Baldwin submitted with a wry grin and held the door open for her. They walked into a small hall, with pots racked upon the shelves that lined the walls. Beneath were sacks filled with aromatic spices and herbs. The air smelled sweet and musty, and Jeanne sneezed twice as she entered.
A youth was serving, a thin and pale lad of not more than twelve or thirteen years. While Jeanne spoke to him, Baldwin walked to the door at the back; as he peered up at some of the pots above it, the door opened and John Sherman came out.
For a merchant, his visage held little of the gracious welcome that Baldwin would have expected. Instead the man looked nervous, smiling weakly. ‘Keeper. What can I do for you?’
‘Not me, Sherman. It is my wife.’
Sherman appeared relieved. ‘Your lady? Ah, I see.’
Baldwin wondered at his change in demeanour. A devil made him ask, ‘I hear you were away in South Molton the day Sir Gilbert died. What were you doing there?’
‘Meeting a business partner,’ Sherman said pompously.
‘And who would that have been?’
‘Why do you need to know?’
‘A man was murdered.’
‘That was nothing to do with me. It wasn’t even the same road. And the matter is closed: the inquest found Dyne killed the knight.’
‘Not everyone believes that,’ Jeanne said distinctly.
‘Which is why,’ Baldwin continued, ‘I might have to make sure you were where you say.’
Sherman threw a harassed look at his apprentice. ‘You’d better come out here, Sir Baldwin,’ he said and stood aside. Jeanne went off to investigate more spices, while her husband followed their host through the door at the back.
Behind was a small chamber, largely filled with sacks and barrels, and Sherman sat on an upturned butt, waving the knight to another. ‘Look, I wasn’t really in South Molton,’ he said without preamble, ‘but I don’t want people hearing where I was. My wife… Cecily has been making a fool of me for some time. I can’t trust her. I told her I was going to South Molton, but really I was going to follow her. Except she went out earlier than I expected and I missed her.’
‘Did you ask her where she had gone?’
‘How could I? That would mean admitting that I’d been spying on her!’
‘You could have told her that someone had called here, and found her from home.’
‘I didn’t think,’ he admitted gloomily. ‘I just went after the man instead. Harlewin le bloody Poter! Fat sod! Only he’d already gone too, so all I could do was ride out in the direction I thought they’d have taken.’
Harlewin! Just as Avicia Dyne had alleged, Baldwin thought.
Sherman continued, ‘He’s in the pocket of Earl Thomas, you know. A year ago he let one of the Earl’s servants escape justice, saying there wasn’t enough evidence against the fellow. There were three witnesses, for God’s sake!’
‘You think Earl Thomas had reason to want Sir Gilbert dead?’
‘Sir Gilbert was Despenser’s man – it’s common knowledge. The last thing Earl Thomas wants is messengers from Despenser persuading barons to follow him. That could make the Earl’s position very difficult.’
‘Surely others support Earl Thomas in town?’
‘Carter and Lovecok, if I’ve heard right,’ Sherman agreed grudgingly.
Baldwin considered a moment. The spicer was too keen to accuse – his judgement was fouled with hatred because of Harlewin’s alleged affair with his wife. ‘That night, you followed Harlewin where?’ he said.
‘South then west. He’s got a share in a mill over that way.’
‘And did you see either him or the knight?’
‘No.’ His response was too quick, too sharp, and Baldwin merely stared at him.
Sherman couldn’t hold his look. He dropped his gaze. ‘I swear I didn’t. I heard horses coming through the trees. It was late, dark, and I thought my wife must have gone in to hide from me.’
‘It wasn’t her?’
‘No, I rode in because I thought my wife must be there, hiding from me. I’d heard the noise and thought it was her. But while there I heard men shouting. I realised it wasn’t Cecily or the Coroner, so I left. I didn’t want to have a blade in the back.’
Baldwin watched him as he looked up.
‘That’s all I know, Sir Baldwin.’
‘Did you see anyone else beforehand – on the road on the way there? Was there anyone you knew?’
Reluctantly he nodded. ‘Sir Peregrine. I saw him before I went up that road. He was riding back to Tiverton in a hell of a hurry.’
‘Anyone else?’
‘The priest. He was up ahead of me on the way to Templeton. No one else.’
‘You never saw the Coroner or your wife?’
‘No.’
Baldwin had been watching him carefully and noticed the slight hesitation. He was lying again. Baldwin was about to press him further when the door opened.
‘Baldwin?’ Jeanne peered at him anxiously. ‘There’s been a murder – that servant of the knight. Simon wants you back at the castle.’
‘We must go,’ Baldwin said.
‘You must, Husband,’ she retorted. ‘Simon sent Petronilla to keep me company, so you can go back with the messenger.’
Avicia Dyne was in the castle’s gateway, peering through from the darkened corridor beneath the gatehouse itself, staring into the yard, but she could see the group of men. They were playing, one man laughing and throwing his ball into the air, then hurling it to his friends. Each of them caught it and sent it on until the Coroner saw her. Roaring with laughter, he beckoned her over, and she saw him take the ball and hold it behind his back. He smiled and waggled his eyebrows as she fearfully came closer, and when she was almost before him, he brought his hands around and threw it at her: Philip’s head.
She awoke with a start, a feverish sweat breaking out all over her body once more. This was the fifth time she had woken, but now she could see daylight at the window and the rough doorway. Exhausted with her grief, dull from sleeplessness and despair, she slowly rolled over and pushed herself up from her low palliasse. Her day must begin.
Sniffing, she rolled her mattress into a cylinder and bound it before setting it against the wall. Fetching a bowl she tried to force down some oatcakes, but her appetite had utterly failed her. Without her brother, her very last relation, she had little desire to live.
She could remember leaving the castle as if it was a dream. When she had come down from her room, most of the men had left, and her brother’s body was already gone, taken out to a room where it could be held until a place was allocated for its burial. She didn’t care where he would be installed. It was irrelevant: God would save him; He would recognise Phil’s innocence.
Shuddering, she then thought how she and her brother had always believed the words of the priests: that a corpse must be anointed to save it from being taken by the Devil. Lucifer was always on the lookout for a new soul, they were told. But God was stronger, she reassured herself; He would surely not leave Philip in Hell for a crime of which he was innocent.
She was aware of the tears coursing down her cheeks once more and dripping from her chin. It was as if she had no further energy for depression. She was drained of all emotion. There was nothing left.
Nothing but hatred.
Avicia had not heard the conclusions of the inquest, all she had seen was her brother’s beheaded body lying amid the dirt. She knew that Carter and Lovecok had executed her brother but she couldn’t blame them. They had acted as they had because the Coroner had persuaded Philip to confess. Yet he was innocent. She knew it.
Sweeping her bowl aside, she knocked it to the floor and put her face in her hands. She felt so weak: useless and feeble. She couldn’t see what to do. Then she had an idea. She couldn’t go to the Coroner, and the previous day she’d seen that the Keeper and Bailiff didn’t believe her, but there were two others who had an interest now. Harlewin le Poter’s lies had made two men murder an innocent.