The Poisoned Chalice (16 page)

Within a couple of minutes, he reached the priory of Saint Nicholas, a small stone-built range of buildings half-way between the north wall and Fore Street. A tonsured monk in a black habit girded up to his thighs, was scratching with a hoe in a tiny vegetable plot and directed John to the prior's cell. He was a spare, ascetic man with a miserable face, but readily agreed to house the unknown corpse in a store room next to their tiny infirmary.

By then, the bier-carriers had arrived and the frame was set down in the small chamber, which was half-full of bags of grain, old clothes and bedding. Gwyn came in soon afterwards, clutching something in his large hand. ‘We have to put a name to this lady as a matter of urgency,' snapped the coroner. ‘Surely someone must be missing from home by now?'

His bodyguard nodded, but first thrust his fist under the coroner's nose. His fingers opened and John saw two small, pale, soggy cylinders lying in his palm. They were each about an inch long and as thick as a little finger. Streaked with blood, they looked rather like broken pieces of candle. ‘What are they? And where did you find them?'

Gwyn humped his shoulders. ‘I don't know what they are, but they were lying in that patch of blood under the corpse.'

The objects meant nothing to John and he turned back to his main problem, that of identity.

‘Who might know this lady?' he asked the four carriers, the prior and the other monk with the hoe. None of them seemed to have any inspiration, until the Cornishman suggested Nesta, landlady of the Bush.

The coroner considered this for a moment. It was certainly true that his red-headed mistress was a mine of information on all manner of local gossip – and her common sense and discretion were beyond question. ‘Get down to the tavern and ask her to come up,' he said to Gwyn. ‘I had better stay here in case our friend the sheriff gets wind of something affecting an aristocratic lady. That would even prise him away from his planning for the Chief Justiciar's visit.'

With a final grunt, Gwyn vanished into the town.

The morning was a relatively slack time at the Bush for the Welsh innkeeper and within twenty minutes, she was at St Nicholas's, a green cloak thrown hastily over her aproned figure.

‘Great God, Sir Crowner, is there a campaign against the young women of Exeter?' she asked, as soon as she arrived at the store room door. Nesta spoke in Welsh, which both John and Gwyn could readily understand: his mother Enyd had used it with him as a child, and Gwyn's native Cornish was virtually the same language.

‘She is no town drab, this one,' John told her, as they entered the temporary mortuary. ‘Her clothing is fine and she has the whole aspect of a Norman lady. There is blood upon her, but no obvious wound – and I hesitate to look further at her body at this stage.'

Nesta had seen many a tavern fight and was no stranger to blood and even corpses, but she entered the mortuary with some trepidation. A narrow window-slit threw a dim light from the overcast sky and the monks had lit a few candle-ends to add to the illumination.

John, with Gwyn at his back, walked to the bier, gently steering Nesta by the elbow.

‘These are really superb garments,' she explained, a slight quiver in her voice as she approached the still, covered form on the trestle. ‘The shoes alone would cost me a week's takings – and that fine wool cloak is more than I am ever likely to have.'

John slowly lifted the mantle and draped it to one side, letting it hang to the floor. Nesta stood breathlessly still, as rigid as the dead woman on the bier. Then she slowly exhaled. ‘I know her, John!' Turning to him, she said, ‘Surely you must too?'

‘The face seems familiar, but I can recall no name.'

The innkeeper looked up at him, her big eyes round in her pleasant features. ‘It's Adele, daughter of Reginald de Courcy, of the manor of Shillingford.'

John's bushy eyebrows rose an inch up his forehead. ‘Of course! I know Reginald, so I must have seen his daughter with him at some function.'

Nesta looked pityingly at the dead young woman lying still and stiff on her wooden bed. ‘Poor woman – she was only twenty years old. And soon to be married, too!'

The coroner's eyebrows could go no higher. ‘Good God! Another young woman betrothed, like Christina.'

Nesta knew all the society gossip from overhearing endless conversations at the Bush. ‘The wedding was to be at Easter in the cathedral, a grand affair.'

‘To whom, for God's sake?'

‘Hugh Ferrars, son of Lord Guy Ferrars.'

John whistled. The de Courcys were an affluent family, with several manors in south Devon, but Lord Ferrars was a major landowner in the West Country.

‘There'll be the devil to pay over this,' he muttered. Though he was an independent spirit, who offered little deference to anyone but Richard Coeur de Lion, the significance of a sudden and probably criminal death interrupting the union of a de Courcy and a Ferrars struck him forcefully. ‘Now we know who she is, we need to know urgently how she came to her death. And who hid her in a rubbish tip.'

Nesta's eyes travelled down the still figure until they reached the skirt of the kirtle. Now that the body was lying on its back, an ominous bloodstain was visible on the fabric between the thighs, as well as at the hem.

‘There are no injuries on the head, neck or chest,' offered Gwyn, watching her gaze move over the body.

Nesta turned back to John. ‘This seems women's business once again, John. I doubt that even the King's coroner will want to probe the nether parts of a de Courcy lady, especially one who is the fiancée of a Ferrars!'

John agreed fervently with her. Only in extreme circumstances would a man, other than perhaps a leech, investigate what was patently a lethal condition relating to a woman's anatomy. He looked at Nesta and she returned his gaze. Then, almost as if a spark jumped between them, they both said, ‘Dame Madge!' The gaunt nun from Polsloe priory had been such a strength and support over Christina Rifford that she was the obvious person to help them now.

‘Do you think this lady may also have been ravished?' asked Gwyn.

Nesta turned up her hands helplessly. ‘How can I tell? It's possible, but even if I dare examine her private parts, I am no expert. I'm a tavern-keeper, not a midwife.'

The way ahead seemed inevitable and, within a few minutes, John had dispatched Gwyn to ride the mile to Polsloe to fetch the formidable nun.

Now Nesta decided to make herself scarce. Though she had a thick skin and knew that most of the town were well aware of her relationship with Sir John, she wanted to avoid appearing blatantly with him in public so often that people would think she was trying to displace his wife.

As she prepared to leave, John said that he would have to carry the news to Richard de Revelle. ‘This is one case that I don't wish to handle alone – not with de Courcys and Ferrars involved!' he said, with feeling.

They went their various ways, leaving the prior of St Nicholas to lay a flower on the still body of Adele, before kneeling in prayer at the foot of her bier.

Unlike the previous evening, the hall of the keep at Rougemont was thronged with people when John arrived there at about the ninth hour of the morning. He had not gone there directly from the priory as, acting on a sensible suggestion from Nesta, he had called at his house in Martin's Lane on the way to the castle. His mistress, ever concerned for his welfare even when it meant improving his relations with his wife, felt that he could use this latest drama to divert Matilda from her current vendetta against him. They were both aware of her obsession with the local aristocracy and the other grand folk of the county. Nesta suspected that news of a sudden, mysterious death of a de Courcy, especially one betrothed to the eldest son of Lord Ferrars, might entice her out of her current evil mood.

She was right. Although John had to summon up the courage to climb the outer stairs to the solar and push his way in, once he had baldly announced the news to his wife, her excitement rapidly banished her sulks. She threw down her needlework and immediately besought him for details. Although John had little real information, he embellished what he had to hold her interest.

Matilda was almost enraptured by the tragedy. ‘Adele de Courcy! We met her at the Guildhall two months ago, when the Portreeves were reappointed. You surely must remember her.'

Her husband agreed that he did, but in fact his only memory was of her father, who had become a little too drunk that night, perhaps at the joy of having one of his daughters linked to the rich and powerful Ferrars dynasty. He let Matilda prattle on for a few moments, to consolidate his restoration to favour. She went through the genealogies of the two well-known families and emphasised that the ladies of Exeter had been looking forward to the wedding of the year in the cathedral.

‘They'll be greatly disappointed, then,' he said, somewhat unwisely, ‘for the poor bride is lying stiff in a store room at St Nicholas's!'

His wife's lips tightened at his earthy dispassion, but the excitement of being the first Exeter lady to know of the matter allowed his stumble to pass. ‘A store room! She needs to be moved quickly to some place of honour. They have a town house in Currestreet,
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surely she should be lying there. Unless they take her to Shillingford.'

This was their manor a few miles to the west, towards Dartmoor. ‘Does the family know of her death yet?' gabbled Matilda. ‘I am slightly acquainted with her mother – she prays at St Olave's occasionally. Poor woman. She's a dull person who dresses like a haystack but a pleasant soul.'

John backed towards the solar door, Nesta's stratagem successfully accomplished. ‘No one knows of her death yet – not even the family. I'm just off to tell Richard. He'll want to know quickly, with all these notables involved.'

He fled while he was still winning and made his way to the castle. The usual crowd of supplicants was milling about, waiting to see the sheriff on one matter or another. Knights hopeful of advancement, merchants with grievances about market competition, applications for fairs and worried-looking clerks clutching sheaves of parchment vied with each other for admission to the sheriffs chamber. In addition, today saw an unusual number of messengers and servants concerned with the imminent arrival of the Chief Justiciar two days hence. However, John pulled rank as the second royal law officer in the county, and thrust his way through to the harassed guard at Richard's door. The sight of the six-foot black and grey figure bearing down on him, like some great bird of prey, strangled the challenge in the man's throat and the coroner stormed past him without a glance.

Inside, the two window openings were unshuttered to let in both the light and the icy wind. The sheriff sat behind his cluttered table with his cloak wrapped around him, a woollen cap on his head. He was dictating rapidly to a clerk, who feverishly scribbled down a list of guests for next week's feast at Rougemont, in honour of the Archbishop of Canterbury – alias Justiciar Hubert Walter.

Richard's face set into its familiar pose of pained surprise when he saw the coroner, but his voice did not break its pace as he continued his monologue to the scribe. John strode impatiently to the window and gazed down into the inner bailey to pass the time. He saw the usual confusion of a castle ward – oxen trudging through the mire, pulling carts full of vegetables and animal fodder, and a sergeant drilling a squad of soldiers. Women came in and out of the huts built around the wall embankment, carrying firewood and pots of steaming food or throwing slops on the ground. Some were screaming at their urchins and scooping up naked infants wandering in front of plodding horses, all familiar sights to a man who had spent more than half his life in soldiers' encampments.

De Revelle's voice jerked him out of his reverie. ‘Well, John, not another contrary notion about Mistress Rifford, I hope?'

The sarcastic tone brought him round to face the sheriff. This time, he looked forward perversely to shocking Richard out of his sneering condescension. ‘Something even more disturbing, Richard. We have a dead woman on our hands.'

‘Surely that's no great novelty for a coroner. And why “we” all of a sudden? I thought you tried to deny my right to dabble in your interests?'

‘I think your interests will include this particular lady. It's Reginald de Courcy's daughter – the same Adele who was to wed Guy Ferrars's son.'

De Revelle's mouth opened and then shut with a snap. ‘Are you sure?'

The coroner went to the table and leaned his fists on the edge, bringing down his face close to Richard's. ‘Never more so. How she died, I don't yet know, but there's blood about her nether parts.'

The sheriff stood up abruptly, half a head shorter than his brother-in-law. ‘Oh, good Jesus, not another ravishment! Those knaves of silversmiths, it could still be one of them. When did she die?'

John shrugged. ‘She was stiff and cold this morning. Some time during the night or last evening, I suspect. Could be longer, but the body wasn't there last night when the priest's servant tipped rubbish on the spot and saw nothing.'

The sheriffs eyes widened in horror. ‘Rubbish? What rubbish?'

Patiently John explained the whole story as far as he knew it.

Richard sat down again with a thud and held his head in his hands. ‘Mother of Christ, what's happening in this town? Hubert Walter is almost upon us, we have a portreeve's daughter ravished and a lady of high birth dead in a dung-heap!'

John sat on the stool that the clerk had vacated when he hurried away with his parchments. ‘Did you not arrest those smiths this morning, as you threatened?'

Richard raised his head and looked rather sheepish. ‘No, I changed my mind. At least, I was going to throw them into the gaol here but Godfrey Fitzosbern came with them to plead for their liberty.'