Bernard Knight - Figure of Hate

This caused anguish among their relatives, who had put up the bail money to try to ensure their appearance and would now forfeit it to the King's treasury.

The issue reminded John again that he needed to get Robert Longus down from Sampford for his resumed inquest.

His business done, he left the new sheriff and the others to deal with matters that did not concern him and went back at the ninth hour with Thomas and Gwyn to his chamber in the gatehouse for their second breakfast of bread, cheese and cider. Thomas was looking miserable again, as he had still heard nothing more from Winchester.

Gwyn was his usual cheerful self, looking like a disreputable giant in his leather jerkin and faded serge breeches with cross-gartering up the calves. The wind that moaned through the window opening ruffled his wild red hair as he stared down the steep track that led from the drawbridge to the gate in the stockade around the outer ward.

'Here's a familiar figure, Crowner,' he said eventually. 'I wonder if he's here to call upon you.'

De Wolfe looked up from one of his Latin reading lessons, irritated by his officer's characteristically obtuse remark. 'Who is it, for God's sake?'

For answer, Gwyn bent towards the doorway and put a hand behind his ear in an exaggerated posture of listening. 'Soon find out, Crowner!'

Sure enough, a moment later there were voices mounting the twisting stairwell and one of the men-at-arms on duty in the guardroom below pushed aside the hessian curtain.

'Gentleman to see you, sirr' he announced, standing aside to admit a tall, thin figure dressed in a green riding cloak, the hood hanging down his back. It was Reginald de Charterai, his face looking pinched from a long ride in a cold wind. John climbed to his feet and Thomas hurriedly left his stool, the only other place to sit.

'Sir Reginald, this is unexpected, but you are welcome! Forgive the miserable quarters the previous sheriff grudgingly allotted me, but please sit down.' Reginald pulled the corner of his cloak from the silver ring that secured it to his right shoulder and shrugged it off, before sitting on the stool. Gwyn hoisted himself from his window ledge and poured the visitor a pot of rough cider, then winked at Thomas before scooping up the clerk and the soldier and diplomatically vanishing down the stairs.

The French knight took a sip of his drink and tried not to wince, then set his mug down on the trestle table and looked sternly at the coroner.

'Forgive my intrusion, but I felt that you were the best person with whom to discuss certain matters.'

Though his Norman French was John's own language, the inflexions betrayed his Continental origins, as he came from the Champagne country east of Paris and technically was an enemy, a subject of the French king, Philip Augustus.

Reginald's long face was finely featured and his whole appearance spoke of an aristocratic, rather cold personality. He stared gravely at the coroner as he sat stiffly erect on his stool.

'I rode from Tiverton to Bridport yesterday, intending to take ship to Barfleur,' he began. Bridport was in the next county, about twenty miles away in Dorset, and had considerable sea traffic with Barfleur, near Cherbourg on the Normandy coast. It was infamous for being the port from where many years ago the tragic White Ship had sailed, the sinking of which led to the death of the first King Henry's son and so to the long civil war between Stephen and the Empress Matilda. John failed to see what this had to do with him and waited patiently for de Charterai to elaborate.

'Owing to contrary winds, no vessel had arrived and I was recommended to try Topsham.'

John nodded and tried to look as if he understood where this was leading.

'I am attending a tournament in Fougéres and will not return from Normandy for some weeks, for a grand mélée at the battleground near Salisbury. I thought that as this Topsham is very near Exeter, I would call upon you and unburden some concerns that I have borne for a considerable time.'

John began to wonder whether the French nobleman had been taking lessons in long-windedness from Gwyn of Polruan.

'Are these concerns a matter for a coroner?' he asked politely.

Reginald inclined his head. 'They may well be — and that is why I seek your advice, as I consider you to be another man of honour, a rare thing these days.'

John cleared his throat to cover his embarrassment at an unexpected compliment, as de Charterai continued.

'You may know that I have a considerable respect indeed affection — for Avelina, the widow of the late William, lord of Sampford Peverel. Both something that she has imparted to me and also knowledge which I myself possess make me most concerned about the manner of her husband's death.'

At last he was getting to the point of his visit, thought John, who sat up at this hint of a suspicious death.

'Tell me what doubts you have, sir,' he prompted.

'I was there at the tourney field in Wilton last spring when Sir William died — in fact, I was the opponent he struck just before he died. He unhorsed me, but fell from his mount himself a moment later and was killed. In some ways, I might be looked upon as a factor in his death, for the force of his lance's impact upon my shield broke his saddle girth and he fell to the ground.' De Wolfe's dark eyes held the other's blue orbs in a direct stare.

'So why do you have concerns? Your conscience must surely be clear at being a factor in his death. That is what tourneys are all about — striking at each other!'

De Charterai shook his head emphatically.

'No, no, there was much else to consider! William Peverel fell from his horse just as I did — a common occurrence in jousts, as you well know from your own experience. We all learn to accept it, unless we are unlucky enough to break our necks. But he was killed by being trampled by another horse — one ridden by his son, Hugo Peverel.'

The coroner nodded. 'I had heard something to that effect. But surely you are not claiming that this was deliberate… how could Hugo foresee that his father would fall in front of him?'

Reginald rapped the edge of the table with his long lingers, the first time he had been anything other than impassive.

'Because he may have foreseen it, Sir John! As soon as I saw my opponent beneath the hoofs of another destrier, I picked myself up and ran forward to offer assistance, as did several others. I grabbed the reins of his stallion, which was prancing about and threatening to run wild. It was then I saw that the saddle was almost off its back, as the girth under its belly was hanging free.'

De Wolfe wondered where this was leading. 'This is also common knowledge,' he said doubtfully. 'Though rare, a broken girth is well known to occur from time to time.'

The French knight shook his head. 'This one was not broken. As I held the horse once it had steadied, I looked at the leather strap where it hung loose, instead of passing around the stem of the buckle. The treble rows of stitching that secured it had all almost been cut through, so that its strength was but a fraction of what was required.'

John's black eyebrows lifted. 'That is a serious accusation! How could you be sure?'

'I spend my life with horses and their harness, Crowner. I know that no stitching could be so sharply snipped in such a regular fashion as that, from wear and tear. It had been deliberately tampered with.'

De Wolfe pondered for a moment. 'Did you draw the attention of anyone to this?'

Reginald shook his head. 'All was confusion at that time. Peverel's squire came running to take the horse, as well as some grooms and officials from the tourney.

I left the beast with them and went to see if I could aid the fallen man, but it was obvious that he was dying as his chest and skull had been crushed by the hoofs of his son's horse.'