Bernard Knight - The Witch Hunter

William Marshal regarded him coldly. ‘If the Count of Mortain objects, he can petition the King about it. But as long as the Lionheart is in France, the administration of England is in the hands of the Chief Justiciar, the Chancellor and the Royal Council.’

Walter de Ralegh glared at the smooth-faced lawyer standing stiffly behind the sheriff’s chair. ‘Why does this fellow have to be here? This is a confidential matter.’

‘Sir Richard has requested that I advise him as to his legal rights and to report what transpires to Prince John, the future King.’

De Ralegh recognised the veiled threat in Roscelin’s words and responded harshly. ‘The sheriff is an officer of the present King, not a future king, though even that is not a foregone conclusion! With God’s grace, Richard will be on the throne for very many years to come.’

William Marshal flapped his hand at the cleric from Gloucester. ‘Oh, let him stay. Though it does go to confirm with whom the true sympathies of de Revelle lie.’

He shuffled some parchments before him, though this was mere habit, as, in spite of being one of the most powerful men in the Plantagenet domains, he had never learnt to read either French or Latin.

‘We will keep this short and to the point. Your fidelity and allegiance to the king have long been suspect. The Chief Justiciar himself, when he visited this city some months ago, was apprised of various matters which gave him great concern and which have been discussed in the Curia since then. Only the reluctance of your brother-in-law to press the matter left you in a state of probation, rather than suspension — possibly by the neck!’

De Revelle opened his mouth to deny this, then found he had nothing useful to say, so shut it again.

‘This time, you have been caught out once more in shameful activities. You recently brought treasure trove to the exchequer and claimed it was as intact as when discovered, yet it has been proven that you removed a substantial portion for your own purposes.’

He pushed some documents across to Walter, who could read, although he had already been through these inventories of the cache found at Cadbury.

‘Those documents were falsified. It was part of de Wolfe’s scheming to bring about my ruin!’ cried the sheriff.

‘We challenge the authenticity of those lists and the trustworthiness of those who wrote them,’ brayed de Sucote.

William slapped the table with a large hand. ‘Be silent! We have made all necessary enquiries to show that they are genuine and were made in good faith. We interrogated not only the treasury clerks in Winchester, but stopped at Cadbury on the journey here to confirm with the manor-lord and his priest the amount of coin originally found. Here we have checked with the constable’s steward that he accurately confirmed the contents of that chest, before you made off with it, in defiance of the coroner’s legitimate ruling that the decision upon its disposal be left to the next Eyre of Assize.’ De Ralegh jabbed a forefinger at the discomfited Richard. ‘And not only did you pilfer the hoard, but you attempted to put the blame on an honest coroner’s officer and even had him arrested on a felonious charge, to cover up your own crime!’

De Revelle began muttering some feeble excuse about a terrible error, but the Marshal overrode his words. ‘Not content with that, you attempted to silence the coroner’s promise to expose you by veiled threats to cause harm to a woman, who, not to put too fine a point on it, was his favoured mistress.’

‘Sir Richard strongly denies that!’ broke in de Sucote.

‘Let him speak for himself, his mouth has been active enough in other directions!’ rasped Sir Walter. ‘He may deny it all he wants, but what we heard in the court today convinces me that he set a trap for Sir John de Wolfe, paying his whore to get her sister to falsify evidence of witchcraft to that gullible canon.’

As the catalogue of de Revelle’s misdeeds was expanded, the sheriff seemed to sag in his chair, convinced now that all was lost and that he would end on the gallows, perhaps after being mutilated and disembowelled for the greater crime of treason. Walter de Ralegh’s finger went down a list on a parchment roll, stabbing a series of items that recorded actual and suspected misdemeanours on the part of Richard, the most serious being his involvement some months earlier in an abortive rebellion on behalf of Prince John, in which the de la Pomeroy family were once again embroiled. When his finger reached the bottom, Walter threw the list aside with a flourish and leaned forward threateningly towards de Revelle.

‘Do you call that honourable behaviour for a Norman knight, and a servant of your king, to whom you swore an oath of allegiance when you were elected sheriff, eh?’ He leaned back and looked across at the Marshal, as if handing over the baton to him.

William shook his head sadly. ‘I cannot tell what is to become of you, de Revelle. We know you claim to have influential friends, some right here in Exeter and perhaps some in Mortain. But I can assure you that you have none in Winchester or London.’

He drummed his fingers impatiently on the table, his long face grave as he stared at the stricken Richard, much as a ferret immobilises a rabbit before pouncing.

‘We have discussed this matter with others in the council and have their full authority, especially that of Hubert Walter, to act as we see fit when we have heard all the evidence here in Exeter.’ He paused and looked at de Ralegh, who gravely nodded his assent. ‘What happens to you eventually will depend on further deliberations between the members of the Curia and ultimately what the King wishes to be done. In that, I have no doubt that your own sponsors, if they do not cast you aside, might have some say. That is none of our concern today, whether you ultimately live or die!’ His voice hardened even more. ‘But what is crystal clear and as certain as night follows day is that you are no longer fit to be sheriff of the county of Devon.’

He rose to his feet, a tall, spare man, with an aura of authority about him that had fortified him in the special role he had played in the history of England.

‘Richard de Revelle, from this moment forth you are no longer the King’s representative in this county. Henceforth, you will have no more authority or privileges than any other man in the city streets. The justiciar has given me the power to appoint Sir Henry de Furnellis as sheriff, until such time as the will of the King and his council is known as to a permanent successor.’

He sat down heavily, leaving a paralysed de Revelle sunk on his chair.

‘This is not the end of the matter, sirs,’ brayed Roscelin. ‘The Prince will soon hear of this.’

William Marshal flung an arm towards the inner door. ‘Just get out of here — and take him with you!’ His eyes dropped to meet those of the deposed sheriff. ‘And if you take my advice, you will collect your chattels from here and quickly get yourself to one of your manors and lay as low as you can, for as long as you can! Maybe then they’ll forget to hang you!’

As the room cleared in an atmosphere of suppressed embarrassment and excitement, John de Wolfe felt one major emotion — not elation at the final defeat of his long-term adversary, but anxiety about how he was going to report this to Matilda in a way that would cause her the least anguish.

John was not present at the last chapter of that Monday’s climactic story, but had to rely on his friend the archdeacon for an account of what went on in the bishop’s parlour at the palace. In the evening, when the oppressive heat seemed even more cloying than before, the three archdeacons who happened to be in the city, plus the more senior members of the cathedral chapter, were called to the palace to witness their prelate deliberate on the behaviour of their fellow-canon, Gilbert de Bosco.