There was a Crooked Man(2024)

Jason Vail

The corpse of one of medieval Ludlow’s tavern keepers, popular Red John Griffin, is found by the beggar One-eye Dick one morning at the foot of the stairway leading down to his establishment. His neck is broken.

It first appears to be accidental, the result of an unfortunate tumble down the stairs. On close examination, Stephen Attebrook, Ludlow’s coroner and deputy sheriff, concludes it was murder.

But other concerns loom larger than the death of a mere tavern keeper. Law and order have collapsed in England. The roads are plagued by robbers and highway men, for the country is in turmoil brought on by the civil war between King Henry and his brother-in-law, Earl Simon de Montfort. Despite the king’s capture at the Battle of Lewes the preceding year, there is no peace. And one robber gang stands out in the spring of 1265 — it kills all its victims and leaves many mutilated. One victim, in fact, is Red John’s brother, William, the lord of Fox Hall Manor.

The sheriff of Shropshire lacks the resources to ferret out the gang. Then he hits on the idea of turning Shropshire’s best finder, Attebrook, loose to locate the gang. So he orders Attebrook to drop everything and make this matter his first priority.

Yet there must be some justice for poor Red John. So the inquiry into his death falls to an unlikely investigator — Stephen’s young wife, Lady Ida — while Stephen struggles to find the gang before it can strike again.