Sir Hugh Corbett 11 - The Demon Archer

not to be too harsh but walked down the nave, leaving the lovelorn man to make his own farewells. He went out and stood on the steps. The front of the church was now quiet and deserted. Sir William had taken his party, including the corpse, back to Ashdown Manor. Corbett stood and closed his eyes, listening to the birdsong. The fragrance of the forest, crushed grass, flowers and newly turned earth, assailed his senses. He wondered how Maeve Was progressing at Leighton. Would she be safe? Was she well? He was always anxious that she would do too much but then he recalled that her uncle, Lord Morgan Ap Llewelyn, who had come as a house guest years ago and decided to stay, would shadow her everywhere, clucking like the busy old hen he was. He heard the door open and close behind him.
    ‘Are you well, Ranulf? And Mistress Alicia?’
    Ranulf’s slightly flushed face told him everything. He opened his hand and Corbett espied the little locket he’d seen round Alicia’s neck.
    ‘A token of affection, eh, Ranulf?’
    His manservant’s face became grave. ‘She thinks you are a very dangerous man, Sir Hugh.’
    Corbett shook his head. ‘You’ve read St Augustine ? He defines murder as the supreme chaos and that chaos, Ranulf, must be resolved by logic, evidence and the enforcement of royal justice.’ He tapped his clerk playfully on the side of the cheek. ‘And murder comes in many guises. For all we know, Ranulf, we may have spent the morning in the presence of a cruel assassin. Remember the proverb: "Of the two brothers Cain and Abel, Cain was the comeliest and smiled the most." ‘



Chapter 12

    After some searching, the hermit found the place where he had crossed the trackway. It was now about noon; clouds were closing over the sun and the first cool winds of autumn were making themselves felt. Gold-brown leaves whirled in the wind, laying down a carpet across the rutted track. The forest was silent apart from the occasional call of the birds and the incessant cawing of the rooks. Corbett noticed how the trackway curved and bent.
    ‘A corner,’ he said. ‘The best place for an ambush, or so my lord of Surrey is always telling me.’
    He and Ranulf followed the hermit and Brother Cosmas down the bank to the narrow grave from which Odo had dug the woman’s corpse. Corbett knelt down and, with gauntleted hands, pulled away the leaves and twigs which had amassed there. The soil was soft, easy to dig; it must have taken only a short while for the assassin to slip the corpse in and then hide it under a layer of muddy soil.
    ‘What are you looking for?’ Brother Cosmas asked.
    Corbett pointed back to the trackway. ‘I suspect this young woman was coming from the Devil-in-the-Woods. She was travelling either to the manor or to the priory or, perhaps, north to London . She turned that corner. The assassin must have stood somewhere near here, arrow notched. There’s a well-known outlaw’s trick. You throw a stone in the air and let it fall on the trackway.’
    ‘And the victim naturally looks up?’
    ‘Yes, presenting his throat as a suitable target.’
    ‘The archer must have been a good marksman?’ the Franciscan insisted.
    ‘We do not know how close he was,’ Corbett replied. ‘But he was definitely skilled with the bow and he fully intended to kill. You served in the wars, Brother. Do you recall a man suffering a throat wound and surviving? Anyway, the assassin steps on to the trackway and drags the corpse down here where it’s stripped and buried. The poor unfortunate’s clothing, smock, dress, boots, belt and cloak.’ He paused, watching a squirrel scamper up the trunk of a tree.
    Ranulf looked at Corbett curiously. His master stood, mouth half open, brow furrowed.
    ‘Master, you were talking of the corpse being stripped?’
    ‘Of course,’ Corbett breathed. ‘Why strip a corpse?’
    ‘Because you need the clothes?’ the hermit half-joked.
    ‘No, no.’ Corbett shook his head. ‘The assassin was no common thief. He was waiting for this young woman. I doubt if she came upon him by chance. It has all the hallmarks of a well-plotted ambush. Our archer can afford a good bow, a quiver of arrows. So, why should he be so keen on some poor woman’s clothes?’ He punched Ranulf on the shoulder. ‘Come on, Clerk of the Green Wax, clear your wits! Remember that corpse, the cropped hair, the sinewy body.’
    ‘A man!’ Ranulf exclaimed. ‘The woman was travelling disguised as a man! That’s