Fear in the Forest by Bernard Knight

Author:Bernard Knight [Bernard Knight]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Severn House Publishers
Published: 2014-08-13T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER NINE

In which Crowner John attends a woodmote

The next day began a new week, and it started relatively quietly for the King’s coroner. After he had woken at dawn in an empty bed, Mary brought his solitary breakfast to the gloomy hall. Boiled oatmeal with honey and salt bacon and eggs fortified him enough to go and find Thomas in the nearby Close, where he had a free mattress in the servants’ quarters of a canon’s residence.

Together they walked to the dismal dungeon beneath the keep of Rougemont, which acted as the prison for those awaiting trial either at the Sheriff’s Court or the infrequent King’s Courts. This morning John had to take confessions and depositions from several ‘approvers’, robbers who were attempting to avoid a hanging by incriminating their accomplices. To achieve that, they would later have to fight these others in legal combat to the death, any vanquished survivors being hanged.

After he had finished, he came out of the rusted gate leading to the cells to find Osric, one of the city’s two constables, waiting to lead him down to deal with a rape in the mean lanes of Bretayne. By the time they arrived, the culprit had been beaten almost to death by the girl’s outraged relatives and neighbours. It only remained for the coroner to take statements from those who were capable of giving a coherent story and to examine the girl to confirm the ‘issue of blood’ that was necessary to establish a charge of ravishment. Then Osric arranged for the battered perpetrator to be carried to the fetid town gaol in one of the towers of the South Gate. Here, if he failed to die of his injuries, he would probably succumb to the overcrowding and insanitary conditions long before he could be brought to trial.

Following these diversions, John retreated to his chamber in the gatehouse of Rougemont, to take his usual morning ale, bread and cheese with his assistants. He wanted to know from Thomas how he had found Nesta when he had spoken to her the previous day.

‘She was in low spirits, master,’ Thomas said guardedly. ‘She needs constant reassurance and comfort, else I fear she will slip into a decline.’

Still a priest at heart, Thomas felt that what she had revealed to him about the true father of the child, as well as her thoughts of self-destruction, was as sacrosanct as the confessional, and it was not his place to tell the coroner. However, he wanted to ensure that de Wolfe was aware of her present vulnerable state, as Thomas knew that his master was not the most perceptive of souls when it came to personal relationships.

John rumbled and nodded and huffed his agreement, promising to go down to the Bush as frequently as possible to bring comfort and cheer to his mistress, but Thomas was not convinced that he was aware of the seriousness of the situation. Later in the day, John walked down to Idle Lane to spend the evening with Nesta – with the expectation of extending his stay overnight.

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