Bernard Knight - The Tinner's corpse

The road ran in a wide semicircle north of Dartmoor, which loomed high on his left hand. It was almost noon when he rode at last into Lydford, which lay half-way between Okehampton and Tavistock at the western margin of Devon. An ancient Saxon burgh, the little town had two castles: one was a ruined timber structure, dating back to the Conquest, which sat on the edge of the deep gorge that protected one side of Lydford; the other was a brand new square stone tower at the opposite end of the old castle bailey. It had been finished only a month earlier, to serve mainly as the Stannary gaol, though the lord of Lydford had quarters on the top floor. The main hall below this was used as a court and guardroom, the gaol being underneath. It was lacking door or window, reached only through a trap-door from the hall. Already, in the short time the prison had been in use, it had gained an evil reputation for its awful conditions.

John de Wolfe rode wearily up to the rebuilt wooden gatehouse that sat in a stockade that ran along the bank and ditch of the earlier fortifications. A crowd of men was clustered outside, with a fringe of curious women and children. As John walked the palfrey through the archway, a guard stepped forward to challenge him, but a snapped, ‘King’s coroner!’ left him standing with his mouth open.

There were more rough-looking men milling around the courtyard who, de Wolfe guessed rightly, were tinners. A thatched stable block was against the inside of the stockade on his left, with many horses and ponies tethered to rails. He left the palfrey with a dim-witted stable-boy, then strode towards the wooden steps that led up to the main floor of the tower.

At the top, there was such a press of people trying to get into the hall that he had to pull shoulders aside to get through. Inside the doorway a solid plug of bodies brought him to a halt. ‘What’s going on in here?’ he growled in the ear of a grey-bearded fellow jammed against his left side.

‘A crowner’s inquest — a local tinner who died here last night, after that affair in Chagford.’

For a moment, de Wolfe was mystified, as well as anxious. Then he realised that the territory given to Theobald Fitz-Ivo included Lydford. Even though the tinner had been injured in Chagford, which was de Wolfe’s responsibility, he had died in Lydford, so Fitz-Ivo rightly had jurisdiction. He forced his way inside, ignoring protests and threats until he had a clear view of the large chamber.

A low dais to one side carried a few benches and chairs, as in the Shire Court at Exeter. On these sat the obese Fitz-Ivo and the dapper sheriff, together with a couple of clerks and Geoffrey Fitz-Peters. Behind them stood a couple of men-at-arms, a priest and a few tinners. Immediately below the dais, a low bier rested on the floor, carrying the body of the black-bearded tinner, covered with a sheet up to his neck.

But de Wolfe’s attention was riveted elsewhere. Directly in front of the platform the huge figure of Gwyn of Polruan was pinioned by two soldiers. His officer looked even more dishevelled than usual, his hair tangled and ominously matted with dried blood. The part of his face that was not covered in whiskers was red and bruised and his left eye was half closed, the lid swollen and dark. As if they feared the giant would break free from his captors, heavy metal fetters were clamped around his wrists and ankles, joined together with a rusty chain.

Appalled and angry, de Wolfe shoved further forward until he stood in a free space at one end of the dais, the rest of the small hall being packed with a few score tinners, presumably both jury and spectators. Fitz-Ivo was leaning forward to speak, hunched over his paunch. The inquest must have been well advanced, for he was haranguing the jury by way of a summing-up.

‘So here we have a law-abiding man, a tinner helping to guard the self-confessed murderer of another tinner, Henry of Tunnaford, as well as being the destroyer of God knows how many stream-works and blowing-houses.’ He leered around the audience, deliberately emphasising the tinning aspects to a jury who were virtually all tinners.

‘This poor man was then grossly assaulted by this Cornishman, who beat him senseless and left him to die. The motive need not concern us, for a coroner’s inquest is to determine what happened and who was responsible, not why it occurred. Suffice it to say that this Gwyn of Polruan was not acting under his master’s orders, for the Exeter coroner was far away by then.’

De Wolfe fumed at this distortion of the truth, but worse was yet to come.

‘Consider your verdict, then, you men of the jury. This honest tinner, who leaves a widow and five children, was done to death by a brute twice his size, who tried to disrupt and prevent a summary trial and execution of a killer, confessed out of his own mouth — crimes solely against Stannary interests and swift justice straight from Stannary men.’ Fitz-Ivo leaned back and gave a self-satisfied smile at Richard de Revelle, as if to canvass his approval.

The sheriff was looking uncomfortable at the way Fitz-Ivo was drumming up feelings in the heart of tinners’ country, but made no effort to intervene, his popularity in this area being so fragile.

With sweat on his podgy face from excitement at his own eloquence, the fledgling coroner turned back to his audience to reach the climax of his exhortation. ‘The verdict is yours, but consider it among yourselves now. This can only be murder, a violent death from grievous bodily harm, and a hundred witnesses can show it was Gwyn of Polruan.’ He took a deep breath then delivered his coup de grâce . ‘If that is your verdict, then the culprit must hang forthwith!’ he shouted.

There was a scatter of yells of approval from the hall, though quite a number of tinners looked uneasy at this premature turn of events.

De Wolfe’s patience snapped, worn to breaking point by rising incredulity and anger. He thrust his way across the floor below the dais to stand in front of Gwyn and glare at the new coroner. The platform was only knee-high and as Fitz-Ivo was sitting down, de Wolfe’s face was on a level with his.

‘Have you gone mad, you fool? Or are you just drunk?’ he yelled, in a voice so strident that a hush fell upon the hall, even among the more raucous elements who had just been applauding his officer’s death sentence.

Fitz-Ivo flinched, his protuberant watery eyes gazing at de Wolfe as if he was the devil just arrived from hell. He opened his mouth to protest, but John overrode his words. ‘Have you learned nothing about your duties and powers, man?’ he ranted. ‘A coroner cannot pass any sentence, let alone that of death. If your jury names a person as being responsible, then he must be committed to the King’s justices for trial.’

Fitz-Ivo lurched to his feet, trying to work up righteous indignation. ‘You have no right to disrupt my court, de Wolfe. A coroner you may be, but now you have no jurisdiction here.’ He looked around for support from the sheriff, but de Revelle sat stonily silent. He was well aware that his protégé was incompetent to the point of absurdity, but locked in a room with a few score ill-disposed tinners he was desperate to remain neutral for as long as possible.

De Wolfe glared directly into Fitz-Ivo’s protuberant eyes as he said, ‘Your appointment has not yet been confirmed by the King’s Justiciar or his judges — and after this fiasco, I intend to make sure it never will be!’ His voice rose in a crescendo of wrath.

Turning his back abruptly on the fat knight, he walked the few steps past the corpse to where Gwyn stood, and laid a hand solicitously on his arm. ‘How goes it with you, man? Are you sorely hurt?’

His officer managed a crooked grin. ‘I’m well enough, Crowner. It takes more than a few loose-fisted tinners to see me off — even when one of them uses a knife.’ He lifted a chained arm enough to show his master where the blade had sliced though his leather cuirass.