The Noble Outlaw (14 page)

John shrugged. 'I see not the slightest reason to give that any credence, Hugh. Why should an outlaw want to slay a glazier, for God's sake? And with Morcok, how would a Dartmoor outlaw carry a body to a loft in the middle of the city?'

Hugh threw down his unfinished glass of wine and hauled his rotund body to its feet. 'I must go down to Rack Lane this instant,' he announced. 'Perhaps de Beaufort will be there, perhaps it's all some horrible mistake. If not, I must convey the sad news to his wife and offer her some comfort on behalf of the guilds.' The coroner laid a restraining hand on the impetuous merchant's arm. 'If you know this Hamelin by sight, it is best that you come with me to Rougemont and look at the body just to make sure. We don't want to upset his wife needlessly if it's not him.'

The hope was ill-founded, however, and half an hour later, a pale-faced Hugh stood outside the cart shed in the castle, wiping his clammy forehead with a gaudy silk kerchief.

'Poor fellow, it's him right enough. But what a ghastly way to die. There are some evil bastards about, John!'
 

De Wolfe gently steered his friend across the inner ward towards the keep. 'We had better have a word with Henry de Furnellis first, then go down to the glazier's shop to break the news and ask a few questions.'
 

The sheriff was equally concerned and mystified at this second death of a senior guildsman and in spite of his usual reluctance to get involved with investigations, he decided to accompany them down to Rack Lane.

'At this rate, we'll be getting short of masters to run the merchant guilds,' he said as they marched down Castle Hill, with Gwyn and Thomas trailing behind the three senior officials. 'Maybe Bridport or Southampton are trying to rid themselves of Exeter as a trading competitor.'

His weak attempt at levity fell on deaf ears and they hurried on through the chill afternoon down to the bottom end of the city where it sloped sharply down towards the fiver. Near the Water Gate which led directly to the quayside, many workshops and storehouses had congregated. They were thriving on Exeter's economic growth, which was based mainly on the export of tin, wool and cloth, though many other trades flourished in the city.

Almost at the bottom of the slope was a house with a shop at the front, the wide shutter on the large window of the ground floor being let down on hinges and legs to form a display stall for the wares of Hamelin de Beaufort's business. Some fine glass drinking goblets imported from Cologne, a few chalices for religious use and a number of glass ornaments and bowls were carefully placed on view, as were some small panels of leaded light, segments of coloured glass intended for rich men's houses or some church where money had been donated for a window, in return for masses said for a departed soul.

De Wolfe turned in to a door at the side of the stall and entered the front workshop, where several craftsmen and a couple of young apprentices were working away at glass panels set on benches. In a room behind, he could hear the rhythmic squeak of a bellows and see the glare of a small furnace where glass was being reheated by a journeyman and another apprentice.

Looking around the faces raised expectantly towards him, he chose the eldest, that of a heavily built fellow of about forty wearing a thick leather apron scarred with burns down the front.

'Your master is not here?' he asked neutrally, in a last faint hope that there had been some error about identity. The man's swarthy features took on a worried expression, as he recognised both the sheriff and the county coroner.

'I wish he was, sir. There's business to attend to and he should have been back from his trip last evening.'
 

De Wolfe soon confirmed that it was indeed Hamelin de Beaufort who had gone to Berry Pomeroy Castle and failed to return. The workshop was thrown into turmoil when the coroner gravely explained that their master was dead. John assumed that their panic was due to the thought of losing their employment, but it transpired that the glazier's business was a partnership with Hamelin's brother, who would no doubt carry on trading.

Hugh de Relaga, discovering that Hamelin's wife now his widow - was in the living quarters upstairs, took himself off to deliver the sad news, much to de Wolfe's relief, as he hated and almost feared that task and the emotions it provoked.

Henry de Furnellis, feeling that perhaps he should make some contribution to the case, asked a number of questions about Hamelin's movements and affairs, but the journeymen and apprentices knew nothing to throw any light on his murder.

'He was a strict master, but a fair one,' said the older craftsman. 'We had no cause for complaint. He was a good guild member and abided by the rules to the letter. It's a real tragedy that he should be struck down so foully.'

Further enquiries amongst all the workers yielded nothing. The coroner's team took a description of de Beaufort's missing horse, which was a tan-coloured gelding, but John suspected it had probably been sold already by whoever had caught it after it ran from the scene of the killing. There were plenty of unscrupulous horse dealers who would not hesitate to spirit away a stolen horse to Totnes or Tavistock and sell it well away from anywhere where it would be recognised.

The sheriff and de Wolfe left the portreeve with the family to console them and to make arrangements for the burial of the dead man, which the guilds would organise. As they were near the Bush tavern, the pair decided to call in for refreshment. Gwyn came with them, though Thomas, never keen on drinking, made his way to his lodgings in nearby Priest Street.

The inn was fairly quiet at that hour of the afternoon and Nesta had time to sit with them near the fire. As always, her soft heart was saddened to hear of the death of Hamelin, though she had never met him.

'I grieve for his poor widow, suddenly being told of his cruel death,' she said sadly. 'I sometimes worry about you, John, also putting yourself at risk with all these unsavoury people you have to deal with.' She was thinking particularly of last month's escapade down on the south coast, when John had rescued his wife and brother-in-law from a very dangerous situation.

Henry de Furnellis, bluff and to the point as always, leaned forward, his bloodhound face staring into the glowing logs. 'Why two guildsmen, killed in such strange ways? Are we going to see more such deaths?' De Wolfe shrugged as old Edwin limped across to refill his ale jar. 'We've not the slightest notion as to why these two were slain, so no one can answer that,' he grunted. 'I had better talk to some more guild wardens, to see if they can throw any light on the mystery.'

Gwyn, who had sat himself down at the far end of the table in deference to the presence of the two king's officers, entered the discussion. 'Are you really sure that this outlaw fellow has nothing to do with it, Crowner?' he rumbled. 'Why should de Revelle be so worked up about him?'

'Because one of them was found dead in his precious schoolhouse, that's why. If he had turned up next door, he'd not have shown the slightest interest.'
 

The sheriff scratched the sparse grey hair behind his ear, where a flea was irritating him. 'And now there is this connection to de Revelle's crony. Would it not be worth trying to find this Nicholas to see if he had any involvement?'

Nesta, who had heard about Nicholas from John, made some tutting noises. 'He sounds a decent enough outlaw, who's been persecuted by that damned de Revelle, so it seems a pity to seek him out to hang him.'
 

De Furnellis took a pull at the quart pot of cider he had grasped in his brawny hand. 'Maybe we could catch him, then let him gain sanctuary and allow him to abjure the realm after you've questioned him?' he suggested.

The coroner snorted in derision. 'Some hope, Henry! Those moor men can vanish like magic into that huge wilderness. And imagine it in this weather: a posse would die of exposure before they laid eyes on a single hair of those outlaws.' The posse comitatus was a band of men raised by the sheriff, charged with hunting down criminals or traitors anywhere in the county. Though John was a seasoned warrior, having fought in Ireland, France and Outremer, he was no moor man, but he knew what a vast area of inhospitable hills, heathland and deep valleys made up the central part of the county. Scores of men had died up there, lost and exhausted in the mists and blizzards that could sweep in at a moment's notice.

Gwyn nodded in agreement. 'There are a dozen gangs of outlaws on the moor, all living in burrows and ruins. We've no idea where this Nick o' the Moors is hiding probably he has a half-dozen different lairs, miles apart. Looking for a needle in a hayrick would be easy compared with that!'

The sheriff abandoned his idea without rancour. 'I suppose you're right - and I don't want to spend Christ Mass freezing my arse off on Dartmoor, so we'll give up the notion of having a talk with this Nicholas.'
 

But Nicholas had not given up the notion of having a talk with them - or, more specifically, with Sir John de Wolfe.

Out on the high moor, a freezing fog filled the valley of the West Webburn stream, rolling into the bleak vale between Challacombe Down and Hameldown Beacon.

At the bottom, a scraggy collection of bare trees stood alongside the brook like black skeletons in the almost crystalline air. Amongst them, four men worked up a welcome sweat as they swung axes at logs felled some months back, which by now were dried out sufficiently for the fire.

The thud of the blades was muffled by the mist, but a steady morning's work had produced a respectable heap of firewood, and eventually Nicholas de Arundell called a halt. 'That should satisfy Gunilda for a day or two,' he declared, picking a leather jerkin from a bush and shrugging it on before the icy cold could bite into him again. 'I'll miss all this exercise when I recover Hempston.'

Robert Hereward threw down his own axe and wiped his brow with his sleeve. He looked disapprovingly at Nicholas, who had been his master in their previous life.

'It's not seemly for you to have to chop kindling, sir. You are still a manor lord, even if you have been shamefully deprived of your inheritance.'

Nicholas slapped him on the back as they walked up the slope from the stream towards the huts. 'Being outlawed levels all men, Robert. There is no aristocracy on the moor, only leaders of men and those who follow.' With the ginger Peter Cuffe following behind dragging a sledge full of logs and with Philip Girard clutching an armful of sticks, they made their way up to the largest hut, which had a wreath of blue smoke climbing from a hole in the roof. The village, consisting of a few part-ruined dwellings, had been abandoned long before. A few years of unusually severe weather had forced the last batch of settlers to give up trying to scratch a living from the thin soil and to move back down the valley to the lower and more hospitable land beyond Ponsworthy.

No doubt this cycle of pioneering and then disillusion had been repeated many times over the centuries - and would be again in the future. But at the moment, the crudely built shelters of large moorstone blocks were empty and the wall enclosing them had fallen in many places. Most of the thatched or turfed roofs had collapsed as their timbers had rotted, and only those intermittently colonised by tinners had been roughly repaired. The hamlet lay a hundred paces uphill from the Webburn brook, safe from the occasional flooding that occurred after cloudbursts on Hookney Tor and Headland Warren.

With Challacombe Down looming above it, the derelict houses stood in a sloping enclosure, some of them solitary huts, others in short terraces of square rooms. Crude openings for windows and doors were formed by lintels made from long slabs of grey moorstone. As timber was in short supply in that generally treeless heathland, all building was in drystone, apart from the rough branches used to support the roofs.

The late afternoon was drawing on as they unloaded their logs and stacked them against the wall in the communal living house. Gunilda was cooking a large pike that Peter Cuffe had caught yesterday in a pool downstream, but their supper was still an hour away. To calm their hungry stomachs, they each helped themselves to a bowl of thin potage, drawn from an iron cauldron simmering at the side of the fire.

'Cedric should be back from his post soon,' said Gunilda in her harsh voice. 'Not much point in him staying there in this fog.'

The outlaw band always kept a sentinel on watch further down the remote valley, perched up on the southern spur of Hamel Down. From there in clear weather, he could see a long way down the track that came up from Buckland. At any sign of men approaching, he could run back to Challacombe, and within minutes the gang could disperse up the sides of the valley and wait to see who came. If necessary, they could evacuate up to Grimspound, their next hideout a mile further away, which was an even more ancient village, set high in a side valley.

'He'll not be able to see his own toecaps up there,' agreed Girard. 'The higher you go, the thicker it gets.'

'By the same token, no one is going to come looking for us in this weather,' grunted Nicholas, blowing on the soup in his wooden spoon to cool it. They had rarely suffered any trouble in this respect: the law officers had only once attempted to seek them out, knowing that it was an almost hopeless task even if they had sufficient men and determination. Both the previous sheriff and the new one had lacked both these resources and left them well alone, as they did the other gangs that inhabited Dartmoor.

It was these last who posed the only real threat, as outlaw bands were sometimes jealous of the success of others and especially resented them poaching on what they considered their territory. Twice in the past year, gangs of even worse ruffians had tried to evict Nicholas from his village, but the superior tactics of a former Crusader and his more intelligent members, who had been manorial servants in Hempston, saw off the badly organised thugs who tried to overcome them, especially as a few of Nicholas's men were accomplished archers.