‘Who the devil are you — and what are you doing?’
De Wolfe turned to see a man in his twenties scowling at them suspiciously. He was dressed in a plain brown tunic and breeches and John guessed that he might be a journeyman in some craft. He had sandy hair and a round, open face, though at the moment that conveyed nervous indignation.
De Wolfe countered his question with one of his own. ‘And who might you be?’ he snapped. ‘This is the scene of a violent death.’
The younger man flushed. ‘I am all too well aware of that! It was my own father who died!’ Explanations followed and it became evident that the man was Simon, the only son of the slain ironmaster who had been called from the nearby village of Charing, where he lived and worked as a carpenter. Thankfully, Simon did not query why the Coroner of the Verge was involved, even though he disclosed that he had been interrogated by the city sheriff a few hours earlier.
‘I returned to collect some of my father’s tools and to see if there is any good clothing that I should take back to Charing. Once it is known that the house is empty and unguarded, the folk around here will soon pillage anything of value.’
Again, Simon seemed oblivious to the fact that they had burst in through the back door, presumably accepting that a royal law officer had the right to do anything he pleased.
‘Have you any idea who might have wished your father harm?’ asked de Wolfe.
The carpenter shook his head. ‘We were not that close, since I married and went to live in Charing a few years ago. But he was just a craftsman, like myself. Who would wish to kill him?’
‘I was told that he has not been robbed. Is that true?’
Simon nodded. ‘When I was here earlier with the other officers, they gave me my father’s money chest. It was a small thing, but had a reasonable sum in it. It was not hidden, just left in his sleeping room upstairs. Any thief would have found it in the twinkling of an eye.’
John grudgingly allowed his estimation of Sheriff Robert fitz Durand to rise, learning that he had not dipped his hand into the money chest, but restored it straight away to the family. However, this did not help him in any way to understand the motive for the crime. He waved a hand around the workshop.
‘Is there anything here that is out of place or missing?’ he asked. ‘Though I admit it would be hard to tell, given the appearance of the place.’
Again, the son could not help, saying that he had not visited for the past month and that the workshop was always as chaotic as this. ‘His living quarters are better, sir,’ he added in defence of his dead father. ‘There is no disorder up there.’
Nothing further could be learned from the man and with some rather gruff condolences and a promise that the house would be made secure, they watched Simon leaving, clutching some of the tools and a bundle of clothing.
John waited in the yard, morosely studying the pool of dried blood, while Gwyn found a hammer and nails amongst the litter in the workshop, which he used to roughly repair the door.
On the way back to the alehouse for a final drink, the coroner bemoaned his inability to round up the people who knew the victim and grill them for any knowledge of the man and his affairs.
‘That bloody sheriff can’t have made any worthwhile enquiries,’ he growled. ‘In the short time he was here today, he would never have been able to find any witnesses — and by the sound of it, he’s not even going to hold an inquest.’
Gwyn hunched his broad shoulders in a gesture of dismissal. ‘Well, although it’s a mystery, it’s nothing to do with us now, Crowner. We’ll never hear any more of it, I reckon.’
Gwyn was not often wrong, but this was a glaring exception.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The next morning brought a genuine case to the Coroner of the Verge, one that needed no consideration about involving the city or Middlesex. It was no mystery or even a crime, but had to be dealt with according to the law. A mason’s labourer had been crushed to death by a large block of stone which fell from the top of the second storey of the Treasury building, on the river side of the front of the Great Hall.
This edifice had previously been wooden, but during the past few years had been progressively rebuilt in stone. The balustrade around the top, surrounding the pitched slate roof, was the last part to be completed.
‘They send me idiots as workmen!’ fumed the master mason, who was in charge of the construction. He was standing at the foot of the wall where the accident had taken place, with de Wolfe and his officer and clerk staring at the mess on the ground. Some of the mess was bloody, being the still shape of the dead workman, pinned under a quarter-ton block of Caen limestone imported from Normandy. Around it was a tangle of splintered timber and rope, the remains of the derrick that had been hauling up the block.
As other men prepared to lever off the stone to retrieve the body, the coroner listened to the mason’s diatribe about the uselessness of his workforce, who had improperly secured the tripod on the parapet.
‘The fools allowed the sheer-legs to lean out too far and overbalance with the weight of this heavy block,’ he ranted. ‘May the Blessed Virgin bar me from Heaven for all eternity, if I lie when I say that I have repeatedly told those men exactly what to do and how to do it!’
John allowed the fiery builder to let off steam, then told Gwyn and Thomas to organise a jury for an inquest in an hour’s time, as this seemed a straightforward, if tragic event. It was obvious that the master mason felt both guilty and vulnerable to criticism, which was why he was so incensed at his men and intent on passing the blame down the line.
The inquest, held in a vacant bay of the adjacent Great Hall, was short and unremarkable, a dozen workmen being empanelled as witnesses and jurors. A few people came to the proceedings, including the Clerk of Works and the Keeper, Nathaniel de Levelondes, who was ultimately responsible for the running of the palace. Also present were several of the senior Chancery and Treasury clerks, as the building operations concerned their departments of state.
Amongst the few curious onlookers, John was rather surprised to see Renaud de Seigneur and his wife. He could only assume that having exhausted the sights of London, they seized on any diversion to fill their time until the old queen came and they could go on their way to Gloucester and Hereford.
The inevitable verdict of accident was dictated by de Wolfe to the jury. He added a comment before dismissing them.
‘I see no point in declaring the errant derrick and block of limestone as “deodands”, even though they were the immediate instruments that caused death,’ he boomed, glowering around at the bemused faces of the jury. ‘It seems pointless to confiscate them or declare their value as a fine, when the proceeds would only go back to the Crown, who owned them in the first place!’
Leaving the Keeper to deal with any disciplinary proceedings against the master mason or his men for negligence, the inquest concluded and the participants melted away from the huge hall. Anxious to get back to Osanna’s dinner, de Wolfe and his officer set out across New Palace Yard for the main gate, but were ambushed by Renaud de Seigneur and the delectable Hawise.
‘That was a most effective demonstration of justice,’ effused the husband. ‘We do not have such a system in Blois, though of course our neighbours in Normandy have coroners.’
John felt that he was talking for the sake of making a noise, rather than from any real interest, but courtesy obliged him to stop and listen, aware that Gwyn was glowering behind him, his stomach rumbling audibly at the prospect of dinner being delayed.
John muttered a few platitudes about the advantages of Hubert Walter’s importation of coroners from across the Channel, as he tried to edge away and make his escape from this clinging pair. Hawise, in an equally clinging gown of pale-blue linen, under a pelisse of cream silk, pouted as she reluctantly stood aside. ‘You are always rushing away somewhere, Sir John!’ she complained. ‘No doubt you have important matters to attend to, but I am glad that I had the chance to see you perform today.’