The Death of a King by Doherty Paul C

Author:Doherty, Paul C. [Doherty, Paul C.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press
Published: 2013-07-25T16:00:00+00:00

Letter Nine

Edmund Beche to Richard Bliton, greetings. I intended to despatch this letter from Italy but circumstances, as you will see, have forced me to write again.

I enclose a letter from Sir Thomas Tweng. Please read it as it makes a most interesting revelation.

Sir Thomas Tweng to Edmund Beche, Clerk of the Chancery, greetings. I write in confidence to one who is also in pursuit of the truth, whatever that may be. Shortly after you left Taunton, one of my agents in the Low Countries, Peter Teloy, sent me an astonishing report. He had managed to track down John Maltravers, living under an assumed name near Ypres in Flanders. Teloy decided not to approach him but keep him under surveillance for a few weeks. He eventually reported that Maltravers (or “Groot” as he now called himself ) was rich and entertained many of the wealthy burgesses, supporters of our king in his war against the French. Teloy could not understand this and so he started to make his own enquiries amongst the burgesses of Ypres. It finally emerged that Maltravers passed himself off as an Anglo-Flemish knight and Edward of England’s special agent in Flanders! Such a position is not wholly remarkable. Maltravers was never specifically accused of the murder of Edward II. He may well have received a secret pardon in return for perpetual but comfortable exile as the king’s spy in the Low Countries. However, more was to come. Teloy became friendly with the wife of one of the most important burgesses who visited Maltravers. From her Teloy learnt that “Groot” was making discreet inquiries on the whereabouts of a certain Englishman, a hunchback called William Ockle.

Maltravers (or “Groot”) had narrowed his investigation down to the groups of mercenaries who were drifting south to offer their services to the highest bidder. Teloy decided to mix with these landless men, who told him a camp-fire story about an English sergeant-at-arms, one of Edward III’s recruiters, being teased by a band of Flemish mercenaries. Evidently, the latter had mocked our king for hiring Germans to do his killing, while the city of Metz hired a hunchbacked Englishman to do theirs as the public hangman.

Teloy realized that their description of the hunchback fitted Ockle and so he immediately travelled to Metz, but he was too late. The hunchbacked Englishman had been mysteriously knifed to death two weeks before his arrival. Teloy then returned to Flanders and wrote to me reporting all he had discovered. I was angry that the king had not informed me about Maltravers. I reproached him, (as an old-time friend and colleague in the conspiracy to destroy Mortimer), for not taking me into his confidence.

The answer I received was stark and brutal. His Grace informed me that Teloy was mistaken on all points. Moreover, he was a disreputable agent, for the king had learnt that he had recently been killed in a drunken tavern brawl with some Hainaulters. I was then ordered to relinquish my task, resign my office of sheriff and assume the custody of Norham Castle.

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