by Paul Doherty
Introductions were made, pleasantries exchanged. A tavern servant brought in dishes of spiced pear, plum and currant tart, figs in a cream sauce and a jug of the lightest white wine. Once Cranston and Athelstan began to eat, the physician ushered his family out then came and joined Cranston and Athelstan at the small table. Seating himself on one of the stools, he filled a goblet and sipped at it appreciatively.
‘Brother Athelstan, I have a great favour to ask of you. As you may know, I travel the city, and as I do so, I pick up chatter here and there.’
‘About me?’
‘Certainly, and I have heard about your intended pilgrimage to St Thomas a Becket’s shrine in Canterbury. I understand you intend to leave St Erconwald’s a week from today, on the eve of the Feast of Our Lady. You and your parish council are going to Becket’s shrine to give thanks for the wellbeing of your congregation after the Great Revolt.’ The physician drew a deep breath. ‘Gossip also says, Sir John, that you are joining Brother Athelstan in his pilgrimage of thanksgiving as well as to meet the lovely Lady Maude at Canterbury after her long sojourn in the countryside.’
‘And who,’ Cranston asked laughingly, ‘was the source of all this gossip? Though I have my suspicions.’
‘You are correct, Sir John, both characters are well known to you. Leif, the one-legged beggar and his constant comrade and bosom friend, Rawbum. I have treated the latter for the hideous sores on his backside.’
‘And he has only himself to blame; he was drunk and sat on a pan of bubbling fat.’ Cranston shook his head in mock disbelief. ‘Now he and Leif haunt my house of rest and refreshment …’ He paused abruptly.
‘At your favourite hostelry, the Lamb of God in Cheapside?’ Giole smiled. ‘You can mention that name in here, Sir John; competition is good for the soul.’ He pushed back his stool. ‘Now for that favour I mentioned: I would be most grateful if you would consider me and my family joining you. We too have a great deal to thank God, Our Lady and St Thomas for. We are foreign born, and foreigners were marked down for destruction during the Great Revolt. I know what happened to those poor Flemings, both the merchants and the ladies of the night, hacked and hanged. We hid deep in the cellars during the terrors, but we all took a vow to make a pilgrimage to the great Spanish shrine at Santiago di Compostela if we were brought safely through the storm, but now that is impossible to carry out.’ He smiled thinly. ‘Accordingly, I went to the archdeacon’s court, the Bishop of London’s man. He has absolved us from our vows and said a pilgrimage to Canterbury would be a fitting replacement. If we travel there our vows would be fulfilled. We leave this tavern in the hands of a most skilled henchman and we would be very pleased to join you.’
‘We cannot stop you,’ Athelstan countered. ‘The King’s highway to Canterbury is free.’
‘Yes, but would we be welcome with you?’
‘Of course, Master Giole!’ Athelstan clasped hands with the physician, as did Cranston.
‘In which case,’ the physician rose and sketched a bow, ‘I shall leave you in peace.’
Once Giole had left, Athelstan heaved a deep sigh, blessed himself and watched Cranston clear the platters on the table before them.
‘The news of our pilgrimage is spreading, Sir John. It’s an excellent idea for many reasons,’ Athelstan reflected. ‘A journey through the English countryside at the height of summer to one of Europe’s holiest shrines in one of this kingdom’s loveliest cities … It will also be an opportunity to escape London, which, despite appearances, still feels the sharp pangs caused by the revolt and its brutal crushing. Master Giole and his family will be most welcome. They are jovial company. I wager the family are highly skilled cooks whilst our master physician could tend to any sickness or injury on the way.’ The friar rubbed his hands in satisfaction. ‘Yes, I think God is directing us. Now, to this present business, Sir John. I noticed that the name of the demon Azrael means something to you?’
‘Yes, it certainly does.’ Cranston drained his cup. ‘Years ago when I fought in France, as you did – you and your brother Stephen-Francis …’ Cranston paused. Secretly he wished he had not mentioned Athelstan’s brother, but he had blurted it out before he could stop himself. Years ago, as a young man, Athelstan had run away to join the King’s wars and had taken his younger brother with him. Stephen-Francis had been killed. The news had hastened the death of Athelstan’s parents as well as prompting Athelstan’s long journey to the Dominican order, his ordination as a priest and his appointment to the parish of St Erconwald’s in Southwark. Prior Anselm of Blackfriars had, in his infinite wisdom, also ordered Athelstan to act as Sir John Cranston’s secretarius; the coroner always prayed that this was now a pleasure rather than a burden. Cranston took a slurp from his miraculous wineskin and quickly studied his companion. The friar, however, resting his head in one hand, merely smiled faintly. ‘I met men,’ Cranston continued, ‘so-called soldiers, knights, squires, men-at-arms, individuals who loved killing. They were not warriors but torturers, abusers of both the innocent and the vulnerable …’
‘And we have found the same here in London,’ Athelstan declared, pulling himself up. ‘Many people commit murder out of fear, desperation, lust, avarice, sometimes even distorted love. Indeed, we are all guilty. At some time in our life we all kill our neighbour in our mind’s eye, provoked by hatred, anger, jealousy or revenge …’
‘Most learned one,’ Cranston teased, ‘I would agree.’
‘Yet there are others who kill and fiercely enjoy it,’ Athelstan continued, becoming quite animated. ‘They perceive it as a craft, a pastime, something to be developed and cultivated as you and I would a garden plot. Only here the full blossom is hideous murder.’ Athelstan paused to sip at his goblet of white wine then pushed it away and pulled a face. ‘I do not like Rhenish,’ he whispered. ‘Now, in the murder of Simon Mephan and his companions, do you think it is a case of assassins who enjoy what they do?’
‘I certainly do, little friar. Mephan’s assassin enjoyed what he did. He sent a soul-chilling warning. He has done the same to the evangelists and now to you. Azrael deeply relishes what is about to happen.’ Cranston moved his goblet away so as to rest against the table. ‘And it is not the first time I have encountered him …’
Athelstan exclaimed in surprise. He stared around the small, comfortable chamber and repressed a shiver.
‘We are spiritual beings,’ he murmured. ‘We live in the metaphysical world of ideas. This certainly applies to the situation we are now in. Something dark and hideous has slipped into our lives. I am glad we are going on our pilgrimage to Canterbury; it will provide spiritual refreshment in so many ways.’ Athelstan paused. ‘No one knows this, Sir John, but you mentioned my brother Stephen-Francis. He was killed in France but I brought his corpse back on a war cog to Tilbury. I took it along the pilgrim’s way, the route we will follow to Canterbury. I had his coffin buried at St Grace’s priory, about four miles from our first resting place at the Sign of Hope. I think it would be good to visit his grave there, but that’s for the future.
‘Now, Sir John. Azrael will hunt us and we will hunt him. He may follow us to Canterbury or be waiting for us there, or here in the city, or Southwark when we return. We have to know our enemy. He can assume his chilling titles and issue dire warnings but he is still a man, not a demon, whilst we have the angels of light who will bring us God’s grace in the coming confrontation. So, let us list what we know.
‘First, Simon Mephan and the evangelists work in the Secret Chancery. God knows what mischief passed through their hands or what role they truly played in the suppression of the revolt. Secondly, Mephan receives a warning: a garrotte string with a makeshift medallion bearing the pointed message, “Lord Azrael greets you”. Yesterday evening Azrael the demon, the Angel of Death, swept into that narrow house in Milk Street and annihilated three lives. Three souls despatched brutally and barbarously to judgement. No time to prepare. No shriving. No prayer. Thirdly, two of the deaths are certain
ly very mysterious – Finchley and Felicity are garrotted yet they do not appear to have resisted. Not a shred of evidence of a struggle, no stool overturned, and yet surely as someone is garrotted they must lash out with arm and leg? This does not appear to have happened. Nor is there any proof that they were drugged and, even if they were, the shock of the garrotte would have startled them into some activity.’
‘Of course,’ Cranston breathed, ‘that solar should have looked like a taproom after a violent affray. Apart from the coffer being forced, there is no other sign of violence. Unless, of course, they were strangled elsewhere and the corpses brought to the solar.’
‘It’s possible,’ Athelstan murmured. ‘Yet there is no mark on the corpses. Anyway, fourthly, Master Mephan. He dies of a heart seizure. He is old, corpulent and weak-hearted. He was forced to flee up those stairs in great fear for his life. I do wonder why he retreated there and didn’t seek refuge in the street. Did the assassin lock and bolt the front door? However, fifthly, before he dies Mephan opens that Book of Luke’s Gospel and underscores two words of the phrase, “Our name is legion for we are many.” The Latin words for “legion” and “many” are emphasised. Once he does this, Mephan places the quill pen, stained with red ink, between the pages of that Book of the Gospels. Undoubtedly he was sending a message. He was attracting our attention, or that of any law officer, to what he had done, but why? I suggest that Simon Mephan died shortly afterwards, certainly before the assassin burst into his chamber. The murderer would rigorously inspect Mephan’s corpse and leave. He would certainly make sure that Mephan was dead.
‘Sixthly, Mephan’s message, what does it really mean?’ Athelstan patted his chancery satchel. ‘I will certainly scrutinise it most carefully. Was Mephan trying to tell us that there was more than one assassin? Yet that is not what the verse means. The possessed man in Luke’s gospel maintains he hosts an entire household of demons. Nevertheless, in the end, the Gesarene demoniac is, as scripture says, one man. Seventhly, why all this mummery, the mystery play, the ritual of warnings and threats? I agree with you that our assassin revels in all this drama and the power it gives him. He plays with his intended victim like a cat with its prey. Have you seen the like before?’
‘Yes, I have.’ Cranston took another generous swig from the miraculous wineskin and offered it to Athelstan, who refused, so the coroner put it back beneath his cloak and continued: ‘It’s interesting that he threatened you but not me. I wonder why. After all, I am the law officer, not you. You are a Dominican priest who also happens to be my clerk and secretarius. There is something rather singular about all this. We need to make careful enquiries.
‘You know how certain items can spark a memory, Brother? I read all the returns the sheriffs make each quarter to the Exchequer. Now and again amongst the dross I find a few grains of gold and silver. Usually malefactors, wolfsheads and outlaws who’ve decided to move from London to practise their villainy elsewhere. The sheriffs also summarise their income from the goods, chattels and moveables of those who died mysteriously yet violently, as well as the goods of those executed for crimes throughout their shire.’ Cranston stroked his lower lip with a stubby finger. ‘I am sure that I have come across some reference to mysterious murders by strangulation! Oh, and before you ask, Athelstan, the victim was not some tavern wench but a powerful merchant, and a message referring to Azrael was left on his corpse. Yes, now I recall!’ The coroner sprang to his feet. ‘I am certain such a murder occurred this year, certainly since the end of Lent, in Rochester. I am also equally assured there was a similar one in Colchester around the same time. But we will have to see. I need to reflect, make careful enquiries …’
‘As well as prepare for Canterbury,’ Athelstan replied, also getting to his feet. ‘My good friend, the day draws on and Southwark beckons …’
PART TWO
The Master of the Secret
Peter the Penniless, the self-confessed repentant miser and lover of gold, walked into the nave of St Erconwald’s. He ignored the mystery play being staged in the entrance of the church and instead studied the ancient font, with its large stem and heavy bowl encrusted with mysterious Celtic signs. According to Mauger, the parish bell clerk and self-proclaimed chronicler of St Erconwald’s, the baptismal font was hundreds of years older than the church which housed it. Mauger was certain that the font had been used by the great Erconwald when that famous Saxon bishop of London exercised real power throughout the city. Peter the Penniless, however, although he would have liked some holy water from the bowl to exorcise himself, decided to ignore it as well as the swirl of bodies engaged in the pageant around the font. He felt his hand grasped and turned to stare into the fear-filled face of his pretty young wife Amelia.
‘Peter,’ she begged, ‘please come home.’ She glanced back and beckoned their clerk Robert, who stood just within the church door, to join them.
‘No, I must seek sanctuary,’ Peter hissed. ‘I need the sacred oils and the holy water. I want the blessing of Holy Mother Church. I have spoken to Brother Athelstan. I will take sanctuary here.’
‘But you have done nothing wrong.’ Robert the clerk, his moon-face all shiny with perfumed nard, scratched his thinning blonde hair, combed to cover as much of his baldness as nature would allow. The clerk then plucked at the threadbare sleeve of his master’s jerkin. ‘You have done nothing wrong,’ Robert insisted. ‘You are not a felon.’
‘I must be in the eyes of God,’ Peter retorted heatedly. ‘I have horrid visions. They plague both my mind and my soul. I wish I was dead. I sometimes pray for that and wonder if suicide is such a horrid sin.’
‘Phantasms of the mind!’ Robert scoffed.
‘Husband, dearest,’ Amelia begged, ‘come back to our house. I will cook your favourite: pheasant in broth, quail eggs in a creamy sauce, sweet manchet bread …’
‘No, I cannot.’ Peter gazed at his wife’s pretty, snub-nosed face, the full-lipped mouth and arching brows above her sad grey eyes, the tendrils of auburn hair escaping from the elegant, murrey-coloured veil which matched her well-cut gown. For a moment he remembered how things used to be, recalling the good sport he and his wife had enjoyed in the great four-poster bed in their comfortable house along Dovecote Lane. He wished he could go back with her. He wished the voices in his mind urging him to destroy himself would disappear, and that those terror-drenched dreams and visions would stop plaguing his mind. ‘No, what I must do …’
‘What must you do?’
Peter and his two companions turned to face the woman who had approached them. ‘I am Benedicta, widow-woman of this parish,’ she introduced herself. ‘Seamstress, sacristan, a member of the parish council and Brother Athelstan’s housekeeper. How can I help you?’
‘My name is Peter,’ the miser gabbled. ‘People call me Peter the Penniless but I am really very wealthy. I promised Brother Athelstan to change my ways. I …’
‘Ah yes,’ Benedicta broke in. The dark eyes in her olive-skinned face had lost their smile. ‘Brother Athelstan did talk to me about you.’ Benedicta studied Peter’s thin, white face, the dirty stubble on chin and cheeks, the dark rings under his eyes, the black, greasy hair which hung like rats’ tails begging to be washed; both his brown gown and the tunic beneath were stained with food. Peter’s fingernails were bitten to the quick and large sores had appeared along his lower lip and on the corner of his mouth. ‘I can see you are distressed.’ she declared softly. She glanced quizzically at Amelia and Robert the clerk, who swiftly introduced themselves, rather wary of this very elegant but blunt woman dressed in her sombre widow weeds, eyes all sharp, so incisive in her speech.
‘I seek the Fridstool, the peace chair, sanctuary,’ Peter declared. ‘I carry no weapon. I swear to observe the immunity of the church, its liberties and privileges …’ Peter’s raised voice rang through the nave and attracted the attention of other parishioners. The scrawny-headed Watkin, dung-collector and leader of the parish council, along with Pike the ditcher,
sallow-featured and as slender as a rake pole, drifted across. This precious pair, as Athelstan described them, or ‘cheeks of the same arse’, as Cranston quietly muttered, were accompanied by their henchmen, Ranulf the rat-catcher, Hig the Pigman, Crispin the carpenter and others. ‘I seek sanctuary.’ Peter’s voice now rose to a screech. ‘I live in the adjoining parish of St Laurence but St Erconwald’s holds the peace stool, the sanctuary chair …’
‘What crime have you committed?’ Mauger the bell clerk, small and rotund, face and body all bristling with importance, pushed his way through.
‘I have committed no crime,’ Peter confessed falteringly. He could now hear the whispers as people recognised and recalled his reputation, here and there a few sniggers. Peter the Penniless ignored these as he repeated his plea. ‘I am in mortal fear of my life, I fear myself.’ Peter tapped the side of his head. ‘I seek sanctuary from the demons who plague me day and night …’
‘In which case …’ Mauger grabbed Peter’s hand and escorted him up the nave to the entrance of the soaring, oaken rood screen which led into the sanctuary of St Erconwald’s. Mauger almost pushed Peter through the entrance, up the steps and across to the enclave which stood to the right of the high altar. Peter went into the embrasure lit by the light of a lancet window high in the wall. The enclave contained a narrow cotbed, stool, small table and lidded jake’s pot. There was a peg driven into a wall cleft on which to hang clothes. Mauger, in accordance with the canonical provisions governing sanctuary, searched Peter for weapons then gestured at him to sit on the stool, promising that victuals would be served as soon as their priest returned. Peter crouched on the Fridstool whilst Mauger went back down the steps shooing away the gaping onlookers gathered in the entrance to the rood screen.