The Poisoned Chalice (32 page)

‘Stop this, I command you!' John bellowed. ‘You'll hang for attacking the King's officer.'

He swung around just in time. The man who had been standing with de Courcy, a hulking fellow wearing a shoulder cape with a hood, lunged forward with a long dagger and struck at him. John twisted to avoid the thrust, but heard the blade rip through the cloth of his tabard and felt the prick as it nicked his side just above the waist.

With a roar, all the fighting reflexes learned in twenty years of battle sprang into action. This was no time for parleying or mediation, his life was now in danger.

As the man stumbled past him with the momentum of the dagger blow, John whirled round and, using the massive broadsword with two hands, whistled it in an arc through the air to land squarely on the back of his assailant's neck.

Gwyn's honing of his blade on the window-ledge of the gate-house must have been very effective, as the spine was cut clean through and only the windpipe and skin on the front prevented the head from parting company from his body. The man fell to the floor jerking spasmodically, a torrent of blood from the big neck arteries jetting on to the mud below the doorstep.

There was a sudden silence in the lane. Nothing could have been more effective in quelling the small mob than the sight of a man spilling his life blood into the mire.

De Courcy, presumably the victim's master, bent down and rolled the body on to its back. ‘You are bleeding, Crowner,' said Guy Ferrars, in a subdued tone.

John, who had stood immobile since striking the mortal blow, looked down at his left side and saw a growing stain of blood spread across his tabard. He pulled it aside and put a finger into a small hole in his tunic, ripping the linen widely apart. ‘It's nothing but a scratch,' he grated, looking at a one-inch slash in his skin, just above belt level. A few inches nearer the mid-line, and the dagger would have killed him. He stepped down from the doorstep, walked a few paces towards his house, then turned to face the silent throng. ‘There'll be no inquest on this one, I assure you, for there's no other coroner but me. But I doubt anyone will contest that it was a justifiable homicide.' He held his side to reduce the bleeding until Mary could tie some rags around it. ‘I advise you all to disperse quietly. Go home – or if you still feel strongly about Fitzosbern, then go to the castle and have it out with de Revelle. There's nothing here for you.'

He turned and walked away, leaving the group of protesters to pick up their dead and decide what to do next.

Unusually for her, the sheriff's wife was in residence at Rougemont that night.

Eleanor de Revelle detested the bare, draughty quarters used by Richard in the keep, merely a pair of rooms joined to the chamber where he carried on all his business. They had manors elsewhere in Devon and the aloof lady far preferred country comfort there to the Spartan facilities of the castle at Exeter. But this weekend the visit of Hubert Walter had demanded that she be at her husband's side, so she had grudgingly suffered several nights of discomfort in a bed that, she strongly suspected, was often occupied in her absence by other women.

This night, she was huddled under three woollen blankets and a bearskin, only her thin nose poking out into the cold, damp air of the lofty circular bedchamber. Richard was lying on his back beside her, snoring gently, after having lain on her and performed his husbandly duty some time before. To her, it was a sexual assault more than making love, but she had the impression that he did it more from a sense of duty than to satisfy his lust. He lived in Exeter most of the time, coming back to Tiverton never more than once a week, an arrangement which suited her well. It seemed to suit Richard also, as being the best way to manage a marriage that had certainly been one of political and financial convenience.

They had gone to bed early, as after a good meal, there had been little left to occupy them. Conversation was even scarcer in this household than in the coroner's. It was still a couple of hours before midnight and a shaft of light struck through a crack between the shutters from a moon now high in the icy heavens.

Almost asleep at last, Lady Eleanor heard, with annoyance, a tentative tapping on the door. She tried to ignore it, but it came again, this time more insistent. Her husband's snores never broke their rhythms, so with some satisfaction – and far more force than was needed – she nudged him in the ribs with a bony elbow. It took a couple more jabs to wake him, but eventually she got him sufficiently out of his stupor to call a testy ‘What is it?' to whoever was knocking.

His manservant, a dried-up old Fleming who had been with him for years, put his head tentatively around the door, a flickering candle in his hand. He had more than once interrupted de Revelle in amorous acrobatics in that bed, and was always cautious of entering, even though he knew it was m'lady who was there tonight.

‘There are men who say they must see you on a matter of greatest urgency,' he announced.

‘Is there a rebellion in the county? Has the King returned?'

The old man looked confused. ‘No, sir. Not that I know of.'

‘Then tell them to go to hell or come back in the morning.'

‘One is Lord Guy Ferrars, sir. And the other Sir Reginald de Courcy.'

At these words Richard shot out of bed. ‘Sit them in my chamber, give them wine. I'll be there in a moment.'

The Fleming shuffled out, leaving the candle-holder on a shelf. When his wife turned her head, she saw Richard struggling to get a tunic over his nightshirt, then sitting on the low mattress to pull on tight breeches and shoes.

‘What's going on?' she demanded.

‘God knows – but if it's Ferrars and de Courcy together, it'll concern that dead woman of theirs.'

The sheriff reached his office in record time to find the two Ferrars, de Courcy and Hugh's squire standing stiffly around the fireplace, where the old servant was trying to stir some life into the smouldering logs.

‘De Revelle, you have to do something about this situation,' snapped Lord Ferrars, with no greeting or preamble.

The sheriff needed no guesses as to what situation he meant. ‘But what more can I do? We have the man who caused the death of your daughter, Reginald.'

The group moved toward the sheriff almost threateningly. ‘He was but a tool, some wretched leech!' snarled de Courcy. ‘We know now that he was forced into it by that swine Fitzosbern. He is the one we want for retribution.'

Hugh Ferrars threw up his arms dramatically. ‘She's dead – my Adele is dead! That bastard took her flesh and then her soul!' His voice was thick and he swayed a little, obviously from more mead and cider taken since he had left Martin's Lane.

His father pushed him aside impatiently, the squire steadying the younger man while Guy Ferrars returned to the attack. ‘We'll not rest until he is brought to justice one way or the other. De Courcy is bringing an appeal against him for conspiracy at your court in the morning. And Hugh and I are demanding that he be brought before a jury to present him before the King's Justices at the next Assize.'

‘But you can't do both!' protested Richard.

Ferrars jabbed his fists on to his sword belt and stared pugnaciously at the sheriff. ‘Where does it say that two different persons cannot bring different charges, eh?'

De Revelle was silent. He didn't know the answer to that.

‘Your coroner suggested that we come to you. He said I should bring an appeal of homicide against Fitzosbern, though I don't want money compensation, I want his life.'

Richard silently cursed his brother-in-law for sending this bunch of troublemakers to him, whom he could not send packing, but to whom he must pay every deference if he wanted to keep his job.

‘You've seen John de Wolfe tonight?' he asked

‘More than seen him, we've fought him,' muttered Hugh Ferrars. ‘And he beheaded de Courcy's bailiff for our trouble.'

Richard sat down heavily behind his desk. This was getting too much for a man dragged from his sleep not five minutes ago.

The story was told and they came round again to their ultimatum. ‘I want Fitzosbern arrested and put in your gaol to be brought to the shire court on my appeal,' demanded de Courcy.

‘And I want him arrested on a Plea of the Crown to stand trial before the judges. He can choose combat or be hanged, I don't care which,' said Guy Ferrars, almost in a shout.

‘That would need presentment from a coroner's jury,' objected Richard.

‘What's the problem? The inquest de Wolfe held was only provisional. He didn't know then how she died, nor who did it. So he can open his inquest again and the jury can commit that swine to the justices.'

Hugh staggered away from the support of his squire. ‘Cut the bastard's throat, I say! Quicker and surer than all this lawyers' talk.'

His father ignored him. ‘I want him arrested, de Revelle. I don't want any argument, if you want to stay sheriff of this county.'

De Courcy nodded vigorously. ‘At the very least, he must be brought before the court and made to account for his involvement. Tomorrow will be as good a time as any.'

Guy Ferrars agreed. ‘So we want him arrested tonight.'

De Revelle stared. ‘Tonight? Impossible!'

‘Why not? It's long before midnight. Does the administration of this county not function in the dark?' asked de Courcy sarcastically.

The sheriff pleaded for good sense. ‘What earthly good will it do to turn out guards, get them down there and drag him back at this hour? There's nowhere he can go in a closed city. And why should he? He knows nothing of your desires to get him locked up. The morning will do just as well.'

They argued for a while, suspecting that the sheriff still desired to protect the master silversmith. Eventually they conceded that a few hours would make no difference to the outcome, once Richard had promised to send down men-at-arms at first light to bring Fitzosbern up to the shire court, which began its session at the ninth hour.

With a sigh of relief, de Reville watched the two noblemen leave his chamber, the squire half dragging the drunken son behind them. He stumbled back into the bedroom and hauled off his outer clothes again, cursing Fitzosbern, his brother-in-law and everyone else involved in the affair.

He rolled shivering into bed and grabbed his wife for a little warmth. ‘God, woman,' he muttered, ‘your feet are as cold as your heart.'

The Shire Hall stood in the inner ward of Rougemont, a plain building with a stone-slated roof. It was a large hall, like a barn, with a wide door on one side. The interior was bare, apart from a raised wooden platform across one end. On this were a few benches and stools for the officials, clerks and other functionaries and observers who came to the sessions. When the King's Justices came, the place was spruced up a little, with high-backed chairs for the judges and some banners and hangings on the wall above the dais.

The witnesses, jurors, accused, guards and sightseers had to mill about on the floor of beaten earth and this morning they were there in their usual abundance, restive at the delay in the start of the proceedings.

Usually Gabriel, the sergeant-at-arms would march across from the keep ahead of Ralph Morin, the constable, followed by the sheriff and the coroner, with a priest and a few clerks at the tail end. But this morning there was still no sign of them long after the distant cathedral bell had tolled nine.

They were in the keep, arguing heatedly with some other citizens.

‘So where is he, de Revelle? Your promises are worthless!' declaimed Lord Ferrars, red in the face as he strode up and down in frustration.

‘We demanded last night that you arrest him there and then. Now the devil has flown!' shouted Reginald de Courcy.

Richard tried to stem the growing storm. ‘He may be here somewhere in the city – because he was not at his house, it doesn't mean that he's absconded,' he pleaded. Then he turned on the castle constable, in a typical attempt to shift the blame. ‘This is your responsibility, Morin, it was you who sent men to arrest Fitzosbern.'

The big constable, an impressive figure with his forked grey beard and huge moustache, was not one to be browbeaten by his immediate senior. ‘I did exactly as you commanded, sheriff,' he said evenly. ‘At dawn, you asked me to send guards to arrest him. That was the first I heard of the matter. That he was not there is no fault of mine nor of my men.'

De Revelle turned on the sergeant as an alternative target. ‘Why could you not find the silversmith, eh? Did you look well enough?'

Gabriel stood at attention and replied, stolidly, ‘The door was locked, sir. We hammered on it and eventually the old cook-servant came. He said no one was there. Both the craftsmen were in your gaol and the old man said that his master went out early last evening.'

‘Where was he going?'

‘He said he didn't know and that it wasn't his place to ask. His master was heavily cloaked and carried a large bag, which he thought was one in which he kept money and some silver.'

‘There was no one else in the house?' demanded Ferrars.

‘Not a soul, sir. The old man said that the maidservant of the departed wife had come earlier to collect some clothing for her mistress. His master was angry with her, but eventually let her take what she wanted.'

‘You searched the house?'

Gabriel nodded. ‘From top to bottom – and the yard, the sheds, the pigsty, the kitchen. We couldn't have missed as much as a mouse.'

De Courcy glared at the sheriff. ‘You see? He must have got wind of the rumours. God knows, there were plenty blowing around the town yesterday. The whole of Exeter must have known what that leech confessed to.'

‘Everyone in Devon must know by now that the bastard seduced my woman,' blurted out Hugh Ferrars, still obsessed with his loss of face over his fiancée's infidelity.