Crowner's Quest

by Bernard Knight

  He kicked the chair in which de Wolfe had been sitting, tipping it over with a crash. ‘I’ll not put the man in my gaol! If he doesn’t die of your assault upon him, he can ride out of the city in the morning where he’ll be safe from your lunatic actions.’

  De Wolfe moved towards the door. ‘Very well. I felt I should give you a last chance, Richard. As soon as I have collected a little more evidence, I will go to Winchester or London to tell what I know to the Royal Justices and to Hubert Walter. Fitzhamon intended to do that and I owe it to his memory – and to his young son – to finish what evil men prevented him from completing.’

  As he pulled open the door, the Nero-like figure of the sheriff spat a last warning at him: ‘Have a care, John! For my sister’s sake – and Christ knows she has suffered enough from you – I must warn you that you are on a path that could lead to the gallows.’

  The coroner glared at his brother-in-law from the doorway. ‘Then maybe we will hang side by side on the same gibbet, Richard,’ he said, slamming the door behind him as he left.

  That next morning, the second short day of 1195, saw several urgent conferences in the county of Devon, mostly conducted in low tones with many a cautious look over the shoulder.

  Well before dawn, shadowy figures could be seen entering the Bishop’s palace behind the cathedral, and a keen observer might have recognised both Canon Thomas de Boterellis and Richard de Revelle going in to see Bishop Henry Marshal, who had recently returned from Gloucester. Soon after first light, the first two could have been seen galloping away along the road westward out of Exeter, with a pair of men-at-arms as escort.

  Shortly before this, the coroner had been meeting the Archdeacon in the square chamber at the base of the north tower of the cathedral. In the opposite chamber of the south tower, used as the Lady Chapel, a group of priests and choristers was celebrating the early Lady Mass, but the bell had not yet begun to ring for prime, the first main service of the day, so John de Alencon had time to confer with de Wolfe and Hugh de Relaga, who had accompanied the Coroner to the cathedral. Hugh was a corpulent, cheerful fellow, addicted to colourful, showy clothing. An astute and successful wool merchant, he had been elected by his fellow burgesses as one of the two city Portreeves, the leaders of the civic administration. Unlike the other Portreeve, Henry Rifford, Hugh was an ardent King’s man, and with de Wolfe, the Archdeacon and John of Exeter, the cathedral Treasurer, formed a firm core of support for the Lionheart amid those whose loyalty was suspect. They stood in a tight group in the deserted chamber, the pale dawn light creeping through the tower windows and adding to the glow cast by the candles on the two small altars of St Paul and the Holy Cross behind them. The coroner explained briefly what had gone on during the previous night. ‘We made Giles Fulford tell us what happened to poor Robert de Hane. Although Fulford was the man that de Limesi and his vicar dealt with, it was his master Jocelin de Braose who was behind him. I lost him at our ambush at Dunsford, which made me suspect that he was the leading spirit in this search for Saewulf’s treasure.’

  De Relaga was slightly bewildered: he had not been privy to the whole story and de Wolfe had to give him a quick summary. ‘That’s the background,’ he ended. ‘But last night I could see that we would lose our only hope of knowing what happened as the thrice-damned sheriff had let Fulford free to leave the city this morning. So Gwyn persuaded him to tell the truth.’

  ‘And that was what exactly?’ asked the Archdeacon.

  ‘When de Braose and Fulford dug up that Saxon brooch, it made them believe even more in the existence of the main treasure. When de Limesi failed to find any other parchment that would lead them to it, they decided to force its whereabouts from Robert de Hane. They beat him, then tried strangling him slowly into submission – but he suddenly died on them, poor old man. To avoid unnecessary problems, they hung him up to look like a suicide.’

  While the coroner talked, de Relaga pulled his red cloak more closely about him in the chill air of the damp tower. He had been called from his bed too early to array himself in his usual finery, but his outfit was still in bright contrast to the sombre clothing of the coroner and the priest. ‘But what has this to do with Richard de Revelle’s refusal to arrest this Fulford?’ he asked.

  ‘Because de Braose and his squire Fulford are leaders of the mercenary gang that’s being hired by the would-be rebels out there in the countryside, I suppose he feels obliged to protect them.’

  De Relaga groaned at the possibility. ‘I thought we had seen the last of this treachery last winter, when the King crushed the remnants of John’s vermin. Now you think it’s boiling up again?’

  ‘There’s no other explanation for the sheriff’s behaviour. He as good as told me so last night. I admit that the Lionheart is his own worst enemy, leaving the country so soon and trusting that the Justiciar can keep the lid on the discontent that these hard taxes undoubtedly foster.’

  The Archdeacon snorted. ‘These nobles who are turning traitor are just using that as an excuse. They want more power and they see a better chance of getting it through the Count of Mortaigne, if they can seize the throne for him.’

  The Portreeve was rapidly catching up with the situation. ‘But surely Hubert Walter is well aware of what’s going on? He has spies all over the country.’

  ‘England is a big place, and he can’t be everywhere at once,’ replied the coroner gruffly. ‘I suspect he anticipates attempts at revolt, but it would help him a great deal if he was given actual names and places.’

  Hugh shook his head sadly. ‘I can hardly believe that people we know well would defect again so soon. And although de Revelle was sympathetic to the Prince last time, he never actually fought for him. That’s why he was allowed eventually to take up his sheriff’s appointment, especially with people like Henry Rifford and the Bishop to support him.’

  ‘The same goes for Henry Marshal and Thomas de Boterellis,’ commented de Alencon. ‘We all know that they sailed fairly near the wind, but never actually paraded their sympathies on the streets. Not like the Bishop of Coventry, who was the revolt’s true leader.’

  ‘Hugh de Nonant!’ grated de Wolfe. ‘A kinsman of the lord of Totnes, Henri de Nonant – who I suspect is also up to his neck in this. It was during his hunting party that William Fitzhamon was murdered. I’m beginning to think that the whole affair was organised as a cover for his killing. Which brings us back to de Braose and Fulford.’

  ‘Do you think de Nonant is the prime mover of this treason in Devon?’ asked John de Alencon.

  The coroner looked at him mournfully. ‘Who can tell? Henry de la Pomeroy is the biggest landowner, but my guts tell me that they are all in this together.’

  ‘We have no proof of anything against any of them yet,’ pointed out the Archdeacon. ‘You claim, I’m sure correctly, that both our canon and Fitzhamon were murdered, but you have only a confession made under duress about de Hane, which is nothing to do with any rebellion.’

  ‘You’ve got de Revelle’s strange partiality towards Fulford, presumably because he is a tool of the rebels,’ objected de Relaga.

  ‘We could certainly do with better evidence,’ conceded de Wolfe. ‘But I am quite ready to ride to Winchester to talk to Hubert Walter.’

  ‘Give it a few days to see if more hard fact comes to light,’ advised the Portreeve. ‘In the meantime, don’t walk down too many dark alleys, John. Keep that ginger giant of yours close at hand with his fists and his sword!’

  The weather had turned fine, but was bitterly cold as John de Wolfe left the cathedral and walked across the Close towards his house. The piles of earth dug out for new graves had frozen into rock-like heaps that blocked some of the paths and, with the rubbish, old timber and the hawkers’ stalls that were scattered around the cathedral precinct, it was something of an obstacle race to navigate into Martin’s Lane. Though Mary had given him some mulled ale and bread before he left to rouse Hugh de Relaga, de Wolfe couldn’t resist going into his house for
a better breakfast. He found Matilda huddled at the table, a heavy cloak thrown around her nightgown and her dishevelled hair wrapped in a cloth like a turban – Lucille had not yet wreaked her witchcraft upon it. She was eating coarse porridge from a wooden bowl, and a large loaf, butter and cheese lay on the boards in front of her.

  She muttered a grudging greeting and carried on eating. Whatever turmoil and alarms came along, nothing spoiled her appetite, which accounted for the thickness of her features, the loose skin under her eyes and the solidity of her frame and limbs.

  De Wolfe had had no chance in the early hours to tell her of the events of the night and something told him to keep quiet about his suspicions of her brother’s loyalty. Mary came in with his hot porridge, fresh milk and more steaming ale, the only hot drink available on a freezing day like this – mulled wine could hardly be served at breakfast. ‘Thomas came in while you were out, Sir John,’ she reported, careful to be formal and respectful to him in the presence of the mistress. ‘He had a message, but I told him you would almost certainly be going up to the castle when you had eaten, so he went away.’

  ‘Do you know what he wanted?’

  Mary opened her hands to him in a gesture of doubt. ‘He said something about royal fish, whatever they are.’

  ‘The evil little pervert is out of his mind,’ muttered Matilda, breaking her silence at the chance to malign the clerk. John held his tongue, but he knew what Thomas had meant, even if he was surprised that the matter had arisen. As soon as he had eaten, he left the house and walked up through the streets to Rougemont. It was Sunday, but there seemed to be no lessening of the market activities, with stalls along High Street selling meat, fish, bread, dairy products and vegetables, all tailored to the season of the year. Much less was available in midwinter compared to later on, but anything that could be cooked or preserved was raucously advertised by the yells of the stall-holders and the keepers of the small shops under the covered ways formed by overhanging upper storeys. Between the fixed stalls and the shops, hawkers stood hopefully with trays and boxes of goods, or with live fowl and ducks struggling under their arms, everything offered for sale to a potential buyer, after the inevitable haggling over a price.

  Black John strode past them all as if they did not exist, deep in thought about the ominous political situation, the prospect of a revival of Prince John’s abortive rebellion. Although a coroner had no official stake in such matters, de Wolfe’s intense loyalty to the King overrode any confinement of his actions to dead bodies, treasure and sanctuary-seekers. Last March, he had been at the sieges at Tickhill in Yorkshire and at Nottingham, the last castles to hold out for the Prince. He and Gwyn had volunteered, itching for action, to help regain these for Coeur de Lion. The King himself had hurried to Nottingham within days of landing at Sandwich in Kent, after his imprisonment. De Wolfe remembered his sovereign setting up a gallows outside the castle walls and hanging a few captives, which rapidly persuaded the garrison to surrender. As he strode up to Rougemont, he wondered whether the same tactics might be needed soon outside the castles at Totnes and Berry Pomeroy.

  At the top of the stairs in the gatehouse, he pushed aside the sacking door and went in to the usual scene of Thomas writing at the trestle table and Gwyn perched on the window-ledge, eating and drinking. The little clerk, his thin nose red with cold, held up a parchment. ‘I recorded all that Fulford said last night, Crowner. It’s written here, as you ordered. I’ve even got that savage over there to make his mark on it where I’ve written his name. You can sign it here, if you want to take it to the Justiciar.’ He offered his quill to de Wolfe, who, with some pride, carefully inscribed his name at the bottom of the document, the only words he was able to write.

  He threw down the pen with studied carelessness. ‘What’s this about fish, Thomas?’ he demanded.

  ‘A sturgeon, Crowner, a big one! Stuck in a pool on the ebb tide near St James’s Priory, where there are salmon traps. The prior sent a message with one of the fish-sellers early this morning.’

  De Wolfe was intrigued: this was the first time he had been called upon to carry out one of the oddest tasks of a coroner. As well as looking into treasure trove and fires, he had to investigate catches of the so-called ‘royal fish’, which were sturgeons and whales. If they were found within the realm of England, these became the property of the Crown. Both were prized and valuable, the sturgeon for its flesh and roe and the whale mainly for the oil it provided for lamps, as well as its flesh, if it was fresh enough.

  Gwyn looked up from his loaf and cheese. ‘Very strange to have a sturgeon come up-river in winter. They usually arrive from the ocean to spawn in the spring.’ The Cornishman came from Polruan, where his father had been a fisherman, and he considered himself an authority on anything that had sails, rudder or fins.

  ‘Maybe this fish is an ignoramus like you, who can’t tell January from March,’ suggested Thomas, always quick to insult his partner. De Wolfe held up a hand to quell the inevitable squabble. ‘That’s enough! Let’s get down there and see this beast. The rest of the day may be busier.’

  As they went out, he muttered to his henchman, ‘Gwyn, keep your eyes open and your hand on your sword. After our encounter with Fulford last night, there are people who would gladly see us dead.’

  CHAPTER NINE

  In which Crowner John deals with a fish and a mill-wheel

  The ride was quite short down to the banks of the river Exe where the sturgeon was trapped. Between Exeter and the port of Topsham was the small priory dedicated to St James, founded over fifty years earlier by Earl Baldwin de Redvers, sheriff of Devon, who had held Rougemont against a siege by King Stephen for three months. Though he could never have met him, de Wolfe didn’t like the sound of Baldwin, possibly because he had fought against his king – for the Empress Matilda, the namesake of John’s wife. The coroner’s team trotted down the mile and a half to the priory, following the track to Topsham, parallel to the river. A small place, it housed only a prior and four monks. Near it was the sluice to a mill-stream and a palisade of stakes in the river for catching salmon.

  When they arrived, a couple of monks and their prior were waiting outside, the latter an amiable, fat man with a fiery red face that matched the bare skin of his tonsured head. St James’s was a Cluniac house, so they wore the black habits of the Benedictine order. The finding of a sturgeon was a welcome break even on the Sabbath from the routine of their day, and they walked with de Wolfe down to the riverbank, where three fishermen were standing around a large muddy pool alongside the salmon trap.

  The prior offered the obvious explanation. ‘It was stranded by the falling tide. On the next flood, it will just swim away.’

  The fishermen were scowling at the prior, whose honest meddling in calling the coroner had deprived them of a valuable catch. As a fisherman’s son, Gwyn typically sided with them against the Church. He went over to them as they stood barefoot in the mud, their rough smocks girded up to their thighs, to discuss the strange phenomenon of a sturgeon trying to force its way up-river at the wrong time of year.

  The fish was at least six feet long, its bony tube-like snout projecting in front of it like a sword. The pool was small and was draining away even more as the tide dropped, so that the fish had to swim in a tight figure-of-eight in the shallowing water.

  ‘What’s to be done about it, Crowner?’ asked one of the fishermen.

  John considered the matter sympathetically. He was well aware that, especially at this time of year, fishermen had a hard time, hovering on the brink of survival with the sale of fish the only means of buying bread. But the law of the land said that these fish were the property of the King.

  ‘Who found it?’ he asked.

  One of the men claimed that he had discovered it when he came down at the start of the ebb tide to see what was in the fish traps. He was a sickly, middle-aged man, thin and undernourished. De Wolfe knew that whatever the fish fetched would go to the Royal Treasury, undoubtedly to b
e put towards more warhorses, arrows and armour for the distant battles in France. He came to a decision and turned to the prior. ‘Although by law the whole value of the fish should go to the King, I realise that the labour of landing, gutting, butchering and selling must be recompensed. Therefore I decree that it be given to these three fishermen, who must get the best price for it. They must divide the proceeds in half, keeping one half for themselves and the other for the Crown.’

  He glared at the three men, whose faces had lit up: they had had no expectations of getting anything at all from this valuable catch. They readily agreed and de Wolfe ordered them to give half the sale price to the prior, to be kept by him until it was collected when the Justices next came to Exeter. They would pay it in to the royal treasure chest kept in Winchester or the new Exchequer treasury at Westminster.

  Gwyn was as pleased as the other men at de Wolfe’s generosity and helped them to haul out the great fish, struggling and thrashing in its death throes. The coroner accepted the prior’s invitation to meet his monks over a cup of wine in St James’s, to which gathering Thomas managed to get himself included, much to his delight.

  The air was still and icy when the four horsemen reached Berry Pomeroy castle at about noon. The smoke from the kitchen fires rose straight up to a pale blue sky that had a few high mackerel clouds. As the two soldiers of the escort walked all the horses to the stables in the bailey, they assured each other that there would be no snow to prevent them getting back to Exeter by nightfall.

  Richard de Revelle and Canon de Boterellis were received at the door of the donjon by Henry de la Pomeroy and conducted to his private chamber off the hall, where first they warmed themselves by a good fire after their frigid journey, then were fortified with hot food and wine. The sheriff’s visit had been arranged days before, though his bringing the Precentor was an emergency move triggered by the events of the night. Henri de Nonant and Bernard Cheevers were there too, as previously arranged, to talk to de Revelle, and the five men stood around the hearth as soon as the travellers were refreshed.