Michael JECKS - The Sticklepath Strangler

Simon took his pot of ale to the door, leaning on the jamb. ‘What do you think about this story of a Purveyor going missing?’

Coroner Roger cocked an eye at him. ‘You think there’s anything new in that? The man who can tax an area and take their food is always unpopular.’

‘No body was presented,’ Baldwin said.

‘True, so I’ll have to see whether I can arrange a suitable fine.’ Coroner Roger was quiet for a short while, thinking. ‘What do you suggest, Sir Baldwin? I can see you’re not happy.’

‘I would recommend that you send someone to find the new Purveyor. Perhaps he has some record to show that Houndestail was mistaken. It is possible that the last Purveyor became ill and resigned his post.’

‘Aye, and perhaps there’s no record,’ the Coroner growled. ‘Which might indicate that the man died around here. It’s a shame: if it weren’t a King’s Officer, I’d just forget about it. A murder committed maybe seven years ago – what chance is there of finding out anything useful?’

‘Perhaps none,’ Baldwin admitted, ‘but we may find that there is a dead Purveyor as well. If more people have been killed here, we should be aware. It could have a bearing on this girl’s death.’

‘Very well,’ the Coroner said.

‘And what of this so-called curse?’ Simon wanted to know.

‘Forget it,’ Coroner Roger said with conviction. ‘Like you said last night, Bailiff, peasants will swallow the most stupid of stories.’

Their debate was cut short by the entrance of Jeanne and Petronilla, and soon afterwards food arrived. There was a large loaf of bread which the Coroner tore apart with his bare hands, and a platter of cold roasted meats. Waving the flies from it, Coroner Roger cut off a thick slice of cold pork and shoved it into his mouth. Simon watched him for a moment or two, but when the Coroner went on to spear a large yellow slab of fat, licking his lips, Simon felt his belly rebel. Muttering that he was going outside to clear his head, he left the others to break their fast.

All was bright and clear. Northwards he heard people in the fields, the rattling of tools, animals complaining as they were harnessed, chickens clucking and calling. He inhaled deeply, noticing the clean scent of cow’s muck, the grassy odours of horse dung, the fresh tang of cut grass. It was a glorious morning, and his head was already beginning to feel a little better.

And yet something was missing. His mind was working slowly today, but he was sure that in and among the smells and noises of the little vill as it began to prepare for the new day, one specific sound was lacking. It took him some time to work out what it was. In fact, he had meandered around the huge patch of mud in the road outside the cemetery, and was up at the spring, drinking, before light dawned.

He stood up, shaking the water from his hands, and gazed about him with astonishment. To the north he could see labourers in the strip fields, bent over as they tugged tiny weeds from the rows of wheat and oats, or hoeing between rows of peas and beans in the gardens; he saw a girl methodically scattering grain for chickens in a yard; he saw a woman sitting at her door with a knife, cutting leaves for a pottage; he saw peasants heading for the door of the chapel to attend the first Mass. People everywhere, yet not one spoke.

It was incredible. The place could have been under anathema, despairing because their souls would be lost under the papal ban. Their demeanour would certainly have suited such a terrible fate, he thought as he watched them going about their business. No one chatted or laughed. All walked as though bent under an intolerable weight, and that was particularly the case when they caught sight of him. The women averted their faces, or raised their hands to hide themselves from him.

He remembered Houndestail’s words: ‘It’s Athelhard’s curse again!’ and he gave a convulsive shudder.

Personally Joan thought that the inquest was a good idea. It meant that people had other things on their minds rather than looking into her affairs, and while all the vill were being told how much they would be fined for discovering the body, she and Emma could disappear.

Emma was panting already, and they weren’t halfway up the hill yet. This track, which led straight to the moors, rose up from the vill and then turned right. It was steep, if not quite so stiff as the climb of the sticklepath itself, but it was quieter, and with the trees all about it was better hidden too. In fact, as Joan toiled upwards, she knew that by the time Emma and she broke out through the trees onto the moor itself, the whole vill would be up at the road and watching the inquest.

It was a shame, she reflected, staring back the way they had come. She would have quite liked to see the body dug up, but her mother Nicole had made it quite clear that if Joan showed her face down there, she would skin her alive. In preference Joan had persuaded Emma to walk up and see their old friend Serlo Warrener.

He was a curious fellow, Serlo. Short and bent, with a shock of brown hair that was never combed or untangled, he had deepset eyes which twinkled above his thick moustache and beard. Invariably dressed in a much-patched and worn fustian tunic of faded green, he would appear in sheepskins when the weather deteriorated, with boots made of the same plentiful material. Consequently he had a distinctive, musty odour, as Nicole once put it in her delicate way. Joan had laughed aloud when her father had growled, ‘If you mean he stinks like a pig, say so, woman!’ Her amusement had earned Joan a clip around the ear.

Many people didn’t like Serlo at all, nor trust him. He was friendly with Mad Meg, and that was enough to put them off. Privately Joan thought that her mother was scared of him, but he wasn’t scary to Emma and her, of course. They could see he enjoyed their company, with his funny smile and his fluttering hands, his high-pitched laugh and rumbling voice, but he was always reticent in front of adults.

They were at the top of the steeper part now, almost through the trees. As they came into the light, they turned left at the heather-covered hillside, and then right, towards Belstone.

This part was always quiet. There were no miners here on the northern face of the moor. The nearest miners were over at Ivy Tor, near where Vin’s parents had lived. Here the only other creatures were the sheep and cattle which were pastured according to the ancient rights of the tenants of the forest, and the deer which belonged to the King himself.

There was also the warren. It lay on the path to Belstone, just past the soggy area where the streams so often overflowed their banks and swept down over the top of the grassed plains. The two girls sprang from boulder to boulder, giggling as they went, playing their usual game, but then Joan slipped on a moss-covered rock and fell with a squeak, straight into the black peat-rich soil.

‘You’ll get a right thrashing for that,’ Emma said unsympathetically.

Joan shrugged. ‘It’ll wash out. I’ll rinse the mud off in the river before we go back.’

‘Ugh! It’ll be freezing in the water today,’ Emma said with a grimace. She turned and jumped to the next rock, her bare feet gripping the stone with the unconscious skill of long practice.

‘I’ll live,’ Joan said. She wasn’t looking forward to stripping and washing her garment, still less to putting it on again afterwards, but there was nothing else for it.

The hut stood a few yards below the warren on the side of the hill. It was a short distance from where Joan had fallen, and the two girls made their way to it without further mishap, walking around the stone-built warren on their way. The warren was quite large. Some three yards wide and ten or so yards long, it was built of good moorstone like any of the walls, but every few yards, gaps in the stonework made doorways for the rabbits to enter. To keep it warm in winter and cool in summer it was covered with turves.