Michael Jecks - The Tolls of Death

‘Accidents will happen,’ Simon said heavily. ‘It’s better than some: last time I was involved with a pig causing death, the damned thing had entered a house in Exeter and eaten a baby before the mother’s eyes.’

Baldwin said offhandedly, ‘It is a great shame, but as you say, if your master cannot find the murderer, I suppose the record is all that matters.’

‘That is not what I said,’ Roger began, but then he peered at Baldwin with a sharp eye. ‘Hmm. You’re a sly one, I see. Perhaps a little further enquiring wouldn’t go amiss.’

‘I don’t understand,’ Simon began, but both ignored him.

Baldwin said, ‘So Mortimer is free. That will be a sore irritation to the King.’

‘I should think so. He was a doughty warrior in the King’s service — before he turned traitor, of course,’ Roger said.

‘So your master will be needed immediately at Bodmin, just in case Mortimer has come all this way?’

The clerk smiled. ‘You are a determined man, Sir Baldwin.’

Simon frowned: he could recall the tale of Lord Mortimer. He was a Marcher Lord from the Welsh borders, installed there thanks to his grandfather’s devotion to the King’s own grandfather, Henry III. It was Mortimer’s grandfather too who had rescued the young Prince Edward, later to be the present King’s father, Edward I, from Simon de Montfort’s men; he later helped the King to win the Battle of Evesham. It was Mortimer who had killed de Montfort’s ally, Hugh Despenser. When his men won through to de Montfort himself, pulling him from his horse and hacking his head from his body, then draping his testicles over his nose, Prince Edward had ordered that the skull was Mortimer’s property, and the skull remained as a proud memento of the victory at the Castle of Wigmore. Simon wondered what had happened to the testicles.

Thus were the seeds of Mortimer’s destruction sown almost a quarter century before his birth. There was a bitter enmity between the Mortimer family and that of the Despensers.

Roger Mortimer had been a close friend of the Prince who was to become Edward II, and through the early years of Edward’s reign, Mortimer had been his most devoted lieutenant, supporting him even through the years of Gaveston’s ascendancy when others deserted him. When the Bruce sent his brother to Ireland to disrupt the English territories there, it was Mortimer whom the King sent with the host, and when the Scottish invasion force was destroyed, he became the Justiciar in Ireland, ruling in the King’s name. Until three years ago, Mortimer was the King’s most trusted servant.

That changed when the Despensers began to encroach on the Marcher lands. One of the lords most affected was Mortimer, and at last, provoked beyond reason, Mortimer rose up in arms with the other Lords Marcher. They took arms against the Despensers, not the King, and when the King’s standard was raised against them, the Marchers stopped fighting and surrendered. As a result, Roger himself was taken and had mouldered in the Tower for eighteen months, since the momentous events on the Welsh marches.

And now he had escaped: the man most feared and detested by Hugh Despenser. It was no surprise that the King and Despenser wanted his head. If Mortimer escaped permanently, he would prove a powerful enemy.

‘Christ Jesus,’ Simon breathed. ‘I hope there won’t be another civil war.’

The clerk Roger crossed himself. ‘So do we all,’ he intoned.

All could remember the tales told at firesides of those terrible times when Henry III fought de Montfort up and down the kingdom. There was scarcely a family which didn’t lose men in the battles that ranged all over the land from Lewes to Wales only fifty years previously.

Baldwin frowned. ‘He isn’t here, though, is he? And I believe the death of this woman and her children is enough of a concern. A man like Mortimer may be able to unsettle the realm, but revolt starts because of injustice. If we allow injustice here, and don’t seek the murderer, it will be as a pebble at the top of a hill which rolls and starts a landslide. I think Jules would be better served remaining here and learning the truth.’

Roger the clerk gave a half-smile. ‘I shall speak to him.’

‘Do so. And I thank you. Godspeed.’

Baldwin watched the clerk walk slowly towards the men at the table. ‘He is a shrewd one, that fellow.’

‘Why do you say that?’ Simon asked, baffled.

‘I think that he has his post because he is interested in justice. Of the pair, he is the man with the understanding and authority. Jules is a pleasant young fellow, but he is an appointment made by the Sheriff — I expect his father is in the King’s Household. It is Roger who records the crimes and instructs his master in what to ask. I think he could be a most useful ally in our investigations.’

Letitia was walking along the lane from her house towards Serlo’s. She carried a basket containing some bread and an egg, and was readying herself to be pleasant to the man. Apparently he had been at the tavern until some ridiculous hour of the night, and now he would likely be incapable of rising from his bed, like the hog he was. Lazy devil!

Well, she wasn’t going to let him stay there. He had a duty to the memory of his son, and a responsibility to his wife and remaining son. Letitia wasn’t going to let him lie about indolently and bring any more shame on himself and poor Alex. She’d stop his sulkiness if she could, and if she couldn’t, well, she’d make his life as miserable as only a woman who knew a man’s weaknesses could.

The stream was loud down here. On the left the trees were taller than at other places, fed from the constant supply of water, and the bushes and ferns in among them were thick and impassable. It was a pleasant, secluded area, she reckoned, just as the mill’s setting was pleasant — but not as a place to live. She liked being in the centre of things. It was alarming to be so far from people, isolated. Although it was only a half-mile from her house, she felt that this valley might have been a hundred leagues away. It was so green, so damp, so noisy with that stream … she could have been anywhere.

There was a place where the ground was stirred, and the soil was black with moisture. She hadn’t noticed this place before, but it was a strange thing about this trail: every so often a patch of dampness would appear. Today she scarcely noticed this new one.

The mill stood, as she had expected, silent; the wheel was stationary, and from inside came not a sound. All she could hear was the chuckle and slap of the water, and the regular snorting of the old sow demanding her food, unaware of her crime. There were chickens scrabbling, too, but since they were all youngsters from Letitia’s last brood, she knew that none were laying yet. The fox had got in among Serlo’s last flock one night when he had been drunk again. Luckily not all the birds had been killed, but those which hadn’t had been traumatised and wouldn’t lay again. They had to be culled. At least they could be eaten. Those which the fox had killed and left had to be thrown away. If a man ate a chicken which had been killed by a fox, he would become very ill indeed.

‘Serlo! Wake up!’ she called, walking into the house, but there was no sign of him there. She went to the sleeping area, but the bed was as it had been the day before, when she had come in here to find Muriel wailing and keening, rocking her dead child.

The memory made her shiver. Thank God that little Aumery was safe at her house now. She put the basket down then crossed the yard to the mill itself. Pushing open the door, a sense told her that there was something wrong, but her rational mind ignored it. She felt the chill in the place, but told herself that was the water nearby. Mills were always cold. She could smell the tinny odour — must be the grease Serlo used to keep the machinery working. She saw the blackened mess on the floor: her brother-in-law was a lazy devil who hadn’t cleaned the place in ages. She heard the scatterings of the rats’ feet, and tutted; she had reminded Serlo time and again to purchase a cat to keep the vermin from his grain stores.