The Manor of Death Read online

  Thomas also fell to his knees and with hands clasped towards the altar began declaiming aloud in Latin. The two law officers bobbed their heads, dropped to one knee and crossed themselves as a token to their faith and waited for the two black-robed figures to climb to their feet.

  As with all churches; there were no seats on the packed-earth floor of the nave, but the parish priest led them to the stone ledge that ran around the church, used by the aged and infirm who 'went to the wall' when necessary. They sat in a row and waited to hear what Henry of Cumba had to say.

  'I have prayed to God for guidance and His consent - or at least to avoid His wrath,' began the priest.

  He fell silent, and Thomas had to prompt him. 'Tell us about Seaton, Henry.'

  'When I heard that my fellow priest across the river had felt obliged to tell something of what that poor lad Simon had confessed, I went to see this brother in God. We spoke long and earnestly about the sanctity of the confessional, when the substance concerns the very lives of our flock.'

  'Have you learnt something here about the crimes that have been perpetrated?' grated the sheriff, somewhat insensitively given the obvious temerity and reluctance of his namesake to speak, but Henry appeared not to hear de Furnellis's words.

  'We tried to separate that which is given in formal confessional for the seeking of absolution for sins and purification of the soul - from what might be said to a parish priest as a personal friend and counsellor. We came to the conclusion that it was difficult and sometimes impossible.'

  Thomas took it upon himself to try to interpret this philosophical dilemma. 'You are unsure what you may tell others of what you learn from your parishioners, is that it?'

  Henry nodded. 'We also decided that the division between the two was not a fixed point but moved according to the seriousness of the matter concerned. A confession about lewd thoughts or pilfering apples was not in the same class as murder or putting lives at risk.'

  De Wolfe was becoming impatient with this priestly long-windedness. 'So what is it that you feel able to tell us, Father Henry - if anything?'

  The sheriff chipped in again. 'Remember, many lives have been lost, and if it were not for our subterfuge this week another full ship's crew would have been slaughtered!'

  The parish priest looked doleful and chastened. 'I realise that - I have heard today that that evil shipmaster is now known to have strangled the unfortunate lad whose body I found. It was that and the knowledge that the same man intended the deaths of those shipmen this week that has decided me to speak.'

  Thank God for that, thought John, and he meant it literally. 'Tell us what you know! It may save more lives. Do you know who killed the Keeper of the Peace and the pedlar?'

  Henry looked at his fellow priest, Thomas de Peyne, and the little man nodded reassuringly for him to continue.

  'This was not heard in this church as a confession, so I feel free to repeat it, even though I suppose it was meant as a confidential whisper. One of the villagers, admittedly a little free with his tongue from drink, told me that he had heard someone boasting in the tavern across there that they had 'seen off' a drunken pedlar who was poking his nose into business that did not concern him.'

  The sheriff roused himself and leant across, his bloodhound features only inches from the priest's. 'Ha! And who was that someone?'

  The other Henry hesitated, then took the plunge. 'It was one of the carters who take goods inland somewhere. That's their wagon in the barn.'

  The sheriff and coroner exchanged a look of triumph. Though the chain of confession was tortuous, they were getting somewhere at last.

  'And what else do you know, father?' asked John encouragingly. 'Tell us anything that you feel is not sacred to your confessional. It may save more lives.'

  'No more confessions, but now that I have started I can tell you that with my own eyes and ears I know that the portreeve and that man from Exeter have been up to no good in respect of the goods that pass through this harbour. And I suspect that that surly wretch from the priory is mixed up with them, too.'

  'What have you seen, brother?' asked Thomas, trying keep up the momentum now that the old priest's tongue had been loosened.

  'Elias sometimes seems to forget that I can read as well as himself. I have been in that chamber where they scribe all their records many times - in fact, I slid back in there deliberately not long ago when no one was there.'

  'You checked the records, you mean?' asked John. 'But we have done that endlessly and have no means of telling whether they are true or false.'

  Henry tapped the side of his nose. Now that he had committed himself to his saga of disclosures, he almost seemed to be enjoying it. 'You had no means of checking against John Capie's tallies, did you? I went out of my way to ask Capie to explain how he did it with his sticks and his cords - just as a matter of idle curiosity, you understand? Then when I saw them on Elias's table, along with what Elias had listed in his rolls, I saw that there were numerous omissions in that day's entries.'

  'Do you mean in respect of the Customs dues on the wool?' asked de Furnellis.

  The priest was scathing in his dismissal of the sheriff's suggestion. 'No, not that! Everyone knows that the wool tax is fiddled all the time; John Capie and the bailiff see to that. I mean the alleged imports of wine, and cloth and fruits - sometimes even tin and marble!'

  'Why didn't you tell us this before?' snapped the sheriff.

  The old priest stared at the floor. 'I have to live here, my son. I am old and have not much longer to endure this world, but there is nowhere else I can go.' He faced the altar and crossed himself, Thomas following suit. 'I turned a blind eye, God forgive me, until that lad was strangled and I saw his young body in the pit I meant for my dog. Then the Keeper was slain and that drunken hawker. My conscience began to overwhelm me, and now that you king's men have descended upon us and will carry off those who would have wreaked vengeance on me if I had betrayed them I cannot hold my tongue any longer.'

  He sank to his knees and began to pray again. It seemed that he had said all he was going to divulge. 'Stay with him, Thomas,' murmured de Wolfe. 'When he is ready, take down every word he said and see if you can get more detail.'

  They left the two clerics talking to their Maker and left the church, going directly across the track to the thatched building opposite. As they entered the Harbour Inn, they saw the surly landlord hurrying out of the back door to see what was going on in the yard behind, beyond which was the barn where the coroner had lodged on a previous visit. As they followed him, they heard shouting and scuffling and found Ralph Morin and Gwyn coming across the yard, helping two soldiers to subdue two scruffy men who were turning and twisting in their grip.

  'Found these two sods hiding together in the privy,' announced Gwyn with a great grin on his face. 'We thought of pushing them down the hole, but I thought you might want to speak to them first!'

  The sheriff grabbed the innkeeper by the shoulder. 'Who are these men?' he demanded.

  'Two of the carters who serve this port,' replied the man, deciding that telling the truth was the best course of action today.

  'No, we're bloody not!' yelled one of them, a squat, black-haired man with a face ravaged by cowpox. 'Just travellers, passing through.'

  Just passing through the privy, is that it?' said de Wolfe sarcastically. 'Which of you killed the pedlar, or did you do it between you? We know all about it, so don't waste my time by lying.'

  The reaction was surprising and satisfying to the law officers. Though the pox-ridden fellow again started to rave denials, the other, younger man, thin and fair-haired, tried to fall to his knees but was jerked up by his captors. He began wailing and sobbing, his eyes rolling wildly. 'It wasn't me, it was Dolwin who killed him!' he screeched, jerking his head towards his companion. 'And it was him who did for that bloody Keeper! I had nothing to do with it!'

  Dolwin almost burst a blood vessel trying to struggle from the grasp of Gwyn and a burly man-at-arms to
get at the man who was betraying him. A stream of blasphemies accompanied a promise to 'tear his lying tongue from his head', but Gwyn silenced him with a punch to the belly that doubled him up.

  'Do you know the names of these men?' demanded the sheriff of the tavern keeper, who decided that cooperation was now the safest policy.

  'That one with the scars is Dolwin Veg - and the skinny fellow is Adam Grendel. Both of them are carters, working for the manor.'

  Henry de Furnellis, beginning to feel his age after all the activity of the day, sat himself on a tree-stump and pointed at the two captives. 'Right, we need to hear a little more of their tale,' he said amiably. 'Ralph, get them tied to those fence posts over there. We'll wait until Sir John's clerk is free to take down some confessions. Meanwhile, landlord, we'll all have a jar of ale to revive us after all these exertions!'

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  In which Crowner John receives a shock

  Though John had always considered that Henry de Furnellis made an unenthusiastic, even indolent sheriff, he seemed to have found a new source of energy and even ruthlessness over the Axmouth situation.

  The two carters had been interrogated while roped to the tavern fence. Though the truculent Dolwin Veg had only spat curses at his captors and threats of horrible mutilation at his partner, words had tumbled from Adam Grendel and were duly scribed on to parchment by Thomas de Peyne. Afterwards, the two men were locked into one of the storehouses on the quayside, and soon the other suspects in Northcote's house were herded down to join them. Their protests were bitter and vociferous, but the sheriff blithely ignored them and promised that this accommodation was better by far than that which they would soon enjoy in Exeter Castle. Some bread, cheese and ale were left with them and the doors locked again. Sergeant Gabriel and another soldier were left on guard outside, with instructions to eavesdrop in case any useful information was bandied about during the arguing and recriminations that inevitably must take place.

  The search of the village revealed no other fugitives hiding away nor any further evidence that would help the law officers. It was now late aftemoon and there was no prospect of getting back to Exeter before dusk, as they intended to use the ox-cart to transport the seven prisoners to Rougemont.

  'We'll stay the night in the alehouse,' decided de Furnellis. 'The men-at-arms can forage for themselves in the village and bed down in a couple of the barns.'

  Seeing the way that the village had been stripped of its leading inhabitants, the landlord became more cooperative, especially after the sheriff hinted that people who gave shelter to a couple of murderers might themselves be in trouble. He found potage, cold pork, boiled beans, bread and cheese for them, together with a passable ale and some rough cider, which Henry, Ralph and the coroner's trio ate around a rough trestle in the main room. The tavern was larger than the Bush but had the same low walls of mortared stones supporting the high trucks and rafters which held up the thatch. As they ate and drank they discussed what they had learnt so far.

  'Those two swine we caught here killed the pedlar and the Keeper,' said Morin. 'But was it on the orders of someone else?'

  'I suspect that killing Setricus was on the spur of the moment,' declared de Wolfe. 'They had already caught him spying on their wagon at dead of night and then later trying to steal something from the back of it. They had to get rid of him for their own safety.'

  The sheriff spat a piece of pork gristle into the rushes on the floor, where a pregnant bitch immediately slunk up and seized it. 'But surely the killing of our poor Luke de Casewold and his clerk was done in cold blood,' he said.

  De Wolfe tore off a piece of barley bread to wrap around a slice of the tough meat. 'I don't know about that. It depends on what that foolish Keeper was up to. He told me he was going to haunt the roads at night to catch them shifting stolen goods. Maybe they caught him red-handed?'

  'Or perhaps they set a trap for him, as we did for Martin Rof?' hazarded Ralph. 'If he was making a dangerous nuisance of himself, then the ringleaders may have decided to get rid of him.'

  'But who are the ringleaders?' grunted Gwyn. 'I'm confused as to who's guilty of what!'

  'Henry Crik is certainly one of them, for the younger carter admitted that they got their orders from him as to where to drop off their goods,' said Thomas, timidly joining the conversation.

  The sheriff agreed. 'He may be the centre of this conspiracy, as being a merchant's agent he would travel the county and could find customers who wanted cheap goods. Then he organised these carters to deliver what was ordered at the right places.'

  'The portreeve is also a leading figure in this,' said John. 'It was his falsification of Capie's tallies that allowed the documents to appear legitimate, if they were questioned - as we did and the Prior of Loders does at intervals, so he claims.'

  'What about John Capie - is he a criminal as well?' grunted Ralph.

  'He probably knew what was going on. I fail to see how he could not,' replied Henry. 'But he's small fry compared with the others, though I'm sure he fiddles the wool tax for a cut from the exporters.'

  De Wolfe wondered if his own partner Hugh de Relaga or his minions took part in this sort of evasion - then decided he did not wish to know.

  'Edward Northcote - he's the problem, I feel,' said Ralph. 'Is he or is he not involved in piracy and theft?'

  There was a pause, broken only by sounds of chewing and Gwyn slurping his ale. 'I just don't know,' said John eventually. 'It's hard to see that a bailiff of a place like this doesn't know everything that goes on here. But no one has put the finger on him so far.'

  'We'll see who cracks first after we get them back to Rougemont,' said de Furnellis grimly. 'A spell in the undercroft should loosen a tongue or two!'

  The journey back to Exeter next day was painfully slow, as the two oxen moved at a snail's pace. The sheriff and constable left most of the troop of soldiers behind and trotted away over the horizon with a couple of men, but John de Wolfe, who was in no particular hurry, stayed with the caravan. This suited Thomas, to whom horse-riding at anything more than walking pace was a miserable experience. They trudged all day across the southern part of Devon, the cries and curses from inside the covered cart becoming less shrill as no one took any notice of them. The prisoners' wrists were tied together and the ropes passed from one to the other, so there was no possibility of escape. The most vociferous was Brother Absalom, who called down vengeance from everyone above, from God Himself to the cherubims and seraphims.

  By early evening the cart had reached the castle, and the passengers were given over into the care of the evil guardian of the undercroft. Gabriel had reported that when they had been locked in the barn at Axmouth, his efforts to hear anything incriminating had been frustrated by Henry Crik, who had ordered everyone to shut up and say nothing, as it was obvious to him that they were being spied upon. The sheriff agreed with de Wolfe that it was probably a waste of time to have someone listening all night in Rougemont, especially as they were all in different cells.

  John took Odin back to his stable and went thankfully to his own door across the lane. He was weary and anxious, but at least the last traces of the boil on his buttock had disappeared, so the long ride had not been too uncomfortable. As he had not returned the previous night, Mary had no idea when to expect him, but he soon had a cup of wine in his hand and a promise of food within the hour. He sank gratefully into the chair near his hearth, with Brutus at his feet, though given his absence and the mild weather Mary had not lit a fire in the empty grate.

  'No message from my wife?' he called at her departing figure as she went back towards the cook-shed.

  'Nothing at all, Sir Coroner,' she replied. 'She's keeping you dangling, right enough!'

  He sat with the pewter cup in his hand and sipped the good red wine of Aquitaine as he pondered the situation. 'Bloody woman!' he muttered to his dog. 'She's doing this on purpose, to make my life difficult. She knows now that I'm leaving for London, but how can I g
o not knowing what she's intending to do?' Brutus looked up at him, head on one side, but the hound had no suggestions to offer.

  John sipped again and thought of Nesta. He had posed the big question to her, but she had given no answer, either. Could he just ride away to Westminster or wherever and leave her behind? She had promised him an answer when he returned, but he was almost afraid to hear it. However, the nettle must be grasped, and as soon as Mary had fed him he would go down to Idle Lane and hear her decision. He felt like someone arraigned at the Eyre of Assize, waiting for the justices to deliver a verdict that could send him to the gallows!

  Mary had no chance to go out to buy fresh food at that time of the evening, so she raided her stores and found three smoked herrings hanging from a nail in the rafters of her cook-shed. She grilled these on skewers over her firepit and served them with boiled cabbage and fried onions. After two decades of eating whatever could be found during campaigns in forest, desert and ravaged countryside, John ate anything that was put before him and made no comment about this peculiar combination. Too early in the season for fresh fruit, it was followed by a bowl of nuts and raisins and a small loaf of fine wheaten bread, a change from the usual coarse ones made from barley or rye.

  By now, dusk was falling, and when he had finished his solitary meal he plucked up his courage and whistled for Brutus to make the customary walk down to the Bush. As he went, he again thought of the familiarity of the route and the fact that within weeks it would be just a memory.

  As he passed through the twilit lanes, men touched fingers to their foreheads and women bobbed their heads respectfully. The tall, slightly hunched figure dressed in black was a familiar sight to most people in the city, loping along with his dog at his side. They knew him for a stern but fair and honest man, which was more than could be said for many in similar positions of power and influence. Those who had already heard that he was leaving for London wondered if his successor would be as well respected as Sir John de Wolfe.