Without a Trace Read online

  The chronicles of Hugh de Singleton, surgeon

  The Unquiet Bones

  A Corpse at St Andrew’s Chapel

  A Trail of Ink

  Unhallowed Ground

  The Tainted Coin

  Rest Not in Peace

  The Abbot’s Agreement

  Ashes to Ashes

  Lucifer’s Harvest

  Deeds of Darkness

  Prince Edward’s Warrant

  Without a Trace

  Text copyright © 2019 Mel Starr

  This edition copyright © 2019 Lion Hudson IP Limited

  The right of Mel Starr to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  All the characters in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Published by

  Lion Hudson Limited

  Wilkinson House, Jordan Hill Business Park,

  Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 8DR, England

  www.lionhudson.com

  ISBN 978 1 78264 267 1

  e-ISBN 978 1 78264 268 8

  First edition 2019

  Cover images © w-ings (woods)

  © cwinegarden (brooch) / iStock

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  For Russell Clark Starr

  (1904-2000)

  and Mabel Osborne Starr

  (1899-1966)

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Glossary

  Bampton to Oxford; fourteenth century

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Afterword

  Acknowledgments

  Several years ago when Dr Dan Runyon, professor of English at Spring Arbor University, learned that I had written an as yet unpublished medieval mystery, he invited me to speak to his fiction-writing class about the trials of a rookie writer seeking a publisher. He sent chapters of Hugh de Singleton’s first chronicle, The Unquiet Bones, to his friend Tony Collins at Lion Hudson. Thanks, Dan.

  Tony has since retired, but many thanks to him and all those at Lion Hudson who saw Hugh de Singleton’s potential. Thanks also to my editors – Jan Greenough for the first nine books, and Penelope Wilcock for the most recent – who know Sir Hugh well and excel at asking such questions as “Do you really want to say it that way?” and “Wouldn’t Hugh do it like this?”

  Dr John Blair, of Queen’s College, Oxford, has written several papers about Bampton history. These have been valuable in creating an accurate time and place for Hugh.

  In the summer of 1990 Susan and I found a delightful B&B in a medieval village north of Lichfield named Mavesyn Ridware. Proprietors Tony and Lis Page became friends, and when they moved to Bampton some years later they invited us to visit them there. Tony and Lis introduced me to Bampton and became a great source of information about the village. Tony died in March 2015, only a few months after being diagnosed with cancer. He is greatly missed.

  Ms Malgorzata Deron, of Poznan, Poland, offered to update and maintain my website. She has done a marvelous job. To see her work visit www.melstarr.net.

  Glossary

  Almoner: official of castle or monastery charged with dispensing alms – food or money – to the poor.

  Ambler: an easy-riding horse, because it moved both right legs together, then both left legs.

  Angelus: the church bell was rung three times each day – dawn, noon, and dusk – announcing the time for the Angelus Devotional.

  Bailiff: a lord’s chief manorial representative. He oversaw all operations, collected rents and fines, and enforced labor service. Not a popular fellow.

  Banneret: a military rank superior to a knight.

  Beadle: a manor official in charge of fences, enclosures, and curfew. He served under the bailiff and reeve. Also called a hayward.

  Beans yfryed: beans first simmered, then fried in oil with onions and/or garlic.

  Beaulieu: Cistercian abbey near Southampton.

  Bruit: a sauce of white wine, breadcrumbs, onions, and spices.

  Candlemas: February 2. Marked the purification of Mary. Women traditionally paraded to the village church carrying lighted candles. Tillage of fields resumed this day.

  Capon: a castrated male chicken.

  Chauces: tight-fitting trousers, often particolored, having different colors for each leg.

  Coney: rabbit.

  Coppice: to cut back a tree so that a thicket of saplings will grow from the stump. These shoots were used for everything from arrows to rafters, depending upon how long they were permitted to grow.

  Corn: a kernel of any grain. Maize – American corn – was unknown in Europe at the time.

  Cotehardie: the primary medieval outer garment. Women’s were floor-length; men’s ranged from thigh to ankle.

  Cotter: a poor villager, usually holding five acres or less. He often had to labor for wealthy villagers to make ends meet.

  Crécy: French village where, in 1346, Edward III defeated the French army.

  Cresset: a bowl that could be filled with oil and with a floating wick used for lighting.

  Cyueles: deep-fried fritters made of a paste of breadcrumbs, ground almonds, eggs, sugar, and salt, then fried.

  Daub: a clay and plaster mix, reinforced with straw and/or horse hair, used to plaster the exterior of a house.

  Demesne: land directly exploited by a lord and worked by his villeins, as opposed to land a lord might rent to tenants.

  Dexter: a war horse, larger than pack horses and palfreys. Also the right-hand direction.

  Dowry: a gift from the bride’s family to the groom, intended for her support during marriage and during widowhood, should her husband predecease her.

  Dredge: mixed grains planted together in a field – often barley and oats.

  Eels in bruit: eels served in bruit sauce.

  Farrier: a smith who shoes horses.

  Farthing: one-fourth of a penny. The smallest silver coin.

  Gathering: eight leaves of parchment made by folding the prepared hide three times.

  Gentleman: a nobleman. The term had nothing to do with character or behavior.

  Glebe: land belonging to or providing revenue for a parish church.

  Grange: a farm associated with and providing food and revenue for an abbey.

  Groat: a silver coin worth four pence.

  Groom: a household servant to a lord, ranking above a page and below a valet.

  Grope Lane: street in Oxford now known as Magpie Lane.

  Hallmote: the manorial court. Royal courts judged free tenants accused of murder and felony; manorial courts had jurisdiction over legal matters concerning villagers.

  Hanoney: eggs scrambled with onions and fried.

  Hosteller: monastic official in charge of providing for abbey guests. Also called “guest master.”

  Hue and cry: alarm call raised by the person who discovered a crime. All who heard were expected to go to the scene of the crime and, if possible, pursue the felon.

  Infangenthef: the right of a
lord of a manor to try and execute a thief caught in the act.

  King’s Eyre: a royal circuit court, presided over by a traveling judge.

  Kirtle: a medieval undershirt.

  Lady: a title of rank for a female. As with “gentleman” it had nothing to do with character or behavior.

  Lammastide: August 1, when thanks was given for a successful wheat harvest. From Old English “loaf mass.”

  Leech Lombard: a dish of ground pork, eggs, raisins, currants, and dates, with added spices. The mixture was boiled in a sack until set, then sliced for serving.

  Liripipe: a fashionably long tail attached to a man’s cap and usually coiled on top of the head.

  Lych gate: a roofed gate at the entry to a churchyard under which the deceased would rest during the initial part of a medieval funeral.

  Marshal: a high-ranking official having charge of a lord’s stables, military resources, and ceremonies.

  Marshalsea: the stables and their associated accoutrements.

  Martinmas: November 11, the traditional date to slaughter animals for winter food.

  Maslin: bread made with a mixture of grains, commonly wheat and rye or barley.

  Meselade: a dish of beaten eggs and bread, sprinkled with sugar.

  Michaelmas: September 29. The feast signaled the end of the harvest. Last rents and tithes were due.

  Michaelmas Term: the academic term from September to Christmas.

  Midsummer’s Eve: June 23/24. (By the fourteenth century the Julian calendar was about ten days off.)

  Palfrey: a riding horse with a comfortable gait.

  Parchment: animal skin, usually sheep or goat, prepared for writing.

  Pardoner: religious official who raised money by selling indulgences.

  Porre of peas: a thick pea soup made with onions, spices, and sugar.

  Portcullis: a grating of iron or wood hung over a passage and lowered between grooves to prevent access.

  Pottage: anything cooked in one pot, from the meanest oatmeal to a savory stew.

  Pottage of whelks: whelks boiled and served in a stock of almond milk, breadcrumbs, and spices.

  Pound: there was no one pound coin in the fourteenth century. The term represented twenty shillings or 240 pence.

  Quarter noble: a coin worth one shilling and eight pence.

  Radcot Bridge: assumed to be the oldest bridge over the River Thames. Built in about 1200, and still in use for light vehicles on the A4095 between Clanfield and Faringdon.

  Reeve: an important manor official, although he did not outrank the bailiff. Elected by tenants from among themselves, he had responsibility for fields, structures, and enforcing labor service.

  Refectory: the abbey dining hall.

  Rice moyle: a dish of rice simmered in almond milk, saffron, and sugar.

  Runcie: a small common horse of lower grade than a palfrey.

  St. Beornwald’s Church: today called the Church of St Mary the Virgin, in the fourteenth century it was named for an obscure Saxon saint.

  Shilling: twelve pence. Twenty shillings made a pound, although there were no shilling or pound coins.

  Solar: a small room in a castle, more easily heated than the great hall, where lords preferred to spend time, especially in winter. Usually on an upper floor.

  Statute of Laborers: following the first attack of plague in 1348-49 laborers realized that because so many workers had died, their labor was in demand and so required higher wages. In 1351 parliament set wages at the 1347 level. Like most attempts to legislate against the law of supply and demand, the statute was generally a failure.

  Stewed herrings: herring stuffed with a mixture of breadcrumbs, parsley, thyme, black pepper, currants, sugar, and onions, all chopped finely, then boiled.

  Stockfish: the cheapest salted fish, usually cod or haddock.

  Stone (weight): fourteen pounds.

  Tenant: a free manor resident who rented land from his lord. He could pay his rent in labor or, more likely in the fourteenth century, in cash. Or a combination of both.

  Toft: land surrounding a villager’s house, often used for growing vegetables and keeping chickens.

  Trinity Term: the third term of the academic year, from mid-April to the end of June.

  Twelfth Night: the evening of January 5, preceding Epiphany.

  Valet: the highest-ranking servant to a lord.

  Verderer: the forester in charge of a lord’s woodlands.

  Vicar: a priest serving a parish church but not entitled to its tithes.

  Villein: a non-free peasant. He could not leave his land or service to his lord, or sell animals without permission. But if he could escape his manor for a year and a day he would be free.

  Void: dessert – often sugared fruit and sweetened wine.

  Wattle: interlacing sticks used as a foundation and support for daub in forming the wall of a house.

  Weald (the): a “suburb” to the southwest of Bampton, its inhabitants were tenants of the Bishop of Exeter.

  Week-work: the two or three days of labor per week (more during harvest) that a villein owed his lord.

  Whitsunday: “white Sunday,” ten days after Ascension Day, seven weeks after Easter.

  Wimple: a cloth covering worn over the head and around the neck.

  Yardland: about thirty acres. Also called a virgate and, in northern England, an oxgang.

  Bampton to Oxford; fourteenth century

  Chapter 1

  June and July are hungry months. Hogs slaughtered and smoked and salted at Martinmas have been consumed, and unless a man is adept at setting snares to poach his lord’s coneys and hares, he and his family will go without flesh upon their trenchers.

  In the June of 1373 corn was also in short supply. The harvest was not bountiful last year, so in June of 1373 most folk of Bampton village lived with hollow bellies and prayed for an abundant harvest this year.

  Two of my Kate’s hens had gone missing since Whitsunday so we were without their eggs to feed ourselves and Bessie and John, and Kate’s father. I was angry that some villager had made off with the fowls, but what would I do if my babes were crying from hunger? Would I steal to spare them? Or to keep them alive? I pray I must never be brought to such a pass.

  Men sometimes wonder how they might conduct themselves in a crisis. Such a question can only be answered when a crisis visits. Better, perhaps, to never know the answer to such a question, for to know means that evil has come.

  No man had made off with Kate’s rooster, so the creature awoke me as he greeted the dawn on the twenty-first day of June – a Tuesday. I remember the day well, for before the sun dropped below Lord Gilbert’s wood to the west of Bampton Castle my employer, Lord Gilbert Talbot, assigned me the most vexing task I had yet undertaken in his service.

  I am Hugh de Singleton – Sir Hugh, since Prince Edward saw fit to award me a knighthood for my service to him some months past – surgeon and bailiff to Lord Gilbert Talbot at his manor of Bampton. My post often requires of me that I seek out miscreants who trouble the peace of Lord Gilbert’s villeins and tenants. Because I have had success in such duty Lord Gilbert has sometimes seen fit to instruct me to assist friends who require the services of a sleuth to unravel some knotty trouble.

  I broke my fast with a fragment of stale maslin loaf and a cup of ale, then set off for John Prudhomme’s house. John has been chosen reeve of Bampton Manor for several years, and this day we must divide our duty – one to oversee haying, the other the ploughing of a fallow field of Lord Gilbert’s demesne. I sent John to watch over the ploughing, to make sure the ploughmen turned the sod deeply so the roots of weeds were exposed, and went to observe the haying.

  Ten of Lord Gilbert’s villeins, with their wives and older children, arrived at the meadow shortly after the sun had dried the dew. The men set off with their scythes while the women and children followed, turning the hay to ensure that it dried evenly. My presence as observer of this labor was not really required. A successful hay crop me
ans more animals can be kept over the next winter – for fresh meat, or breeding stock, or sale. So the men at their scythes swung them close to the ground and the women and children were careful to leave no clumps which would molder if the weather turned wet.

  The day grew so warm that the haymakers had stripped to their kirtles by the fourth hour, and sweat mingled with dust upon their brows when the Angelus Bell rang from the tower of the Church of St. Beornwald, signaling noon and a break for dinner. The work was arduous, but the laborers grinned as they went to their meals. The hay crop was good.

  As I turned from Bridge Street to Church View Street on the way to my own dinner, I saw Adela walking ahead, returning to Galen House from the baker with three loaves in her arms. Adela’s father is a poor cotter of the Bishop of Exeter’s lands in the Weald. My service to Prince Edward last year included discovering who had slain Sir Giles Cheyne, the prince’s companion at the Battle of Crécy. For this labor I had been made Sir Hugh, and also awarded a sixth part of the revenues of the murdered knight’s lands – prosperity enough for me to hire a servant to assist my Kate, who was now Lady Katherine to the folk of Bampton and the Weald.

  Dinner this day at Galen House was a porre of peas, and the loaves yet warm from the baker’s oven. Thrifty Kate had eked out the gammon, so we still had some scraps of it to flavor the pottage.

  “Have Lord Gilbert’s guests arrived?” my father-in-law asked as we ate.

  “Nay, but Coleshill is not far distant and the roads are dry. Sir Aymer should arrive before supper.”

  The care and feeding of guests at Bampton Castle is not a part of my duties to Lord Gilbert, but his instructions for his cook, chamberlain, valets, and grooms regarding any forthcoming visit of guests were soon known to me and most others of the village.

  Sir Aymer Molyns, the expected guest, was wed to Philippa Felbridge, cousin once removed to Lady Petronilla, Lord Gilbert’s wife. Lady Petronilla had succumbed to plague when the disease reappeared four years past. Lady Philippa was Sir Aymer’s second wife, his first bride, Lady Alyce, having also perished in the return of plague in 1369.

  As we enjoyed our repast with its welcome flavor of pork added to the peas, we speculated about the mealtime conversations at the castle when Sir Aymer came to stay. Did the memory of old sorrow and the specter of plague stand in the shadows? Or were present friendship and married felicity cheer enough? Bittersweet, mayhap. We chewed it over along with our meal, then at last I must wipe my mouth, lay aside my napkin, and return to the tasks of the day.