Michael JECKS: The Sticklepath Strangler

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, events or locales, is entirely coincidental.

Sir Baldwin de Furnshill

The Keeper of the King’s Peace in Crediton, Baldwin has been marked by the injustice of the destruction of the Knights Templar. As a result he seeks justice for common folk.

Lady Jeanne

Baldwin’s wife, who was once widowed and now fears losing her second husband.

Edgar

Baldwin saved Edgar’s life in Acre, and since then Edgar swore loyalty to him for life. He is Baldwin’s most trusted servant.

Simon Puttock

Long a friend of Baldwin’s, and an official of the Stannaries, the tin miners of Dartmoor. Simon and Baldwin have often worked together on investigations.

Roger de Gidleigh

Coroner Roger is one of only two Coroners who must investigate all sudden deaths and wrecks in Devonshire.

Nicole Garde

The French wife of Thomas Garde; mother of Joan.

Thomas Garde

Thomas is a freeman, who works his own little plots, but he is an incomer to the vill of Sticklepath and has never been fully accepted.

Joan

Daughter of Nicole and Thomas, Joan has found a corpse.

Ivo Bel

Brother of Thomas, and Manciple to the nuns of Canonsleigh. He lusts after Nicole, his sister-in-law.

Serlo Warrener

A gruff, hardy man, crippled years ago, who tends to the warren up on the moor.

Athelhard

Athelhard was killed by the vill when they thought him guilty of murder.

‘Mad’ Meg

Sister to Athelhard, and simple from birth, Meg avoids the vill since the death of her brother.

Ansel de Hocsenham

A Purveyor to the King, Ansel last visited the vill during the 1315–16 famine.

Emma

Close friend of Joan who found the corpse with her.

Swetricus

A peasant of Sticklepath who lost Aline, his daughter, several years ago. Three daughters survive.

Samson atte Mill

The miller, known for brawling and drunkenness.

Gunilda

Samson’s wife, a downtrodden woman.

Felicia

Samson and Gunilda’s daughter.

Alexander de Belston

The cautious Reeve of Sticklepath who is determined to preserve the reputation of the vill and its people.

William Taverner

William is the master of the only inn.

Ham

Taverner’s son, who was killed in the recent floods.

Mary

Daughter to Taverner, who often serves visitors to the inn.

Gervase Colbrook

Parson to the little chantry chapel of Sticklepath.

Drogo le Criur

Leader of the Foresters, charged with the duty of guarding the Forest of Dartmoor and travellers over it.

Peter atte Moor

A Forester under Drogo, Peter lost his daughter Denise to the murderer some years ago.

Adam Thorne

Also a Forester, Adam has a bad limp, but is known for his strength and integrity.

Vincent Yunghe

The youngest of the Foresters, Vin is still learning his duties.

Miles Houndestail

A traveller who was first to see the corpse with the two girls.

There is a natural series of stages in the creation of a new book. For me, a central scene comes first, something which drives the whole of the rest of the story. In The Leper’s Return , for instance, I wanted to look at leprosy in the Middle Ages, while in The Crediton Killings , I examined the role of mercenaries. Often, though, I find myself chewing over a curious beginning and wondering how I could develop it into a story. The Sticklepath Strangler belongs to this category, and I have to thank Deryn Lake, author of the excellent John Rawlings stories, for the initial idea.

It was while we were walking over Dartmoor – not, I have to add, the sort of thing that Deryn’s friends would expect of her – some few years ago that she and I swapped ideas for new novels.

My idea for her was for a deserted ship suddenly arriving at a Devon port, a concept she used in her novel Death in the Port of Exeter , while hers gave me the initial scene of this book, with Joan and Emma’s hideous discovery. I must add that her suggestion that I should write about a skull falling from a wall came only from an appreciation of a two-thousand-year-old wall – not from any wishful thinking about what she would like to do with the struggling author who had promised to show her an attractive walk to a not-too-far distant pub.

And if Michael, who later gave us a lift back from the Northmore Arms in his Audi, should ever read this, I would like to thank him too.

Sticklepath is a fairly typical and relatively unspoilt village, but it has had a confusing past.

Take the Church: Sticklepath has been split among the parishes of Sampford Courtenay, South Tawton and Belstone. Then again the roads have all changed their routes; the main road used to suffer gridlock for the whole of the summer until the dual carriageway was built, which avoids Whiddon Down, South Zeal, Sticklepath, and Okehampton itself, so that now, instead of stationary vehicles belching fumes on the old A30, locals have no passing traffic whatever. Good for the children walking to and from school, but less so for the many pubs and cafes which were built on the old road. Most have been forced to close.

Sticklepath itself has had a great history. There is the Finch Foundry, until the 1960s a working tool-manufacturer which exported its billhooks and spades all over the world. Nowadays the foundry is a National Trust museum dedicated to water power, and I would recommend anyone who has an interest in metalwork and smithing to visit it, especially since ‘Dartmoor Dave Denford’, to whom this book is dedicated, can often be found there giving demonstrations of blacksmithing. Just remember not to ask if he makes horseshoes. He is keen to point out that ‘I don’t do ’orses’, since he is not a farrier. Yes, there is a difference.

A short way further up the river from the foundry’s water-wheels is the old mill of Tom Pearce, made famous in the song ‘Widecombe Fair’. Now the main buildings have gone, to be replaced by houses. The mill too has been converted, but not so long ago, a thick serge-type of cloth was still being manufactured here from wool shorn from the sheep on Dartmoor; it was then worn all over the British Empire by soldiers and sailors alike. All this from a tiny little village hiding in a valley in the middle of Devonshire.

The success of the place came from two factors: its abundant water power, and its location on the main road to Cornwall. The village supplied the needs of visitors and travellers, because during the age of horse travel, everyone going to Cornwall passed through Sticklepath and made use of its inns, cooks and grooms. While other villages lost their trade, like South Zeal, which was bypassed centuries ago so that the mail coach horses didn’t have to cope with the two hills at either side of the town, Sticklepath somehow survived.