House of Shadows Read online

  And at a knock-down price, thought John cynically. After some more questions that got him no further, he decided to take the bull by the horns, perhaps an apt expression for the bovine-looking man sitting opposite.

  ‘I have to say this, Sir Roger, but you had a good motive for seeing the girl dead. Had this marriage gone ahead, you would have lost your half-share of the revenue and all chance of acquiring her large estates.’

  The reaction was violent.

  Roger Beaumont sprang to his feet, his chair going over with a crash as he confronted the coroner. ‘Damn your impertinence, sir! Are you accusing me of killing my own ward, whom I have nurtured like another daughter for so long?’

  Thomas, cowering in his corner, saw that the baron’s face had turned purple and was afraid that he was going to have a seizure.

  De Wolfe held up a placatory hand. ‘I am accusing you of nothing, but it is my royal duty to explore every possibility. I must ask you, as I will ask everyone else, where were you on the night Christina went missing?’

  Roger stared at him as if he had gone mad, but his rage seemed to have passed and he sat down heavily on the chair, which Thomas had hurried to put back in place. His voice was dull and thick when he answered.

  ‘I spent the whole night asleep in my chamber with my wife. She will vouch for that, though I doubt you would consider that of much value.’

  John inclined his head in acknowledgement. ‘I consider everything most carefully, I assure you. Perhaps it would be convenient if I did speak to your good wife next.’

  Roger left with an air of obvious annoyance, muttering under his breath, and a few moments later a buxom maidservant ushered in his spouse.

  Lady Avisa Beaumont was a tall, handsome woman at least ten years younger than her husband. Her fair hair was plaited into two coils above each ear, contained in gold-mesh crespines, over which was a samite veil trailing down her back and over her shapely bosom. The cold was kept at bay by a heavy brocade mantle lined with ermine, covering her ankle-length kirtle of blue velvet. A slim, high-cheekboned face bore a pair of large brown eyes, and John, an experienced connoisseur of elegant women, could easily see how Roger had wanted her for his second wife.

  There was virtually nothing Avisa could add to what he already knew, in relation to the night of the girl’s death. She had spent it all in a bed an arm’s length from her husband’s in the guest-chambers near the inner gate and knew nothing of the tragedy until the hubbub in the morning. She produced a fine-linen kerchief, which she used to dab at her eyes when she related this part of her story, and de Wolfe had no reason to think that her grief was anything but genuine.

  ‘Your husband tells me that Christina was not overjoyed at the prospect of marriage?’

  Again the wife confirmed what Roger had said, but with an addition. ‘Until a few months ago, we had hoped that my stepdaughter, Eleanor, would have joined the Neville family. She has long admired Jordan, whom she has known since childhood. In fact, it was on his visits to us at Wirksworth that he became acquainted with Christina.’

  John scratched his stubble and out of the corner of his eye watched Thomas’s pen scribbling away on his parchment.

  ‘Was Christina or Eleanor the attraction that brought him to Wirksworth?’ he asked.

  Avisa Beaumont dropped her long-lashed eyes. ‘Neither, really. He came to accompany his mother, who is my cousin. But we hoped that some attraction might develop between him and our daughter – as, indeed, it still might!’ she added hopefully.

  ‘So Christina’s death has left the field open for a match with a young man who was heir to considerable property?’ ventured John.

  Just as a critical remark had fired up her husband, Avisa’s face darkened and she glared at the coroner. ‘That is not an issue, Sir John, and it is improper of you to suggest it! Anyway, she is not the only contestant on the field,’ she added obscurely, but refused to enlarge on the remark.

  De Wolfe’s questions went on for a few more minutes but, as with Roger Beaumont, nothing useful was obtained. The lady seemed very reluctant to accept that the girl’s death was deliberate and firmly declared it to be a terrible accident – though she could not hazard any guess as to why Christina should be found in the crypt of the cellarium.

  When she left, with a rather haughty promise to send Roger’s daughter down next, John turned to his clerk shivering on his stool, as he was furthest away from the brazier.

  ‘Anything strike you so far, Thomas? You have the sharpest mind among us,’ he said. The rare compliment warmed the little priest more than any fire and he hastened to offer his opinion.

  ‘As you said, Crowner, both those persons had a motive to see Lady Christina out of the way, though whether they would – or could – stoop to murder is another matter. Sir Roger is easily capable of striking the girl unconscious and breaking her neck…I’m not sure about the lady, but she looks tall and strong.’

  They were interrupted by the arrival of a younger handmaiden who was acting as chaperone to her mistress, Eleanor Beaumont, whom she ushered into the room. She was eighteen and, though comely enough, had none of the beauty of her stepmother, following her father more in her solid physique. Thomas thought that she might have done better as a boy, as she looked capable of wielding a sword or drawing a bow.

  Again, she repeated the claim that Christina had been like a younger sister to her for the past six years and, though she was not moved to tears, de Wolfe thought that unless she was a very good actress she was genuinely sorry that her friend was dead.

  ‘I understand that you were lodged in the guest-chamber next to your father and mother?’

  Eleanor nodded and turned her head to indicate the young woman who stood behind her. ‘Sarah slept on a mattress near my door, but in the same room.’ This was a hint that she could not have left the room that night without the maid being aware of it.

  ‘I understand from Lady Avisa that you had hopes of marrying Jordan de Neville yourself?’ John asked as delicately as his nature would allow.

  The girl bristled visibly. ‘She should not have said that! True, I had great affection for Jordan, but I doubt he noticed me in that respect.’

  ‘But she is gone, so who will he marry now?’ persisted John.

  Eleanor flushed, looking more like her father than ever. ‘You had better ask him yourself, sir!’

  The coroner did just that a short time later, when the man who had been deprived of his nuptials arrived. Jordan de Neville was twenty-three and had spent some time at the Lionheart’s court in Rouen, thanks to the noble connections of the various ramifications of the Neville family, who were a rising faction in the corridors of power.

  He was a tall, thin man with a shock of black hair that sat like a thick cap on top of his head. He was dressed in the most modern style, the toes of his shoes being elongated into long points stuffed with wool and curled back almost to his ankles. A rather supercilious manner did nothing to improve his looks, which were average, to put it kindly. John felt that here was a fellow unlikely to set a girl’s pulse racing, unless she had an eye on his undoubted family wealth and influence.

  After he had seated himself before the coroner, John made sympathetic noises about the tragic loss of his bride-to-be. Jordan looked appropriately mournful and expressed his devastation at such a tragic loss. The words were perfectly phrased, but de Wolfe felt that their delivery lacked conviction. He came straight to the point with almost brutal directness.

  ‘I am aware that this marriage was not your own choice, but arranged by your family at the behest of our sovereign lord, King Richard?’

  The tactic was successful, for the young man broke into a flood of words, as if he had been yearning for someone on whom to unload his feelings. John saw that he was a weak character, easily persuaded by those in authority. He confessed that though he liked Christina, he had not wanted to marry her, being greatly attracted to her friend Margaret Courtenay, whom he now hoped to wed. He dismissed John’s sugge
stion that Eleanor Beaumont might make an alternative bride, though he was aware that she had done all she could to ensnare him.

  ‘My parents and uncle were the architects of this pact with the king to fuse the Neville and Glanville lands – it was a political arrangement. I had no say in the matter,’ he concluded sadly.

  De Wolfe moved on to more immediate issues. ‘You were here at Bermondsey the night that Christina vanished?’ he asked abruptly. Jordan looked affronted at the implications.

  ‘I was indeed! Until about an hour before midnight, when all the monks trooped off to their church for Matins. Then I left with my squire and rode in the moonlight back to our lodgings.’

  ‘Where did you spend the evening?’

  ‘The whole party was in the guests’ refectory. We ate supper and sat talking until about the ninth hour, when Christina went to her chamber with her lady-in-waiting, as did Sir Roger and Lady Avisa. I stayed talking to Margaret and the prior for another hour or so. Eleanor insisted on sitting with us, rather to my annoyance, but eventually she left for her bed as well.’

  ‘So you were with your favourite lady until quite late?’

  Again Jordan looked offended, a frequent mood of his, thought John.

  ‘Not alone – it would not be seemly. Her handmaiden was there as a chaperone, as well as Prior Robert – and the two monks, Ferdinand and Ignatius, came and went on various errands.’

  As with the others, more questioning failed to extract anything useful from the dandified young fellow, and the coroner waited impatiently for the last of the guests to present herself.

  Margaret Courtenay dispensed with a chaperone, telling her maid to wait outside and firmly shutting the door on her as de Wolfe rose to greet her. A very self-possessed young woman, she was quite different from Eleanor Beaumont. A few years older, probably of twenty-one summers, she was a pretty blonde who fell just short of being beautiful. Strong character showed in her face, and her garments, just visible under a heavy cloak, were plain but elegant. She had a veil of heavy white silk over her head, but her fair curls peeped out of the front.

  Once again, John went through the familiar routine of questioning. She was the third daughter of a baron from the West Country and had been sent to Sempringham as a novice some years earlier to test her suitability for becoming a nun. This was where she met Christina, but when the latter left for Wirksworth Margaret abandoned any intention of taking the veil and returned home to her parents. She stayed at Wirksworth on a number of occasions, and it was here that she met Jordan de Neville. She made no secret of her aspirations to become his wife, but their plans had been ruined by the forced marriage insisted on by the higher powers.

  De Wolfe had left questioning her until the end, as she might well have been the last to see Christina alive. ‘You returned to your chamber later than her, I understand?’ he asked.

  ‘I took the chance to be with Jordan a little longer,’ she said rather wistfully. ‘I thought it might well be the last time we could meet as single people. Christina was in bed when I entered the chamber next door to say goodnight. At least, her maid, who was sleeping in the outer part, whispered that she thought her mistress was already asleep.’

  ‘And you went to your couch yourself then? Did anything wake you that night?’

  Margaret shook her head. ‘Nothing, and neither did my maid hear anything from her outer room – though she sleeps like a log, so nothing would disturb her,’ she added disdainfully.

  De Wolfe grunted, to cover his frustration at being unable to get anything useful from all these folk. ‘You knew Christina for some years. Have you any reason to think that someone would wish her dead?’

  She dropped the lids over her blue eyes. ‘Only the obvious ones, Sir John,’ she said very quietly.

  ‘I crave your pardon, Mistress Courtenay, but it is not that obvious to me,’ he rumbled.

  Margaret looked up again, almost defiantly. ‘Sir Roger and his wife have always been very good to me, having me to stay at Wirksworth. I would not wish to defame them, but surely everyone knows that he would lose a great deal – including his further expectations – concerning the lands that would have come to Christina on her sixteenth birthday, if this marriage had gone ahead.’

  De Wolfe thanked her for her frankness and suggested that she remain while he asked her maid a few questions. However, there was nothing that this young woman could add, as she merely repeated Margaret Courtenay’s account of that last evening. Outside in the corridor, the lady who had attended upon Christina de Glanville was waiting, and John took advantage of the presence of the other two women to bring her in for questioning. She started off the proceedings by bursting into tears, distressed by the reminder of the death of her mistress, whom she had served for over two years. When she had composed herself, all she could offer was a similar lack of help to his investigation.

  ‘My lady left the refectory some time after supper ended and we both went up to our chamber. I helped her to dress for bed and then settled her for the night. She asked me to blow out the candle, so I knew she wished to sleep at once.’

  Her snivels began again. ‘That was the last time I ever saw her alive!’

  De Wolfe made his throat-clearing noises – he never could abide weeping women; they made him feel helpless.

  ‘There was no disturbance in the night?’ he asked, for something to say. ‘She never called for you or left her room?’

  ‘No, not that I knew of. I slept soundly until dawn. She had said she wished to go to the prior’s chapel to take the Sacrament, so I went to awaken her, but she was not there!’

  Her sobbing began anew and John looked helplessly at the other two women.

  ‘If you have finished, sir, we will take her back to Sir Roger and his wife,’ offered Margaret Courtenay. ‘We should all seek our beds, for tomorrow will be a sad and stressful day.’

  ‘We are little the wiser for all that talking,’ growled de Wolfe later. He, Gwyn and Thomas were sitting in the warming room, the only habitable place unless one wore three layers of extra clothing. There were half a dozen monks in the chamber, some dozing, others in murmured conversations, giving the coroner’s party covert and often suspicious glances. However, the place was large enough for them to talk in low voices without the others hearing. John had given Gwyn the gist of the interviews, and his officer agreed that it took them no further forward in discovering the culprit.

  ‘This Roger Beaumont is the obvious suspect,’ he grunted. ‘But he’s hardly likely to admit it, even if he’s the guilty one.’

  ‘I wonder if he already has something to hide?’ mused de Wolfe. ‘What if he was embezzling some of the portion of the estate profits that were supposed to be going to the Exchequer? If he suddenly lost control after Christina’s marriage, might not Jordan’s new stewards and bailiffs discover the fraud and report it to the king? Beaumont could literally lose his head over that!’

  Gwyn looked dubious, not because he could not believe that a lord was capable of such greed, but because they had no means of proving it.

  Thomas ticked off the candidates on his spindly fingers.

  ‘His wife has no obvious motive, other than what she gains by her husband becoming richer. The daughter Eleanor no doubt felt that she might have a chance with Jordan de Neville if Christina was out of the way, but would she kill for it?’

  Gwyn reached across and grabbed Thomas’s third finger. ‘This one’s for Jordan, for he wanted to marry the Courtenay woman, not Christina.’

  ‘So that leaves only Margaret Courtenay, who also wanted an unmarried Jordan for herself,’ finished John. ‘But the dead girl was a good friend, for God’s sake!’

  They sat around the fire in silence, digesting the unpromising situation.

  ‘Does it have to be one of the family guests?’ ruminated the coroner. ‘What about the people in this place? They’re a queer bunch, right enough.’

  ‘There’s that chaplain, Ignatius, who thought Christina was a witch
,’ agreed Thomas.

  ‘I suppose the prior himself had no motive,’ said Gwyn in a hoarse whisper. ‘Maybe he was tired of the court using his priory as a lodging-house!’

  Thomas sneered at his big colleague, his reverence for priests making the very idea sacrilegious, but the idea set John’s mind working. It seemed unlikely that Robert Northam could be implicated, but he was an important man and knew many of the barons and bishops who wielded power in England. God knows what plots and schemes were going on in the higher echelons of government – could he be involved in any of them?

  However, there seemed no way forward to accuse anyone of the killing, let alone the prior himself, and their discussion faded into silence until an old monk approached them and sat down uninvited. He was a wizened man, with no hair left to demarcate his tonsure, his head being covered in wrinkled pink skin. His lined face was relieved by a pair of sharp brown eyes that suggested an active mind inside that shrivelled exterior.

  Thomas smiled a welcome at him and shifted along his bench to let the old man get nearest to the fire. ‘This is Brother Martin, whom I spoke to earlier,’ he explained. ‘He supervises the scriptorium next to the chapter house and keeps the archives of the priory.’

  In a quavering voice that spoke of his advanced years, the monk enquired after their health and their lodgings and bemoaned the cold weather, which ‘plagued his old bones’, as he put it. The conversation, prompted by the eager Thomas, got around to the history of the priory, by which time Gwyn was nodding off with boredom.

  ‘It was much smaller than this in the early days, some ninety years ago,’ explained the archivist. ‘But it grew fast with patronage. I hardly recognize it from what it was when I was a novice here, about fifty years ago. Old buildings knocked down and new ones springing up.’

  ‘The priory received many gifts, then?’ asked John politely, though he was not much interested.

  ‘A lot of money and land from wealthy donors, sir. At one time it became fashionable to give to Bermondsey…lands, rents, advowsons, even whole manors sometimes. Rich folk would pay a lot for Masses to be said for their souls to spend as little time as possible in purgatory!’