The Mad Monk of Gidleigh

Chapter Twenty-Two

Alan, Saul’s apprentice, tipped the bowl back and felt the cool draught wash down his throat, taking away the dust from the journey as it passed down his gullet. That was the trouble with riding in a line with other carters when the roads were drying. Wherever there was dust, everyone swallowed it. Refilling the bowl, he could sense the warmth spreading from his belly through his body. It was just as though someone had lighted a fire in his stomach.

‘Careful, boy. You’ll get drunk again!’

Alan gave a pale grin. His calmness had almost returned now that they were in the small town of Chagford. They had at least managed to sell most of their goods at the market, and Saul himself was delighted with the prices he had won for his cheeses: the men here paid good sums for produce because Chagford was so far from civilisation and the roads leading here were appalling. Most of the buyers were miners who had little money, but they were happy to pay for Alan’s stock of iron blades for shovels, for his spikes, adzes and hammers.

‘After the last couple of days, I wouldn’t mind getting drunk.’

There were so many people in this inn it had taken an age to reach the large plank of wood which was the bar. All about them, men sipped their ales or ciders while keeping an eye on all these foreigners. Men who lived in market towns like Chagford might need the money that carters and buyers brought, but that didn’t mean they had to like the folk that brought it, and several of the older men in this tavern looked as though they would be happier if all the market people would clear off. Traders were welcome in the market, but not here in the taverns, where all they did was block access to the bar.

It wasn’t only the older locals who eyed Alan and his friends askance, either. There was a wealthy-looking fellow in one corner who appeared as unhappy about the noise and commotion as any. He sat on a low stool, his legs thrust out before him. Although he was clad in an expensive-looking tunic of some velvet of crimson, it had faded. His hosen were of a soft green material, but were heavily bespattered with mud of red, brown and black, and his boots were scuffed and stained. A thick grey riding cloak with a leather hood sat rolled into a bundle on the floor beside him, and his upper body was encased in a leathern jacket, cut long to fall to the knee.

His dark eyes looked unpleasant and cold; his was the sort of face which Alan thought would suit one of the men who had swept down the hill at him on the day that the raid had taken place. He had the same blank look of a man who was used to dealing in death. Alan shivered.

Saul drained his pot and belched, wiping a hand over his beard. ‘There will always be footpads about, boy, and it’s not worth worrying about them. Leave that to the Sheriff. You concentrate on what you’re good at: helping me buy and sell for a profit.’

‘So they can rob us again?’

‘If you have a brain you won’t come that way again,’ Saul said thickly. The cold which had assailed him on the way here had developed, during their incarceration at Gidleigh Castle, into a real snorter, and he ran his nose over his sleeve again, leaving a glistening trail. His eyes lowered to the table and his voice dropped at the same time. ‘I don’t think you should go talking about it too much, though. They’re powerful men, them who robbed us.’

‘I see. Let the buggers get away with it, you mean?’

‘Get involved in something like that, and you’ll never get away from the town, boy. You’ll have the Keeper of the Peace demanding you turn up in his court, the Sheriff too, and then you’ll have to come back when the Justices return. Do you want all that?’

The idea of accusing men the like of Sir Ralph made Alan feel queasy.

‘That’s right, boy! Just leave things as they are.’

Alan nodded into his bowl. Sir Ralph was a knight, and knights could do much as they wanted, because the law hardly affected them. Esmon had been seen by many witnesses leading the attack on the carters, but that wouldn’t have much impact. He was the son of a knight – what, would anyone expect a knight’s lad to be held in gaol ready for the Justices? Of course not. Esmon would be out of court in minutes, his father’s friends putting up money to meet the cost of his bond, and then he would make sure that the Justices would have no one to accuse him in their courts: he’d personally murder Alan, or maybe he’d simply pay one of his men to do it. Either way, he’d be safe and Alan would be dead, which was not a prospect that appealed much to Alan.

The tavern was raucous, and they had to raise their voices more than once as they talked over the robbery. It was a small place, built of solid moorstone, and stood a short distance from Chagford’s marketplace, which was why at present it was filled with shouting, laughing and swearing miners. Two wenches were negotiating their services at one corner, Alan could tell, because the crush of drunken men was thickest there, and outside at the back there was a cock-fighting pit, with a regular turn-around of protagonists, so the noise swelled and broke from the cheering and cursing spectators there, making conversation still more difficult.

‘This isn’t our Frankpledge, after all,’ Saul added persuasively. He had to shout to make himself heard.

‘But it means letting a man’s murderer go unpunished.’

‘Oh, sod that! I never saw a man die. Maybe he escaped! If it makes us more secure, leave it alone, that’s what I say.’

It was as he spoke those fateful words that Alan happened to glance across the room. The well-dressed man was staring at them both with a frown, as if displeased at something he had heard. Slowly, to Alan’s concern, the man pulled his legs back and stood. He picked up his bundled cloak and walked over to Alan and Saul.

‘I heard you talking about letting a murderer go. I don’t think you should do that.’

‘None of your business.’

‘Isn’t it?’ The man pulled his jerkin back to show his sword and long-bladed knife as he took a stool and sat on it. ‘I would have thought that a murder would always prove interesting to the King’s Coroner. Now, suppose you two tell me about this murder of yours.’

Lady Annicia was gentle as she and a woman-servant washed Hugh’s bloody face and scalp. With the help of Godwen, who held Hugh’s head still, she shaved it before inspecting the gash.

Simon was easy about this, but Baldwin felt decidedly uncomfortable. It was one thing to see a dead body being prodded and poked, but to his mind it was quite another to see someone who was still alive being treated like this. Or maybe he didn’t like to see a personal acquaintance lying there. Whatever the reason, Baldwin couldn’t face remaining in that room. When Annicia stood and mumbled about fetching herbs, he was first to the door to open it for her.

They didn’t speak. Baldwin took deep breaths of the clean, smoke-tinged air as he trailed after her. There was a faintly sour sweetness on the air, and he realised it was her winey breath. He hoped that she had found time to doze after the court session, because he didn’t want Hugh to be harmed by being tended to by a drunken angel. As he considered this, she walked to the small room built on the side of the gatehouse, and opened the door.

When he peered in, he gave a low whistle. ‘A marvellous stock.’

‘Hmm?’ she asked, glancing up. ‘Oh, yes. It’s Wylkyn’s store. He used to make all sorts of things to ease Sir Richard’s pain.’

She sounded as though her mind was elsewhere. Baldwin set his head to one side. ‘My Lady, are you well?’

‘Well? Yes – why?’

‘My Lady, I merely noticed that you seem a little distracted, that is all. If it is something with which I can help, please feel free to ask.’

To his consternation, her eyes suddenly filled with tears. ‘I am a foolish woman, Sir Knight. I was told a secret today, and just because I was in a fey and foolish mood, I told another. I fear that my husband will be very displeased with me when he hears. But no, there is nothing you or anyone else can do to help me.’

She was still slurring her words slightly, but it was hard now to see that she was drunk, apart from a certain deliberation in her movements. Baldwin watched her carefully as she moved among the potions, but she looked safe enough. Only very sad.

‘Sir Richard died suddenly, I heard.’

‘No. He was in his bed for a few days, but then he often was. Poor man. I think he gave up in the end. He knew he couldn’t keep this place.’

‘His back and face must have been constantly painful.’ Baldwin glanced at some drying leaves, and then he frowned.

‘Not just them. He had an awful case of gout in his good leg, which made it impossible for him to walk. That was why he took to his bed in the first place.’

‘Gout? That wouldn’t kill him.’

‘No.’ She had found the jug she wanted. She shook some powder into a cloth, then added some more from a second earthenware pot. Transferring them to a mortar, she began grinding and mixing the powders with the pestle. ‘He died, I believe, when he had a spasm, and that was that.’

‘Oh? I had thought he died from a fever.’

She squinted at him. ‘Not exactly. He had a bad case of gout, to which he was prone, and took to his bed. Then a mild fever attacked him and he was ill for some days.’

‘What were the signs of his illness?’

‘Blurred vision,’ she said, ‘I remember that. Then he grew giddy and complained of his head aching, and slept a great deal, but then he fell into delirium. In the end he had great convulsions, and during the last one, he died. I don’t know what could have done this to him. If he had cut himself, I should have thought it was one of those fevers, and I would have expected an inflamed limb, but there was no sign like that. Perhaps we should have bled him more. With such diseases, it is hard to know the best cure. And he had suffered so much during his life, with all his twisted and badly-set bones. Even eating was a torment, because of his mouth.’

Baldwin remembered Sir Richard’s face. It had been all but sliced in two by a massive sword-blow. One eye was gone, and his jaw had been shattered on that side. His hideous injuries can have given poor Sir Richard no peace from the moment he received them.

Baldwin glanced at the leaves again. Gout could be helped, he knew, by the leaves of henbane, but life could be ended: henbane was a fierce poison.

When they returned, rather than staying in the gloomy hall, Baldwin walked to Thomas, who stood watching the yard outside.

‘Are you all right?’ he asked the Constable.

Thomas shrugged. ‘I’m here, miles from my home, far from my wife, and stuck with him.’

Baldwin didn’t need to glance in the direction of his jerked thumb: he knew Thomas was indicating Godwen.

‘Come with me, then,’ he said, and strode out into the yard.

‘What do you want out here?’ Thomas asked, trotting to keep up with Baldwin’s long stride.

‘Roger Scut. I want to know what he thinks there is in all this for him.’

‘Him? He’ll see money. That’s the only reason he ever puts himself out for anything. Money or gold for himself.’

‘How could he see money in this place?’ Baldwin wondered.

Thomas glanced about him. ‘He’ll see some advantage, he always does. Same way as he always fleeces people – like poor Jack.’

Baldwin was listening with only half an ear to his mutterings, but the mention of the groom in Crediton made his ears prick up again. ‘What is all that about Jack? You said that Roger Scut is his landlord and that Jack’s rents are always going up, didn’t you?’

‘Yes. Jack is one of his serfs, but he used to be successful until Scut took over his demesne. Scut inherited the land and all the free or servile tenants on it.’

‘Get to the point.’

‘It’s this. Until Scut arrived, Jack was doing well. He had bought land, animals, commuted his service by paying the Manor to get someone else in to do his work, and then increased his wealth and his animals by his efforts.’

‘That is good.’

‘Yes. Except Jack was a serf, so he couldn’t own anything without his lord’s agreement. Scut took the land back, then increased Jack’s rents and let him rent the extra lands back for still more money. He also told Jack that he couldn’t sell his produce anywhere except direct to the Canons at Crediton – and he had to agree to whatever price they offered. Now he can’t afford to resow his fields with grain, and he has to scratch a living by grooming horses, helping out at the tavern and trying to manage with his three cows.’

‘That is immoral. How can a lord take away lands that he never gave to his bondsmen in the first place?’ Baldwin asked. It was all too common, he knew, but he hated it nonetheless. It was an abuse of the power a lord held over his serfs.

‘There he is!’

Following Thomas’s pointing finger, Baldwin saw Roger Scut walking from the small chapel beyond the castle’s hall.

He looked pale, Baldwin thought, like a man who had swallowed a shellfish and realised that it did not agree with him. ‘Scut, I want to speak to you,’ he called out.

‘Yes, Sir Baldwin? Oh, and your Constable. What do you want?’ Roger Scut said, peering down his nose at them enquiringly.

‘What are you up to here?’ Baldwin asked. ‘You came here with us to protect the lad, or so you said, and then in the court you betrayed him badly.’

‘I surely said nothing that could have been construed as a betrayal? I listened hard to what he had to say, but when I commented on his abilities, that was your fault, Sir Baldwin.’

‘My fault?’ Baldwin grated.

‘At the inn at Crediton, you suggested that Mark might not even have been a cleric, that he could have been an outlaw who had filched the papers of a clerk from one of his victims. Naturally, when he was asked to speak the words of a prayer, and could not, I began to wonder whether your initial scepticism might have been justified.’

‘Do not try to blame me for your actions,’ Baldwin said, incensed that this pompous little fellow was attempting to put the onus for Mark’s position on Baldwin’s shoulders. ‘You should have merely claimed him for your lord’s court. Instead you chose to throw him to the crowd like meat to a hunting pack.’

‘I did no such thing. All I did was make a comment on his ability.’

‘Which was the same thing. Scut, what do you seek here?’

Roger Scut’s face altered subtly and Baldwin instantly knew that the man was about to lie. ‘Why, Sir Baldwin, all I wish to do here is support a fellow cleric. If he is one, of course.’

‘If he fails to convince, he will be executed here,’ Baldwin stated.

‘I sincerely hope not! Surely our Bishop will save him,’ Roger Scut said, adding meditatively, ‘But I shall have to remain here, no matter what. There are so many poor souls desperate for comfort, and I should wait here until another cleric is nominated to take his place.’

‘In that chapel?’ Baldwin said, recalling vaguely a small one-roomed building with a lean-to at the side from his last visit to the area. It did not strike him as being particularly attractive.

‘Well, when the new one is built, yes. Until then I shall have to stay in here, I suppose.’

‘What new one?’ Baldwin demanded. ‘What are you talking about?’

‘The new chapel, of course. Didn’t you know the old one was destroyed? Someone burned it to the ground.’

Baldwin shook his head. ‘A terrible act.’

‘Sacrilege, yes. The people here will have to pay dearly for their destruction,’ Roger Scut said. ‘But fortunately I have experience of making serfs work and be obedient. Perhaps this is my true vocation in life, to see to it that this place has a decent church.’

Annicia left Hugh feeling pleased that she had been able to alleviate a little of the man’s pain. She hoped he would recover. Perhaps he wouldn’t. It was always so difficult to predict whether a patient would or wouldn’t survive.

Simon had watched her closely, but he was relieved to see that she was as capable and self-assured as any physician.

‘You are well practised, Lady.’

She looked up at Simon, who had moved silently to stand beside her.

‘Yes. This castle has always been well provided with people to be practised upon!’

Simon glanced at her enquiringly.

‘Sir Richard, and since him… well, there have been others. My son’s men are often hurt in their training.’

He nodded. ‘Is there anything else we should do for Hugh?’

‘Your concern does you credit, Bailiff, but I think the main thing he needs right now is plenty of sleep and a good bleeding. I’ll send a messenger to Chagford in the morning to fetch a phlebotomist. It is lucky you were so close to the castle when he was knocked down.’

‘Perhaps if we’d been further away your son wouldn’t have tried to do this,’ Simon said ungraciously.

‘Esmon?’ she said, a hand going to her throat. ‘Why should he do this?’

‘I don’t know, but my man there saved my life by throwing me from the path of Esmon’s mount. If he hadn’t, I’d be lying there instead of Hugh.’

She looked back at Hugh, then wished Simon a good night before leaving him, her mind whirling, and not only from the slight dizziness of a mild hangover.

Attacking the Bailiff was a ridiculous thing to do, Annicia thought distractedly. She would have hoped that Esmon would have shown more sense. His father was cleverer than to simply try to ride down a Stannary Bailiff. Sometimes subtlety was needed. Why couldn’t her son behave more circumspectly, the fool! His father had always been more sensible, more pragmatic, she reflected. The memories brought a smile to her face.

Then her smile faded. Her husband was as much of a fool as her son now, she thought. Ever since he had acquired this castle by devious means, befriending the King’s favourite and making himself politically useful, he seemed to have lost his integrity. She deplored his behaviour.

Sir Ralph had told her that morning of his affair with Huward’s wife. Gilda had been his concubine since before his marriage to Annicia, whom he had wed for the reason that he craved her father’s lands: in marrying her, he gained them as well. The union was rational and steady, if unfulfilling, but it was humiliating to think that he had gone to Gilda, a rough, untutored peasant with the coarse hands and skin of a villein, rather than to her own fragrant bed.

Annicia set her jaw. Yes. It was deeply shaming to think that her husband could have committed adultery with a woman like Gilda when Annicia herself was willing to submit to him. That was why she had spoken to Huward and told him about their spouses, told him the truth about his children. It was pure spite. Perhaps, she thought, Huward would go home and beat Gilda. She deserved it!

Her brow furrowed, she sat back, listening to the sounds of the castle closing for the night. Thinking of Sir Ralph’s errant behaviour made her head ache, as well as the shouts, footsteps pattering across the yard, men roaring for ale and food, and laughter. There were few enough women in the place. Women were always thought of as a distraction, Annicia considered, just like Mary. She had definitely been a distraction!

Standing, Annicia went to the window that gave out on the court. The windows here had no glazing. Sir Richard had had no money to install glass, and in the time since they had taken possession of the castle, Sir Ralph had not had the opportunity to address such matters with all his other responsibilities. Not that it mattered in most of the rooms. They had strong shutters that either pulled inwards and lay flat against the wall, or dropped vertically in runners, held up overnight by a strong thong which hooked over a peg in the wall above.

Annicia had grown up with shutters. It was no hardship to live with them. It was better that a door should block the harshest breezes, and that shutters should exclude snow and rain. There was no need of glass.

Suddenly her eyes were drawn to the old castle keep on her right. The upper chamber was built into the hillside, and the upper door gave out onto the grassed sward beyond. No doubt in years past, there had been another wall planned which would have secured this area, making it impossible for an attacking force to reach the keep itself, but Sir Richard had never possessed the money for that either, so a thin palisade stood there to protect the whole of the court area. It was sufficient to keep the odd draw-latch or cut-throat away, but that was about it.

She thought about her son. Trying to kill the Bailiff in broad daylight was stupid. Executing Wylkyn was different, of course. That evil man had to die for what he had done.

She had felt nervous in Wylkyn’s old room when Sir Baldwin started asking about Sir Richard’s death and looked at the henbane. Although she was reasonably sure that she had concealed her alarm at his questions, she was convinced that he had guessed. He must have some leach-craft. Well, never mind. If he had, he would see the same as Annicia – that Wylkyn had killed his own master. He deserved to die for that. How any man could wish to kill a poor soul like Sir Richard was beyond her, but she had no doubt. That was why she had spoken to her husband and son, why she had told them what Wylkyn had done, and persuaded them that someone who could commit petty treason like that had to be slaughtered like a rabid dog, without compunction, before others got the same idea.

It had been her aim to have Wylkyn brought back to the castle, to be held there and killed before her eyes, but perhaps it was better this way. If Esmon was arrested, she would be able to state that they had wanted to arrest Sir Richard’s murderer, but he refused to surrender. And then, with the Keeper in the vicinity, they grew alarmed.

There was some truth in it, after all. Esmon had had the body hidden rather than leaving it at the roadside. Hiding it satisfied Annicia – it meant that her son was safe from accusations of murder, for no man could be convicted when there was no body, and she knew Sir Richard’s murderer had died unshriven and now lay concealed on unhallowed ground. A suitable end to him, so she felt.

‘Damn him!’ she hissed suddenly.