Bernard Knight - The Manor of Death

'She's in there and in a strange mood, so tread carefully! '

John groaned. 'My dear wife is always in a strange mood. What's the trouble this time?'

Mary picked up his riding boots to take them away to clean off the mud. 'Her brother called today, the first time we've seen him since he slunk off in disgrace. There was a lot of shouting and he left in a temper.'

Richard de Revelle, his brother-in-law, had been sheriff of Devon until the previous year, when largely at John's instigation he had been ejected by the king's judges for malpractice and suspected treachery. He had been in further trouble since then and had been lying low in one of his distant manors, so John was surprised to hear that he had appeared again in Exeter, though he had recently bought a town house in Northgate Street.

'I'll bring you a meal within the hour, then afterwards you had better let me attend to that boil of yours,' declared Mary.

As she left for her kitchen-hut in the yard, John reflected that exposing his nether regions to her would be no embarrassment for either of them, as they had enjoyed many a tumble in the past. Then Matilda had got herself a French maid, Lucille, who was too fond of carrying tales to make it safe for them to continue dallying in the wash-house or kitchen.

With a heavy heart at the prospect of his wife's sombre mood, he pushed open the hall door and went around the screens inside that helped to reduce the draughts in that gloomy chamber. The hall went right up to the bare beams supporting the shingled roof, the dark aged timber of the walls relieved only by some dusty tapestries portraying scenes from the Scriptures. The only modern feature was the large stone hearth that filled much of the inner wall, which John had copied from some he had seen in Brittany. Most houses still had a firepit in the centre of the floor, the smoke having to find its way out under the eaves, after half-choking and blinding the occupants. The conical chimney that rose above the fireplace to the roof was a recent innovation, like the flagstones beneath his feet. Matilda's elevated ambitions had insisted on these, instead of the usual floor of beaten earth covered in rushes or bracken.

He loped towards the hearth, where a small fire of beech logs burnt in spite of the pleasant weather. His wife was sitting in a high-backed wooden seat with a cowled top, holding a pewter cup in one hand and a rosary in the other. Her fingers were slowly clicking the beads and her lips were moving silently, but she did not look up as he entered.

John went to a side table and poured himself a cup of red wine from a pottery flask, then lowered himself gently into a similar chair on the opposite side of the hearth.

'I am back, wife. This suppuration on my body is giving me no small discomfort.'

Matilda slowly looked up and the clicking of her rosary stopped. Her heavy features regarded him dully, but she said nothing. He wondered again if her mind was failing, and his pity was mixed with a curiosity as to whether his marriage could be annulled if she lost her wits completely.

'I have spent the night on a hard floor in an alehouse in Axmouth — and much of the rest of the time on Odin's back,' he said, trying to strike some spark of reaction from his wife. She often upbraided him for spending so much time away from her, attending to his coroner's duties over half the county — which he resented, as it was she who had made him accept the appointment in the first place, as a stepping stone to her ambitions to climb higher in the hierarchy of Devon society.

His attempt at conversation failed, for her small dark eyes under their hooded lids swivelled back to regard the burning logs in the grate, and her fingers resumed their relentless manipulation of the holy beads. They sat in silence, and John moodily stared at her stocky body, swathed in its long kirtle of brown wool under a surcoat of dark red velvet. Her head was swathed in a white linen cover-chief that was draped around her face, even her neck being hidden by a wimple of the same material. They had been married for seventeen years, though until the last three he had barely spent a total of six months at home, being away with Gwyn at campaigns in Ireland, France and the Holy Land. They had been thrust together by their respective parents in a union that disposed of the least attractive of the de Revelle daughters and, in the case of John's father, struck a useful bargain between a younger son with no land and a woman from a rich family. De Wolfe did not hate her, in spite of the endless animosity that she generated between them. He just wished that she did not exist — or at least not as his wife.

Making one last effort, he told her of his exploits at the coast. 'We had a strangled youth at Axmouth. Buried and then unearthed by the parish priest.'

The mere mention of something religious seemed to trigger a reaction in Matilda, who spent part of every day on her knees, either in the nearby cathedral or at St Olave's Church in Fore Street. Apart from her considerable interest in food and drink, attending places of worship seemed to fill the rest of her life. Her head came up and she seemed to focus on her husband for the first time.

'A priest? How came that to be?' Her voice was rough, as if her throat was sore.

De Wolfe explained the circumstance, emphasising the religious connections. 'The town is part of a manor owned by the Priory of Loders. It seems the prior keeps a firm grip on the place through his bailiff and portreeve. '

Matilda nodded, looking almost animated compared with her former torpor. 'Loders is a daughter house of Montebourg Abbey in Normandy,' she announced as if she was preaching a sermon. 'Richard de Redvers, a former sheriff of Devon, gave it to the abbey many years ago.'

'Well, it looks as if they are reaping a good profit from it, for it's one of the busiest ports along this coast,' grunted John. 'The new Keeper of the Peace, a knight called Luke de Casewold, suspects that some of their business is not strictly honest. But that's none of my concern unless it's connected with the death of this poor lad.'

Once the mention of priests had passed, Matilda lost interest and went back to clicking her beads and staring into the fire. It was only the arrival of Mary with a large tray bearing their supper that brought her out of her gloomy reverie. She rose to her feet and took her well-padded body over to the long oak table that sat in the centre of the hall, with benches on each side and a chair at each end. Dropping heavily into one of these, she waited until the cook-maid had set a thick trencher of yesterday's bread in front of her, then laid two grilled trout upon it. A wooden bowl of boiled cabbage and another of fried onions appeared alongside, before Mary went to the other end of the table and gave the same to her master. Then she returned with a large jug of ale and filled earthenware cups before vanishing to the back yard to get the next course.

Matilda took her small eating knife from a pouch on her girdle and attacked the trout, muttering that it was fish again and not even a Friday!

John tucked in, as he was hungry after a day in the saddle and Mary was a cook to be treasured. Most people ate the main meal of the day at around noon and had very little afterwards, but Matilda, always keen to adopt new fashions that she could brag about to her friends at St Olave's, insisted on eating in the early evening — though this did not stop her healthy appetite from also being exercised at midday.

They ate in silence, which was the usual state of affairs in their household, as John was usually out of favour for one reason or another. A fresh loaf appeared, with yellow butter and a slab of cheese, and when Mary had cleared away the debris of the fish she brought two platters of dried fruit, imported from France.