by Paul Doherty
'Fourthly,' I continued. 'We know fifteen men were killed at Malevel Manor but how or by whom is a mystery. There's no evidence as to how the assassin was able to enter and massacre so many able men and then leave without disturbing a mouse. Fifthly, Sir Thomas Kempe is not above suspicion. We believe that at least one archer may have been sending him messages from Malevel Manor.'
'But there again,' Benjamin intervened, 'we have no evidence that it was Kempe who was receiving such messages.'
'Finally,' I concluded. 'Lord Charon may be involved in this wickedness. He was undoubtedly responsible for the murder of Lady Isabella Malevel and he may know some secret entrance into the manor.'
'There is one other person,' Benjamin added. 'The man Cornelius referred to as the Schlachter, a former member of the Noctales who may be working for himself...'
'Or for Lord Charon?' I suggested.
I gazed round the taproom. The day was drawing on; traders, journeymen, porters, a few of the street trollops, two wandering musicians and a beggar with a fistful of pennies were now clamouring for wine and food, laughing loudly at Boscombe's imitation of a friar. One of the porters, a drunken oaf, caught my gaze and came lumbering across threateningly; Castor raised his head and growled and the fellow scuttled off like a beetle.
'I wonder if Cerberus, or another of Lord Charon's men, is here?'
Benjamin pulled a face.
'Boscombe!' I called. I held up my hand, a silver piece between my fingers.
The taverner almost jumped across the room, knocking aside other customers.
'Master Roger?'
'If I wanted,' I whispered, 'to speak to Lord Charon, how would I do it?'
Boscombe took the silver piece and, before I could stop him, clapped his hands.
'Hear ye! Hear ye!' he bellowed, mimicking a town crier. 'Know that Master Shallot, my guest and dearest friend, wishes to have words with the Lord Charon!' Boscombe put his hand on his chest and bowed. 'Of course,' he added, 'at a time and place of Lord Charon's choosing.'
The rest of the customers just gazed at him and a deathly silence held the taproom. Boscombe clapped his hands again and laughed.
'The scullions and tap boys will look after you: a free blackjack of ale.' His eyes slid towards me. 'On our good friend Master Shallot!'
He sat down on a stool.
'Was that really necessary?' I asked.
'It is the only way, my son,' Boscombe replied unctuously. 'Do it in any other manner and Lord Charon would become suspicious and you, my son, would be dead.' He leaned across the table. 'Why, Roger?' he whispered. 'Why Lord Charon? You were out at Malevel Manor, weren't you? There are terrible stories about a massacre taking place. Was Lord Charon ... ?'
'They are all true,' Benjamin retorted. 'Will one of Lord Charon's men be here?'
'Oh, don't worry,' Boscombe replied. 'Within the hour he'll know all about it'
'Where do you come from?' Benjamin asked abruptly. 'Your accent?'
'From the West Country,' Boscombe replied cheerily, wiping his hands on his robe. 'But there's not good custom along the south-western road, that's where my father had his tavern. Anyway, we sold up and moved into London, my wife and I. She's now lying in peace in St Botolph's churchyard.' His smile widened. 'And if she's at peace then so am I.' He was about to push his stool back. 'Ah, Master Roger, when Lord Charon took you and your belongings I found a bag under your bed.' He got up, hurried away and then came back and thrust the bag at me.
I looked inside. Nothing much: the cup I had stolen from the Poppletons and a few of my makeshift relics. My smile of thanks faded as I realised that, when all this was over, I would have to go back to Ipswich and face their malice, King's pardon or not. Such a thought would turn any man to drink and indeed I drank so deeply that I slept the night with Castor on the taproom floor. I spent the next day recovering, glad that Lord Charon did not strike immediately; my wits were so befuddled I would have been no use to anyone.
Now Sir Thomas Kempe had called me the bait so, naturally, I became anxious about what might happen if this self-styled lord of the underworld took me prisoner again. I pestered Benjamin but he was of very little help.
'Don't worry, don't worry,' he replied absentmindedly. 'Dearest Uncle will look after us.'
I didn't believe him. However, on the morning of the second day as I sat in the tavern or walked the maze of alleyways around it, I became aware of men I had never seen before: traders and journeymen as well as beggars who looked as if they had eaten too well. Strangers called into the Flickering Lamp. Three or four self-styled merchants hired chambers in houses around whilst the old beldame who owned a tenement opposite the tavern, commented on how all her rooms, even the filthy cellar, had been hired.
Boscombe became suspicious and, after he served me breakfast, a succulent pie, gold and crusty, he decided to join me.
'What's the matter, Roger? I know your master is the Cardinal's nephew.' His face became worried. 'This invitation to Lord Charon: is it a trap?'
I glowered at him.
'I helped you once!'
'If it's a trap,' I replied enigmatically, 'stay well clear of it. If it's not, you have nothing to fear.'
I looked down at the pie, so fresh and sweet, then at Castor who was looking at it longingly, tongue lolling, his great jaws drooling. I cut the pie in two. Castor growled with pleasure and Boscombe, seeing he was going to get nothing from me, shrugged and returned to his post by the ale casks.
Benjamin came in. He had been absent all night and I wondered if he had been across the city to see if the marvellous Miranda had returned. He was unshaven, out of sorts, his eyes red-rimmed. He ordered some food and sat down opposite me.
'The French have left,' he snapped.
'I beg your pardon?'
'The French.' Benjamin paused as Boscombe came over to serve us. 'Don't you remember, Agrippa told us the French were in London? They, too, wanted the Orb of Charlemagne. The envoys had rented a large mansion in Westchepe. I went there yesterday afternoon.' He shrugged. 'To see if I could learn anything. Last night there appears to have been a banquet. Some form of celebration. Nobody we knew attended. Then, this morning, just before dawn, carts were drawn up outside the house, and the envoys' goods and baggage were piled high. I bribed one of the porters. He said the Messieurs were leaving, going down to their warship docked at East Watergate.'
'Why the interest?' I asked.
'Who ever stole the Orb ...' Benjamin replied. He put down a piece of the pie he was eating and stared at it. 'Master?' I asked.
'Nothing.' He shook his head. 'My memory was jogged but I am too confused to place it.'
'You were talking about the thief and the Orb?'
'Ah yes. Who ever stole the Orb,' Benjamin continued, 'must have done it for personal gain. They would try to sell it...'
'To the French?' I asked.
'Well,' Benjamin declared. 'Let us say the thief did sell it to the French, is that why they celebrated and left London? They've got what they came for.'
'Kempe should be able to help us there,' I replied. 'He'd keep the French under close scrutiny?'
'Sir Thomas has a great deal to answer but
'Master Daunbey! Master Shallot!'
We looked up at the travel-stained man who stood, hac in his hand, just inside the doorway. He came forward. Benjamin gave a cry of delight and rose to his feet, gesturing the man to a stool. I recognised Laxton, one of our manor officials: he looked after the horses and managed the stables.
'I rode through the night,' Laxton explained, taking off his cloak and mopping at the dirt on his doublet. 'Oh master, if you permit... ?' He began to ease his boots off. I helped him and he sighed with pleasure.
Benjamin ordered some food and meat. Boscombe, all curious, brought this across.
'How did you know we were here?' Benjamin asked.
Laxton pointed at me. 'You wrote to Lucy. We found the letter on her.' His face grew sad.
My heart skip
ped a beat. 'She's dead, isn't she?' I asked.
Laxton nodded. 'I am sorry, master. She was found in a lane outside the village. She had been attacked, beaten sorely about the head.'
'What was she doing there?' I asked.
'We think she was going to the manor,' Laxton replied. 'She had a cloak and a pair of old battered boots on. She was carrying a small bag full of her possessions: some rosary beads, your letter and, I think, a lock of your hair.'
Hot tears scalded my eyes.
'Who attacked her? Why?' I whispered. 'Why Lucy? She was a merry soul.'
'She wasn't dead when we found her,' Laxton replied. 'One of the grooms from the White Harte was going into the fields with his sweetheart, and heard her groaning. Lucy had tumbled into a ditch at the side of the road. They dragged her out. They thought she was dead but then she opened her eyes. She left a message for you.' He closed his eyes. 'Tell Roger,' he repeated carefully. 'Tell Roger the cup . . .' He opened his eyes. 'She repeated that a number of times. The groom ran for help but, by the time we arrived, Lucy was dead.' He paused. 'What did she mean, master, about the cup?'
'"My cup is overflowing".' I brushed the tears from my eyes. 'It's a quotation from the Bible. She always said that, when I was with her, her cup of happiness overflowed. For some strange reason she thought this was funny.'
'Does anyone know why she was attacked?' Benjamin intervened.
'No. Since Master Roger left she had been working at the White Harte. She made no enemies, though she steered well clear of the Poppletons. I know she had a disagreement with them over you and refused to work at their house. After she died, we had a parish meeting in the taproom,' Laxton concluded. 'It was ' decided that I should come and tell you. I reached the city just before dawn.' He shook his head. 'It's years since I've been to London. I'm glad I found you.'
Benjamin, seeing I was upset, took Laxton away. For a while I just sat and cried. I then got up and walked out into the alleyway, knocking aside the costermongers and traders who thronged into the alleyway.
Now, you know old Shallot. I am not a man for prayer. I just like to sit and hope that God looks my way and, if he's in a good mood, smiles at me. I laugh and joke: it's the best way to hide the tears. However, Lucy was a soft young thing. She was a woman full of life with a keen sense of wit, lovable and kind. There wasn't a jot of malice in her beautiful body. She was born good and some bastard had killed her. I went down the narrow street and into the small church owned by the Crutched Friars, a little, dank place which suited my mood. I crouched on the floor before the statue of the Virgin Child and tried to pray for Lucy's soul. My usual prayer: 'This is Roger Shallot, sinner and stupid with it.' I was only halfway through when I heard the slither of footsteps. I was just thinking of fleeing when the club hit my head. I felt rough sacking and then it was down into the darkness. I woke up and, believe me, what a change! Not the Virgin and Child but Charon's ugly face peering at me. He didn't begin with some dramatic line like, 'Welcome to my abode.' He just kicked me in the groin and asked me what I was doing in church.
'I was praying,' I moaned.
I stared around and, trust me, I began to gabble my prayers. I was back in the Lord Charon's abode, full of the opulent luxury which contrasted so strangely with the filthy surroundings and, in the background, I could hear the ominous slop of water. Shadows moved into the candlelight; Cerberus and all the other beauties of Lord Charon's household, twisted, leering faces, garbed in tawdry finery and armed to the teeth. I did what I always do in such circumstances: I knelt, clasped my hands and hoped my bowels would not betray me.
(Honestly, I can never stop trembling in such situations. Once, when the Great Beast had me sent to the execution block, the headsman told me to stay still.
'What do you expect me to do?' I screamed back. 'Do a dance?'
And so I did a merry jig. I made the executioner chase me round the scaffold. God be thanked, Henry was playing one of his sick jokes and the courier bringing my pardon had taken a fall from his horse and been delayed!)
However, I did not jig that day. I just gazed beseechingly at Lord Charon.
'You wanted to see me?'
This king of villains, that mad, moustached, purple-hued, malt-worm crouched down beside me.
'Well, ticklebrain?' He poked me in the shoulder. 'You want to see the Lord Charon?'
'I know where those tapestries come from,' I blurted out, pointing behind him. 'Lady Malevel's house. You broke in, cleared out all her valuables, cut her throat and buried her in the cellar, didn't you?'
(You young men, take note, whenever you are captured by the enemy, none of this stiff upper lip business. For goodness' sake, talk and talk fast. The longer you talk, the more hope there is and, where there's hope, there's life!)
'Now, here's a clever boy' Charon tapped me on the head.
'And you want to take it all back with you?'
'No! No!' I gabbled. 'But the Orb of Charlemagne, the relic you stole
'Stole?'
And, throwing his head back, Charon laughed. The rest of his coven guffawed in ghastly chorus.
I stammered, thinking of the replica that Kempe still held, 'I ... I... I can get you the real Orb of Charlemagne.'
Charon started to laugh again, until the tears rolled down his cheeks.
He waggled a finger at me. 'We are not going to kill you just yet.' He sighed. 'Lord, I have never laughed so much since the Lady Isabella begged for her life.' He glanced round at his lieutenants and edged a little closer. 'Now, let me understand you, Shallot. On the one hand you think I stole the Orb, which I didn't. On the other—' One finger scratched at his blue, pockmarked face. 'You say you can get it for me: that means you stole it! And you know what happens to thieves,' he whispered. "They hang.'
'No, no, you misunderstand me!'
'No, no, you misunderstand me!' The entire devilish crew chorused back.
Oh, pity me, I was in a nightmare: Charon's ugly, stained face; his cutthroat coven chanting my line like a chorus in one of Marlow's plays. And what about poor old Shallot? I just prayed that one of Kempe's men had seen me. Yet where was I? How would they rescue me? I started to cry. (Another of Shallot's rules; if you can't babble, blurt. Crying wastes time.) Charon dragged back my head.
'Didn't you ever think,' he hissed, 'that I knew about the Orb of Charlemagne? Do you really think I would have attacked a manor full of armed men? Do you really think I'm stupid enough not to realise how many strangers have appeared in the alleyways around that tavern? You are bait, aren't you, Shallot? A lure to catch old Charon? And that is very, very foolish of you!'
He was now talking like a schoolmaster confronting one of his dimmer scholars.
'I don't need the Orb of Charlemagne,' he whispered. 'I have taken it and I have sold it.' He saw the surprise in my eyes. 'And for you, Roger, I have a special gift. Do you remember the rats?'
I moaned with fear.
After that Charon beat me around the head. The others joined in with kicks and blows before I was dragged out along the sewer side to another cavern, sealed by an iron grille. The small door was opened and I was thrown inside. I sat there wondering how in heaven's name I was to escape. I knelt and prayed. I vowed to become a monk but realised I was lying so I just crawled into a corner and listened to Charon and his henchmen carousing a few yards away. I didn't know whether it was night or day, but, a few hours later, they returned carrying torches. I was dragged out, back to Lord Charon's cave. The table was littered with food, goblets of wine, pieces of meat strewn on the floor. One of the villains had been killed in some drunken brawl, and now leaned against the table, his throat slashed from ear to ear. No, I don't lie! They just left him propped there, eyes popping, mouth gaping. I was laid out on the floor and ropes attached to my wrists and ankles. Charon, much the worse for drink, came and knelt beside me.
'You are going to die, Roger, in a way you can never imagine. Cerberus, show him our friend.'
Dogface knelt on the
other side. In his hand he held a cage. Inside was the longest and most ferocious-looking rat I have ever seen. This turd of iniquity was at least a yard long from the tip of his nose to the end of his tail; yellowing teeth jutted out, his belly sagged and his ribs showed through. He dashed himself against the cage and those eyes, pin-pricks of hell fire, glowered at me. I fainted.
I was roused by a bucket of filthy water.
'Now, this is what's going to happen.' Charon talked like some gentle priest. He pulled back my doublet and tapped my side. 'We are going to attach a pipe here, the rat scuttles down and we light a small fire at the open end. The rat is hungry, ravenous. There is only one way out, dear Roger, and that's through you. Now, what do you think of that?'
I screamed and yelled, begging for mercy. I might as well have whistled across a graveyard. The pipe was attached, the rat went in. I could hear it rustling about, its sharp claws and teeth scrabbling against my clammy skin. I screamed, sobbing for mercy. The bastards were so drunk they could not light the fire at the other end. As they fumbled with the tinder, I heard a sound which, to my ears, was like an angel singing. A deep throated bark. Castor had arrived! Confusion broke out, and there was a scramble for arms as Castor burst into the cavern like a hell hound. Intelligent beast, noble heart, Shallot's saviour! He took one look at Charon and lunged. The cavern became full of a confusion of figures. I heard the roar of an arquebus, the clash of steel. The pipe was kicked away from me, the rat fled. Benjamin, a bloody sword in his hands, crouched down and cut my bonds. I jumped to my feet. Archers, bullyboys, Kempe's men, as well as those of Egremont and the Noctales were now locked in a fierce life and death struggle with the outlaws. Charon was screaming, his body one bloody wound: he stabbed at Castor with a dagger but the hound refused to let go. I rushed towards them but stumbled over a corpse. I heard a splash and both the Lord of the Underworld and my noble hound disappeared beneath the surface of the sewer.
I ran to the edge but the current was strong. I could see no sign of either of them and I turned to defend myself as a villain, blood streaming from his mouth, lurched at me. Benjamin caught him midway with a cutting slash to the neck and the fellow fell, tumbling sideways into the water. Now, I have been in bloody struggles, I have watched the most horrible of battles. I have seen Mars in all its terrors, thankfully from some safe vantage point, yet that struggle in the sewers of London is one of the most memorable. A recurring nightmare. You see, Charon's men had no illusions. This was no honourable chivalrous fight where prisoners could be taken, ransoms obtained. These were bullyboys, the scum and the filth of the city who lived off the fat of the land with a deep-seated hatred for all authority. They asked for no quarter and none was given. I crouched in the shadows and watched. Benjamin moved effortlessly: a swordsman, he stood with his back to the wall and took on all comers. Cornelius moved beside him, a thin silent, deadly killer with his broad stabbing sword and thin Italian stiletto. A man born to kill. Lord Egremont and Kempe swirled by me. Kempe shouting orders, trying to stop the villains fleeing into the darkness whilst Egremont, and you can always tell from a man's face when he likes blood and dotes on killing, was in his element.