Michael Jecks - The Malice of Unnatural Death

To answer a question like that directly was dangerous. ‘It was only a short while ago that you told me you had suggested thatour queen’s household should be dispersed. Then you told me that you thought you were to be asked to administer her estatesin Devon and Cornwall. What is next? Her children to be taken from her?’

Bishop Stapledon nodded slowly. ‘They are heirs to the English crown. They must be protected.’

‘You would have them removed from their mother?’

‘For their protection — yes.’

That was the moment when Baldwin changed his mind, he realised later. At the time he simply left the bishop without agreeingor refusing, but later he knew he would have to go. It was while he was sitting in his hall, his daughter Richalda on hisknee, listening to her cooing and singing. The thought that the king could accept the advice of others and have his wife deprivedof her children was so repugnant, it made him feel physically sickened. If the best advice the king was receiving led himto take his children from their mother, Baldwin could hardly do less good. He could sit back in comfort here in Furnshilland complain, easing his soul with the reflection that it would do little good for him to lose his own life and thereby losehis children. Better to be in at the fight.

‘I will go,’ he muttered.

‘What was that, my love?’ his wife asked.

Baldwin looked at her and then he smiled. The decision was made. His fate was sealed. ‘Would you like to travel to London,wife?’

The road to Tavistock

Simon endured the ride to Tavistock without listening to much of Busse’s talk. So far as he was concerned, the task was complete: Busse had been followed, and he had indeed tried to visit Langatre. It was a shame, especially since Simon was still convincedthat Busse would make the better abbot.

It was a thought that remained with him all the way back, and for his part Busse seemed pensive too. Only Rob was his usualself, whistling tunelessly, talking and complaining about the length of the journey. ‘Is it far now?’

‘Be silent!’ Simon snapped after the last plaintive cry. ‘Christ in chains, you whine like a child!’

‘It is very cold, is it not?’ Busse commented, his cloak pulled tight about him.

Simon looked about him wonderingly. There was no snow, no hail, not even a fine mizzle, which was a blessing. ‘It’s not toobad.’

‘You are not talking to me, Bailiff. Are you so concerned about my misdemeanours that you refuse to speak to me any further?’

‘I don’t know what you mean.’

Busse smiled quietly at that, and was quiet.

On this return journey Simon had acquiesced in the monk’s wishes concerning their route, and now they were passing along thegreat road to Cornwall, passing through Crediton, then south-west along to the northern tip of the moors before turning southwards. As the sun started to sink in the west, they reached the little village of Bow, a place Simon knew quite well, and he waslooking forward to stopping for the night. There was a windblown and sad-looking furze bush hanging over the door of the largeinn at the centre, and he suggested that they pause for the evening.

Soon they were inside, Simon gripping a large jug of ale, warming it with the poker he had heated in the fire. Busse had alarge mazer of wine in his hand, and he smiled with a sort of sad amiability as Simon tested his ale. ‘You appear to havelost all confidence in me, Bailiff. Do you think that I will lose the post?’

‘Oh, I don’t know about that sort of thing,’ Simon said uncomfortably.

‘But you think that a future abbot should not indulge his whimsy by consulting a man like Langatre?’

Simon set his jaw, but he was no hypocrite. ‘I do not suppose to understand the use of a man like him.’

Busse’s brows rose. ‘What do you mean?’

‘A necromancer. A man who …’ Simon’s hand lifted, and he wriggled his fingers as he sought for the correct word. ‘Whoconjures demons to do his bidding. I’ll have nothing to do with such things, and I don’t understand why anyone else would. I fear such things too much to …’

‘Simon … oh, Bailif! Do you think I would ask him to produce a black demon to go to Tavistock and carry away my brotherde Courtenay?’ Busse suddenly chuckled aloud. ‘Oh, Bailiff — would that it were that easy! No, all Langatre can do is foretella little of the future. Not that accurately, I dare say, but he is a useful man to speak to. It seems to clear any confusion. And I had much before I made this journey. I wanted to think more deeply about whether I wanted to be the abbot. I was notsure. In my humility, I wondered whether de Courtenay might not be a better man for the job than me. And that made me fear.’

‘And Langatre put your mind at rest?’

Busse nodded, his eyes shining in the firelight. ‘He pointed out to me that a man who was anxious about the awesome responsibilitiesof power would perhaps be better for our community than one who was utterly convinced of his fitness for the duty.’

‘So a man who thinks he is right for a job is necessarily the worst man for it, eh?’ Simon ventured.

‘Unless it is a mason taking on a building, or a herdsman asking to look after the cattle!’

Simon nodded to himself. ‘Or,’ he added, ‘a good stannary bailiff who finds himself promoted to a new post in a differenttown.’

‘As I said on the way to Exeter, my friend, if you wish to leave that post and become a bailiff once more, I should be pleasedto confirm it. What did de Courtenay offer you?’

Simon shrugged. ‘What does it matter what he suggested?’

‘Well, if he had asked you to watch me at every moment, and report back to him, then there could be some trouble for me. Ifyou preferred him to me, that is.’

‘You knew?’

‘From the first moment after we arrived in Exeter when I turned and noticed that excellent servant of yours behind me. Hisstern visage is hardly inconspicuous even in a large gathering. So what will you do?’

‘I cannot lie to him,’ Simon said, aiming an idle kick at his snoring servant.

‘No — but if you do not embellish, I will be content.’

Simon eyed him, and gave a slow grin. ‘All right.’

Busse raised his mazer. ‘A toast, then: to brother de Courtenay, and his patience, for I hope to be in post for many longyears to come. And another toast, my friend: to the good stannary bailiff, and long may he endure on the moors with the tinnershe administers!’

Monday, Christmas Eve

Exeter City

And as they drank into the long night, Will closed the door on his wife’s petulant complaints, hunched his shoulders against thecold, and set off once more on his nightly route, up the great street from the South Gate, and right along the way to the Palace Gate. He passed down the alley, and when he reached the burned remains of his house he stopped for a long time andstood, staring, at the place where his children had lain.

His body was found the next morning, huddled in a corner of the path, not far from where Mucheton had been murdered. Therewas no sign of pain on his face, and no apparent wound when Coroner Richard had him stripped and rolled over.

‘So what in God’s name was there for him to smile about when he died, then, eh?’ the coroner muttered to himself.

‘Peace, Coroner,’ Baldwin said. ‘Just peace.’

Dartmoor

Maurice found a shelter as he walked down past Scorhill. For a man used to constructing little shelters, it was always easy to find a place. Always look for a fallen tree, look away from the wind, and imagine how someone else would make a refuge. This one was hardly the picture of comfort, and some of the covering had blown away, but it took little time to gather upmore fallen leaves from about the place and replenish the roof of the little shelter, and for one man there was space to spreadout inside.