Bernard Knight - Fear in the Forest

Matilda was away, visiting her cousin in Fore Street, and John ate the boiled pig’s knuckle that Mary put before him in peace and quiet. This was shattered just as he was dropping the stripped bone under the table for Brutus.

A hammering on the front door was answered by the maid, as she was bringing a bowl of dried apricots for his dessert. Mary came through the screens into the hall, followed by the thin figure of one of the burgesses’ constables, responsible for trying to keep public order on the streets.

‘Osric’s here, in a lather of excitement,’ she said disapprovingly. ‘You’re wanted urgently, as usual, to the ruination of your digestion!’

The lanky Saxon, who seemed all limbs and Adam’s apple, stood awkwardly, twirling his floppy cap in his hands.

‘There’s been a killing and an assault, Crowner. Not an hour ago, in St Pancras Lane. I went up to Rougemont to report it, but Gwyn said you were at home. He’s gone straight to the house.’

At the mention of the address, de Wolfe rose to his feet.

‘St Pancras Lane — who’s involved?’

‘The dead ‘un is an old servant. Bottler to the injured party, Sir Nicholas.’

The coroner was already moving towards the door. ‘God’s toenails, what’s going on? I was with both of them only last evening!’

Striding through the streets, with the constable pattering alongside, the coroner looked like a large, avenging bat, his black surcoat flying wide over his long grey tunic. As they thrust aside folk dawdling in the lanes, Osric breathlessly added some details.

‘Must have happened earlier this morning … only just discovered by the cook who comes to make the dinner. The servant was dead in the vestibule, the master lying out of his wits in his hall.’

There was knot of neighbours clustered outside the door of the Warden’s house, kept at bay by the massive form of Gwyn of Polruan, who stood on the step. Grimly, de Wolfe thrust his way through and, with the constable close behind, went into the vestibule with his officer, who slammed the heavy door behind them.

‘The cook called an apothecary, who’s with him now,’ grunted Gwyn. ‘The corpse is there, under that table.’

As in John’s own house, the vestibule led at one end into the hall and at the other to a passage to the back yard. It was bigger than the one in Martin’s Lane and had a bench, a table and a row of pegs for cloaks and sword belts.

The bench was overturned and the table knocked askew. Between the legs was the crumpled body of the old man who had served wine the previous evening.

‘Have you looked at him yet?’ demanded the coroner.

‘Just a quick glance. He’s had a beating, poor old devil. Look at his head.’

John motioned for Osric to lift the table away and then crouched down alongside the cadaver, which was on its side, bent so that the knees were almost touching the face. An ominous pool of blood lay under the head, soaking into the earthen floor. When he turned the head, he saw a great tear in the skin of the temple and dark bruising covering most of the cheek.

Something about the ease with which the neck moved gave him further concern.

‘I suspect his neck is broken, too. See what you think about it.’

He rocked back on his heels to give Gwyn space to get at the body. His officer was as experienced as the coroner in the various modes of death, learnt in battles, riots and ambushes the length and breadth of Europe and beyond. They sometimes competed with each other over the accuracy of their diagnoses of different types of lethal injury. Gwyn tested the rigidity of the arms first, to compare with the neck.

‘Been dead more than a few hours, by the stiffness. I wonder when he was last seen alive?’

As he gripped the bloody head to swing it about, the hovering Osric answered his question. ‘Last night, it seems. The cook gave them their supper, then went home. None of the neighbours saw them this morning.’

Gwyn finished his manoeuvres and stood up, wiping his stained hands on his breeches. ‘You’re right, Crowner. His neck’s snapped. Must have been a tidy stroke on his head to do that, though he’s a frail old fellow.’

They stood looking down at the pathetic remains of the aged bottler.

‘A club or a baulk of timber did that. Nothing sharp edged,’ announced de Wolfe, determined to have the last word on fatal injuries. ‘Now what about Sir Nicholas?’

He turned to the door into the hall and lifted the crude wooden latch. Inside, he saw the same high, gloomy chamber that he had sat in the previous evening. Now the owner was stretched out on the long table, lying on a sheepskin coverlet fetched from his bed. He was groaning and moving restlessly, with an anxious-looking man standing alongside, a cup of some liquid in his hand. De Wolfe recognised him as Adam Russell, an apothecary from a shop in High Street, a well-known and trusted dispenser of remedies.

‘He’s getting his senses back, then?’

The apothecary, a small man with a round, owl-like face, nodded thankfully.

‘Just these past few minutes, Sir John. He’s also had a nasty crack on the skull, though naturally not so heavy as the poor fellow outside. There was nothing I could do for him.’

De Wolfe advanced to the side of the table and looked down anxiously at the Warden of the Forests. Part of his concern was for the victim himself, but part was the fear that de Bosco might not be able to identify his attacker and the possible motive. The man’s eyes were open, but rolling about. He was moaning and trying to lift his hands towards his injured head, where a deep cut could be seen through the thin white hair. Blue bruising spread down his forehead and his upper eyelids were black and puffy.

‘Can he hear me, I wonder? What potion have you got there?’

Adam allowed himself a slight smile. ‘The best medicine for this, Crowner — a little brandy wine.’ He bent over the Warden and held the cup to his lips. Nicholas spluttered as the strong spirit burned his mouth, and he struggled to sit up, but fell back with a groan.

‘De Bosco, it’s John de Wolfe, the coroner. We met only yesterday, in kinder circumstances. Can you understand what I say?’

The victim’s eyes stopped swivelling and focused on the speaker’s face. His thin lips parted to show his bare gums and a weak voice emerged.

‘De Wolfe? Why have they done this to me?’

John bent lower to catch the whispers. ‘They? There were more than one?’

The Warden tried to nod, but the movement made him hiss with the pain in his head. ‘Two men — burst in here at dawn. I was just out of bed, sitting here drinking ale. I never take food to break my fast.’

De Wolfe had feared that the Warden’s mind was wandering, but he seemed to be recovering his wits by the minute.

‘Did you recognise them? What did they say?’

The apothecary frowned at the coroner. ‘He’s not yet in a fit state to talk much.’

John bobbed his head impatiently. ‘I know, but just a few words. We need to set up a hue and cry.’ He looked down again at Nicholas de Bosco, who returned his gaze through blood-shot eyes, and raised his head a little from the coverlet.

‘I recollect very little — not even being struck. But they were rough louts, poorly dressed. They said nothing, not a word.’

He groaned and closed his eyes, his head sinking back again. At the apothecary’s disapproving frown, John straightened up and stepped back.

‘I’ll not bother you more at present. When you are stronger, we’ll talk again.’

He looked at Adam Russell. ‘Do you want him taken to the monks at St Nicholas or St John’s?’ These were the two priories that had infirmarers with some skill as physicians.

‘There’s little they can do that God and time will not, Crowner. I’ll get some men to carry him to his bed, then I’ll send my apprentice around to sit with him. I’ll return myself in a few hours.’