Mel Starr - A Corpse at St Andrew's Chapel

This act caused raised eyebrows, but one advantage of being bailiff to a powerful lord is that one may do such things without feeling a necessity to explain. And I didn’t. Although I did later make plain my motive to Simon Osbern.

My action at the grave produced two threads from the frayed blue sleeve. The tint was familiar. I was eager to compare this find with the blue yarn taken from Alan’s corpse. I turned from the bewildered assembly and hastened back to the castle. The blue wool from Henry atte Bridge’s burial garment matched perfectly the yarn drawn from Alan’s scalp seventeen days before.

I compared the woolen fragments and thought that I knew what had happened to Alan the beadle on the path to St Andrew’s Chapel. He had left the town to investigate the howl of a strange beast; a beast I also had heard. Alan had died at the jaws of that animal, or more likely trying to escape its jaws, along the dark lane. Henry atte Bridge had found him there, wearing nearly new shoes for which the beadle could have no further use. Henry had taken the shoes, then perhaps dragged the body into the hedgerow to…to what purpose? That I could not explain. Who can know the mind of a thief who will plunder the dead?

I thought little more of the matter as I went about my business that day. Lord Gilbert’s sheep were to be moved to a new field, so that the fallow field they had grazed and manured could be plowed. This business took most of the afternoon, for Lord Gilbert has a large flock, and sheep are wont to go in every direction but that which they should. My father thought them the stupidest of God’s creation. When the afternoon was done I found myself in renewed agreement with him.

I could not sleep that night. My mind wandered back to its earlier conclusions regarding the death of Alan the beadle and Henry atte Bridge’s role in that sorry event. Although my bed was warm and the night cool I rose past midnight to walk the parapet and consider that which caused me such unease.

If Alan died on the road, and the beast attacked him there, why the dent in the back of his head? There were no rocks in the path. But if he fell into the hedgerow while fighting a wolf, and lay hidden there in death, how was it that Henry atte Bridge found him? Alan’s corpse was drawn so far into the nettles that he was discovered by a plowman in the field which lay inside the hedgerow. Those who passed by on the road for the day he lay dead did not discover him. And why was Henry atte Bridge walking that path? His work at the new barn would take him north out of Bampton, not east toward St Andrew’s Chapel.

I circled the walls of Bampton Castle twice but my perambulation brought me no nearer a solution to the riddles my mind created. I understood how a thread of blue yarn might fall from the raveled sleeve of Henry atte Bridge and become lodged in the beadle’s dark locks. This find indicated that Henry had grasped Alan by the shoulders and neck at some time. But why? To haul him into the hedgerow? If so, Alan died along the path. Then why the blow to the back of his skull? Perhaps after dragging the corpse into the bushes Henry let the body fall so that it struck the stones hidden there with great force.

No. A fall of two or three feet would not do the damage to Alan’s skull I had found. And there was the blood. Or not enough of it. Henry atte Bridge surely had something to do with the death of Alan the beadle, but what that was I could not determine.

I expected, or perhaps I hoped, to hear a wolf howl that night as I circled the walls of Bampton Castle. I heard no such beast, nor any other sound. The castle and town slept peacefully, although there may have been those who turned uneasy in their beds, unknown to me. I know now there were several who had cause to rest uneasy.

I returned to my own bed, now grown cold, and thought how agreeable it would be to find a wife for such a moment as this. I fell asleep reflecting on the pleasures of such a search and its successful culmination.

I awoke with grainy eyes as dawn lightened the window of my chamber. I could not sleep longer, but had no wish to leave my bed and plant my feet on the cold flags. I did so anyway. I decided as I lay abed that I would this day visit Emma atte Bridge. My questions might easily be resolved. Surely the woman knew something of her husband’s business. Her response to a few questions might permit me to sleep more soundly.

They had rather the opposite effect. I broke my fast with wheat bread and ale, then walked across Mill Street to the Weald. No morning sun warmed this day. Thick clouds had swept in from the north during the night. I wrapped my cloak tight about me and shivered as if December had returned, without the glow of Christmas to warm my soul. The blossoms newly forming on Lord Gilbert’s apple trees would think better of opening further this day.

No door in the Weald was open to spring air this day. I knocked vigorously a second time before Henry atte Bridge’s widow cracked her door to see who disturbed her morning. Her expression did not speak joy at the discovery.

I invited myself into the dim, smoky interior of the hut. The fire on the hearth was weak and produced little heat, so that there was no draft to draw the fumes up to the gable vents. Three children gazed unblinking at me from a bench, bowls of yesterday’s cold pottage balanced precariously on their laps, their fingers clotted with the coagulated meal.

I introduced myself, though I am sure the woman remembered who I was. It does no harm to remind people from time to time that I serve as bailiff to Lord Gilbert Talbot. Emma pushed the door shut behind me and waited, jaw set, to learn the reason for my visit.

I would gladly have given her a reason, had I known it myself. It would be foolish to say that I chose to visit her this morning because I could not sleep the night before, but that was the truth of it. I decided to ask first about the blue cotehardie in which she had buried her husband.

“’Twas old…an’ could be spared,” she answered. “Henry said as ’twas too worn to be of use any more. He’d not worn it for a time.”

“How long? Since Easter?”

Emma was startled at this question, for she looked up at me abruptly. I saw her brow furrow and guessed that she was uncertain whether or not she should tell the truth. She evidently could discover no reason to lie, so after a moment’s hesitation nodded, “Aye, ’bout then.”

As we spoke I watched over her shoulder while her children went back to their bowls. They paid me no more attention, but returned to their meal with enthusiasm, licking sticky fingers as they shoveled food into their mouths. The oldest finished his breakfast as I watched. He reached into his bowl and drew forth a chunk of meat which he proceeded to stuff into his mouth until his cheeks bulged. He chewed contentedly, and turned his gaze back to me and his mother.

In the spring of the year those tenants and villeins who had a pig to slaughter in the autumn have usually consumed the last morsel of the animal. I was surprised that this hut was yet able to flavor its pottage with meat. Perhaps this was the last of the fletch of bacon Henry atte Bridge had spoken of. Or perhaps it was from the haunch I’d seen roasting on a spit.

“The shoes your husband wore when last I called…he did not buy them in Witney.”

Emma gazed steadily at me, as if assuming she had heard but a portion of what I wished to say and that I would shortly continue. She was correct, but I hoped to build my inquiry on her responses. This was not to be. The woman knew when to be silent. Perhaps living with Henry atte Bridge taught her that skill.

“I traveled there and saw the cobbler. He sold no shoes to a man of Bampton.”