Yet Simon was also aware of a niggling doubt at the back of his mind: if a monk did wish to murder, he would scarcely leave Tavistock carrying a large club studded with nails! He would prefer to concoct a weapon out on the moors, where no one could see and comment.
* * *
The shouts of ‘Murder! Murder!’ brought Nob to his senses. He leaped forward, shoving through the crowds, and soon reached the side of the fallen sergeant. He paused, looking down at the body. As he did so, he saw a grimy hand reach out to the man’s purse and a dagger slice through the laces that held it on the belt. Then a pair of pale eyes glanced up and met his, before the lad suddenly turned and pelted through the crowds.
‘Oh, bugger!’ Nob swore, and set off in pursuit.
The boy was fleet, but there were too many people in his way. He tried to dodge and slip between legs, but as Nob came closer, he gave a squeak and dropped the purse, sprang through a narrow gap, and then hurtled off along an alleyway.
Nob stood catching his breath. The boy was unknown to him, and to be honest, he didn’t want to see him get caught. There was little satisfaction in the hanging of a mere child. He took up the purse and weighed it. It was heavy with his own coins! With a discontented grunt, he took it back to Jack, and dropped it onto the sergeant’s breast.
The Sergeant coughed and tried to sit up. ‘Eh? What? Who fucking hit me? I’ll break his sodding neck, the—’
‘It was a monk. He didn’t want you to kill someone right in front of him. A cutpurse took your money. It’s there.’
‘Sod the money! I was going to knife that bastard when someone hit me,’ Jack said, every word making him wince. ‘It was “Red Hand” Armstrong, God rot him!’
‘Who?’
‘The murderer who attacked the monk, the man who murdered Peter’s girl, the man who led the Armstrongs after they were slaughtered by my master and me!’ Jack exclaimed, struggling to his feet, but as soon as he was up, he staggered as though his knees were turned to jelly.
Nob wasn’t sure what he was talking about, but to him it sounded as though Jack’s head injury was worse than he’d thought. When Jack bent and threw up, his opinion was confirmed. ‘Wait here, I’ll get you help,’ he said kindly. Asking another man to keep an eye on him, he hurried off to find Ellis. It was obvious that Jack really needed a vein opened.
Ellis was finishing shaving a man’s chin when Nob found him. He completed the job swiftly, threw some knives and a bowl into a bag and went back with Nob to find Jack.
‘Bare your arm, fellow,’ Ellis said. ‘From your face, your humours are all unbalanced. I have to bleed you.’
‘Oh, shit. I don’t usually have to pay to lose my blood,’ Jack said with a feeble attempt at humour. He held out his forearm, and the knife was applied, the blood caught in a bowl held beneath.
‘Where has the bastard gone?’ Jack asked, staring about him with a frown.
‘Who?’ Nob asked.
‘“Red Hand!” He was here. I was going to kill him, but someone struck me down first.’
Nob shrugged and Jack went through the story again, of how he and Sir Tristram caught the Armstrongs and slaughtered them, but missed ‘Red Hand’ and two others.
‘What did he look like?’ Ellis asked sceptically as he studied the congealing blood in his bowl, stirring it with a finger, while Nob applied a styptic and bandage to the cut.
Jack told them, and then caught sight of their expressions. ‘What name does he use here?’
Ellis shot a look at Nob. ‘Joce Blakemoor. Could he be a felon?’
* * *
Baldwin listened to the coroner with only half an ear while he contemplated the body.
This was an unpleasant little murder, a brutal killing with no evident motive, and there was also the second issue, that of the disappearance of the novice. The two could well be related in some way, but it was hard to see how. Surely such men as a tin-miner on the moors and a novice from Tavistock were so far divorced from each other that they could not have met?
The coroner had soon dismissed the jury and witnesses, and when they were all leaving and Baldwin could talk to Sir Roger alone, he raised the matter although, conscious of the abbot’s stipulation, he did not mention the reason for his interest.
‘Do you think that the miner would have any involvement with the abbey?’
Coroner Roger raised an eyebrow. ‘Why? What’s the abbey got to do with him?’
‘I don’t know. I was merely wondering whether there could be some connection with the abbey rather than with the poor folk who work out here.’
‘And that’s all?’ the coroner asked. ‘It seems to me you know something I don’t.’
‘I know nothing, but I have been asked to look into things,’ Baldwin agreed. ‘The problem is, there is an ancient superstition here that a band of monks were so debauched and irreligious that they were taken away by the devil. People tend to keep that kind of story close to their hearts and lend more credence to it than they ever would to the truth. I merely wondered whether there could be any substance to that sort of tale.’
The coroner rubbed his chin. ‘Seems odd that people should get that feeling if there’s nothing there. What’s this story about?’
Grudgingly Baldwin told him of the legend of Milbrosa, while the coroner eyed him keenly. When Baldwin was finished, he sighed and stared out over the moors.
‘Look at this land. Desolate, wind-swept, cold and foggy even in summer, and during the winter, you have to avoid almost all of it because of the bogs and mires. It’s no wonder people like to make up tales about the place. So there’s a mad monk here too, is there? Folk in Tavvie would believe that easily enough.’ He cast Baldwin a swift glance. ‘I suppose you won’t tell me any more. Well enough. But I think you have more information that you could give me, if you had a mind.’
‘I assure you, I have told you all I can,’ Baldwin said disingenuously.
‘Hah! Is that the truth? Anyway, I won’t put you under any more pressure. If you’re keeping something back it’s because you either can’t trust me with the truth, which I’d find hard to believe after the cases we have investigated together, or that someone with more power has ordered you to keep it to yourself. And the abbot is a powerful man, isn’t he?’ He held up his hand to stop Baldwin’s quick denial. ‘Enough! Your protestations prove my guess. Very well, so we need to consider whether this miner could have been tied to the abbey in some way. Certainly he was at the coining, so he could have had some sort of contact with the abbey. Perhaps he went to pray at the shrine? Or simply bumped into a monk he knew?’
Baldwin wasn’t convinced. He glanced over his shoulder, and seeing Simon talking to the old miner Hal, he led the way to them.
‘Simon, may we ask this miner some questions?’ Baldwin asked.
There it was again, Baldwin thought to himself. The usually cheerful bailiff gave a most ungracious nod without meeting Baldwin’s eye. It made him look almost shifty, and Baldwin was convinced that there was a block between them, a wall of resentment. He couldn’t understand it. Simon and he had never had a hard word. They had been friends for six years now, and Baldwin was sure he had not given his friend any reason to be angry with him. Perversely, he began to feel a reciprocal bitterness rather than a desire to offer sympathy and find out where the problem lay, and he turned a little from Simon to face Hal.
‘You knew this man Walwynus?’
‘I’ve told the bailiff all I know.’
‘And now you’re going to tell us as well,’ the coroner said happily.
Hal glared at him, but said nothing.
Baldwin said, ‘Did he go to the town often?’
‘No. Hardly had a penny to spend. He only went for the coinings. Four, five times a year.’
‘Was he friendly with any of the monks?’
Hal shrugged, glancing at Simon, who was standing a short way off, listening intently. ‘Don’t know.’
‘Do you often see monks out here?�
�� Coroner Roger asked. Hal tilted his head and flung an arm out towards a tall cross at the top of a nearby hill. ‘See that? That’s a way-marker for the Abbot’s Path. There are always monks wandering from Buckfast to Buckland to Tavistock. We see them all the time. When they aren’t walking about and being a nuisance, they’re talking to folk and getting in the way, or sometimes preaching. They’re a pain in the cods.’
‘Are they always monks?’
‘What do you mean?’
Baldwin smiled reassuringly. ‘There are others who wear the habit, aren’t there? Friars, for example. And novices.’
‘Oh, yes. The almoner, Peter, he sometimes has younger lads up here. I think it’s to teach them safety on the moors, in case they are ever sent out to Buckfast.’
‘This almoner is a regular visitor up here?’
Asking the question, Baldwin heard Simon make a tiny sound, like a grunt, as though he was suddenly listening so carefully that he had all but forgotten to breathe.
‘Peter’s often up here, yes. There’s a shepherd boy over toward Ashburton – John, he’s called. Orphaned, he’s been looked after by the abbot for some years. Recently he was crushed by a falling tree-limb and broke his leg. The abbot’s almoner is often up that way to see him and pay him.’
‘Pay him?’ Baldwin asked.
‘Yes. He has a half-wage while he’s ill. The abbot takes his charity seriously,’ Hal said without irony.
‘Are you aware of the almoner or any of these novices talking to Walwynus?’
‘What would an almoner have to do with a man like him?’
‘He was a poor man; a poor man is often provided for by alms.’
‘What, you think Brother Peter would give out his money to a miner who fell on hard times? Wally would have to have been beggared in the town itself for Brother Peter to consider him; Wally had land and the ability to work.’
‘Perhaps one of the novices knew Walwynus before taking the tonsure?’
‘It’s possible. But if you reckon to suggest Wally was father to any of them, well, I’d guess you’d be wrong. He enjoyed the whores when he could, but I doubt he’d have had a child without me knowing. If he had, it’d be living in Tavistock still, not out Ashburton way.’
There was no way to put that to the test, Baldwin noted, yet it could be a useful line of enquiry for the future. He was worried about the disappearance of the novice still; the idea of the lad running away was attractive, if only because the other possibility, that he had been killed, was so repellent. That would surely mean that another novice, or monk, was a murderer.
That thought led him to muse, ‘This Peter… some monks have fathered their own children, and…’
‘Brother Peter only came here-a few years ago,’ Simon said. ‘If this boy was a shepherd, he must be more than eight years old.’
‘He’s fourteen,’ Hal supplied.
‘Not his own, then,’ Baldwin said reluctantly. He glanced, at Simon, acknowledging his help, and Simon tried to smile. He looked as though he was suffering from piles. What on earth was the matter with his friend? Baldwin wondered. He swore to himself that he would tackle Simon as soon as he could.
He turned back to the miner. ‘Have you seen any monks or novices up here recently? Or just travellers generally who look out of place?’
Hal scowled up at him. ‘There was one fellow earlier during the inquest. I saw him, running as if the devil and all his hounds were after him. Straight up along the Abbot’s Way, past us and on eastwards.’
‘Who was it?’
‘I’ve seen him before.’ Hal stuck out his jaw and scratched at his chin. ‘Lad called Art, who works as servant to Joce Blakemoor, the receiver.’
Baldwin’s eyes followed his pointing finger. ‘What lies that way?’
‘Go far enough and you’ll get to Buckfast.’
‘Is there anything between us here and the town?’
‘Only the travellers. Don’t think there’s anything else.’ Baldwin smiled. ‘One last thing. These travellers. Where would we find them?’
Chapter Twenty
Joce stalked across his hall still bellowing for his servant, but Art was nowhere to be seen. Feeling thwarted, Joce stormed through to the buttery and drew off a quart of wine himself before carrying it back to the hall, where he sat down before his fire. The embers were smouldering pleasantly, and he threw some sticks onto it and sat back to wait until the flames should begin to lick upwards.
It was good that he had managed to see off that cretinous fool of an arrayer. It would be better still if Sir Tristram failed to win the King’s approval for his contract and had to pay for the food for all those peasants out of his own pocket. Not that Joce cared much now. He had enjoyed the altercation while it lasted, had done his duty as he saw it. He drank and sullenly gazed at the fire.
This had been a bad week, he thought. First there was the problem with the girl, then the neighbour, and finally the death of Walwynus. That was a problem, too.
With that thought, his eyes went to the cupboard. He hadn’t looked at it since that night when Sara had come here, he thought. When she arrived he had been counting all the pieces. Next week he would ride off to Exeter with it all and sell it. That would settle his debts and turn him a handsome profit.
It was as he rose and was about to walk to the cupboard, that he heard the rapping on his door. In two minds whether to answer it or leave it, Joce stood a moment, but then swore and strode out to the front of his house.
‘Thank God you’re here! I came as soon as I heard…’
‘Calm down, you fool! Jesus! What are you doing up here? You useless piece of donkey shit, what have you got between your ears – cloth?’
‘Let me in. It’s not me who’s going to be hanged, is it?’
Joce grabbed a handful of the man’s habit, hauled him inside and kicked the door shut. He thrust hard, and the man was forced against the wall, then up, with Joce’s hands beneath his chin. He held his face close. ‘Are you threatening me, Brother?’
‘Let me down!’
‘Why, Brother Augerus,’ Joce said, leaning closer so that he could see the naked terror in the steward’s eyes, ‘how nice of you to drop in. Would you like some warmed wine? Or mulled ale? Or would you prefer me to throw you into my fire and leave you there to burn?’
‘Joce, let’s talk, all right? I came here as soon as I heard.’
‘Heard what?’
‘That the boy has bolted! Gerard, the acolyte we used to steal for us, he’s gone! Ran off last night, from the sound of it.’
‘So what?’
‘What will he live on, Joce?’ Augerus allowed a little sarcasm to enter his voice. ‘We monks are sworn to poverty, aren’t we? What if he takes money or plate from someone else to pay for his escape?’
Joce wavered, drew his head back and eyed Augerus. ‘What are you saying?’
‘He’ll be caught. He will have to steal to live, won’t he? And he’ll get caught. Felons always do. And when he is, he’s bound to tell them everything, isn’t he? He’s committed apostasy already, so there’s nothing to lose by telling the truth.’
‘Shit!’ Joce licked his lips. ‘I’ll clear it all tomorrow. It’s earlier than I intended, but I’ll have to. Once it’s all in Exeter, sold, no one can appeal us.’
‘Good. Be quick, then. All that plate came from the abbot’s coffers or the church. Christ Jesus! If they find it on you, you realise you’ll hang?’
‘Get out, you craven cur. Leave it to me as usual. I’ll get it sorted.’
Augerus nodded and slipped through the doorway like a wood-louse scuttling under a stone.
Joce locked the door and marched back to his hall. The cupboard was at the wall opposite, behind his table, and he went straight to it, fumbling with his keys. Then he pulled the doors open.
He was so astonished to find it bare that, although his mouth dropped open, he didn’t have the wherewithal to swear.
* * *
Th
e camp was set out in the bend of a little stream, one of those few whose course had not yet been changed. So many were being diverted to feed the miners’ works, it sometimes seemed as though there was nowhere which was left alone. There were times, when he rode over the moors, when Simon felt as if the place was being systematically raped rather than farmed.
Here there were plentiful signs of mining. Small pits had been dug all along the plain before him, the smooth surface of the grass ruined, like a beautiful woman’s face scarred by the pox. These were the results of prospecting. All miners were constantly searching for a new lode because either the existing workings were soon to be exhausted, or they already were. No miner could afford to be complacent.
This place had been worked extensively. There were what looked like thousands of pits, some of which had grown to become great trenches, while others had deepened into shafts. Small piles of rock showed where miners had stored their tools, and little turf-roofed sheds stood all about where the men had lived, but now all looked desolate. They had overtaken several miners on the way here, but this area wasn’t empty because of the inquest, it was deserted because the area had been worked to extinction. Simon could remember when the miners had been here, four or five years ago now. Wally had been here before that, six years ago, digging with his friend in a small claim. After the death of his companion, he had enjoyed some little success, Simon recalled.
But the place wasn’t empty now. Smoke curled up from the fires of the small band of travellers.
They were a colourful group. Men and women alike wore bright reds and greens, oranges and purples. Some of the younger women had their hair braided and unconcealed by wimple or veil, while the men had their hair longer than was strictly fashionable. Simon grunted to himself, thinking that they looked like a band of actors or musicians on the move.
That they were not intending to remain here in one place for long seemed evident by the pony carts that created a defensive wall; one, with a badly broken wheel, sat in an ungainly manner, its shafts pointing to the sky. The folk rested inside this palisade, their rear defended by the stream and, from the look of the cotton-balls dancing in the wind, a bog of some sort.
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