The Manor of Death (42 page)

De Wolfe was becoming impatient with this priestly long-windedness. 'So what is it that you feel able to tell us, Father Henry - if anything?'

The sheriff chipped in again. 'Remember, many lives have been lost, and if it were not for our subterfuge this week another full ship's crew would have been slaughtered!'

The parish priest looked doleful and chastened. 'I realise that - I have heard today that that evil shipmaster is now known to have strangled the unfortunate lad whose body I found. It was that and the knowledge that the same man intended the deaths of those shipmen this week that has decided me to speak.'

Thank God for that, thought John, and he meant it literally. 'Tell us what you know! It may save more lives. Do you know who killed the Keeper of the Peace and the pedlar?'

Henry looked at his fellow priest, Thomas de Peyne, and the little man nodded reassuringly for him to continue.

'This was not heard in this church as a confession, so I feel free to repeat it, even though I suppose it was meant as a confidential whisper. One of the villagers, admittedly a little free with his tongue from drink, told me that he had heard someone boasting in the tavern across there that they had 'seen off' a drunken pedlar who was poking his nose into business that did not concern him.'

The sheriff roused himself and leant across, his bloodhound features only inches from the priest's. 'Ha! And who was that someone?'

The other Henry hesitated, then took the plunge. 'It was one of the carters who take goods inland somewhere. That's their wagon in the barn.'

The sheriff and coroner exchanged a look of triumph. Though the chain of confession was tortuous, they were getting somewhere at last.

'And what else do you know, father?' asked John encouragingly. 'Tell us anything that you feel is not sacred to your confessional. It may save more lives.'

'No more confessions, but now that I have started I can tell you that with my own eyes and ears I know that the portreeve and that man from Exeter have been up to no good in respect of the goods that pass through this harbour. And I suspect that that surly wretch from the priory is mixed up with them, too.'

'What have you seen, brother?' asked Thomas, trying keep up the momentum now that the old priest's tongue had been loosened.

'Elias sometimes seems to forget that I can read as well as himself. I have been in that chamber where they scribe all their records many times - in fact, I slid back in there deliberately not long ago when no one was there.'

'You checked the records, you mean?' asked John. 'But we have done that endlessly and have no means of telling whether they are true or false.'

Henry tapped the side of his nose. Now that he had committed himself to his saga of disclosures, he almost seemed to be enjoying it. 'You had no means of checking against John Capie's tallies, did you? I went out of my way to ask Capie to explain how he did it with his sticks and his cords - just as a matter of idle curiosity, you understand? Then when I saw them on Elias's table, along with what Elias had listed in his rolls, I saw that there were numerous omissions in that day's entries.'

'Do you mean in respect of the Customs dues on the wool?' asked de Furnellis.

The priest was scathing in his dismissal of the sheriff's suggestion. 'No, not that! Everyone knows that the wool tax is fiddled all the time; John Capie and the bailiff see to that. I mean the alleged imports of wine, and cloth and fruits - sometimes even tin and marble!'

'Why didn't you tell us this before?' snapped the sheriff.

The old priest stared at the floor. 'I have to live here, my son. I am old and have not much longer to endure this world, but there is nowhere else I can go.' He faced the altar and crossed himself, Thomas following suit. 'I turned a blind eye, God forgive me, until that lad was strangled and I saw his young body in the pit I meant for my dog. Then the Keeper was slain and that drunken hawker. My conscience began to overwhelm me, and now that you king's men have descended upon us and will carry off those who would have wreaked vengeance on me if I had betrayed them I cannot hold my tongue any longer.'

He sank to his knees and began to pray again. It seemed that he had said all he was going to divulge. 'Stay with him, Thomas,' murmured de Wolfe. 'When he is ready, take down every word he said and see if you can get more detail.'

They left the two clerics talking to their Maker and left the church, going directly across the track to the thatched building opposite. As they entered the Harbour Inn, they saw the surly landlord hurrying out of the back door to see what was going on in the yard behind, beyond which was the barn where the coroner had lodged on a previous visit. As they followed him, they heard shouting and scuffling and found Ralph Morin and Gwyn coming across the yard, helping two soldiers to subdue two scruffy men who were turning and twisting in their grip.

'Found these two sods hiding together in the privy,' announced Gwyn with a great grin on his face. 'We thought of pushing them down the hole, but I thought you might want to speak to them first!'

The sheriff grabbed the innkeeper by the shoulder. 'Who are these men?' he demanded.

'Two of the carters who serve this port,' replied the man, deciding that telling the truth was the best course of action today.

'No, we're bloody not!' yelled one of them, a squat, black-haired man with a face ravaged by cowpox. 'Just travellers, passing through.'

Just passing through the privy, is that it?' said de Wolfe sarcastically. 'Which of you killed the pedlar, or did you do it between you? We know all about it, so don't waste my time by lying.'

The reaction was surprising and satisfying to the law officers. Though the pox-ridden fellow again started to rave denials, the other, younger man, thin and fair-haired, tried to fall to his knees but was jerked up by his captors. He began wailing and sobbing, his eyes rolling wildly. 'It wasn't me, it was Dolwin who killed him!' he screeched, jerking his head towards his companion. 'And it was him who did for that bloody Keeper! I had nothing to do with it!'

Dolwin almost burst a blood vessel trying to struggle from the grasp of Gwyn and a burly man-at-arms to get at the man who was betraying him. A stream of blasphemies accompanied a promise to 'tear his lying tongue from his head', but Gwyn silenced him with a punch to the belly that doubled him up.

'Do you know the names of these men?' demanded the sheriff of the tavern keeper, who decided that cooperation was now the safest policy.

'That one with the scars is Dolwin Veg - and the skinny fellow is Adam Grendel. Both of them are carters, working for the manor.'

Henry de Furnellis, beginning to feel his age after all the activity of the day, sat himself on a tree-stump and pointed at the two captives. 'Right, we need to hear a little more of their tale,' he said amiably. 'Ralph, get them tied to those fence posts over there. We'll wait until Sir John's clerk is free to take down some confessions. Meanwhile, landlord, we'll all have a jar of ale to revive us after all these exertions!'

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

In which Crowner John receives a shock

Though John had always considered that Henry de Furnellis made an unenthusiastic, even indolent sheriff, he seemed to have found a new source of energy and even ruthlessness over the Axmouth situation.

The two carters had been interrogated while roped to the tavern fence. Though the truculent Dolwin Veg had only spat curses at his captors and threats of horrible mutilation at his partner, words had tumbled from Adam Grendel and were duly scribed on to parchment by Thomas de Peyne. Afterwards, the two men were locked into one of the storehouses on the quayside, and soon the other suspects in Northcote's house were herded down to join them. Their protests were bitter and vociferous, but the sheriff blithely ignored them and promised that this accommodation was better by far than that which they would soon enjoy in Exeter Castle. Some bread, cheese and ale were left with them and the doors locked again. Sergeant Gabriel and another soldier were left on guard outside, with instructions to eavesdrop in case any useful information was bandied about during the arguing and recriminations that inevitably must take place.

The search of the village revealed no other fugitives hiding away nor any further evidence that would help the law officers. It was now late aftemoon and there was no prospect of getting back to Exeter before dusk, as they intended to use the ox-cart to transport the seven prisoners to Rougemont.

'We'll stay the night in the alehouse,' decided de Furnellis. 'The men-at-arms can forage for themselves in the village and bed down in a couple of the barns.'

Seeing the way that the village had been stripped of its leading inhabitants, the landlord became more cooperative, especially after the sheriff hinted that people who gave shelter to a couple of murderers might themselves be in trouble. He found potage, cold pork, boiled beans, bread and cheese for them, together with a passable ale and some rough cider, which Henry, Ralph and the coroner's trio ate around a rough trestle in the main room. The tavern was larger than the Bush but had the same low walls of mortared stones supporting the high trucks and rafters which held up the thatch. As they ate and drank they discussed what they had learnt so far.

'Those two swine we caught here killed the pedlar and the Keeper,' said Morin. 'But was it on the orders of someone else?'

'I suspect that killing Setricus was on the spur of the moment,' declared de Wolfe. 'They had already caught him spying on their wagon at dead of night and then later trying to steal something from the back of it. They had to get rid of him for their own safety.'

The sheriff spat a piece of pork gristle into the rushes on the floor, where a pregnant bitch immediately slunk up and seized it. 'But surely the killing of our poor Luke de Casewold and his clerk was done in cold blood,' he said.

De Wolfe tore off a piece of barley bread to wrap around a slice of the tough meat. 'I don't know about that. It depends on what that foolish Keeper was up to. He told me he was going to haunt the roads at night to catch them shifting stolen goods. Maybe they caught him red-handed?'

'Or perhaps they set a trap for him, as we did for Martin Rof?' hazarded Ralph. 'If he was making a dangerous nuisance
 
of himself, then the ringleaders may have decided to get rid of him.'

'But who are the ringleaders?' grunted Gwyn. 'I'm confused as to who's guilty of what!'

'Henry Crik is certainly one of them, for the younger carter admitted that they got their orders from him as to where to drop off their goods,' said Thomas, timidly joining the conversation.

The sheriff agreed. 'He may be the centre of this conspiracy, as being a merchant's agent he would travel the county and could find customers who wanted cheap goods. Then he organised these carters to deliver what was ordered at the right places.'

'The portreeve is also a leading figure in this,' said John. 'It was his falsification of Capie's tallies that allowed the documents to appear legitimate, if they were questioned - as we did and the Prior of Loders does at intervals, so he claims.'

'What about John Capie - is he a criminal as well?' grunted Ralph.

'He probably knew what was going on. I fail to see how he could not,' replied Henry. 'But he's small fry compared with the others, though I'm sure he fiddles the wool tax for a cut from the exporters.'

De Wolfe wondered if his own partner Hugh de Relaga or his minions took part in this sort of evasion - then decided he did not wish to know.

'Edward Northcote - he's the problem, I feel,' said Ralph. 'Is he or is he not involved in piracy and theft?'

There was a pause, broken only by sounds of chewing and Gwyn slurping his ale. 'I just don't know,' said John eventually. 'It's hard to see that a bailiff of a place like this doesn't know everything that goes on here. But no one has put the finger on him so far.'

'We'll see who cracks first after we get them back to Rougemont,' said de Furnellis grimly. 'A spell in the undercroft should loosen a tongue or two!'

The journey back to Exeter next day was painfully slow, as the two oxen moved at a snail's pace. The sheriff and constable left most of the troop of soldiers behind and trotted away over the horizon with a couple of men, but John de Wolfe, who was in no particular hurry, stayed with the caravan. This suited Thomas, to whom horse-riding at anything more than walking pace was a miserable experience. They trudged all day across the southern part of Devon, the cries and curses from inside the covered cart becoming less shrill as no one took any notice of them. The prisoners' wrists were tied together and the ropes passed from one to the other, so there was no possibility of escape. The most vociferous was Brother Absalom, who called down vengeance from everyone above, from God Himself to the cherubims and seraphims.

By early evening the cart had reached the castle, and the passengers were given over into the care of the evil guardian of the undercroft. Gabriel had reported that when they had been locked in the barn at Axmouth, his efforts to hear anything incriminating had been frustrated by Henry Crik, who had ordered everyone to shut up and say nothing, as it was obvious to him that they were being spied upon. The sheriff agreed with de Wolfe that it was probably a waste of time to have someone listening all night in Rougemont, especially as they were all in different cells.