The Tinner's corpse

CHAPTER NINE

John de Wolfe wrestled only a short time with his conscience. His rigid sense of duty soon convinced him that both his visit to his mother and the dalliance with the delectable Hilda were now out of the question. One dead tinner from Chagford was mystery enough, but to have two within a week was pushing coincidence too far. The news would have to be taken to Knapman’s family without delay, and investigations would have to be made in earnest. He motioned to Gwyn to step back from the chattering crowd, who fluttered around the body like agitated birds. ‘We must get him away from here and examine him properly. Which direction was this pack train going?’

Gwyn shouted across to one of the men and found that they were bound for Exeter, the panniers of the eight sumpters laden with cloth from a mill at Paignton.

‘They can carry the corpse there for us. If one of the horses has its load shared out among the others, we can lash the body across its back. I’ll even buy a length of their cloth to wrap round it, for decency’s sake.’

Gwyn gave his master one of those looks that de Wolfe had come to recognise as an expression of doubt. ‘Well, what’s wrong with that?’ he asked, with a sigh.

‘These pack trains move awful slow, Crowner. They’ll not be in Exeter until this time tomorrow.’

‘So? Knapman’s in no hurry — he’s dead.’

Gwyn refused to be brushed aside. ‘The body’s been soaking in water a day or so already. By the time he’s bumped along all the way to Exeter tomorrow, he’ll not be that fresh. Shouldn’t we take a look at him now?’

As usual, his henchman was right. But to strip the body here, on a bleak sandbank in full view of the village, was unseemly, even to a hardened character like de Wolfe. Then inspiration came to him. ‘We’ll take him just up the road to Holcombe and use one of my brother’s barns to examine him. Then we can ride on to the city and let these folk take their time bringing him the rest of the way.’

An hour later, they pulled open the tall doors of a wattle and daub farm building at Holcombe, aided by the local manor reeve, who fussed over his master’s brother like a hen with a favourite chick — he had known him from infancy. He was Hilda’s father and was well aware — even secretly approved — of John’s affection for his daughter.

Knapman’s body had been rolled in a length of serge and lashed over the back of a sturdy pony, his head resting on one pannier, his legs on the opposite one. Gwyn untied the corpse and carried it like a baby into the barn, even though the dead Walter was no lightweight. The two hauliers, who rode their own steeds, one at each end of the line of roped pack-horses, waited patiently outside, mollified by the promise of a fee for this funereal transport.

In the barn, which in early spring was virtually empty, the reeve rolled out a small handcart to provide a flat platform for the body. Gwyn laid it down and they stood back to view it carefully.

‘No blood to be seen,’ observed the Cornishman, ‘but he’s been well washed in the river.’

‘Where did your alehouse gossip say he went missing?’

‘Last seen near the mill near Steps Ford on the upper Teign.’

‘The same river, certainly. He must have been washed down twenty miles or more — but it’s been in full spate after that cloudburst.’

De Wolfe looked at the pallid face, the skin soggy and peeling in places. But the expression was calm enough, giving the lie to the nonsense about contortions of fear and agony remaining after death. His experience of hundreds of corpses on the battlefields of Europe and the Levant had long ago disabused him of that fable.

He moved to the side of the cart and pulled up the half-open eyelids to examine the whites of the eyes. The globes were already softened and partly collapsed, but there were no blood spots to suggest throttling. Some fragments of grass floated out of the corners of the eyes as the water drained away and John pulled down the lids to blanket the sightless stare. ‘Nothing around the neck, no marks of a rope or throttling fingers,’ he commented, as Gwyn and the reeve watched him pull aside the neck of the brown tunic.

‘Could he have been thrown from his horse, perhaps?’ asked the reeve who, as an old retainer, was bold enough to ask questions of the man he once knew as a child.

‘Quite possibly, it happens often enough,’ conceded de Wolfe, though he thought that it didn’t happen that often to folk who have just lost an employee through murder. He motioned to Gwyn to go round to the other side of the cart, and together they began to remove Knapman’s clothing.

‘One boot missing, but that’s common enough in drowned men, both in sea or river,’ boomed Gwyn, who, as a former fisherman, considered himself an expert on waterlogged corpses.

They removed Knapman’s broad leather belt and de Wolfe picked up the purse slung from it. There was a chink of coins and when he opened it, a handful of silver pennies and a small gold crucifix tumbled out. ‘Doesn’t look like a robbery. No outlaw or footpad would leave these behind,’ he remarked.

They hauled the long brown tunic over the head, having to fight the stiffness of death to free the arms from the sleeves. Underneath, Knapman wore a shirt of fine linen and a pair of worsted breeches tied around the waist with a drawstring.

‘Nothing on the front of him, apart from these scrapes and scratches,’ grunted the coroner’s officer.

‘That happened after death, I’m sure — no bruises or blood under the edges of the rips. All done against rocks and tree trunks, rolling down the river.’

De Wolfe moved to the head and felt with his long fingers among the thick wet mop of hair. When they reached the back point of the scalp, they stopped abruptly. ‘Ah, here we have it. The head is cracked like an egg.’ The reeve, bending to peer more closely, jerked back when he heard the grating crepitation of bone fragments rubbing together as de Wolfe massaged the rear of the skull.

‘So he might have taken a heavy fall, Sir John?’ The manor servant was keen to promote his theory.

‘He might, indeed. It’s a long way down from a big stallion, especially if you land on a rock.’

John’s presumption of foul play was starting to waver a little, but it was soon revived when Gwyn hauled the body over on to its face.

‘What have we here, Crowner?’ he bellowed, almost gleefully, pointing with a massive forefinger at a red mark running diagonally across the back between the shoulder-blades.

De Wolfe hunched over the corpse, to peer down at the pale, macerated skin. There was no purplish-red livor mortis due to the sinking of blood, because the body had been constantly rolled and twisted by the currents. But a clear double track of red bruising ran from the back of the right shoulder across the spine for a distance of four hand spans, fading away below the lower edge of the left shoulder-blade. The two lines ran parallel, with a clear central zone the width of a thumb between them.

The reeve gave an amateur but accurate description. ‘Looks as if someone has dipped two fingers in blackberry juice and drawn them across his back,’ he said.

The coroner and his henchman looked at each other across the corpse, their eyes meeting in silent agreement.

‘Struck with a staff, no doubt about it,’ observed Gwyn, in a satisfied voice.

‘Maybe he did come off his horse, like the reeve says — but he didn’t fall, he was knocked off,’ concluded John. ‘It takes quite a blow to leave a clear track like that.’

The rest of the examination revealed nothing and the coroner stood back while Gwyn and the reeve rolled the body back into its makeshift shroud. De Wolfe gave instructions to the hauliers to deliver it to the castle at Exeter, then he and his officer mounted their horses and trotted away, retracing the route they had taken only a few hours earlier.

As they passed through Dawlish, de Wolfe reined in and looked longingly up the street alongside the creek, where he could just see the arcaded front of Thorgils’ new stone house.

‘Are you stopping here for a rest, Crowner?’ asked Gwyn, with a false air of innocence.

De Wolfe debated with himself as to whether he should call in, even if only to explain why he couldn’t keep his promised assignation with Hilda that night. But he knew he would be tempted to stay with her, then fail to get back to the city before the gates were closed at curfew. With a grunt, he touched Odin reluctantly with his heels and set off again along the coast road.

The return of a leaden sky made the approach of dusk even earlier as the coroner and his officer rode through the West Gate that evening. De Wolfe sent Gwyn ahead up Fore Street, hoping that he would go home to his wife and children rather than to the nearest alehouse, then turned right to follow inside the city wall to the storehouses and dwellings near the Watergate. The narrow lane was congested even at this late hour with handcarts, hawkers’ stalls, beggars and a multitude of gossiping residents, some poring over the wares of the chapmen who trudged the roads of England, selling trifles from the bundles on their backs.

At the bottom of Priest Street, where the overflow of vicars and secondaries from the cathedral lodged, he asked directions from a porter resting on a huge bale of wool he was lugging from the fulling mills on Exe Island. ‘Matthew Knapman, the tin-merchant? You’re right outside it, Crowner.’

Looking up at the corner house, de Wolfe saw a stone building that contrasted with the timber or cob dwellings on either side. Tin was a valuable and portable commodity, so presumably the Knapmans felt the need for a more thief-proof storehouse than the often ramshackle buildings in the lower part of town. His deduction was strengthened when he saw that there were no window openings on the lower floor, only a stout oak door set in the flattened face of the house where the two streets met. Another larger gate was set in an arch around the corner, big enough to admit carts to the yard when tin was being transported.

John slid down from Odin’s high saddle and tied the reins to a ring set in the wall. He went to the door and beat upon it with the hilt of his dagger, regretting that he had such bad tidings to deliver.

Soon he heard feet clattering downstairs, then a voice shouted a challenge from inside. Bending his head to the door, he called in reply, ‘Sir John de Wolfe, the King’s coroner.’

The heavy oak creaked open a short way and a face appeared. The young man was slim and dark, with a black, down-curving moustache that gave him a somewhat Moorish appearance. The coroner remembered seeing him about the city, but had no idea who he was.

‘Does Matthew Knapman live here?’ he asked.

‘He does, sir. I am Peter Jordan, his … his nephew.’

The slight hesitation told de Wolfe that this was a convenient rather than an accurate description of the relationship. The door opened wider, to reveal Jordan as a slim man in his twenties, well but soberly dressed. He wore a leather apron and gauntlets of the same material, and explained, ‘I help Matthew with his trade. We have been shifting bar tin to the warehouse on the quay, to make room for the new coinage from Chagford, due in the next few days.’

‘It is Chagford that brings me here. I need to speak urgently to Matthew — and if you are his nephew, you must also be present.’

Silently, Peter Jordan stood back to allow de Wolfe inside. Already, the coroner felt a tension he recognised from many previous such encounters: the visit of a senior law officer could never mean anything but trouble or sorrow.

The gloomy ground floor was stacked with hundreds of what looked like irregular grey bricks. As the young man led the way to a flight of wide steps to the upper floor, he waved a hand at the piles of dull metal. ‘These are the crude bars, awaiting the second smelting.’ The unnecessary information seemed like a nervous diversion to cover his anxiety at the coroner’s appearance.

Upstairs was a marked contrast to the commercial lower floor. Doors led from a landing into a large living hall on the left and what seemed to be a pair of bedrooms or solars on the right. Presumably the kitchens, laundry and privy were in the yard behind.

Jordan rapped perfunctorily on a draught screen behind the hall door and led de Wolfe into a well-furnished room with a fire burning in a hearth at the further end. ‘Matthew, the crowner has called upon us. He wishes to speak to you.’

He stood aside and John walked forward to meet the tin-merchant, who rose from a settle near the fire. Opposite was the stout lady with the drooping lip he had seen with Matilda at St Olave’s a few days earlier. They both looked apprehensive at his appearance, though after more than six months in the job he was getting used to this reaction to his presence. Immediately Matthew guessed the reason for his visit. ‘You have news of Walter.’ It was a statement rather than a question. The appearance of a coroner, rather than a bailiff or a sheriff’s man, could have only one interpretation. ‘Where did you find him?’ he added flatly.

De Wolfe explained the circumstances in his sonorous voice, and Matthew’s wife began to sniff and cross herself, reminding John of Thomas and his troubles. Matthew said nothing, but sat John down and busied himself with a wine flask and some cups. Jordan remained standing behind them, almost forgotten until the merchant handed him a pewter cup of red wine.

‘Walter was Peter’s stepfather, you know,’ he said, in a strangled voice. ‘He was married before to the widow of one of his tinners. Peter’s father was killed in stream-works when the lad was only eight. Walter married Bridgid, but she passed away from the phthisis three years ago.’

De Wolfe gave one of his throaty noises, which might have meant anything from deepest sympathy to sheer disbelief. He wanted to get back to the nature of the death. ‘You realise that your brother was murdered?’ he said bluntly. ‘He was struck on the back, probably hurled from his horse. Either he fell to his death or might have been hit on the head deliberately. Whatever it was, it was no accident.’

Mistress Knapman’s snivels became louder, but no one took any notice.

‘I rode back from Chagford this morning,’ quavered Matthew. ‘I stayed until dark last night helping to search the roads between there and Dunsford — and again this morning on my way back. All Walter’s house servants and many of his tinners were beating the verges and woods, but there was nothing. No wonder! The poor fellow was floating down the Teign by then.’ He wrung his hands and paced back and forth before his glowing hearth. ‘Who can have done this awful thing? Was it just trail-bastons or chance outlaws? Yet he was big man, able to defend himself, unless he was outnumbered.’

Peter Jordan spoke for the first time since de Wolfe had broken the news. ‘What of the killing of Henry of Tunnaford? Is this not likely to be connected? There have been many incidents lately, damage to the workings and now two deaths.’

John turned to face the younger man, who had been standing behind him. ‘Did you see your stepfather often, lad?’

Jordan shook his head. ‘Not lately, sir. Three years ago, after my mother died, I came to Exeter to work with Matthew here. It was a convenient arrangement between all of us. I was to learn the trade of selling what my stepfather produced.’

John peered at him from under his black brows. ‘Did you get on well with him?’

‘I did indeed. He was good to me after my real father died. He cared for my mother when she was widowed and much regretted her death, I am sure.’

To the coroner’s suspicious ear, he had left something unsaid. ‘What about his second wife? Did you approve of the marriage?’

Peter Jordan shrugged indifferently. ‘It was none of my business. Walter was not my natural father, so what he did was his affair. I admit I am not fond of her, for I think she is a selfish woman who married him only for his wealth — but as I rarely see her, it is of no consequence.’

He seemed to have a maturity beyond his years, and what he said seemed reasonable enough. De Wolfe turned back to Matthew and his wife, whose sniffing had subsided, although she still stared at him from watery eyes. ‘Your brother’s body should arrive in the city in the morning.’ He thought it kinder not to add that it was being brought on a sumpter train, slung over a pony like a dead sheep. ‘I will have it rested in St Mary’s Chapel in Rougement, but I presume you and your family will require its burial in Chagford, Walter’s home.’

Matthew nodded. His normally ruddy face was pale. He rapidly refilled the wine cups and drained his at a gulp. ‘I will have to talk to Joan, his wife, but no doubt he will be buried at St Michael’s, which he largely built with his own money.’

De Wolfe finished his wine and stood up, hovering over Matthew and Peter like a black crane. ‘There will have to be an inquest, but I will hold that in Chagford when the body gets there, a day or two hence. You will no doubt arrange for some conveyance for it as soon as possible.’

He made for the door, followed by the two men. As he descended the steps, he turned for a last question. ‘Has either of you any notion why someone should have wanted Walter Knapman dead?’

There was a momentary silence, then Matthew spoke. ‘In the tin trade there is intense rivalry. This business of the headless overman and now Walter’s death must surely be connected. There is at least one other tin-master who envied Walter his success. And Walter made some enemies in his campaign to have a Lord Warden elected by the tinners themselves.’

Peter, his face stony, was more forthright. ‘Let us not beat about the bush, Matthew. Everyone knows Stephen Acland had his eyes not only on my stepfather’s trade but also on his new wife. He’s welcome to her, as far as I’m concerned, but maybe he is not too displeased that Walter is dead.’

John de Wolfe went home with a mild sensation of self-righteousness, twisted logic persuading him that his conscience was clear.

First, he had told Matilda that morning that he would be away for yet another night, ostensibly visiting his family in Stoke, yet here he was, back early, yearning for her company. It would be too much to ask that he might surprise her in the arms of another man — even the fat priest of St Olave’s — but now she could hardly scold him for not being away from home.

Second, he almost convinced himself that he had resisted the charms of Hilda, rather than having had his adulterous assignation cancelled by circumstances. It was a pity that he could not let Nesta know about it, though he could hardly gain credit for having to miss a passionate session with her rival.

In Martin’s Lane, he found that his wife was not entertaining a lover — indeed, she greeted him with a sour face and the immediate announcement that she was going out to visit her cousin in Goldsmith Street. As Lucille smirked in the background, holding Matilda’s mantle, de Wolfe managed to grab his wife’s attention with the story of Knapman’s murder and his visit to Matthew’s house.

‘I must go in the morning and comfort his poor wife,’ Matilda announced firmly. For a moment, de Wolfe thought she meant she would travel to Chagford to see Joan, but it was her fellow churchwoman, the wife of Matthew, whom she would visit.

‘It will give me an opportunity to see their house,’ Matilda went on. ‘I hear that Matthew Knapman lavishes his wealth on his furnishings and his wife.’ She bestowed a poisonous look on her parsimonious husband, before she swept out with the French maid in her wake.

It was now almost dark and de Wolfe sat by his fire for a while, with a quart of ale and the adoring Brutus for company, until Mary bustled in with a meal for him. She brought thick slices of lean bacon, called ‘collops’, with four hen’s eggs fried in butter and a small loaf, half of which he ate after the meat, smeared with honey still brittle with the wax of the comb.

Secure in the knowledge that Matilda was away for an hour or two, Mary sat on the bench opposite while he ate, keeping out of range of his searching fingers under the table. However, she was still quite willing to gossip and was always intrigued by John’s latest cases. After he had recounted the dramatic events around Chagford, she added a few snippets of her own concerning some of the participants. Like Nesta — and, indeed, Matilda — she picked up much intelligence about Exeter’s citizens from other house-servants and stallholders in the markets.

‘That Matthew, the tin-merchant, he keeps the vintners rich, they say. His nose tells you what his staple food must be! A good job he can afford it.’

‘Matilda was goading me about how much he spends on his house and his wife — not that I noticed it when I was in there.’

He tucked into his collops as she answered. ‘Plenty of money there — though some tap their noses when you mention it and say that he’s almost the equal of the sheriff when it comes to embezzlement.’

De Wolfe’s dagger paused midway to his mouth, a boiled onion skewered to its tip. ‘He has a reputation for that, has he? I thought he was in partnership with his brother, the dead Walter.’

Mary shrugged her robust shoulders. ‘It’s just gossip — but usually, where there’s smoke there’s fire. That nephew of his who assists him seems honest enough — a good-looking boy, too,’ she added appreciatively.

‘Peter Jordan — I met him tonight. No doubt you’ve also got some tittle-tattle about him?’

Mary wrinkled her nose at him. ‘Not at all, though I wonder where he got that swarthy complexion if his father was a local tanner. Maybe his mother met a Crusader one dark night.’

De Wolfe made a sarcastic catcall, then recalled that the brunette Mary was herself the offspring of a Saxon serving-woman and an unknown soldier who had remained only for the conception.

She took no offence and went on with her chatter. ‘But I don’t know how a good-looking young man like him came to marry Martha Courteman. She’s like the mistress, only much younger, begging your pardon, Sir John. A stuck-up, miserable snob. Her father is that lawyer, Robert Courteman.’

De Wolfe was not interested in the further ramifications of the Knapman family, though he knew the lawyer, who had been the unenthusiastic advocate in the Appeal that week.

Sensing his lack of interest, Mary changed the subject. ‘I’m worried about Thomas, poor little man,’ she said forcefully. ‘He comes round to my hut now and then for some decent food. He’s half starved on the pittance you pay him.’

‘Is it his diet that concerns you, then?’ he asked facetiously.

‘It’s his mind that worries me. He’s getting more and more miserable, turning in on himself these past weeks. What’s wrong with him?’

John explained the problem and related how he had interceded with the Archdeacon on his clerk’s behalf. Mary smiled as she rose and planted a quick kiss on his rough cheek. ‘You’re a good-hearted man, Sir Crowner. Finish your victuals and get yourself down to the Bush while you’ve got the chance. I hear that you’re in bad odour down there, so make your peace before it’s too late.’

After she had left with the empty platters, he reflected that the gossip grapevine must reach into every house and tavern in the city. He touched his cheek where Mary had kissed him and mused on how the master-servant relationship was altered by a few tumbles in the kitchen-shed.