‘Was Henry de la Pomeroy mentioned at all? Or Prince John?’ persisted John. He wanted to know how deeply the Lord of Berry could be tied into this murderous conspiracy, but Walter Hamelin was too far down the chain of conspirators to be of much use.
‘All he let slip was that he was a squire and lived in Berry Pomeroy castle,’ growled their prisoner. ‘He stayed at the inn the second night, as he said it was too far to ride back almost to Totnes that late in the day.’
By now, the two soldiers had come out of the alehouse and added themselves to the guard around the captive. They marched on to where they had left the horses, where the youngest soldier reported that he had seen no one since they left.
Walter was hoisted on to the spare horse, his hands tied in front of him so that he could still grip the pommel of the saddle, as the reins were held by Gabriel, who rode on one side with Gwyn on the other. John de Wolfe led the small procession through the moonlight, the other men-at-arms bringing up the rear. Their prisoner had given up his barrage of cursing and blasphemy and sat in sullen silence as they jogged along the deserted road.
‘The North Gate will have closed long since,’ said Gwyn. ‘How will we get this fellow to the castle?’
‘Don’t worry about that, I know all the night porters,’ Gabriel assured him. ‘They’ll open if I tell them it’s king’s business.’
All city gates were closed at dusk, but like the curfew that was supposed to keep people off the streets at night, the regulations were often broken, either for important people or for a bribe.
John had suspected that Walter might have made some desperate break for freedom, knowing that he was inevitably headed for the gallows, but after a couple of miles had passed without incident, he felt more confident that they would deliver the outlaw to Stigand’s tender care.
The track generally followed the little River Yeo, which joined the much larger Exe halfway to the city. It crossed the Yeo at one densely wooded point over an old humpback stone bridge a few yards long, which had a low parapet on each side. Halfway across, without the slightest warning, Walter Hamelin suddenly threw himself sideways from his saddle and fell to the ground virtually between the legs of Gabriel’s horse. The animal shied in alarm and caught unawares, the rider had difficulty in staying on its back. There was instant confusion in the gloom, now all the deeper because of the high trees all around the bridge. Amid the shouting and yells of alarm from the escort, the prisoner, who had caught a hefty blow from one hoof of Gabriel’s mount, managed to scrabble his way the few feet to the parapet and throw himself across it. Everyone else was sliding from their saddles to intercept him, but John and Gwyn were blocked by the horses on the narrow trackway. Gabriel almost fell from his own frightened mare, but managed to catch Walter by the ankle as he squirmed across the rough stones bordering the bridge
‘I’ve got the bastard!’ he yelled, but it was a premature claim, as with a frantic kick, the outlaw freed his leg and vanished head first over the wall. By now, the others had struggled to the spot and leaned over to look down into the river. Though only a dozen feet wide, it was in full spate, the water splashing over large stones in the gleam from the moon.
‘Can you see him?’ roared de Wolfe.
‘Not a sign, he’s washed down under the bridge,’ hollered one of the soldiers.
‘I heard a hell of crack as he went down,’ shouted Gabriel. ‘I reckon he landed on his head on those rocks.’
John stood up and began running across the bridge in the direction they had been going. ‘Quickly, follow the river down, he can’t have got far!’
Three of the men rushed across the bridge after him, but Gwyn and Gabriel went back over the bridge and clambered down to the bank, following the boisterous torrent downstream. The other party was opposite and in the poor light, they all began to comb the water’s edge as they stumbled along in the direction of the flow, shouting and cursing as they went.
After a hundred yards, Gwyn let out a thunderous bellow. ‘Here he is, caught up against a tree stump!’
As the others strained to see from the opposite bank, Gabriel helped him to haul out the sodden shape of Walter Hamelin and dump him on the grass at the base of a tree.
‘He looks dead to me!’ called out the sergeant.
John fumed on the other side. ‘He can’t have drowned in that time, he’s not been in the water five minutes!’ he yelled.
Gwyn, after a moment’s examination, mainly using his fingers in the dark, called back across the turbulent water. ‘No, but he can crack his head open! And I think he may have a broken neck.’
‘I said I heard him hit something,’ declared Gabriel. ‘Well, it saves having to hang the murderous swine!’
EIGHTEEN
De Wolfe was in two minds whether to tell Nesta of Matilda’s unjust accusations about them and eventually decided that for the time being, he would say nothing. After her first outburst, Matilda followed her usual habit of glowering in a sullen mood for a few days, but she made no more open reference to the matter. John had gone through this before, when she had discovered his other infidelities over the years. As he had been absent so often, she stored up her justifiable complaints for when he was home between campaigns, using his sins as fodder for the martyrdom she affected. In truth, her main complaint was the fear that his indiscretions might be used to belittle her in the eyes of her women cronies, though this rarely happened. She suspected that most of them were in the same situation, as it seemed that almost every man in Exeter had similar illicit liaisons — and many were quite open about it. So the pair endured their meaningless marriage as before and now at least, there was the novelty of the new house to divert them from open hostility.
The adventure in Crediton a few days earlier was already half forgotten, though Ralph Morin had made sure that the next messenger to Westminster would take a message confirming Henry de la Pomeroy’s involvement in Roger Smale’s murder — and emphasizing to the Chief Justiciar John de Wolfe’s role in trying to establish some law enforcement in Devonshire.
In the first week of December, John hired some porters and a cart to bring Matilda’s belongings from Fore Street to St Martin’s Lane, consisting mostly of her two trunks of clothing and some smaller articles. Before he had gone to Palestine, they had rented a small house near St Pancras Church, but as that had been furnished, everything for the new place had to be bought new and was already in place.
Lucille staggered behind the cart with an armful of gowns that could not be squeezed into the boxes and Mary carried two wooden pails filled with oddments that Matilda had used in her cousin’s house. As Mary had been Hugh de Relaga’s contribution, Matilda grudgingly accepted her, though she looked upon the woman’s shapely figure and rather bold eye as yet another temptation for her wayward husband.
Though there was no snow, there was a bitter east wind and John was glad that he told the old yardman to get a good fire going in his new hearth.
Matilda immediately retired to her solar above, where the endless nagging and scolding of Lucille began. When the porters had lugged the heavy trunks up the steps, Matilda set to, sorting her beloved gowns, surcoats, cloaks and headgear and harrying her new maid into laying them reverently back into the boxes and on to shelves on one wall. The solar, which was a wife’s territory, was sparsely furnished, with a single high-backed wooden chair, a couple of stools and a single trunk for John’s clothes. The bed was on the floor, a thick mattress slightly raised on a plinth, covered in blankets and a heavy coverlet of sewn sheepskins.
While Matilda was snapping her orders at the already tearful Lucille, John went out to the kitchen shed to see how Mary was settling in. She had already spent a few nights there and had made her quarters as comfortable as she could, claiming that she was quite happy with her accommodation.