The Sanctuary Seeker

Chapter Nineteen In which Crowner John uses his sword

Sir John’s attempt at warming the matrimonial bed was shortlived. The cathedral bell had rung for the second hour by the time he was under the blanket and he had hardly dozed off when he felt himself shaken by the arm. It was Mary, wrapped in a shawl, trying to get him up without waking his wife.

She bent to hiss in his ear. ‘Gwyn is outside! You must come, he says it’s urgent.’

Unfortunately, it was Matilda who sat up first and saw the woman silhouetted in the moonlight streaming through the open door. ‘Mary! What are doing with my husband? John, are you up to your tricks again?’

‘No, mistress, really. It’s Gwyn of Polruan, wanting the master. He says you must come to raise the hue-and-cry. Some felons have made a run for it.’

The coroner, struggling out of his dreams, gave a yell of despair. ‘What? They’ve gone? By Christ, that can’t be!’

He leaped from the low bed and scrabbled for his breeches and tunic in the silvery light. Mary disappeared down the outside steps, leaving her master to give a hasty account to his wife of the unmasking of the Peter Tavy villain.

He tumbled down the stairs from the solar, yelling to Mary for his boots, helmet and sword. Within minutes, he was striding alongside Gwyn down the high street, dressed for trouble in a basin-shaped iron helmet, whose dents bore witness to service in many a campaign. Under this he wore his aventail, a chain-link balaclava, to protect his neck, tucked into a thick leather cuirass over his chest with mailed plates on the shoulders. A massive broadsword clanked at his waist and he had pulled on thick gauntlets, the backs covered in chain-mail.

Gwyn, wearing no protection apart from his ragged hide jacket, explained the situation as they hurried along. ‘I went back to the Bush with Nesta and old Edwin. We had a dish of stew to warm us up, then Nesta went to her bed and I climbed up to the dormitory, just to make sure the birds hadn’t flown … but they had!’

‘All of them?’

‘Martyn was still there. There were seven or eight people staying the night. I tiptoed among them and found the young brother sleeping like a baby – but two pallets were empty and there was no sign of the other brother or that Baldwyn.’

‘They must have been warned. How else could this have happened?’ snarled the coroner. ‘It must be de Revelle. He’s trying to save his reputation over that farce of a trial yesterday by letting them go. They’ll end up in France if we don’t bottle them up in the city.’

‘You think that Gervaise is party to these killings, then?’

The coroner snorted as they hurried along. ‘I’ll be damned surprised if he’s not. What reason would the squire have for being involved in the deaths? He has nothing to gain.’

Gwyn pondered on how they had been tipped off. ‘Someone could easily have come into the inn. There were still a few drunks snoring on the floor downstairs and Nesta usually leaves the door open all night.’

They turned into Idle Lane where the tavern stood on a plot of wasteland, starkly visible in the light of the full moon. Edwin was standing in the doorway, a long spear in one hand and an axe in the other.

‘They’ll not pass me, Captain,’ he said bravely, though with his eyesight he could hardly tell friend from foe.

John tapped his shoulder appreciatively. ‘Go up to the castle quickly. Tell the sergeant to get the sheriff and the constable out of bed and bring half a dozen men down here. Say the coroner orders it. The hue-and-cry must be raised at once to find these people.’

Edwin, rejuvenated by the prospect of battle, stumped off as fast as he could, leaving Gwyn and the coroner to decide on the next move.

‘It’ll be a long while before the castle people get here. But it won’t be light until seven, so those two can’t get out of the gates until then.’

Gwyn grunted. ‘What about their horses? They can never hope to slide out of the town on horseback?’

John looked back at the junction of the narrow streets, where Idle Lane and Butcher’s Row joined. ‘The stables for the inn are over there. Make sure their animals are still inside. Knock up the stable-boys and tell them not to let any horses out until we tell them.’

As Gwyn hurried one way, John walked cautiously the other, down towards Rack Lane. Apart from a few nocturnal cats, many scurrying rats and the odd whimpering dog, the streets were silent. The moon’s bright orb hung in a clear, frosty sky and gave a good light, but there were plenty of shadows to hide two desperate men who had nothing to lose but their lives.

He stopped where the two streets met, unsure of which way to go. De Bonneville and Baldwyn could be anywhere in the city by now – they could have left the inn at least an hour ago.

The city walls should be an impregnable barrier, unless they could bribe a gate-keeper to open up for them – or, thought John cynically, if someone in authority gave orders for them to be let out.

He heard Gwyn coming back from the stable and stepped into the centre of the slushy road so that he could be seen and not attacked by mistake.

‘Their horses are still there, so they will have to escape on foot. Where could they go, not to be overtaken at first light by mounted men?’

John pushed back his helmet a little, as the long nasal guard rubbed his prominent nose. He considered what he would do in the desperate circumstances of the two fugitives.

‘The river!’ he said suddenly.

They were in the south-west quadrant of Exeter, where the Watergate gave access to the quayside and to the ships that came up the Exe from the sea. John pointed down Stripcote Hill towards the inside of the town wall.

‘We may as well go down that way, until the sergeant and his men arrive. The sheriff will be in no hurry to help us, though Ralph Morin might.’

As they strode down the steep slope, Gwyn asked if they should raise a hue-and-cry among the townsfolk. The law required that when a crime was discovered or a body found, the four nearest households should be roused and should chase any suspects or fugitives. But John thought it pointless to start pounding on doors at four in the morning for sleep-fuddled citizens resentfully to stumble around the streets in the dark.

They reached the wall at a point near the West Gate, then came in a few yards to the twin towers of the gate, where they were challenged by an alert watchman.

‘Someone’s awake, at least,’ growled Gwyn, whose opinion of peace-softened civilians was usually unrepeatable. The gateman reported that he had seen no one around for several hours and certainly would not open up his gate at any price. It was a hanging offence to risk the security of the city, even in times like this when there was no war or insurrection.

‘Is there any place where two men might get across the wall?’ asked John, looking up at the fifteen foot fortifications, built of the usual soft red stone. Sometimes, lack of maintenance and neglect allowed parts of city walls to crumble away.

The watchman shook his head. ‘No, not a stone missing. The good city finances encouraged the portreeves to repair it last year. Sound as a bell, it is.’

They moved off eastwards, still listening for any sounds of the soldiers coming.

All was silent and they walked to the Watergate with no further sign of any human activity.

The Watergate was in the corner of the city walls, leading straight out on to the wharves. The gate was shut but they found the watchman sound asleep. After giving him a rousing telling-off, the coroner and his henchman started back into the town, taking an unsavoury lane that led towards the Shambles and eventually the cathedral Close.

Suddenly, Gwyn gripped John’s arm. They listened and strained their eyes to the left, down an alley. There had been a metallic tinkle, unlikely to be rat or cat. Their own shoes were leather and the soft slime of mud and manure deadened any footfalls.

Gwyn melted into the shadows on one side of the alley and John vanished back around the corner of the lane. The opposite wall of the alley was bright in the moonlight.

They waited, frozen into statues in the blackness.

There was another slight rattle of metal on stone.

Slowly, a figure slid round the corner of the next building down the alley, and silently crossed over into the shadow opposite, the same shadow that hid Gwyn but five yards distant. Then another man, slighter in build, emerged and stood half in shadow but with part of his body still in moonlight. This part included an arm holding a naked sword.

Oblivious of the pair concealed only a few feet away, the fugitives’ whispers came clear through the still, frosty air. ‘Watch that bloody mace, Baldwyn. It clatters at every movement.’

‘I’ve no sword, damn it to hell. That’s still at Peter Tavy.’

‘You’ll never see that again. Nor yet Peter Tavy, I’m afraid.’ The one in deep shadow moved again and the chain of his weapon made the same small sound, even though he tried to keep it rigid.

‘Which way now? I don’t know this pestilent town.’

‘Turn right, then left. The Watergate will be ahead of us. If we jump the gateman silently, we can slit his throat and get out on to the riverside. There must be a boat there, to float us downstream far enough to land and make across country.’

Becoming bolder, Gervaise stepped into full moonlight and trod silently along the alley towards the junction with the lane.

Baldwyn, just visible to John, kept pace with his master in the shadows under the eaves. He was walking directly towards the immobile Gwyn and inevitably must see him within the next few seconds.

John’s strategic instincts told him that he must give Gwyn the maximum advantage of surprise, so he stepped round the corner and stood in full moonlight, blocking the end of the alley. Simultaneously, he drew his sword with a flourish from its scabbard, the steel grating ominously against the bronze lip of the sheath.

The two escapers were as if struck by lightning. The sudden appearance of their persecutor from nowhere, to stand before them in the ethereal light of a full moon, seemed almost supernatural.

‘Christ!’ screamed Gervaise in terror. He threw away his sword, which hit the nearest wall with a clang. Then he turned tail and ran back round the corner of the alley.

‘Get him, Gwyn!’ roared John, throwing himself forward to chase the fleeing man. But Baldwyn was made of sterner stuff and stepped out to swing a murderous blow at the coroner with his chain mace. If it had connected, the heavy iron ball covered in spikes would have pulped John’s head, even with the protection of the helmet. But Gwyn, his presence in the shadows unsuspected by Baldwyn, leaped forward with a yell and hacked down with his heavy sword on to the hardwood handle of the mace. The short chain that carried the ball swung up and wrapped itself around the sword-blade, preventing Gwyn from making another stroke.

The coroner, who had felt the wind of the mace-head within an inch of his ear, staggered sideways, and before he could recover, the squire from Peter Tavy had snatched up his master’s discarded sword and had jumped back to face them both.

Gwyn’s sword had slid free of the mace-chain, but Baldwyn stood blocking the alley, his mace touching one wall and his sword-point the other. ‘Come then, I’ll have the pair of you!’ he snarled, crouching slightly and swinging the mace-chain menacingly.

‘Get after the other one – I’ll settle this fellow!’ barked Gwyn. In answer Baldwyn, who for all his evil deeds was no coward, took a great swing at both his attackers, the ball whistling across the whole width of the alley, preventing either opponent from getting close to him.

As the studded metal knob began another traverse, Gwyn jumped forward and jabbed his long sword behind it, trying to get Baldwyn’s shoulder as he turned with the swing of the mace. But the man used Gervaise’s discarded sword to parry left-handed, the two blades clashing like a pair of cymbals.

John dodged the mace on its return trip across the lane and, using his massive sword with two hands, slashed down at the squire’s arm. Baldwyn pulled back and the blade bit into the oak stem, knocking the mace out of his hand. The black sphere spun away out of control and struck Gwyn full in the chest. His stiff-leather jerkin blunted the impact of the conical spikes, but the weight and force of the five-pound ball made him fall backwards, dropping his sword as he staggered.

With a delirious whoop of triumph, Baldwyn followed him down, his sword poised for a thrust through the neck. But not for nothing had his adversaries fought together on dozens of battlefields. In a flash John was between them and another two-handed side stroke pushed Baldwyn’s sword high in the air.

The coroner’s blade skidded down the length of Baldwyn’s and stopped with an arm-wrenching thud against the cross-hilt. Even before Gwyn could pick up his own weapon, John de Wolfe had begun Baldwyn’s defeat. Though the younger man managed to get in one downstroke on John’s shoulder, its strength was easily absorbed by the overlapping metal plates. Before the squire could lift his blade again, John had swung horizontally and hacked into the back of his hand. Baldwyn screamed as bones crunched and blood spurted. With a last desperate swing at the coroner’s neck, he left himself open for a straight lunge and the point of John’s sword went into his chest, through a lung and protruded an inch from his back.

Gwyn, now with his retrieved sword pointing at Baldwyn’s neck, said, ‘He’s done for. I’ll see him finished, if you want to find the other.’

As Baldwyn, his lifeblood rapidly filling the inside of his chest, slowly and silently subsided to the ground, the coroner hauled out his sword from between the dying man’s ribs. He kicked the fallen weapon well clear of Baldwyn’s grasp, in case of any final tricks, and sheathed his own bloody blade. ‘See if he has anything to say as a dying confession – I’ll try to find this other bastard. There’s still no sign of the sheriff and his merry men.’ Leaving Gwyn to witness the last moments of Baldwyn of Beer’s life on earth, the coroner loped away up the alley where Gervaise de Bonneville had vanished.

Disturbed by the commotion, a few fearful faces peered from the window-openings of some of the mean huts in this least salubrious part of town, but no one ventured out to offer help. John could hardly blame them: this might have been just another fight between footpads.

The lanes were still deserted and there was no sign of Gervaise, who had a lead of four or five minutes, which was how long it had taken to deal with Baldwyn.

John soon came out on Bell Hill, one of the main cross streets that led to the South Gate, but this was also empty, though now a few windows showed flickering lights as the earliest risers began to crawl out of their beds for the new day. For want of any better direction, the coroner walked up to the major street junction of the city, where the roads to all four main gates crossed at St George’s Church.

Here, at last, he saw half a dozen men-at-arms walking briskly down the road, with the castle constable and a sergeant hurrying behind. He hailed them and told the constable that one fugitive was dead or dying but that the other was still loose in the town. ‘He came up this way, so he’s not in the lower town,’ concluded the coroner.

‘No one crossed the High Street in the last five minutes, for we’ve just come down that way, Sir John,’ added the sergeant.

Ralph Morin, another experienced campaigner, looked up and down the main roads, swinging his naked sword hopefully in his hand. ‘I reckon he’ll most likely be near the cathedral,’ he said, waving an arm beyond the church of St Petroc, which stood on the opposite corner.

The mention of the cathedral caused Ralph, John and the sergeant to look at each other knowingly.

The constable sighed. ‘I’ll bet the swine has claimed sanctuary,’ he said, reluctantly slamming his sword back into its scabbard.