“Why are you so sure?” asked Baldwin.
“Because he was hanged – that’s why! Two of my men found him swinging from a tree,” he said curtly.
Simon and Baldwin exchanged a look. Both were troubled by the news, the bailiff most of all. With all the existing problems between the tinners and landowners, it only needed one small spark to start a conflagration which could engulf all the lands under his authority. This death could easily be that spark.
Sir William plainly did not hold the same fear. He was reserved but not fearful as he strode to the fireplace where his wife sat quietly stitching at a tapestry. She smiled up at him as he touched her shoulder. When she returned to her work he said, “Certainly, it’s a nuisance. But it’s a problem solved as well.” Baldwin was not surprised at his words. It would have been strange for the old knight to feel otherwise. After all, he reasoned, the death of Bruther must have been a relief to Sir William, and the man was no hypocrite.
Seating himself at a bench near the fire, Simon gazed at the old knight thoughtfully. Robert wandered to the dais and leaned back on the table, listening carefully. Simon glanced at him, then back at the knight. “Solved?” he prompted.
“Yes.” Sir William dropped heavily into a chair. “Solved. Bruther is dead. He was a sore problem to me and my family while he lived, but now he’s dead, the example he set to my peasants has been killed with him. If any other villeins had ideas about running away, they’ll think again now.”
Baldwin had seated himself beside Simon, and now leaned forward. “Do you have any idea who might have killed him?” he said. He was surprised when Matillida Beauscyr answered, her eyes on her stitching at first, but then rising to meet Baldwin’s gaze.
“Yes. He did.” Her voice carried certainty. “He killed himself as surely as if he had put the rope round his own neck.”
“I’m sorry?” said Baldwin, frowning. “How did he do that?”
“The miners hereabouts are a tough group, Sir Baldwin, and they have their own kind of justice. They rely on all tinners holding to certain principles. If a man makes a claim to some piece of land, it is his. This fool Bruther went on to a plot and began tinning there. I have no doubt you will find that he was on someone else’s land. To the tinners, that would be as good as theft. I rather expect you will find that he was trespassing and the real miners decided to punish him.”
Sir Robert frowned, unsure of her point, but then it came to him and he almost gasped. In a few short words, Matillida had put the blame firmly on to Thomas Smyth.
“You mean that he was hanged as a punishment for working on another man’s claim?” Baldwin probed.
Sir William spoke again. “Yes. We’ve no doubt about it. He was lynched by a mob.”
Simon stirred. “You’ve got his body here?”
“Yes, in an undercroft – it’s cool down there.”
“May we see him now?”
Shrugging, the knight led them back into the courtyard and up toward the kitchen area, leaving his son and wife behind. At the back of the building, near the wall closest to the river, he took them down a short stair and into a shallow, pit-like cellar. Here wine and ale barrels lined the walls, and when Hugh tapped one experimentally, it thudded dully, sounding comfortingly full. Up at the far end of the chamber was a large box; within it rested the corpse of the man who had caused so many problems to the landlord.
Walking toward it, Sir William beckoned the others forward with a proprietorial gesture. Peering inside the box, Baldwin and Simon found themselves staring into the face of a man in his late twenties, slimly built and dressed in a rough sleeveless tunic of thick reddish cloth which left his arms bare.
“Poor devil,” Simon heard Baldwin mutter, and he could easily understand why. Lank dark hair fell over one eye, almost covering it, but not hiding the unfocused stare. Bruther had plainly died from strangling. His eyes were wide and staring in the suffused face, his mouth open, tongue a blackened, bloated mass with a line of toothmarks where his jaws had closed in his death throes. Around his neck were the remains of a hemp rope. It was a light cable, of the kind used for lashing, not the type normally associated with a hanging, and was tied loosely. While the bailiff watched, Baldwin studied the body, his hands resting on the edge of the box while his eyes ranged over the figure. Copying his stance, Simon forced himself to stare down as well.
Bruther’s was not like the other corpses he had seen. He was becoming familiar with death, having viewed men dead from burning and stabbing in the last two years, and all too often he had felt the need to vomit afterward. He had witnessed enough hangings, too, as a legal representative, and seen the results. To his mind, the bodies of those who had been hanged were less distressing than those of murdered people, probably, he knew, because he was content to see the guilty punished, but also because there was less overt violence visible. This one felt different from them because it was that of a man who had been killed for no good reason, without trial, in a violent crime. And Bruther’s end must have been horrific. It was as if the final terror of the victim managed to transmit itself to him, and in his mind’s eye he could imagine the group of men grabbing him, tying his hands, throwing the rope around his neck, hauling the kicking, choking victim aloft, and leaving him there while his face blackened and his eyes rolled. The thought made Simon shiver. He swallowed heavily and turned away.
As usual, Baldwin appeared unaffected by the sight of death. Having finished his quiet survey of the body, he called his servant forward. Edgar had armed himself with a candle, and he held it near the dead man to the knight’s instruction, first next to the feet then slowly moving upward, halting at the hands and wrists, then on up to the face. Last of all Baldwin took the head in his hands and studied it, muttering to himself, not just the face but the scalp as well.
Sir William shot a look of astonishment at Simon, who gave him a weak smile. “Do not worry, Sir William. My friend’s always like this.”
“And lucky I am too!” snorted the crouching knight.
“Right, Edgar. Now, near his neck while I look at the rope.”
“But why?” The older knight tapped his foot impatiently, arms crossed over his chest. “Haven’t you seen enough? The man is dead, and there’s an end to it.”
At this Baldwin glanced up, his face thrown into deep lines and shadows where the orange candlelight caught it. “I don’t know about that yet, sir.” He motioned to Edgar. “Cut the rope from him. Sir William, how can you say there’s an end to it when we don’t know who did it?”
“But as my wife said, it must have been…”
“The miners. Quite. However, I have little doubt that the miners will say it must have been someone else. Who knows – they might even say it was you, Sir William. Now, where did you say this man was found?”
The older man stared from Simon to Baldwin, aghast. “ Me? They wouldn’t dare!”
“Or one of your sons,” Baldwin continued cheerfully. “That is why we must study this body, to see whether there is any evidence about who really did kill him. So, where was he found?”
“In… in Wistman’s Wood – a little wood some distance from here.”
“And he was hanging from a tree?”
“Yes. My men saw something swinging as they passed by. When they looked, they found his body.” Sir William was still wide-eyed with shock.
“Thank you. I think it might be interesting to see where this was, if you don’t mind. Could you ask one of the men to take us there?”
“Yes. Yes, I suppose so, if that’s what you want. I’ll arrange it.”
“Good. Now… ah, thank you, Edgar.”
Taking the heavy cord from his servant, Baldwin studied it carefully. It was strong hemp. Edgar had cut it from the neck, preserving the knot so that the interwoven threads could be studied in one piece. While Simon watched, Baldwin tested the noose, pulling at the knot so that it ran up and down the rope easily. Then the knight threw a glance at the body. Simon held out his hand, and Baldwin wordlessly passed him the rope. He was concentrating on the figure again, oblivious to the others in the room.
Simon had always had a squeamish side to him which the knight found either endearing or infuriating, depending on his mood at the time. For Baldwin, who had experienced warfare and seen death in many forms, there was a certain fascination in a new corpse. He was driven by a pure curiosity, not to prove a principle, but merely to find truth. Each time he saw a new body, he wanted to study it, and discover the reasons behind the death, as if the corpse could explain to him if he would but listen and observe. And he was determined to give each the time it needed to tell him.
Long ago he had realized that when a man or woman died in a specific way, the signals were roughly the
