‘Good. In that case I can tell you of all his crimes on the way there. Come – I do not want him to escape. He killed Karvinel and he has stolen my revenge from me. I wanted Karvinel to die for my friend, but now he is already murdered!’
Chapter Thirty
Vincent le Berwe was in his hall when the furious hammering came on his door. He looked up bemused as one of his servants shouted through the panel to demand who was visiting so early. Hearing the bellowed reply, Vincent shot to his feet and called for his bottler, while ordering that the door should be opened forthwith.
‘Coroner, and Sir Baldwin. Bailiff Puttock! It is a pleasure,’ he said, and then there was a freezing knot in his throat as he recognised the last man.
‘Good day, Vincent,’ Sir Thomas said, walking inside and gazing about him with interest. ‘Receivers do well for themselves, don’t they?’
‘Are you alone here?’ Baldwin asked.
‘My wife is at the Cathedral, Sir Baldwin. Why?’
‘Because we are here to learn why Karvinel and his wife were murdered,’ Coroner Roger grated. ‘And we don’t want to upset your wife unduly.’
Baldwin smiled. ‘Vincent, please be seated. This will take us some little while.’
‘Seated? Why? And who is that man? What’s he doing here?’
In answer, Sir Thomas pointed at him. ‘Coroner, before God, I swear that I know this man. He is Vincent le Berwe, Receiver of the city of Exeter. I met him many years ago when we were both young, he a student, me a youth practising at the warrior’s arts. Recently I fell in with felons, and this man Vincent le Berwe persuaded me to help him. He wanted me to ruin his enemy Nicholas Karvinel. To that end he paid me to break into Karvinel’s house and steal all I could. Later he paid me to repeat the break-in and fire the place.’
‘Thomas! What are you doing? Are you mad?’ Vincent demanded, astonished.
‘Sir Thomas, did you harm Karvinel and his wife last night?’ Coroner Roger intoned solemnly.
It was Baldwin who answered. ‘Oh no. Sir Thomas had nothing to do with that, did you?’
The outlaw wiped a hand over his brow. ‘No, although I should have. I wanted the bastard to pay for the way he had my man killed. No, I would never use poison. It’s a coward’s weapon.’
‘Who?’ demanded Coroner Roger. ‘Which man did he have killed?’
‘Hamond, the man you had arrested and hanged. He was with me all that day until he went to the tavern for a drink. Neither of us robbed Karvinel.’
Coroner Roger sneered. ‘Then who did?’
‘No one,’ Baldwin answered.
‘What?’ All the men turned to him, the Coroner dumbstruck for the first time since Baldwin had met him.
He smiled. ‘That is right. I think when we look through Karvinel’s house, we shall find his own money there intact, and we’ll probably find the money supposed to be stolen from the Cathedral as well.’
‘Why would a man stage a robbery?’
‘I think I just gave you the answer: the Cathedral’s money. It was a significant sum, far too great a temptation to a man whose own fortunes were so weak. He pretended to have been robbed, then hurried back to the city. There he sought his clerk and told him, I guess, that he had been robbed. Peter was horrified. He agreed to back up Karvinel, even to the extent of identifying a certain felon whom, so they alleged, had been partly responsible for the theft of the money. That was enough to secure the death of Hamond.’
‘What has all this to do with me?’ Vincent demanded.
‘Your responsibility lies with the death of Ralph the Glover,’ Baldwin informed him. ‘But not directly because you yourself didn’t kill him. Just as you didn’t kill Peter or the Karvinels.’
‘Who did?’ Coroner Roger asked impatiently.
‘Consider Ralph first. It could hardly have been any of the Cathedral staff who killed him. They were all in the Cathedral at the time. After Ralph left the dawn Mass, they would all have been attending Chapter. What is more, the knife was a slender one, with a blade of only half an inch in width at the base. That is a very small blade. And the attacker struck many times, in a berserk manner, which is significant.’
‘Of what?’ the Coroner demanded, baffled. ‘And why kill him? Ralph was a lovely fellow, always kind and honest.’
‘He told the City Bailiff that he thought he had learned of a robbery,’ Baldwin said. ‘He had discovered that Vincent here was stealing from the Cathedral.’
‘I wouldn’t do a thing like that!’ The merchant’s cheeks went purple.
‘Adam has confessed.’
‘The feeble-minded cretin! He hasn’t the–’ Then le Berwe stopped and shrugged, defeated. ‘Well? What of it? I was only doing what any other man would do. It didn’t cost the Cathedral much, and I needed the money. My ship sank, you know. I’ve got next to nothing.’
‘So you killed Ralph?’ the Coroner said disbelievingly.
Baldwin shook his head. ‘Think of the poisonings. What sort of person uses poison? And who was the target? Peter? Or was it someone else: the man living with him – Vincent’s illegitimate son, Jolinde.’
Simon nodded. They had agreed this before – but what sort of man was le Berwe, to have tried to kill his own son?
‘No. This is all rubbish. No, you’re wrong,’ Vincent said, shaking his head in denial. He half-lifted a hand as if to protest further, but let it fall into his lap.
Baldwin ignored him. ‘That must have been difficult for you, Vincent, knowing that your wife had tried to kill your own son. Why? Well, probably because Hawisia is herself pregnant. She would hardly want a competitor to her own child’s inheritance, would she? But her plan failed. She poisoned the wrong man. For all her planning, she killed poor Peter by accident. And Jolinde, being a pleasant, easygoing sort of fellow, never even guessed that he was the target of the poison.’
The Coroner gaped at Baldwin, dumbfounded. ‘A woman did all this?’
‘That’s preposterous!’ Sir Thomas exclaimed. ‘Hawisia is too highly bred to do such a thing. Perhaps a slattern from a tavern would be capable of it, but a woman like Hawisia?’
Only Simon grunted in agreement as he saw how all fell into place. ‘What about the Karvinels? Why should she try to murder them?’
‘No, this is mad,’ Coroner Roger said, but his tone was unconvinced.
Baldwin continued quietly, assured and certain of his facts. ‘Presumably Nicholas knew something. We know that expensive leathers are missing from Ralph’s shop. Perhaps Karvinel saw the thief taking them.’
Vincent covered his face with his hands. There were no tears; he was like a man who has found peace at last after a long and terrifying struggle, but his voice was broken, almost sobbing. ‘You’re right. Karvinel heard that I was seen in the street that morning. I didn’t realise what it meant at first.’
‘You were in the Guildhall, weren’t you?’ Simon confirmed.
‘Yes. But Peter, rot him, told Karvinel I had been there, since he had seen my cart, but it wasn’t me, it was my wife. Hawisia came to the Guildhall to see me with one of my carts, saying she thought I wanted it for goods, but I didn’t. I told a servant to take it home rather than see her struggle with it.’
Coroner Roger gazed from him to Sir Baldwin. ‘I don’t understand.’
Baldwin continued. ‘Hawisia had wanted to help her husband by removing a threat to him. She thought Ralph was more dangerous than Karvinel and planned his murder to the last detail. She went to his house and knocked, having already ensured that his apprentice would be away. She persuaded Ralph to open his shop for her, and when he had done so, she murdered him, striking him madly, like a berserker. But I think she carried on quite calmly with her plan after that unpleasantness. She was perfectly collected; she took his keys, locked the shop and went to the house, locking that door after her. That was why Elias couldn’t get in. She went upstairs and got the money from the strongbox. It was then that Elias arrived. He banged on the door without answer, then went round to the back. While he did so Hawisia unlocked the front door, crept out and unlocked the shop.’