‘How have you sinned? What have you done? Have you killed, Ralph?’ The coroner was becoming desperate in his quest for a confession.
‘Killed? I have sent a legion of souls into purgatory!’
De Wolfe’s spirit leapt for a moment, in glorious hope that he had at last found his man.
‘What do you mean? Were they murdered in the city?’
De Capra thumped his lean body back and forth into the angle of the wall, his nails scrabbling at the plaster. ‘I stopped believing! Satan stole my mind! With no faith I shrove many, I betrayed them! I baptised babes with no belief in what I was doing! I shrove the dying without the true grace of God! They are lost! I betrayed them!’ He slid down the wall on to the pallet and sat in a crumpled heap, weeping disconsolately.
With a sinking heart, John made one last attempt. ‘But have you killed, Ralph? The old Jew, the priest at All-Hallows, the sodomite, the whore?’
There was no reply and the sobbing continued.
The door opened and the fearful face of the novice appeared, followed by that of the prior. ‘This cannot be!’ he hissed. ‘You must leave, Crowner. This man is sick in his mind.’
Acknowledging defeat, de Wolfe nodded and, with a last compassionate look at the wreck of a man on the mattress, he followed the monks out of the room. As they left the passageway, Ralph de Capra began to scream, the high-pitched, repetitive wail of a soul in torment. It was the signal that de Wolfe’s last chance of saving Thomas had failed.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The coroner left the priory of St Nicholas at dusk, going from there to Priest Street to find Julian Fulk. Matilda’s news that the priest of St Olave’s was leaving suddenly was curious, but John had little expectation that it was in any way connected to the Gospel killings, unless Fulk was running away in expectation of being exposed.
Most of the dwellings in Priest Street were lodging for clerics and he had to ask directions to the right house. The priest was at home, living in two comfortably furnished rooms, which suggested that he had some means of his own as well as his pittance from parish tithes.
Fulk was resting after his meal before preparing for the midnight Matins, which he insisted on holding even though sometimes he had no congregation at that hour. Confident that one day he would be officiating in some great cathedral, he drove himself to observe most of the canonical hours, even in a tiny church like St Olave’s. He was surprised to see the coroner, but invited him in civilly and gave him a cup of good wine. He seemed more subdued than usual and his normal false heartiness had evaporated. As de Wolfe sat drinking his Anjou wine, he felt that whatever oddities might be in the priest’s nature, he was unlikely to be a serial killer. But, for Thomas’s sake, he had to pursue every chance to the bitter end.
‘They say you are leaving Exeter rather suddenly?’ The plump priest gestured impatiently. ‘This city is like a village. Every time you fart, the news is around the taverns within five minutes.’
De Wolfe agreed with that, but it was no answer to his question. ‘Is there an urgent reason for us losing you? There is nothing wrong, I trust, between you and the Church authorities?’
The priest began to spit out a litany of complaints against the religious establishment in England — their indifference to his ability, their deliberate campaign to keep him in some ecclesiastical backwater and similar expressions of outrage that soon convinced John that he was quite paranoid about the Church’s attitude towards him. But nothing in his tirade gave the coroner hope that Julian Fulk was anything but a vain, self-opinionated wind-bag.
Tiring of the repetitive monologue about the iniquities of bishops, abbots and priors, John finished his wine and took his leave, more depressed than ever that nothing now could save Thomas.
His feet took him the short distance to Idle Lane and he flopped down on his usual bench in the Bush, feeling ten years older than he had the previous day. Even the usually loquacious potman was subdued when he brought over a quart of ale, and when Nesta came in, she sat quietly by his side, with little to say once he had told her of the fruitless efforts he had been making.
He described his visit to Thomas and the clerk’s apparent calm. ‘I’ll see him again in the morning — and, along with John de Alençon, go with him to the gallows at noon,’ he said sombrely.
He saw that tears were running silently down Nesta’s cheeks at his mention of the hanging-tree beyond Magdalen Street, for it brought home with awful finality the fact that this tragedy was really going to take place. ‘I’m a coward, John, for I can’t bring myself to visit him,’ she whispered. ‘I wouldn’t know what to say and all I’d do is weep and make things worse for him. Neither can I come out beyond the walls with you tomorrow, for I couldn’t bear to see him die. But Gwyn will be with you — he called in here earlier looking for you.’
‘What did he want?’
‘Only to know if you had any good news, poor chap. He said he would call to see Thomas on his way home to St Sidwell’s, before the gates closed.’
He sat with Nesta a little while longer, then decided to go home. The lack of anything useful or comforting to say to each other had depressed them even further. It was now quite dark outside, but his feet knew every pothole in the twisting lanes without him being conscious of guiding them. However, he was certainly conscious of his full bladder as he crossed the rough wasteground at the side of the tavern. After two quarts of ale, he needed to relieve himself against the trunk of a gnarled elder tree that was dimly visible at the edge of Smythen Street.
As he stooped to hoist up the hem of his long tunic, a figure materialised out of the gloom behind him and struck him a violent blow on the back of the head, pitching him forward to lie stunned at the foot of the tree.
John de Wolfe was found less than ten minutes later by three men coming up from the Saracen ale-house. One, who was quite drunk, tripped over his legs and, cursing, stumbled against the elder tree. Though it was so dark, they heard a body on the ground groan, though the sounds were strangely muffled. The other two, who were less inebriated, bent over him, just able to make out the shape of a man. The groans became louder, now being mixed with slurred words, but were still indistinct.
‘There’s a bloody bag over his head!’ exclaimed one man, feeling around with his hands. ‘Let’s get some light, quickly.’
The other, a porter from Milk Street, looked up Smythen Street for any glimmer of a candle behind a shutter. The street was mainly occupied by forges and blacksmiths, hence the name, though a couple of houses had lately become schools. Seeing a faint flicker across the road, the porter ran across and hammered on the door, shouting, ‘Stop thief!’ at the top of his voice, then ran next door and repeated the cry.
Meanwhile, the rapidly sobering drunk and his friend squatted alongside the victim, who was fast recovering his senses. His stifled groans became more strident and he dazedly lifted his hands to the covering over his head, which the third man, a weaver from Curre Street, was already trying to remove.
‘There’s a purse-string around his neck!’ he complained, but then managed to undo the knot and pull off the leather bag. Groggily, John struggled to sit up and by this time, several people had run across from nearby dwellings. By the light of a horn lantern they propped him against the tree, at which he started to curse fluently and hold the back of his head gingerly with one hand.
As soon as the faint lights fell on his face, the rescuers recognised him. ‘Holy Mary, it’s the crowner!’ yelled the porter. Half a dozen neighbours were now clustered around, some risen from bed and wearing only their under-shirts. A buzz of excitement went round when they realised that it was John de Wolfe, known to every person in the city.