‘Someone’s awake, at least,’ growled Gwyn, whose opinion of peace-softened civilians was usually unrepeatable. The gateman reported that he had seen no one around for several hours and certainly would not open up his gate at any price. It was a hanging offence to risk the security of the city, even in times like this when there was no war or insurrection.
‘Is there any place where two men might get across the wall?’ asked John, looking up at the fifteen foot fortifications, built of the usual soft red stone. Sometimes, lack of maintenance and neglect allowed parts of city walls to crumble away.
The watchman shook his head. ‘No, not a stone missing. The good city finances encouraged the portreeves to repair it last year. Sound as a bell, it is.’
They moved off eastwards, still listening for any sounds of the soldiers coming.
All was silent and they walked to the Watergate with no further sign of any human activity.
The Watergate was in the corner of the city walls, leading straight out on to the wharves. The gate was shut but they found the watchman sound asleep. After giving him a rousing telling-off, the coroner and his henchman started back into the town, taking an unsavoury lane that led towards the Shambles and eventually the cathedral Close.
Suddenly, Gwyn gripped John’s arm. They listened and strained their eyes to the left, down an alley. There had been a metallic tinkle, unlikely to be rat or cat. Their own shoes were leather and the soft slime of mud and manure deadened any footfalls.
Gwyn melted into the shadows on one side of the alley and John vanished back around the corner of the lane. The opposite wall of the alley was bright in the moonlight.
They waited, frozen into statues in the blackness.
There was another slight rattle of metal on stone.
Slowly, a figure slid round the corner of the next building down the alley, and silently crossed over into the shadow opposite, the same shadow that hid Gwyn but five yards distant. Then another man, slighter in build, emerged and stood half in shadow but with part of his body still in moonlight. This part included an arm holding a naked sword.
Oblivious of the pair concealed only a few feet away, the fugitives’ whispers came clear through the still, frosty air. ‘Watch that bloody mace, Baldwyn. It clatters at every movement.’
‘I’ve no sword, damn it to hell. That’s still at Peter Tavy.’
‘You’ll never see that again. Nor yet Peter Tavy, I’m afraid.’ The one in deep shadow moved again and the chain of his weapon made the same small sound, even though he tried to keep it rigid.
‘Which way now? I don’t know this pestilent town.’
‘Turn right, then left. The Watergate will be ahead of us. If we jump the gateman silently, we can slit his throat and get out on to the riverside. There must be a boat there, to float us downstream far enough to land and make across country.’
Becoming bolder, Gervaise stepped into full moonlight and trod silently along the alley towards the junction with the lane.
Baldwyn, just visible to John, kept pace with his master in the shadows under the eaves. He was walking directly towards the immobile Gwyn and inevitably must see him within the next few seconds.
John’s strategic instincts told him that he must give Gwyn the maximum advantage of surprise, so he stepped round the corner and stood in full moonlight, blocking the end of the alley. Simultaneously, he drew his sword with a flourish from its scabbard, the steel grating ominously against the bronze lip of the sheath.
The two escapers were as if struck by lightning. The sudden appearance of their persecutor from nowhere, to stand before them in the ethereal light of a full moon, seemed almost supernatural.
‘Christ!’ screamed Gervaise in terror. He threw away his sword, which hit the nearest wall with a clang. Then he turned tail and ran back round the corner of the alley.
‘Get him, Gwyn!’ roared John, throwing himself forward to chase the fleeing man. But Baldwyn was made of sterner stuff and stepped out to swing a murderous blow at the coroner with his chain mace. If it had connected, the heavy iron ball covered in spikes would have pulped John’s head, even with the protection of the helmet. But Gwyn, his presence in the shadows unsuspected by Baldwyn, leaped forward with a yell and hacked down with his heavy sword on to the hardwood handle of the mace. The short chain that carried the ball swung up and wrapped itself around the sword-blade, preventing Gwyn from making another stroke.
The coroner, who had felt the wind of the mace-head within an inch of his ear, staggered sideways, and before he could recover, the squire from Peter Tavy had snatched up his master’s discarded sword and had jumped back to face them both.
Gwyn’s sword had slid free of the mace-chain, but Baldwyn stood blocking the alley, his mace touching one wall and his sword-point the other. ‘Come then, I’ll have the pair of you!’ he snarled, crouching slightly and swinging the mace-chain menacingly.
‘Get after the other one – I’ll settle this fellow!’ barked Gwyn. In answer Baldwyn, who for all his evil deeds was no coward, took a great swing at both his attackers, the ball whistling across the whole width of the alley, preventing either opponent from getting close to him.
As the studded metal knob began another traverse, Gwyn jumped forward and jabbed his long sword behind it, trying to get Baldwyn’s shoulder as he turned with the swing of the mace. But the man used Gervaise’s discarded sword to parry left-handed, the two blades clashing like a pair of cymbals.
John dodged the mace on its return trip across the lane and, using his massive sword with two hands, slashed down at the squire’s arm. Baldwyn pulled back and the blade bit into the oak stem, knocking the mace out of his hand. The black sphere spun away out of control and struck Gwyn full in the chest. His stiff-leather jerkin blunted the impact of the conical spikes, but the weight and force of the five-pound ball made him fall backwards, dropping his sword as he staggered.
With a delirious whoop of triumph, Baldwyn followed him down, his sword poised for a thrust through the neck. But not for nothing had his adversaries fought together on dozens of battlefields. In a flash John was between them and another two-handed side stroke pushed Baldwyn’s sword high in the air.
The coroner’s blade skidded down the length of Baldwyn’s and stopped with an arm-wrenching thud against the cross-hilt. Even before Gwyn could pick up his own weapon, John de Wolfe had begun Baldwyn’s defeat. Though the younger man managed to get in one downstroke on John’s shoulder, its strength was easily absorbed by the overlapping metal plates. Before the squire could lift his blade again, John had swung horizontally and hacked into the back of his hand. Baldwyn screamed as bones crunched and blood spurted. With a last desperate swing at the coroner’s neck, he left himself open for a straight lunge and the point of John’s sword went into his chest, through a lung and protruded an inch from his back.
Gwyn, now with his retrieved sword pointing at Baldwyn’s neck, said, ‘He’s done for. I’ll see him finished, if you want to find the other.’
As Baldwyn, his lifeblood rapidly filling the inside of his chest, slowly and silently subsided to the ground, the coroner hauled out his sword from between the dying man’s ribs. He kicked the fallen weapon well clear of Baldwyn’s grasp, in case of any final tricks, and sheathed his own bloody blade. ‘See if he has anything to say as a dying confession – I’ll try to find this other bastard. There’s still no sign of the sheriff and his merry men.’ Leaving Gwyn to witness the last moments of Baldwyn of Beer’s life on earth, the coroner loped away up the alley where Gervaise de Bonneville had vanished.
Disturbed by the commotion, a few fearful faces peered from the window-openings of some of the mean huts in this least salubrious part of town, but no one ventured out to offer help. John could hardly blame them: this might have been just another fight between footpads.
The lanes were still deserted and there was no sign of Gervaise, who had a lead of four or five minutes, which was how long it had taken to deal with Baldwyn.
&
nbsp; John soon came out on Bell Hill, one of the main cross streets that led to the South Gate, but this was also empty, though now a few windows showed flickering lights as the earliest risers began to crawl out of their beds for the new day. For want of any better direction, the coroner walked up to the major street junction of the city, where the roads to all four main gates crossed at St George’s Church.
Here, at last, he saw half a dozen men-at-arms walking briskly down the road, with the castle constable and a sergeant hurrying behind. He hailed them and told the constable that one fugitive was dead or dying but that the other was still loose in the town. ‘He came up this way, so he’s not in the lower town,’ concluded the coroner.
‘No one crossed the High Street in the last five minutes, for we’ve just come down that way, Sir John,’ added the sergeant.
Ralph Morin, another experienced campaigner, looked up and down the main roads, swinging his naked sword hopefully in his hand. ‘I reckon he’ll most likely be near the cathedral,’ he said, waving an arm beyond the church of St Petroc, which stood on the opposite corner.
The mention of the cathedral caused Ralph, John and the sergeant to look at each other knowingly.
The constable sighed. ‘I’ll bet the swine has claimed sanctuary,’ he said, reluctantly slamming his sword back into its scabbard.
CHAPTER TWENTY
In which Crowner John goes to the cathedral
No one had had much sleep, and no one had had any breakfast, so the customary snack in the coroner’s chamber above the guardroom of the Rougemont gatehouse was more substantial than usual. The coroner had given Gwyn two silver pennies and his officer had come back at about the ninth hour laden with bread, pork, cheese and smoked fish. Thomas had been sent out to replenish the gallon crock of beer and had also brought some cider, which he much preferred.
Towards the end of their hearty meal, Ralph Morin came up to the bare room and accepted a jar of ale and some bread and cheese.
‘I’ve put men at every door of the cathedral, but I don’t think de Bonneville has the stomach to escape again – there’s nowhere for him to go.’
‘He gave us the slip well enough this morning,’ said the coroner, ‘although he owes that to his squire, who kept us busy long enough for us to lose him in the back lanes.’
The constable took a draught of his beer. ‘The cathedral Close gates are supposed to be locked every night, but people are in and out at all hours. The canons like to go out for drink and to visit their women, and the place is infested with beggars. It’s impossible for them to keep the place secure.’
‘What about the cathedral itself? Is that always open?’
The clerk, considering himself the authority on matters episcopal, ventured a comment. ‘The main west door is hardly ever used. It’s barred most of the time. But there are smaller ones at each side of the west end. They are often left open between services – and, of course, there’s a door into the chapter house and another leading to the cloisters. At the base of the North Tower, there’s a small door alongside the canons’ bread-house.’
The coroner sat hunched on his stool, finishing off a smoked herring. ‘It doesn’t matter a damn how de Bonneville got in. He’s there now and we’re stuck with him for up to forty days.’
‘Where is he holed up?’ Gwyn’s curiosity got the better of his usual silence.
‘Sitting at the foot of an altar in the North Tower,’ replied the constable.
‘Has he said anything yet?’ asked John.
‘Nothing apart from endlessly claiming sanctuary and hanging on tightly to the altar-cloth if anyone goes near him. A couple of canons and their vicars are circling about him, but the big men are going down there in about an hour – the Bishop himself, so they say.’
Gwyn lumbered off his window-sill to pour more drink. ‘Does he get fed in sanctuary?’
They all looked at Thomas, the oracle on this ancient procedure. ‘It’s the responsibility of the village or the Hundred – or, in this case, the town burgesses – to keep him alive for up to forty days. That’s why so many escape from sanctuary as the local people don’t want the expense of feeding and guarding them.’ He crossed himself spasmodically as he spoke.
The constable made a noise expressing disgust. ‘And the task of guarding him falls on us – and that means half a dozen doors to watch. Why the hell didn’t he choose a small church instead? There’s plenty of them in Exeter, God knows, all with only one door.’
Crowner John gave one of his rare barking laughs. ‘Maybe we can tempt him to move to St Olave’s. My dear wife would love that, it being her favourite praying place. And, talking of the de Revelles, how is our beloved sheriff taking this?’
Morin grinned, his plain face lighting up at the thought of his superior’s discomfiture. ‘He’s keeping his head down as much as possible. When I told him that the villain was in the cathedral, he scuttled off to see the Bishop, who for a wonder is actually staying in his palace here for a few days.’ He shifted his bottom on the edge of John’s table and hauled his sword scabbard into a more comfortable position. ‘What’s the next move?’ he asked. ‘There’s a crowd around the cathedral already. News gets about quickly in this town.’
‘No chance of his escaping again?’ queried John.
‘The place is sealed up tight as a drum. A mouse couldn’t get out.’
The coroner got up from his bench behind the parchment-littered trestle and walked restlessly across to look down through one of the wall slits. The town looked as it usually did in early morning: all the action was out of sight in the cathedral Close. ‘I’d better get down there, I suppose, to make sure those damned churchmen don’t have some scheme up the sleeves of their cassocks.’
As Gwyn and Thomas cleared up the remnants of their breakfast, the constable had a sudden thought. ‘This Baldwyn, whose corpse lies bleeding in my cart shed down below. Will there have to be an inquest upon him?’
John stared at him in puzzlement. ‘Of course. He certainly came to his death unnaturally.’
‘But you slew him yourself! Can a coroner stick a sword between someone’s ribs and then investigate the death?’
John hadn’t had time to consider this problem. ‘What choice is there? I’m the only coroner in the county.’
The constable still felt the situation was difficult. ‘But how can you be a witness in your own court? For that’s what an inquest is, even if it’s often held in the open air.’
As they walked down the winding steps, one behind the other, the coroner considered this problem. ‘I’ve no answer to that, Ralph – and I doubt if it has happened anywhere else yet. Maybe I’ll have to turn to Dorset or Somerset, to ask one of them to officiate – though, as far as I know, they’ve no jurisdiction in Devon.’
Morin laughed at John’s obvious dilemma. ‘That’ll teach you to go hunting felons with your own sword. Leave it to the professionals, like me and the sheriff!’
John was scornful, though in good humour with the constable, whom he much admired. ‘Leave it to you lot? Where were you and your merry men last night, when those two were trying to mash my head with a mace? If the coroner of this county wants something done, he had better do it himself!’
The banter went on for while as they walked away from the castle. Both men knew that the real object of their derision was Richard de Revelle, whose deviousness made the keeping of law and order by his military servants a stock joke in the county. The constable was uncomfortable with this, as the men-at-arms were mainly under his command, yet the unpredictable behaviour of the sheriff reflected badly on his own performance. They strode on down High Street, the citizens greeting them with affability, respect, suspicion or downright hostility, depending on their current relationship with law and authority.
When they reached St Martin’s Lane, they turned in towards the cathedral Close. John looked up at his house as they passed, but made no effort to go in. He hoped that Matilda’s new-found compliance was standing the stra
in of the night’s events.
When they entered the Close, they found that the idle section of the population had discovered a new source of entertainment. Groups of people, mostly women and old men, stood around the doors at the west end of the huge building. Even the children and imbeciles who usually roved among the graves, playing ball and touch-tag, had gravitated to gape at the cathedral entrance. There, men-at-arms were stationed at each door and the older sergeant was parading restlessly between them, anxious to disprove their reputation for letting fugitives escape. Morin went off to talk to him, while John, his officer and clerk in tow, pushed through the sightseers. Leaving their swords with one of the soldiers, they went in through one of the side entrances that flanked the big main doors of the Cathedral of St Mary and St Peter.
Inside, the poor November light left the huge building dim and shadowy. None of the side windows were glazed and birds flew in to perch on the corbels of the wooden ceiling, high above John’s head. The body of the building, with its wide nave and flanking aisles, was an empty, bare vista of flagstoned floor. The many services each day were for the benefit of the clergy, and the public, who could stand in this open space, were merely passive spectators. Only at the many small altars scattered about the inner walls was there contact between priest and supplicants, where masses were said at frequent intervals.
Many religious relics were scattered around the building, most in side-chapels and on altars, where people came to pray and plead for favours to cure body, mind and purse. One of the lesser clergy acted as a guide to the splinters of the Cross, hairs of Christ, St Mary Magdalen’s finger and part of the manger from Bethlehem.
But today no one had eyes for these holy artefacts as John marched the trio up the centre of the nave until they reached the quire-screen. This stood level with the sixth pair of massive columns that supported the building, separating the nave from the aisles. The quire was an ornately carved wooden cage, running back past the two huge towers towards the High Altar and the apse of the curved east end.
The Sanctuary Seeker Page 23