[Mediaeval Mystery 06] - Cast the First Stone

by C. B. Hanley

  The voice that came from behind Edwin was that of Young Robin, who had appeared with a couple of his brothers in tow. Dusk was starting to fall on this short November day, and they weren’t the only ones who were returning from their work. The noise had drawn something of a crowd.

  The elder Robin made a visible effort to calm himself. ‘No. No trouble. Barty here has taken someone’s hammer,’ – he raised his hand again, making the little boy cower, but made no move to strike – ‘but Edwin has agreed to say no more about it.’

  Young Robin, who Edwin couldn’t help noticing was much taller and more powerful than himself, grunted. He folded his arms and stood to watch.

  Edwin bent once more to the snivelling boy. ‘It’s all right, Barty, it really is. All I want to know is where you found it, and then I’ll take it back and everything will be fine. All right?’

  A tentative nod.

  ‘So. You saw it lying about somewhere and you just picked it up?’

  Nod.

  ‘And where was that?’

  ‘In that house.’ He pointed. ‘The stone one. Where the dead man was.’

  Exclamations of surprise came from the spectators. Young Robin snatched the hammer from Edwin’s hand. ‘Is that blood?’ He held it up for others to see. ‘It’s covered in blood! This must be what was used to kill the bailiff!’ Belatedly he realised what he was saying and looked down in horror at his youngest brother.

  Edwin hastened to put matters straight before anything nasty happened. ‘Barty is five years old,’ he said, loudly. ‘There is no possible way he could have struck and killed a grown man – he wouldn’t even be able to reach! – and nobody is accusing him of anything.’

  Nobody could argue with that, and there were murmurs of assent.

  Barty was by now almost paralysed with fear, not really understanding what was happening but aware that a lot of people were looking at him and that something serious was going on. Edwin wasn’t sure whether he would get anything else useful out of him, or whether he should come back another time. But he’d give it one last go. ‘Now, Barty, I want you to think carefully. When you picked this up from inside the stone house, was there already a dead man lying on the floor?’

  Nod.

  ‘And did you see anyone else, apart from the dead man?’

  Pause. A shake of the head. An exhalation of breath all round.

  ‘All right. Now, that will do. I’m going to take this hammer – you can’t keep it – but you’re not in trouble. You’re not in trouble for picking it up, and you’re not in trouble for anything to do with the dead man. Understand?’

  Barty nodded again and then fled to hide behind the skirts of his eldest sister, who had emerged from the house while all this was going on.

  Edwin held out his hand for the hammer, still in the possession of Young Robin, who was examining it. ‘Not one of ours, Father.’ Robin agreed, and Young Robin held it up for others to see. ‘Anyone?’

  ‘Isn’t that …’ Everyone moved to look at the speaker, who turned out to be the reeve. ‘Isn’t that a stonemason’s hammer?’

  The murmurs, the rumbling of voices, became louder. Edwin felt he had to take control of the situation. ‘It is. But that doesn’t mean that one of the masons must have killed Ivo. Den– the man who owns this hammer reported it missing; he dropped it somewhere in the village so anyone might have picked it up.’

  ‘A likely story,’ came a cry from the back of the group.

  Edwin could feel anger building. He tried to sound as stern as he could. ‘Nobody is to take matters into their own hands, you hear? There is still plenty more work to do to find out who killed Ivo and why.’ He gazed at them, trying to look each in the eye. ‘I repeat. Nobody is to do anything until I’ve spoken to Sir Roger. And that includes throwing stones.’

  He’d slipped in the reference to a higher authority to bolster his cause, and it seemed to have worked – just. He saw a few nods, and the group started to break up as men made their way home for their evening meal, shaking their heads to each other.

  Robin and the rest of his family were called in by Avice, leaving Edwin alone outside the workshop with a bloodied hammer in his hand. He heaved in a juddering breath of relief, realising that he was both shaking and sweating.

  Anyway, that made his next tasks clear. As well as talking to the night porter to find out more about Ivo’s movements last night, he also needed to show the hammer to Sir Roger, who could bear witness to its condition, and then to Denis and Philippe, to confirm that it was the one Denis had lost. Or claimed he had lost.

  The evening meal was in progress up in the inner ward, several braziers lit around the tables against the fast-encroaching darkness. Their light was enough for Edwin to see that Sir Roger was sitting at the head of the table, picking at a dish of something.

  Edwin didn’t want to disturb his meal, and certainly didn’t want to start waving a bloodstained implement around in front of everybody. He took off his hood and wrapped it around the hammer, putting it down by his feet as he slipped into a place at the lower end of the table. He hadn’t intended to eat, but all he’d had today was that bit of cinnamon bread, and the vegetable pottage being doled out smelled enticing, though he passed on the Friday eel stew. He ate without taking his eyes off Sir Roger, and as soon as the knight had finished Edwin left the remainder of his meal – the trencher gratefully appropriated by his neighbour – and went to him. ‘May I have a word?’

  ‘Of course. How have you got on today?’

  The men around were still concentrating on their food, but Edwin didn’t want to risk saying too much out loud in case he started off more as-yet unnecessary bad feeling. ‘Perhaps we could go somewhere else?’

  ‘That well, already? Let’s go into the keep.’

  There were torches on the walls all the way up the stairwell, but the council chamber was in complete darkness. Sir Roger groped around for a candle, went out into the passage to light it, and returned to place it on the table. ‘Now.’

  Edwin placed his parcel in the small pool of light and unwrapped it. Once he’d explained everything, Sir Roger agreed that this must be the murder weapon and said he would be happy to bear witness to that effect.

  ‘So, this is the weapon. But who wielded it?’

  ‘That is the main question, of course. But first things first – we should trace where it’s been. Tomorrow, if you are agreeable, I will take it to Denis and Philippe and ask them if it is the same one Denis says he lost. I am certain that it is, but I want to see their faces while they look at it.’

  ‘All right. But in the meantime, I don’t think you should be carrying it around with you – or keeping it in your house, for that matter. Leave it with me here, and then come and find it in the morning.’

  ‘Very well.’

  ‘Good.’ The knight stretched, one of his shoulders cracking. ‘And now? Are you off home to your pretty wife, whom I have still not met? Or have you time for a game of chess? I hear you were becoming quite skilled while we were away.’

  Normally such an offer would have been a great temptation to Edwin, but he shook his head reluctantly. ‘I need to talk to the night porter now, while he’s awake, and then I must get home, or Alys will worry.’

  Sir Roger sighed. ‘How nice to have someone who will worry about you. All right, off you go then.’

  Edwin left him sitting alone in the cold, shadowy room. Before he had reached the first flight of stairs he heard footsteps crossing the wooden floor behind him, which could only mean that Sir Roger was on his way to the chapel.

  Warin, the night porter, was an odd man. Although he had worked at the castle for many years, he was little known – not unnatural, given that he guarded the gatehouse to the inner ward while most other people were asleep, and slept during the day while the place was busy. Edwin wondered what it must be like to live in a world of almost perpetual darkness; Warin only saw the light in the summer months when his shift started before sundown and finished a
fter sunrise.

  He was at his post now, sitting by the closed inner gate and warming his hands at a brazier. He stood as he heard Edwin approach and prepared to unbar the small door set into the gate. Edwin didn’t think he’d been recognised yet, but of course, letting people out of the ward wasn’t a problem; Warin certainly wouldn’t let anyone in without knowing who it was.

  Edwin greeted him quietly as he reached the gate. Warin stood aside without speaking to let him through, and seemed surprised – and not a little irritated – when Edwin stopped to talk.

  ‘Have you heard about what happened to Ivo?’

  ‘Aye. Heard it when I woke up.’ He jerked his thumb at the small room in the gatehouse as he spoke, where the day porter was no doubt either asleep or preparing to be so.

  ‘He was killed in the village last night. Do you know when he went out?’

  Warin scratched his head as he thought. Time probably meant little to a man who did not see the sun. ‘Well, I’d been on duty some while. Place was quiet, everyone asleep apart from whoever was on duty on the walls and the roof. Moon was up.’ He spread his hands wide. ‘Midnight, give or take? Yes, about halfway through my shift, I reckon, because I remember thinking he’d been out a long while and he hadn’t come back. Still hadn’t when I knocked off.’

  ‘I don’t suppose you know why he went out?’

  ‘Nope. He didn’t say and it’s not my business to ask. He’s the bailiff. Could have been getting an early start, maybe? Because he needed to be out somewhere by dawn?’

  Edwin hesitated; he hadn’t thought of that. But no. ‘That’s a good thought but I don’t think it’s right – I’ve already spoken to Arnulf and Ivo didn’t take a horse.’

  Warin grunted. ‘Oh well. Must be some other reason, then.’ He sounded monumentally uninterested, and Edwin didn’t think he’d get much else out of him. He spoke a few words of thanks and stepped through the door, hearing Warin close and bar it behind him as he walked away.

  That narrowed down the time when Ivo had been killed – between midnight and dawn – but why, in the name of all the saints, had he left the castle at midnight?

  He was engrossed in his thoughts and it took him a moment to realise there was much more activity in the outer ward than there should have been at that time of night. Men were running around; there were cries of alarm. And what was that strange light over the north side of the outer wall?

  A man came pounding up the slope, ignoring Edwin, and began to hammer on the inner gate. ‘Help! Quick! Raise the garrison!’

  He continued thumping. Edwin grabbed him, hearing a grumbling ‘All right, all right, I’m coming!’ from the other side. ‘What is it?’

  The man – one of the stable hands, Edwin couldn’t immediately recall his name – had a look of panic on his face. ‘The masons’ camp – it’s on fire!’

  Chapter Five

  Edwin ran as fast as he could down the pitted slope and across the outer ward, where men were already pouring out of the main gate. The masons’ camp. It was far enough away from both the village and the castle buildings that the blaze shouldn’t spread, but it was made of wood and canvas and the inferno would be intense. Anyone inside one of the lodges would be dead in moments unless he got out.

  As he feared, the camp was well ablaze by the time he got there, but efforts to control it were already underway. In between bursts of fiery light he could see figures with buckets running to and from the river, their numbers soon bolstered by those who had come from the castle. In the darkness further out he could make out a group of village men, but they seemed stupefied. He ran over to them. ‘Quickly – to the river and we might be able to contain the damage!’

  None of them moved.

  At first Edwin thought they hadn’t heard him, so he repeated himself over the top of the background noise. But still nobody moved.

  ‘Why should we?’ came a voice. And ‘Serve them right for coming here and murdering our bailiff.’ A chorus of agreement.

  Despite the fire, Edwin went cold. Surely none of them had …? But there was no time to think of that now. He, at least, could help.

  He was darting away when a roar went up from the village group. ‘There! That one – it’s him!’ They surged past him and he caught a glimpse of Denis before he was engulfed by the mob.

  Edwin looked around in panic. Where in God’s name was the garrison? Surely even Sir Roger would come away from his prayers for a disaster such as this? But there was nobody, so with an oath he threw himself into the press to try to protect Denis as well as he could.

  He shouted and flailed as he fought his way through, feeling the heavy blows land on him and grateful that they were only using their fists and not weapons – for now. Denis was on the floor and Edwin tried to shield him, but he was going to be no match for an enraged mob, and indeed he could feel his tunic tearing as someone tried to pull him away.

  More voices and shouts, and mercifully the thumps and kicks thinned out and then stopped. He stayed where he was, half-lying on top of the prone mason, arms over his head, while he tried to make out what was going on.

  There were cries of pain, and Edwin could see a stick being wielded. He risked uncovering his face to see who it was: William Steward, somehow keeping his balance on both bad legs while he thrashed about him and bellowed the sort of curses he probably hadn’t let slip since he was a soldier on campaign many years before.

  Part of the weight on Edwin was lifted as a man was hauled off him and bodily thrown aside. His new rescuer proved to be the hulking form of Crispin, the smith.

  There was a stand-off of yelling, threats and swearing, while the camp burned in the background behind them. Then the village men – and there were at least a dozen of them – seemed to get a second wind and surged forward. Edwin braced himself for a violent death.

  A huge blast from a horn stopped everyone in their tracks. The castle garrison, headed by Sir Roger, had belatedly appeared. At a word from the knight half of them went to aid the increasingly futile firefighting efforts, while the other half, armed with spears and bows, formed up around him.

  Sir Roger’s voice was calm and level. ‘I will give orders to shoot the next man who strikes a blow.’ He waited in silence while the villagers stepped back and dropped their arms to their sides.

  ‘See who that is and bring them here,’ he said to the sergeant-atarms, pointing at Edwin and Denis.

  Edwin found himself being helped to his feet, and he made a mental inventory. Most of the blows had landed on his back, which was a little stiff, and he’d somehow managed to twist his ankle, which was inconvenient but not, he thought, serious. From what he could see in the flickering darkness Denis was bleeding from the head – although whether it was the same cut from earlier, now re-opened, or a new one, he couldn’t tell – and he was holding his side. Both of them limped gingerly over to Sir Roger, who was horrified when he recognised Edwin.

  ‘Who is responsible for this?’ he demanded of the villagers.

  They all looked at the ground and shuffled their feet, before a voice from the back called out, ‘Edwin did it himself, my lord. We all saw it – threw himself at us while we was trying to make a lawful arrest.’

  ‘Arrest?’ Sir Roger’s voice was sharp now.

  Eager to deflect blame, several of the men were now talking over each other, the reeve trying to calm them and have his own voice heard, but the gist of it was that Denis had murdered Ivo and that they were merely apprehending him so he could be brought to justice.

  ‘Justice,’ said Sir Roger, drily. ‘And just how much of him were you intending to leave in one piece to face the court?’ There was silence, so he continued. ‘And when Edwin – Edwin, whom I have set to investigating the matter – quite rightly intervened, you attacked him too.’

  There was more shuffling. ‘Didn’t know it was him, sir, not in the dark. It could have been anyone trying to stop the arrest.’

  Edwin was sure that Sir Roger could see as well as he
could that that was a contradiction of what someone else had already said, but he evidently decided that now was not the time to go into it. ‘Go back to your homes, all of you. And stay there. We will assemble on the green tomorrow morning and hear the case.’

  There was a murmur. The reeve ventured, ‘But what if the mason escapes in the meantime, my lord?’

  Edwin knew Sir Roger well and saw from his face that he was displeased at being questioned. But nothing came across in his voice as he kept his tone level. ‘The man will be taken to the inner ward and kept there under guard until then.’

  Nobody could argue with that, so the men started drifting away, the atmosphere thankfully more subdued. Sir Roger spoke in a low voice to Edwin. ‘And it will be just as well to guard him for his own safety.’

  ‘You may be right.’

  ‘Now, you? You’re not badly injured?’

  ‘No. I’ll be fine. I’m not so sure about him, though – may I ask someone to tend to him?’

  ‘Hmm. In some ways it might be better to let him appear while he’s still bloodied, so they can get a sense of the seriousness of their actions. But –’ seeing Denis wiping his face with his sleeve – ‘that would not be Christian. Very well. Send up your wife, or better still Mistress Steward, whom nobody can object to, as soon as it is light. And you come to me at the same time so we can talk this over.’

  ‘Yes, Sir Roger.’

  ‘Now, I’ll go and see what damage there is over here, and you can explain to him what’s going to happen.’ He moved in the direction of the masons’ camp. It was now smouldering rather than flaming, but Edwin though that that was probably because the fire had burned itself out rather than because it had been extinguished. Thankfully the earth surrounding it was very wet, so it had not spread towards either the wheat field or the castle garden.

  He turned to Denis and explained the substance of what Sir Roger had said.

  Denis nodded. ‘But, Edouin, I did not do this thing. I did not kill monsieur the bailiff.’

  Edwin sighed. He believed Denis at heart, but he was unwilling to commit himself either way while he still had so little evidence. ‘Just speak the truth at tomorrow’s court. It will be in English, but I’ll be there to make sure you can understand what’s going on. But for now, please go peacefully with the guards – it will be less trouble.’