Sir Quintin cackled from his chair. 'Sir Harold is a major landowner up near Winchester.' I cursed silently. There could be few worse men to conduct this inquest.
Sir Quintin looked at me. 'There is a surfeit of inquests these days. Master Shardlake says there is to be another one, at the town he has just visited in Sussex. Though that one, I fancy, will be slower, with an uncertain outcome. A body found after near twenty years.'
Sir Harold nodded in agreement. 'That will not be a priority for the Sussex coroner.' Priddis exchanged a glance with Edward, who had been watching silently.
'If you will excuse me,' I said, 'I should pay my respects to Master Hobbey.'
HOBBEY WAS IN his study again, with Dyrick, but now it was Dyrick who sat at the big desk, while Hobbey sat in a chair with the picture of the former abbess on his knee, staring at it. He barely looked up as I entered. His face was grey and sunken.
'Well, Master Shardlake,' Dyrick said, 'so you are back. The coroner was quite agitated to find you absent.'
'I have spoken to him. I hear Master Fulstowe has selected a jury from the villagers. Ettis's enemies, I imagine.'
'That is up to the steward. Now, tell me, Brother, have you decided to accept our proposals on costs?'
'I am still considering it,' I answered shortly. 'If the inquest finds that Ettis committed the murder, he will be committed for trial at Winchester. They will have to find a jury of townsmen there. I will be called to give evidence as first finder, and I promise you I will ensure that any trial is fair.'
Dyrick turned to Hobbey. 'You hear him, sir? Now he thinks he can interfere with the trial of your wife's murderer. Was there ever such a fellow?'
Hobbey looked up. He seemed barely interested, sunk in melancholy. 'What will happen will happen, Vincent.' He turned the picture round on his lap, showing us the old abbess, the dark veil and white wimple, the enigmatic face in the centre. 'Look how she smiles,' he said, 'as though she knew something. Perhaps those who say we who have turned monastic buildings into houses are cursed are right. And if the French invade, who knows, they may even burn this house to the ground.'
'Nicholas—' Dyrick said impatiently.
'Perhaps that is why she is smiling.' He turned to me with a strange look. 'What do you think, Master Shardlake?'
'I think that is superstition, sir.'
Hobbey did not answer. I realized he had retreated completely into himself. Dyrick and Fulstowe were in charge here now. And if it took hanging Ettis to end opposition to the enclosure of the village, they would do it, whether he was guilty or not.
SUPPER THAT EVENING was one of the most melancholy meals I have ever attended. Hobbey sat slumped at the end of the table, picking listlessly at his food. Fulstowe stood watchfully behind him, and several times exchanged glances with Dyrick. Hugh sat staring at his plate, oblivious of everyone, including David, who sat next to him. David was unkempt, his doublet stained with food, his pale face furred with black stubble and his protuberant eyes red from crying. Occasionally, he would stare wildly into space, like someone trying to awaken from a horrible dream. Hugh, though, was as neatly dressed as ever, and had even had a shave.
I tried to engage Hugh in conversation, but he made only monosyllabic replies. He was, I guessed, still angry after our conversation about his words over Abigail's corpse. I looked round the table: those sitting there were all men. I wondered if a woman would ever sit here again, in this place which a decade before had housed only women. I stared up at the great west window and remembered my first evening—the hundreds of moths that had come in. There were few this evening; I wondered what had become of them all.
I glanced again at the bare walls. Dyrick said, 'Master Hobbey had the tapestries taken down yesterday. He cannot bear to look at them now.'
'That is understandable.' Hobbey, next to Dyrick, had taken no notice.
Edward Priddis was next to me. He spoke quietly. 'My father says there has been a discovery at Rolfswood. That William Fettiplace did not die in that fire, but ended in the mill pond.' His tone, as always, was quiet and even.
'That is true. I was there when the body was found.' I told him how the body had been exposed when the mill pond dam burst. I saw that on Edward's other side his father was listening intently, ignoring Sir Harold's tale of how some villagers along the coast had accidentally lit one of the beacons while practising what to do if the French landed.
'I suppose the Sussex coroner will have to be brought in to conduct a fresh inquest?' Edward asked.
'Yes. Do you know him?'
'No. But Father does.' Edward leaned across and said loudly, 'Master Shardlake is asking about the Sussex coroner.'
Priddis inclined his head. 'Samuel Pakenham will let such an old matter lie. As I would. He'll get round to it in time.'
'They will want to call you, sir,' I told him, 'as you conducted the first inquest.'
'I dare say. But they won't find anything new, not after twenty years. Maybe Fettiplace killed his workman and then himself. There's insanity in the family, you know: his daughter went mad.' He fixed me with his keen eyes. 'I remember now that I helped arrange for her to be sent to relatives in London. I've forgotten who they were. You forget things, Master Shardlake, after twenty years, when you are old and crippled.' He gave his wicked-looking half-smile.
More determined than ever to be at the Sussex inquest, I turned back to Edward, forcing a disarming smile. I said, 'They will also want to call the young man who was connected to Mistress Fettiplace at the time. Philip West, who comes from the local family I mentioned to you.'
'I remember the name. Father, did he not go to the King's court?'
'Yes.' Sir Quintin nodded. 'His mother was a proud woman, full of herself.' He cackled again. 'Everyone knew from her that Philip West went hunting with the King.'
'You did not go to court yourself when you were young?' I asked Edward.
'No, sir. My time in London was spent at Gray's Inn. Working like a dog to become qualified. My father kept my nose to the grindstone.'
The old man answered sharply, 'Law students should work like dogs, that is what they are there for, to learn how to snap and bite.' He leaned across, supporting his weight on his good arm, and said to Dyrick, 'Something you seem to have learned well, sir.' He laughed again, like old hinges creaking.
'I will take that as a compliment,' Dyrick answered stiffly.
'Of course.'
There was silence round the table. Edward and his father flicked looks at me from two pairs of hard blue eyes. Then Sir Quintin said, 'You seem very interested in matters at Rolfswood, sir, going there twice and digging up all this information.'
'As I explained to your son, a client was trying to find the Fettiplace family.'
'And now at some point you will have to trail back to Sussex from London. It does no good to meddle, I always think. Master Dyrick told me meddling landed you in trouble with the King once, at York.'
He leaned back in his seat, his barb delivered, while Dyrick gave me a nasty smile.
THE INQUEST ON Abigail Hobbey was held the following afternoon in the great hall. Outside it was another bright, sunny day, but the hall was shadowed and gloomy. The big table had been set under the old west window. Sir Harold Trevelyan sat behind it, with Edward Priddis on his right, evidently pressed into service to take notes. On his left—in defiance of all procedure—sat Sir Quintin. He surveyed the room, his good hand grasping his stick. The jury, twelve men from the village, sat on hard chairs against one wall. I recognized several who had worked for the hunt. Men who would likely be in Fulstowe's pocket.
Barak and I, Fulstowe and Sir Luke Corembeck sat together.