Michael JECKS - The Crediton Killings

His visage must have betrayed his doubt. The mercenary curled his lip. “You think I would simply have murdered the tavern slut for not being Mary? She was nothing to me! I kill those who harm or threaten me, those who thwart or betray me – the wench did not deserve to die for not being the woman I desired. And I certainly could never have killed my poor Mary, whatever she had done. I loved her with all my heart.”

“When did you last see her?”

“On Monday night. Her servants, and her husband’s apprentice knew I was there, but they didn’t care. They watched me enter her chamber, and they saw me leave in the morning. They all felt I was better for her than her husband.”

Simon doubted that. Any number of servants could be relied on to keep their silence if talking might involve annoying a mercenary captain.

“You are sure that was the last time you saw her?” pressed Baldwin.

“Yes. I tried to many other times… You saw me on one occasion, in the town. I was waiting for her then, that was why I was so irritated by that other slut.”

“Judith?” Baldwin asked.

“Was that her name? The beggar.”

“Did you recall her?”

“Recall her?” Hector’s face showed no emotion, but Simon saw that he had paled.

“Yes, Sir Hector: recall her. She was the woman you took when you last came to Crediton, wasn’t she? Before you met Mary.”

“I… I don’t think so.” He licked his suddenly dry lips.

“You had forgotten her? The woman whom you had enjoyed for a night or more, but whom you evicted from your side once you had met Mary for the first time.”

“No. I… No.”

“And then there is her son, of course. Born a little while later.”

“No!” The captain’s features had paled to wax-like translucency, and he picked at his lower lip as if in an attempt at memory.

“Was he your son?” Baldwin threw out the question swiftly and harshly.

“No, he can’t have been.” The anguish in the captain’s voice was almost tangible.

“I wonder. In any case, Sir Hector, I think I have more than enough reason to suspect you for the murder of these women.”

“Why would I have killed them? What reason could I have had?”

“The first because she stole, you thought, a new dress bought for your lover, the second because she shamed you in the street, telling you she had borne your son.” Baldwin watched the captain narrowly as he guessed at this, and was satisfied to see the dart strike home. Sir Hector flinched. “And then Mary, I assume, because she refused to leave her home and her husband to run away with you.”

“No, that’s not it at all. It’s all wrong, completely wrong.”

“She wouldn’t go with you, would she?”

“If that was all, I’d have killed him, not her! It had nothing to do with…”

“She wouldn’t go away with you, so you decided to kill her instead. You decided that if you couldn’t have her, nobody else would either. Even her husband.”

“That’s nonsense. Why should I do that? I couldn’t have hurt her, not my Mary. I loved her.”

“Yes,” Baldwin said, resting himself against the table and crossing his arms. “But I have to wonder what that word means to you. You are a soldier, Sir Hector. You are used to taking what you want. You wanted Mary Butcher – and you took her. You had no thought for her husband, her reputation, or for anything else. You wanted her, so you had her.”

“That’s a lie!”

“Is it? Do you really understand what the truth is, I wonder? Your whole life is a series of thefts. You agree terms with a lord or baron, and then ravage a whole area. You take what you want – isn’t that how your band survives? And then you come here and try to carry on the same way. A woman here, a woman there. Sarra, and Judith, and Mary. All of them were yours until you became bored with them. And then you killed them. All of them, all stabbed twice, all killed the same way.”

“Even Mary?” His voice had fallen to an awed horror.

“Even Mary,” Baldwin agreed mercilessly. “You killed them all, didn’t you? Why did you do it?”

Simon watched as the two men confronted each other. Sir Baldwin seemed to grow in stature as he spoke. It was as if he was trying to convince himself that he did not truly believe his own words, that the concept of such hideous crimes was so awful that he could not credit anyone with the ability to commit them. His face was hard with a kind of desperate urgency, like a man who wanted to be proved wrong, but who was convinced nonetheless that his worst imaginings were shortly to be confirmed.

But while they spoke, Baldwin found himself becoming more sympathetic to the captain. It was not that the Keeper was gullible, or that he was prepared to condone the mercenary’s life, but the man appeared to shrink even as Baldwin, alive with a new strength, invigorated with his disgust and revulsion at the crimes, railed at him.

To Simon, Sir Hector looked as if he was shrivelling in on himself, reducing to the scale of one of the hill farmers whom the bailiff saw every week; old beyond his years, worn and ravaged by cares and ill-health. Simon nodded. There was all too often no way to prove who might have committed a particular crime, but in this case he was convinced that he and his friend had caught the correct man, and it gave him a fierce pleasure to see the effect of Baldwin’s words.

There was something in Sir Hector’s haggard visage which made Baldwin study him hard as he spoke. Something about the man’s manner made his voice soften a little. It was not the immediate sympathy which a man felt for another accused of heinous offences, for the Keeper had become hardened to seeing criminals suddenly realize the degree of their crimes as their doom approached. It had often occurred to Baldwin that nothing was better capable of assisting a poor memory and inducing contrition than a rope. But if his sensitivity had become blunted after years of prosecutions, his empathy remained, and with this captain, he was sure that there were signs of his pain.

That itself was no proof of innocence. Baldwin had known of cases where men had killed women they loved: from jealousy, from sudden rage, from any number of reasons. All had expressed their shame, and appeared honestly devastated by their actions. It was not rare. But as he mentioned the name of the latest victim, he was assailed by doubts. The captain stood, head bowed, shoulders sagging, and hands limp by his sides, the very picture of misery. This was not the arrogant warrior-lord, ready to quarrel with anyone, and to back up his argument with the point of his sword; this was a man who had lost everything he held dear. His life, his posture suggested, was at an end. There was nothing more for him.

Baldwin ground to a halt and viewed Sir Hector pensively, his head on one side. The captain made no gesture, spoke no word of denial, gave no statement of outraged innocence, and suddenly the knight was doubtful. His mind ran through the evidence, and he was forced to admit to himself that the only links which connected the captain to the dead women were tenuous.

“Sir Hector, you are free for now, but I demand that you do not leave this inn. I will speak to your men, and make sure that they do not abet you in an escape, but I see no reason to lock you in a cell. You may remain here.”

The man nodded, and walked away, through to the solar, and Baldwin’s keen stare followed him until the door had shut. “Edgar. Fetch me Wat, and the man Will who found this woman today.”

Wat walked in with a rolling swagger that put Simon in mind of the sailors he had seen in Plymouth and Exeter. The old mercenary wore a grave expression, but Simon was convinced that a grin of sheer exultation was battling for dominance, and it was no great surprise. He had wanted the leadership of the company, and his master had allowed it to slip from his grasp and fall into Wat’s lap almost unnoticed. It made Simon glower with disapproval, to see a man so pleased by the results of three deaths.