Paul Doherty - The Treason of the Ghosts

‘But he’s gone to God as well.’

‘Has he?’ Corbett asked. ‘Or is he still in hiding, moving like some silent vindictive ghost through the trees? Loosing arrows at Sir Louis, visiting Deverell at the dead of night, not to mention his old enemies, Molkyn and Thorkle. Come on,’ Corbett urged. ‘It’s possible. After all, who does leave you that money? Could it be Furrell, guilty at deserting you?’

‘No, he wouldn’t do that. I think the money comes from young Chapeleys, in gratitude for what we tried to do for his father. I tell you, clerk, Furrell’s dead.’ Sorrel tapped her chest. ‘Oh, yes, sometimes I have wondered myself but I know he’s dead, buried in some unmarked grave.’

‘For the sake of argument,’ Corbett moved on his stool, ‘let us say that’s true.’ He paused. ‘By the way, have you seen Blidscote? Ranulf is searching for him. Furrell didn’t like Blidscote either, did he?’

‘No one likes Blidscote!’ Sorrel snapped. ‘Especially the tinkers with their little boys. I tell you this, clerk: if Furrell had wanted to kill Blidscote, he could have done it years ago. Perhaps he should have done. Our bailiff’s a turd of a man.’ She moved her head and winced at the pain in her neck. ‘But Furrell’s dead.’

‘In which case, Sorrel, we come to you.’

She gaped at him.

‘Don’t act the innocent,’ Corbett murmured. ‘You are a strong and capable woman, Sorrel. You know the countryside around Melford. You can use a bow, you are strong enough to swing a sword or a flail. You can slip across the fields and no one will notice you. You hated Molkyn and the rest because they mocked Furrell, disparaged his evidence. Because of them Sir Roger was hanged and Furrell later went missing. Your pleasure at Deverell’s death was obvious.’ He watched her intently. ‘I wonder if one of them killed Furrell. Did he become such a nuisance that they murdered him? Perhaps his corpse lies buried under Molkyn’s mill? Or on Thorkle’s estates? You kept well clear of both of them, didn’t you?’

Sorrel’s head went down.

‘Look at the evidence,’ Corbett persisted. ‘When Sir Louis Tressilyian rode into Melford to meet me, he was attacked. Everyone, apart from you, was in the crypt of that church.’

‘Repton was not there.’

‘But why should Repton attack a royal justice?’ Corbett pointed to her weather-beaten boots. ‘You could slip them off, take a bow and quiver of arrows and try to kill Tressilyian.’

‘Why? I have no grievance against him.’

‘But he was responsible for Chapeleys’ hanging and, indirectly, Furrell’s disappearance. Perhaps you suspected him of murdering Furrell? Did your man persist in reminding Sir Louis of a miscarriage of justice?’

‘I saw where the ambush took place,’ Sorrel retorted. ‘If I had loosed an arrow at Sir Louis, I would not have missed. Perhaps the first but certainly not the second.’

Corbett stared at a point beyond her head. He hadn’t thought of that. Moreover, hadn’t Sir Louis talked of a man’s voice taunting him?

‘But you were roaming the meadows and woods that afternoon. You must have seen someone. This mysterious archer who, perhaps, was the same person who daubed messages on Sir Roger’s tombstone and elsewhere.’

Once again, Corbett privately wondered about the true whereabouts of Furrell the poacher.

‘I wasn’t roaming anywhere, clerk. I went to Melford to watch you arrive. I visited Deverell.’ She bit her lip.

‘I’ll come to him by and by,’ Corbett declared.

‘I then went and waited on the outskirts,’ Sorrel continued. ‘I dogged your footsteps from the moment you left the crypt and, before you ask, I never met any mysterious archer, though, I concede, Sir Louis was attacked.’

‘So you visited Deverell? You knew about the porch, the front door and the Judas squint?’

‘Yes I did.’

‘And you were there when I examined the corpse?’

‘So was half of Melford. It doesn’t make me the murderer. Are you going to say I killed Thorkle and Molkyn?’

‘It’s possible,’ Corbett replied. ‘You could have taken both men by surprise. One blow would be enough.’

‘But I didn’t,’ Sorrel protested. She got to her feet. ‘And why do you accuse me?’

‘As I said, two assassins are at work in Melford. Now we come to the attack on you today. Perhaps the Mummer’s Man resents your interference in his bloody affray and came to silence you.’

‘I can’t prove my innocence.’ Sorrel walked to the window and pulled back the shutters, eager to breathe fresh air. ‘I have never killed anyone, master clerk.’

‘Haven’t you, Sorrel? Never lifted your hand in violence?’

She stood by the window, shoulders shaking.

‘Isn’t that why you fled Norwich?’ Corbett continued remorselessly. ‘Perhaps a customer became too rough? Why all the secrecy, the change of name?’

‘Yes, in self-defence, I killed a man.’ Sorrel turned and leant against the sill. ‘He wanted to hurt me, cut at my body, watch me squeal with pain. He was drunk. In the struggle I took his knife and plunged it into his heart. I don’t know who he was or where he came from: it was in some filth-strewn alleyway. I was just a whore fumbling with a customer. I left Norwich within an hour of his death and never returned. Why, master clerk, are you going to arrest me?’

Corbett shook his head. ‘Some men bring about their own death. I am more concerned with the present.’

‘And so am I, clerk! I did not murder anyone. Oh yes, the thought crossed my mind on a number of occasions. But, take Sir Louis Tressilyian, for example. Do you really think, master clerk, I would have missed? And why should I kill Deverell, Thorkle or Molkyn?’ She walked back and stood over him. ‘I prayed for your day. I would have loved to have seen such men appear at the bar of justice and be questioned, like you are now questioning me.’

Corbett stared closely at the woman. He always prided himself on his logic and his reason but, as Maeve often advised: ‘Follow your heart, Hugh: truth has its own logic.’

‘Very well.’ Corbett grasped her hand. He folded back the fingers and examined the white linen cloth wrapped round the wound. ‘I believe you, Sorrel. So I must still ask myself, why should the Mummer’s Man — and I think it was he — come out to Beauchamp Place to murder you?’

‘And the answer?’

Corbett chewed the corner of his lip. ‘When we first met, you said you had much to say about Melford but you’d let me draw my own conclusions. Perhaps the killer realises this. Perhaps he suspects that you know more than you do and wants to silence you once and for all.’ Corbett snapped his fingers. ‘Or something else.’ Corbett got to his feet. ‘Perhaps Furrell told you something? Shared knowledge which brought about his own mysterious disappearance?’

Sorrel shook her head. ‘If I could, I’d recall it.’

‘No,’ Corbett urged. ‘I spoke to one of the other jurors. He met Molkyn in his cups. Our good miller confessed that Furrell had declared how the truth about the killer was plain as a picture. Do you know what he meant by that?’

‘Furrell said many things,’ she answered softly. ‘But not that. Or, if he did, I never heard it. I want to show you something, clerk.’

She went across and took down the piece of tapestry and described the crude map she had drawn.

‘I didn’t tell you the full truth,’ she explained. ‘But this is Melford. Here is Falmer Lane.’ She pointed to the roughly etched map. ‘Devil’s Oak. These crosses mark the places Furrell told me to stay away from.’

Corbett studied the painting. The map was very crude. He wouldn’t have understood it if she hadn’t explained each symbol. He shook his head.