The Sticklepath Strangler

Chapter Eleven

Reeve Alexander sat in his hall for a long time after Drogo had left. He heard the Forester greet his men outside, their laughter, then the sound of their booted feet fading away in the distance. He was just about to shout for his maid and a fresh jug of wine, when he heard more steps in the screens.

‘Who the devil is it now?’ he wondered aloud, grimly staring at the gap which gave onto the passage. Then: ‘Ivo? What do you want?’

Bel walked in smiling and went straight to Alexander’s table, taking his seat at the end. ‘Hello, Reeve. I was surprised at the inquest today. Were you?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘The skeleton. Hadn’t it shrunk?’

‘If you want to talk in riddles, man, bugger off. I’m not in the mood for stupidity today.’

‘Very well. I shall speak to the Coroner instead then, or the Keeper. It’s nothing to me. I was just wondering how that girl could have been found in that grave today.’

‘You’re drunk!’

The smile vanished from Bel’s face. ‘I’ll take no more shit from you, Reeve, and that’s your only warning. You’ve accused me of stupidity and drunkenness; now I’ll accuse you of murder.’

Alexander sputtered angrily. ‘Murder! You primping sodomite! Get out of here! You have the nerve, the ballocks to come in here and accuse me, the Reeve, of–’

‘Cool yourself, Reeve. I saw you – you and the good Forester – both walking up the hill with a man’s body and a shovel. Yes, I watched you, both of you, digging a hole, throwing the man into the pit, covering him and returning to the vill. Do you remember that night?’

Reeve Alexander kept his face neutral. ‘You were dreaming.’

‘That’s better. A measured response. Yes, I am happier with that. Now, I return to my first question: how did the man’s body become a girl’s? Interesting. Perhaps one of the men who buried the man also buried the girl – and that would mean that one of you was also the vampire, wouldn’t it?’

‘Perhaps it was the man who watched the burial who was the murderer?’ Alexander said coldly.

‘Perhaps.’ Bel sat back easily and picked at a sliver of meat between his teeth. ‘But if all I wanted to do was see you hanged, I’d have gone to see the Coroner, wouldn’t I?’

‘So what do you want with me?’ Alexander demanded. This shit could see him dumped in gaol with what he knew.

Bel leaned forward, his long face staring intently at the Reeve’s. ‘What I want is to see that the felon is caught,’ he said quietly. ‘And we know who the culprit is, don’t we? That nasty fellow, Thomas Garde.’

‘But he’s your brother!’ Alexander protested.

Bel ignored him. ‘I want him accused, I want him imprisoned, and I want him dead.’

‘I can’t do that. I have no authority.’

‘You are the Reeve.’ Bel stood, dropping a purse of coins on the table. ‘There you are. Plenty to cover the cost of someone who suddenly remembers seeing Thomas killing the girls.’

Alexander groaned and cast a look at the wall in a gesture of theatrical disbelief. ‘Bel, even if I wanted to, Thomas wasn’t here when the first two died. He was still living in France.’

‘Where there’s a will…’ Ivo patted the purse. ‘I would hate the Coroner to come to the conclusion that you had done it. Oh, and I’d be grateful if you could talk to William Taverner. I believe he has been thinking of telling me to leave his inn and I don’t want that. Right! Well, I’m glad the murders are resolved at last. It’ll be a weight off your mind, I know.’

Chuckling to himself, he walked from the room, Alexander’s eyes following him to the screens. When the door shut behind him, the Reeve picked up the purse and weighed it in his hands, shouting for wine.

By the time Cecilia rushed in, her master was sitting shaking with silent mirth, and when he saw her pour his wine, he began to laugh out loud, tears falling from his eyes.

Not only had he been given a felon, someone to be convicted, handed to him on a plate, he had even been given the money to pay for his conviction! It was only a shame that Thomas couldn’t actually have done the murders.

But, as Alexander reflected, wiping the tears from his eyes, you couldn’t have everything.

Coroner Roger stood at the foot of the millstream and watched grimly as four peasants manhandled the body from the water. One day only had he been here – and now he had not only Aline’s death to sort out, but also those of Denise, Ansel the King’s Purveyor, and now another dead man to cater for as well.

There was nothing suspicious about this last death. Simon had already learned that the victim was Samson atte Mill, the screaming woman his wife Gunilda, and the younger woman with her their daughter Felicia. Coroner Roger knew plenty of cases where a miller had fallen into his own gears or millpond. Death from the paddles of his own mill was a common end for a miller. It was good to know that Sir Baldwin was at his side, for the knight was an excellent questioner, and yet Sir Baldwin remained mute as he watched. It served to confirm the Coroner’s opinion that the case was a simple matter.

The Parson was already at the side of the water, mumbling his words like a good priest, although it sounded as though he was slurring most of them. He was clearly drunk. It was a miracle he could stand without toppling. Roger looked meaningfully at Simon, who nodded resignedly, taking Gervase’s scrip and setting out ink and reeds and paper.

As the body was dragged from the water, the witnesses peered with interest. There was a dry retching and a boy of some twelve years fell to his knees and spewed. It wasn’t a surprise. Not many lads his age would have seen a man so mutilated.

The left side of the miller’s face was fine, but the right was a bloody mess. A long flap of skin had been peeled away from his scalp, like a skinned sheep’s head, and now dangled above his ear. Coroner Roger gave him a cursory once-over, but it was clear enough that the man was dead. There was no sign of movement at his breast, no breath, and his eyes were still and unfocused.

‘I am Coroner to the King, and I declare that this inquest into the death of…’ he glanced enquiringly towards Simon, who called clearly: ‘Samson atte Mill.’

‘… Samson atte Mille, is opened. Are all the men of over twelve years here?’

The Reeve stepped forward reluctantly. ‘They are all here, but couldn’t this wait until you decide the matter of Aline, daughter of Swetricus? We have our work in the fields to get on with and–’

‘Bearing in mind I have yet to decide on the fine to impose on you for concealing the death of Denise, daughter of Peter atte Moor, I’m surprised at your suggestion that I should delay this inquest,’ Coroner Roger thundered, and was glad to see that the Reeve bowed his head, abashed. Good, he thought. Just wait until I question you about Mary as well, you lying turd! ‘Now, who was the Finder?’

‘Samson’s wife, Gunilda,’ Alexander said more quietly. He cast Roger a pleading look, as if to beg that the Coroner would not be too harsh with the woman.

Coroner Roger made no sign that he had seen Alexander’s expression, but he didn’t miss its significance. He had no wish to make the woman suffer. ‘Mistress Gunilda, would you come forward?’

She could only walk supported by two other women, and as she was taken through her evidence, she turned regularly to them, weeping. The Coroner was calm and almost gentle with her. At his side, scribbling odd notes on the parchment, Simon thought he was seeing a new side to Roger, a more kindly aspect. Simon knew him to be a good companion in a tavern, an astute questioner who was keen to ensure not only that justice was seen to be done, but also that any infractions of the law were spotted so that fines could be levied, but seeing him cautiously question the widow of a man while her husband’s corpse lay before her, Simon thought the Coroner behaved with great sensitivity.

Gunilda was not a prepossessing sight. Short and sturdy, her peasant stock was plain in the squareness of her face, the coarseness of her features, the large, masculine hands. Yet for all that, she showed little of a serf’s fortitude. Instead her frame was racked with sobs as the Coroner prised from her the details of her man’s death. There was a bruise at the side of her face, an angry, painful-looking mark.

One of the women upon whom she leaned was the one Bel had been watching at the inquest earlier. She appeared anxious for the feelings of Gunilda, giving the Coroner a pleading look when she thought his questions too pointed or unsympathetic. It made Simon warm to her.

Samson had been worried about a grumbling from the main axle of the wheel for some weeks, Gunilda said, but he hadn’t bothered to do anything about it because there wasn’t much work coming in yet, not until the grain was harvested. Now, with the harvest soon to begin, he had decided to get on with the maintenance.

‘He was working on the machine?’ Coroner Roger asked.

With much wailing and many declarations that he ought not to have done so with the wheel still turning, but should have stopped the water at the sluice first, Gunilda agreed that he was. ‘I wouldn’t have thought he’d fall. I saw him lean over to reach the bearings with his hand full of grease. Then…’

‘How did he reach it?’ Roger asked, glancing at the wheel. It was massive, at least five feet in diameter, far too big for a man to reach over.

‘From that window,’ she said, pointing. There was a small hole in the wall with no shutter to close it, almost concealed behind the wheel itself. ‘He leaned out, and he was slapping the grease onto the axle when he slipped.’ There were more tears, but then she sniffed hard. ‘He tried to reach up with his hand to save himself, but it was filled with grease, and he couldn’t hold himself. He… he fell, and I saw the wheel come around and…’

‘That’s enough, mistress. I am sorry about your loss,’ the Coroner said. ‘Has anyone anything else to add?’

Simon cast an eye over the waiting people, but there was no movement. Nobody stepped forward to speak. Baldwin was silent, although Simon saw his attention was fixed on the woman with faint puzzlement.

‘Was no one else near when he fell?’ the Coroner asked again. ‘No? In that case I shall declare that I am certain that there was no crime here. Misadventure. How much is the wheel worth?’

The men before him shuffled their feet and looked at each other, and then Alexander, with a face like a man who had bitten into a crabapple thinking it was a pear, suggested, ‘Perhaps tuppence? It’s a very old wheel.’

Simon kept his face blank, and when he glanced about him, he saw that Baldwin was studiously avoiding his eye, and Simon knew he too was close to laughter. The amount was derisory: utterly unrealistic.

‘Would you say so?’ the Coroner asked jovially. ‘But surely not! Look at it, the wood in places is still quite green, isn’t it? Fresh timbers, I’d think. Do you really mean to tell me that this magnificent wheel is ancient?’

‘Perhaps it is not terribly old,’ the Reeve amended. ‘But then it can only be worth a little more. It is not a very large wheel.’

‘Eight pennies, and think yourself lucky I don’t demand a shilling,’ Coroner Roger said, losing interest in the process of haggling. ‘Does the jury agree?’

There was grumbling and several black looks, but the noise died when the Reeve gloomily nodded his head.

‘Good. I am glad that at least this has been cleared up,’ Coroner Roger said. He shot a look at the drunken priest. ‘I would suggest that he be buried as soon as possible, in this heat.’

It was as the crowd parted, slouching off back to the fields and gardens, that Simon saw her again. Nicole Garde had left the grieving miller’s wife, and now held Joan by the hand. Baldwin and the Coroner had already set off back to the vill’s inn, but Simon wandered over to speak to them.

‘Hello again,’ he said.

Joan peered up at him expressionlessly.

‘Sir?’ Nicole said.

‘I am called Simon Puttock, my lady. I met your daughter near the river earlier.’

Nicole gave her daughter a long, steady stare. ‘I thought I told you never to talk to strangers on the roadway, did I not? Ah, you never use the brains you were born with!’

‘Is something wrong, Nicky?’

Simon found himself being confronted by a tall man with sparse dark hair and a narrow, suspicious face. He was reminded of Ivo Bel. Both men had long faces, the same nose, and deepset, rather intense eyes, but there the similarity ended. This man looked like he had a more open, genial temperament. Unless, apparently, he found another man talking to his wife. He snarled, ‘Who are you?’

‘Please, Thomas, do not be concerned. Our daughter was talking to him, up on those moors.’

‘I wasn’t on the moors,’ Joan protested.

‘Enough!’ she said, giving her daughter a shake. ‘You spoke – it is enough. You should not, and that you know.’

‘I didn’t see her on the moor,’ Simon explained, pointing. ‘It was on the road here, and she didn’t talk to me – I spoke to her.’

‘Oh, yes? And why’d you want to do that, then?’ the man asked suspiciously.

‘You are Bel, aren’t you?’ Simon stated.

He had intended to throw the man off-balance, and was pleased that his ploy worked. The fellow’s eyes narrowed, and there was a fresh wariness about him.

‘That was my name once; no more.’

‘What name do you use now?’

‘I am called Thomas Garde, and this is my wife Nicole – and now you know who we are, who are you, and why are you so interested in us?’

‘I am Bailiff of Lydford Castle, and I’m here to help the Coroner. When I saw your daughter, I asked her about finding the body. That is all – apart from your brother.’

‘What about him?’

Simon surveyed him with interest. It was obvious that he had touched a raw nerve, because Thomas’s face blanched and he cast a quick look at his wife. ‘Nothing, except that he is here.’

‘Is this true?’ Thomas demanded of his wife. ‘Is he here?’

‘Yes,’ she nodded, her face downcast. ‘I did not want to tell you this. I did not think it was necessary to worry you.’

‘I haven’t seen him. Where’s he staying?’

Simon said mildly, ‘I don’t see why you should be so bothered about him being here.’

‘That’s none of your business,’ Thomas snapped.

‘I’m helping the Coroner. I can make sure it’s his business, if you want.’

Thomas scowled, and he would have spoken, but his wife touched his arm. She looked up at him appealingly, and he gave an exasperated snort. ‘Oh, very well, Nicky!’

‘My husband married me when we were in France,’ Nicole said.

‘I had noticed your accent,’ Simon said with a half bow to her. She returned his smile, but weakly, as though there was little enough to smile about.

Thomas took up their story. ‘At the time I was in the service of a nobleman in Gascony, but he died and his son had no place for me in his household. Still, we parted on good terms, and he gave me a purse to remember his father. With it I bought a little parcel of land here and our pigs. All my father’s property fell to my brother. I had nothing.’

‘I see. And that caused friction between you and your brother?’

‘No. Ivo took everything, but he still wasn’t satisfied. He’s a grasping, selfish man who has always taken what he desired. When I returned from France with my wife, he tried to persuade her to leave me and become his whore. He couldn’t believe I could give her a life to compare with living with him as his prostitute.’

‘It was brave of you to leave your home and come all the way here, my Lady,’ Simon said.

‘It was not so very hard.’

‘I will find my brother,’ Thomas said. ‘he must be at the inn. Nicky, go back to the house. If he turns up, tell him to leave. I don’t want him pestering you again.’

‘Yes, Husband.’

Thomas looked as though he was going to say more to Simon, but after studying him balefully for a while, he spun on his heel and marched through the mud towards the inn.

Nicole sighed. ‘He is a good man, but his brother offended him greatly, I think.’

‘I can quite understand your husband’s feelings,’ Simon said. ‘What’s that?’

There was a howling from some sheds at the edge of the cemetery. Nicole barely glanced towards them. ‘Samson’s hounds. They are mourning their master’s death.’

‘Let’s get away from this miserable place,’ Simon muttered.

‘You see,’ the Frenchwoman continued as they left the mill, ‘it was not so very easy for Thomas to marry me.’ She let go of her daughter’s hand. ‘Emma is over there, why don’t you go to her?’

‘I played with her all afternoon,’ Joan protested.

‘And morning, too. You think I don’t guess? Now, go!’

Once her daughter was out of earshot, Nicole continued quietly, ‘You see, where I lived, my father was the executioner. The people of the town loathed him. And me.’

‘I see!’ Simon breathed. No one wanted to continue the line of a murderous bastard like an official executioner, nor would anybody want to sleep with a woman born to such a man. Well, Simon wouldn’t, anyway. It was repugnant.

She caught his tone; she must be used to hearing revulsion in people’s voices. ‘Thomas was the only man who treated me like a woman. He did not care, you see, what other men said. All he cared about was that he loved me, and that I loved him. That was all. I could never betray his trust in me. His love. That was why I was so shocked when Ivo asked me to leave Thomas for him.’

‘I don’t know that it is so surprising,’ Simon said gallantly.

‘It was so confusing. Ivo was staying with us, and he made me his offer while Tom was working.’ She gave a snort and wouldn’t meet Simon’s eye as she said, ‘He wanted to buy me, like a milch cow or a dog. It was a simple transaction. And he had no thought for his brother, whom he would be betraying – whom he asked me to betray! No, he just expected me to fall at his feet and agree because he had money.’

‘You refused.’

‘Of course. I was married to a good man who loved me, and this other offered to buy me. It was contemptible.’

‘Your daughter told me that the Warrener said they argued about vampires,’ Simon said tentatively.

‘Vampires?’ she repeated, shooting him an amused glance. ‘I expect Serlo thought it was kinder to scare Joan than tell her that her uncle wanted to steal her mother.’

Simon sighed. ‘Yes, of course.’

Her humour faded. ‘The worst of it is, now I think Ivo hates Tom so much, he would do anything to destroy him and win me.’