conversation took its expected course, with Longus denying any knowledge of anything and truculently refusing to come to Exeter on Thursday, on the grounds that he had absolutely nothing to say about anything at any inquest.

  'You'll come and like it!' barked the coroner. 'Why were you not there the last time?'

  'I told you before, because my master, Sir Hugo, said that I was not to go .. It was a waste of time, he said, and he needed me here to do my work. And he was damned right, too!'

  'Well, as I told you last time, if you're not there on Thursday, the sheriff will send a posse to fetch you back to the gaol in Rougemont! And if you feel like vanishing to avoid them, I'll outlaw you, which is as good as you being dead. Understood?'

  He glared at Robert Longus, then switched his pugnacious expression to the inarticulate assistant, who was standing stupidly with his mouth open.

  'And all that goes for you, too!'

  They strode away, leaving the armourer to blaspheme under his breath at their retreating figures. He pulled off his apron and heavy gloves and threw them on to the ground.

  'I'm off to see Ralph about this. If we've got to go to Exeter, then I want him with us.'

  Eustace was enthralled by what he saw as the drama of the day's visit, and though he continued to plague Thomas with whispered questions, the clerk had become less irritated by the earnest young man. In truth, Thomas began to relish his superior knowledge as the teacher in him came to the fore. He began to enjoy explaining the intricacies of legal procedures and the difficulties of this case, where no hard evidence was forthcoming from anywhere.

  'What are they doing now?' murmured Eustace, as they followed John and Gwyn from the forge back out into the village.

  'Going to see two other suspects again,' said the clerk. 'It often happens that, deep inside, the conscience of a guilty person gives them the desire to confess. If you keep at them, sooner or later they may break down.'

  Thomas delivered this with the air of an expert, though in fact he had only once witnessed the coroner pull this off. Eustace was suitably impressed, however, and looked at the clerk with added respect. They all went out of the manor bailey and up to the reeve's dwelling, where they found Warin Fishacre outside in his half-acre croft, hammering in a stake to tether the house cow on to a fresh circle of grass. His son-in-law Absolon, whose father was Nicholas the smith, was holding the stake, while Warin struck it with a heavy wooden mallet. He stopped a
s de Wolfe led his men through the lopsided gate and they both waited uneasily for them to approach. They were some distance from the thatched house, where a young woman sat outside on a stool, feathering and gutting a pair of fowls.

  'What brings you here again, Crowner?' asked the reeve, suspiciously.

  John went straight to the heart of the matter, his frustration over this case making him feel that there was nothing to lose.

  'Did you or your son-in-law kill Hugo Peverel?' he asked bluntly. 'You both had good cause, as I understand it.'

  Fishacre looked quickly across to the house and decided that his daughter was out of earshot. 'Good cause indeed, Crowner! I would gladly have hanged for his death - but God saw fit to bring it about by other means.'

  'And I thought of killing the bastard, but I was too much of a coward,' said Absolon, a large young man with an open face and shoulders like an ox from working in his father's smithy. 'No, Crowner, we didn't send him to hell, where he surely is. But I will admit to you that 1 threw that cow turd on to his coffin, for I suspect that you'll not tell our masters in the manor house.' He looked with sad eyes towards his young wife. 'Though it's early days, she already suspects she's with child. And the devil of it is that we'll not know if it's mine or his.'

  'Unless the child is born with red hair,' muttered Warin, looking up at his son-in-law's black locks. 'But it won't be the first Peverel bastard in the manor. There are a few here already, living in squalor while their fathers enjoy the fruits of our labour, living in style in their big house.'

  His voice dripped with bitterness, and de Wolfe glimpsed again the enmity and hate that seemed to pervade this village. He kept at them for a few more moments, trying to shake their stubborn denials, but his heart was not in it. John felt instinctively that much as the Fishacres had yearned for Hugo's death, they had no hand in it - and in truth, looking at this riven family, he would have had little stomach for trying to prove it, even if they had.

  The Exeter men moved on up the track to the thatcher's hut, which was smaller than the reeve's dwelling, just a single room of wattle and daub. At least it had a good roof, as Godwin could ply his own trade upon it, using reeds and straw left over from other buildings.

  The thatcher's family were having their dinner when John arrived. He motioned to the others to stay at the gate, while he went to the open doorway and put his head inside. The hut had virtually no furniture apart from a few stools grouped around the clay rim of the central fire-pit. Hazel-withy hurdles divided off two corners where straw and ferns under sacking covers provided beds for Godwin, his wife and surviving son, a youth of about eighteen. The far end of the long room had a more substantial wooden partition, beyond which could be heard - and smelt - a cow and a suckling calf. In a small wooden cage on the floor, a slinky ferret scrabbled at the bars, desperate to escape. No doubt the owners would claim it was to catch rats, but John knew that a more likely purpose was illegal coney hunting.

  Godwin, a burly man of about fifty, had flaxen hair turning grey at the temples. One side of his face was stained a livid red from a birthmark that extended from his eyebrow to his jaw. He sat on one of the stools, eating porridge from a wooden bowl with a horn spoon. His wife, a wan, sickly creature, was standing over the fire, ladling the thick gruel from a pot into a bowl held by her son, who crouched on the other stool. There was no table, but a shelf on one wall seemed to function as the woman's kitchen, as it carried a few earthenware cups and some homemade wooden platters.

  When they saw the coroner's shadow in the doorway, the thatcher and his son climbed to their feet and stared at him, while the Wife backed away to the wall, a hand to her mouth in consternation.

  'You're back, sir?' said Godwin, more as a question than a statement. 'We thought the law had given up on Sir Hugo's death.'

  John raised his hand, palm forward in a placatory gesture. 'Sit down and finish your dinner. I'll not keep you long. I've not been able to return lately, as I had to go out of the county these past couple of weeks.'

  'What brings you now, sir?' asked the youth, a younger copy of his father in his Saxon colour and features, though he had been spared the disfiguring birthmark. He had bits of straw in his hair, which showed that he was following his father's trade.

  'We've not forgotten the crime that was committed here,' said de Wolfe. 'These matters take time, but the law never gives up trying to administer justice.' He managed to say this with more conviction than he actually believed, given the calibre of many law officers, such as the corrupt de Revelle or the lazy de Furnellis.

  Godwin waved an arm at his wife, who was cowering against her cooking shelf. 'Gunilda, bring that other stool for the coroner. Sir, will you have a cup of ale? That's all I can give you, unless you would like some of this poor fare.' He pulled his spoon out of the porridge, which made a sucking noise, so glutinous was the texture.

  John hastily declined both the offer of a seat or refreshment.

  'I have to ask this, Godwin Thatcher - of you and of your son here. It is common knowledge in the village that you had cause to hate your last lord, Hugo Peverel., Is that not so?'

  Gunilda gave a muffled sob and buried her face in her arms. Her husband looked stolidly at the coroner. 'Why should we deny it? He was a cruel and vile man. He took my eldest son and killed him on his damned gallows-tree, before our very eyes.'

  The son suddenly kicked his stool across the room in a fit of anger.

  'And for what? Killing an already wounded hind, so that we could have something decent to eat for once. This is not part of the royal forest with their harsh laws, he could easily have overlooked it.'

  John nodded, for he knew that poaching was a way of life in the villages, especially for the poorest people. The only real offence was getting caught.

  'That's as may be, but did you kill him in revenge? You had motive enough and everyone in the manor had the opportunity.'

  The wife burst out crying and fled to the other end of the hut, where she vanished behind the screen to cower down with the cattle.

  'Would I admit it now, if I had, Crowner?' said Godwin calmly. 'I tell you, if I had known that I could have got away with such a deed, I would have killed the bastard. But I am a coward and have a sick wife and a son to look after. I could not afford to let my neck be stretched like my poor Edwin.'

  'And your other son here? Did he avenge his brother's death?'

  The younger man shook his head slowly. 'It never came into my mind, sir. Perhaps it should have, but it seems beyond the comprehension of simple cottars like us to even think of killing one of our lords. We don't dare even to speak out of turn before them, let alone murder them.'

  As with Warin Fishacre, the coroner felt that these folk were telling the truth - and if they were not, there seemed no prospect of them admitting anything. He tried badgering them a little more, but was met with the expected stolid denials.

  As he turned to leave, he had one last question. 'And the putrid rat?' he asked, with a lift of his black eyebrows.

  The shadow of a smile passed over Godwin's face. 'It must have fallen from my pouch when I bent over the grave, Crowner!'

  Chapter Thirteen

  In which Crowner John examines a strap

  In spite of the bailiff's forecast, Reginald de Charterai did not appear at Sampford by the time that John de Wolfe was ready to leave. As he wished to ask him for news of Matilda, he decided to return to Exeter by way of Tiverton, the distance being about the same as going down the CuI m valley via Cullompton.

  With Gwyn alongside him and the clerk and his eager pupil behind, he trotted through the early autumn afternoon along the rutted but thankfully dry track. When the village was left behind, they passed through wooded land for a mile, wliere some trees had already turned yellow or russet.

  'Maybe we're on Richard de Revelle's land now,' observed Gwyn. 'Perhaps he'll arrest us for trespassing! '

  John was in no mood for jokes where his brother-in-law was concerned. 'It's the King
's highway, though no doubt he'd like to seize it for himself and put it to the plough,' he rasped. A ready sense of humour was not one of de Wolfe's attributes and the mischievous Gwyn often teased him, though John was usually unaware of it.

  'Where are we going to find this French fellow?' he asked.

  The coroner nudged Odin with his knees to speed him up a little - he disliked using his spurs except in urgent situations.

  'He's lodging there, so if there's a half-decent inn, that should be where we'll find him.'

  'Be discreet, then, if he's with two comely ladies!' said the irrepressible Cornishman. 'Best knock on the chamber door first!'

  That managed to raise a grin on John's face, though the prim little Thomas tutted under his breath as he caught the gist of it from behind.

  But de Wolfe was wrong about finding them in Tiverton, for as they rounded the next bend between the trees, they saw a small cavalcade approaching. At a walking pace, de Charterai was on his black charger between two palfreys carrying Avelina and Beatrice sitting side-saddle, both enveloped in hooded riding cloaks that left only their faces and gloved hands visible. Behind came two grooms on ponies, carrying cudgels and maces. The ladies' maids had been left at home, as the pair of widows acted as each other's chaperone.

  The two groups met and remained mounted, but when introductions had been made, they rearranged themselves in an almost hierarchical fashion. John stopped alongside Reginald, Gwyn gravitated to the escorting grooms and Thomas and Eustace went to pay their respects to the ladies. Eustace seemed to make a hit with Bertrice, with his smart clothes, charming manners and cultured speech, and even Thomas became quite articulate with Avelina, who was of a religious disposition and soon learned about the clerk's imminent readmission to the Church. This left de Wolfe free to talk to the French knight about his wife's journey to Normandy.