The Poisoned Chalice

Chapter Five In which Crowner John holds an inquest at Torbay

Early next morning John called at the Rifford house on his way up the castle, partly to enquire after Christina and partly to make sure that his wife was still there. Mary would not let on that he had not slept at home that night – and even if Lucille betrayed him, he had weathered worse storms before.

After a rumbustious night in Nesta’s bed, he had slept like a log and finally filled up on a great breakfast of eggs, ham, horse-bread and ale. He walked back through the town, his tall, spare figure loping past stall-holders and their customers. He ploughed heedlessly through a herd of goats on their way to slaughter and dodged handcarts filled with vegetables fresh from the countryside – the five town gates were now open. He wondered wryly if the extra guards on duty had been anything but a waste of time: most of them would miss a suspect even if he was shouting, ‘Ravisher’, at the top of his voice. Ox-carts trundled their huge wheels through the muddy slush as he crossed Southgate Street and the cries of vendors of everything from fresh river-fish to live ducks and bread hot from the over, rang in his oblivious ears.

On the way to the Riffords, he diverted slightly to have a look in daylight at the scene of last night’s crime. He entered the cathedral Close through the Bear Gate and walked around the great west façade to the north side. Here, he found large new blocks of stone, some partly fashioned, others plain cubes, waiting to be hoisted up to the masons on their scaffolding. The building, begun as long ago as 1114 by Bishop Warelwast, was only now in the last stages of construction – indeed, some of the soft stone used eighty years ago already needed replacement.

John found the small door in the base of the North Tower and traced a short route from there to the main path, which ran parallel with the row of canons’ houses. He poked about the new masonry, some piled up high above his head. There were several empty spaces, both between each stack and between them and the cathedral wall – plenty of hiding places for a girl to be dragged into and assaulted.

Bending down, he studied the ground but saw nothing except churned mud. He had not expected anything dramatic and the absence of blood was not surprising, given the small quantity shed and the state of the ground.

He soon abandoned the search and strode briskly away, passing his own street door without a glance. He stopped at Godfrey Fitzosbern’s house, but decided to leave him until later. Soon he was at Henry Rifford’s and was met by Matilda in the main hall. ‘The girl is sleeping, thank God,’ she informed him. ‘I sat with her all night. Her cousin Mary is with her now, and the old aunt has gone to her own bed, so I can leave for a while.’

‘Did she say anything more of what happened?’

Matilda clucked her tongue and scowled at him. ‘Still the crowner, John? Will you not let it rest for a moment? No, she said nothing, and I did not bring the matter up. She needs peace and forgetfulness for a time, not inquisition.’

As he helped her on with her heavy serge cloak, she commented, ‘Where on earth can this Edgar be? You’d think her betrothed would have been around here at the gallop – he lodges only down at Fore Street with the leech Nicholas.’

John had forgotten the fiancé, but now realised that Edgar must have gone with his father, Joseph, down to Torre to identify the wreck and the dead sailors.

When he told Matilda, she exploded. ‘You sent word to them yesterday! They must have ridden out before dusk and stayed on the way. The boy will still not know that his fiancée has been deflowered.’ In spite of the tragedy, she was excited at all this drama unfolding before her very eyes. ‘You must ride and tell him before he returns home, to prepare him for the shock,’ she ranted. ‘Maybe he will not be so keen on a wedding when he hears this.’

John rubbed the dark stubble on his lean jaw. How was he best to fit together all these tasks? He felt like a juggler at the Martinmas fair, with six balls in the air at once.

He had to have the Topsham people to identify the sailors’ bodies, and he had to hold an inquest with them present. In the circumstances, it was a lot to ask them to ride back to Torbay again tomorrow, especially after they learned of the assault on Christina. It would take them the better part of a day’s ride, especially with the short hours of December daylight. ‘You’re right, madam. I must ride down and meet them, to take them back to Torre. I will have to hold the inquest tonight or first thing in the morning, while they are still there – then hurry home to see what has developed with this ravishment.’

John had a few words with the anguished portreeve, then escorted his wife back to Martin’s Lane, as she was stridently declaiming that things had come to a pretty pass in Exeter if a good woman couldn’t walk the streets in safety. In the busy daylight, she was hardly at any risk – and, John thought bitterly, it would be a brave man who tried anything with Matilda.

After delivering his wife safely to their doorstep he went straight back to Rougemont. Gwyn and his clerk were there, eating and drinking as was usual at that time. Gwyn lived outside the town wall, in a hut at St Sidwell’s beyond the East Gate, so had heard nothing of the commotion until he had come into town that morning.

Thomas, even though he lived in the cathedral precinct, had also remained unaware of the assault. However, the efficient grapevine among the castle soldiery had soon brought them up to date and they waited to hear their master’s orders.

‘First, Thomas, take one of your rolls and enter the facts of the case so far as we know them now. I’ll dictate what needs to be said in a moment.’ John settled himself on his stool behind the trestle table and poured himself a jar of cider – Nesta’s breakfast had filled him and he did not want any bread and cheese. ‘Then we have to ride back to Torbay again.’

The little clerk groaned at the effects on his backside of another long ride on his new pony. ‘We only came back last evening, Crowner. Why return so soon?’

Gwyn, leaning against the window-ledge, lifted a large foot and pushed the clerk off his stool, the only other furniture in the small room. ‘When Sir John says, “Ride”, we ride, you miserable toad!’ He looked across at the coroner. ‘Is there a connection between these matters?’

‘Christina Rifford’s husband-to-be is still unaware of her misfortune, as he went with his father and Eric Picot down to Torre to look at those dead seamen. I want to catch them before they return, to tell them of what’s happened, and to get this inquest done with at the same time. Joseph of Topsham must bear witness and make presentment of Englishry.’

Gwyn pulled ineffectually at his tangled hair. He had a large face with a massive jaw, balanced by his slightly bulbous nose that bore the marks of old acne. The rest of his face was almost hidden under his rampant moustache. ‘What about those murdering villagers?’ he demanded.

John took a long swallow of cider. ‘They must be arrested and brought back to the gaol. Go over to Ralph Morin and ask him for a couple of men-at-arms to accompany us – four of us should be more than enough to seize those dogs down there. See if Gabriel can come.’

Gwyn clumped down the stairs of the gate-house, and the coroner prepared to record the rape of the portreeve’s daughter. Thomas scrabbled in the shapeless cloth bag that held his writing equipment and came out with parchment, quill and a stone bottle of ink. The parchment was a palimpsest, a piece of sheepskin used several times. The old writing had been painstakingly scraped off and the surface treated with chalk. New parchment and especially the finer vellum, made from young or stillborn lambs, was expensive. Thomas took a pride in both his writing ability and the tools of his trade and settled down happily to scribe the events of the previous night, as recounted by the coroner.

By the time they had finished, Gwyn was back with the news that the castle constable had given him a couple of men, one of them their friend the sergeant.

‘Did the sheriff have anything to say about it?’ demanded John.

The Cornishman grinned. ‘He wasn’t there, thank Christ – he’s down at the Rifford house.’

John grabbed his sword and buckled it on. ‘To the stables then, before he comes back and interferes!’

They met Joseph and his party just after midday, on the coastal track where it crossed the estuary of the Teign. Fortunately, it was low tide when they reached the north bank of the river mouth, so that their horses could splash across the shallow water between the sandbanks without having to swim. On the left was the sea, still grey and choppy, and on the right, the wide expanse of sand, mud and marsh that went up for a few miles until the river narrowed near King’s Teignton.

As the five riders entered the cold water, Gabriel gave a shout and pointed ahead. ‘Four horsemen at the other bank. Are these our men?’

John waved and yelled and the newcomers stopped, letting the coroner’s party come up to them.

It was Joseph of Topsham and his companions, who were puzzled to see this unscheduled return of Sir John.

‘A sad business, John, losing my men like that,’ said the ship-owner gravely. ‘But your message said we would need to return in a day or two for your inquest. Why this sudden rush?’

The coroner felt uneasy about divulging such a delicate matter while still on horseback on the bank of a river in a cold wind. ‘There are several important matters to speak about, Joseph, and this is not the place for it. I suggest we ride to my mother’s manor, not two miles from here, and talk around a good fire over some food and drink.’

Mystified, Joseph and his companions spoke among themselves for a few minutes. One was Edgar, his son, a tall thin young man with blond hair cut in a deep fringe across his eyes. Eric Picot, the wine merchant, was a dark, handsome man of about thirty-six, thickset and well-dressed. He was French with Breton blood but had lived in Devon for many years, though he still owned vineyards along the Loire. The other man was Leonard, a wizened old fellow who had hardly a word to say. He was the chief clerk to Joseph’s several trading ventures.

‘Is this really important, Crowner?’ asked Picot. ‘We all have business awaiting us.’

De Wolfe nodded gravely. ‘You will find that it is of very grave importance. Going back to Torre later will save another ride from Exeter. We can return home first thing in the morning.’

Sensing the coroner’s inflexibility, Joseph shrugged philosophically and wheeled his horse around. ‘You had better lead the way, John.’

Now on home ground, where he had grown up as a boy and hunted as a youth, John led them inland along the south bank of the estuary. Less than a mile upstream, a narrow side-valley came down to the Teign and they turned into it on a narrow track that wound through the dense woodland that filled the combe. Soon they came to a pleasant dell in the low hills, with crofts and cultivated fields well sheltered from the winds. A stone church sat a little above the village, which boasted a new church hostel, a timber and wattle building providing food and shelter for travellers.

‘Welcome to Stoke-in-Teignhead,’ called John, reining in his big stallion outside the Church House. ‘Eric, Gwyn, Thomas, Leonard and the soldiers can take their ease here for an hour and eat around a good fire, while the rest of us go up to my family’s manor.’ As he and his party rode away, John could not resist waving a hand around him saying, ‘My father, may the Mother of God rest his soul, paid for that church of St Andrew of Bethsaida to be rebuilt in stone, and he endowed the hostel in gratitude for a safe return from the first campaign in Ireland.’

Just outside the centre of the village lay a fortified manor house, a two-storeyed, stone-built building with a steep-pitched stone roof. It was set within a wide bank and ditch, with a wooden stockade along the top. Fertile strip fields lay all around it, and a number of relatively tidy cottages of wattle and thatch, each with a well-kept vegetable garden and a pig, goat or house-cow. Inside the enclosure, there was a barn, several outhouses, stables and kitchens, with a few wooden huts for the servants. The whole place had an air of rural contentment and well-being that was not lost on Joseph of Topsham, who knew a well-run business when he saw one. But his mind was mainly on this unexpected appearance of de Wolfe: he had a bad feeling about what was to come.

John slide from his horse and looked about him with affection and pride. ‘This is where I was born – the house was wooden in those days.’ Though his brother William lived here and ran the manor, John had a part share of it under his father’s will, as did his younger sister Evelyn, who looked after the domestic side with their active mother, who had a life-interest in the manor. But unfortunately, this was not the right day or time for reminiscing about his inheritance. Sad work had to be done.

The manor bailiff bustled up, a cheerful fat Saxon named Alsi, and conducted them to the house, their horses being spirited away for food and water. ‘The ladies have gone with Lord William to market in King’s Teignton, Sir John, but they will be home before long.’

The coroner was glad of a breathing space before his family arrived, so that he could get the bad news over with.

They climbed to the solar on the upper floor, reached by an outside wooden staircase, which could be thrown down in time of attack for the better defence of the upper storey. Thankfully, this had never been needed since Simon de Wolfe, John’s soldier father, had built the new house.

They sat near the smouldering logs in the arched fireplace and Alsi poured wine for the three men. Then he hurried away to organise a meal to be served downstairs in the hall.

Joseph was as perceptive as his wise, patriarchal appearance suggested. He turned immediately to the coroner, whom he had known in the way of business for a number of years. ‘Well, John, out with it! You didn’t bring us miles off the beaten track just to drink wine and show us your home.’

The coroner looked from father to son and back to the father. Edgar had said hardly a word since they met at the river and looked rather bored. Being dragged from his beloved herbs and poultices to ride for half a day to view drowned corpses did not amuse him, especially as it seemed they had now to ride back to Torre. But the next few minutes were to be the worst so far in his twenty-two years of life.

De Wolfe took a deep breath. ‘This is not to do with the loss of your ship nor the death of your men, Joseph,’ he began. Slowly and dispassionately, he recounted the events of last night in Exeter, knowing of no easier way to tell them.

Their reactions passed through stunned silence into incredulity, then horror and, finally, unbridled anger. Even John was surprised to see how the languid apothecary’s apprentice became almost demented with rage. Though he wore no sword, Edgar whipped his dagger from its sheath and waved it about wildly as he paced the room with jerky, directionless steps. ‘I’ll kill him, damn him! Whoever it is, I’ll kill him! I’ll not rest until he’s slain!’ His rage gradually became mixed with tears. John was not sure whether they were all for Christina or whether some stemmed from self-pity.

His father, red-faced with anger above his grey beard, was less distressed but equally vindictive. After a few futile minutes of rage, Joseph pulled his son to him and threw an arm around his shoulders to console him. He looked past Edgar’s head to the coroner. ‘What is to be done, John?’ he asked, his son’s jerking body against his breast. ‘How can we return to Torre now? We are needed in Exeter.’

John explained that Dame Madge, Matilda and the other beldames were unanimous in advising that Christina be left in peace without the company of men for a time. ‘We have to settle this matter of the boat and its crew, come what may. If we go to Torre now, then that is an end of it as far as you are concerned. Otherwise, the journey will be hanging over you in the days ahead, when you will be most needed in Exeter.’

Joseph nodded, his rage subsiding. ‘Edgar and I will walk quietly together outside in the bailey and talk about this. Tell us when you are ready to leave.’

Refusing all offers of food, they went down to the ward around the house and, from an embrasure, John saw them walking slowly and sadly together, talking in low voices.

They were still there some time later, when the de Wolfe family returned from market. In a covered ox-cart, fitted with seats, sat his mother and sister, while alongside them rode his brother William and several manor servants. Though he saw them fairly often, there was always a warm welcome for him at Stoke-in-Teignhead. His mother Enyd was a lady of sixty-three, with red still mixed in her greying hair. She was small, sprightly and pure Celt, her mother being Cornish and her father a small landowner from Gwynllwg[2] in Wales, the same area as Nesta’s home. Her daughter Evelyn was ten years younger than John, a spinster who had wanted to be a nun. Her mother had discouraged her as she wanted a companion at home, with her husband and second son always away at the wars. Enyd’s main support was William, the elder son, a couple of years older than John. Though tall and dark like his brother – they both took after their father – William was a much milder character, preferring the farm and the manors to campaigning.

After embracing his mother and sister, and grasping William’s arm, John brought them up to date on events in Torre and Exeter. The pair from Topsham were still brooding outside and John advised leaving them alone with their sorrow and anger for the time being. Now Alsi had the other servants running around with food and drink, all smiling and bobbing their knees at John – many of them had known him since he was a child.

While they were eating, Enyd de Wolfe clucked her dismay over the ravishment and her sympathy for those involved. Her eyebrows lifted a little when John told her of Matilda’s Good Samaritan efforts the previous night. She had never shared her late husband’s enthusiasm for joining John to the de Revelle family, and her relations with Matilda were as distant as the twenty miles that lay between them.

As usual, William was characteristically intent on practicalities. ‘So what happens now, brother? About the ship and the poor young lady?’

John, now warm, well fed and at ease among his own folk, stretched his legs before the fire. ‘The dead seamen are the easiest matter – we have a couple of the sheriff’s men-at-arms down in the Church House, to help us arrest these thieving murderers. If I can prevent de Revelle from hanging them, they will stand trial when the King’s justices next come for the Assize of Gaol Delivery.’

‘And the rape?’ asked Evelyn, whose long nose marred an otherwise good-looking face.

The coroner shrugged. ‘Where can we start? There are many hundreds of men in the city of Exeter. Christina was acknowledged to be one of the most desirable young women in Devon, so many a lecherous eye must have turned upon the poor girl every day. Unless we have some unexpected good luck, I fail to see how we can find the culprit.’

His mother bobbed her head towards the window opening. ‘How is the girl’s betrothed taking it?’ she asked.

‘He is fit to burst every blood vessel in his body. Though he’s no fighter, he wants to challenge to the death every possible suspect between here and Winchester, poor fellow.’ He rose to his feet. ‘We must get on to Torre. There is an inquest to arrange for the morning and the day’s passing quickly.’ He bent to kiss his mother’s brow. ‘If I spend much more time on a horse, I swear my backside will fuse to the saddle!’

Soon after it was light the next morning, John and the others were assembled on an open space within sight of the sea near the hamlet of Torre. They had spent the night at one of the manors of William de Brewere, the influential lord of these parts. Though he was absent in London, his seneschal readily prepared food and sleeping space for the King’s coroner and his party.

The six bodies dug from the sand had had to be kept for viewing at the inquest and the most seemly place for that purpose was the rough buildings that the White Canons had set up on a flat area at the southerly end of the neck of the Tor peninsula, not far from where the wreck and the looting had taken place.

As far as Gwyn was concerned, the holy men were monks, but in fact they were priests, come from the parent Norbetine abbey at Welbeck. They had offered to keep the corpses at the back of their small timber church, next to the wattle and thatch building in which the three of them lived. William de Brewere was negotiating with their abbot in Welbeck for the building of a substantial stone abbey at Torre, and though it was fifteen months before Abbot Adam and six canons were to arrive, these three were the advance party.

When the coroner had arrived at dusk the previous evening, he had given orders for every man and boy over fourteen in the village and surrounding Hundred to be present an hour after dawn. It was difficult to carry out the letter of the law and have every male person present to form the jury, as that would have paralysed the work of several villages. However, this was such a serious matter, compared to the usual accident or sudden death, that Gwyn, Sergeant Gabriel and his men-at-arms went through the village and surrounding hamlets, knocking up each household and ordering them to be present at the inquest.

The rough grass in front of the canons’ habitation was soon churned by the feet of several score of reluctant freemen and villeins, backed at a distance by curious wives and girls, who had no legal part to play. Children, dogs and even a goat wandered in and out of the crowd and an enterprising hawker was selling apples.

The reeve Aelfric was there, apprehensive and furtive, as were several others John recognised from the affair on the beach. Even the village priest was present, haggard and yellow-faced.

The salvaged goods from the tithe barn were piled up on two ox-carts at one side, ready to be taken to Exeter. They had been left under the guardianship of William de Brewere’s seneschal, when John returned to Exeter after his first visit two days before. He was unsure if the seneschal was party to the theft of the valuable flotsam, but strongly suspected that the bailiff, who was next in command, well knew what was going on and had been hand in glove with his assistant, Aelfric.

The coroner looked around to check that his clerk was ready with quill, ink and parchment to record the inquest. Then he nodded at Gwyn. The Cornishman beat on a wheel of the cart with the flat of his sword to gain attention, before he roared in a thunderous voice, ‘All persons who have anything to do before King Richard’s coroner for the County of Devon, draw near and give your attendance!’

There was a shuffling and squelching of feet in the mud, as the men of Torre tried to understand the meaning of this new ritual imposed on them by the distant powers in far-off London and Winchester. Few had any idea what an inquest was, but most accepted resignedly that it was yet another way of screwing more money out of an already impoverished population.

Standing apart from the villagers were the men from Topsham and Exeter, the father and son looking grey and downcast, sad enough at the deaths of the men from their ship but even more so about the ravishment of their poor Christina. They were anxious beyond all measure to get back to Exeter to console her and her father. Yet John sensed, through Edgar’s simmering anger, an apprehensiveness at both how to handle the crisis and his own feelings about the violation of his future wife, virgin no longer.

There was no chair within miles, so John officiated from a three-legged milking stool brought from the village. Hands on knees, his grey and black-clad figure, with the long jet black hair blowing in the wind, gave him the appearance of some satanic angel of doom come among them. He began in a menacing growl, loud enough for all to hear. ‘This inquest is into the circumstances of the death of six men found on Torre beach, and also into the wreck of the vessel of which they were crew,’ he began, in a tone redolent of accusation.

The first witness was Joseph of Topsham, who stood forward like an Old Testament figure with his long grey beard and flowing cloak. He swore that the wreck was that of his own ship Mary of the Sea. The vessel had been laden with wool on the outward voyage and due to return from Barfleur with a full cargo of dried fruit and wine.

Gwyn handed him the shattered board found on the beach and he confirmed that it was part of the ship’s hull, bearing some of the words of its name carved upon it.

‘And you have seen the bodies of the six men laid out in the priests’ chapel here?’ demanded the coroner. ‘Are they all members of that ship’s crew?’

Joseph nodded sadly. ‘They are indeed – and one is missing, a young lad called Hecche. I knew them all, poor souls.’

‘And were they all English?’ asked de Wolfe.

‘Two were Bretons and one an Irishman.’

‘But none were Normans?’

The older man shook his head emphatically. ‘No, all either Saxons or foreigners.’

At this there was a sigh of relief from the crowd: no Normans meant that at least the murdrum fine, of up to forty marks, had been avoided.

Then Edgar and the wine merchant, Eric Picot, who usually met his cargoes when they arrived at the port on the Exe and knew most of the ship’s crew by sight, were able to confirm Joseph’s identification of his men. Old Leonard, the silent clerk, produced a parchment copy of the order that the ship’s master had taken to Barfleur, listing the goods to be purchased for the return trip.

John led them over to the ox-carts and they formally identified the barrels and boxes by the markings burned into the wood with hot irons as the consignment they had been expecting to arrive at Topsham. ‘Much of it is missing, but this would account for about half of the cargo,’ said Joseph, laying a hand on one of the wheels of the nearest cart.

‘It means a considerable loss to us,’ added Eric Picot, brushing back his dark hair as it fell forwards across his forehead.

The coroner looked around at the silent crowd. ‘I must assume that almost all the goods that were rescued from the sea are here.’ He glared pointedly at the sickly village priest, as if to emphasise that he was well aware that some of the salvage had vanished down the man’s gullet. ‘But now I will turn to the deaths of these men. Three seemed to have died from drowning.’ He named those dug first from the sand, with no injuries. ‘These had died from the effects of the shipwreck, casting them into the waters, an Act of God, caused by the storm at sea. But the other three …’ He turned a thunderous eye on Aelfric and several of the other village men, who were standing in the front row of the audience, flanked ostentatiously by Sergeant Gabriel and his man-at-arms. ‘These three, also named by Joseph of Topsham, carry marks of violence, namely wounds on their heads and other parts, plainly caused by heavy blows from blunt weapons. There were splits on their scalps and severe bruises on their necks. There is no question of them suffering these hurts by the action of the sea. They were done to death by deliberate violence. Then there was an attempt to hide these foul deeds by burying them in the sand.’

After the hermit Wulfstan had been called to testify that he had seen bodies on the beach and casks being concealed, the reeve was thrust forward. He stood before the coroner like a bull waiting for the dogs to bait him, his face showing a mixture of truculence and fear. ‘I know nothing about any killings! Those seamen were dead afore I laid eyes on them!’ he cried, before John had a chance to challenge him.

Gwyn, standing close behind the reeve, gave him a helpful buffet on the shoulder to remind him of his manners. ‘Say “sir” when you address the crowner!’ he demanded.

‘You’re a liar, Aelfric,’ snapped de Wolfe. ‘I’ve seen the injuries with my own eyes. Those men were done to death.’

‘Not by me they weren’t,’ retorted the reeve and got another clout from Gwyn for his pains.

The coroner’s black brows came together in an angry scowl. ‘Are you trying to tell me that someone else crept into your village, killed them and left you the cargo to steal? You’re the village headman, you know everything that goes on in Torre, so don’t spin me these lies.’

With a vision of mutilation or the gallows strengthening in his mind, Aelfric cast about wildly for an escape. ‘Could have been those people down in Paignton – they’re a bad lot and no mistake.’

This was too much for John, who sprang to his feet and bellowed at the hapless reeve, ‘Be silent, you evil knave! Don’t insult our common sense with such nonsense. You were caught red-handed by the hermit, you had the stolen goods hidden and the bodies cry out that they perished from foul violence. Get back there and wait for the verdict – though there’s little doubt what that will be.’

Gwyn jerked Aelfric back to his place at the front of the crowd, before two other men, whom John and Gwyn had picked out as having been on the beach, were interrogated. Their abject denials were treated with similar scorn.

Two other villeins had absconded since the day the corpses had been revealed: one was the man John had seen scuttling away when the second trio had been discovered in the sand. They had probably vanished into the forest to join the bands of roving outlaws, fleeing from justice.

Within a few more minutes, the inquest was over. The jury of villagers were made to file past the six corpses, several of which, in spite of the cold weather, were now beginning to look the worse for wear. John pointed out the injuries on the heads as they shuffled past, and dictated the elements of the inquest to Thomas, who scribbled furiously on his parchment roll to keep up with the coroner’s flow of words.

In the background, three White Canons, wearing their small round skull-caps instead of monk’s tonsures, stood silently contemplating the evil that men do, more convinced than ever that in this corner of England, which seemed full of sinners, their Premonstratensian order should have a foothold.

Soon the evidence had all been taken and recorded, and the King’s coroner delivered his verdict.

‘Three men have been done to death, callously and for the venal profit of flotsam washed up from the wreck of the vessel Mary of the Sea. The tenants of the manor of Torre had shown great iniquity in stealing the salvaged cargo of the ship, worth at least eighty pounds, according to the merchants here.’ He swept a hand across the crowd. ‘And for failing to report the wreck and the salvage, as should have been done to the sheriff or the coroner, the village is amerced in the sum of twenty marks, to appear before the King’s justices at the next visitation. For attempting to steal the said cargo, the village is amerced in the sum of forty marks.’

A wave of anguish rippled through the crowd at this imposition of a corporate fine, which was huge by the standards of the village’s meagre income: a mark was worth over thirteen shillings, two-thirds of a pound. They could not look to their lord for any contribution – he might even impose his own penalties on them at his manorial court when he found out what had happened. Some lords encouraged wreck pillage, and even took part in it as long as they were accorded the lion’s share, but de Brewere was too politically ambitious to dirty his hands with petty local corruption.

John had not yet finished. ‘Wrecks of the sea and their salvage belong to the Crown and are not for the benefit by theft of those who find them. This remnant of cargo should be forfeit to the royal treasury, but as it so patently belongs to the ship-owner and the consignee of the wine, I will recommend to a later inquest on the goods that they be returned to them in part compensation for the loss of the ship and the rest of the cargo.’

There was more to come. ‘For not raising the hue and cry over these bodies and not reporting them to the coroner, the village is further amerced in the sum of ten marks. Maybe this will teach you not to leave it to some poor hermit’s conscience to bring it to the attention of the King’s officers.’

The coroner paused to draw breath. ‘And for the most heinous sin of killing three innocent seamen, who in the hour of need at the foundering of their vessel should have been given Christian succour but who instead were bludgeoned to death to conceal your thieving purposes, your reeve and two freemen are to be arrested and taken to Exeter to await trial, to be kept there at the expense of the village, which is further amerced at twenty marks for condoning these killings and attempting to conceal them and the existence of the valuable salvage.’

There was a groan that almost echoed over the sea, as the village of Torre heard its financial future for years hence being mortgaged to pay these huge fines. True, no money would be paid over until the King’s judges heard the case at the General Eyre in Exeter, which might be a couple of years away, so slow was the progress of the royal courts about the country. But the fines would hang over them and the buying in of new cattle and pigs, the expenditure on good corn and other things requiring capital, would now be under a cloud for half a decade ahead, as William de Brewere would still expect the manorial fields to be worked by the villagers as usual.

John’s final command, that Aelfric and the other two suspects would be taken under guard to Exeter, had been expected by everyone. They would be imprisoned in the castle gaol to appear before the justices in due course – if they survived more than a few months of incarceration in the foul cells under Rougemont’s keep.

The soldiers, aided by Gwyn’s huge figure, grabbed the three men and hustled them to the carts, where they were tied on to the tailboards for the slow journey back to Exeter. The reeve’s daughter ran forward with screams to hug her father as he was hauled away. Probably this was the last time she would ever see him. Relatives of the other two men also crowded around and the soldiers let them have a few minutes to say their farewells before the cart drivers climbed aboard and flicked their patient oxen into lumbering movement.

The crowd dispersed, grumbling and throwing baleful glances at these officials who had disrupted their simple, but placid lives. To them, a wreck was manna from heaven, goods that could be covertly sold to help village finances, pay the tithes and buy a few more sheep and cattle next spring, perhaps some food, too, if the winter was hard. Starvation hovered over every household after the last salt pork was gone and all the mouldy oats consumed. To them, the death of six sailors was a small price to pay for that: the shipmen would have died anyway, in the next storm, or the one after that.

As they trudged off, despondently wondering who their next reeve would be, John thanked the White Canons for the use of their premises, then collected up his party for the ride back to Exeter. It was not yet half-way through the morning, so they expected to be home well before the December dusk fell.

The sergeant and man-at-arms had gone with the wagons and would not reach the Exe until tomorrow, so it was the coroner and his two men who rode back with Joseph, Edgar, the old clerk and Eric Picot, all in sombre mood. ‘God knows what we shall find when we return,’ said the merchant from Topsham, as their horses climbed the slope across the neck of Tor headland to reach the coastal track. ‘This has been the worst two days of my life.’

But worse was yet to come.