by Paul Doherty
‘One thing is clear,’ Athelstan replied. ‘The murderer believes all these clerks are guilty but, as you say, guilty of what? And two other questions warrant our attention. Why isn’t Chapler’s name mentioned? He worked with these young men. Secondly, was he innocent of any crime?’
‘How do we know Chapler’s dead?’ Cranston asked.
‘Oh, Sir John, don’t be stupid!’
‘I’m not being stupid, monk!’ Cranston snapped. ‘A young man is fished out of the Thames, and only by the contents of his wallet do we know he is Edwin Chapler.’
‘But Mistress Alison, his sister, recognised the corpse as that of her brother.’
‘No, no.’ Cranston shook his head and leaned against the wall. ‘What happens if Chapler is not dead? He knew the habits and customs of his companions. He knew they liked riddles. Perhaps he and his sister are waging their own private war of vengeance, God knows for what reason.’
‘It’s impossible,’ Athelstan murmured. ‘Mistress Alison was not in London when Peslep was killed; she was in Southwark when Ollerton died and the second riddle delivered. We know Havant viewed Chapler’s corpse whilst the poor clerk was last seen alive near the very place where he probably died.’
Athelstan stared down at the corridor where Flaxwith still stood with the carpenter Laveck. ‘It’s like any puzzle isn’t it, Sir John?’ he continued. ‘There are many answers but only one is correct. I may have the riddles wrong. Chapler could well be alive. Moreover, we must not discount Master Lesures: he must know what is going on in his own Chancery office. And there’s the other little strand we’ve picked loose: your good friend, the Vicar of Hell, seems to know a lot about our beloved clerks. Perhaps he has a score to settle? He can move round the city like a will-o’-the-wisp. Finally . . .’ Athelstan paused, wiping some dust from his sandal.
‘Yes, Brother?’
‘We must not be carried headlong by the force of our own logic. Here we are suspecting everyone of murder but there are others, besides Lesures, we must not forget. Napham and Master Alcest, in particular. How do we know that one, or both, might not be the assassin? Was there some quarrel amongst the clerks? Peslep might have been born wealthy but all these young men do seem to have a lot of money.’
‘So, a visit to the Chancery of the Green Wax may not be fruitless?’ Cranston asked.
‘It might be very rewarding, Sir John.’
‘And this business here?’
‘Well, the remains of Drayton’s wife have now been removed. Master Laveck has told us what he knows about the door. However,’ Athelstan stared around, ‘is that enough to accuse the two clerks? How did they really kill Drayton? It’s possible that in the days preceding the murder they distracted Drayton and worked one of those bolts loose. But how did they kill their master and how could they enter and leave the house without leaving some door or window loose?’ Athelstan picked up his writing bag. ‘The day draws on, Sir John. Let’s visit Master Lesures and his clerks. Then I’m back to Southwark to see what fresh miracles have occurred.’
They walked out of the house and almost bumped into Mistress Alison. She was breathless and for a while just stood, hands on her chest, panting for air.
‘Oh, Sir John, Brother Athelstan.’ She smiled. ‘I am sorry. I made inquiries at the Guildhall. They told me you were meeting your bailiff here.’
‘That’s right. Why, what’s the matter, girl?’
‘Nothing. It’s just that I’m leaving London, Sir John.’ She leaned up and kissed him on both cheeks and did the same to Athelstan. ‘I could not go without saying goodbye. I want to be on the road before the sun sets. Oh,’ she continued in a rush, ‘Brother Athelstan, I went back across the bridge, I had forgotten something at Benedicta’s. Your crucifix is still bleeding and the crowds are fair flocking there.’
Athelstan closed his eyes and groaned.
‘But Benedicta sent a message.’ Alison closed her eyes. ‘Er, Wat . . .’
‘Watkin,’ Athelstan intervened.
‘Ah yes, Watkin has everything under control. I must go.’
‘I am afraid you can’t.’
Athelstan looked at Cranston in surprise. The coroner hunched his great shoulders. ‘Mistress Alison, we are hunting your brother’s murderers.’
‘But you surely could send a message out to Epping? I am more than prepared to return. I don’t like it here.’ Tears sprang to her eyes. ‘Go ask mine host at the Silver Lute. Last night and today I’ve had a visitor, Brother Athelstan. He was very similar to the young man you described who was in the tavern where Peslep died. The landlord remembered him well: he was cowled and hooded, spurs jangling on his boots.’
‘Have you seen him yourself?’ Cranston asked.
‘No, Sir John, I have not. However, I remember you describing such a man when I first met you in the Chancery Office.’ Alison moved a loose hair away from her face. ‘I am afeared.’
‘Tell me.’ Athelstan took her gently by the hand and stroked her fingers. ‘Mistress Alison, you came into London to see your brother?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did you do that often?’
‘Not as much as I would have wished. When the weather changed and the rains and snow clogged the trackways, no. But in summertime as often as I could.’
‘You came this time because you were concerned?’
‘Yes, I told you. Edwin fell suddenly ill. He was vomiting, his bowels were loose. Some contagion of the belly.’
Athelstan studied her closely. ‘This illness?’
‘It was sudden,’ Alison replied. ‘One afternoon at the Chancery. Edwin suspected his drink had been tainted.’ She pulled a face. ‘But there’s no proof for that and Edwin was so agitated.’
‘Did he say about what?’
‘Never!’
‘Did he have other friends in London?’
‘I think he talked of Tibault Lesures, Master of the Rolls.’
‘Any young women?’
Alison laughed. ‘If he did, he kept it a great secret. But Sir John,’ Alison turned back to the coroner, ‘I want to go. I should go, I have no business in London. My brother is buried. I have a trade in Epping, property to look after.’
‘Go back to the Silver Lute,’ Athelstan offered. ‘Pack your baggage, and come and stay with Benedicta.’
Alison looked down at the ground.
‘You’ll be safe there,’ Athelstan insisted. ‘No one will hurt you.’
‘I agree,’ she replied.
‘Good.’ Athelstan patted her on the shoulder. ‘I’ll meet you there.’
Athelstan watched her go then, half listening to Sir John’s chatter, he followed the coroner through the afternoon crowds, past Newgate and down Holborn to the Chancery of the Green Wax. As they passed the old city gate on to the Holborn road, Cranston stopped, a hand on
Athelstan’s arm. The coroner stared fixedly at the mouth of an alleyway.
‘What’s the matter, Sir John?’
Cranston scratched his chin and took a swig from his miraculous wineskin. Athelstan followed his gaze. There were a few stalls; children played with an inflated pig’s bladder near a drunken juggler who was trying to ply his tricks much to the merriment of some labourers.
‘One of your villains, Sir John?’
‘Oh yes,’ Cranston breathed. ‘Lovely lad, lovely lad! William the Weasel. I know him of old. There’s not a window he can’t climb through. Show him a crack in a wall and he’ll slither through as swiftly as a river rat.’
‘But I can’t see him.’
‘No, no, you won’t, Brother. He’s gone in the twinkling of an eye. William was not up to villainy, he was watching me. The Weasel is one of the Vicar of Hell’s most ardent parishioners and, if young William’s watching me, that means the Vicar of Hell is very interested in where I go and what I do. So Flaxwith’s story is correct. Our Vicar must be greatly smitten by young Clarice. I think it’s only a matter of time before he rises to the lure.’
‘But he’ll know you’ll have Dame Broadsheet’s house watched?’
‘Yes, yes.’ Cranston gnawed on his knuckle. ‘I’ll have to think about that. But come, Brother.’
The Master of the Rolls met them in a small chamber at the back of the office of the Green Wax. He sat on a bench to one side of a table, Cranston and Athelstan sitting opposite.
‘Master Tibault, you seem agitated?’ Athelstan began.
The Master of the Rolls scratched an unshaven cheek and rubbed one red-rimmed eye. ‘All these deaths,’ he wailed. ‘Brother Athelstan, this is an important office of state. The Regent, the Chancellor, even the King himself has sent messengers down.’
‘The dead clerks have been replaced?’
Master Tibault pulled a cloth from the cuff of his robe and mopped his brow. ‘Oh Lord save us, yes. There’s no shortage of skilled men.’
‘We have come to talk about Chapler,’ Athelstan continued. ‘Master Tibault, describe him to me.’
The Master of the Rolls did and both the coroner and his secretarius recognised the young man who had been fished out of the Thames. Athelstan raised his eyes heavenwards as one theory crumbled to dust.
‘Why?’ Tibault asked, playing with the rag.
‘Oh nothing,’ Athelstan replied. ‘Sir John and I wanted to be sure: apart from his sister, no one identified the corpse taken from the Thames. However, the man you describe fits Chapler’s description exactly, from the colour of his hair to the small mole on his right cheek.’
‘Yes, yes, that’s so.’
‘What was Chapler like? As a person?’
‘Very shy, very secretive. He kept himself to himself. He did not carouse with the others.’
Athelstan watched the bead of sweat form on Lesures’ upper lip. You are lying, he thought; you are not just flustered because your clerks have been killed: there’s some great secret here.
‘So you know nothing about his private life?’ Athelstan asked.
Lesures shook his head.
‘And nothing happened untoward, before Chapler’s death, which would account for his murder?’
Again the shake of the head.
‘Not even Chapler’s sickness?’
Lesures gulped, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down.
‘He was sick, wasn’t he?’ Athelstan continued. ‘A slight contagion of the belly, so his sister told me: vomiting, a flux in the bowels.’
‘Oh yes, yes,’ Lesures gabbled. ‘He was ill for a few days.’
‘Did he fall ill suddenly?’ Athelstan grasped the old man’s hand: it was cold and clammy. ‘Master Lesures, you are wasting our time. I am becoming very suspicious about the doings of your clerks in the Chancery of the Green Wax.’
Athelstan glanced sideways at Cranston, he sat dozing, eyes half closed.
‘Would you please answer our questions?’ Athelstan insisted. ‘Either here or in the Tower.’
Lesures licked his lips. ‘I’m just frightened,’ he whined. ‘That is all, Brother Athelstan. My mind is clogged, my wits numb. I go home and lock myself in . . .’
‘You live by yourself?’ Cranston opened his eyes.
‘I am a bachelor, Sir John.’
And you do not join your clerks when they carouse the midnight hours away?’
‘Sir John,’ Lesures simpered, ‘I may be a bachelor but I am also quite vulnerable.’
‘We were talking about Chapler’s illness,’ Athelstan intervened. ‘He became ill here, didn’t he?’
‘Yes, yes, he did.’ Lesures swallowed. ‘After I had served the malmsey, Chapler suddenly fell sick: clutching his stomach he ran down to the privy in the small garden.’
‘And no one else showed similar symptoms?’
‘No.’
‘And you didn’t think that was suspicious?’
‘I . . .’
‘Come, come, Master Tibault.’ Cranston hammered on the table. ‘A healthy young man takes a cup of malmsey like the rest, but only he has gripes in his belly’
‘I thought it was suspicious,’ Lesures bleated. ‘But the clerks are always playing tricks upon each other. They did not like Chapler,’ he continued in a rush. He put his face in his hands. ‘Some madcap scheme. I asked Peslep but he just laughed.’
‘I wish you had told us,’ Athelstan replied. ‘How do you know, Master Tibault, it was some witless trick? Chapler could well have been poisoned. Sometimes the poison works but if you are fortunate, depending on your belly, the body can expel it. It would leave you weak but not dead.’
Lesures’ face went as white as a sheet.
‘What is happening here?’ Cranston asked softly. He gripped Lesures’ wrist. ‘Master Tibault, you are one of the Crown’s principal clerks yet you shake like an aspen leaf. What do these young rapscallions know about you? You should be their master, but look, you sit here more like their minion. Bring down the seal,’ Cranston continued.
‘I don’t need to bring it down.’ Lesures unbuttoned the cords of his gown.
Athelstan glimpsed the chain and the small round box on the end. Lesures took this off, opened the clasps and handed the seal across. Cranston held it as if it was some holy relic: dark green in colour, on one side it showed the young King Richard II on horseback, sword in hand; on the other a crown and the arms of England, France, Scotland and Castille quartered on a shield.
‘Sir John, what are you hinting at?’ Lesures asked, taking the seal back. ‘You know no one holds that seal except me. No one can use it to impress a document except me.’ Lesures made to rise as if to walk off in disgust.
‘We haven’t finished,’ Athelstan remarked. ‘But you may go and ask Napham and Alcest to join us. We have something to tell them.’
Lesures hurried off. He returned with the clerks. Both men look subdued, pale-faced, not a touch of their old arrogance and swagger.
‘Did you like Chapler?’ Cranston began abruptly.
‘No, we did not,’ Alcest retorted. ‘I’ve told you, he was not one of us so we let him be. He came to work here then he went home. We knew nothing about him except that he had a sister in Epping.’
‘How long did Chapler work here?’ Athelstan asked.
‘Two years,’ Lesures answered from where he stood nervously by the door. ‘He came highly recommended from a merchant in Cambridge.’
‘And he was the last to join you?’
‘Yes, yes, he was,’ Alcest replied. ‘He came a stranger and remained as one.’
‘Is that why you tried to poison him?’ the coroner asked.
Napham sat back as if a crossbow bolt had hit him in the chest.
‘You did try to poison him or someone here did? A few weeks ago he drank some malmsey . . .’
‘We didn’t poison him,’ Alcest retorted. ‘That was Peslep’s idea of a joke. He put a purgative in Chapler’s cup. Peslep thought it was amusing. We did not.’
‘You have no proof of that,’ Athelstan said sharply.
‘I have spoken the truth.’
‘Ah yes, the truth,’ Cranston remarked. ‘Pilate also asked what is the truth. Brother Athelstan, tell him what we have already learnt.’
Athelstan explained the three riddles and how each of them was a reference to the first letter of the surname of the murdered clerks. Alcest and Napham became even more subdued, especially as Athelstan explained how there was little connection between the murder of Chapler and the other three clerks.
‘This makes us wonder,’ Athelstan concluded. ‘We have Peslep, Ollerton, Elflain: P O E. If we add the first letters of Napham and Alcest the word poena is formed, the Latin for punishment. Now,’ Athelstan leaned his hands on the table, ‘what have you five clerks done to deserve such punishment?’
Napham began to shake but Alcest abruptly got to his feet and, taking his Chancery ring off, threw it on the table.
‘Pray, sir, what’s the matter?’ Cranston barked.
‘I’m a royal clerk in the Chancery of the Green Wax,’ Alcest declared. ‘I work fo
r the Crown. I am being threatened. Accordingly, unless we take the appropriate measures, both I and Master Napham will also be brutally killed whilst you, Sir John, fumble around!’
‘And so?’ Athelstan played with the Chancery ring lying on the table.
‘Sir John will tell you the custom.’ Napham also took his ring off. ‘In times of great danger royal clerks can demand the Crown’s protection.’
‘Of course!’ Cranston breathed. ‘And where will you go, sir?’
‘To the Tower, of course.’
Alcest picked up both rings and slipped them into his pouch. ‘I will go to the Constable of the Tower and demand that we be housed there.’ He jabbed a finger at Cranston. ‘Until you, the coroner of this city, discovers who the assassin is!’
Alcest, followed by Napham, walked to the door. ‘We will both stay in the Tower from where we will petition the Regent for his protection and complain about the bumbling doings of a drunken coroner!’
Cranston sprang to his feet. ‘And you, sir, can go down to hell and ask the Lord Satan for protection. If you seek it in the Tower, then go! Yet you have still not answered our questions.’ The coroner continued. ‘Why are you and your companions being hunted and killed? What have you done to merit such terrible punishment?’ He smiled bleakly. ‘My Lord Regent will be interested in your reply, as will I.’ He glanced at the Master of the Rolls. ‘Lesures, will you join them?’
‘No, no, my post is here!’
‘Good,’ Cranston breathed. ‘Master Alcest, you will be in the Tower by the morning, yes? I can visit you there.’
The two clerks were already pushing their way out of the door, slamming it behind them. Cranston took out his wineskin and swallowed a generous mouthful.
‘They should be careful,’ Athelstan warned. ‘They are not yet in the Tower and the assassin still hunts them!’
CHAPTER 9
Athelstan left Cranston in Cheapside. The coroner was growing tired, rubbing his face and murmuring about Lady Maude and the poppets. The day was drawing on. The market bell was tolling and already carts and barrows were being refilled as peasants prepared to leave the city before sunset. The air was ripe with rotting fruit and vegetables as Athelstan made his way along the streets. A beggar boy, for a penny, took him to the Silver Lute tavern, a broad-fronted hostelry with a small gatehouse which dominated its spacious cobbled yard. Athelstan walked into the taproom. The taverner, a great leather apron round him, came hurrying up, a cheerful, merry-eyed fellow.
