Bernard Knight - Crowner's Quest

Her worst fears were realised when John walked back across the hall, his head slightly forward, looking like some great bird of prey in his grey tunic and long black hose. Bending down to John de Alencon, he murmured something into the Archdeacon’s ear. The emaciated priest stood up immediately.

The coroner cleared his throat and, in his deep, sonorous voice, excused himself from the festivities for a while. ‘I hope it’ll not be long! I have but a few yards to go and hope to be back soon. So, please, eat, drink and be merry until then.’

Now furious, Matilda hurried around the table and caught her husband’s arm as he walked with the Archdeacon across to the door, where Gwyn still waited. ‘Where are you going?’ she hissed venomously. ‘You can’t leave me like this now, with all your guests still here!’

‘It’ll not be for long, wife,’ he grunted. ‘This won’t wait, I’m afraid, but I’ll try to get back soon.’

Fuming with rage, she hissed again, into his ear, ‘What can be more important on a Yuletide Eve than entertaining some of the most important citizens in Exeter?’

‘What about a dead canon in the cathedral Close, woman?’ he suggested, and slipped out of the door without another word.

De Wolfe and the Archdeacon strode on either side of the Cornish giant as they left the coroner’s house. Martin’s Lane was a short passage leading from High Street into the cathedral precinct. It took its name from St Martin’s Church on the corner, from which a line of houses stretched along the north side of the Close. Here lived many of the twenty-four canons of the cathedral, along with some of their vicars, lesser priests and servants, all male, for officially, women were forbidden in their dwellings.

As they hurried through the still, frosty air, the coroner’s henchman told what little he knew of the incident. ‘An hour ago, that miserable clerk of ours came running to me at my sister-in-law’s dwelling in Milk Street. My wife and children are lodging with her tonight, as the city gates are shut until morning.’ Gwyn lived outside the walls, at St Sidwell’s, beyond the East Gate.

‘What did Thomas have to tell you?’ demanded de Wolfe. Thomas de Peyne was the third member of his team, a diminutive, crippled ex-priest who had been unfrocked for allegedly interfering with a young female novice in Winchester.

‘He said that at about the tenth hour there had been a great uproar in the canon’s house near where he lodges and someone came to fetch him out. Being the nosy little swine that he is, he went to see what was afoot.’

De Wolfe was used to Gwyn’s leisurely way of telling a tale, but John de Alencon was less patient. ‘So what was afoot, man?’

‘The house steward was standing at the front, screaming that the canon was dead. With some others, our clerk ran through to the back of the house and found the prebendary hanging by his neck in the privy.’

By now the hurrying trio had entered Canons’ Row, with the huge bulk of the cathedral on their right. A full moon shimmered on the great building, which hovered above the disorder of the Close, with its muddy paths, piles of rubbish and open grave-pits.

‘He was undoubtedly dead?’ growled the coroner.

Gwyn pulled up the hood of his shabby leather jacket against the chill air. ‘Dead as mutton, Thomas said. The others felt his heart to make sure, then he ran to fetch me, while a servant went off to take the news to the Bishop’s Palace.’

The Archdeacon, sweeping along in his long black cloak, clucked his tongue in irritation. ‘And the Bishop is away at Gloucester, leaving me as the most senior cleric at this tragic time.’

They had arrived at the fifth house in the terrace, marked by a cluster of people around the narrow passageway that led through to the backyard. One short figure detached itself from the throng and limped towards them. Thomas de Peyne was blessed with a good brain and cursed with a twisted body. Old phthisis had bent his spine into a slight hump and damaged a hip to shorten one leg. As if this was not enough, the Almighty had given him a slight squint in his left eye. ‘Thank God you’re here, Crowner,’ he squeaked, crossing himself nervously. ‘These people are running around like chickens with their heads cut off!’

‘Where’s the corpse?’ demanded John gruffly. He never wasted breath on niceties of speech.

Thomas pushed through to the passageway and the little crowd opened up deferentially for the other men, the servants and secondaries bobbing their knees as the Archdeacon passed. The alley was dark and narrow, running alongside the tall timber house roofed with wooden shingles. It was similar, though not identical, to the other buildings in the row, some of stone, some slated and some thatched.

At the back, the passage opened into a yard with several rickety outbuildings. One was the kitchen, another a wash-house and one a pig-sty. Furthest away, against the back fence, was a small shed that acted as the latrine for the whole house. It was built up on several stone steps, a deep privy-pit dug beneath it.

‘He’s in there, Crowner,’ said Thomas, his thin, pointed nose wrinkling in anticipation. De Wolfe loped across to the shed, lit by the moon and the horn-lanterns of several residents who had followed them into the yard. He pulled open the crude door, whose bottom edge grated across the rough flagstones.

‘Bring more lights here,’ he commanded, as he stepped inside. The stench was strong after the cold night air outside, but as everyone had a stinking privy the coroner took no notice.

Gwyn, the Archdeacon and the clerk pushed in alongside him, holding tallow tapers taken from the servants. Along the back wall was a wooden bench with two large holes cut in it, in case more than one resident was taken short at the same time. Beneath it was a four-foot drop into an odorous pit, which was cleared from the rear by the night-soil man, who came around with his donkey and cart once a week.

But their gaze was fixed on a figure hanging in front of the seat, toes all but touching the floor. It was rotating slowly in the draught coming up from the faecal pit. Eerily, the face revolved close to de Wolfe’s, the eyes just level with his, due to the coroner’s greater height. Staring sightlessly ahead, tongue protruding, the corpse slowed down and stopped, then reversed its mindless study of the privy walls as the cord untwisted again.

For a moment there was shocked immobility, broken only by the clerk spasmodically crossing himself.

‘For God’s sake, cut the poor man down!’ muttered the Archdeacon.

Gwyn started forward, pulling a dagger from his belt, but the coroner laid a restraining hand on his arm. ‘Wait, until I look at his neck.’

Leaving the other three jammed in the doorway, de Wolfe stepped to the side of the dead man and held up his thin tallow candle. He saw that the corpse was a rather slight, elderly man with a rim of white hair around a bald crown. He was dressed in a long robe of thick black wool, similar to a monk’s habit. The thin face was congested and purple, prominent blue eyes glimmering in the flicker of the candle-flame. Even in that poor light, pinpoint bleeding spots could be seen in the whites of the eyes. John grasped a drooping arm as the body turned slowly and stopped the rotation so that he could look at the side of the neck.

‘What type of cord is this, John?’ he asked his priestly namesake.

De Alencon, visibly distressed but keeping a firm grip on his emotions, was glad of the chance to divert his thoughts from the death of a colleague. He looked at the ligature, which was around the neck and vanished into the darkness above. It was a twisted rope of brown and black flax, the thickness of a man’s little finger. ‘It looks like a monk’s waist cord, probably from the habit that covers him.’