Here, though, he’d learned that there could be benefits to peace. He hadn’t had to take up weapons against men who were bigger than him, or fight with a band of fellows who were likely to desert him just when the battle grew harshest. Instead he’d discovered that the lands about here were conducive to relaxation. There was little work that truly had to be done today.
‘I’d stay with Sir Odo for as long as I could, I reckon,’ he said at last. ‘That’s it. He’s been good to me. I – I like him. I can respect him. I think I’d stay with him even if he lost everything.’
‘You’d be that loyal?’
Walter stirred himself, irritated by the questioning. ‘Why? Do you think that I’m just a mediocre felon because I don’t have a master? I am a free man, not tied to some land. I am as loyal as any man deserves. Sir Odo saved me when I needed help. I’ll repay that. What’ll you do? If the Despensers decide to take this manor, they’ll still need a bailiff here, so you may well find yourself wanted anyway.’
‘But I’m Lord de Courtenay’s man.’
‘You can protest all you want, but you’d best think about that if you want a home to live in. If Despenser chooses, Lord de Courtenay won’t have any household to be loyal to. Look at Earl Thomas, the king’s own cousin. He’s been executed like a felon. Then there’s King Edward’s favourite general, Lord Mortimer. He’s under threat of execution if he’s ever found again. Those two were loyal to their king too. How long do you think de Courtenay can survive if Despenser takes against him the way he took against those other two?’
Baldwin eyed this knight with the same cold, dispassionate interest with which he studied any other man he suspected of murder.
Sir Geoffrey was a confident, square-jawed man with the manner of a natural bully. Baldwin had known many like him, although usually there was one clear flaw in their character. A bully would usually give himself away with bluster and arrogance. Not so this knight. He hadn’t threatened or sworn at the sudden interruption of his privacy. Perhaps it was because he was intelligent too, that he offered wine and allowed them to remain in his hall without calling for guards to remove them as he could have. After all, even the Despenser’s men had to be wary of insulting the king’s own officials … in public, at least.
There was more, though, Baldwin reckoned. This man was no fool, and he wanted to know what the Keeper knew. He wanted to trade information, perhaps, or was it only that he wanted to win Baldwin over, if that was at all possible?
‘Come with me,’ Sir Geoffrey said, tilting his head slightly to one side and giving a self-deprecating grin and shrug, like a peasant who’d been caught out in a little ruse.
That manner of his made Baldwin wonder whether the man was actually as intelligent as he had initially suspected. If he had thought to conceal a crime he himself had perpetrated, surely the worst thing he could have done would have been to bring the body here. To attempt to hide her in his own hall would immediately have the effect of adding to any suspicions about him.
But Sir Geoffrey had no foolish delusions that he might be free of suspicion, of course, Baldwin told himself. Sir Geoffrey was an astute man. If he had been involved in this woman’s murder, he would have made sure already that his men were briefed to give him an alibi; if another man had killed her, surely he would want to make sure that the killer was speedily discovered.
She lay on a door on the floor of the solar. Her body had spent some time in the water, Baldwin reckoned: although he was no expert in bodies retrieved from mires, the flesh of her hands appeared almost like gloves, and looked as though it would pull away at a touch. Simon, he realised, had walked straight in and now stared down at her at Baldwin’s side.
Thinking again of how Simon had kept back from the ruins of Hugh’s house, Baldwin was surprised. Simon could usually be relied upon to remain at the rear of any investigation like this, but today he was right beside Baldwin, and Baldwin wondered why, until he saw Simon’s face. The bailiff had wondered whether there could have been any error, and whether this could have been Hugh’s wife. That it was not was not in doubt. This lady was dark-haired, with probably a dark complexion in life; Constance had been very fair of skin and hair. Simon took one look at her and subsided, moving behind Baldwin, his head hanging.
‘Who has identified her?’ Baldwin demanded of the knight.
Sir Geoffrey shrugged. ‘I have men here who know her well enough. I can find others, if you wish. There’s a local priest who knew her. If you don’t trust our word, you will believe a priest, I suppose?’
Baldwin turned and gave him a long stare. The man was insufferably confident now that the men were all in here looking at the body, but whether it was the confidence of the innocent, or the bluster of a guilty man, Baldwin could not tell. ‘Which priest?’
‘Humphrey or Isaac down nearer the river. Anyone will tell you where you can find them.’
‘Why did you remove the body to this room? You know the law. She should have remained where she was found.’
‘How often would a coroner demand that a drowned man be left in the river where he was found? Don’t be ridiculous. She was in a pool of water. It would be stupid to leave her there. And in any case, this poor child was a neighbour almost. I could not let her remain there. I fear that if the law demands that an innocent young woman like this should be left in the wet grave in which she was discovered, the law deserves to be ignored.’
‘You did not intend to see whether you could hide her?’
Sir Geoffrey grinned more widely. ‘Sir, is she hidden? How many men did I tell to keep silent about finding her? None! I merely sought to protect the body of a dead neighbour from being consumed by wild beasts, because no matter how much I tried to have her person guarded, in this weather my peasants would have left her alone while they went to find more adequate clothing, or sticks for a fire, or a hovel in which to shelter from the rain, and in the meantime she would have been eaten.’
‘When was she last seen?’ Baldwin asked.
‘Oh, I don’t know. You need to ask her household.’
‘I shall. She came from Meeth?’
‘Yes. She was Lady Lucy of Meeth. Husband died in the war against the king, so she had no one to protect her.’
His gaze had gone to her as though regretfully, Baldwin thought, but that should be the natural reaction of any man who learned of a poor widow who was taken and killed.
Baldwin subjected the corpse to a close examination, speaking all the while. ‘Edgar, see this? Her left arm is broken – above and below her elbow. And the right is broken below the elbow. Both legs have been broken too. There is a great wound under her left breast. Someone stabbed her, but not with an ordinary weapon. It is grossly opened … a terrible wound. The poor child. This looks like torture, followed by a stabbing. At least her death was swift enough. Would you have any idea when she could have been put in that mire, Sir Geoffrey?’
The steward shook his head decisively. ‘Of course not. She was probably thrown there by someone passing by. It’s an easy place to reach from the road, as you saw today, I expect. Anyone could have flung her in and ridden on to Monk Oakhampton or Exbourne. There is nothing to make me suppose that she was put there by someone from my household.’
‘Yet she was tortured. Somebody must have had reason to do that to her.’
‘Someone who might, for instance, have desired her?’
Baldwin smiled without humour. ‘You think so? A man who craved her body so much that he was willing to destroy it in order to prevent another having it? Or someone who wanted to make her a compliant bed-mate? How many women have you known who would willingly sleep with a man who had tortured them?’
‘What else could it be?’
‘Oh, I am sure we can come up with some suggestions to cover the facts,’ Baldwin said mildly. ‘But I think that there is little more to be learned from this poor child’s broken body. You have sent for the coroner, you say?’
‘Yes.’
‘
And he is a knight who owns his loyalty to Lord Despenser. As you do. That will make matters much more convenient.’
‘That is the second time you have mentioned that we both owe allegiance to the same man,’ Sir Geoffrey commented. His eyes looked lazily at Baldwin, the lids falling until he seemed close to dozing. ‘Does that mean that you have some comments you wish to make about my master?’
‘Not at all. He is not here,’ Baldwin smiled.
‘Then, perhaps, you have something to say about me?’
‘No. I am simply intrigued that so much should be happening here, and by the coroner’s assumption of an accident up at Iddesleigh. That was a very convenient decision, was it not?’
‘Iddesleigh?’
‘The coroner suggested that the house fire was an accident. I think it was a murder. Men went there and murdered a woman and child.’
‘I heard of that. Yes, a man and his wife and child died, so I heard.’
‘Certainly the woman and child are dead.’
Baldwin was aware of Simon throwing him a look, but Baldwin refused to return it. He was watching the knight in front of him very carefully to see whether his words had affected him.
Sir Geoffrey eyed him doubtfully, but Baldwin did not see any guilt, only a little surprise. ‘Well, if you have questions for the coroner, you will be able to ask him before long.’
Baldwin looked back at the body on the rude stretcher. ‘I think I may do that.’
‘Do,’ Sir Geoffrey said.
Glancing up at him, Baldwin thought he had a little of the stillness of a snake preparing to strike. Rather than provoke him further, he would have left the room, but Sir Geoffrey was blocking his path.
‘There is one thing you should consider, Sir Baldwin,’ he said quietly. ‘Bear this in mind. If I was going to murder, I would not be foolish enough to hide the body on my lands just when I was going to expose that very area to the gaze of all my villeins. If I killed, I would leave the woman’s body somewhere else. Perhaps on a neighbour’s lands, if I sought to do him a foul turn.’
‘You have many enemies?’
Sir Geoffrey showed his teeth. It could have been a smile, but it could equally have been a snarl. ‘What do you think?’
Chapter Twenty-Two
‘What are you talking about?’ Simon demanded as soon as they had remounted and ridden away from the hall. ‘You said in there that Constance and young Hugh were both dead, but you implied …’
Baldwin brought his horse nearer Simon’s. ‘Simon, Edgar and I have seen men burned at the stake. You’ve seen bodies brought out from burned-out cottages, too. A man doesn’t simply burn away.’
Edgar nodded. ‘A man takes cartloads of wood to be completely immolated, Simon.’
‘But what else could have . .?’
‘If Hugh was hurt, he would find a place to hide until he was well, wouldn’t he?’ Baldwin said. ‘And then he would return to exact vengeance.’
‘He could have escaped that place only to die alone somewhere else,’ Simon said with a gasp. His grief was rising again. It felt like panic. The idea that his man could have been injured, and had run off like a stabbed hog to die in a lonely, miserable, cold place far from anyone he loved, was more than Simon could bear. He closed his eyes and didn’t quite catch Baldwin’s next comment. ‘What?’
‘Wake up, Simon!’ Baldwin snapped. ‘This is the first chance we’ve had to discuss this. We’ve had people with us up until now. I wasn’t going to talk to you about it at Hugh’s ruins, but I am sure that Hugh did not die there. The question is, did he die at all, or was he free to escape?’
Edgar shrugged. ‘Obviously he was free.’
‘What are you saying?’ Simon protested. ‘How could you think that he would choose life when his woman was dead? He couldn’t have lived.’
‘Clearly he did,’ Edgar said flatly. ‘He sent a messenger to me.’
Simon’s jaw dropped. ‘He … how do you know this?’
‘The messenger was from a friar who met him somewhere round here. He told me that the friar was agitated, but that he had been told to pass on the message. If Hugh is in the hands of a friar, I should think he would be well enough.’
Baldwin nodded. ‘I did not even think of that. I simply assumed that the messenger came from the vill.’
‘My first thought was, who there could have known where I was,’ Edgar said. ‘There were some who could have known where Simon was, but not me, I thought. That was why I asked.’
‘And it was a good thing you did,’ Baldwin said. ‘So let us assume that he is alive and recuperating. That means we have an urgent task.’
‘Why assume that?’ Simon said, reluctant to accept this leap of faith. ‘He may have died.’
‘If he had, I think the friar would have told someone,’ Baldwin said. ‘A friar need not fear the local politics. No, I think the fact that they are still silent and apparently hidden means that they are both alive. So we have the job of finding the killer before Hugh tries to.’
‘I would have no difficulty with Hugh finding the murderer and killing him,’ Simon said, and spat into the road. ‘He deserves whatever Hugh does to him.’
‘I agree,’ Baldwin said, but now there was an unusual note in his voice, a tone Simon had only rarely heard before. Baldwin swung his arm and winced at the pain in his shoulder. ‘But we have to remember that Hugh has been known to get things wrong before, Simon. I don’t want to have to protect him after he’s killed the wrong man.’
Humphrey was happy that he’d done all he could now, and he was about to pack his meagre belongings when the heavy pounding at the chapel door made him stiffen and wait, considering what he could do.
The only thought in his mind had been of escape, and he was almost ready to leave. He’d done it before, and he was more than ready to slip off again. It wasn’t the best weather for it, of course, but at least he could depart at night and find a new post somewhere, anywhere, and begin again. There was no point in hanging around here any longer. He was convinced of that. If he did, he might be hanged.
‘Who is it?’
‘Father, it is the Keeper of the King’s Peace, Sir Baldwin Furnshill. I understand you saw the body of a young woman on Sir Geoffrey’s land today. May we speak to you?’
Humphrey closed his eyes and swore to himself. God was playing games with him now. So near to escape, yet he was in danger again. He stared at the altar and the plain cross accusingly, his lips pursed in anger. ‘Oh, very well,’ he said, and slipped the bolt open, stepping into the chill daylight.
The men before him were alarming. The Keeper, of course, was worrying enough. Any man whose job involved tracking down and arresting felons was not the sort of person Humphrey wanted to be involved with, not with his past. Still, he managed to smile coolly and eye the three with what he hoped looked like calm disinterest. ‘You wanted to speak to me about the young woman?’
‘Yes. What can you tell us about her?’
‘I did not know her, if that is what you mean. She was the widow of a knight at Meeth, I understand. That was what Perkin told me, anyway.’
‘Perkin?’
‘One of the peasants. He was the man who found Ailward after the football.’
Baldwin nodded. ‘You mean the sergeant who died?’
‘Yes. He was killed up on the moor near Iddesleigh. I reckoned it was because of the camp ball. Perkin was running up to the goal when he saw Ailward. It was because Ailward appeared there in his way that a man from Fishleigh was able to knock Perkin down and take the ball, and it was because of that tackle that Monkleigh lost the game. Not many forgave Perkin that loss. And I doubt he forgave Ailward for distracting him.’
Simon listened with rising anger. This was all nonsense. The man was talking about some game of camp ball, while he wanted to learn about his man. He pushed his way forward. ‘What of the …’
‘Simon, please wait,’ Baldwin said. He glanced at his friend and gave him a sympathetic smil
e. ‘We have to try to get to the bottom of all these stories before we can hope to learn what became of Hugh. There must be a connection between them all.’
‘Hugh?’ Humphrey repeated, looking from one to another. ‘Who’s he?’
‘He was the servant of my friend here,’ Baldwin said. ‘And his wife and child were killed up beyond Iddesleigh a few days ago.’
‘Oh, the man who died in the fire,’ Humphrey acknowledged.
‘You agreed with that conclusion?’ Baldwin said.
‘The coroner said it was an accident, didn’t he?’ Humphrey said.
‘I believe so,’ Baldwin said without emphasis. Then he added, ‘A coincidence that the coroner was here for Ailward’s death just when this man and his family were killed too.’
‘And now another woman’s dead too,’ Simon snapped. ‘What is happening here, priest?’
Humphrey licked his lips and glanced from Simon to Baldwin. He was in two minds, but there seemed little point in trying to conceal anything from them. It wasn’t as if the matters had anything to do with him – and he would soon be gone anyway.
‘Everyone thinks she was killed by Sir Geoffrey. He and his men are vassals of Despenser, and you know his reputation. Lady Lucy had land and could perhaps be bullied into giving it up, while your man was one of several who were beaten up and told to go.’
‘He wasn’t “told” anything,’ Simon spat. ‘He was slaughtered with his family.’
‘It was meant as a message, I think,’ Humphrey explained. ‘Others have been used in the same way. There is a man called Robert Crokers over the way there, who is sergeant to Sir Odo of Fishleigh. He had his home burned too. That was the same day as your man.’
A Friar's Bloodfeud: (Knights Templar 20) Page 22