‘You have no idea who these pirates were?’ demanded Gwyn.
‘I recollect very little. It was all confusion for the couple of minutes that I remember. They shouted in English, that’s for sure.’
‘What was their ship like?’ asked John, standing over the man like a great black crow.
Alain shrugged under the blanket. ‘Nothing special, though it was not a trading knarr like the Saint Isan. It was slimmer and faster, more like a longship – and it had a big sail, as well as a bank of oars on each side.’
‘No name painted on the bow, nor any device on the sail?’ grunted Gwyn.
‘Nothing. Other than that they used your Saxon tongue, I’ve no idea who they were or where they came from.’
Gwyn pulled down the ends of his moustache, as if that would help him think. ‘You are a shipman in these waters. Have you heard of any other vessels being attacked in this way?’
Alain shook his head wearily. ‘It was never mentioned by the other men, God rest them.’
‘What cargo were you carrying?’
‘It was a mixture – some wine, casks of dried fruit, bales of silk, I don’t know what else.’
‘Valuable stuff, a good haul for pirates,’ observed Gwyn.
After some more questions, it became obvious that Alain had nothing else useful to tell them. Although de Wolfe would have liked him to appear at the inquest to identify the corpse, it was obvious that the young Breton was far too sick to be moved at present. They described the dead man to Alain, who felt sure that it was a Bristol youth called Roger, of mixed Norman and Saxon blood.
De Wolfe felt in his waist pouch and gave Siward three pennies, with instructions to get some good food for the shipman and to tend him until he was fit to travel down to Ilfracombe, hopefully in a few days’ time.
Leaving the old shepherd and his patient, they made their way back the several miles to the port, arriving in mid-afternoon. Their clerk was fussing outside the bailiff’s dwelling, hopping about on his lame leg like a black sparrow, marshalling the reluctant crowd of about thirty men and boys whom he had coerced into a jury.
De Wolfe, conscious that the day was slipping away, led them across to the fish shed where the cadaver lay. ‘Let’s get this over quickly, Gwyn,’ he growled. ‘There’s little we can do today – it will mean at least one other journey back here later.’
At the shed, he instructed Gwyn to pull out the body into the open, and the jury stood in a wide half-circle in the keen wind, the surf rumbling beyond the harbour and the seagulls wheeling and mewing overhead.
The Cornishman cut short his usual formal opening of an inquest and merely yelled at the motley throng, ‘Silence for the king’s crowner!’
With his arms folded across his chest, de Wolfe stood near the head of the corpse and addressed the jury. ‘You men are representing the Hundred in this matter. I have to determine who this man might be and where, when and how he came to his death. The witness who can name him is too ill to attend but was also a member of the crew of that vessel. The name of the dead man was Roger of Bristol, that’s all I know. He was part Saxon, but we cannot prove presentment of Englishry as there are no relatives here nor even the only witness who knew him.’ He glared around the faces of the jury, as if daring them to contradict him. ‘In the circumstances, I am not going to amerce this village as it is plain that he died before reaching your land.’
There was a murmur of relief from the older men and the few wives who stood listening in the background. At least they would avoid the heavy fine for being unable to prove that the dead man was a Saxon: the Norman laws assumed that, in default of proof, he was of the conquering race – even if that event had taken place well over a century ago.
‘This witness I mentioned confirms that the vessel, known as the Saint Isan, was attacked by pirates somewhere between here and Lundy Island. We know of this death, and the survivor claims he saw the ship’s master killed, so we assume that the rest of the crew were also killed or drowned.’ He paused to look down at the shrouded figure at his feet. ‘This man, Roger of Bristol, was most certainly murdered.’
He motioned to Gwyn, who pulled off the canvas and displayed the corpse to the jury. As they shuffled nearer for a better view, the coroner pointed out the deep slash in the belly, livid against the whitened skin. ‘A typical pike wound. There is no explanation other than murder.’
Again his dark face came up and his eyes slowly ranged across the villagers, brooding on each face in turn. ‘Have any of you here any knowledge of who may have done this thing?’ he boomed. ‘Have you heard tell of any piracy in these waters?’
There was muttering and whispering and general shaking of heads, and the coroner, not really expecting any useful response, was about to carry on speaking when a quavering voice piped up from the middle of the crowd, ‘I have heard tell, sir, that them Appledore folk are not above a bit of thieving at sea.’
This provoked a further buzz and another man, dressed in the short blue serge tunic of a sailor or fisherman, called out, ‘I do know they’ve pillaged a wreck last year, afore the lord’s steward could get to it. That was down Clovelly way.’
John de Wolfe spent a few minutes trying to get more concrete evidence than these rumours, but he ended with the suspicion that there was bad blood between Ilfracombe and Appledore, a small village on the other side of the river from Barnstaple. After he had ended the inquest, with the curt decision that Roger of Bristol had been killed against the king’s peace by persons as yet unknown, he dismissed the ragged jury and turned to Gwyn and Thomas. ‘What d’you think of these Appledore accusations, eh?’
‘Village gossip, that’s all,’ grunted his ginger henchman. ‘Any hamlet will strip a wreck, given the chance. This one was already pillaged or they would have stolen every last raisin.’
‘But why Appledore? They might just as well have blamed Combe Martin or Bideford – or Lundy itself, which is more likely,’ objected Thomas.
De Wolfe shrugged. ‘Some local spite, no doubt. You have to live in one of these villages to fathom the petty disputes they dredge up.’ He looked thoughtfully at the corpse. ‘Though they may be right, of course.’
Chapter Three
In which Crowner John meets an old acquaintance
Another long day’s ride meant that it was almost dusk when, on the following evening, they reached Exeter’s North Gate. An early start from Umberleigh, a few miles south of Barnstaple, had enabled them to ride steadily, allowing John’s leg and his clerk’s backside to survive the many hours in the saddle.
When the coroner reached his house in Martin’s Lane, he saw Odin settled in his stable opposite, then went wearily through his front door and took off his riding clothes in the vestibule. In the hall, his wife was sitting in her usual place before the hearth, partly hidden by the hood of her monk’s chair. At the sound of the creaking door, she peered around its edge. When she saw him, she gave a throaty grunt and turned back to the fire. ‘You’ve deigned to come home, I see.’ It was her usual frosty greeting.