The Malice of Unnatural Death: Read online

  THE MALICE OF UNNATURAL DEATH

  Michael Jecks

  Copyright © 2006 Michael Jecks

  The right of Michael Jecks to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publishers or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.

  First published as an Ebook by

  Headline Publishing Group in 2014

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library

  eISBN: 978 1 4722 1983 1

  HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUP

  An Hachette UK Company

  338 Euston Road

  London NW1 3BH

  www.headline.co.uk

  www.hachette.co.uk

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  About the Author

  Also by Michael Jecks

  Praise

  About the Book

  Dedication

  Map

  Cast of Characters

  Glossary

  Author’s Note

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  About the Author

  Michael Jecks gave up a career in the computer industry to concentrate on his writing. He is the founder of Medieval Murderers, has been Chairman of the Crime Writers’ Association, and helped create the Historical Writers’ Association. Keen to help new writers, for some years he organised the Debut Dagger competition, and is now organising the AsparaWriting festival for new writers at Evesham. He has judged many prizes, including the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger. Michael is an international speaker on writing and for business. He lives with his wife, children and dogs in northern Dartmoor.

  Michael can be contacted through his website: www.michaeljecks.co.uk.

  He can be followed on twitter (@MichaelJecks) or on Facebook.com/Michael.Jecks.author.

  His photos of Devon and locations for his books can be found at: Flickr.com/photos/Michael_Jecks.

  Also by Michael Jecks

  The Last Templar

  The Merchant’s Partner

  A Moorland Hanging

  The Crediton Killings

  The Abbot’s Gibbet

  The Leper’s Return

  Squire Throwleigh’s Heir

  Belladonna at Belstone

  The Traitor of St Giles

  The Boy-Bishop’s Glovemaker

  The Tournament of Blood

  The Sticklepath Strangler

  The Devil’s Acolyte

  The Mad Monk of Gidleigh

  The Templar’s Penance

  The Outlaws of Ennor

  The Tolls of Death

  The Chapel of Bones

  The Butcher of St Peter’s

  A Friar’s Bloodfeud

  The Death Ship of Dartmouth

  Malice of Unnatural Death

  Dispensation of Death

  The Templar, the Queen and Her Lover

  The Prophecy of Death

  The King of Thieves

  No Law in the Land

  The Bishop Must Die

  The Oath

  King’s Gold

  City of Fiends

  Templar’s Acre

  Praise

  ‘Michael Jecks is the master of the medieval whodunnit’ Robert Low

  ‘Captivating … If you care for a well-researched visit to medieval England, don’t pass this series’ Historical Novels Review

  ‘Michael Jecks has a way of dipping into the past and giving it that immediacy of a present-day newspaper article … He writes … with such convincing charm that you expect to walk round a corner in Tavistock and meet some of the characters’ Oxford Times

  ‘Great characterisation, a detailed sense of place, and a finely honed plot make this a superb medieval historical’ Library Journal

  ‘Stirring intrigue and a compelling cast of characters will continue to draw accolades’ Publishers Weekly

  ‘A tortuous and exciting plot … The construction of the story and the sense of period are excellent’ Shots

  ‘This fascinating portrayal of medieval life and the corruption of the Church will not disappoint. With convincing characters whose treacherous acts perfectly combine with a devilishly masterful plot, Jecks transports readers back to this wicked world with ease’ Good Book Guide

  About the Book

  The twenty-second novel in Michael Jecks’s medieval Knights Templar series.

  1324: The English kingdom is in uproar. Roger Mortimer, once the King’s most able commander, now his most hated enemy, is plotting his assassination. And he is not the only person with murder in mind…

  When the bodies of a local craftsman and the King’s messenger are found in the streets of Exeter, Sir Baldwin de Furnshill and Bailiff Simon Puttock are implored to find the person responsible. The deceased messenger was carrying a dangerous secret that could prove fatal in the wrong hands. Now Baldwin and Simon must find the murderer before he strikes again…

  This is for the men of Tinners’ Morris …

  Especially for Mike and Shelagh Palmer

  With many thanks for all the laughs – and your patience with us!

  Map of Exeter in Early 1300s

  Detail of South Eastern Exeter

  Cast of Characters

  Sir Baldwin de Furnshill – once a Knight Templar, Sir Baldwin de Furnshill has become respected as a shrewd investigator of crimes

  Simon Puttock – formerly a stannary bailiff, Simon has recently been made responsible for the Customs of the port of Dartmouth

  Sir Richard de Welles – the coroner for the king at Lifton

  Rob – Simon’s servant at Dartmouth, Rob is a young lad who has grown up in the company of sailors

  Brother Robert Busse – a monk from Tavistock, and contender for the vacant abbacy
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  Brother John de Courtenay – another monk from Tavistock, and son of Baron Hugh, John is determined to win the abbacy

  Robert le Mareschal – a student of the magical arts in Coventry, Robert studies under John of Nottingham

  John of Nottingham – known as a necromancer, John is feared even by the most powerful in the country

  Walter Stapledon – Bishop of Exeter

  Sir Matthew de Crowethorne – Sheriff of Exeter

  Maurice Berkeley – the son of Lord Maurice Berkeley and brother to Alice, Maurice has been on the run after ill-advisedly ransacking Despenser properties

  Madam Alice – Sir Matthew’s wife, daughter of Lord Maurice Berkeley

  Sarra – a servant girl from the country north of Exeter

  Jen – Sarra’s friend, Jen has recently joined her at Sir Matthew’s house

  Norman Mucheton – a worker of bone and antlers in the city

  Madam Mucheton – wife to Norman

  Elias – a beadle

  Ivo Trempole – a watchman, who lives with his mother Edie

  Michael Tanner – a moderately successful tradesman, Michael rents properties to those such as his friend Richard de Langatre

  Richard de Langatre – familiar to many in the city, Richard is a fortune-teller famous enough to have even monks from Tavistock come to consult him

  James of Wanetynch – a king’s messenger, James has recently arrived in the city with messages for the bishop

  Robinet of Newington – also known as Newt, and once a king’s messenger, Robinet has retired now, and is visiting his friend Walter in Exeter

  Walter of Hanlegh – once a king’s man, Walter has retired to obscurity in Exeter

  Will Skinner – the watchman down at the southern gate

  Madam Skinner – Will’s wife

  Sir Richard de Sowe – a knight in the king’s household who was murdered by witchcraft on 28 April 1324

  Sir Simon Croyser – Sheriff of Warwick, and the main official responsible for the arrest of the men involved in the attempted assassination in Coventry

  Glossary

  Cokini literally, ‘kitchen knaves’, the early term for the king’s messengers. Later this was replaced by

  Cursores ‘runner’, which must have seemed more suitable!

  Maleficium harm done to another by the use of magic, whether necromancy, sorcery, witchcraft, or wizardry

  Necromancy communicating with the dead to tell fortunes or work magic

  Nuncii regis the term for mounted king’s messengers

  Salsarius Purveyor of salted meats and fish within Tavistock Abbey

  Schiltrom an enhancement of the Saxon shield-wall, this Scottish development involved the warriors lining up behind a solid wall of shields, bristling with long spears, which could withstand even a cavalry charge

  Sorcery performing magic – usually to do harm – by the use of substances or objects which are believed to be imbued with supernatural powers, often involving certain gestures or spells spoken aloud

  Witchcraft performing magic – again to harm another – by making use of powers which exist within the practitioner. Occasionally may involve the use of objects or spells, but not necessarily

  Wizardry see ‘necromancy’

  Author’s Note

  When I try to think what actually led to a story’s forming in my mind, it is often remarkably easy. Usually the court records or coroners’ rolls lead me to a basic plot, and then the format of the story, the characters, and sometimes the location, can be conjured up.

  This story was a little different. I had been hunting about for some little while for a decent concept for book 22 in the series, because I felt very satisfied with its predecessor, The Death Ship of Dartmouth. That book seemed to me to have a strong story, with some excellent action and fresh characters, and I wanted something as strong – but different.

  My problem was that the next important piece of history would not be until early 1325, which was some months after the last story. I needed something to fill in the gap. By sheer good fortune, as so often happens, a strange little snippet led me straight to a new plot and the book.

  I happened to read in Alison Weir’s book Isabella, Queen of England, She-Wolf of France a paragraph in which she mentioned a curious assassination attempt. The Despenser was alarmed in late 1324 and early 1325 to learn that Lord Mortimer was paying a necromancer to try to murder him with magic. This, apparently, put the fear of God into him, and he even went so far as to write to the Pope to apply for special protection – to which the pontiff somewhat testily responded that if the man would confess his sins, behave better and stop making enemies, he’d find he felt more at ease with himself. I paraphrase, but the letter’s meaning was clear.

  It put me in mind of a short paper produced by that marvellous historian, H.P.R. Finberg, called The Tragi-Comedy of Abbot Bonus, in West Country Historical Studies (David & Charles, 1969), which described the dispute between John de Courtenay and Robert Busse, two monks who contested the abbacy of Tavistock in 1325. In that case, Courtenay complained about Busse’s election to the top job for a number of reasons, but one was that he had been visiting a necromancer in Exeter to make sure that he won the post.

  That was enough to give me my starting-point. I began to look up necromancers in other books, and soon gained a lot of useful material, especially from Norman Cohn’s brilliant study Europe’s Inner Demons, published by Heinemann Educational and Sussex University. From that I learned much about how magicians would conjure spirits. However, it was a visit to the library and a quick look at the Selden Society books, Volume 74: Select Cases in the Court of the King’s Bench part IV, that fleshed out the story of the Despenser murder attempt.

  The case was exactly as set out in my story here, so I won’t perform the tedious act of repetition. Suffice it to say that John of Nottingham never, to my knowledge, escaped from Coventry and Warwick, and I have taken the unforgivable step of suggesting that poor Sheriff Sir Simon Croyser was guilty of trying to free a felon in order to fulfil his ambition of killing the king. Oddly enough, though, other aspects of the story are correct, such as the mysterious illness and subsequent death of Sir Richard de Sowe. His death would appear to have been enough to make Despenser tremble.

  As well it might.

  From my point of view, only one thing was important here, though, and that was the fact that there was a story begging to be told. I just had to sit down and let the characters tell it their own way.

  The subplot of the poor servant girl is one that has been in my mind for quite a while now. I first came across the sad story of Jen when I was reading Elliot O’Donnell’s A Casebook of Ghosts many years ago.

  This fascinating book is the record of a ghosthunter, or purports to be. He came from a long line of illustrious Irishmen, and asserted, I seem to recall, that being the seventh son of a mother who was herself the seventh in her brood he was more than usually prey to ghostly visits. Whether or not this was so, it is certainly true that he was a keen researcher of strange phenomena, and an avid collector of stories from eye-witnesses.

  Many of the stories are pleasantly gruesome, as one would hope. However, the story of the young maidservant was peculiarly sad.

  He told (so I remember) of a young servant who became infatuated with a guest at the country house in which she worked. All too often in those days, visitors would come to spend a significant time with the family: you need only read Wodehouse to get a feel for the relaxed atmosphere of such places. The young visitor, so O’Donnell wrote, was probably entirely unaware of the effect he had on the young, malleable heart of the servant girl. Without doubt, he was moderately courteous to her, as a public school educated young man would have been to the servants in his host’s house, but that was almost certainly all there was to it.

  But she convinced herself over a matter of weeks that he was utterly enraptured by her. She began to dream of the day that he would leave, how he would take her away from the dr
udgery of her miserable working life, and elope with her. They would marry in splendour, honeymoon in Europe, and return to a small house of their own, where they would raise their little family. All this was in her mind.

  And when he left? He thanked her, along with all the other staff, and gave her as he gave all of them, a small gratuity. A coin.

  She, apparently, was appalled, and stood rooted to the spot, staring at the coin, but then, as the coach door shut behind him and the horses were whipped up, she was heard to shriek. The coach moved off, and she launched herself after it, to the surprise of the others standing by to wave off the young gentleman. No one had any idea of the fixation she had with the man, and to see her fling herself down the driveway after the carriage must have had a terrifying impact. In those days, madness was viewed with horror.

  So the upshot of the story was that the girl spent the whole of the rest of her life bemoaning the fact of his departure, predicting his imminent return, and keening to herself in the local lunatic asylum. And in all that time, she never once let his coin leave her hand. Such asylums in those days were not pleasant, and it is sad to consider this poor young woman walking amongst the insane, between those who stood screaming in shackles and the others who lay in their own mess, with no possibility of a cure. It would be many centuries before anyone began to think of psychotherapy.

  It was said (which is why Elliot O’Donnell heard of it) that when she died she still had that coin in her hand, and an unscrupulous pair of gravediggers saw it and tugged it from her clenched, dead fist. But they were then hounded by her wraith, which sought her coin all over the asylum and in their homes, and made their lives a misery. The two returned it to her grave at the earliest opportunity, and the ghastly visitations ceased.

  I can treat the story slightly flippantly now, but when I was eleven years old, reading that while listening to Neil Young’s After the Goldrush, it had a significant impact on my impressionable little mind. Neil Young’s voice and tracks from that album still have a nostalgic effect upon me.

  The story may or may not be true, but I do believe that young girls, young women, call them what you will, can occasionally form these intense bonds with the concept of a man or a future. This is something which I have never seen in a male of a similar age. Perhaps it’s a gender thing.