Sword of Shame

by The Medieval Murderers

  The two men climbed laboriously up the steep treads to the second floor and pushed through a crude curtain of sacking which attempted to reduce the draughts. Two narrow window openings allowed the wind to whistle in from above the streets far below, as Rougemont was built at the top corner of the sloping city, in the northern angle of the old Roman walls.

  As they entered, a skinny young man, dressed in a threadbare black cassock, got to his feet from a stool at the table and made a jerky bow to his master. He had a narrow, peaky face, with a receding chin and a long thin nose which always seemed to have a dewdrop on the end. Before him on the table were rolls of parchment, a pot of ink and some quill pens.

  ‘God be with you, sir,’ he squeaked, crossing himself quickly in an almost automatic gesture. ‘I was just copying yesterday’s inquests for the next visitation of the Justices.’

  John de Wolfe grunted, his favourite form of reply, and went to sit on the only other item of furniture, a bench on the opposite side of the trestle table. Gwyn parked his vast backside on a window-ledge, his usual resting place, where he stared again at his useless sword with morose concentration, until his master spoke to him.

  ‘How long have you been my squire and companion, Gwyn?’ he snapped.

  The Cornishman frowned in concentration as he tried to work it out. He tugged at the ends of his ginger moustache that hung down almost to the collar of his scuffed leather jerkin, which had a pointed hood hanging down the back.

  ‘In ’seventy-four, it was, Crowner!’ he decided eventually. ‘The year we first went to Ireland to fight for Richard Strongbow.’

  ‘Twenty-one years, eh?’ mused de Wolfe, leaning his elbows on the table. ‘I think that deserves some mark of recognition.’

  ‘What d’you mean?’ grunted Gwyn, rather suspiciously.

  ‘It means I’ll buy you a new sword, you hairy oaf! Meet me at the armourer’s yard in Curre Street, straight after dinner.’

  At noon, the coroner went home to his house in Martin’s Lane, a narrow alley that joined High Street to the cathedral Close. He sat in his gloomy hall, his wife at the other end of the long table, while their cook-maid Mary served them. Boiled salt-fish and a grilled fowl appeared, with beans, onions and cabbage. These were speared or shovelled with a small eating-knife and a horn spoon from pewter bowls on to trenchers, slabs of yesterday’s coarse bread which acted as plates.

  Matilda de Wolfe, a stocky, pugnacious woman of forty-four, was in a bad mood and uttered not a single word during the whole meal. Mary winked at John as she passed behind her mistress with the wine-jug and grimaced to indicate that Matilda was in a touchy state of mind. He took the hint and held his tongue, knowing from bitter experience that anything he said would be turned against him, even if it was only an observation about the good spring weather.

  As soon as the dessert of honeyed, boiled rice and dried apricots from southern France was finished, he muttered some excuse about attending a suspicious death and made his way out of the hall into the vestibule. This was a small area behind the street door, where cloaks and boots were kept. As he sat on a bench to take off his house shoes, Mary came around the corner of the covered passage that led to her kitchen hut, which shared the backyard with a wash-house, a privy and a pig-sty.

  ‘What’s her problem today?’ he asked quietly, with a jerk of his head towards the hall door.

  Mary, a handsome dark girl in her twenties, rolled her eyes. ‘That maid of hers, Lucille, she trod on the hem of the mistress’s best gown and ripped open a seam, just as she was going to St Olave’s to pray! I’ve never heard such language from a lady!’

  De Wolfe grinned and gave Mary a quick kiss as he opened the front door. They had been sporadic lovers in the past, but Matilda’s suspicions had become too acute for it to continue.

  ‘I’m off to buy Gwyn a new sword,’ he explained. ‘But don’t let her know, she can’t stand the sight of him.’

  Curre Street was only a short distance away, a lane on the opposite side of High Street that ran towards the north wall of the city. It had a mixture of houses and shops, the buildings being mostly of wood, though some were now being replaced by stone. Exeter was thriving on its trade in wool, cloth and tin, which were exported not only over all England, but as far away as Flanders and the Rhine. Halfway along Curre Street, there was a substantial timber house with a roof of stone tiles, which had a yard at the side, from which came the sound of hammer on anvil.

  Gwyn was there already, with their clerk Thomas de Peyne also in attendance. Though an unfrocked priest, the little man had an insatiable curiosity for all sorts of things and wanted to see where swords were bought and sold.

  ‘Are you sure you want to do this, Crowner?’ Gwyn asked uneasily. ‘A good sword is expensive these days.’ A gruff, independent character, the Cornishman did not want to be obligated to his master.

  De Wolfe clapped his officer on his shoulder, a sensation similar to slapping a stone wall. ‘How are you going to save my life next time, without a good blade?’ he replied with rare jocularity, for the coroner was not renowned for his sense of humour.

  They passed through a gate into the yard and skirting the forge where two men were sweating over a furnace and anvil, went to a hut where the owner displayed his wares. Roger Trudogge, himself an old soldier, sat at a bench, carefully sewing an ornate leather sheath for a dagger, but put it aside as soon as he saw Sir John. They had known each other for years and soon they were picking over his stock, laid out on trestles at the sides of the hut. Thomas followed them around, his eyes wide at the sight of all these instruments of injury and death–chain-mail hauberks, shields, lances, daggers, maces, axes and swords.

  It was soon obvious which weapon had caught Gwyn’s critical eye. He kept returning to a sword with a handsome scabbard, that lay at the end of the display. Pulling the blade out, he hefted it to test the weight and balance, looked closely at the metal work of the hilt and pommel, then put it back. De Wolfe watched him with half-concealed amusement, as the big red-head made a show of looking at other swords, before drifting back yet again to his favourite. This time he drew it out and made some slashing motions in the air, both single-handed and with both of his great fists. Then with a sigh, he put it back into its sheath and laid it back on the table.

  ‘That looks like the one you favour,’ observed the coroner. ‘It’s even got hounds’ heads on the hilt.’ His officer had a marked affection for dogs, with whom he seemed to possess a strange empathy.

  ‘It’s a beautiful piece of work, right enough,’ Gwyn answered longingly. ‘And no doubt the most expensive of the lot.’

  Trudogge, a burly man with a severe hare-lip, shook his head. ‘Strange to say, it’s not! One of the best blades I’ve ever had in my shop, but people are not keen on its history, so I’m selling it for less than it’s worth.’

  ‘What’s wrong with it, then?’ demanded Gwyn, suspiciously.

  ‘Nothing wrong with the sword! It’s who it belonged to, that puts folk off.’

  The armourer explained that he had recently bought the weapon from the eldest son of the late Sir Henry de la Pomeroy, who wanted to get rid of everything that reminded him of his father. The coroner and his assistants immediately realized what the problem was, as they had been partly responsible for bringing it about.

  ‘That was that bastard from Berry Pomeroy Castle,’ exclaimed Gwyn. ‘The traitor who turned against our king as soon as his back was turned!’ When Richard the Lionheart had been captured by Leopold of Austria on his way home from the third Crusade, his younger brother Prince John had tried to seize the throne while Richard had been imprisoned in Germany for well over a year. Many of the barons and senior clerics had sided with John, including the Bishop of Exeter and Henry de la Pomeroy. However, as soon as the dramatic message ‘The devil is loose’ had reached England just before Richard was released, many of the rebels panicked, suddenly regretting their dalliance with treason.

  Thomas de Peyne, a most lit
erate and knowledgeable fellow, knew all the details. ‘Our king sent a herald down to Berry Pomeroy as soon as he came home, to tell Sir Henry that his guilt was known,’ he recalled. ‘But Pomeroy stabbed the messenger to death, then ran off to St Michael’s Mount, where the castellan had already dropped dead of fright when he heard that the Lionheart was home!’

  ‘I didn’t know that bit of the story,’ said Roger. ‘What happened to him?’

  ‘I know this, for Cornwall is my land!’ broke in Gwyn, still grasping the sword. ‘He made his surgeon open the veins in his wrist, so that he bled to death, to avoid the vengeance of the king!’

  John de Wolfe nodded his agreement. ‘Let’s hope the son has more sense–and loyalty!’ he grunted. ‘Walter, do we know where Pomeroy got this weapon?’

  The armourer took the sword from Gwyn, who seemed reluctant to let it go. He drew the blade from the scabbard again and held it so that they could see its quality. ‘It’s far older than his generation. His son said it was handed down through the family and there was a tradition that it was used at Hastings when William the Bastard defeated Harold Godwinson.’

  ‘There’s an inscription on the blade,’ observed Thomas. He was the only one of the four who could read.

  ‘What’s it say?’ demanded de Wolfe.

  Thomas squinted at the Latin words engraved down the length of the weapon and gave a rough translation in English. ‘It says that he who lives with falsehood, kills his own soul–and if he lies, he loses his honour.’

  Gwyn shrugged. ‘Seems common sense to me,’ he growled.

  After the coroner had taken the armourer aside for some haggling, they left Curre Street with Gwyn the proud possessor of a knight’s sword. His thanks to his master were brief, but heartfelt. John de Wolfe knew that after more than twenty years’ friendship, any effusive gratitude would have been misplaced.

  When they returned to Rougemont, the Cornishman sought out Sergeant Gabriel and together they had an hour’s sword-play in the castle’s inner ward, so that he could get used to the feel of the hilt and the balance of the blade.

  In the early evening, Gwyn made his way down to Milk Lane. Though almost in the centre of the city, its name was appropriate, as each of the dwellings had cows and goats on their plots, supplying milk to most of the townsfolk. His wife’s elder sister was Helen, a buxom widow who made a living from her five cows and four nanny-goats. Her two sons tended the animals, carrying in hay and grass for fodder, and hawked milk and cheese around the streets, while Helen did the milking and made the cheese in the dairy shed behind the cottage.

  This evening, Gwyn ambled to their temporary home, eager to tell his wife of the coroner’s generosity, but Helen met him at the door with a worried expression.

  ‘Agnes is unwell, Gwyn. All this trouble with the fire and the boys has done her no good at all. The wise woman from Rock Street is with her now, but I’m afraid it looks as if she’s going to miscarry again.’

  Next day was Tuesday, a hanging day. An unusually subdued Gwyn went with the coroner and his clerk to the gallows outside the city, along Magdalen Street. The coroner was required to record the event and to confiscate for the King’s Treasury any property that the felon left behind.

  Today was a lean harvest, as two of the four being executed were captured outlaws, with not a penny between them. Another was an old woman who had poisoned her neighbour by mistake, intending only to kill her house-cow out of spite. She had no property other than a few sticks of furniture, hardly worth the trouble of selling for the Crown. The last was a boy of fourteen, convicted of stealing a goblet worth twenty pence from a shop in North Street.

  Once the ox-cart had rumbled from under the crossbeam, leaving the victims dangling and kicking–and when the screams and sobs of the relatives had faded after they had ceased pulling down on the legs to hasten death, the coroner’s team walked back towards the city. Gwyn had told his master earlier about his sick children and his ailing wife.

  ‘I’m sorry to hear of your troubles, Gwyn.’ The deep voice of the coroner was sincere, though he rarely ventured into personal matters.

  Thomas nodded in agreement, always a sympathetic soul. ‘You have had more than your share of worries this past day or so,’ he squeaked. ‘May Christ and the Virgin spare you any more problems!’ He crossed himself jerkily in his almost obsessional manner.

  ‘Troubles always come in threes,’ he grunted. ‘Let’s hope this is the end of them.’

  ‘What’s wrong with the lads?’ asked Thomas, solicitously.

  ‘Brother Saulf, the infirmarian from St John’s Priory said they have the jaundice,’ grunted Gwyn. ‘I noticed as soon as I got up today, that their faces and eyes seemed yellow. He said there’s nothing to be done, it seems that there are other cases in St Sidwell’s. The monk suspects it’s because the midden heap got washed into the well, when we had that flood a few weeks back.’

  ‘I’ll pray for them, but I expect they’ll soon recover,’ said Thomas reassuringly. ‘And may the Holy Spirit protect your good wife, too.’

  ‘She’s miscarried twice before–and we’ve lost three babes before they were a month old,’ said Gwyn sadly. ‘Let’s hope the two little lads will survive this.’ Though the frailty of young life was accepted philosophically as God’s will, John felt deeply for his henchman, as he knew how much he loved his family. To cover up the risk of showing any emotion, de Wolfe cleared his throat and marched on more briskly.

  ‘Must get on! The noon bell has rung, my dinner will be on the table.’

  After he had turned off into Martin’s Lane, Gwyn and the clerk continued up to the castle. Here Thomas went to pray for his friend in the little garrison chapel of St Mary, while Gwyn continued to the keep, a squat tower on the far side of the inner ward. He intended eating in the hall with his soldier friends, but on climbing the wooden stairs to the entrance, he was confronted with a familiar but unwelcome figure.

  ‘There you are, you reckless savage!’ snapped Walter Tyrell, almost hopping with angry impatience. ‘Come with me, the sheriff is waiting.’

  He grabbed Gwyn’s arm, trying to pull him towards a door at the side of the large hall, noisy and bustling with the everyday business of Devon’s administration. The coroner’s officer stood like a rock, becoming irritated by his former landlord’s persistence. ‘What the hell do you want, Tyrell?’ he growled.

  Today the fuller wore a long yellow tunic under a dark blue mantle–which matched the colour of a large bruise on his left temple, where Gwyn had hit him the previous night.

  ‘I’m indicting you for both the loss of the house I leased you and for assault!’ he snapped. ‘The sheriff is going to attach you and demand sureties for your appearance at the next County Court!’

  ‘Don’t be so bloody silly, man!’ boomed the Cornishman, angrily shaking off Tyrell’s arm.

  ‘I’ve got witnesses, some of that rabble that was in St Sidwell’s last night.’

  ‘The same witnesses that will prove I asked you many times to fix the roof–and will say that you drew a knife on me!’

  ‘They’ll change their tune for the offer of a handful of silver pence!’ jeered Walter.

  Gwyn was just about to offer to give the man a matching bruise on the other side of his head, when the door of the sheriff’s chamber jerked open. The man-at-arms on guard thumped the butt of his pike on the floor in salute as a slight figure stalked out, even more dandified in his appearance than his friend the fuller. Sir Richard de Revelle wore his favourite green, the tunic edged in gold tracery around the hem and neck. A light surcoat of crimson silk carried his family device of a blackbird on a green ground, embroidered on his shoulder. His light brown hair was brushed back from his narrow face, made even more saturnine by the pointed beard below his thin-lipped mouth.

  Advancing on the pair near the main door, he brandished a piece of parchment and thrust it at Tyrell. ‘Here, Walter, this is what you requested!’

  Scowling at the coroner’s
officer, whom he knew and despised as a loyal servant of his brother-in-law, he added ‘My clerk has prepared the writ you desired, so I’ll see this fellow in front of me in the next Shire Court.’

  With that he turned and marched away before Gwyn could get out a word of protest. The fuller leered at him. ‘I’ve heard you’re fond of games of chance–are you willing to wager what the verdict will be before the sheriff next week?’

  Though Exeter now had over four thousand souls living within its walls, the portreeves and burgesses who ran the city council still employed only two constables to keep the peace. One was Osric, a tall skinny Saxon, the other an older, fatter man called Theobald. Their headquarters was a tiny hut behind the Guildhall in High Street, left behind by the masons who had recently rebuilt the hall in stone.

  The two men, carrying the heavy staves which were their only means of keeping order in the city, left together on patrol an hour before midnight and headed down Waterbeer Street. This was a lane parallel to the main street, which held a mixture of dwelling-houses, shops, taverns, two apothecaries and several brothels. One of their prime duties was to enforce the curfew, keeping an eye out for uncovered fires which might pose a threat to the still largely timber-built city, though dealing with unruly drunks staggering out of ale-houses was their other main concern.

  Tonight, neither of these tasks occupied them as they walked down Waterbeer Street. Theobald discovered a corpse by the simple process of tripping over it in the gloom, as its feet were protruding from a narrow alley alongside a leather-worker’s shop. Osric held up his horn lantern, which contained a single candle, to shed its feeble light on the body and saw blood oozing from a terrible wound in the neck.

  ‘Someone’s down the alley!’ bleated Theobald in his squeaky voice and with surprising agility for one with such a prominent ale-belly, started off in pursuit of the rapid footsteps that they had both heard.

  The Saxon knelt by the victim, but having seen many corpses during his time as a constable, he knew straight away that he was beyond help. The blood was no longer pumping, but merely oozing from the jagged tear that extended from below the left ear to just above the breastbone, indicating that his heart had already stopped. Osric opened the little door of yellow cow-horn on his lantern to get a better light and held it up above the face of the dead man.