‘Well, are you going to tell me or not?’ she snapped, interrupting his sullen reverie.
Too weary to argue, he swallowed his exasperation and related the story of the dead verderer.
‘Your brother has gone to Tiverton, so I presume that he’s not yet aware of the loss of one of his appointees,’ he concluded, sensing that she was only mildly interested in his story, as the dead man was merely a minor knight and not one of the county aristocracy. Matilda was an avid follower of the notabilities of Devon and was always angling for ways to ascend the social hierarchy of the county. Being sister to the King’s sheriff and wife to the King’s coroner was a good start, but she closely followed the activities and intrigues of the barons, richer burgesses and manor-lords, pushing for invitations to feasts and receptions at every opportunity. It was largely at her instigation that her husband had accepted the coroner’s post the previous year, with Matilda nagging her reluctant brother to support John’s bid. But the violent demise of Humphrey le Bonde struck no chord with her and the only faint interest was that Richard de Revelle would be the one who would recommend his successor for election by the freeholders in his County Court.
Their desultory conversation was interrupted by Mary coming in from the kitchen-shed with their supper. The main meal was dinner in the late morning, but the pangs of night starvation were kept at bay by slices of cold pork on a thick trencher of stale bread, with side dishes of fried onions and boiled cabbage. Fresh bread and hard cheese filled up any remaining empty spaces in their stomachs, washed down with ale and cider.
They moved to the long oak table, where the steady champing of Matilda’s jaws removed the strain of devising any further talk, though her husband also acquitted himself well with the food, after a day in the saddle. By the time they had finished and the cook-maid came to take away the remains, it was growing dark in the hall. The one small window-opening, covered in varnished linen, looked out onto the narrow lane lined with high buildings, which was in shadow even when the open cathedral precinct was still well lit. Matilda abruptly pushed back her stool and announced that she was going up to the solar, where her maid Lucille could prepare her for bed.
John, following a well-used pattern, said that he would have some more ale, then take Brutus for a walk. They both knew where the hound was likely to take him, but only a tightening of her lips betrayed her feelings as she stamped off through the outer passage to reach the back yard and the stairs to her upper room.
At about the same time as the coroner of Devon was whistling for his dog, twenty miles farther west in the county, a Cistercian monk was sitting across a table from a horse trader. They were in the large guest house of Buckfast Abbey, in a small room adjacent to the refectory reserved for feeding travellers who sought lodging for the night during the journey from Exeter to Plymouth. Across the large walled courtyard with its two gatehouses was the abbey church with the cloisters and other monastic buildings alongside.
However, Stephen Cruch, the dealer in horses, was no casual visitor to the abbey, as he often spent a night there on business. The austere Cistercians were famed for their prowess in agriculture and animal husbandry. The monks and lay brothers of Buckfast not only kept large flocks of sheep for their wool and meat, but bred both sheep and horses for sale. Richard Cruch had a standing contract as an agent for moving on their horseflesh and frequently came to negotiate with the abbey on behalf of buyers from all over the West Country and beyond.
His contact was Father Edmund Treipas, who conducted most of the trade with the outside world. Though an ordained priest as well as a monk, Father Edmund was a down-to-earth businessman, which was undoubtedly why he was also the abbey’s cellarer, responsible for all the provisions needed by the large establishment. In both roles, that of sales manager and storekeeper, he was unique in the enclosed community of Grey Monks, in that he frequently journeyed abroad, visiting Plymouth, Exeter and even Southampton on the abbot’s business.
These two unlikely acquaintances now sat head to head across the table, with a flask of mead between them, for Buckfast was famous for its honey. Edmund Treipas held a short roll of parchment, on which were the details of a batch of horses to be taken away the following morning to a buyer in Plymouth, who would ship them across the Channel for resale in Brittany. The priest had been going through the list of thirty beasts, noting whether they were stallions, mares or geldings, ticking off their value on the document with a charcoal stub. Stephen Cruch, who could neither read nor write, was using a tally made of a length of twine with different-sized knots, which he fingered one by one as the priest checked off the animals.
As well as the difference in their stations in life, the two men were markedly unlike each other in appearance. Father Edmund, in his habit of pale grey wool with a black scapula apron, was tall and angular, with a Roman nose and jet-black hair cropped short below his tonsure. He was in his late thirties and had a brisk, businesslike manner, unlike the typical image of a monastic recluse.
The horse-dealer was, by contrast, small and furtive. A dozen years older, he had a leathery, wizened face, darkened by an outdoor life. His mobile features had a sly look, his eyes constantly darting about him. When he spoke, it always seemed to be from one corner of his mouth. He allegedly lived in Totnes, but was always on the move between horse fairs and markets. Some rumours had it that he was an illegally returned abjurer from Wiltshire, but other gossip said that he was an outlaw from Gloucester’s Forest of Dean who had slipped back into circulation years before.
When both were satisfied that their lists coincided, Father Treipas rolled up his parchment and slipped it into his sleeve, while Cruch tucked his tally into the pouch he carried on his belt. They raised their pewter cups of mead to seal the bargain and drained them. The priest refilled from the flask.
‘My men will rope them up from the top paddock in the morning, Father,’ said the dealer. ‘We should be in Plymouth well before evening.’
He pushed a heavy leather bag across the table, the neck tied securely with a thong. ‘That’s the price we agreed. Count it if you wish.’
Edmund Treipas shook his head briskly. ‘No need. We’ve done business too often for you to short-change the abbey.’
He pulled the bag of silver coins nearer, then looked quickly around the room, to check that no one else was within sight. Dipping into a deep pocket in his loose robe, he pulled out a smaller purse and slid it across to Stephen. The bag, clinking a little, vanished as if by magic into some recess in Cruch’s brown serge surcoat.
‘I don’t want to know any details, understand?’ said the monk. ‘Just don’t tell me. It’s none of my business how you arrange these affairs.’
He threw down the rest of his drink and stood up, nodding rather curtly at the horse dealer.
‘I’ll see you off with the beasts in the morning, straight after Prime. And you’ll be back here as arranged, in three days’ time.’
He strode out without a backward glance.
In the gathering dusk, John de Wolfe made his way across the Close, the large space around the cathedral. It was almost a city within a city, being under canon law, where the jurisdiction of neither the sheriff and burgesses nor himself could run without the consent of Bishop Henry Marshal.
Tonight no offences were being committed there, apart from Brutus’s leg-lifting desecration of every tree and occasional grave-mound in the cluttered, rubbish-strewn area. Even the irreligious John thought this place was an eyesore, so close to the magnificent church which had so recently been completed.
However, John’s mind was not on the state of ecclesiastical Exeter, but on Nesta, the landlady of the Bush Inn and his beloved mistress. For the last week or two, he had had the feeling that something was wrong. Nothing that he could put a finger on, but in the back of his mind there was a little flutter of concern. Nesta was as affectionate as ever, as talkative as usual and looked as beautiful as always — but something was amiss. He had caught the odd sideways glance when she thought he was not looking and his ear, attuned by two years of loving her, picked up a change in the timbre of her voice now and then.