Fear in the Forest (18 page)

De Alencon stopped walking and ran a hand through his crinkled grey hair. He turned a worried face to the coroner.

‘I have heard through channels that need not be named that the old trouble may be stirring again, and I cannot but wonder if this unrest in the forest is related.’

De Wolfe rubbed the black stubble on his face.

‘You mean the old trouble involving our royal namesake? How can that be, what could he gain from it?’

They began walking again, down Castle Hill towards the high street.

‘More money, more influence, disruption of the existing order,’ replied the priest. John did not ask him where he had heard the rumour – it was a poorly kept secret that Bishop Henry Marshal, in common with some other senior churchmen, had been sympathetic to Prince John’s abortive rebellion when King Richard was imprisoned in Germany and not expected to survive. They walked on for a few more yards, then the archdeacon spoke again.

‘My duties these days are more administrative than pastoral or devotional,’ he said rather bitterly. ‘I meet many other priests from the diocese and hear many scraps of gossip and chatter.’

De Wolfe waited patiently; he sensed that his friend was gathering himself to tell him something that the secretive ecclesiastical community would rather keep to itself.

‘I heard a rumour not only that certain senior colleagues were dabbling again in sedition, but that some particular priest was actively engaged in furthering that ambition.’

They took a few more strides, which brought them into the hubbub of the main street, before the coroner pursued the matter.

‘Have you any idea as to his identity? You are not talking about one of the prime movers, I assume?’

He meant the bishop himself, but kept to their coded way of talking.

‘No, no, he will keep a low profile until things develop much further, having had his knuckles rapped last time. This priest seems to be some kind of go-between, a buffer to insulate the leading lights from any dirty work that may be needed.’

‘And you have no idea who or where he is?’

John de Alençon shook his tonsured head. ‘Only that he is not from Exeter, but probably farther west. I have no means of improving on that hint – I had it second hand from someone whose informant unwisely let slip a few words and immediately regretted it.’

As they shouldered their way through the crowded street, with stall-holders and shop men advertising their wares and hawkers shaking trays at them, John once again realised what a dilemma men like himself and the archdeacon faced. They were devoted to the King, both from a sense of loyalty to their monarch and because of his powerful personality and courage. Yet competing reluctantly with these feelings of fidelity was the common-sense realisation that Richard Coeur-de-Lion was not the best head of state as far as England was concerned. In the past six years he had spent a bare four months of his reign in the country; he seemed unwilling ever to return; and he had never even bothered to learn to speak English. His interest in the country seemed confined to how much money he could squeeze from its inhabitants; time and again he had imposed crushing taxes and additional demands on religious houses and nobles alike. He and his Curia Regis strove to raise extra funds for his French wars, on top of the great debt still owing on his ransom to Emperor Henry of Germany. Richard auctioned titles and offices of state to the highest bidder and brazenly sold charters to towns and cities. He was once reputed to have said that he would have sold London itself if he could have found a rich enough buyer!

In contrast to Richard and his careless and profligate manner, his brother appeared to many to be a more practical and prudent caretaker of the island of Britain. Even the rather blinkered John de Wolfe could appreciate that to many the accession of the Count of Mortain, as John was also known, might be advantageous to the country. But never would men like de Wolfe accept this while the Lionheart lived, especially as John’s personality was so unattractive. Mean spirited, conceited and arrogant, the younger brother was personally highly unpopular. Having lived for so long in the shadow of his illustrious royal brother, John was disgruntled and jealous.

In his father’s time he had almost no territory of his own, being dubbed ‘John Lackland’, but when sent by Henry II to prove himself by governing the new conquest of Ireland, his rule was such a disaster that he had to be recalled in ignominy. When Richard came to the throne, he was excessively generous to John and gave him six counties for himself, including Devon and Cornwall – and was repaid with treachery when he was imprisoned on the Continent. Even after his release, when he rapidly crushed John’s rebellion, Richard was far too forgiving – instead of hanging his brother, he pardoned him and even restored some of his forfeited lands. Now, thought John sourly, the King’s compassion was being thrown back in his face, if the prince was once more seeking the throne. But how could this be related to the troubles in the forest?

De Wolfe’s cogitations had brought them to Martin’s Lane, where the archdeacon left him at his front door.

‘I have a suggestion, John,’ said the canon, as they parted. ‘I know you think highly of my nephew’s artfulness. You have told me before that he is adept at worming his way into the confidence of priests, so why not send Thomas out of the city to seek better information?’

He gave the coroner a broad wink with one of his lively blue eyes and strode away, his long cassock swirling as he crossed the cathedral Close.

The coroner spent the afternoon examining a corpse discovered in the Shitbrook, a foul stream just outside the city wall which ran from St Sidwell’s down to the river. It was aptly named, for it served as one of Exeter’s main sewers, the effluent that oozed down many of the streets eventually seeping to the little valley that carried the brook. After heavy rain, it tended to cleanse itself, but most of the time it was a stinking channel infested with rats. Often a dead dog or cat lay in its ordure, but today a resident of Magdalene Street, when tipping a barrow-load of goose droppings into the stream, came across the corpse of a man. From the state of him he had been there for some days, and nothing could be learned of the cause of death. Even de Wolfe and his officer, hardened as they were to repulsive sights, found the advanced decay of the body and the putrid waters of the Shitbrook an unattractive combination in this hot weather.

The swollen cadaver was totally unrecognisable, and there was nothing about the nondescript clothing that helped to identify the man. John was in no mood to dally with the problem, and after Gwyn had turned the body over with a stout stick he declared that there no visible wounds, as far as could be seen. After a few local men had been herded together as a jury, the coroner held a five-minute inquest on the spot and declared that the unknown man had died from an act of God. He ordered Osric, one of the burgesses’s constables, to send for the man who drove the night-soil cart to come and remove the body to the shed behind the cathedral that acted as the public dead-house, until a priest could be persuaded to read a few words over a hastily dug grave in the pauper’s corner of the Close.

When they got back to their chamber in the castle, they found Thomas hard at work as usual with quill and ink. After swilling the smell of putrefaction from his throat with some of Gwyn’s cider, the coroner gave his two henchmen their orders for the coming few days.

‘I have decided to go down to Stoke-in-Teignhead in the morning, to visit my family,’ he announced. ‘I’ll be back in Exeter on Sunday, but I want you two to spend those few days trying to discover more about this unrest in the forest.’

His officer and his clerk looked puzzled, Thomas’s concern being mixed with apprehension, as his undoubted intelligence was not matched by his personal courage.

‘You want me to venture into the forest, Crowner?’ he murmured hesitantly.

John grinned at his clerk’s trepidation. ‘Don’t fret yourself, fellow! I’m not asking you to go charging into the woods waving a broadsword – I’m leaving that to Gwyn. No, I want you to do what you’re best at, worming out information from priests.’

He repeated what little he had been told by Thomas’s uncle about someone in Holy Orders who might be involved in a conspiracy.

The clerk was anxious to assist his master, but doubtful about his chances of success.

‘Where am I to start looking, Crowner, with so little information?’

‘These problems seem concentrated around the southern edge of Dartmoor, Thomas. Why not work your wiles on some of the parish priests around there?’

Leaving the little clerk to ponder his instructions, de Wolfe turned to Gwyn, who placidly sat munching bread and swilling cider.

‘Go with Thomas as far as Bovey Tracey or Ashburton – make sure he doesn’t get lost or fall from his pony! Then while he’s wheedling news out of priests, you can tour the alehouses and see what you can pick up. I’m particularly interested in these bands of outlaws. I’m sure they are being used to do some of the dirty work.’

This was a task that suited the Cornishman admirably – sitting in taverns with the blessing of his master was a commission sent from heaven.

‘We’ll ride out soon after dawn tomorrow,’ promised Gwyn. ‘And be back here on Sunday, hopefully with some useful news.’

John walked down to the stables opposite his house and arranged with Andrew the farrier for Odin to be groomed and given extra feed, ready for an early start the following morning. Then he went across the lane to confront Matilda, who was sitting up in the solar half-heartedly playing with some embroidery by the light from the only window, an unglazed shuttered aperture looking out on the back yard. She had been unusually withdrawn since the visit of Lord Ferrars and his friends, chastened by the seemingly endless untrustworthiness of her brother. But her husband had to broach a subject that was guaranteed to stir up her emotions – a visit to his relatives in Stoke-in-Teignhead.

‘You needn’t think I’m coming with you, John,’ she snapped, her pug face creased into a scowl. ‘I’ll not suffer a few hours on the back of a palfrey for the pleasure of enduring a stay in that primitive house with that old Welsh woman and the two yokels you call your brother and sister!’

Her rapid return to her usual rude and abrasive nature caused John to lose any sympathy that might have been lurking over her disillusionment with her brother. Her unreasonable dislike of his family, though nothing new, was no less insulting to him. It was also unfair, for his mother was a sprightly sixty and undeserving of Matilda’s epithet ‘old Welsh woman’. It was true that she had both Welsh and Cornish ancestry, but she had always tried to be pleasant and kind to Matilda, though her efforts had been in vain. As for the spiteful epithet ‘yokel’ flung at his brother and sister, William and Evelyn may not have been sophisticated city dwellers, but they were solid, dependable country folk. And to call their manor house at Stoke ‘primitive’ was nonsense – it had been rebuilt in stone by his father, Simon de Wolfe, when John was a child, and though it may not have boasted flagged floors and a chimney-piece, it was as good as many others in the county – and in his opinion, better than most.

Repressing the urge to say that he had had no intention of asking her to accompany him, he turned on his heel and clumped down the stairs, going out to Mary’s cook-shed in the yard for a pint of ale and some soothing conversation, while his temper cooled. The maid easily diagnosed his irritation and turned the subject elsewhere.

‘How is Nesta? Is her child-carrying causing her any problems?’

John had confided in Mary soon after he learned that Nesta was pregnant, only narrowly beating the efficient grapevine that spread the news all over the city.

‘She has no problems with her body,’ he grunted. ‘But she is loath to let me acknowledge the child. I can’t understand her attitude. I would have thought she would be glad to have me stand by her.’

Mary had her own ideas on the matter, but prudently kept them to herself.

‘There’ll be several kinds of hell let loose, when she finds out,’ she observed, raising her eyes to the solar window at the top of the stairs.

De Wolfe nodded glumly as he drained his quart pot. ‘I know, but I’ve weathered worse before,’ he muttered, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Rising, he gave Mary a quick affectionate kiss on the top of her glossy brown hair as she bent over a fowl she was gutting for their supper.

‘I’ll have a quick stroll down to the Bush now, to see how she is. Last night she’d not speak to me – she locked herself in her room to cry.’

He spoke with the wounded bewilderment of a man to whom the moods of women were a total mystery, and Mary gave a secret sigh at the naivety of a man who in all other things was so forceful and dominant. Whistling for Brutus, who was lurking under Mary’s table hoping for scraps of offal, he marched away, leaving his maid shaking her head at what was to become of them all.

In the morning, though John left the city at about the same early hour as his assistants, they did not meet, as he went out through the South Gate and they left by the West, crossing the river to reach the main high road that went towards Plymouth.

The coroner’s route lay down the other side of the river as far as the port of Topsham, where he led Odin on to the flimsy skiff of the rope-ferry for the short crossing to other bank. In the fine air of early morning, he trotted across the flat, marshy ground of the estuary towards the line of hills that stretched down to the coast. With his sword hanging from his saddle, he had little fear of ambush, even though he rode alone. This well-used coast track was rarely plagued by outlaws, and the sight of the tall, hawkish figure in black on a heavy warhorse was not a tempting prospect for any casual robber.

Little over an hour after leaving the ferry, he found himself approaching the village of Dawlish, on its small creek leading up from the beach. Slowing Odin to a walk, he carefully scanned the few boats pulled up on the muddy bank of the tidal stream. With some disappointment, he saw that one was the larger seagoing vessel that often carried some of the wool sold to Brittany by Hugh de Relaga and himself. It belonged to Thorgils the Boatman, the elderly husband of the beautiful Hilda, who had been John’s adolescent sweetheart and occasional mistress ever since. His vessel had been damaged in a storm some time ago, and even now he could see that men were still working on it, replacing ribs and planks along both sides of the hull. Regretfully, he touched his stallion with a spur and moved on – even if Hilda had been available, his sense of loyalty to Nesta in her present condition was too great to allow him to dally in Dawlish, though his recent enforced celibacy, which seemed likely to continue for many months, gave him an uncomfortable ache in his loins. He wondered briefly whether he could last out that long, then chided himself for his selfish lack of honour.