A Plague of Heretics

Epilogue

Three months later, on a clear winter’s day, Sir John de Wolfe was married to Hilda of Dawlish in the porch of St Andrew’s Church in Stoke-in-Teignhead, the parchment with the banns still nailed to the door as they faced it for the ceremony, as was the tradition.

The slim blonde, in a long gown of blue satin under a fur-lined pelisse of dark blue velvet, was attended by a beaming Evelyn as maid of honour. John, in a new grey tunic and mantle, had his brother William as his wedding squire, still thin and pale but happy to be back in charge of his beloved manors.

After Father Martin, assisted by Thomas de Peyne, had completed the ceremony and taken them inside the church for the nuptial Mass and a blessing, they all adjourned to the nearby Church Hostel for the ‘bride-ale’, a lavish feast, which overflowed on to the street, where trestles were spread with food and drink for the whole village, the festivities lasting until well after dark.

Many guests had come down from Exeter by cart and on horseback the previous day, so that all John’s friends were there to wish them good fortune. Gwyn, Martha, Mary, Henry de Furnellis, John de Alençon, Hugh de Relaga, Ralph Morin, Gabriel were there — even Andrew the livery man, who provided the transport. A further large contingent came across the river from Holcombe, including all Hilda’s extensive family.

As John stood with an arm around the slim waist of his lovely bride, a hand grasping a cup of mead, a thought penetrated the haze of his happy confusion. He wondered where Nesta was at this moment, the Welsh woman whom he had undoubtedly loved, as he now loved Hilda. Was she still happily married to her stonemason in Chepstow and was there perhaps a chubby infant at her breast? Would she ever learn of Matilda’s death?

Another person who did not attend the wedding was Cecilia, who, as soon as she fully recovered, left the house and returned to live with her family in Worcester, taking Lucille with her as her maid, as her own did not wish to leave her folks in the city. Cecilia had confessed to John that she felt out of place in Exeter, being a reminder to the citizens of the harm that her husband had done there. Though de Wolfe did not appreciate it, the perceptive Mary suspected that Hilda was secretly pleased that the handsome widow was going far enough away not to be a temptation to a susceptible next-door neighbour!

Yet another notable absentee was Richard de Revelle, whom John had not laid eyes on since Matilda’s funeral, when they both studiously ignored each other. That sad occasion had also been well attended, as Matilda’s many friends from St Olave’s and the cathedral had been augmented by a large number of sympathetic citizens. The Requiem Mass was conducted by the archdeacon, and she was laid to rest under the floor before the altar of St John in the nave, right up against the rood screen. Since then, John had had it covered by an inscribed granite slab, which recorded Matilda’s name for posterity.

John had heard nothing more from Aubrey de Courtenay, the Dorset coroner. The sheriff had gone on his routine visit to Westminster with his pony-train of panniers filled with silver coins and had seen Hubert Walter, who had sent his condolences to John and told him to ignore any legal complications that the Justices in Eyre might raise when they eventually came to Exeter. He also forcibly expressed the wish that John continue as county coroner, for de Wolfe had had some qualms about his position, given that he had been arrested, committed for murder and had sought sanctuary as a common criminal, even though the allegations proved unfounded.

This hardened his resolve to stay in the city, rather than move to Hilda’s fine house in Dawlish, as she had suggested. She did not want to move permanently to Exeter, so they compromised by living part-time in each place, with Hilda spending at least one week a month at the coast and John going from there to visit his family at Stoke far more often since the scare over his brother’s health.

The yellow plague vanished from Devon as mysteriously as it had arrived, but reports from other parts of the country showed that it struck sporadically here and there. However, it claimed one last victim in the city and simultaneously cleared up one last mystery. The mad monk, Alan de Bere, had been living in his hovel on the marshes near the river, when he was struck by the dreaded disease. As someone in holy orders, however renegade he had become, he was taken to St John’s Hospital, where it was soon all too apparent that he was dying. Brother Saulf urged him to make a last confession and, surprisingly, de Bere gasped that he wished to confess to murder and wanted a law officer to be present. John de Wolfe was away at his brother’s manor, so Gwyn and Thomas were called instead. In their presence, the monk admitted that he and Reginald Rugge, the weird lay brother from St Olave’s, had taken it into their own hands to cleanse the world of two heretics whom the Church seemed unable to deal with. These were the porter from Bretayne and the man from Wonford. The first they smothered and hid among the plague victims, the other man they stabbed and hid in the earth closet.

‘And what about the woodcarver whose throat you tore out?’ growled Gwyn, standing uncaringly over the yellowed man who lay dying at his feet.

Alan de Bere stared up at the massive Cornishman. ‘I swear to God we had nothing to do with that,’ he whispered. ‘That must have been one of the doctor’s.’

As they left the priory, Gwyn and Thomas walked in silence for a while. ‘Is that confession going to be any use, given that two priests were present?’ grunted Gwyn.

Thomas nodded. ‘He asked for a law officer, so he intended it to be known far and wide. It had none of the inviolacy of the confessional, so it can be disclosed to the coroner. Sir John will welcome it to clear up two uncompleted inquests.’

‘So what about the woodcarver, Nicholas Budd? That bloody monk back there says he didn’t do it — and I can’t see why he should tell anything but the truth on his deathbed.’

Thomas crossed himself jerkily. ‘God rest him, however evil he’s been. If it wasn’t that awful pair, then it must have been the doctor. We thought at the time that someone with medical skill may have cut out that voice-box so neatly.’ He shuddered at the memory, as they walked on. There was no way to squeeze the truth out of Reginald Rugge, as he had vanished immediately after Clement’s death and by now was probably living rough somewhere in the forest.

The heretics had also vanished — or, at least, were keeping such a low profile that no more was heard of the canons’ crusade against them. De Wolfe suspected that the revulsion against the burning of the fuller’s family had quenched everyone’s appetite for pursuing them. Certainly, John de Alençon told him that the bishop had no desire to make an issue of the matter, in spite of the Papal Legate’s letter. Henry Marshal was more concerned with keeping an eye on Prince John’s chances of becoming king, which should lead to his own advancement in the hierarchy of government.

In Martin’s Lane life went on almost as usual. Mary was content to keep house for John and his new wife, with whom she got on exceedingly well. Gwyn and Martha revelled in their tenancy of the Bush Inn, though the big Cornishman still acted as John’s officer. Thomas continued as his clerk, but also managed to fit in his teaching at the choir school and his duties in the scriptorium.

Six months later the Eyre of Assize came at last to Exeter and John half-expected to be summoned before the justices, but he heard nothing of it and it appeared likely that the Chief Justiciar had warned them off. Richard de Revelle sold his town house in Exeter and no one of John’s acquaintance had laid eyes on him for months, so he was probably lying low in his manor at Revelstoke in the far west of the county.

‘And long may the bastard stay there!’ was de Wolfe’s heartfelt comment to Gwyn and Thomas.