'Who put roofs on some of those huts?' he questioned.
'A couple were made by passing tinners, as a shelter when caught by bad weather, but we repaired some others as a refuge should some large force come against us in Challacombe,' he replied.
John had heard of Challacombe but never been near it, as it was in a remote part of the moor. At the bottom of the slopes they reached a track that ran southwards down a valley through which a stream babbled. On each side were high bare hills and at the bottom, alongside the brook, a few sparse trees grew. The old huntsman took them about half a mile farther, as the wind dropped and the mist crept down from the moor.
'That's where we live, if you can call it living,' said Philip Girard bitterly. He pointed across the stream where, beyond a thin copse of stunted, black trees, the irregular outlines of some low, crude buildings could be seen behind an old wall. In single file, they rode towards them and crossed the stream over a rough bridge of fallen logs. As they approached the enclosure, men came out through a gap in the surrounding walls and waited for them to dismount.
'That's Sir Nicholas, our lord,' murmured Girard to the coroner, indicating the figure standing in the middle of the small group, staring at the newcomers. John saw a stocky man in his mid thirties, dressed in much the same type of clothing as his men. A leather jerkin and worsted breeches seemed the most practical garb for living in these wild conditions. Girard dismounted and hurried ahead to explain to his master what had happened.
De Wolfe stepped forward, as did Nicholas de Arundell, so that they met on the patch of rough ground that separated the two groups.
'You are welcome, Sir John,' said Nicholas in his deep voice. 'I only wish it was in more civilised surroundings.' The two men weighed each other up, making no move to grasp each other's arm in greeting. John took in de Arundell's strong, rather stubborn features, but Nicholas held his gaze unwaveringly. The younger man recognised an even tougher character, de Wolfe's dark face carrying the stamp of grim resolve and determination.
'We are both old Crusaders, I understand?' grunted de Wolfe. 'We never met in Outremer, which is hardly surprising given the chaos and turmoil we all suffered.'
'I was delayed for almost a year in Sicily, fighting another war,' explained Nicholas. 'But we have other matters to discuss first, so please come into our shelter, which at least will be warm and where we can feed you.' As they walked into the compound where the stone shacks were built, the former steward, Robert Hereward, made himself known. Then Philip Girard introduced Gwyn to the other men. Inside the largest of the huts, the fire had been built up to defeat the cold outside; though the fumes seeking to escape through the gaps under the thatch prickled the men's eyeballs. Daylight from the open door and the flames gave enough illumination for the visitors to see the sparse furnishings and the piles of bracken where some of the men slept.
At Nicholas's invitation, they sat at the trestle table and from the other end, the old woman shuffled forward, carrying some wooden bowls and a loaf of bread.
'This is Gunilda, the most important member of our tribe,' said Nicholas. 'She keeps us fed and moderately clean, God bless her.'
The woman put her load on the table and nodded at the visitors, before going to the firepit to take a blackened cauldron off the stones near the edge. After she had ladled out a thick vegetable potage into their bowls, the other men crowded round with their own pots and dishes, then went to sit or crouch around the fire to eat.
'There'll be venison later on,' promised Hereward. 'Peter Cuffe, our best archer, got a hind yesterday down towards Widecombe. That's a hanging offence, I know, but you can't be hanged more than once!' There was a guffaw of laughter from the outlaws; Gunilda distributed more hunks of bread to them and went back for the ale pitcher.
De Wolfe, who had been silently taking in the situation, began asking questions of de Arundell.
'Are these all your company?'
'They are, apart from a lookout down the valley. We are now only twelve men - and a woman.'
'And this is your permanent home?' asked John.
'At present, though we have several smaller hideouts scattered over the moor. We need to be able to vanish within minutes if anyone comes against us.'
Gwyn raised his head from his soup bowl. 'Does that ever happen?' he asked.
Robert Hereward, also sitting at the table, answered with a nod. 'Yes, but not often, thank God. A year ago, a large gang of desperate men from over the Tavistock end of the moor took it into their heads to finish us off, but we melted away and they achieved nothing but wrecking this place. It is poor, but soon mended.'
De Wolfe picked up the ale pot which Gunilda placed before him. 'So no law officers have come against you?'
Nicholas shook his head. 'Not for a long time, thank God. In the earlier days, Richard de Revelle tried to pursue us here with the excuse that he was sheriff, but he sent only a few men and we soon lost them in the wildness of the moor.'
'This place is very remote, being near the centre of Dartmoor,' added Philip Girard. 'There is often bad weather and it is easy to evade those clodhoppers who march up the valley. Our sentinel spots them in plenty of time and we just vanish.'
There was a pause, then the coroner spoke again. The tone of the meeting changed perceptibly and the other men around the hut listened attentively, for possibly their lives depended upon what was to be said.
'You must understand that as a senior law officer, I should not be here, except to arrest you all or strike off your heads. But I have heard certain things about you, which I need to investigate further.' He paused and looked sternly around the ring of faces seen dimly in the poor light. 'Officially, I am not here - understand?' There was a muttered chorus of agreement.
'Now, I need to know exactly what happened at your former manor - and what has transpired since then.' He took a gulp of ale and looked expectantly at Nicholas de Arundell.
The blue eyes in a handsome, rather flushed face looked back at him steadily. 'I will start at the beginning, Crowner.
Probably like your own family, we Arundells came over at the time of William's conquest, and settled mainly in Sussex and the West Country. The Bastard gave much land to Roger, the first of the Arundells down here in the west, most of it in Somerset and Devon, though lately many of the family have settled in Cornwall.'
'Sensible people,' grunted Gwyn.
'His son Robert was my grandfather,' continued Nicholas. 'He gave Roger's name to my father, who acquired the manor of Hempston, near Tomes, from the descendants of Judhael who was granted all the land thereabouts by the Conqueror.'
'How did your father come by it?' asked de Wolfe, who wanted to exclude any false title to the land before they went any further.
'It was all quite legitimate,' answered Nicholas, anticipating the coroner's caution. 'He was left land in Somerset by my grandfather and he exchanged it for Hempston, which was part of the adjacent Pomeroy estate. The bargain was sealed with a witnessed deed in the proper way.'
'Where is that deed now?'
The noble outlaw's face darkened. 'If I know de Revelle and Henry de la Pomeroy, the parchment is ash scattered to the winds by now. It was in my chest at Hempston, but when I had to run for my life, I had no chance to recover such things.'
John looked over the horn spoon that he was dipping into his stew. 'Such a deed of transfer for such a significant item as a manor would have a copy lodged in the Chancery in Winchester or London. But carry on with your tale, sir.'
'When my father died some eight years ago, I inherited the manor as his only son. I married Joan and all was well for a few years until I decided to take the Cross and go off to Palestine.'
He paused and rubbed his forehead in some anguish.
'If I had stayed at home, none of this would have happened. I sometimes wonder why God called me to the Holy Land, then stabbed me in the back after I went.'
De Wolfe gave one of his throat clearings, this time intended to convey sympathy. 'Why indeed? Why did any of us go, for there was little booty to be gained, unless it was for our souls?'
'My father was always keen on my supporting the Pope when he declared a Crusade. He had been on the ill-fated one in the forties. Anyway, go I did and was away almost three years. When I got back, that bastard de Revelle and his crony at Berry Pomeroy had annexed Hempston, claiming that I had been assumed dead and that the land had reverted to the original freeholders.'
'Why should they consider you dead?' demanded the coroner.
'Because it suited their purpose,' snapped Nicholas, banging the table and making the ale pots rattle. 'I had twice sent messages home to my wife, written by our chaplain, as I have no skill with letters. But I later learnt that one certainly never arrived, as the friend to whom I had entrusted it was shipwrecked off Italy. God knows what happened to the other; I have never heard since of the knight who promised to deliver it.'
'Then what?' prompted John, as his host seemed to go into a gloomy reverie at these evil memories.
'Almost three years ago, having arrived by ship at Dartmouth, I arrived unannounced at my manor. I found the house occupied by strangers, my wife gone, and my steward and reeve replaced by men from Berry.' He looked across at the dour Robert Hereward. 'He can tell you better what had happened, Crowner.'
The older man nodded and leaned forwards across the table. 'Three months before my lord came home, a group of horsemen rode up to the manor house one day and confronted Lady Joan and myself. They were led by Henry de la Pomeroy, Lord of Berry, and Richard de Revelle, who at that time was not yet the sheriff.' He stopped and shook his head as if trying to rid himself of the memory. 'They said that Sir Nicholas was dead, so that the manor now escheated to the tenant-in-chief - John, Count of Mortain - who had decreed that Hempston would in future be held by the former freeholders, the Pomeroys.'
There was a murmur of anger from the men around; though they knew the sad tale backwards, it never failed to stir their emotions.
'So how did de Revelle come into this?' asked Gwyn.
'No one mentioned it at the time, but later it seems that Henry de la Pomeroy and Richard de Revelle made some deal with each other, to divide up the revenues of Hempston between them. Anyway, I was thrown out and a bailiff from Revelstoke, Richard's main manor near Plympton, was installed for a time - then Pomeroy's man Ogerus Coffin arrived, and he remains there to this day, God curse his guts!'
'And my wife was also turned out,' snarled Nicholas, returning to the story. 'Those two swine declared her a widow, though she had no proof of it except my absence in Outremer and my silence. They even had the bloody gall to offer her some damned Pomeroy cousin as a husband, the bait being that she could then stay on in Hempston as the new lady of the manor.'
'So what did she do?' asked de Wolfe, impressed by the sincerity of the outlaw's complaints.
'Joan is a spirited woman, right enough. It seems she told them to go to hell and take their miserable cousin with them.'
'The lady actually spat in Pomeroy's face,' said Hereward with some relish. 'She screamed and raved at them and tried to get us servants to attack them, but it was hopeless. They had men-at-arms and a whole crowd of retainers to manhandle us out of the hall. I ended up living with Martin there, in the reeve's cottage though he wasn't the reeve any longer. They imported their own from de Revelle's place near Tiverton and built him a new house.'
Gunilda came around with her jug to refill their pots.
'I lived in Totnes at the time,' she said indignantly. 'Not a word of the real truth reached there, all that was said was that Sir Nicholas had died on Crusade and that Lady Joan had sold up the manor and gone back to Cornwall.'
De Arundell took a deep drink and moodily continued his saga. 'They were right in that she went back to Cornwall, for she had nowhere else to go. She threw herself on the mercy of her second cousin, Humphrey de Arundell of Trefry, who has been good enough to support her.'
John de Wolfe scratched at his bristly face and scowled at his host. 'But we have not come to an explanation of why you are now outlawed,' he said bluntly.
'I arrived at Hempston with only a few attendants, my squire Philip Girard there and a couple of men.' He waved at the lean, wiry fellow with the horn at his belt.
'Philip had been the chief huntsman at the manor and came with me to Palestine. Like your man Gwyn here, he has been a constant and faithful companion to me.'
'That was a terrible day, it still haunts me in my dreams,' contributed Girard. 'We expected a rapturous welcome - and all we got was black disaster.' Nicholas nodded in agreement. 'In my hall, I looked for my wife and her tire-women - and was met by a total stranger, this bailiff, who claimed we were impostors and threatened to have us whipped out of the village. Some of the old servants were hanging back behind him, too afraid to come forward and greet us.'
'We tried to throw him out' said Philip Girard. 'But he hollered for help and half a dozen strangers ran in and forcibly pushed us out of the house and into the road outside the stockade, threatening to cut our throats if we tried to come in again.'