The Witch Hunter (19 page)

Gwyn marched forward to close the proceedings by shooing away the jury and picking up the valuable box, which he retied once again.

‘What’s to be done with this, Crowner?’ he boomed.

‘I want you to take it straight away back to Rougemont and give it into Ralph Morin’s hands, to be locked up somewhere safe. I’m staying here for a few hours, as Robert Hereward has kindly invited me to eat with him at the manor house. I’ll ride back this evening with Thomas.’

It was a decision that was to cause de Wolfe considerable aggravation some time later.

Although Walter Winstone lived a frugal existence in the dismal room above his shop, he was a moderately rich man, mainly because he added considerably to his legitimate business as an apothecary by his more dubious activities in procuring miscarriages and the occasional killing. The last was usually of animals, when some disgruntled person wished to get even with an enemy by poisoning his horse, cow or pigs – but sometimes, as with the attempt on Henry de Pridias, he undertook the occasional murder. As he begrudged every penny he was forced to spend, his wealth had steadily accumulated and his locked chest upstairs now contained quite a few pounds, quite apart from the box buried in his backyard, which held another large hoard of silver pennies. Thus, although he was the meanest man in Devon, he felt able to cast a little bread upon the waters by bribing agents to discredit his rivals, the cunning women whom he obsessively blamed for undercutting his business.

So far he had scored a spectacular success with Alice Ailward, the widow of Rock Lane, who was now securely locked up in the proctors’ cells near the cathedral. This emboldened him to repeat the escapade, after doing some intelligence work to discover the names of a few more alleged witches in the city.

On the evening of the day when John de Wolfe rode out to Cadbury to inspect treasure trove, a porter called at the cottage of Theophania Lawrence, in one of the mean lanes of Bretayne. This was the south-western corner of the city, called after the remnants of the original Britons of the Dumnonia tribe, who gave their name to Devon. These Celtic people were pushed into this ghetto when the Saxons arrived hundreds of years earlier to settle within the old Roman walls. It remained Exeter’s poorest area, a warren of narrow lanes, shacks and hovels, populated by the lowest class of manual workers.

Theophania’s hut was marginally better than those of her neighbours, but was still a dismal one-room dwelling, with wattle and daub walls and a tattered roof of straw thatch. Her visitor aimed a kick at a large rat that was nibbling at some offal in the gutter that oozed past the rickety door and shouted her name through the cracks in the warped boards. He was Edward Bigge, from St Sidwells, the village where Gwyn of Polruan lived, just outside the East Gate. A wide, squat man of thirty, he had cropped ginger hair and a square, pugnacious face that was deeply pitted by old acne scars. He had almost no neck and his arms seemed too long for his short body, but he was immensely strong, almost muscle-bound, from his occupation of carrying goods on and off the ships at the quay-side.

He shouted again and was answered by a yell from inside to wait a moment, as the woman of the house was occupied. Theophania was dealing with another client, a sailor who was about to take ship to Flanders, carrying tin and silver bound from Dartmoor to Cologne. Such cargoes were often preyed upon by pirates, who came from as far afield as the Barbary Coast or even Turkey, and he wanted a charm to keep him safe. Such requests for protection on journeys were common and the old woman had a ready supply of amulets in her cupboard on the wall.

‘Take this and hang it around your neck – then we will say a prayer together to St Christopher,’ she croaked, handing him a crude
agnus dei
.

This was a small roundel of wax with a cross crudely stamped into one side and a leather lace attached to go over his head. The wax had come from stumps of altar candle that she had scavenged from the waste middens outside various Exeter churches, which she melted down and moulded to make her talismans.

‘This has holy powers, man,’ she assured him. ‘It has a fragment of the consecrated Host within it!’ A tiny scrap of the communion wafer that she had smuggled out of St Martin’s made the amulet all the more powerful. She looped the thong over his neck and muttered some confused words of prayer to various saints, including Christopher, James and Peter, adding Mary, Mother of God for good measure.

She forced her client to repeat them and as he was mumbling a final ‘Amen’ she held out her hand for her three pence fee.

‘Now get you gone in safety!’ she declared, opening the door and letting the sailor push past Edward Bigge, who was waiting on the step.

‘What can I do for you, fellow?’ she demanded brusquely. Her services were in constant demand and she could afford to dispense with courtesy and amiability.

‘I have this pain in my belly and burning when I piss, mother,’ Edward complained, sticking to the story that the apothecary had given him.

‘How long have you suffered?’

‘About four days now. I also feel feverish and sick to my stomach.’

Theophania took his roughened hands and studied the palms, then poked a finger at his face and pulled down his lower lids to look at the whites of his eyes. ‘Your member stings when you pass water, eh? Have you been with dirty whores this past few weeks?’

He denied it vigorously, but the old wife sniffed her disbelief as she went to a shelf and took down a small earthenware cup. ‘Here, piss into this, while I cut a lock of your hair.’

This was not what Edward was expecting, but he fumbled under his short tunic to loosen the strings of his leggings. Turning his back to her, he held the cup to his loins, while the uncaring crone took a small knife and, with some difficulty, hacked off a small bunch of his cropped hair. He turned round and handed her the filled cup, some embarrassment showing even on the hard face of this rough workman. As he struggled to put his clothing back in place, she opened the door and carelessly threw most of the urine out into the lane, keeping back only an inch in the bottom of the cup. As he watched, she dropped the sample of hair into it, then went to a table in the corner where a candle was burning. She held the cup over it for a few moments until it boiled, the stench in the room becoming even more pungent. Looking into the cup, she muttered something to herself, then set it on the table while she rummaged among pots on the shelf above. Selecting one, she tipped a small quantity of brown powder from it into the cup.

‘What’s that, mother?’ the customer grunted suspiciously, afraid that she was going to ask him to drink the mixture.

‘Soil from a fresh grave, man. It has certain powers that we need.’ With a piece of holly stick, she stirred the concoction, mumbling to herself. Then she advanced on him, holding the cup and stick. Edward recoiled, but she reached out and grabbed his tunic. ‘Lift this up out of the way, if you want to be cured!’ she snapped.

Apprehensively, he hoisted his garment to expose his grubby belly, but was relieved to discover that all Theophania did was to dip the stick in the fluid and make a wide cross on his stomach with the odorous liquid. She repeated this three times, muttering incomprehensible rhymes under her breath. Then she repeated the process on his forehead, before pressing the warm cup into his hand.

‘Go to the cathedral and tip some drops at the north, south, east and west of the Close, saying the paternoster each time. Understand?’

He nodded, uncaring of what she told him, as his mission was nothing to do with his imaginary symptoms.

She reached for another jar on her shelf and tipped some dried flakes of crushed leaves into a scrap of cloth, which she folded and pressed into his hand. ‘Mix a pinch of these in a cup of ale each morning for five days. Say prayers to five saints each day – and keep away from unclean harlots!’ Holding out her hand for two pence, she opened the door and sent him out into the street.

The next morning, Matilda was still sulking with her husband, refusing to speak to him at the early morning meal. He had thought about taking Nesta’s oblique advice and assuaging his wife’s displeasure by at least going through the motions of holding an inquest on the death of Robert de Pridias, but his stubborn faith in the legal processes that existed in the name of his king, prevented him from carrying this through. He decided that he preferred to suffer the familiar scowls and snubs at home, rather than twist the law to his own personal advantage.

When he went up to Rougemont after breakfast, he heard from the constable, his friend Ralph Morin, that Gilbert de Bosco had visited the sheriff to demand that secular charges be brought against Alice Ailward. Although Richard de Revelle had perhaps unwisely promised his support for Gilbert’s crusade, he was unable to find any specific grounds on which to arraign the woman before either the Shire Court or the royal justices, but promised the canon that he would take legal advice when he went to Winchester the following week.

Ralph Morin said that de Bosco went away in a huff, promising to bring Alice before an ecclesiastical court without delay and, if possible, hand her over to the secular authorities for sentencing. ‘The bloody man sees advancement for himself in all this,’ growled the constable, over a mug of ale in the hall of the castle keep. ‘I hear that he has the bishop on his side, but maybe you know more about what goes on down in that nest of vipers around the cathedral.’

John promised to find out what he could from the archdeacon, as this issue was rapidly dividing opinion and heating tempers throughout the city. Although the subject of witchcraft had previously been ignored, since the canon had interfered, it was now as if a wasps’ nest had been poked with a stick. Conflicting opinions were being voiced all over the city and it was the main topic of gossip in both the alehouses and the churches.

Meanwhile, another matter claimed the coroner’s attention, one which potentially held more satisfaction for him. This was the arrival of the treasure chest from Cadbury, which Gwyn had escorted back to Exeter the previous evening and which now rested in the constable’s chamber, at the opposite end of the hall from the sheriff’s quarters.

‘Does he know about it yet?’ asked de Wolfe.

The big warrior grinned over his forked beard. ‘I’ve left that pleasure to you, John! I thought you would enjoy seeing his face when you tell him.’

‘Did you look inside the box?’

Ralph held up his hands in mock horror. ‘No damned fear! I’m keeping well out of this one, knowing de Revelle’s love affair with money. I left the chest exactly as your man brought it, tied up with cords and locked in a box. And I kept a man on the door all night, just to safeguard myself.’

De Wolfe finished his ale and with a grim smile of anticipation, loped to the door of the sheriff’s chamber, at the end of the hall nearest the entrance. As usual, he marched in without ceremony and planted himself in front of Richard’s table, hands on hips. For once, de Revelle was alone, without the clerks that normally buzzed around him like flies, waving their parchments for his attention.

The sheriff, who was signing warrants for this week’s hangings, looked up and sighed when he saw his brother-in-law. ‘Do you still stubbornly refuse to enquire into the death of Robert de Pridias, John? I suspect that this sorcerer woman that is being held by the proctors may be the one that did the deed.’

John smiled his lopsided smile. ‘Yet I hear that you decline to arraign her, Richard! Very sensible, I think – you would have some difficulty in devising criminal charges in the absence of any evidence. Try that on the royal judges and they’ll lock you up!’

De Revelle’s narrow face flushed with annoyance. ‘We’ll see what the consistory court thinks of the matter first. Was there something you wanted?’

His tone was deliberately offensive, as if his visitor were some minor clerk, rather than the next most senior law officer in the county.

John ignored this, savouring the moment he had been anticipating. ‘I was in Cadbury yesterday, Richard. I believe that you have leased that manor to Robert Hereward of Somerset.’

The sheriff nodded absently, still signing his documents.

‘A pity you didn’t keep it, for at least twenty pounds’ worth of gold and silver was dug up there a few days ago!’

The quill went down on the table with a smack as Richard’s head jerked up. He stared incredulously at his wife’s husband. ‘Treasure? Twenty pounds? On my land?’

‘It’s not your land, Richard. You leased it for five years to Robert Hereward. In any case, the value goes to the King. I held an inquest yesterday and declared it treasure trove, though possibly the Chief Justiciar may award some part of it to Hereward.’

De Revelle jumped up from his chair, every nerve in his body vibrating at the thought of so much money. ‘Nonsense, all that should be mine. You idiot, what right had you to declare it treasure trove? It must have been carelessly lost on my estate and must all be mine, by right of tenure.’

His previously flushed face was now pale with fear at the likelihood of losing such riches and he came from behind his table to pace agitatedly across the chamber. ‘Where is this find now? I must see it and claim it before any is stolen!’

John hovered over him as he came close, a head taller and as dark and sombre as the peacock-attired sheriff was gaudy. ‘It’s quite safe, Ralph has it locked away. But the money – and a big gold brooch – is not yours, Richard, so calm yourself! It was not lost, it is ancient metal, all being of Saxon origin. It was obviously hidden at the time of our conquest.’

Although not a vindictive man, John savoured another opportunity to crow over his brother-in-law, who had so often cheated and embezzled the people of Devon, apart from his devious plotting against his own sovereign. But de Revelle was so obsessed by the thought of such a large hoard of gold and silver being found on what he considered to be his own land that nothing would divert him from seeing it. He hurried to the door and flung it open. ‘You say it is with the constable? Is it safe? I must see it!’