them. It’s Mortimer who tells them where to go, what to do, and who to kill!’
The King put a hand to his temple. ‘Then prepare the men to leave this place. We shall ride to Caerphilly. At least we should find some peace there. Dear God, I hope so!’
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Simon, Hugh and Sir Charles crossed the town to return to the castle. On the way, they passed the execution ground where the headsman, liberally beslubbered with gore, was drinking from a great skin filled with wine, humming a tune with a slurred inflection. Sawdust had been liberally spread over the area to soak up the blood, and Earl Hugh’s body was already being fought over by the dogs.
‘It is a terrible thing to see a man brought so low,’ Simon murmured as they passed.
Hugh grunted. He had detested the Despenser family since his wife’s death, because it was Despenser’s men who had killed her and her child, he believed. The shock of it had, if anything, turned him still more introverted and misathropic than before.
Sir Charles was not concentrating. ‘Hmm? Yes. Not good to see that the highest in the land can be killed. Precedents like that should not be popularly displayed to the peasants. They may get all sorts of unwholesome ideas!’
Sir Charles was one of the new knights, a man who had lost his home and livelihood when Earl Thomas of Lancaster had been toppled from power and executed by his cousin, the King. That had been a terrible time, with many of the Earl’s followers being taken and knights who had been loyal to him being forced to flee. Sir Charles was one of them. He had reached France, hoping to make his fortune in the tournaments, but later managed to win the trust of the King again, and had returned to favour. He had experienced the lowest fortune and the highest, and even now there was a measuring look in his eye as he glanced over the gibbet.
He looked at Simon. ‘Where do you wish to go?’
‘The knight described by the fosser sounds like the man who was so keen to throw open the gates of the city for Mortimer and the Queen: the Coroner, Sir Stephen Siward. Let’s see if we can speak with him.’
It was easy enough to find the knight. He was lounging at a table at an inn not far from the one where Simon and Margaret had stayed on their first night here.
The impression Simon gained was entirely positive. Sir Stephen Siward was a large man, heavy and tall, and with black hair cut short, and with his piercing blue eyes in that round face, he looked the sort of man who would make excellent company around a table. ‘So, you seek me?’ he said amiably. ‘What, will you join me in a cup or two of wine?’
Sir Charles agreed with alacrity, sitting on a bench, and Simon too was glad of the offer. Soon the patron had arrived with two flagons of wine and more cups, and all three could begin talking, while Hugh stood a short distance away like a guard, leaning on his staff.
‘How may I help you?’
‘Sir Stephen, this is nothing to do with the surrender of the city. This is about a woman who was killed here a little while ago.’
‘I won’t pretend I don’t know who you’re talking about,’ the knight said. He frowned into his wine, then, tipping his head back, he emptied the cup. ‘Poor Cecily. She was such an unfortunate woman. To escape one hideous attack, only to be slain in another.’
‘You knew her well?’ Simon asked.
‘No. I thought you realised: I am Coroner here for the King. I cover a wide area, but I happened to be here in the city, fortunately, when Squire William went on his mad crusade of death. You know the story of him and his wife? Oh. Well, you know then, that he assaulted the Capons’ house with a gang of men, slew the old doorman, then Capon, his wife and daughter, before finally dashing out the brains of the baby. A terrible revenge. There were – oh, I’ve lost count of them now – but many, many blade wounds on his wife’s body. Poor girl – she was only eighteen when he killed her.’
Simon felt his belly tighten at the thought of such carnage. ‘He was arrested?’
‘Oh, yes. In little time. Everyone knew him, and poor Cecily was able to identify him and some of his henchmen once she recovered. It was enough for the jury. Besides, as she accused him, he tried to launch himself at her. It was hard enough in the first place to persuade him to come to the court, but then to try to attack Cecily just because she told what she witnessed… that was shameful.’
Sir Charles leaned on an elbow. ‘Why would they leave her alive?’
‘Well, when they took the baby from her, the horror made her faint – so perhaps they thought her dead?’
‘Committed killers are rarely so careless,’ Sir Charles said. Then: ‘Why was the Squire not in gaol?’
‘The King has issued a general pardon to those who will serve him. Squire William was more than happy to take that offer with both hands. I had heard he was going to join the King when His Highness arrived here – but his body was so mutilated and decomposed, I suppose he was killed before the King arrived.’
‘Was there any sign as to who could have killed him?’ Simon asked.
‘I swear I do not know. I… But no.’
‘Please?’ Simon pressed him.
‘It is probably nothing, but I did hear that there was a priest out there, not far from where the man’s body was discovered. A fellow who recently arrived from Tewkesbury.’
‘What of it?’ Sir Charles said.
‘Only this: young Petronilla ran away with her confessor, a young priest called Paul. Now I hear that a priest by that name has been given a living just far enough from here to be safe from people in the town, and far enough away from Squire William, too, generally. Unless…’
‘You are speaking in riddles,’ Sir Charles snapped.
‘Am I? You must accept my apologies. All I meant to say was, that if this same Paul, who is some three to four leagues from Bristol, were to hear from some passing traveller that a woman called Capon, along with her father and mother and a little illegitimate baby, had been slain by her husband, and that the husband had been captured, but then freed under the King’s order – well, if you were that priest, thinking it was your woman, your baby, what would you wish to do? Forgive – forget? Or waylay the Squire and hack off his head and disembowel him for the traitor he had shown himself to be?’
Simon pursed his lips in a whistle. ‘That makes sense. What would your priest do then?’
‘Return to his church as though nothing had happened. What else would he do? There’s nowhere for him to run to now, and if he is found, what can you or I do about his crimes?
‘True enough,’ Sir Charles said. He made ready to stand.
‘One thing, though,’ Simon said. ‘The dagger. Why throw that into Cecily’s grave?’
‘The dagger? What dagger?’
There was instantly a falseness in his tone, and as Simon looked at him, he saw that the man’s eyes were averted. ‘Sir Stephen, a man saw you throw the dagger into the woman’s grave. Why did you do that?’
Sir Stephen looked away, over towards the castle’s open gates, as though musing on the foolishness of life.
‘I did not know Cecily, not until I had to go and view all the bodies at the Capon household, but I do distinctly recall the feeling of something akin to joy, to find one person who was still breathing in that slaughterhouse. She was a mere maidservant, but the fact that she survived seemed to me to be a good thing in its own right.’
He rubbed at his nose. ‘So, you can understand how appalled I was to be called to her body when she was killed. In fact, I was so horrified, I asked Sir Charles here to go to it instead. I could not face the accusation in her eyes. To know that she had died as well… it felt as though I too had failed her.’
