The Elixir of Death Page 5

A curragh was a kind of elongated coracle, a light boat large enough to hold six men. It was made of canvas daubed with pitch, stretched over a frame of hazel withies.

  'Every cog carries a curragh, lashed upside down on its deck,' said Gwyn. 'It's used for getting ashore when the vessel can't come against a wharf - or even as a life-saver if she sinks.'

  'No doubt it was washed off the Mary when she lost her crew and was capsized,' said John.

  Both fishermen shook their heads emphatically. 'Not so, sir! The boat was undamaged and had been dragged up above the tide-line,' said the thin man.

  'There was a keel mark in the sand where it had been pulled up,' confirmed the other fellow. 'And there were two paddles left inside. Someone had landed there, no doubt of that.'

  'It may be nothing to do with the Mary,' objected Thomas stubbornly. 'If this poor lad mentioned "Saracens", surely that means it was attacked by pirates.'

  'Was the curragh one you recognised?' asked Gwyn. The sick-looking local shook his head. 'We know every boat for ten miles along this coast. This was a different style from the few we fishermen build, it was the sort that trading vessels carry.'

  De Wolfe rubbed his bristly face, now black with four days' stubble since his last shave. 'So it seems that someone came ashore - and there's nowhere they could have come from other than a ship, unless it was St Brendan himself!'

  His allusion to the Irish monk who centuries before had allegedly explored the deep ocean in a curragh was lost on these untutored folk.

  'And the only ship around here is stranded on this very beach - and its boat is missing!' said Gwyn with morbid satisfaction. 'Too much of a coincidence not to think that the killers used the curragh to get ashore.'

  'But why, for God's sake?' demanded de Wolfe. 'Why slay a few poor shipmen and let the vessel become wrecked. It wasn't even for the cargo, for that didn't amount to much - and anyway, it's still in the vessel.'

  No one had an answer for him, and after he had made a quick check of the young sailor's body, the fishermen set off with the packhorse to deliver the corpse to the church, where it could lay with the other victims. John then discussed with the bailiff and reeve how best to manage the removal of the cargo and get the stranded cog towed to shelter. After the promise of a small reward, the fishermen and the crabber agreed to help and Osbert the reeve was dispatched upriver to negotiate for a couple of pulling-boats and the men to handle them, so that the Mary could be hauled off on the following day's tide, while the weather still held calm.

  Then they set off after the pony with its unhappy burden, and before mid-morning were back in Ringmore, where they thankfully warmed themselves again in the hall of the manor-house and ate a more substantial breakfast of bread, sea-fish, eggs and fat bacon, before the next stage in their legal proceedings.

  CHAPTER TWO

  In which Crowner John calls upon a new widow

  It was past noon before the coroner could begin his inquest, for they had to wait for Osbert the reeve to return from Bigbury, a village farther inland, where he was seeking men to salvage the cog. He was needed for the proceedings, as he had been declared First Finder. This time, John de Wolfe had a double jurisdiction, not only in respect of the dead men, but also concerning the wrecked vessel.

  None of this had much impact upon proceedings in the tiny manor of Ringmore that day. De Wolfe was the second-most senior law officer in the county, and his superior, the sheriff Henry de Furnellis, was an elderly, easy-going man who was only too content to let John get on with his job in whatever fashion he chose. In this, he was quite different to his predecessor, Sir Richard de Revelle, who was also John's brother-in-law. He had recently been expelled for malpractice, mainly at John's instigation, a fact that made the coroner's married life even more fraught with problems. As he went down to the churchyard for the inquest, de Wolfe remembered with a twinge of unease that his brother-in-law's main manor, Revelstoke, was only a dozen miles farther down the coast, and in fact could just be seen from where they had stopped to survey the wreck. He shrugged off the thought, as he could conceive of no possible way in which Richard could become involved in this present matter, even though John was always suspicious of any of his activities.

  At the gap in the moss-covered stone wall that surrounded the neglected churchyard, John found that the surly village priest was directing everyone across the overgrown area to another opening on the far side, which led to the large tithe barn, standing lower on the sloping terrain.

  'I thought it more seemly for your deliberations to take place there, rather than in my consecrated church,' growled Father Walter, who seemed ill disposed to offer any help to the representatives of the Crown. 'I had the bodies laid out there, together with the new one that you sent.' With that, he loped off to indicate that he wanted no more to do with them.

  'Useless old bugger!' growled Gwyn, who had little time for clergymen, other than his friend Thomas. 'I'll wager he's off to find a skin of wine, even at this time of day.'

  'That's why he's stuck in a God-forsaken place like Ringmore,' replied John. 'The bishop and his archdeacons send the drunks and deadbeats to places like this, where they get even worse.'

  After the manor-house, the tithe barn was the best structure in the village. It was a substantial building of massive oak frames, boarded with panels of woven hazel withies plastered with cob, a mixture of clay, dung and bracken. The steep roof was thatched with oat straw, mottled with moss and growing grass. There was a pair of doors tall enough to admit all. ox-cart piled with hay, and now, at the start of winter, the barn was half full of this sweet-smelling fodder. Heaps of turnips and carrots lay on the floor and piles of threshed oats occupied a boxed platform raised up on large stones in an attempt to keep the rats away. Though a tenth of all this was destined for the church, the contents of the barn represented most of the winter stores that the village hoped would keep them alive until late spring.

  Floor space was limited, and the four corpses were laid in a row just inside the wide-open doors. The coroner stood in the entrance to conduct the proceedings, which were opened by Gwyn in his role as coroner's officer.

  'All ye who have anything to do before the King's Coroner for the County of Devon, draw near and give your attendance!' he roared in his bull-like voice. With his wild red hair and whiskers, he cut a fearsome figure in his coarse woollen tunic, over which his worn leather jerkin fell open to reveal the huge sword hanging from a wide belt, supported by the leather baldric over his shoulder.

  His audience consisted of a score of men from the village, rounded up earlier by the bailiff to act as a jury. In theory, all the males over fourteen from the four nearest villages should have attended, in case any of them knew anything about the deaths under investigation. In a hardworking farming and fishing community this was patently impossible. Though the object of a jury was to provide witnesses, as well as adjudicators, finding so many men and boys from such a wide area was quite impracticable in the time available. John knew this very well and was content to carry on with the handful of men who might know something about the matter, which included Osbert, the fishermen and the crabber. Even old Joel, the recluse from the island, was there, a tall, thin man who looked like an animated skeleton dressed in a ragged robe of hessian, with a poorly cured sealskin cape stinking around his bony shoulders. In spite of his scarecrow appearance, he held himself erect and had the remnants of authority about him, which made the ever curious Thomas wonder as to his past history.

  De Wolfe knew full well that his inquiry would be futile at this early stage, but being a man who stuck rigidly to his royal mandate, he pressed ahead with the formality of the inquest. The first matter was that of 'Presentment of Englishry', which again was a foregone impossibility, given that a hundred-and-thirty years after the Norman invasion, intermarriage had blurred the distinction between Norman and Saxon. And if proof could not be produced, a murdrum fine was levied, so 'presentment' had become merely a cynical device for extorting money from th
e population, especially as all deaths other than those from obvious disease were eligible, even if they were due to accidents or the occasional suicide.

  John de Wolfe still had to apply the out-dated procedure, however, and he began his inquest by glaring around the bemused villeins and freemen of Ringmore, demanding to know whether anyone could prove the identity of the corpses. As the dead men were strangers washed up on a nearby beach - and presumably came from Dawlish, over thirty miles away - there was little chance of anyone present knowing anything about them, but one fellow spoke up in a rather truculent voice.

  'I hear that one of them is called Thorgils, so with a name like that, how can he be anything other than of Saxon blood?'

  From the size of his bulging arm muscles and his leather apron scarred with burns, John assumed that he was the village blacksmith. The coroner knew that the smith was doing what he could to avoid the murdrum fine - usually of several marks - being imposed on the village, as they would all suffer from having to scrape together the hundreds of pennies needed. He replied, but tempered his words with a reassurance.

  'A good point, but I need much better proof. In the absence of any family, then presentment cannot be made and my clerk will so record the fact.' He jerked his head towards Thomas, who was sitting on a small stool just outside the doors, with his writing materials before him on an empty keg. 'But no murdrum fine will be imposed until the Justices in Eyre consider the matter, which might be a year or two in the future. And if the true culprits of this heinous crime are found before then, you will not be amerced.'

  A murmur of relief rippled round the half-circle of jurors, echoed in the background by the group of anxious wives who were clustered around the gateway into the churchyard. Women had no voice in these matters, but they suffered just as much when penalties were imposed on their village.

  The few witnesses were called one after the other, to haltingly say their piece. Osbert described how he had been called to view one body and then found another two. The fishermen repeated their story about discovering the dying boy and the mysteriously intact curragh. The hermit Joel, who had a surprisingly deep and cultured voice for such a wreck of a man, related how he had heard the word 'Saracens' pass the lips of the dying lad, but he could add nothing more of any use. Then John instructed Gwyn to march the jury past the four pathetic corpses, so that they could see the wounds on three of them.

  'It was a large knife, with a wider blade than the usual dagger,' he pointed out in his sonorous voice. 'The younger lad has no wounds, but you have heard how he soon expired from the effects of the sea, being half drowned when they found him on the shore.'

  Gwyn marshalled the men back into line outside the barn, so that the coroner could address them again.

  'There is much more to be learned about this affair, but I must reach a verdict now, so that the dead men may be given a Christian burial. There is no doubt that three of the seamen have been stabbed to death. It is impossible to be sure what happened to the boy, but common sense would suggest that he managed to jump over the side of the vessel when they were attacked. Thus he escaped injury, but perished in the waves.' He glowered along the line of men, his dark head thrust out like a vulture. 'So make up your own minds and get one of you to tell me what you decide.'

  There was a muttered discussion lasting less than a minute, then the blacksmith stepped forward. 'Crowner, we go along with what you said. The three men were slain, but we can't be sure about the lad.'

  De Wolfe nodded his agreement. 'It shall be so recorded. Now I have to consider an easier matter, that of the vessel. The Mary and Child Jesus, a trading cog out of Dawlish, was owned by Thorgils, one of the murdered men. It was washed up on the shore at the mouth of the Avon and as no living thing survived aboard, I now declare it a wreck of the sea.'

  Ancient law stated that a stranded vessel that was totally abandoned became the property of the Crown. If anyone survived on board, the boat and its cargo remained the property of the owners. There had even been cases where it had been successfully pleaded that even a dog or cat left on the ship had prevented the declaration of a wreck.

  'I also take the cargo into the King's custody and I command that it be kept safely.' De Wolfe scowled around the small crowd to impress the point upon them. 'My clerk has a complete inventory of what was in the vessel and I expect every single item to be there when arrangements are made for its collection.'

  He knew only too well that the contents of a ship - and even the structure of the vessel itself - were an irresistible attraction to poor coastal communities. In fact, the Curia Regis had placed wrecks within the coroner's jurisdiction in an attempt to reduce the pillaging that went on, often with the local lord's consent or even active participation.

  The inquest was soon over, and all that remained for John to decide was the fate of the corpses.

  'If we wait until we get back to Exeter before sending a cart down here to fetch them, they'll be stinking by 'the time they reach Dawlish,' said Gwyn, in his typically blunt fashion. It was true that a clumsy ox-cart trundling along the atrocious tracks of South Devon would take many days to make the round trip. William Vado confirmed that there was no carter in Ringmore or any of the nearby villages who would be willing to make the long journey to Dawlish. Eventually, de Wolfe compromised by paying for a local carter to convey the dead men as far as Totnes, where the coroner promised to make arrangements for them to be taken on to Dawlish.

  Their work in the village done, the trio saddled up and by noon were on their way eastwards, the coroner grimly promising the bailiff that he would be back as soon as there was any news of what had occurred on that lonely coast.

  It was the afternoon of the next day when they reached Dawlish, as John had stopped to visit his mother and the rest of the family at Stoke-in-Teignhead, a village just south of the River Teign, not far from where it emptied into the sea at Teignmouth. He had been born and brought up there and had a great affection for the place, where his sprightly mother Enyd, spinster sister Evelyn and elder brother William still held the manor. Their usual effusive hospitality extended not only to John, but to Gwyn and Thomas as well, who were always welcome there. They were plied with food and drink, which the ever hungry Cornishman attacked with gusto, while John brought the family up to date on recent events. In fact it was difficult to get away, and only John's pleading that he must call at Dawlish on the way home allowed them to get back on the road. His family had been saddened to hear that Hilda was now widowed, for she was the daughter of the reeve at their other manor at Holcombe, farther up the coast. They had all known her since she was a child, but the unbreachable gap between a Saxon villein and the son of a Norman manor-lord made it impossible for John's youthful romance with Hilda to flourish. Privately, Enyd would have preferred her as a daughter-in-law to Matilda de Revelle, but it was not to be.

  As the three men rode out of the wooded valley of Stoke, John's mother gazed after them with a twinge of anxiety, as she was well aware of her son's partiality for women and the affection he felt for Hilda. Enyd was also very fond of his Welsh mistress Nesta, especially as she herself had a Welsh father and a Cornish mother. As John vanished beyond the trees, she hoped that Hilda's new availability would not put her son's life in greater emotional turmoil than usual.

  The riders reached the ford at the mouth of the Teign, where thankfully the tide was low enough for them to cross, then went northwards up the coast for a few miles. Dawlish was a village that straggled above the beach, where a small river gave shelter for the vessels that were pulled up on to its sandy banks. Most were fishing boats, but there were two trading cogs lying there, smaller than the wrecked Mary.

  'I'll leave you to it, Crowner,' said Gwyn tactfully, as they reined in in the centre of the hamlet. 'I'll be in the alehouse when you've finished.'

  'And I'll be in the church, praying for the souls of those poor shipmen,' added Thomas rather haughtily, preferring God's house to a tavern.

  John led Odin
down to the river to drink, then tied the reins of the big grey stallion to the rail outside the inn, giving orders to a runny-nosed lad who acted as ostler to find hay for their three studs. Then he loped up a short side lane from the village street, making for the largest house in Dawlish, which lay behind the usual collection of ramshackle dwellings.

  Thorgils had done well from his cross-Channel business, after many years of sailing back and forth with goods in either direction. Some five years before, he had used some of his accumulated wealth to build this fine house, modelled on some he had seen in Brittany. It was all in stone, the only one in this village of wooden dwellings, and had an upper storey, supported in front by two pillars, like a house he had admired in Dol.

  John de Wolfe threw his mantle back over his shoulders as he approached the front door, made of heavy oak with metal banding. Suddenly, he felt apprehensive at being the bearer of such bad news. Though he knew that Hilda had never been in love with her husband, who was more than twenty years older, he was well aware that she had felt affection and respect for him and that Thorgils had always treated her courteously and generously. She had married him twelve years earlier, when John was away fighting in the Irish wars. Though a little piqued and slightly jealous, de Wolfe had been glad that she had found security and comfort, as although his brother William was a most benign lord in Holcombe, the life of an unfree peasant in a small village did not equal that of the wife of a wealthy ship-master. .

  He straightened his habitually stooped shoulders and rapped on the door with the hilt of his dagger. A moment later it opened and Hilda's maid, a pleasant, round-faced girl called Alice, gazed out at him in surprise.

  'Is your mistress at home?' he asked gently, for he knew the girl from previous clandestine visits when Thorgils had been on the high seas. The maid stood aside for him to enter, then led him down a short corridor between two rooms. The house did not have the usual cavernous hall with an upper solar attached - instead, an open wooden stairway rose at the end of the passageway. The girl clattered up the steps before him and went into a chamber at the back of the house, one of the pair that occupied the upper floor. He heard her excitedly announce that Sir John had arrived, then he followed her into the room. Hilda was seated on a padded bench next to an open window that looked over roofs towards the shore. The Saxon woman, now in her mid-thirties, was slim and supple and had long blonde hair falling to her waist, unconfined in braids or a cover-chief when she was at home. She rose quickly as he came in and gazed with pleased surprise at her former lover.