The Butcher of St Peter's

Chapter Eighteen

By the next morning, Baldwin was feeling a great deal better. He had taken to his bed early the previous evening, still feeling exhausted after his exertions, and now, lying in his bed, he realized that he was not bound to strain himself into an early grave for the Coroner. Perhaps just this once he could leave the Coroner to earn his own money. There was nothing about the matter that needed the independent eye of a Keeper of the King’s Peace. True, it was his duty to seek out and apprehend those who might have been guilty of a felony, especially a murderous attack, but he saw no reason why the city’s men shouldn’t find Estmund themselves, as well as Mick’s killer. He was not Keeper for Exeter, and it was time he went home to his own territory. They were more directly responsible than he, and he had a more important duty to perform: getting better.

He rose soon after dawn and stood idly swinging his arm to see how it moved. Ralph was a better physician than some, clearly. The pain was significantly improved, and Baldwin could already lift his arm higher than he had been able to the previous morning. There was a little weeping when he looked underneath the bandages, but for the most part his wound appeared to be healing nicely.

Edgar had risen as soon as he heard his master wake, and had dressed himself. Seeing his master was well-rested and fully awake, he left to fetch water and towels. Soon he was back, and Baldwin splashed water liberally over his face, trying to work up a lather with the cheap soap which was all he could find at the inn. Giving it up as a poor job, he splashed more water on his face and beard and wiped them dry before taking a sip of water. Although others, notably his old friend Simon, were prone to taking the strongest of wines and ales at the first opportunity in the morning, Baldwin had learned in the heat of the Holy Land to try to avoid too much by way of fermented drink. He had learned that it was likely to give him headaches and could make him feel sick. Since returning to England, he had found that it was easier to keep to his old regime, and now he preferred to have very weak or non-alcoholic drinks in the morning, although he was quite content to drink wine or ale later in the day.

Seeing Edgar watching him, Baldwin grinned briefly. ‘Prepare our bags. I think it is time we returned home to Furnshill. If we travel gently, it should not hurt my shoulder.’

‘Husband.’

‘Jeanne, my love. Did you sleep well?’

She wiped her eyes, which felt gritty, and moved forward into the security of his arms, sighing. Her heart was racing and she felt quite light-headed, almost sick with relief to know that they would soon be home again. She was desperate to see their daughter Richalda.

‘Now, my love, be easy in your mind,’ he said, pulling away from her. ‘Put some clothes on, and I shall go and tell the good Coroner that I intend leaving here at noon. After that, we can break our fast.’

He felt very contented as he walked along the road to Sir Peregrine’s house. He had heard that the Coroner lived in a house near the castle, on Correstrete, and he walked out there quickly, swinging his sore arm deliberately.

In the past, when he was knocked from a horse or beaten in a battle, he used to find that there were very definite periods for recuperation: a battered head might need some days in bed before the dizziness would leave him; a slashing knife wound would heal generally in a few days, followed by another few weeks before the soreness went; a stab would take a little longer, and the weeping could last some days. That was when he was younger. Last year he had travelled to Okehampton and taken part in some tournaments, and the battering he had taken had needed weeks to heal. This time, with the hole in his breast, he felt as though it was going to take a great deal longer. He set out feeling fine, but only a matter of yards from the inn’s door he felt short of breath and tired. It just showed, as he told himself ruefully, that he wasn’t so young as he once had been, and much though he liked to think himself indestructible, this was proof that he was not. No, he must learn to respect his age a little more. He was still strong enough to beat most youngsters with sword or mace, but there were times when he really should not be in the fight. He was growing too old.

He forced himself onwards. Up ahead rose the red keep of Rougement Castle, and he peered up at it critically. It was strong enough as a fortress, although he was unsure how secure it would be, were decent artillery pieces to be brought up against it. The red sandstone walls were likely to be brittle. From Baldwin’s experience, the sandy rocks were little defence against heavy missiles.

The Coroner’s house was easy to find. Among the merchants’ and traders’ homes, it stood out for the lack of signs outside. All the others had their advertisements showing that they were selling skins or wine or something else. Looking along them, Baldwin was amused to see the servant of Ralph of Malmesbury appearing from one doorway, and thought that the physician must be visiting a patient, until he saw a second man whom he recognized entering the same house, and realized that the place must be Ralph’s home.

That gave him pause for thought. It was one thing to learn that Sir Peregrine lived here, because he was a knight bannaret, the highest level of chivalry below baron. To be able to afford a property in the same street implied to Baldwin that the physician was more successful than he had thought. On an impulse, he crossed the road and went up to Ralph of Malmesbury’s door.

‘Let me see the physician.’

‘He is busy.’

‘Good,’ Baldwin said, showing his teeth to the pimply youth at the door. ‘Because I am too. That should mean we can save each other time, should it not? I will wait here in the passageway. Tell him I am here.’

‘Who are you?’

Baldwin looked at the boy. His manner was insolent in the extreme. Baldwin dropped his gaze to the lad’s boots, scruffy, scratched and scuffed, and then took in the holed and tatty hosen, the faded but at least whole tabard, and the acne-ridden face. ‘If you are an advert for his business, boy, I’d suggest he remove you instantly. Tell your master that Sir Baldwin de Furnshill, lord of my own manor, Keeper of the King’s Peace, and Justice of Gaol Delivery is here, and … boy?’

‘What?’

‘If you are so rude to me again, I will have you arrested for possessing a face that could curdle milk. I have the power, you know.’

Agnes woke with the anger still simmering.

Her sister was incapable of honesty: stealing men from other women, trying to pretend that she was a good sister by taking Agnes in when she lost her home, only to throw her out when she found a lover … She had no honesty at all.

After the sad break-up of her affair with Daniel, Agnes had not run weeping to the nearest man. She had bottled up her sadness and grief and behaved in a manner more becoming. Where Juliana would doubtless have grabbed by the cods the first man who appeared, as though to prove her ability to ensnare another, Agnes kept herself under a tight rein.

She had always possessed that ability of focusing her thoughts inwards. Where some folks cared too much what others thought, Agnes had the ability to ignore it. She really didn’t care what anyone thought. All that mattered to her was her own feelings, and this, she thought, was a better way to live. A maid couldn’t go through life worrying about what other people thought all the time. There were certain proprieties to consider, but apart from them a maid should not worry. Better by far to worry about yourself, and let the opinions of other people look after themselves.

Juliana had denied lying, but that itself was a lie. She must think that Agnes was a fool if she thought she was going to convince her of that. And then she had said she knew who the murderer was, as though Agnes should stop asking questions about it! Why shouldn’t Agnes be interested to know who had killed her brother-in-law? It was only natural.

Anyway, lying to the Coroner was stupid. He would learn the truth, given time. He seemed a most assiduous investigator. Agnes would like him to investigate her! And if he didn’t find out what Juliana was hiding, God would. To lie under oath was a terrible thing. No, Juliana was a fool, and the sooner she came to realize that fact, the better.

With that thought came another, though. If she was lying, why was that?

Agnes suddenly had a clear memory of how Daniel had reacted when he learned that she had invited her lover to the house. Daniel had first gone entirely white, as though in horror, and then flushed with fury and begun to accuse her of being little better than a strumpet from the stews; at the time she had been convinced that his anger was merely proof of his foolish care for the nicer proprieties of life in the city, not wanting it to become known that his own sister-in-law was enjoying a lascivious relationship with a married man. Adultery was a dangerous crime.

But now she was intrigued. Perhaps the man’s rage had not been caused by the fact that Jordan was married, but by some other reason. Juliana had said before that Daniel hated Jordan and didn’t want him in the house, and perhaps that was in part his attraction for her; yet what if there was some other reason for Daniel’s loathing? He only ever appeared to take a violent aversion to those who threatened his authority as sergeant … could it really be true that Jordan was a felon?

She had never really confronted that possibility before. In the past she had automatically assumed that Daniel’s attitude to Jordan was based on his hatred of adultery, but now she considered the possibility more seriously. Juliana had appeared to feel that the man responsible for Daniel’s death must be protected — that was why she was lying about him. She said, because he had threatened her and the children. But there must be some other reason why she was holding back. Jordan couldn’t have killed Daniel.

And yet … there was a circular common sense to the idea that Jordan had indeed killed Daniel. The two men had hated each other for quite some years to her knowledge. It was only her bringing him into Daniel’s home that had led to the explosion, but she knew that Daniel and Jordan had avoided contact whenever possible, only occasionally nodding stiffly to each other in the street or at other encounters. Perhaps her lover was indeed a felon. And perhaps he had, as Juliana had appeared to imply, killed Juliana’s husband.

Agnes was entirely still for some time as she considered this, and then she made a decision. She put on a clean apron, her best wimple, and went out into the street. She had business to attend to. No matter what she thought of her dead brother-in-law, she was not going to consider maintaining a relationship with his murderer. If Jordan had done it, she would see him pay for the crime.

Ridiculous that Juliana should try to conceal his guilt. Perhaps she just didn’t want to upset Agnes with the truth.

Baldwin waited only a short time. Soon the scowling youth returned and, with his best approximation to courtesy, invited Baldwin to follow him.

The knight found himself brought into a pleasant hall, not vast by any means, not a great hall like the one at Tiverton, nor even so broad and deep as his own at Furnshill, but a goodly sized room for a house in a city none the less. It was tastefully decorated with tapestries, and had a good three-shelf sideboard displaying rows of plate, all of good quality.

Ralph himself sat on a comfortable-looking chair near the fire roaring in the middle of the floor. ‘Sir Baldwin, is your shoulder worse?’ he asked, with what Baldwin considered to be a rather hopeful air.

‘No, I thank you. I am feeling well today. Well enough to leave Exeter for home. I wanted to make sure that there was nothing more you felt I should do,’ Baldwin lied smoothly.

Ralph’s brow lifted in surprise, but then he shrugged and told Baldwin to remove his upper clothing so he could look at the wound again, and passed him a large glass bottle for a urine sample.

While Baldwin used the bottle, Ralph gave his shoulder a cursory look, and then took the urine from him, holding it up to the light and frowning as he peered. ‘Yes, this looks good now, and the wound appears to be healing still. I should think that you are well on the way to recovery, Sir Baldwin.’

‘I am glad to hear it,’ Baldwin said heartily, beginning to pull his shirt back up over his shoulder.

‘So why don’t you tell me why you’re really here?’ Ralph said.

‘You don’t believe I’m here for my shoulder?’

‘Of course not. You’re a knight. You know full well what a bad injury looks and feels like. Not that you’ve taken yourself to a physician often from what I’ve seen. I can imagine your telling your wife to make up some of her family concoctions rather than trusting yourself to some overpaid and incompetent star-watcher like me. Isn’t that so?’

Baldwin smiled widely. He studied the man for a few moments, then said, ‘Send your servant for some wine and let’s talk awhile, Ralph.’

‘Go on, Geoffrey — and not the cheap barrel. Bring us some of the Bordeaux.’

When they were alone, Baldwin leaned forward. ‘Ralph, I am concerned about that girl in the brothel. Her suicide and the murder of her pander both point to someone else’s being involved, but I have a feeling that there’s unlikely to be enough evidence to find anyone.’

‘What of it?’

‘I don’t believe you think that. I think, from what I saw of you in that place, that you care for those women. They are still women, after all. If one of them was cut up like that … why? What was the point? And her pander was simply executed. That means, to my mind, that someone had a definite object in mind.’

‘Explain yourself. It is too early in the morning for me to play with words.’

‘Then I shall be plain. I think that the man was killed as punishment. Betsy mentioned something about him and Anne leaving to set up a new life. If that was so, who would have wounded her and killed her man? Obviously someone who thought that the pair of them owed him something.’

‘It is a large guess, but carry on.’

‘Perhaps it is a great guess, but such an intuition is not unrealistic. Suppose a man had owned the woman at the brothel and she was leaving without his permission, would he not mark her as a warning to the other girls in his house? And would he also not injure the man who was to take her away as a means of discouraging others from trying the same game?’

Ralph shrugged. ‘What of it? As a theory it holds water, but so could many others.’

‘Yes, but could you learn from Betsy whether the two of them were beholden to any single man? And if they were, does that mean that the same man owns Betsy and others in the building … is the whole place one investor’s property? If so, who is he?’

Ralph sucked the air between his teeth. ‘You do realize that this could be very dangerous information? If you’re right, the man was prepared to torture and murder any who sought to defy him. What if he were to become aware that I was seeking to learn his identity?’

‘Your life could be in danger, if my theory was correct,’ Baldwin acknowledged.

‘So why in God’s good name should I help you? I would have to be mad to do anything of the sort, wouldn’t I?’ Ralph exclaimed.

Baldwin nodded with a grin, but gradually the lightness left his face and he met Ralph’s look with a correspondingly serious gaze. ‘I think you’d do it because you like the women in that terrible place. You care enough to go there and help them when they need it, and yes, you get to pick one of the women afterwards, but that’s for comfort, isn’t it? In truth, you would like to help them. And you could help them in a valuable, material way, if by catching this murderer you protected them from his depredations.’

Ralph laughed aloud. The youth returned as he leaned back in his seat, guffawing.

‘Ah, ah! Sir Baldwin, you should be a jester! Protected them? What do you think would be the first thing that would happen to those girls if you were right? They would lose their master, and that would mean that they’d also lose the roof over their heads. Their individual panders would appear and whip them away to work in worse conditions all over the city, and I’d never get to see them to help them again. Nor would anyone else. If you arrested the man who killed Anne, you’d take the one man who had a vested interest in looking after them all.’

‘That is mad!’ Baldwin waited until the sulky youth had left the room. ‘Look, the man killed her man and ruined her. What he did to her was savage. I’ve seen torture in my time, but that was foul. He intended to leave her as an advert of what could happen to a woman who crossed him. Now I have heard that Jordan le Bolle has had something to do with prostitution. All I want is to learn whether he owns that brothel or not.’

‘Him? Hmm. But the corollary is, if you’re right, that he would kill any man who attempted to beat or hurt one of his women. He feels he owns them, they are his investment. He wants them to behave in the way he expects, and he wants them to remain here. He’ll look after them like his own children, provided they do what he wants.’

‘And then throw them away like garbage,’ Baldwin summed up for him. ‘Ralph, a man who can do that to a girl must not be allowed to keep the brothel. He has done it to this one … what if he did the same to another? What if he did the same to Betsy? Yes, to her, Ralph.’

He stood. Ralph was sitting pensively now, a small frown wrinkling his brow.

‘Think on it, Ralph, and then go and speak to Betsy. Find out who it is who owns her and the other girls there. And then tell Sir Peregrine. I would not have another girl die.’

‘What of you? Should I not tell you?’

‘Ach!’ Baldwin pulled a face and felt his shoulder. ‘I think that I have done enough already. My shoulder, as you keep telling me, needs rest. I shall ride home today and leave all these affairs in the hands of those who actually have responsibility for them. It’s no longer my business.’

Jordan was home at a little before lunch, and as he walked inside he saw his wife sitting waiting for him. She stood as soon as he came in through the door, and went to help him with his cotte.

‘Get me an ale,’ he rasped. ‘My throat is parched. Christ’s cods, the way those arses talk you’d think there was a tax on silence.’

She obediently hurried out to the buttery. Usually their bottler should have been there to serve him, but Jordan had sent the man away to replenish their stocks, and he had taken the cart down to Topsham a little after Jordan and she had broken their fasts. He wouldn’t be back for a long time.

Jordan watched her go sombrely. The matter of Daniel’s death was all over the city, and several men had been glancing at him askance as though they were wondering. It didn’t matter, though. He’d been at the South Gate brothel with two merchants. They were both of them unmarried, so neither would worry too much about their presence there becoming known, and Jordan didn’t care who learned he’d been lying with a whore. That was his protection. He couldn’t have been present when Daniel was murdered. He hadn’t been.

Still, some men were asking who else would wish to see him dead, and he was unhappy with the sidelong looks and suspicious stares. The city’s receiver this morning had refused to sit near him and hadn’t shaken hands with him. Nor had the clerk. If those two took it into their heads that he might have paid someone else to kill Daniel, it could go hard for him. God, he was thirsty! ‘Where are you, bitch?’

Mazeline shivered at his voice. The barrel was almost empty, and she had to lift the end to pour a little more from the bottom. It meant that there was more sediment in the jug than usual, but she could do little about that. Taking it back into the room, she set the drink down with his favourite goblet in front of him on his table, and asked if he’d like some cold meat or a pie.

‘Meat, woman. Bring it out quickly, I’m hungry. Where’s Jane?’

‘Playing at the Bakeres’ house.’

She saw him nod approvingly. Jane didn’t like the Bakeres’ little boy — she said he was loud, rough, and bullying — but Mazeline knew that her husband approved of the Bakeres because Master Billy Bakere was a rising force within the Freedom of the city. In that exclusive club it was as well to keep an ear to the ground, and Jordan had heard that Billy might soon be the city’s official receiver, in charge of all the city’s money. That would make him a worthwhile friend, so Jane had been told to play with his son at every opportunity.

The meat was ready with some bread sliced on a trencher, and she brought them through to the table. He watched her as she approached the table and set the food down, and then, as she took a pace back, he swept up his goblet and hurled it at her.

‘This tastes of shit! Are you trying to poison me?’

The heavy pewter rim struck her above the eye, cutting the flesh on the point of the bone, and dashing the ale all over her. There had been a good two-thirds of a pint, and it exploded from the goblet, drenching her hair and upper body.

She stood for a moment, and the urge to burst into tears was so overwhelming, she felt certain she must succumb, but the expression on his face stopped her. She recognized that look. He was waiting for her to react.

When they had first been married, each time he had lost his temper she had been sure that it was a brief aberration, not a proof of his true character. She knew now that she had been fooling herself. This man was not a kindly lover such as young maids dreamed of and hoped to marry. Mazeline had been unfortunate in her choice of husband.

She had realized that the first time she had provided him with a meal that was late. She had explained that it was not her fault, that the cook had bought some flesh that was already too old and that it was unfit for him, so she had gone to buy some fresh meat from the fleshfold.

He had listened, very calm and collected, and then he had explained coolly that he was providing money for her to feed him, and if she was unable to provide even that service, she had no use. And then he had gripped her wrists and held her while he took a rope and studied it carefully, weighing it in his hand. The hemp was heavy, almost an inch thick, and he beat her so violently that she had been sick on the floor in front of him. Although the rope had not cut her skin as badly as, later, the plaited leather switch would, the weight of the rope bruised her dreadfully, and she had been incapable of lying on her back. Later that night, her protests were ignored, though. A wife had two duties, he explained, to provide food and then to bed her man. She had failed in one, but she wouldn’t fail in the second. While she wept and groaned in pain, he thrust and moaned lustfully above her, and probably from that moment she had truly begun to hate him.

It was a strange feeling to give birth to this man’s offspring. At first the idea of a child was repulsive, as repellent as taking him between her thighs and permitting him to enter her, but then, when the child arrived, she realized that this little babe was part of her too, and as soon as Jane first opened her eyes and looked up at Mazeline she knew that she loved her. They would love each other, despite all that the world could throw at them; against her husband, Jane’s father, they would unite for each other’s support.

And so life had progressed, at first. Jane was entirely dependent upon her mother, as all children must be, and Mazeline was able to perform her duties to her husband’s satisfaction while still feeding and watching over this new life which was so entwined about her own. She adored their little baby, longing for those moments when the child would suckle. And as Jane grew larger and larger on her milk, so Mazeline looked forward more urgently to holding her to feed, up until the time when Jane was just over two years old, when she suddenly rejected the breast. Mazeline still looked on that date as the beginning of her misery, because it seemed to her that it was then that Jane first began to look to her father for everything, rather than Mazeline. Mazeline had never felt so lonely as she did in the days after that initial rejection.

But there was little she could do now to retrieve her daughter’s love. This man had stolen that, just as he had taken her pride. It was in order to gain some affection, to try to renew some confidence in herself, that she had allowed herself to be seduced by Reg. Not that she could ever tell Jordan that he was being cuckolded. Some men might flash into a rage and kill their spouse and her lover on hearing that she had been unfaithful, but Mazeline knew full well that her own man would not merely kill.

Taking a lover was dangerous, as she knew. But at least Reg faced the same danger in taking her. Either of them could be murdered by her man for their infidelity. With any luck, Jordan would never know of their secret trysts. Just now, with the ale dripping down her face and trickling from her nose and chin, mingling with the blood from her eyebrow, she didn’t care. It felt to her as though at least for the last few weeks she had been loved by a man for whom she could feel affection.

Poor Reg. In the street yesterday he had seemed so shocked to see the other bruises. She only hoped she could save him from seeing her like this: so forlorn and destroyed. There was nothing left of her self-respect. All her life was pointless, other than Reg’s love. And her hatred for her husband.

‘You should go and dress that scratch,’ he said.

She remained standing where she was a moment. There was no affection or shame in his tone. She had failed him, so he had corrected her. That was an end to the matter. He knew nothing of guilt. Guilt was for weaklings, he had once said.

It was the knock at the door that made her move at last. She drew her eyes from him and went to the door, ashamed to be seen like this, but knowing that she must go. He would not tolerate her leaving the door unanswered, and he wouldn’t go to it himself. That was a woman’s work when his bottler was away.

‘Mistress,’ Agnes said, looking her up and down with some surprise. ‘Is your husband here?’

Mazeline was so filled with hatred, she could not speak, but merely pointed, and then stood staring after this latest woman to have stolen her man’s love from her.