The Sticklepath Strangler (2001) (11 page)

‘Who are you?’ Edgar asked.

‘Ivo Bel, Manciple to the nuns at Canonsleigh.’

‘I see.’ Edgar wasn’t surprised. The man had the look of an ascetic. If he was honest, Edgar would say Ivo had the look of a eunuch who would prefer holding parchments in
preference to a young, fragrant girl. Edgar, a hot-blooded man, found that difficult to understand.

Bel was shorter than Houndestail. Slim of build, with narrow shoulders under his light cloak, his long nose gave him a singularly lugubrious expression. The first impression he gave was of
painful thinness. In fact, with the miserable light thrown by a pair of candles and a few rushlights, the stranger’s features appeared so drawn and cadaverous, Edgar thought they looked
almost like a skull.

The girl reappeared in the doorway, then approached. ‘Sir,’ she said falteringly, ‘I have to say sorry, but your things are all in the pantry.’ She shot a look at Edgar
and said spitefully, ‘They were thrown from the room.’

Ivo’s face was unmoving, but his voice became chilly. ‘And who did that?’

‘My apologies, friend,’ Edgar said immediately and explained again. ‘My master’s wife wanted somewhere quiet for herself and her child. When we enquired, the innkeeper
admitted that he possessed a room. We took it.’

However, the damage was done. Ivo Bel studied the wine in his pot. ‘If your lady is comfortable, that is enough for me,’ he said eventually. ‘I am only glad to have been of
service. Pray do not trouble yourself about me.’

His tone was calm, but Edgar could see the cold fury gleaming in his eyes. It made him smile, but at the same time he resolved to keep an eye on this fellow.

It had been a ghost.

Baldwin forced himself to stand and wait until the pounding in his breast was a little calmer, until the rushing in his ears had slowed.

There had been someone there, a figure he remembered from his dream. No, he amended, that was not true. It was not from his dream, but from his past: the body of the fat Prior, the man found in
the clearing in the woods near to Crediton, whose death he and Simon had investigated six years ago. Yet the figure today was not so fat, nor was he clad in rich, embroidered things, but in
miserable grey, like the poorest churl. Like a leper.

No matter. Baldwin, a proud knight, had wanted to flee, to bolt up the hill to the roadway and human company. He had been petrified by the mere sight of someone standing against a tree. It was
pathetic.

Snapping his fingers to Aylmer, he turned his back on the scene and set off to the road, but he had only walked three paces when he glanced down at his dog with a puzzled expression. If the
figure
had
been a ghost, surely his dog should have been scared as well? He had heard that dogs would always hurry away from ghosts, yet Aylmer had apparently noticed nothing.

The hound was frowning up at him as though concerned for his sanity, and Baldwin gave a dry laugh. His breathing was easier now, and his overriding feeling was of shame rather than fear.
‘So there was no ghost, eh? And yet I do not think I shall share this escapade with Jeanne. She would not appreciate the irony.’

Before going to the vill itself, he noticed a freshwater spring and drank from cupped hands. It was refreshingly cool, if slightly brackish, and he drank thirstily before washing his face.
Shaking his hands dry, he felt the anxiety drip from him as the sun’s warmth seeped into his frame.

It was ludicrous. Although he could consider the affair logically and rationally, he would not feel completely easy until he was back among the cottages of the vill. There was nothing for him to
be afraid of, and yet he was. With an effort, he put the dark shaw from his mind and took in his surroundings.

There was a series of buildings some little distance from the road and he let his feet take him along the puddled track towards them. Most were simple barns and sheds filled with farming tools
and equipment, but the furthest was devoted to animals. This was where travellers left their mounts. Even as Baldwin approached, he could see Jeanne’s magnificent Arab being groomed. His own
mount stood patiently nearby, reins tied to a metal ring in the door, while the cart horse and Edgar’s animal were tied to a post.

He made sure that they were all being looked after and glanced at the stalls inside. At once a smile spread over his features as he saw the unmistakable brown rounsey with the white star on his
forehead.

‘Simon’s here, then,’ he murmured to himself as he sauntered back to the inn. On his way, he noticed the entrance to the little chapel. He was about to pass, but the unsettled
feeling was still lying heavily on his spirit, and he craved a moment’s peace and reflection. Calling to Aylmer, he stepped through the gate and up to the chapel’s entrance.

It was a poor little property, built of stone and thatch, but the thatch itself was old and leaked, and streaks of dirt had run down the walls and stained the paintings. The decoration of the
ceiling itself was all but wrecked, with the paint falling from it. As Baldwin pushed the door wide, bending in a quick genuflexion as he noticed the altar, he saw that there was a damp mess of
leaves and rubbish stuck to the flagstones. All in all, there was a feeling of melancholy and neglect about the building, as though no one cared for it. Even Aylmer was bemused. He stood in the
doorway and gazed about him, as though he had no wish to soil his paws.

‘You need sweeping out,’ Baldwin muttered, and then felt stupid for talking to a building. It was all of a part with his trepidation in the woods, he thought irritably.

The altar was a plain table of roughly smoothed wood; a large pewter cross stood roughly in the middle of it, but when Baldwin studied it, he saw it was carelessly positioned, the arms facing
away from the door, and just far enough from the centre of the table for the failing to be noticeable.

‘May I help you?’

The words made Baldwin spin. Behind him stood a fat cleric, who nervously licked his lips when he saw how Baldwin’s hand had flashed to his sword. His eyes were bloodshot, as though he had
been weeping, and his tonsure looked ill upon him. The pate that showed was covered with a light stubble, like a man’s chin after a week’s growth, and there was a thick lump of clotted
blood on the left of his skull as though he had stumbled. He had pale hair which, together with his tonsure, made it difficult to guess his age, although Baldwin thought he had already seen his
thirtieth summer. The wrinkles at forehead and eye tended to support that. Overall, Baldwin had the unpleasant impression of a dissipated man.

‘I fear I may have alarmed you, my Lord. My apologies. I am Gervase, Parson of this little chapel. I live opposite, and when I saw you enter, I thought I should come and ask whether you
wanted . . . um . . .’

His voice trailed off, but long before the end of his speech Baldwin had realised that the priest was drunk. If his slow and careful pronunciation had not convinced him, the man’s
too-stiff stance, his red face, twitching eye and trembling hand would have sufficed.

‘I am well, I thank you,’ Baldwin said, keen to be gone. ‘I only wanted to see what the chapel was like.’

‘It was once a flourishing little church,’ the priest said, almost to himself. He looked about him as though seeing it for the first time. ‘People used to visit often. All the
travellers on the way to Cornwall or back, they came and worshipped. Not now, though. Since the famine, people stay at home.’

‘The famine was years ago,’ Baldwin protested.

‘People still don’t come. Not in the same numbers,’ the priest said, and there was a shiftiness in his manner as he lowered his head and avoided Baldwin’s gaze.
‘Please excuse me, I have . . . duties to see to.’

He carefully stepped around Baldwin, who watched as he walked unsteadily towards the altar, then dropped to his knees, hunched, hands clasped. Rather than a penitent making his appeals to God,
uncharitably Baldwin thought he looked like a clenched fist making a threat, all knuckles and anger.

It was when he quietly left the chapel, pulling the door closed behind him, that he heard the gleeful shout. ‘Baldwin! About time, too!’

Peter atte Moor stood watching the roadway, leaning against a tree. At his side, Adam picked his nose and studied the crust before flicking it away.

‘This inquest on Aline,’ Peter said. ‘You think it’ll be a problem?’

‘No reason why it should be,’ Adam said. ‘It’s high time we caught this bastard. What do you reckon to Drogo as a suspect?’

‘Him? Nobody would dare tell the Coroner if they thought Drogo was guilty. Not when they knew they’d get us lot, all the Foresters on their backs.’

‘He’s not been the same since his wife and girl died, has he?’ Adam said. Drogo had apparently thrown away any hope of ever finding another woman, and lived behind his own
armour of cold dispassion, putting his all into his job. Perhaps it was because there was no one to blame, no one to attack over his daughter’s death. So many starved during the famine, but
no one could fight it or try to kill it.

‘My Denise was an angel,’ Peter said quietly, and Adam glanced at him. Peter, too, had changed greatly since his daughter’s death.

Six, seven years ago now, everyone in Sticklepath had been starving, the women trying to eke out their meagre stores, some few helping their neighbours, but mostly the whole vill subsisting and
jealously protecting their own. During the hardship, Denise was found – and for that crime Athelhard had been horribly punished. But the murders never stopped, and now they, too, were killers
themselves. Adam shuddered at the memories of a burning cottage, a bloody corpse and the weeping idiot girl. The regret would never leave him. Nor would the speculation. Every time he observed his
friends in the vill, he wondered which one was the killer, the real
sanguisuga
?

Peter lived only to find the killer of his girl. That was why he spent so much time up on the moors, he always said. He was looking for the murderer in case he ever returned. Aline and Mary had
been killed up there, but Peter had apparently seen nothing.

Adam stared back towards Sticklepath. The girls’ murderer could be someone local, who lived in the vill itself, or perhaps it was that miserable sod Serlo, the warrener up on the flank of
the hill towards Belstone. The girls all appeared to like him, often visited him. Yes, Serlo was one possibility – but what about that weird bastard, Samson? There were enough rumours about
him
.

Peter was glowering at him, his shoulders hunched, his face dark with anger, and suddenly Adam realised that the killer could well be Peter himself. ‘Something wrong?’ he asked.

‘There’s no point being up here,’ Peter said. ‘Might as well get back.’

‘All right,’ Adam said, and he stood to one side, thoughtfully watching the other man before they set off back to the vill. Denise had been the first of the girls to die, and since
then Peter had been very jealous of any man who had a living daughter.

Suddenly Adam wasn’t happy to expose his back to Peter. Not until the killer had been identified and hanged.

Simon wore a broad grin as he bore down on Baldwin, and the knight was glad to see that his old friend the Bailiff showed no sign of the strain of the last few weeks.
Organising the tournament had been both an honour, because in former days it had been Simon’s father to whom Lord Hugh had always turned, and an ordeal, since when Simon arrived at Oakhampton
Castle, he had almost immediately become embroiled in arguments with the builders, and then there was a murder, which rather spoiled the whole affair.

Now, though, his eyes twinkled and he gripped Baldwin’s arm enthusiastically. ‘How are you? When did you get here? We arrived yesterday, but Christ’s balls – the place is
deserted. No one is about at all.’

Baldwin managed to pull away long enough to give his greetings to the Coroner, Sir Roger de Gidleigh, who stood at Simon’s shoulder. ‘I hope I am not too late for the
inquest?’

The Coroner gave a crooked smile. ‘Oh no, Sir Baldwin. You haven’t missed anything yet.’

Gunilda heard the door open and she shivered against the wall as her husband stormed in.

‘Where’s my food, bitch?’

Samson atte Mill was a heavy, barrel-chested man in his mid-thirties; hefting sacks of grain all day had given him muscles like a cart horse. He had broad hands with stubby, dirt-stained
fingers, thighs as thick as a young man’s waist, and a neck so short it was almost non-existent. When Gunilda had married him, he was fabulously desirable, and she was slim and girl-like. He
had loved her then.

Not now she was thirty-five. Gradually she had become aware that his love for her was fading, as her slim body filled and she became a woman. He had given her one daughter, Felicia, but now she
wondered whether that was just so that he had another young girl to feel, to stroke, to slobber over in his bed, while his wife lay beside him weeping silently.

‘I have it ready, Husband,’ she blurted, and ran to the hearth. There was the loaf she had cooked that morning and the pot of hot soup thickened with peas and grains. She quickly
brought them to him at his seat at the table, his small eyes watching her without expression. He kept his eyes on her all the time, as though measuring his complete control of her. Certainly not to
protect himself against her; he knew she wouldn’t dream of striking him. Too many years of obedience made that unthinkable.

When he glanced down, his lip curled, and then he swept both the bowl and the loaf to the floor. Instantly the dogs were on the bread, snarling at each other as they tore at it.

‘It’s ruined, woman. You useless bitch, you can’t even cook a loaf of bread, can you?’

She was already crying; she knew what would happen.

‘Is this the best you can do? A whore from the Plymouth stews could do better than this. How dare you serve me up with that pile of ox dung! All you have to do is feed me, woman, and you
can’t even do that, can you?’

As he spoke, he grasped the thick length of rope which he kept on the rafter overhead. He swung it through the air, and it whistled viciously, a serpent woken.