by Paul Doherty
Fifthly, it now seemed that Athelstan, aided by the garrulous chronicler Brother Roger, was to assist Fieschi’s investigation assuming the role of Devil’s Advocate now that Alberic had gone to his eternal reward. Sixthly, Athelstan was puzzled about how deeply people’s feelings ran about a king who’d been murdered – or martyred, according to your perception – over fifty years ago. Prior Anselm had pointed out how different Dominicans, including himself, were related to families caught up in the hurling times of Edward II’s deposition, imprisonment and death. But how and why should that matter so much now? Why should it lead to Alberic’s murder as well as that savage attack upon himself in the beacon tower? Athelstan was certain this violence was linked to Fieschi’s mission. What danger did he himself pose?
Athelstan put his face in his hands as he recalled those ominous war barges. Did he have it wrong? Perhaps the attack on him was nothing to do with Alberic’s death but was linked to the general disturbance throughout the city. Or it might be because of who Athelstan was and what he knew – because he and Sir John Cranston truly believed the rebel Leader Wat Tyler was Gaunt’s creature suborned to kill the young king. Once Richard was gone, leaving no heir, the crown would pass to Gaunt and the House of Lancaster. Gaunt’s behaviour was certainly suspicious, leading an army to Scotland when the King, the city and the kingdom lay under serious and bloody threat from rebel armies. Athelstan recalled his earlier confrontation with Tyler. Why had he come here? It was possible that he’d hoped to seize Isabella, Thibault’s daughter, with some madcap notion of using her against her father, to gain entrance to the Tower and access to the young king. And where was Sir John Cranston in all of this?
Athelstan sighed, rose to his feet and left the chantry chapel. The nave stretched before him, a place of dappled, shifting light. Dust motes danced in the lance-like rays of sunshine across which trails of fading incense and candle smoke drifted. The twisted, leering faces of gargoyles and babewyns stared down at him. He caught the stony gaze of statues and glimpsed the faint glow of candlelight in the Lady Chapel. Again that sound. There was a faint scuffling, an ominous click. Athelstan recognised it immediately. He fell to his knees, head bowed, to crawl back into the chantry chapel as the crossbow bolt whirled above him. Another one followed immediately afterwards, smacking into the wooden trellised screen. Athelstan gabbled a prayer for protection. Ever since his days in the royal array he had never forgotten the distinctive sinister click of a crossbow loosing its bolt, a danger Cranston had, time and again, alerted him to. He wiped the sweat from his brow.
‘Pax et bonum!’ he called. ‘This is God’s house, the gate of heaven, not some slaughter shed!’ Again the click but this time the mysterious archer must have fumbled. A bolt whirled but only to clatter along the paving stones. Athelstan edged his way across the chantry floor. He relaxed as the devil door further up the church crashed open.
‘Brother Athelstan?’ Isabella’s young, carrying voice echoed down the nave. ‘Brother Athelstan, you have visitors.’ The friar rose to his feet. He heard a soft patter followed by a creak which came from the side door to the main entrance. He left the chantry chapel, peering through the smoky murk. The would-be assassin had fled. Athelstan turned and crouched as Isabella raced towards him.
‘Brother, Brother,’ she gasped, ‘you have visitors! A very pretty woman, olive-skinned, kind-eyed, with hair as black as night. She is with a man as large as a horse with a white bristling beard and moustache and fierce blue eyes. He swears by …’ Isabella pulled herself away, fingers to her lips as she tried to recall Sir John Cranston, Lord High Coroner of London’s favourite curse. ‘Oh yes, by Satan’s pits!’
‘You mean Satan’s tits!’ Despite the danger, Athelstan laughed. He rose and clasped her hand. ‘Come.’
‘Brother, what is wrong?’ Isabella pulled his fingers. ‘Your hands are always warm. Now they are cold. What is the matter? Why were you hiding?’
‘Nothing, my pearl of great price,’ Athelstan assured her. ‘You are,’ he whispered to himself, ‘as sharp and keen as your father. I just pray you have all of his wit and none of his vices.’
Sir John Cranston and Benedicta the widow woman were waiting in the Chamber of Penitence close to the prior’s parlour. A lay brother gave a whispered explanation as to how the other chambers were being used for this and that. Athelstan nodded, kissed Isabella on the head and asked the lay brother to take her back to her nurse, who must be beside herself with worry. Once they had gone Athelstan opened the door.
‘Good morrow!’ he called out. ‘Benedico vos, I bless you both.’ Cranston and Benedicta spun round from looking at one of the wall paintings. Athelstan exchanged the kiss of peace even as he noticed how tired and drawn both his visitors looked. Cranston, despite the early summer warmth, was swathed in his usual bottle-green cloak which he used to cover his bulky warbelt as well as the light coat of Milanese steel beneath his jerkin. The coroner was unshaven and unkempt, his eyes bloodshot, his breath reeking of Bordeaux from the many sips he had taken from the miraculous wineskin concealed beneath his coat. Benedicta was garbed like a nun in dark blue with an old-fashioned wimple which framed her face though it did not completely conceal her glossy black hair. Athelstan stepped back. ‘So good to meet you.’ He half smiled. ‘I heard—’
‘Brother,’ Benedicta gripped his hand, ‘you must come back with us to Southwark. Something terrible …’ Her voice faltered. Athelstan’s heart skipped a beat.
‘Your parishioners,’ Cranston took a generous mouthful of wine and offered it to both but they refused. ‘In a word, Athelstan,’ Cranston declared, ‘all the men in your parish, all those who are Earthworms or Upright Men, have disappeared.’
‘Disappeared?’ Athelstan exclaimed. ‘I heard the same.’ He waved a hand. ‘I will tell you later but …’ He sat down on a stool, gesturing at Cranston and Benedicta to take the two high-backed chairs. The door opened and a lay brother brought in a tray, a jug of ale, three tankards and a plate of spiced chicken which he passed around the guests. Athelstan stared at the painting to the right of the small, stained-glass window. This was the Chamber of Penitence where those who wished to be urgently and secretly shriven from their sins would be told to wait for absolution from a priest. The wall frescoes identified the Seven Deadly Sins, or rather their punishments, especially Avarice. The artist had depicted this vice in lurid colours. The picture showed a tavern room where the door had been ripped off its hinges to serve as a gambling table. Around this were grouped rat-headed fiends, a demonic pig dressed in the robes of an abbess and a slimy salamander with a human face, half-masked by a war helmet. These and other grotesques had assembled to divide the spoils of damned souls, mice with human heads who sat clustered in abject terror watching an ape-like animal devour one soul between his filthy lips even as his scaly claws searched for the next.
‘Brother?’
Athelstan looked around. The server had gone. Benedicta and Cranston were sipping at their tankards, napkins on their laps used as platters for their strips of spiced chicken. Athelstan, his mouth dry, his stomach agitated, refused any food.
‘What actually happened?’ he asked.
Benedicta began to explain: ‘Yesterday evening Pike, Watkin and all their coven received a message, allegedly from you. No, listen. We now know it wasn’t you. Anyway, they were to assemble in the nave of St Erconwald’s around the hour of the Vespers bell. Of course they all did, armed and ready to move off to meet the rebels at Mile End and elsewhere. I joined them—’
‘Of course you did,’ Athelstan interjected, leaning forward and grasping Benedicta’s hands. ‘My friend,’ he smiled, ‘now is the time for truth and plain speaking. You know, I know and perhaps Sir John here even suspects, that you, Benedicta, belong to their coven. You sit high in the councils of the Upright Men. You may even be one of their captains, recognised as such by the Great Community of the Realm.’ Athelstan squeezed Benedicta’s hand, holding her gaze. He glanced swiftly at Si
r John, but if the coroner was surprised, he hid it well behind raised eyebrows and a wry smile.
‘I say this, Benedicta,’ Athelstan explained, ‘because I know that all this great tumult is going to end in hideous slaughter. True, the Lords of the Soil have been caught unawares. Troops are leaving for both France and Scotland but there are others who will watch and wait. The revolt has begun, there is no longer need for secrecy.’ He let go of her hand. ‘Do continue.’
Benedicta swallowed hard. ‘We assembled in the nave. Pike and Watkin had even brought their banners, broadcloths dyed scarlet and black fastened to poles. They trooped into St Erconwald’s and piled their weapons around the statue of St Christopher, then waited. We thought you would come out of the sacristy, but even then I was mystified, as I had not seen you return. Someone had lit candles in the sanctuary. We wondered if you would bless us. Suddenly the corpse and devil doors were flung open, then, a few heartbeats later, the main door. Ranulf the rat-catcher was guarding it, but he was knocked aside. Some of the company tried to hurry over to their weapons, but it was futile.’ She paused to wipe her mouth on the back of her hand. ‘Like a vision from Hell,’ she whispered, ‘armed, masked men, mailed coifs up over their chins, conical helmets with broad nose-guards hiding their faces.’
‘How many?’
‘About two dozen under a serjeant similarly dressed. They carried arbalests primed and ready; sword and dagger in sheaths. They pushed in front of them some of the parish children: Crim, Eleanor, Matilda and the rest. They had apparently visited the houses and dwelling places of parishioners and seized these hostages. From outside we could hear the wails of mothers and sisters. Watkin tried to resist and received a blow to the face which drew blood like wine from a cracked cask. The serjeant was foreign. He spoke in a thick, guttural accent, perhaps from Flanders or Hainault.’
‘Mercenaries,’ Sir John interjected. ‘I do not like the sound of this.’
‘The serjeant threatened the men, saying he would kill any who resisted and take their children as hostages. Pike and Crispin the carpenter both objected, shouting, “What do you strangers want?” The serjeant replied that the children would not be harmed as long as the assembled men promised to offer no violence, that they were his prisoners and must go with him.’ Benedicta played with a brooch on her cloak. ‘They agreed. They had no choice. The serjeant ordered them to be bound.’
‘How many?’
‘Ten or eleven. All of them Upright Men. Watkin, Pike, Ranulf, Joycelyn, Merrylegs and his eldest son, Crispin, Hig the pigman.’ She waved a hand. ‘Once they were secured, they were hustled out of the church and loaded into a caged prison cart. Their womenfolk surged all around them but the serjeant was most thorough. He and his retinue mounted and, in a short while, they left the concourse, two of them staying behind to ensure no one followed.’
‘Was the Hangman there?’
‘No, I don’t think he was.’ Benedicta shrugged. ‘He was busy on the gibbets at Smithfield and London Bridge.’
‘Good Lord,’ Athelstan breathed. ‘Sir John, what do you think?’
Cranston, his face twisted in anxiety, took a generous gulp from the miraculous wineskin, then whispered a prayer as he pushed the stopper in.
‘Sir John?’
‘Mercenaries,’ he murmured. ‘Condottieri – licensed brigands hired by this lord or that, to protect themselves. The rebels have begun to execute those they have proscribed; John Ewell, Escheator of Essex, had his head severed at Coggishall. Three more officials at Canterbury were just dragged into the High Street and decapitated. Others followed. They say blood swirled in the streets of Canterbury, mixing with the sparks and cinders from burning property. Tyler, the Kentish leader, has prophesised the same for London.’
Athelstan glanced away, sick with fear. Where had his parishioners been taken? By whom? And why?
‘Brother?’
‘Wat Tyler,’ Athelstan replied without thinking. ‘Wat Tyler came here this morning.’
‘So I heard from Brother John, your gatekeeper. War barges filled with rebels. What did he want?’
‘Entrance to Blackfriars, which, of course, was refused. Tyler is looking for those who have taken sanctuary here, including Isabella, Thibault’s daughter which,’ Athelstan crossed himself, ‘will be another case of children being held to hostage. I am sure Tyler would love to use her to make demands. He is a wicked malefactor.’
‘But a leader amongst the Upright Men,’ Benedicta declared sharply. ‘A captain most feared and respected.’
‘A true villain,’ Athelstan retorted. ‘Sir John, this mischief has begun. One sin hurls after another. We should tell Benedicta what we suspect.’
‘What?’
Athelstan held his hand up as if taking a solemn oath. ‘What we say, Benedicta, I swear to be the truth. Tyler is one of your captains. Sir John and I, not to mention another rebel leader, Simon Grindcobbe, believe that in truth he is Gaunt’s man …’ He stared at Benedicta who sat frozen, still and distant as a statue. ‘Gaunt,’ Athelstan continued, ‘has left for the northern march taking much needed troops with him. Our king is left vulnerable. We suspect Tyler will entice Richard into a meeting where he will kill the King and those with him. Richard has no heir, so the crown will immediately pass to his uncle, John of Gaunt, head of the House of Lancaster and next in line to the throne. The threat is real and imminent, which is why Sir John and others of the King’s council have insisted that Gaunt leave his own son and heir Henry of Derby in London along with the King. So, if our beloved prince suffers, so will Gaunt and his family. Few people know this. At the behest of the Queen Mother, Joan of Kent, Sir John and other knights of the body are sworn to protect her son with their lives.’
Benedicta now sat with her arms crossed, rocking slightly backwards and forwards, lips moving soundlessly. ‘Divisions,’ she declared. ‘Deep divisions have appeared amongst the Upright Men about what this revolt intends to achieve. Some talk of sweeping away the old order, its total destruction, as well as the death or exiling of every prince or prelate. Others, like Grindcobbe, argue just for a reform, the calling of a supreme parliament, a new Magna Carta, a Great Charter of Deliverance; but other voices whisper about treachery and treason within our ranks. So yes, Brother, what you say is possible. The revolt has begun.’ She shrugged. ‘Already I sense it is not what we planned. We sowed the harvest but the reaping may not be to our liking. As for our brethren in the parish,’ she looked questioningly at Sir John, ‘what could have happened to them?’
Cranston sat with his legs apart and his head down as he threaded his beaver hat between gauntleted hands. Athelstan noticed the small, sharp studs which decorated the mailed gloves; Cranston was probably wearing them because he feared hand-to-hand combat with sword and dagger.
Cranston lifted his head. ‘I have heard stories, hideous tales about the Lords of the Soil taking vengeance already. But, Brother, I don’t want to alarm you.’
‘I am alarmed already. I feel as if I am entering a land of deep shadow.’ Athelstan wetted his dry, cracked lips. ‘Sir John, I am desperate. Tell me you have no knowledge of this abduction.’
The coroner smiled wanly. ‘Athelstan, my friend, two great armies now threaten London. The King and his council are locked up in the Tower with no troops at their bidding. Much as I grieve for your parishioners, there is little I can do about them.’
‘You said you’d heard stories?’
‘Some of the Lords of the Soil have hired mercenaries. Remember, the menfolk from the shires are now in London. There are many villages left exposed. Anyway, I have heard of landings along the east coast, hired killers from across the Narrow Seas. These men are ruthless. One lord, along with his Brabantine cohort, ambushed a small party of rebels on a lonely road somewhere near Walton in Essex. They herded their prisoners into a tithe barn, sealed the windows and doors and set the place alight …’
Athelstan put his face in his hands, fighting back the tears. He glanced
up. ‘I must go to Southwark. I must visit my church.’ He grasped Benedicta’s hand. ‘Sir John, Benedicta, you must come with me.’ The coroner nodded. Benedicta, eyes brimming with tears, excused herself and fled the chamber. For a while Athelstan and Cranston sat in silence.
‘Little monk?’
‘Friar, Sir John.’
‘What are you actually doing here in Blackfriars?’
Athelstan, eager to distract himself, told the coroner briefly about Fieschi’s visit, the reason for it and his role in the proceedings. He then, at Cranston’s insistence, gave more details about the two attacks on him earlier in the day and the mysterious murder of Alberic. Once he had finished, Cranston, whispering under his breath, leaned back in his chair and stared up at the rafters.
‘Edward II,’ he murmured, ‘allegedly a sodomite, an incompetent prince who blundered from one disaster to another in his lifelong journey, only to be murdered in a filthy pit in Berkeley Castle. It was a time of great intrigue.’
‘Sir John, did you ever have dealings with those involved?’
‘Yes, I did. When I was a young squire I met Berkeley, the king’s jailor. I also had dealings with Sir John Maltravers, who was also accused of being involved in the regicide. Surly men from a different age with little to say. When they did speak about the old king’s death, they stoutly maintained they were not involved. They pointed the finger of suspicion at a third individual, a Somerset knight called Sir Thomas Gurney. When Isabella and Mortimer fell from power, Gurney fled to Castile and then on to the kingdom of the two Sicilies. Edward III, then a young man of eighteen, fastened on Gurney as the real regicide. He despatched agents to hunt him down the length and breadth of Christendom.’
‘And did they find him?’
‘Oh, they caught him, then he escaped only to be recaptured. In the end little came of it. Gurney died on the sea journey back to England.’