‘You’ve deigned to come home at last, have you?’ a high, hard-edged voice snapped. Matilda was huddled against the draughts with a woollen shawl over her kirtle. ‘You stay away for two days and a night with no message for me whatsoever. How am I supposed to know where you are and when you’ll be back?’
‘Does it matter?’ he grunted. ‘You’d never have a meal waiting. If it wasn’t for Mary, I’d starve to death in this miserable house.’
‘That’s what serving-girls are for, you fool. Though perhaps you can find other uses for them, that Saxon included!’
For a moment, he thought she meant Hilda, whom he hoped was still unknown to his wife – but then he realised that her remark had been directed at Mary, whose mother was a native.
‘You’ve been in every tavern in Devon, I suppose, since I last saw you.’
This rankled with de Wolfe, as he had not set foot in an inn since Christ Mass. ‘I have been to see two dead outlaws, then stayed with my family, held an inquest and then travelled home.’ He reversed the order of the inquest and his visit to Stoke to account for the time spent that day, but whatever he said, Matilda would use it as grounds for complaint.
She ranted on for a few more minutes, managing to get in a few spiteful remarks about his family, then grudgingly gave him a message. ‘That evil little clerk you employ is sitting in the kitchen, as far as I know. He came here two hours ago, pestering us to know where you were. He says he has an urgent message for you – though what can ever be urgent in your business is quite beyond my understanding.’
Eager both to escape her and to hear what Thomas de Peyne had to say, de Wolfe loped away to the vestibule and turned down the earth-floored passageway to the backyard. In the lean-to shanty on the left, which was both the kitchen and Mary’s home, he found his crooked clerk perched on a stool. He was eating heartily, for the motherly Mary, suspecting that the little ex-cleric was half-starved, was stuffing him with good food.
When Thomas saw his master, he gulped the last mouthful and slid off the low stool next to the cooking fire. ‘Crowner, I have some news from the Close. Canon Roger de Limesi’s vicar came to me this afternoon at his master’s behest. The man Fulford has sought Langton, and demanded that he hand over the parchment that reveals the site of the main treasure. He threatens to kill de Limesi if he fails to deliver it. The canon does not know what to do, as he has no such document, as we know.’
The coroner adjusted his mind to this new and unexpected turn of events. ‘Does the Archdeacon know of this?’
Thomas nodded. ‘The canon went directly to see him, in fear for his life. I think the Archdeacon is awaiting your return to discuss what is to be done.’
De Wolfe rasped a hand thoughtfully over his chin, the stubble now well overdue for attention. ‘Go to the Close, arrange for Roger de Limesi and his vicar to attend upon John de Alencon at his house at the seventh hour, then go to the Archdeacon and say that we will all be there at that time.’
The little clerk hurried away self-importantly, and the coroner turned to Mary, who had been silently listening to these exchanges.
‘I’ll have something to eat out here, my girl. The atmosphere in the hall is colder than an easterly gale.’
He failed to mention that he did not feel like going to the Bush for a meal that night: there, he would have to meet the landlady’s eye after his visit to Dawlish that day.
The Archdeacon lived in Canons’ Row in the same way as many of his fellow prebendaries. Among the twenty-four priests some had specific appointments and duties, but this gave them no special privileges. There were four archdeacons – John de Alencon for Exeter itself, the others for Cornwall, Totnes and Barnstaple. There were also the Precentor and the Treasurer, but all had similar houses and lifestyles, either in the Close or in houses elsewhere in the city.
De Alencon, named after the town in Normandy from where his family originated, resided in the second house in the Close from St Martin’s church, almost within a stone’s throw from the coroner’s dwelling. After he had finished a hot, filling meal quickly provided by Mary, de Wolfe had made a token visit to the hall to emphasise to Matilda that he was going out on duty, to meet senior members of her beloved priesthood.
He walked across to the Close and found Thomas waiting for him, shivering in his thin cloak outside the Archdeacon’s house. Inside, Roger de Limesi and his vicar Eric Langton were already there, both looking subdued and uneasy. Indeed, the canon was afraid for his very life after the murder of de Hane and the threats of Giles Fulford.
The room in which they met was almost as spartan as Robert de Hane’s bare chamber further down the road. John de Alencon was another austere priest who took the Rule of St Chrodegang literally, as far as worldly goods and comforts were concerned. They sat around a bare table on rough benches, the only light coming from three tallow dips hung on the wall, which also carried a large crucifix.
‘We could have this villain seized by the sheriff, I’m sure,’ began de Alencon. ‘Richard de Revelle would be happy to indict him on the sworn evidence of Langton and the canon here. Threatening the life of a man of God – or anyone else – must surely be a hanging matter?’
Remembering his brother-in-law’s strange attitude to Fulford, de Wolfe was not so sure, but kept his tongue still on that matter. He said, ‘Maybe, but what would it achieve? There is not the slightest proof that he was involved with the death of Robert de Hane, though the circumstances point that way.’
‘De Revelle is not noted for his affection for proof,’ said the Archdeacon wryly.
‘No, but it would be far better to catch this man red-handed, for it may also trap any associates he may have. His master is a knight called Jocelin de Braose, and I have good reason to think that both of them were involved in some other bloody venture. Maybe this de Braose is in on the treasure hunt as well.’
‘So what do we do, John?’ asked de Alencon. ‘We have no map or directions to give him.’
John looked sideways at his stunted scribe. ‘But we could always manufacture one. How would he know the difference?’
De Limesi’s small eyes had almost vanished into his podgy cheeks. ‘Surely he could tell an ancient parchment from a new one? It’s my life that’s in danger if he suspects he is being hoodwinked.’
Thomas spoke up. ‘I could use a piece of old parchment taken from some of the blank skins that abound in the archives. I can thin my ink to make it faint like old writing. And remember, he cannot read.’
‘So how does he hope to find any treasure, if he cannot decipher the directions?’ asked the Archdeacon, reasonably.
‘This vicar will have to translate it for him. Is that what happened last time?’
Eric Langton nodded. ‘He committed what I said to memory. It was not difficult, only a number of paces and a landmark or two.’
The coroner looked grimly at him. ‘You’ll have to go with them this time, to interpret the instructions on the spot.’
As he realised the hazards, the vicar paled. ‘When they find there is no hoard, they will undoubtedly turn nasty,’ he stuttered.
‘That can be part of your penance, brother,’ observed de Alencon drily. ‘Albeit a very small part, considering the evil you have done.’
De Wolfe brought the meeting back to practical matters. ‘My clerk will produce a false parchment. Thomas, it should have complicated instructions, so that Langton will inevitably have to go with Fulford to translate them. Otherwise, we have no means of knowing when they will attempt to recover the treasure.’