Figure of Hate

Chapter Three

When John arrived at his house in Martin's Lane, he again found his wife missing. He was too late for their noontide dinner, the main meal of the day, and obviously Matilda had not waited for him.

'She's gone to her cousin in Fore Street,' announced Mary briskly, as she hurried in with a tray of bread, cheese and cold meat for him. He sat in the cheerless hall, perched on a stool at the end of the long oaken table, glaring at the faded tapestries that tried to conceal the bleakness of the timber walls. His maid-of-all-work banged a quart pot of ale in front of him. 'But she said she'll be back in time for supper — and that her brother will be coming to join you at the meal!' De Wolfe swore out loud. 'What in hell is that scoundrel coming for? That's spoiled my appetite already!' he exclaimed, immediately giving the lie to his words by energetically attacking a slice of mutton with his dagger, as if it were Richard de Revelle's gizzard. As the thoaaght of his brother-in-law invading his house and his privacy spread deeper into his mind, he threw down the knife and grabbed his tankard angrily.

'To hell with him, I'll not sit down at table with that traitor and thief!' He sucked down some ale and banged the pot down again. 'I'll be eating supper at the Bush tonight, Mary. At least there I can choose what company I keep!'

His cook-maid shrugged as she picked up his cloak from the floor where he had thrown it on coming in.

'It's your house, Crowner — but the mistress will give you a hard time if you don't turn up.'

'Ha! What's new about that, girl? She hardly speaks to me as it is.'

Mary made for the door, muttering something under her breath as she went. Usually she supported John against his wife, as far as it was possible without jeopardising her job, but sometimes he felt that she had joined the legion of women who conspired to make his life miserable. Even the usually amiable Nesta had her moments of provoking annoyance and aggravation, though admittedly, since taking up with John, she had suffered enough distressing events to give her good cause.

He sat alone, champing his way through the food that had been set before him, pouring more ale from the pitcher Mary had left on the table. Now that it was October, a pile of logs glowed in the hearth, below the conical chimney that was his pride and joy. The only part of the house that was built of stone, it took the smoke up through the roof, a fairly novel idea for Exeter and one that he had had copied after seeing a similar device in Brittany.

John took his last pot of ale to sit in one the cowled monk's chairs near the fire, where Brutus was already stretched out to enjoy the warmth. As he slowly savoured the last of his drink, he thought about what he had to do for the rest of the day. He should tell the portreeves about the murder of one of the stall-holders, as they were the main sponsors of the fair that had brought August Scrope to Exeter. They were also both senior men in the city's merchant guilds, and given that one of the prime purposes of these organisations was the well-being of members and their families, no doubt they would help in getting the silversmith's body back to Totnes and seeing that the local guild attended to his affairs, though as he was said to be a widower with a new mistress, perhaps that was not such an urgent issue. De Wolfe decided that he would have to keep the new sheriff informed of what was going on not only telling him about the killing, but reassuring him that all seemed in order at the tourney field. It was a sensitive topic for all towns that had scores of high-spirited knights and squires assembling for what was essentially a battle. Even if the sport was not meant to be lethal, the combination of pent-up excitement and aggression, fuelled by excessive drinking among volatile young men, was an inflammable situation which could easily be ignited by a spark from some personal quarrel.

John decided that he would also have a word with his good friend Ralph Morin, the castle constable, to ensure that as many men-at-arms as could be spared were sent to Bull Mead the next day. The fair itself could be left to the constables and the stewards, though after dark the main trouble would be in the city streets, where thieves and cut-purses would have been attracted by the crowds, and where the taverns would be bursting at the seams with rowdy drinkers looking for a fight.

With a sigh, he hauled himself from his chair and, forsaking the warmth of the fire, went around to the back yard to see Mary. He found her sitting in her cook house, talking to Lucille, his wife's maid. Mary was wary of the skinny girl, as she knew she carried every bit of tittle-tattle back to her mistress, but she felt sorry for her. Lucille was a refugee from the Vexin, a part of Normandy north of the Seine which was fought over endlessly by Richard and Philip of France. Her parents were dead and she had been palmed off on Matilda by the latter's Norman cousins, of whom Matilda was inordinately proud, as they validated her own ancestry.

Though she had been born in Devon and had spent barely a couple of months visiting across the Channel, she acted to her friends in the town almost as if she were a direct descendant of William the Bastard himself. John hardly ever said a word to Lucille and she was obviously in awe of him, bobbing her knee and running off to her box under the solar steps as soon as he came into view.

'Anyone would think that I was going to eat that bloody girl,' he growled to Mary. 'I'm off to Rougemont and then I'll be going down to the Bush, so you can tell my dear wife that I'll not be sitting at table with her and her damned brother!'

He stalked away and minutes later was in the Guildhall, just around the corner from his house. Here he found his friend Hugh de Relaga fussing with final details of the finances of the fair and of the arrangements for the guild pageants that would help to entertain the crowds over the next three days. With clerks scurrying around him with parchments, John had difficulty in catching his attention and when he managed to tell him that he had lost one of his stall-holders, the Portreeve was too distracted to take much notice, apart from clucking in sympathy and putting a line through August Scrope's rental payment on a document.

De Wolfe abandoned him to his duties and went back up High Street and turned left before the East Gate, climbing the steep lane to cross the drawbridge into the castle at the top end of the city. The weather was overcast but dry and the mud in the inner ward was setting into a hard red crust, crunching under his feet as he walked across to the squat keep on the other side. There was the usual bustle in the hall, which served as a meeting place, refectory and business office for the mixture of soldiers, clerks, merchants and supplicants to the Sheriff that normally milled around inside its sombre walls.

The first door on the left led to the sheriff's chambers and he nodded curtly to the man-at-arms who stood guard upon it. As he opened the door, he thought how strange it was that he was not going in for his usual confrontation and shouting-match with Richard de Revelle, who had occupied these rooms ever since John had been coroner. He gave a rare grin as he decided he would be unlikely to surprise the new man in his shirt or dressing robe, with a whore in the bedchamber beyond, as he had with his brother-in-law on two previous occasions.

Inside the room, he found that he was right, as Henry de Furnellis was sitting behind a table with his exasperated chief clerk, Elias Pulein, who was trying to explain the contents of a parchment roll spread out before them. Like John, the new sheriff was virtually illiterate, barely able to write his name, whereas de Revelle, for all his many faults, had been an educated man. Now de Furnellis, once more sitting in this chamber as sheriff, was again dependent upon his clerks and scribes to guide him through the intricate task of running the county of Devon, especially overseeing the collection and delivery of 'the farm', the twice-yearly submission of taxes to the treasury in Winchester. Though getting old and weary, Henry was no fool, and had sufficient wealth and lack of ambition to disdain corruption and embezzlement.

He looked up as John entered and, with a sigh of relief, used his arrival as an excuse to dismiss his irritaring clerk and reach for a jug of wine and two cups.

His somewhat haggard face creased into a weak smile as he motioned to John to sit down on a stool on the opposite side of the table.

'I've managed to survive the first day without clouting that damned Elias across the head, in spite of his sneering at my lack of understanding of these blasted accounts!' he said, raising a fist that could have laid a larger man than the clerk flat on the floor. John knew that the older man had been a doughty fighter in his day — he had been with Strongbow, Earl of Pembroke, on the first invasion of Ireland a quarter of a century earlier, and even some years later, when de Wolfe and Gwyn had been fighting there, Henry de Furnellis was still a well-known figure in that bloody campaign.

The coroner took a sip of wine and found it to be a good Bordeaux red — the new sheriff was not one to drink common gut-rot and he could well afford to have the superior stuff brought from his town house near the East Gate, where he lived when he was not at his manor near Crediton.

John told him at length about the murdered silversmith from Totues and the injured survivor lying in St James' Priory. Henry nodded sagely, but made no offer to intervene in the matter, even though technically he was the supreme oyerseer of law and order in the county,

'You can handle it, de Wolfe, I'm sure!' he boomed in his deep voice. 'Take whatever you need in the way of men. I know Ralph Morin is a good friend of yours, I'll tell him to go along with whatever you want.' John nodded, well aware of the new sheriff's desire to hand over as much responsibility as he could, but he felt he had to point out a few home truths.

'These next few days will see Morin's men stretched pretty thinly. We'll be lucky to get away without trouble at the tournament — and keeping order in the town will be a job in itself.'

Henry waved his cup dismissively. 'No doubt you'll manage well enough. All my time will be taken up sorting out this bloody mess that de Revelle left behind.' He slapped his other hand on the pile of parchments on the table. 'God knows what schemes he was up to, it will takes months to get to the bottom of it — and I'm dependent on these damned clerks to tell me what it all means.'

For a moment John was tempted to offer him the use of Thomas de Peyne, whose reading, writing and arithmetical skills were superb. Then he thought that with all the extra work that de Furnellis was going to burden him with, he needed to keep all Thomas's help for himself.

The talk moved on to other things, foremost among them the arrangements for the next day's tournament.

This was a topic dear to the sheriff's heart, as in his day he had been a keen tourney contestant himself and still followed news of the various big events across the country. Along with the portreeves, he was a prominent member of the council that had brought this contest to Exeter, and was keen to hear what John thought of the preparations at Bull Mead. They discussed this for some time, and John felt himself warming to the new incumbent of the seat opposite.

Though he had known him slightly for years, he had never had much to do with Henry officially, but knew him to be a staunch ally of the King, which was good enough for John.

The wine finished, he Pose and announced that he was going to seek Ralph Morin to talk about patrolling the city during the rest of the week, As he reached the door, de Furnellis had a last query.

'So what are you going to do about the slaying of this silversmith? It looks bad that a prominent merchant who hires one of our stalls in the fair should straightway get himself robbed and killed!' De Wolfe shrugged, 'Little I can do until we get some more information. I'm hoping this servant of his will recover enough to give us some description of his assailants. I'll keep you informed, never fear!' Outside in the noisy hall, he moved up to the next door and went into, the constable's domain, an office that had a more military stamp upon it. There were several tables with benches piled with equipment, and behind one Gabriel, the sergeant of the men-at-arms, was counting out a pile of pike-heads, to be sent down to the workshops in the outer ward to be fixed to their shafts. His craggy face creased even more into a smile of welcome as the coroner entered.

'I hear you are to umpire tomorrow, Sir John,' he said with evident pleasure. 'Any hope of you taking a turn yourself?. That's a fine destrier you've got in Odin! John shook his head sadly. 'The last time I took lance and shield, I had my dear old stallion Bran killed under me — and" got my own leg broken into the bargain.' Gabriel scowled at the memory. 'But you were fighting an evil bastard with no sense of honour, Crowner. Tomorrow it would be a fair, friendly contest.' De Wolfe smiled wryly. 'That'll be the day, when a joust is friendly, Gabriel! All those youngbloods might not want to kill me, but they damn well want to win and that can be painful, even fatal!'

The door to the inner chamber opened and the burly figure of Ralph Morin emerged, followed by a soldier stumbling under the weight of an armful of wooden cudgels. The other room was supposed to be a bedchamber for the constable, but Morin used it for storing weapons, as, having a wife and two children, he lived in a large chamber on the upper floor.

'I'm breaking out some less lethal implements for my men,' he explained. 'We can hardly quell a few drunks with ball-maces or arrows!'

'That's what I came about, Ralph. As we expected, our new man next door has passed on the responsibility for keeping order to us. Any problems?' The massive constable pulled at one end of his forked blond beard, a mannerism he had, just as Thomas de Peyne always crossed himself and Gwyn scratched his crotch.

'All the troops will be on the streets for the rest of the week. I've only got two score to defend the whole of Devon, as the King has skimmed off the rest to take to France. But we'll manage well enough.' For a time they talked about the disposition of the soldiers around the town and especially at the tourney field, where trouble was most likely to arise. They ended with the inevitable jars of ale brought in by one of the men-at-arms, before John made his way back to the gatehouse and climbed the twisting stone staircase in the thickness of the wall to reach his garret at the top.

Here he found Gwyn sitting in his usual place, on the sill of the slit window that looked down over the city.

He was aimlessly whittling a piece of stick with his dagger as he whistled tunelessly to himself.

'Where's that damned clerk?' demanded the coroner.

'Gone back to St James' Priory to see how that fellow is getting on.'

John nodded — he had forgotten that he had told Thomas to follow the progress of the assault victim.

'The little runt is starting to fret again over this priest business,' commented the Cornishman. The little that could be seen of his ruddy face behind the ginger hair and whiskers carried an unusually serious expression, 'He's been setting great store by this pardon from Winchester, but he's getting anxious now that he's heard nothing more for many weeks.'

De Wolfe shrugged and dropped down on to his bench, behind the crude table that served as his desk.

'There's nothing I can do about it, Gwyn. This is entirely a Church matter, and you know how long winded they are about everything except money.' Belatedly and reluctantly, the Church authorities had recognised Thomas's innocence and promised to reinstate him. So far, nothing more had been heard, and John was well aware that his own ecclesiastical enemies, who resented his faithful adherence to King Richard and his dogged opposition to those who favoured Prince John's scheming to seize the crown, were spitefully dragging their heels over Thomas to annoy him.

'I'll have another word with John de Alençon and John of Exeter,' he said, naming the Archdeacon of Exeter and the Treasurer, who were both King's men.

'But they know the score already, I doubt they can do anything more.'

Gwyn grunted and threw his stick out of the window.

'I know, Crowner, but I just thought I'd tell you. He's a melancholy little bastard at the best of times, and we don't want him chucking himself off the cathedral again.'

Some time before, the clerk had been so depressed over his situation that he had jumped from the roof of the nave, but had miraculously survived without serious injury.

Gwyn clumped away to seek a game of dice in the guardroom below and John reluctantly settled to practise his letters. For a long time he had been trying to learn to read and write, with some tuition from a vicar in the cathedral. Thomas, who would have been a far better teacher, had given up trying to help him, as de Wolfe was very sensitive about the process, which he felt was rather effeminate for an old warrior and former Crusader. His devotion to the task was sporadic, as he had no great incentive, and his progress was painfully slow. In truth, the process bored him and his attention span was poor. After an hour, much of which he spent gazing blankly at the sliver of sky visible through the window, he abruptly pushed back his bench, grabbed his cloak and clattered down the stairs to the open air.

The fair was now in full swing as de Wolfe pushed his way down the central lane between the stalls. It was crowded with people, jostling each other to get a better look at the goods on offer and dodging the handcarts, barrows and porters that were bringing new merchandise to the booths and carting away larger purchases made by customers. There was a constant roar of sound, compounded of the cries of vendors, shouted offers from buyers, the clatter of hawker's rattles and the excited buzz of chatter and gossip. Jugglers and acrobats performed between the stalls, sheets of cloth spread before them to catch stray half-pennies.

Musicians, singly and in groups, performed on the sackbut, shalmes and cornet, in the expectation of a few half-pennies being thrown on to the threadbare cloaks spread hopefully in front of them. Minstrels and ballad singers, some good, some bad, added to the cacophony, and as John neared the makeshift stage at the centre of the fair a new collection of sounds assailed his ears.

On the platform, a miracle play was being performed, and he stopped for a few moments at the edge of the crowd, his height allowing him to see over their heads. This one was being enacted by clerics from the cathedral and appeared to represent the temptation of Adam in the Garden of Eden. Several vicars stood around the edges of the backdrop, on which was painted a crude forest. They held flaming torches, smoking with incense wafting out to the awe-struck audience. A garish tree, made from wood and canvas, stood in the centre, and the actors were posturing around this in exaggerated poses. One was Adam, dressed in a tattered leopard skin, and another was dressed as the Devil, his face covered by a snake-like mask. Both were recognisable as secondaries, apprentice priests under the age of twenty-four, which was the minimum age for ordination. On the other side of the apple tree stood a young chorister in female dress, taking the part of Eve, as no women were allowed to appear in dramatic performances.

As John watched, the three actors went through the motions of the Genesis story, with the wicked serpent tempting Adam with a large red-painted wooden apple.

They made no sound, apart from stomping around the hollow stage, but a loud, high-pitched commentary was delivered by a robed vicar, who stood at a lectern to one side, reading from a manuscript book, relating the tale as the players went through the motions. He spoke mainly in French, which many understood, but with some English thrown in, as the idea of these performances was to enlighten the common throng in their own language. De Wolfe thought it ridiculous that all church services, apart from sermons, were delivered in Latin, which was incomprehensible to the bulk of the congregation. The Bible, the Vulgate of St Jerome, was also in Latin, apart from a few fragmentary vernacular copies, so even if the faithful could read, they would not be able to understand a word if they only had English.

During the few minutes that he stood there, some of the audience began to drift away, for they had either seen it many times before or preferred the pageants put on by the guilds, which were usually more spectacular and often dealt with secular topics, rather than the well-worn biblical themes that the priests provided to drive home their messages of piety and morality.

John himself soon tired of the show and walked on down through the lower part of the fairground. The silversmith's stall was deserted, all the stock taken away for safe-keeping by the two assistants. He knew that one had gone back to Totnes to tell Scrope's family of the tragedy and arrange for collection of the body as soon as the inquest was over. The other man was waiting in his lodgings until the coroner told him he was needed.

John again cut across to Magdalen Street and went on to Bull Mead, where there was now more activity than there had been that morning. All the erection work on the stand and the tents was finished and many more coloured pennants were flying bravely around the jousting arena. A number of knights and their squires were riding up and down the field, trying out the feel of the turf and practising the handling of their lances and shields, though today they wore no armour or helmets.

Behind the makeshift platforms for the more privileged spectators, several tilts had been set up in an area reserved for the contestants. These were crude mechanical targets for the combatants to try out their skills, normally used for training young men in the art of jousting.

John watched with a critical eye as several excited, sweating youths galloped their horses towards these devices. One consisted of a long cross-arm pivoted horizontally on a post. From one end hung a shield and on the other a sack full of sand. As the coroner watched with a sardonic grin on his face, he saw a young man charging his heavy horse at the tilt, yelling at the top of his voice, his lance lowered and his shield held before his chest. He rammed the target with his blunted point and ducked, but he miscalculated, and as the beam swung the sack came around violently and struck him on the back of his neck, knocking him clean out of his saddle.

There was raucous laughter from a group of his friends watching the debacle and as the youth picked himself up from the dried mud he screamed abuse at them and stalked across to punch the ringleader in the face. A scuffle began immediately, but broke up as two stewards and a couple of men-at-arms began yelling at them. De Wolfe knew that this was the sort of bad tempered high spirits that could readily develop into a full-scale riot if not nipped in the bud, and he hoped that Ralph Morin would have enough men down here tomorrow to keep the peace.

He spent almost an hour on the field, watching the preparations and viewing the practice bouts with an experienced eye. The older knights were naturally more expert, many of them spending much of their time away from the battlefield going around the tournaments. Some had come from as far afield as France, the Low Countries and even Germany, all in search of winnings in the form of horses and armour. There would be no chance of ransom money in a small tourney like this, as there were no mock battles like those allowed near Salisbury and the other official tournament fields, but the professional jousters filled in between these events by visiting as many of the smaller events as they could manage.

A number of old soldiers were standing around the edge of the field, some of them aged and crippled in past battles. They were content to study these young men going through their paces, and watched with critical but dreamy eyes, seeing themselves long ago, when their joints were still supple and their eyesight keen.

John stood for a while talking to them, realising that he too would soon approach their condition, a spectator with only memories and scars to remind him of his former prowess.

Then he shook his head angrily, telling himself that there was plenty of strength left in his arm and iron in his soul, sufficient to show these callow youths a thing or two! He stalked off and, as if to confirm to himself his own virility, directed his steps purposefully towards the Bush Inn, where a pretty young woman waited to prove that senility and impotence were still well in the future.

Sir John de Wolfe spent a pleasant hour in Nesta's small room, a corner of the loft partitioned off from the rows of penny mattresses that were fully booked every night for the duration of the fair. They made relaxed, languorous love, the grim-faced coroner becoming a different man in the company of his amorous mistress. His lean, dark face softened and his eyes sparkled as he kissed and cuddled her — or 'cwtched' her, as they said in Welsh, for the pair always spoke in the Celtic tongue that was her first language and the one that John had learned at his mother's knee, for she was also of Welsh stock. Her mother had been Cornish, but her father was Welsh, so half of John's blood was Celtic in origin. Even Gwyn spoke this 'language of heaven' with them, much to Thomas de Peyne's annoyance, for the western Welsh of Cornwall was almost identical with that of Wales, and quite similar to that of the Bretons across the Channel.

In the early evening they made their way down the ladder again, as Nesta claimed that such a busy night needed her attendance to make sure that her girls and Edwin were satisfying her customers' wants for food and drink. The taproom was crowded, the regulars being outnumbered by the many strangers who were attending the fair. The renowned food of the Bush was much in demand, and Nesta had hired an extra ale-maid and a kitchen skivvy for these hectic few days.

The one-eyed potman had still managed to keep John's favourite bench and small table free beside the hearth, in which an autumn fire was now glowing from a circle of logs arranged like the spokes of a wheel.

The coroner sat there chatting to various acquaintances, as he contentedly downed a large pot of ale and later ate his way through a thick trencher covered in slices of roast pork and fried onions, with a pewter dish of boiled beans on the side. Life seemed tolerably good at the moment, with both his stomach and his loins satisfied. The only cloud on his horizon was the thought of his brother-in-law sitting at his own table in Martin's Lane, but he could hardly deny his own wife's right to entertain her only brother, as long as John was not forced to be present.

As dusk began to fall, Edwin went around the noisy, smoke-filled taproom and lit the tallow dips that sat in sconces around the walls. Candles were too expensive for most people, so small dishes of mutton fat with a floating wick were used to give a feeble light. Soon afterwards, a small figure entered and approached de Wolfe's table, diffidently sliding on to the stool opposite. Thomas de Peyne was not over-fond of taverns, his priestly upbringing leading him to consider them dens of iniquity. Even after a year in the coroner's service, he rarely entered one except when his duties demanded. This was one such occasion, as he had some news for his master.

'Crowner, I've been to the priory, as you commanded,' he announced in his rather squeaky voice. 'That man Terrus has recovered his senses — in fact, he's almost back to normal!'

John's black brows rose, as he had not been expecting the silversmith's servant to recover this quickly, if at all.

'Has he said anything useful?'

'The infirmarian allowed me into his cell for a few moments. Terrus told me that two men on horseback attacked them, and although he recollects nothing after being struck on the head, he now remembers something about them.'

John felt that Gwyn's long-windedness was rubbing off on his clerk, but held his impatience in check. 'And what was that?'

'He claims that they were not ruffianly outlaws though they would hardly be on horses if they were.

Though not gentlemen, he felt they were a better class of body servants — or maybe some manner of I squires to lesser gentry. They wore plain but good tunics and breeches and their horses had decent harnesses.

'Would he recognise them again, if he saw them?'

Thomas nodded emphatically. 'I asked him that question directly and he seemed in no doubt about one of them.'

De Wolfe glowered into his ale as he drank the last drop. It was a damned nuisance that the fair would finish in two days' time, for the chances were that these men had arrived in the area to attend it and would most likely be gone as soon as the fair ended.

'How soon will this fellow be up and about?' he demanded.

The clerk's peaky face brightened. 'Remarkably, by tomorrow, according to the monks who are caring for him. He has a constitution like an ox, they said, and is already off his pallet arid demanding to be allowed to return home to Totnes. They will be glad to be rid of him, as he's eating too much and upsetting their quiet life in the priory.'

The coroner considered this for a moment. 'Then if I send Gwyn and a hired horse down there tomorrow, would they release him to us? I need him to identify the assailants, if he can.'

Thomas nodded. 'I'm sure they will, Crowner. Apart from his being knocked senseless and dumped in the river, his other injuries are no threat to his life.' Gwyn would have left the city for his hut in St Sidwells by now, to beat the closing of the gates at curfew, but John felt there would be plenty of time for him to give his orders first thing the next morning. Thomas made his escape from the alehouse to return to his free lodgings in one of the canon's houses in the close, where he had the use of a thin mattress in the servants' quarters. John sat on in the Bush for a long while, being content to have Nesta's company intermittently, between her bustling about between the patrons and haranguing her servants over the business of keeping her customers filled with food and ale.

Eventually, John judged that his odious brother-in-law must surely have left his house and, after a final discreet cuddle with Nesta at the back door, he left for home and the inevitable verbal skirmish with his wife.

On Wednesday, his duties at the tournament did not begin until noon, so he had ample time to dispatch Gwyn to St James' Priory. With him he sent a spare palfrey from Andrew's yard, the livery stable in Martin's Lane, with orders to bring Terrus back to Bull Mead.

De Wolfe then walked up to Rougemont to see whether any more deaths, rapes or other tragedies had been reported overnight to the guardroom, which was always manned. News of these events came in to the coroner from the city constables and from the manor reeves of outlying villages. When the coroner's system had been introduced in September the previous year, there were supposed to have been three such officials appointed for the county, but only two could be found willing to undertake the unpaid work. Within a few weeks, the knight covering the north of Devon was killed when he fell from his horse, and it was only recently that a replacement had been found. John still had to cover a huge area in the southern half of the county, and there was no doubt that cases in the more distant villages often went unreported, as the distance involved in riding to Exeter was too great for many manor-bailiffs and reeves to contemplate.

This morning, the guardroom had nothing to offer, for which John was thankful. Sergeant Gabriel and most of the men-at-arms were already patrolling the fair and the city streets, so the castle was almost deserted. He found Thomas upstairs, busily writing out copies of inquest proceedings, executions, ordeals, amercemerits, attachments and other legal documents, which all had to be duplicated to present to the King's justices when they next came to Exeter. These judicial visits were very irregular, even though the judges were supposed to appear every quarter.

The Commissioners of Gaol Delivery managed to get around their circuit several times a year, to hear cases and clear the prisons of captives, either by hanging them, fining them or acquitting them. Much less often, the Eyre of Assize trundled along, with four senior members of the Curia Regis, to hear the most serious cases — and even more infrequently, the great General Eyre arrived. This looked into the more weighty matters of the administration of the county, a nightmare for the sheriff, especially the recently deposed one, who had had to cover up his embezzlement as best he could.

But today there were no legal problems for Sir John de Wolfe, and he retraced his steps back down Castle Hill and made his way through the crowded streets to the fairground. Business was in full swing, and though he was happy to see soldiers and stewards patrolling the lanes between the booths, there seemed to be no trouble, apart from an odd scuffle and the occasional drunk stumbling to upset a tableful of goods.

At one point everyone stood aside to gape and shout and clap as a colourful procession squeezed down the central lane. This was a guild pageant, put on by the craft organisations that controlled the many trades in the city. Several flat carts, covered in white and coloured cloth, were pulled by teams of apprentices to show off the tableaux displayed on these mobile stages. One was of a mock crusade, with half a dozen knights wielding wooden swords and axes upon twice their number of 'Saracens'. Again these were all apprentices, arrayed in garish costumes, accompanied by much yelling and screaming as the Christians vanquished the Moors.

Another cart had tumblers wheeling about alongside jugglers, a fire-eater and a sword-swallower. The last float was a sop to the ecclesiastical establishment, being a re-enactment of the John the Baptist story. While a parish priest shouted the story from a parchment, a tall bearded man in a white robe stood in a River Jordan made from a horse trough full of water, enthusiastically dousing a trio of the youngest apprentices with a pitcher normally used for ale. At the end of the wagon, another young man dressed in oriental female attire with a blond wig and padded bosoms portrayed Salome, holding aloft a tray on which was a realistically bloody severed head.

As John watched, the crowd cheered their appreciation and threw coins on to the carts, alms for the guilds to donate to the poorhouse near the West Gate. When the parade had passed, he followed the crowd of urchins that capered behind it until it reached the centre, where another miracle play was in progress, a competitor to the more popular guild spectacle.

As he walked past, John turned his head to look and saw that today they were performing 'The Wise and Foolish Virgins', again with a bevy of young choristers dressed as girls — in fact, several of the more comely ones were impossible to distinguish from females.

As they tripped about the stage, over-dramatically posturing with their lamps and oil vessels, a vicar-choral chanted a commentary in verse, based on the Gospel parable.

But de Wolfe, who had seen them all before, loped on and made his way back to a form of entertainment that suited him better, on the turf of Bull Mead. The area was now crowded, compared to his visit yesterday, as the contests had been in progress for several hours.

The stand was filled with the more exalted spectators, colourful in a variety of costumes, including quite a few women. They were by no means all dewy-eyed maidens come to wave a handkerchief at their champions, for a good half were the solid wives of burgesses, knights and several barons who had come to watch the bouts. Along the ropes marking off the battle area was a straggling line of lesser spectators, many from the city itself, together with supporters and gambling men from the Devon countryside and several other counties. As John arrived, a series of trumpet blasts from a herald marked the end of the morning's bouts and the field was cleared for workmen and boys to go out to shovel up piles of dung and to knock the worst of the hacked-up turf back into shape, after the pounding it had had from so many heavy hoofs.

John made his way to the recet, the contestants area behind the stand, which was now crowded with men and horses. Both there and at the opposite end of the ground, where the circular tents of other competitors stood, he saw several men prostrate on the ground, some being tended by their squires, others lying groaning under horse blankets. At least they all seemed alive, he thought, as he saw no still bodies with a cloak thrown over their heads. He made his way to where a florid-faced man was talking to a pair of stewards, all with red bands tied around their arms. Lord Guy Ferrars broke off his conversation to greet the coroner.

'Good day, de Wolfe. You're early, but none the less welcome.'

Ferrars, as the most influential baron in the district, was overseeing the tournament, being convenor of the committee that was organising it. A gruff, no-nonsense man, with considerable wealth and estates scattered all over England, he had the ear of many in the King's Council and made a good ally, as well as a bad enemy.

'I thought I'd get my eye in by watching a few bouts before I start my duties,' John replied. 'Have there been any problems so far?'

Ferrars shook his head, a pugnacious globe set on a thick neck.

'Nothing of importance. A few cracked heads and a couple of broken arms. These were the youngsters this morning, with more spunk than sense! The serious men will be on this afternoon, which is why we asked you to keep an eye on things, being the most experienced fighter in Devon.'

This was a rare compliment, coming from the usually taciturn and aggressive baron, and John could not suppress a small glow of pride warming him from within. They talked for a few moments about the morning's events and the prospects for the later, more serious contests, then walked over to a tent where some food and ale were laid out for the stewards and judges.

As he would miss his dinner at home, John laid into a few capon's legs, mutton pasties, hard-boiled eggs, fresh bread and cheese, washed down with an ale markedly inferior to Nesta's brew at the Bush.

'Who's likely to win the most loot today, d'you think?' he asked Guy Ferrars, as they chewed and drank.

'A dozen good men in the running, I'd say,' replied the other. 'There's a French fellow here, Reginald de Charterai. It seems he's a professional, going around all the tournaments both here and in France.' He wiped his bristly moustache with his fingers. 'Damned odd, when you think of it! Our King and thousands of our soldiers are fighting the bloody French year in, year out — yet one of their knights comes over here to win our money. Could be a damned spy for all we know, by Christ!'

John shrugged. 'Our men do exactly the same — they have far more tourneys in France than we do here and plenty of Englishmen take part.'

Ferrars grunted as he grabbed a couple more chicken thighs.

'I suppose so. War seems to make little difference to trade or learning. My sister's son has just gone to Paris to study some useless subject called philosophy, instead of staying home to hunt and learn how to use a lance properly!'

John brought him back to the subject of potential winners on the field.

'This Frenchman is tipped to do well, then?' Guy waved a hand at some other men standing near by, who were rather furtively exchanging bags that clinked with coin.

'Plenty of money being wagered on him, I hear. It's not only the contestants who make or lose in this game, as you well know.' He tapped the side of his fleshy nose with a forefinger. 'The bloody priests pretend to abhor betting, but they're damned hypocrites, for I know for a fact that several canons not half a mile from here have got quite a few marks riding on the winners today.' De Wolfe grinned, as he knew as well as Ferrars that though wagering was officially forbidden, half the people on the field today would be gambling between themselves, either for a penny or a few pounds. Many a time he had done the same himself, though today his sense of honour prevented him having a flutter, as he was one of the judges.

'Any others favoured for a win?' he asked.

The baron scratched the iron-grey stubble on his cheek as he considered.

'There's Thomas de Cirencestre, he's usually good for a few overthrows, though maybe he's getting on in years now. And Robert de Northcote from Lyme, he did well at Wilton a few months back. Of course, we've got the gang from Peverel as usual. The old man got himself killed earlier this year. He was a cunning old devil, God knows — but his sons are hungry fighters.

I've no doubt there's a few wagers on Hugo and his brother Ralph today.'

John knew the Peverels by sight and recalled that they were not the most popular lords of the Devon manors, but if they were doughty fighters, then their other faults were none of his business.

The bouts had. temporarily ceased as most of the knights and their squires wanted to eat and drink before the second half of the day began. When John went out of the meal tent, he could see that many people were seated or sprawled on the grass, drinking from flasks and skins and munching on bread and meat produced from their saddlebags or bought from the several stalls set up well back from the boundary ropes by enterprising traders.

The respire was as much for their horses as for the men, as the heavy destriers were being cared for by squires, varlets and grooms at each end of the ground.

They were being fed oats and hay and watered from wooden troughs filled by a succession of small boys with buckets brought from nearby wells. But in less than an hour, the trumpet sounded again, discordant blasts giving a five-minute warning. There was a groundswell of movement, as spectators climbed back into the stand or moved towards the boundary ropes, some already fingering purses in anticipation of the next wager.

John made his way to the centre point of the combat area, meeting the other umpire for the afternoon, Peter de Cunitone, a knight from a small manor near Ashburton, farther down the county on the edge of Dartmoor. He knew him slightly, having been at a siege with him in France ten years earlier, where he had been wounded in the leg. A much older man than John, he had lost most of his hair and had such a ruddy complexion that the coroner suspected that he was too fond of brandy wine for his own good. But today he seemed sober and alert, and after discussing the way they were going to handle the events, they retired to stand one on either side of the arena, at about the halfway mark. John was on the side nearest to the herald and trumpeter and he gave them a signal that they were ready for combat to start again.

A wailing blast produced a flurry of activity in the recet, and a moment later two horsemen cantered out of the gate alongside the viewing stand, to the accompaniment of shouts and a few jeers from the spectators, who now numbered several hundred. They rode up to John, one of the destriers nervously jumping about and tugging sideways as his rider swore and tried to pacify him. Each marr'had a squire who ran behind and stood anxiously inside the ropes — they were the only persons other than the judges permitted within the combat area and were allowed to assist their lords if they came to grief. The contestants confirmed their names to the coroner and he called these out to the herald, who was a clerk from one of the fulling mills, able to read and write. The man checked the names on his parchment register and nodded agreement, then in a resounding voice announced them to the crowd.

De Wolfe waved the two fighters away and they wheeled about and pranced to opposite ends of the ground, their long wooden lances held upright, a coloured pennant flying from near the tip. Both were young men, as far as could be seen under their basin-shaped iron helmets with the long nasal guards.

The two horsemen turned at the ends of the field and waited, stiffly erect in their deep wooden saddles.

Their long mail hauberks glinted in the sun, thanks to their varlets' efforts with dry sand and scrubbing brush to remove the pernicious rust. John raised his hand again and the unmelodious trumpet sounded for the last time. As if joined by an invisible cord, the two jousters simultaneously lowered their lances to the horizontal, pulled their shields stiffly across their chests and dug their spurs into their stallions' sides.

Slowly at first, but with rapidly gathering momentum, the big beasts pounded down the field, to the rising shouts and cheers of the spectators.

As they closed, there was a crash as the lances struck the leather-covered wood of each opponent's shield. A fragment of one flew off as both men rocked in their saddles, but then they were past each other with both men still astride their horses. To the accompaniment of more yells and cheers, they turned to face each other, one man making a tight circle, the other going wider to keep up his speed for the return pass. Again they charged each other, and this time the faster knight triumphed. His blunted lance took the other's shield squarely at the central boss and the force tipped the rider backward over the cantle of his saddle. He managed to grab it with one hand to break his fall, and hanging on the reins for a few more seconds stopped him from crashing to the ground. As soon as he began to be dragged along the turf he let go and his horse thundered on alone, though its training had taught it to stop as soon as possible.

The other man pulled his own mount around and trotted back towards the defeated knight, wary as to what he would do next. The options were for the downed man to submit — or to pull out his sword and prepare to fight on foot. As John and Peter de Cunitone advanced to get a closer view, the matter was settled quickly. The fallen knight pushed himself up, but then rested on his knees in the dirt, his head bowed in surrender.

Gallantly, the victor slid from his horse and helped his opponent to his feet, as the crowd either cheered or groaned according to whether they had won or lost their wagers.

The defeated knight offered his sword to the winner, hilt first, as a token of submission, though later he would have to hand over his armour and horse as well.

As they walked together back to the recet, the trumpet sounded again and the herald yelled out the names once more, as well as the identity of the victor. As they passed the stand, both men saluted the grandees there by bowing their heads and putting a fisted arm across their chest, before vanishing into a tent for a welcome jug of ale.

'At least they behaved with good grace,' said John to the other judge, as they, met briefly in the middle of the field.

De Cunitone nodded his polished head. 'Let's hope the rest will do the same, but it's a bit much to expect.' They went back to their positions and the process was repeated with the next pair of contestants. This time, neither was unhorsed, but on the third pass the lance of one splintered in the middle and he threw it down in disgust. Sliding from his saddle, he hauled out his broadsword, three feet of tempered iron, and waited for his adversary to do the same. They closed and, with blows that raised sparks, hammered away at each other for several minutes. The tips of the weapons were rounded and the edges of the blade were also supposed to be blunted — but as these swords were designed for hacking rather than thrusting, the state of the tips was not all that relevant. As de Wolfe came nearer, he suspected that both men had failed to blunt the sides of their blades, but this was such a common ploy that he was not going to put it to the test.

The contest was soon over, as the heavier man, holding a shield with a black raven upon it, sidestepped and caught the other a resounding blow on his right arm, which made his weapon spin away like a whirling stick. He clutched his arm and yelled, but the chain links saved him from a wound, though no doubt he would have a painful bruise for a week. In the next contest, one young man was knocked from his destrier by a lance strike in the centre of the chest. He was saved from serious injury by the oblong metal plate laced over his hauberk to protect the heart. Again he would have a massive bruise there, which would have been even worse but for the shock-absorber effect of the gambeson, a padded shirt of quilted linen stuffed with loose wool, that every knight wore under his chain mail.

The afternoon passed in a similar fashion, with a bout every fifteen minutes or so. The results were clear cut in most instances, though one pair of jousters, a Fleming and a Breton, were reduced to bad-tempered fisticuffs when both lost their swords in a scrimmage.

The two adjudicators had to forcibly pull them apart and dismiss them from the ground without any result being awarded, to the boos and jeers of the watching crowd, whose wagers were rendered null and void.

As the sun began to slip down the sky, the last few bouts were announced. One was between Ralph Peverel, of Sampford Peverel near Tiverton, and an older knight from Warwickshire, who was a regular on the tourney circuit. Much to everyone's surprise, Ralph unhorsed the Midlander at the first pass, knocking him clean off his destrier to crash on to the hard ground.

He was knocked unconscious and his squire, who ran on to the field, had to call for men from the recet to bring a long board to carry him back to the tents, while the betting men were muttering at this win by an outsider with such long odds.

The next joust, almost the last of the day, was the one the crowd had been waiting for all afternoon, ever since the ballot had chosen who was to fight with whom.

This was a contest between Hugo Peverel, the elder brother of the previous contestant, and the Frenchman, Reginald de Charterai.

Both had an impressive track record of wins and much money was being staked on the outcome. Hugo was tipped as a likely successor to his late father William, who had been a steady winner over many years, until his untimely death at Wilton, De Charterai, though a foreigner, had appeared at so many tourneys in England that he was very well known and his prowess was common knowledge to all those who followed the contests.

The trumpet brayed and the two men trotted out from the recet, their huge horses tossing their heads in excited anticipation of a few moments' glory in front of an appreciative audience. Hugo Peverel went down to the far end and waited expectantly.

The herald, now getting hoarse after a day's yelling, gave their titles, and at the second blast the thunder "of hoofs began over turf that was now decidedly the worse for wear after more than forty great stallions had hammered across it that day. The first clash of lance upon shield left both riders upright, as these experts were adept at angling their shields to deflect much of the force to the side.

The second pass was equally ineffective in unhorsing either Hugo or Reginald, and they galloped past each other quite intact. Hugo was the bigger man, broad within his byrnie of iron links, his scratched shield carrying a crude emblem of two white chevrons on a blue background.

De Charterai was taller and thinner, his spine as stiff as a fire-iron. He wore no mail hood or aventail, trusting to the code of honour to safeguard his head from attack. Black hair peeped from beneath the rim of his helmet, matching the colour of a thin, sloping moustache that adorned his rather sardonic face. The pair wheeled around for the third pass, lowered their lances and charged. This time the Frenchman was able to vanquish his opponent, as with a grinding crunch his lance-tip hit Hugo's shield at just the right spot to neutralise the attempted deflection and the impact pushed the Devon man sideways off his saddle.

The experienced fighter grabbed the saddle-edge and girth and let himself down lightly, hanging on to his shield, but losing his grip on the long lance. There was a roar from the onlookers as he fell to his knees, but he was up on his feet again long before de Charterai could slow his destrier and pull him around to canter back. It was obvious that Hugo was going to make a fight of it, with his reputation and his property at risk from the foreigner. The latter slowed to a halt, dismounted and laid his lance on the ground, as his squire ran out to take his horse's reins and lead him away. Hugo's riderless horse had ran on several hundred paces and was being retrieved by his own squire farther down the field.

Hugo faced the Frenchman and hauled out his sword, which made a metallic rasp as it slid from the scabbard hanging from the baldric slung around his shoulder. De Wolfe watched keenly as Reginald gave a slight bow and pulled out his own weapon. The two men advanced on each other warily, shields held up by the left forearms pushed through the straps on the back. Their heavy swords were sloped downward until they got within striking range. Then, as they circled each other, the points came up, and with a yell Hugo lunged forward and tried a straight thrust past the edge of Reginald's shield. The Frenchman parried it easily and in turn brought down a slashing blow, which sent chips of wood flying from the edge of Peverel's shield.

Time and again they slashed and smote, but they were evenly matched and neither could get past the other's guard. The spectators yelled their approval at this bonus to their expected entertainment.

Striking at the head was forbidden by the commonly accepted rules of chivalry, so the ambition of each man was to make a strike either with his sword point against his opponent's chest or belly or a heavy slash against any of his limbs. These would count as a win, even though the chain mail of the padded hauberks would hopefully protect against any serious injury. The two judges hovered a few yards away, far enough not to get in the way of the fighters, but close enough to check for a vital strike.

Then an unusual thing happened.

Hugo Peverel, the more aggressive of the two, gave another furious shout and stepped forward to smash his blue shield against the green of de Charterai's.

Tilting it away, he lunged with his blade, aiming for the heart, but the other knight swung sideways and, as Hugo's sword arm came within reach, slashed down upon it.

The blunted edge struck the back of the Devon man's hand just below the wrist, and although he was wearing chain-link mittens the impact of the heavy steel temporarily paralysed his fingers and his sword went spinning away. The foreigner gave his own excited yell of triumph and stood back, clearly the victor. Both de Wolfe and Peter de Cunitone threw up their hands as a signal for a win and there was a trumpet blast in response.

It seemed, however that Hugo de Peverel, now in a vile temper, had other ideas.

Instead of kneeling in submission, as convention required, he cast about for his sword, apparently intending to pick it up again. But it had fallen almost at the feet of his adversary and so, to John's indignant surprise, he bounded sideways and snatched up his lance, from where it had fallen when he was unhorsed. With a roar of defiance, Hugo hefted it near its centre, brought his powerful arm back and threw it straight at Reginald de Charterai's head.

Astonished at this unheard-of behaviour, the Frenchman stood stock still for an instant, then his well-honed instinct for self-preservation snapped into action and he brought up his shield before his face. The blunted tourney lance struck it with a loud thump and fell to the ground, instead of hitting him between the eyes.

There was immediate chaos on and around the field.

The two judges came running, shouting cries of recrimination. Along the barrier ropes, there was a roar of outrage and yells, boos and hisses rent the air. Even those who had money on Hugo Peverel were disgusted at his blatant disregard of the usual conventions. De Wolfe strode up to the culprit, his face white with anger, closely followed by his fellow adjudicator.

'What in Christ's name d'you think you're doing?' he yelled.

'Have you gone bloody mad?' snapped de Cunitone, hands on hips as he glared at Hugo. Peverel, sweating, red in the face and seething with anger, was far from contrite. 'There's no rule against a man continuing to fight!' he hissed.

'Rule? You've been in more than enough jousts to know what's proper!'

De Wolfe's nose was almost touching Hugo's now and he was in a towering rage. 'You're a knight, damn it, you have a duty to show an example to the squires and younger men. I'm ashamed of you, Peverel!' Half afraid that he might strike him in his temper, John stepped back and forced himself to signal to the herald forty paces away. The man took the hint, and as the trumpet sounded again he roared at the top of his voice that the bout had been won by Reginald de Charterai.

The man named had remained standing where he was, his face white with shock at this unheard-of breach of conduct by someone who should know better. He said not a word, but turned and walked off stiffly to where his bewildered squire was holding his horse's head. The victor walked his mount back to the enclosure, to the sustained cheers and shouts of congratulation from both the crowd along the ropes and the more aristocratic audience in the stand.

'You had better send your squire to treat with de Charterai over the forfeit of your armour and destrier,' snapped de Cunitone, the contempt obvious in his voice as he spat the words at Hugo Peverel. 'Better keep clear of him yourself, or you might get a punch in the face, which you richly deserve!'

With that, the second judge turned and marched after the coroner, who was making his way back to speak to the herald. Left alone in the middle of the field, the lord of Sampford Peverel glowered at everything within sight, unwilling to admit even to himself that he had seriously transgressed the unwritten codes of chivalry.