Just as the skies had promised, the morning of the first day of the tournament was clear and fine when Simon walked from the castle towards the tilting ground, resolutely putting all thought of Wymond and Benjamin from his mind.
He was up before dawn and drank his morning whet of a pint of thin ale at the castle’s bar before setting off. As he gathered up watchmen and inspected the field to make sure that all was ready, walking about the ber frois and reassuring himself that everything was prepared, he couldn’t help but be glad that Coroner Roger was responsible for investigating sudden death. Simon had enough to occupy him already.
He checked that Lord Hugh’s seat was safe and hadn’t been stolen (stranger things had happened) before peering beneath the stand and making sure all looked sound, it would be dreadful to have Lord Hugh’s own stand collapse, not that it was only the fear of poor construction that made him nervous. He was concerned. The sight of Wymond’s mutilated body had shocked him and the more he considered it, the more he was sure that a killer who could strike once in so devastating a manner could do so again. That was why Simon had wanted to come and check the area once more. To make sure that there were no more unpleasant surprises lurking for Lord Hugh.
Lord Hugh had listened with frowning disbelief when Simon and Roger spoke to him of Wymond’s death, but his first thoughts were for his tournament.
‘Whoever it was must be mad,’ he concluded after consideration. ‘But you must find him, Coroner, Bailiff. If someone could be a danger to other people here, you must stop him.’
‘Fine,’ Simon muttered to himself. ‘Show me who he is and I’ll catch the bastard!’
With no clear idea who could have killed Wymond or why, Simon found himself scouting about the stands, glancing beneath all those which did not have solid wooden walls, poking in the bushes lining the field with a stick and generally reassuring himself that no one was lying there dead like Wymond the previous day. He had to keep occupied, keep moving – the alternative was to sit and fester, wondering who and why, and whether another attack would take place.
He had completed a half-circuit of the ground, and was standing at the riverside, morosely contemplating his tunic, hose and boots, all of which were sodden and wrinkled with the dew from the long vegetation, when one of the watchmen gave a muttered curse and called to him.
‘What is it?’
‘Some drunk. He’s puked all over himself,’ the watchman called back, kicking at a figure lying supine near the river some yards away.
Simon wrinkled his nose. Even from where he stood he could smell the rancid stench. He ordered another watchman to help and stood back while the drunk was hauled upright and half helped, half dragged away. Simon continued on his rounds reflecting with satisfaction that even drunks hadn’t caused too much trouble with this event. Evicting one snoring reveller who had over-indulged the previous night didn’t compare with other festivities, when men and women could be found drowned in their own vomit, or in a well, or having tripped and fallen into a stream or river.
There were legions of dead associated with events. Sometimes it was children who, having enjoyed ale or wine with their parents, would fall asleep out of doors and freeze to death. Simon had himself, some years before, seen a boy running about a campsite after too much wine, and fall into a fire. Such deaths were natural, if unpleasant.
There was a loud splash. Simon saw that the two watchmen had hurled their burden into the river. One of the watchmen was walking back, chuckling to himself.
‘Is he all right?’ Simon asked, jerking his head towards the noise.
‘He’s smelling a lot better already. He sobered up soon as the water closed over him.’
Simon opened his mouth but the watchman reassured him. ‘Don’t worry, he’s not going to drown. It’s only a couple of feet deep there.’
At the bank Simon could see the second watchman standing and laughing. Simon assumed that the drunk was still in the water, hidden by the trees, and nodded to himself. ‘Fine. Let’s get on, then.’
As they continued their slow progress around the staged area, Simon found it hard to maintain his solemn visage. All was well; very well. The ground was a little damp and muddy, but this was Dartmoor, and the ground was always a bit damp and muddy. Flags had been raised and hung heavily, waiting for the first breezes to clear the dew from them, while every wooden surface Simon touched was slick with the damp, but all was as well-prepared as he could hope. Feeling his spirits rising by the moment, he led the way into the tilt-area itself. The sight of the lists was daunting and he was pleased not to have to worry about fighting here, with the local population and strangers from miles around watching to see if he might dishonour himself by incompetence or cowardice.
The space was flanked by the ber frois, each of which had strong boards facing the fighting area, all painted with the heraldic symbols of many of the knights who would be fighting here. Lord Hugh’s own shield was painted before his seat, at the point where the competing men-at-arms should meet in their headlong clash, for there was no point patronising tournaments if you couldn’t enjoy the best view. On the last day all would change, for this would be the day that the two ends would be blocked off, and all knights would compete inside the enclosed ground to fight with whatever came to hand, while diseurs and heralds noted who had achieved signal feats. The mêlée was always the most popular of the events staged.
However, today’s show should be a good sweetener, a taste of the displays to come, for today selected squires would show their skill. Riding to prove their courage in front of their lord would lead to some being knighted – although Simon knew perfectly well that all the men to be knighted had already been chosen. It would be foolhardy to leave such things to the last minute. Especially since many of them were to be rewarded for their fathers’ service or for some praiseworthy deed supporting the Lord’s interest.
As the thought came to him, he realised that others were already arriving. Sauntering over the grass were knights and squires. Some heralds were already standing in a small knot and gazing about them as they agreed where each would stand in order to have a clear view of the tilting.
‘Where is Hal?’ he grumbled to himself, glancing over to the tent where Wymond and he had slept during the building of the tournament. There was no sign of the man, nothing at the tent, nothing in the ber frois, but neither was there any sign of the watchman sent to guard him, so Simon told himself resignedly that the silly little sod must have gone to fetch wine or bread.
Philip Tyrel watched them as the stench of vomit gradually faded. It was a relief that the bailiff had not recognised whom he had caught; a wonderful relief! Especially with the body lying so close.
When the bailiff and watchmen appeared from the market, he had realised that he only had the one means of escape. He had pulled the tunic from the body, stiff and chill from cooled puke, and hauled it over his head, then emptied the remaining wine in his skin over his head. He reeked, but he should be safe if he was careful. Quickly he drew ferns and weeds over the corpse and crawled until he was in full view on the grass at the foot of a stand. He was not concealed. Why should he be? He was guilty of nothing so far as anyone knew. No, he was only a drunk who had spent the night snoring in the open air. He was safe enough.
The two watchmen had dragged him to the river and thrown him in, but he was grateful to have been taken away before the bailiff could see his face. Far better that he should be remembered as a vagrant without features. There were so many others here in a similar condition, it was no surprise that he should have been found there. It was practically a daily occurrence. He sat on his arse in the water and belched, scooping water over his head to make his hair dangle over his features and hide them. That way nobody could swear to him. Wearing this tunic, no one would associate him with his usual finery and in any case no jury would be happy to convict him. Before long the second watchman lost interest in him and gave a yawn before strolling away to rejoin his friend and the bailiff.
As soon as the guard was gone, Philip stopped making a fool of himself and climbed from the water on the farther bank, shivering. The water came straight from the moors, and was as cold as ice. Walking in the shade of the trees into the field where he had killed the carpenter, he cast about constantly for other people who could be watching him, but everyone was busy breaking their fast: bakers were stoking their little fires, poulterers preparing fowls and songbirds, pastrycooks kneading dough ready for the first spiced pies. All had plenty to do without watching a man dressed in soaking wet garments walking away.
The field curved about the line of the hill and soon he was out of view. Walking up the hillside, he went to a natural gash in the ground, and here he sat down for a moment. He took off the dead man’s tunic. There was no need for it now. Screwing it into a ball, he tossed it away from him. Here, among the long grasses, it could lie hidden until winter. Removing all his own clothes, he set them out to dry on the grass, then lay down patiently to wait.
There was a tingling in his whole body as the sun crept over the trees and its warmth touched him with the softness of a kiss. He felt almost as though he had been rebaptised by his immersion in the river. Gazing up at the clouds floating past so slowly, he could almost believe that God was up there even now, watching him with a smile on His face while He considered Philip’s acts.
Three had died. Three! All by his hand, and he felt no remorse. How could he? What, regret the loss of Benjamin the usurer, Wymond the carpenter, and now Hal? Who could regret the passing of such men? They deserved the punishment meted out to them. The guilty had paid for their crimes.
Except one.
He shivered. There was a leaden sensation in his bowels. Why should all the others have been punished, but this last one escape justice?
Closing his eyes, he tried to ignore his qualms. He was at ease here, as the sun warmed him lying among the long grasses; it was hard to bring to his mind the anger and determination necessary to kill. What was the point? Did he truly have justification? He had murdered three, and surely that was enough? This last was not even involved. The sole reason for executing him was to make another realise his evil. Make him confront his crime.
Here in the sunlight that scene of carnage seemed so remote, so impossibly distant in time, that his long-planned vengeance appeared almost as foul as the original act. It was as if he had suddenly acquired a sense of proportion which had thrown all his plotting into confusion. It was a terrible possibility – but what if his slaughter made him no better than his enemy?
He felt tears running down both cheeks. With them he could feel his remaining determination seep away like water dripping from a leaking wineskin. His plan had been to kill the murderous bastard’s son as a fitting revenge for the loss of his family. That thought, together with the deaths of Hal and Wymond and Benjamin, had driven him. Yet now it seemed absurdly cruel to execute the youth. If anyone, he should kill the father, not the whelp.
Undecided, he lay trying to clear his mind but the thoughts would give him no peace. They chased about his heart: the boy should die, an eye for an eye; the father was guilty, not the boy. He couldn’t make a decision. It was impossible.
Sitting up, he felt his clothes. They were dry enough, but his shirt and hose were dreadfully scruffy. He would have to get changed into clean finery for the béhourd, but there should be plenty of time. Rising, he walked up the hill in among the trees, then followed the line of the woods eastwards until he was past the castle and on the way to Oakhampton. Here a tree had fallen over the river, and he waited a moment, clawing his hair back from his face and tidying himself, before clambering on to the tree and stepping assuredly along the trunk until he reached the other bank. Once there he turned back towards the castle, a late-night reveller wandering homewards. None of the other travellers on the road took any notice of him.
Philip entered the tented area and was about to go to his own small pavilion when he saw the last man. And he felt the rage, freezing as winter frost, ice its way along his spine, felt the muscles of his back and belly suddenly clench as if he was preparing to strike the mortal blow.
He turned away and entered the pavilion, quickly doffing his clothes and washing his face and hands before selecting a fresh shirt and pulling on his tunic. Soon he was back in the tilt-yard.
His determination had returned. He would kill one more time.
‘You have achieved much, Bailiff. Is there any news of the dead man?’
‘I thank you, Sir Richard. No, there is nothing yet on Wymond, but the coroner has hopes.’
There was no need for an introduction to Sir Richard Prouse; everyone knew who he was. His scarred features, with the appalling line of twisted and raw-looking flesh that ran from his temple, close to the milky white and ruined eyeball, down through his ravaged cheekbone to his broken jaw, was instantly recognisable. Seeing him so close, Simon felt his belly lurch. He looked away hurriedly.
‘You need not worry about my feelings, Bailiff. I know I am an ogre now, a repellent creature used to scare children when they misbehave. “If you don’t behave and do your chores, they’ll send Sir Richard Prouse to take you away”! I have heard it often enough.’
Wanting to change the subject, instead Simon found his mouth running on. ‘It was in a tournament you got that wound, wasn’t it?’
‘Yes, Bailiff. I got in front of a dangerous man. I was only twenty-four when this happened.’ His eyes clouded and a slight tremble made him lean more heavily on his stick. Hobbling slowly and carefully, for his right leg still dragged, he walked to the stands beneath Lord Hugh’s seat and stared about him. ‘It was in Crukerne, back in 1316 – another tournament designed by that sodomitic cretin Hal Sachevyll.’
‘You are angry with him?’
‘How would you feel?’ Sir Richard snapped, his voice rising as he spoke. ‘The Goddamned fool didn’t strengthen the stands. That was how I got this!’ He spoke with a bitter, shivering rage, but gradually his fury ebbed. ‘Damn him! I was riding in the mêlée and became the target of an attack by Sir Walter Basset. The murderous bastard managed to squeeze me up against the stands, where he started beating me about the head with a mace. I was forced up against the wooden barricades, and he was on my left side. It was hard to wield my sword to protect myself, and he was battering me with two or three blows for each one of mine.’
He could recall it perfectly. The mount beneath him kept trying to move away, but was forced against the wooden boardings while Sir Richard felt the heavy ball on its reinforced wooden shaft raining down upon him.
‘I was young and resilient, but deafened by the clanging of steel striking my helm. It felt as though my head was being used as the clapper of a giant bell. And there was no let-up to the ringing, hammering torture. Do what I might, I could not stop the assault. Nor could I escape. Some of my anxiety was reflected in my horse, too: pushing forward, then pulling back, trying to release himself from Sir Walter’s great destrier, but he was snared. And meanwhile I could feel the energy sapping from my arm. I will not lie – I was panicked.’
It was terrifying, and with the terror came the realisation: he was a failure just like his father; he would be captured and ransomed. A fool who would lose all, who would see his properties mortgaged once more.
‘A heavy blow caught my head and glanced onto my right shoulder. Instantly my arm was dead. No sensation whatever. I had no defence. My sword-arm was gone. You know, at that moment I could look into the eyes of the spectators. They were so close, I could see into the throats of the men and women as they roared…’
He was quiet a few minutes. ‘It was as if time stood still. I saw people shaking their fists, shrieking with blood-lust, longing to see a man die… to see me die. It was very curious.
‘Then another buffet knocked my head and I knew I must get away. My only safety lay in flight. I was desperate and spurred my horse until the blood ran in rivulets, staining the cloth covering.’
He had tried to move, Sir Richard told Simon, but he had no purchase. He barged forward and tried to thrust a path between the boarding and Sir Walter’s mount, but the Comishman wheeled his horse to block them, his mount’s rump slamming into the ber frois. ‘I swear that at that moment I could hear a dreadful creaking,’ Sir Richard said quietly. ‘It was like a kind of grumbling, as though the barrier and plankings were complaining. That was it, a sort of moaning, like an old man muttering under his breath as the cold weather seized up his ancient joints.
‘And then, with a crash, the section nearest me gave way. I was falling, and as I went I felt an explosion of pain in my neck. The mace had struck the weak spot between my shoulders where the mail was feeble from age and rust. I had never worried about it before, but now, with my head bent, the spot was exposed. That blow felled me like an ox under the hammer. And if it wasn’t for Hal Sachevyll, that section of barrier wouldn’t have collapsed and I wouldn’t have fallen.’
‘Was it the barrier that did that?’
‘You mean, was it the barrier which so ruined my face and looks, Bailiff?’ He smiled thinly. ‘No. This was a sword. I fell through the barrier, and as I fell a chance blow almost broke my neck. I was not aware of anything else for some time. But as I fell, Sir Edmund of Gloucester came to help me, I thank God. He rode up and fought with Sir Walter to protect me, but Sir Walter was a wild beast at being frustrated in capturing me. He set about Sir Edmund and so belaboured him that Sir Edmund was driven back.
‘I knew I’d been seriously injured. My horse was dead, impaled upon a metal spike, but when I saw Sir Walter was fighting someone else, I pulled my helmet off to breathe. God, it was hot! When he returned to me and bellowed at me to yield, I couldn’t hear. My head was full of a clamorous row, because of the beating I’d received. When I noticed him, I knew only fear to see him again. I grabbed for my sword, which lay a few feet from me and as I caught hold of it, Sir Walter swung.’
He remembered that blow. It came to him at night, when he was in a deep sleep, the sight of that notched and scratched blade swinging down at him as though time was standing almost still. Then the slamming agony of the blade above his temple and the hideous dragging as it clove through his flesh and skull, tearing and rending its way down, through eye-socket and cheek and on down to his jaw. That was where the blade and the horror ended. At last Sir Richard’s mind surrendered and he passed out.
‘Have you ever seen a bear enter a ring to be baited?’ he asked quietly. ‘Sometimes it will look mild, until the dogs begin to snap at it, and then it will defend itself, but without fury. That comes later. At first the bear wants only to protect itself, but then, once a mastiff has got to it and maybe chewed the bastard’s leg, that is when the thing becomes enraged and flings its tormentors away or smashes them. Sir Walter became like a bear, may his cods shrivel.
‘He brought it down two-handed,’ Sir Richard said softly, adding, ‘I felt every moment as it passed through my bones and skin.’
‘It must have been terrible,’ Simon said with an awed hush.
Sir Richard stared over Simon’s shoulder as his hand rose to the dreadful scar. A forefinger traced the line of rippling and badly mended flesh, following it from his ruined eye down to his cloven jaw. He looked like a man who lived in a permanent nightmare, a man pursued by his own terrors.
‘Terrible, Bailiff? You could not possibly imagine. At the time I thought it was going to kill me. It never sprang to my mind that I would soon wish it had.
‘It almost split my head in two. And then Sir Walter, brave Sir Walter, would have gone to find another victim, but the people were so furious that they ran forward to attack him.’ His good eye hardened. ‘They chased him from the field. That bold, proud man fled before the rabble of Crukerne. But gentle, kindly hands came and collected me and took me to a convent where I was gradually healed. Although then I was ruined financially instead by the usurers.’
‘Because you had lost?’
‘Yes. I was captured by Sir Walter, so I had no escape. He demanded my money since I had yielded to him, and would give no quarter when it came to his cash. What would he care? He had destroyed my life, so he might as well have my money as well. And he had a willing accomplice. Benjamin the Bastard came to me and said that he had settled on my behalf. I demurred, said I hadn’t agreed to any funds, but Benjamin had a clerk with him, and they showed me a document I had signed and sealed. It confirmed I had asked him to settle with Sir Walter.’
‘And you hadn’t?’
‘How could I?’ Sir Richard demanded sadly, his anger fading as swiftly as it had flared.
‘How could I have managed such an agreement while my face was being stitched or when the flesh had caught afire with agony as the fever gripped me? No, Bailiff. I knew nothing of this. Benjamin came to me in the convent while I suffered, pretending to be a friend and counsellor, but in reality he was a thief. And I could not even prove it. All I can say is, the bargain was less costly than my father’s.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘My father Godwin was a knight in the great tournament in Exeter of 1306, but he died when a mace caught his neck. At least I have my life, even if I’ve lost my leg and my arm,’ he said, gesturing with his left arm towards his useless right arm and leg.
‘I’ve heard of that one,’ Simon said. ‘There was a whole family killed.’
‘Yes. So I seem to recall,’ Sir Richard frowned. ‘Tyrel, that was their name. The father was there. Poor devil saw the stand collapse and tried to rescue his children and wife, but it was no good, of course.’
‘Christ Jesus! You mean that he was there and saw his family die?’ Simon winced.
‘Yes. Poor fellow. Philip Tyrel. I was only a child, of course, but I remember him.’
‘What was he like?’ Simon asked.
‘Tyrel? A large man, big-chested and with a great belly, if not very tall. He had a strutting arrogance, and he was always wary of insults. He took his own importance very seriously.’
‘He sounds like Tyler,’ Simon said half jokingly.
‘Hmm. If Tyler wore a beard, I would almost say they were brothers. Certainly not dissimilar.’
‘Really?’ Simon was interested. ‘Did this Tyrel survive?’
‘He disappeared soon after the disaster. His heart was broken, I think. Whose wouldn’t have been?’
Simon tried to imagine how he would have felt if he had seen his own wife and children killed. ‘Have you seen him since then?’ he asked absently, and then his head shot up. ‘Christ Jesus! You haven’t spotted him here, have you?’
‘Who, Tyrel? No, I’d have noticed someone like him. Tall, strong, dark of hair and bearded, he wasn’t the sort of man you’d miss. No, he’s not here. Poor devil has probably died.’
‘Yes. Perhaps,’ Simon said, unconvinced. ‘But if he did return here, it would explain much.’
‘His seeking revenge on the men who destroyed his family, you mean?’
‘Yes, and all because of money. At least Benjamin won’t fleece anyone else now,’ Simon said soberly. ‘He’s dead.’
‘Yes. The devil’s gone, thank God. May he rot in eternal fire. He almost cost me my castle.’
‘Do you know how he died?’
‘Beaten, I heard. So what? Many a cut-throat will execute a victim with a club.’
‘True. Where did you hear of his death?’
‘Do you think me guilty of his murder? Oh Bailiff, you should arrest me at once! Do you know, I can’t remember who told me about him. Perhaps it was an itinerant carter passing by my castle.’
Simon gave a faint grin in apology. ‘I am too used to suspecting everyone.’
‘Perhaps you should.’
‘Do you think he helped finance the ber frois that collapsed at Crukerne?’
Sir Richard gave him an intent stare. There was no shame or fear in his eye, only an increased sharpness. ‘You do think I killed him? Perhaps I did, Bailiff. But if I did, it was because he funded a cheap piece of work which indirectly led to this damage. That is all. Surely if I wanted revenge, I’d have killed Sir Walter?’
‘Perhaps you thought that would be more difficult?’
‘Aye. Perhaps I would,’ said Sir Richard with a twisted smile, glancing at his feeble leg. He opened his mouth but, as he did so, his expression hardened and a shiver of revulsion made him tremble like a willow in a gale.
Turning, Simon saw that he was staring at the figure of Sir Walter Basset.