He slid a hand on to her plump thigh, smooth through the green woollen kirtle she wore under a white linen apron. ‘I’ve no time today to warm your bed, more’s the pity, my love. Gwyn will be chasing me before long for this inquest. But I wondered if your sensitive – and very pretty – nose had smelt any intrigues that may have a bearing on this murder. It seems like the work of men who knew what they were about, to make such an attempt to conceal murder as self-destruction.’
The Welsh woman grew serious. ‘I know nothing remotely to do with dead canons, John. But there has been a strange atmosphere abroad these past few weeks, even for a month or two.’
‘What do you mean – strange?’
‘All manner of men come in here, from the city and further afield. From Cornwall going east, and from Southampton and London going west, as well as shipmen from Normandy and Brittany. I listen to all their chatter – many a contract is made in here and not a few dark plots, I’m sure.’
‘What are you trying to say, woman?’
‘Lately, there have been more furtive conversations, ones that break off when you pass their table. And more among the soldiering class, knights, squires and a few mercenaries, who would sell the use of their sword for a couple of marks.’
‘How can you tell, if you can’t hear what they say?’ he objected.
Nesta turned up her hands in supplication. ‘Just a woman’s instinct – or maybe an inn-keeper’s instinct. This doesn’t affect the merchants and workmen but a higher class of customer, especially those who have a sword clanking under the table. Even old Edwin has noticed it, he says. He’s the nosiest man this side of Windsor and he tries to eavesdrop on people’s talk, but he has been warned off more than once.’
‘By whom, for instance?’ persisted the coroner.
‘There are some mercenaries, out-of-work squires, who sometimes pass through. They go to Plymouth or the eastern ports, seeking recruitment for wars in France or even from barons this side of the Channel. One threatened to cut off Edwin’s ears if he persisted in hanging about their table.’
De Wolfe considered this, his black brows lowered in thought. ‘This is interesting, though for different reasons than our deceased canon,’ he murmured. ‘Keep your ears open, Nesta love, this may be a return of the old trouble that afflicts England.’
Chapter Three
In which Crowner John holds an inquest
A few minutes later, de Wolfe was back in the cathedral Close, where Gwyn and Thomas waited for him at the front of the dead canon’s house.
‘There are too many folk to fit inside so I moved the cadaver out into the backyard,’ explained his officer. ‘I’ve laid him on a bier we borrowed from the cathedral porch.’
They walked through the house and out at the kitchen door. Gwyn had taken a chair from the hall and set it against the wooden fence. In the centre of the yard was the bier, a stout wooden stretcher with four legs and handles, on which lay the mortal remains of Robert de Hane, decently covered with a linen bedsheet. In a wide circle around it stood the servants from the house, the vicar-choral, the secondary priest, two choristers and several similar residents from nearby houses.
As John took his solitary seat, a convoy of priests, their black cloaks billowing, hurried down the alleyway from the Close to join the throng. They included the Archdeacon, the Precentor, the Treasurer and half a dozen canons, including the two who had been at the meeting that morning. De Wolfe noticed that the sheriff was not among them: he had no legal obligation to be present.
Gwyn started the proceedings in the traditional way, enjoying his chance to bellow at a group of senior churchmen. ‘All persons having anything to do with the King’s coroner for the county of Devon, draw near and give your attendance!’
The buzz of conversation died down as those present gave their attention to the coroner.
‘This is the inquest into the death of Robert de Hane, lately a canon of this cathedral,’ began de Wolfe formally, his hard voice cutting incisively through the cold air of the winter afternoon. ‘It is not the usual procedure as we are on ecclesiastical ground, which strictly is within the jurisdiction of the Church. However, Bishop Henry Marshal has agreed that whenever there is an unnatural death in the cathedral precincts he will defer to the secular authorities, embodied in the King’s sheriff and coroner.’
He paused to look sideways at Thomas de Peyne, who was squatting on a small stool with a roll of parchment, quill and ink spread on a box before him. ‘Normally, a jury would be gathered from all who might know anything about the death – in the countryside every man above twelve years of age from the Hundred or the four nearest townships should be summoned – though that is often an impossible task. Here we cannot drag half the population of Exeter into the Close, so I will make do with those who may have any information by virtue of their nearness to this house.’
He paused again, to let Thomas write a summary of what he had said, then went on. ‘Where a corpse is found in the countryside it is also usual to demand presentment of Englishry. Here this is pointless, as we all well know the late Robert de Hane for a Norman. And as there is no village or town to amerce for the death of a Norman and as this is Church ground, I will dispense with that aspect.’
‘Not a lot left to say, then,’ murmured Gwyn to himself, under cover of his huge moustache.
The coroner scowled around the expectant throng. ‘Let the First Finder step forward.’
The servant who had discovered the body when he visited the privy the previous night trod hesitantly forward. He described in a few words that at about two hours before midnight he had found the canon hanging by the neck when he pushed open the door. When the shock had passed, he had run to the house and roused the older steward, then they had raced to the adjacent houses to raise the alarm. One of the servants remembered that Thomas de Peyne, the coroner’s clerk, lodged in a nearby house. As they had a vague idea that this new official called the coroner had to be told about sudden deaths, Thomas was sought and he had taken control of the situation.
One by one, the servants from de Hane’s house were called but, as John already knew, there was virtually nothing they could add.
‘He was in his room from about the sixth bell,’ quavered Alfred, the old steward, near to tears at the sight of his master lying still under the sheet in front of him. ‘After that, I didn’t see him again – alive.’
‘Was that at all unusual, for him to stay alone all evening?’ asked the coroner.
‘Not at all, sir. He was a great one for reading and praying, or sometimes writing about his old churches. And he went to bed very early, as he was used to getting up at midnight for matins.’
The other servants all told the same tale, as did Robert de Hane’s vicar-choral and his secondary. De Wolfe avoided the matter of historical research and the canon’s trips into the countryside, as he could not see that the inquest was the place to delve into those. When all who might have had anything useful to say had been heard, he rose from his chair and advanced with Gwyn to the bier.
‘It is necessary for you, the jury, to examine the body, before coming to a verdict based on what you know, what you have heard and what you see on the corpse,’ he said. He nodded to Gwyn, who pulled down the sheet to expose the cadaver as far as the waist. The Cornishman usually flicked off the death shroud to expose the whole body, but de Wolfe had warned him that in the presence of a gaggle of senior cathedral canons, he had better be a little more reverential. Even so, there was a communal sigh as the pallid skin of the dead priest was revealed. Reluctantly, the jury shuffled a step or two nearer at John’s impatient gesture.