‘Tom? Good God in heaven, there’s a name I haven’t heard for many a long year. Yes, he was a mate of ours, but again, he left the city soon after the King arrived, two years after the murder. I haven’t seen him since.’
‘You can tell us nothing then, about the attack on the Chaunter?’ Baldwin pressed.
Joel had a clear picture in his mind’s eye of Will wielding his great staff and slamming it into his face. ‘No.’
‘Perhaps we need to think of something you can tell us about then,’ Simon said sarcastically. ‘What of Henry’s business? Was he doing well?’
‘Henry Potell was one of the foremost craftsmen in the city. Everyone who could would buy a saddle from him. They were marvellous pieces of work.’
‘Yet one of them broke recently. One that you had made.’
‘Like I said, it can happen.’
Baldwin lifted his eyebrows. ‘I have never had a good quality saddle break under me. Do your frames often fail?’
‘I wouldn’t still be in business if they did, would I?’ Joel growled. ‘No, I think that my apprentice made an error. There was some greenwood out in the yard, and I reckon he picked that by mistake. Nothing more than that.’
‘How much would Henry have sued you for?’ Simon asked.
‘He said it’d depend on how much Udo expected to get from him.’
‘We hadn’t heard of that,’ Simon said. ‘Mabilla didn’t mention him.’
‘Maybe he’s dropped the matter then. I don’t know.’
‘Perhaps he has,’ Simon said. He didn’t like the fact that the two women had mentioned nothing about Udo suing Henry, but then he knew that many men wouldn’t discuss their business with their wives. It was possible Henry hadn’t told Mabilla about being taken to court so that she wouldn’t worry.
‘Do you know what Henry would have been doing up at the Cathedral?’ Baldwin asked. ‘It was in the Charnel Chapel that he was found, and it appears a peculiar place for him to visit.’
‘I wouldn’t know,’ Joel said.
‘Is there anybody else in business in Exeter who could have felt a rage against him? A rage bitter enough to kill him, or to have him killed?’ Baldwin said.
Joel looked up at him and in his eyes was a frank honesty. ‘I don’t think this has anything to do with business. Henry tended to pay on time, and he had a good reputation as a craftsman — why should anyone want to hurt him?’
‘Why indeed?’ Baldwin repeated thoughtfully, observing Joel with his head on one side.
He was about to speak again when there was some shouting from the shop, and the sound of urgent footsteps. Vince hurried in, a young novice from the Cathedral behind him.
‘Master? The Dean has sent for the Keeper to go back to see him,’ he panted. ‘It’s urgent, he said.’
Baldwin looked at the novice. ‘Well?’
‘Sir Baldwin, it’s another body. Someone’s murdered a friar.’
‘Christ Jesus, not poor Nick?’ Joel muttered, and Baldwin shot him a look as the novice nodded.
Chapter Sixteen
‘What was the man doing here?’ Baldwin wondered. If his voice was harsher than usual, that was because he felt scaffolding was precarious at the best of times. This lot in particular seemed to wobble alarmingly, and Baldwin was reminded of the story he’d heard that a rock had recently plummeted from the wall, through the scaffolding and crushed a man. He wondered now whether the labourers had put it back together again quite so solidly as they ought.
The others appeared unconcerned. They were staring at the body on the rough planking. It had lain in a rock enclosure, built as stones were piled at the base of the wall, and to remove it, the Master Mason had pulled it up until it could be lain down on the scaffolding, rather than manhandling it over all the rubble.
In life, Baldwin reckoned the dead man would have been a humbling sight. His back was badly hunched, his face disfigured by a dreadful scar that had penetrated one eye-socket and ruined the eyeball itself, and his right hand was badly withered. His looks were not improved by the terrible, bloody burnmark that encircled his throat. Baldwin looked more closely. There was a lot of blood, he thought. Usually a man who was hanged would have bruising, perhaps a little blood where the rope had torn the flesh away, but not so much as all this. The fluid had soaked the rope itself, dripping down the man’s neck and running into his old tunic.
‘He could have been walking past the site, and when the rope was released to allow a stone to be taken down from the top, maybe he walked into it? The rope encircled his neck, and he couldn’t do anything to get it off, maybe?’
This was the Annuellar speaking, but he was ignored by the other men. The Master Mason shook his head. ‘This was no accident, I can tell you that much. He was strangled on purpose.’
‘How can you be sure of — ah — that?’ the Dean enquired.
‘When I knocked off work last night, I came here as usual to take a last turn about the place. I always do, to make sure that there’s no thieving bast- saving your grace, sir, no felons about the place seeing what they can take. It’s been known before now. I once had a pair of anvils stolen from under my nose and … anyway, the fellow wasn’t there then. He was killed later, I’d wager.’
The friar’s flesh was thin, Baldwin noted. It was possible that a blood vessel had been ripped open when the rope tightened. He leaned down and felt at the greying skin, and then saw the nick under the ropemark. He nodded pensively. ‘This rope. Would it have been up there yesterday?’
‘Yes. It’s one we use to bring mortar and tools up from the bottom. The heavy stuff is lifted on a windlass from a separate pulley up there.’
‘His body was concealed down there, you say?’
‘Yes, he was hidden in among those stones,’ Robert said helpfully, taking Baldwin’s shoulder and pulling him to the edge of a plank, pointing down. Baldwin closed his eyes and tried to quash the desire to knock the Master Mason’s hand from him. It was very tempting to push the man away, even if it would mean his falling to his death many feet below. Swallowing hard, Baldwin peered down.
‘There was no one working there last afternoon,’ Robert said, frowning down into the abyss. ‘He could have been throttled and just left down there.’
Baldwin could see what he meant. There below them was a large gap between slabs of rock. He would have been effectively concealed for as long as no one searched for him, but … Baldwin frowned. Surely the killer would know that the body must soon be spotted in daylight, as soon as someone climbed this scaffold? Had he hidden the body in a hurry, before some passer-by could see what he had done? ‘So he wasn’t hanging when you found him?’
‘No. When I got here this morning, I found the rope hanging there for no reason, so I gave it a pull to see what was down there. Got the shock of my life!’
‘I can imagine it,’ Baldwin said, stepping back from the brink, he hoped not too hurriedly.
‘So what now?’ the Treasurer asked. He watched as Baldwin walked to the ladder and descended.
Baldwin didn’t answer immediately. He reached the bottom with relief, and paused a moment before walking under the scaffolding to the pile of rocks.
Each of the rocks was a cube, the faces at least a foot square. There was a large pile of them in a rough horseshoe shape, the open edge facing the old wall. Baldwin squeezed around between the rocks and the wall. It was a tight fit, very tight, and when he was inside, he peered back at the gap thoughtfully for a moment.
The space in the horseshoe was only some six feet in diameter. Glancing up, he felt a vague sense of disquiet as he realised how high up he had been, standing on those warped planks. A noise behind him told him that Simon had joined him.
‘What do you think, Baldwin?’
‘I’m not sure. I don’t like the fact that his neck seemed to bleed so much. When I looked, I think there was a cut.’