Unhallowed Ground

by Mel Starr

  One afternoon I stood in the toft watching Peter and his apprentice hoist a beam from ground to scaffold. This timber was heavy, hewn square, six paces or more long, and thick through as a large man’s hand from fingers to wrist. The weight of two men and the beam proved too much for one of the poles supporting the scaffold. It bent under the weight. I saw it begin to bow and shouted to the men to look to their safety. They did so, but not before the pole snapped. Three poles yet supported the scaffold, and Peter and the apprentice seized two of these and so were spared a fall which might have required my services to repair their injuries. They had released the beam when I cried a warning. It thudded to the earth, doing no harm.

  Peter clambered down from his perch, thanked me for advising him of danger, scratched his head while he inspected the fractured pole, then set to work raising another so the scaffold might be made whole and he might continue his work.

  I watched as Peter selected a solid pole from the stack Gerard had delivered for rafters and set it in place of the splintered shaft. When it was in place he instructed his apprentice, a slender youth whose wiry form was more suited to the work, to mount the scaffold and secure the plank to the new post with a length of hempen cord wrapped thickly about both pole and plank.

  Hempen cord. I was not pleased with the thought which then came to me. It had not occurred to me that a carpenter might have use for hempen cord.

  My enthusiasm for observing the rebuilding of Galen House withered with this discovery. I left the site and walked slowly to the castle, considering the import, or coincidence, of what I had learned. I was distressed at what it might portend, but could not allow the revelation to pass unexplained.

  I kept my own counsel for the next hours, but as dusk darkened the window of our chamber I told Kate what I had seen.

  “Many craftsmen may find need of rope in their work,” she advised. “You said such cord was common.”

  “Aye, I did, but a common thing in the hands of a man wronged by another may be put to uncommon purpose.”

  “You believe the carpenter capable of such cunning, doing murder made to seem suicide?”

  “Do you think me capable of such a thing?”

  “Nay,” Kate replied with some heat. “Why do you ask?”

  “I am not a father… not yet,” I added, responding to Kate’s smile. “But when I think of the injury Thomas atte Bridge did to Peter, and consider what vengeance I might seek should our babe be a lass, and some felon deal with her as Thomas did with Jane, then I am no longer certain of Peter’s peaceable nature.”

  “You could slay a man who did harm to a daughter?”

  “If no other penalty seemed in store for the man.”

  “You believe all men be of such a mind?”

  “I do.”

  “What will you do?”

  “I will go to our bed. Mayhap a new day will offer new counsel.”

  It did not. Sleep was elusive. It came reluctantly and departed eagerly. I arose from our bed in a sour mood, which Kate saw and so busied herself about our chamber wordlessly. A kitchen servant brought a loaf and pot of ale, and when I had broken my fast I felt ready to face my duty. I made ready to depart the castle and Kate finally spoke.

  “What will you do?”

  “I intend to seek first Father Simon. I have two questions for him which will go some way to resolving this business, I think.”

  “I pray you succeed,” she replied.

  “Best pray I do not,” I answered wryly.

  Father Simon’s clerk responded to my knock on the vicarage door and admitted me to the house. The rotund priest soon appeared, puzzled, I think, by my early appearance and black visage.

  “Good day, Master Hugh. How may I serve you?”

  “Two questions, then I will depart and trouble you with the business of Thomas atte Bridge no more.”

  “Atte Bridge? I’ve heard nothing of that matter for many weeks. Thought you’d given up pursuit of a felon an’ laid the death to suicide.”

  “I gave up quest for a murderer several times. But each time I did so some new matter arose to restore my interest. I never thought Thomas did away with himself, nor do I now.”

  “And you seek me now because some new evidence presents itself?”

  “Aye. The hempen cord your clerk purchased to fashion your new belt, whence did it come?”

  “Many in the town grow hemp, soak the stems in Shill Brook, and wind the fibers into rope,” the priest replied.

  “This is so, but not all hempen cord sold in Bampton is missing a length which matches the span of rope used to hang a man.”

  Father Simon made no reply, hoping, I think, that I would give over my questions and depart. I did not.

  “Peter Carpenter,” he said finally. “But you should not assume the carpenter guilty of such a felony. Others may have known the unused cord was in my shed and snipped off a length.”

  “Did Peter know you kept the unused coil in the shed?”

  “Don’t know. Robert made the purchase of Peter. You might ask him.”

  “I may. I have another question for you. Does Peter confess his sins to you, and seek absolution, or does he confess to Father Thomas or Father Ralph?”

  “You know I cannot reveal what is said in confession,” Father Simon said indignantly.

  “I do not ask you to do so. I ask only if Peter confessed to you, or to another.”

  “I cannot say,” the vicar said firmly, and folded his arms across his belly as if punctuating his denial.

  “Very well,” I replied. “Your answer is helpful.”

  The priest’s brows lifted at this, but I saw no need to enlighten him. He had told me a valuable thing but knew not he had done so.

  Had Peter Carpenter confessed to Father Thomas or Father Ralph, Father Simon would, I think, have had no reluctance to tell me he had not heard of the man’s sins. Since he refused to answer when I asked, I was sure it was Father Simon who had heard Peter’s confession. If this was a confession of murder, the knowledge would explain why he tried to deflect my suspicion from John Kellet and save me a fruitless journey to Exeter.

  Or perhaps he feared that I might construe some evidence against Kellet which would see the man punished again, this time for a thing he did not do, and of which Father Simon knew him to be innocent.

  I walked north from the vicarage, past the bishop’s new tithe barn, and watched as John Prudhomme directed the folding of new-shorn sheep on to demesne lands. He saw me and waved cheerily, but I had no heart for gladsome reply.

  All I suspected might be coincidence. I hoped it was so, but I was not satisfied with uncertainty. I wandered the town until dinner, considering and disposing of methods whereby I might find truth, and above all fearing what knowledge of the truth might cost me, the town, and Peter Carpenter.

  Kate saw my solemn demeanor at dinner and divined the cause. She did not ask of me what I had learned from Father Simon, but guessed it was unsettling. When we were alone in our chamber she asked of me what news, and I told her.

  “The priest speaks true that many folk cultivate hemp and flax for rope and flaxen yarn,” she said. “Some have plenty and enough to sell.”

  “But do they sell a length of cord which matches the rope found about Thomas atte Bridge’s neck, when joined together with the cord coiled in Father Simon’s shed?”

  “Why would Peter seek cord in Father Simon’s shed if he had of his own enough to sell?”

  “There has been little employment for carpenters since the plague,” I reasoned. “Perhaps he needed money and sold unneeded possessions to find it.”

  “Mayhap,” Kate mused, “but he has rope now, you say, to fasten scaffold together.”

  “And he has fifteen shillings I gave him as early payment, so he might hire laborers and begin the work. Enough cord to build his scaffold would cost little more than a penny.”

  “How will you discover if Peter hanged Thomas at Cow-Leys Corner,” she asked, “and what will yo
u do if it be so?”

  “I do not yet know… on both counts.”

  I could not stay away from Church View Street, no matter who it was who assembled my new home. I left Kate stitching a new kirtle for her enlarging form and set out.

  Peter, his apprentice, and two laborers had nearly completed setting posts and beams for the upper story. One worker, a poor cotter whose family was large and whose lands were few, was at work fitting wattles between posts. Warin had nearly completed brickwork upon the ground floor and would soon set to work upon the second chimney.

  Peter Carpenter glanced down from his perch above me on the scaffold, acknowledged my presence with a nod, then returned to his labor. The man had wife, children, and now grandchild to provide for. What poverty would come to them if I found Peter had indeed slain Thomas atte Bridge? But what guilt would I incur against my soul did I learn of a certainty of Peter’s guilt and allow the crime to go unpunished? Or was it a crime? Perhaps it was justice, wrongly discharged.

  I felt drawn to the hempen cords which bound the scaffold together. Without considering why I did so, I drifted close to the framework and unthinkingly fingered a length of the brown cord, as if touch could tell me whence it came and what it knew.

  The hemp remained silent. From the base of the scaffold I raised my eyes again to the place where Peter and his apprentice were driving home a tree nail to fix a beam in place. Peter swung his mallet a last time, wiped sweat from his brow, and glanced down through the lattice of the scaffold to see me examining the hempen cord and studying him.

  Some unaccountable recognition flickered between us. I knew then from the look in his eyes what Peter had done, and he saw that I knew. He stared at me, sighed heavily, then turned back to his work.

  Peter’s oldest child, now Jane was gone, was a lad of twelve or so years. I saw then how Thomas atte Bridge might have met his end.

  I suspect Peter was lurking about Thomas’s hut, seeking how he might avenge his daughter, when he saw in the moonlight John Kellet enter atte Bridge’s toft and harry the hens roosting there. He saw Thomas respond to the troubled hens, watched as Kellet and atte Bridge spoke, and perhaps was close by to hear what was said.

  Next eve, when all was dark and quiet in the Weald, Peter and his lad tried the same ruse, disturbing Thomas’s hens until the noise once more drew him to his toft. Perhaps atte Bridge expected to find John Kellet there again. But instead Thomas saw a shadow approach and from out of the dark came a blow which laid him insensible in the mud.

  Peter then bound atte Bridge’s wrists and ankles, and perhaps crammed a wad of fabric in his mouth should he wake from the blow. Then with his lad Peter carried his victim from the Weald toward Cow-Leys Corner. Mayhap Thomas regained his senses while carried thus, and struggled, so that the child lost grip on his ankles and there were then two grooves made in the road; these ruts Kate and I found next morn, and also mud from the road on the back of the doomed man’s heels. Perchance Peter delivered another blow to quiet Thomas before continuing to Cow-Leys Corner.

  But what of the stool? How would Peter have come by that object? He traveled the Weald to appraise Philip Mannyng’s shattered door. Perhaps as he passed he saw Maud sitting at her door, working at some task in the sun, and later made off with the stool she sat upon when she left it. Might he have even then had use in mind for it? Who can know?

  Peter, the apprentice, and the laborers continued their work, stretching wattles between posts to make ready for the plaster. I lost interest in the business and departed the toft. As I set foot on Church View Street I saw and heard a large cart approach, drawn by two horses. I stopped to see what this conveyance was about and watched as a man atop its load pulled upon the traces and halted his beasts before Galen House.

  “Where’s the carpenter?” he asked.

  “He is at the rear of the house, framing wattles.”

  “Peter requires these tiles an’ here they are. Not ready yet for ’em, I see,” the tiler said with a glance at the empty sky where ridgepole and rafters should soon be placed.

  “Need another load anyway. We’ll just leave this lot in the toft an’ return next week with more. Wat,” he called to his apprentice, “lead the ’orses ’round back an’ stack the tiles. I’ll be there shortly. Good worker,” the tiler said to me, with a nod to his apprentice, “but bull-headed.”

  “So long as he lays a roof which keeps me dry, his disposition is of no concern.”

  “He’ll do that well enough. I’ll see to it. Got to return to Witney, so best help the lad.”

  The tiler touched his cap with a finger and hastened off in the track of his cart. I set off for the castle, where I hoped a few circles of the parapet would clear my mind and set me toward my duty, when I decided where my duty lay.

  I had made one circuit of the castle wall and leaned against a merlon, staring at the forest which hid Cow-Leys Corner from view, when I heard Kate call up to me from the castle yard. Her expression indicated peevishness that I had returned and not told her of it. She strode to the gatehouse and a moment later appeared on the parapet.

  “What news?” she asked breathlessly. Climbing the circular stairs of the gatehouse was becoming more of a task for her as her belly grew.

  “I have no evidence to charge a man before the King’s Eyre,” I replied.

  “But you know the truth of Thomas atte Bridge’s death all the same,” she asserted, reading my unspoken thoughts.

  “Aye, so I believe.”

  I told Kate then of what I had seen in the hour past. She looked away as I spoke, and together we studied the Ladywell and Lord Gilbert’s millpond beyond.

  “Will you seek more proofs against the carpenter?”

  I could not answer, for I did not know.

  “Mayhap he is innocent,” Kate brightened, “and you will be spared dealing with him… or if you charge him before the king’s judges a jury may discharge him.”

  “I wish he was guiltless, but of all men he had best cause to slay Thomas atte Bridge, and because he is not a practiced miscreant he could not hide his guilt when I looked him in the eye an hour past.”

  “The town needs a carpenter,” Kate added softly.

  “Aye, there is that.”

  “And Peter is not likely to slay any other. It does not seem to be his nature.”

  “Nay,” I agreed. “He has always been a peaceable sort, since I came to Bampton. But might a man who has succeeded in murdering a foe, and escaping penalty, find it less irksome should the desire again arise to eliminate an adversary?”

  Kate made no reply, nor could I answer my own question. We stood thus for some time, until we heard below us Wilfred closing the castle gate and cranking down the portcullis. Kate then took my arm and drew me silently from the parapet to the stairs and our chamber. “Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof,” so says Holy Writ. I had experienced enough evil this day. I would seek my bed and await the evils of another day.

  I placed my feet upon the cool flags of our chamber floor next morn before the Angelus Bell ceased ringing from the tower of the Church of St Beornwald. I had resolved in the night to seek the carpenter and confront him with my suspicion against him, so departed the castle before even breaking my fast. The task before me was onerous and I wished it over and done so soon as possible.

  Peter’s apprentice, the laborers, and Warin were at their work, but Peter was absent. I watched the apprentice busy himself with placing wattles while he occasionally glanced to the street to see was his employer arrived. He soon tired of this, left the workmen to the task, and clambered down from the scaffold.

  “Peter seemed unwell when we quit work yesterday,” the apprentice said. “I’m off to Rosemary Lane to see is he ill.”

  I circled the structure to where Warin was placing bricks and his apprentice mixing mortar. From this place a few moments later I saw Peter’s apprentice appear at a run from two hundred paces down Church View Street.

  The youth skidded to a sto
p before me and breathlessly gasped a single word: “Gone.”

  “Who?” I asked stupidly.

  “Peter, an’ all his household.”

  “His house is empty?”

  “Aye. None there. Goods is gone, tools an’ such. Horse an’ cart, as well.”

  Before the lad finished his declaration I set off apace for Rosemary Lane. There I found Peter Carpenter’s house and yard as the apprentice said, all abandoned.

  I entered the empty house. No chests or pots remained. Tools were absent from Peter’s workshop, and the crude shed which had sheltered his horse and cart was vacant. Peter had fled in the night, loading possessions upon his cart and slipping away while the town slept, after the beadle had completed his rounds.

  I returned dolefully to Galen House. The apprentice stood where I had left him, open-mouthed.

  “Are you competent to complete the work Peter has begun,” I asked him plainly, “or must I seek another?”

  “Uh, aye,” he stammered. “But what has become of Peter?”

  “He has fled the town.”

  “But why so?”

  “I am uncertain,” I lied. May the Lord Christ absolve me of this sin. “Go this day to Alvescot and tell Gerard the verderer what you need in the way of roof-tree and rafters to complete my house. Then carry on as before. I will pay you what you are due. The tiler promised soon to bring another load of tiles and I wish the rafters ready when he comes.”

  The apprentice nodded and immediately set off afoot for Alvescot. No matter, he may ride back on Gerard’s cart with the timber and rafters.

  From Galen House I walked to Father Simon’s vicarage and announced my presence with vigorous thumping upon the door. The clerk soon appeared, recognized by my scowl that some grave matter troubled me, and hastened to announce my presence to the vicar.

  “Good morn, Master Hugh,” Father Simon greeted me pleasantly, although I suspect he guessed that my reappearance at his door brought little good. “How may I serve you?”

  “You may send servants and clerks to Cow-Leys Corner to unearth Thomas atte Bridge, then bring his corpse to the churchyard and bury the fellow properly.”