by Paul Doherty
‘They have, all of them, a tale to tell and a truth to hide. However, one thing unites them all: they hated Marsen.’
Athelstan, lost in own thoughts, absent-mindedly agreed. Cranston said he would supervise the removal of the corpses and everything else and bustled out. Athelstan sat down at the table, staring at the painted cloth pinned to the far wall depicting a Catherine wheel, surmounted by a cross and crowned with lighted candles, which held off the darkness in which murky-faced demons could be glimpsed.
‘Come, kindly light,’ Athelstan whispered. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes and recited the ‘Lavabo’ psalm, ‘“I will wash my hands among the innocent and encompass thy altar O Lord …”’
Athelstan dozed for a while and started awake at a heart-cutting shriek which echoed through the tavern. He jumped to his feet and entered the sweet-smelling Dark Parlour, where Thorne, standing on a barrel, was busy hanging fresh herbs and flitches of bacon from the smoke-stained rafters. He just stood gaping; the shriek was repeated and the taverner swiftly clambered down. He and Athelstan hurried out into the main hallway and up the stairs into the gallery. They pushed their way through the slatterns and servants milling about. Thorne shouted at them to be quiet. He and Athelstan strode down the gallery which ran past chambers on either side to another narrow stairwell at the far end. Eleanor Thorne stood stricken outside one of the chambers. She glanced up, her face white as snow, pointing at the blood seeping out from beneath the chamber door.
‘Scrope’s chamber,’ Thorne whispered, gathering his wife in his arms, comforting her and pushing her gently back down the gallery to the waiting maids. Athelstan tried the door but it was locked. He hammered on the dark oaken wood but realized it was futile. Thorne took a ring of keys from his apron pocket and tried to insert the master key but failed.
‘The lock’s turned on the other side.’ Thorne, his craggy face now sweat-soaked, tried to push back the eyelet high in the door, a small square of wood hinged on the inside, but this was firmly closed. Other doors in the gallery opened, faces peered out. Athelstan glimpsed Father Roger’s fearful and wary face just before Cranston came pounding up the stairs shouting at everyone to stand aside or keep to their chambers. The coroner stared at the thick bloody plume still spreading out from beneath the door.
‘The window is open!’ Mooncalf shouted as he threw himself up the other set of stairs. ‘The shutters are pulled back, it would be easy to enter from the stableyard.’
‘Off and up you go lad,’ Cranston shouted, twirling a penny at the ostler, who deftly caught it. Athelstan turned and tried the latch on the door to the chamber facing Scrope’s.
‘Empty,’ Thorne murmured. The taverner inserted a key and opened it. Athelstan went in. The room was neat and tidy, the window opened to air it. Everything was in order. The four-poster bed was made up, its curtains drawn back. There was a high-back chair, two stools, tables and an open aumbry for clothes, although the pole between the uprights had been taken down. Athelstan shivered at the draught created by the open door and hastily retreated back into the warmth of the gallery. He heard movement in Scrope’s chamber. Mooncalf’s exclam-ation followed by gasps and cries. The bolts on top and bottom were pulled back and the key turned. The door swung open. Cranston immediately ordered the white-faced ostler to stand with his master in the gallery as he and Athelstan stepped over the physician’s body into the chamber. Athelstan glanced quickly around. The room was very similar to the one he had just visited, though the physician’s clothing and possessions lay scattered about. In order to open the door Scrope’s corpse had been pulled back and rolled on to one side. Athelstan crossed himself and pulled the corpse further into the room, turning it over so they could see the crossbow quarrel embedded deep in Scrope’s chest. The dead physician’s pallid face, twisted in agony, was caked with the blood which had erupted through his nose and mouth. Athelstan felt the corpse’s hand: it was still slightly warm.
‘He was murdered very recently,’ Athelstan murmured. ‘Sir John, a moment, please.’
Athelstan took out the holy oils and anointed the corpse, reciting the absolution, followed by the final prayer for the departed. Once he had finished, Athelstan scrutinized the chamber door but could detect no interference with the bolts, lock and eyelet. He walked to the window, which was very similar to the one in the Barbican, with shutters on either side of a horn-covered door window. Athelstan pushed this back and stared down. The stableyard below was busy: yard ser-vants and customers were staring open-mouthed up at the chamber. Athelstan asked one of them to remove the ladder Mooncalf had used.
‘Did you see anything?’ he shouted. A chorus of denials answered his question.
‘Obviously not,’ Athelstan murmured, turning away. Anyone trying to climb into Scrope’s chamber would have been noticed. Athelstan went to the corpse and knelt by it, half-listening to Cranston’s theories. He noticed a manuscript, a small book, its pages tightly bound together by red twine. It had been opened and lay half-hidden by Scrope’s robes. He held this up.
‘Brother?’
‘A vademecum, Sir John.’ Athelstan leafed through the bloodstained pages. ‘A pilgrim’s book listing all the great relics at Glastonbury Abbey: Arthur’s tomb, Joseph of Arimathea’s staff. The Stella Cristi, the Star of Christ, a beautiful ruby. The Holy Thorn and other items. Scrope must have been clutching this when he died. I wonder why.’ Athelstan rose as Cranston opened the door and began to question others outside. The friar quickly sifted through the dead physician’s possessions: clothing, most of it very costly, two purses containing silver and gold coins, a set of spurs and a war belt finely stitched with gold thread. He emptied Scrope’s chancery bag on to the bed and sifted through the billae, memoranda, lists of herbs and other medicines as well as letters of attestation from different universities. He opened a bronze chancery cylinder, shook out a small roll of documents and went through these. His exclamations of surprise brought Cranston back in from the gallery. Athelstan handed over what he had found.
‘True bills, Sir John, drawn up by a notary in Coggeshall, Scrope’s home town. They contain a confession of one Alain Taillour, housebreaker. Apparently, about ten years ago, around the Feast of Michaelmas, Scrope’s house in Coggeshall was burgled and ransacked. Scrope was attending a guild meeting in town. On his return he found his house a place of mayhem and murder. Scrope’s wife and their manservant had been brutally slain. During the first week of Advent last, Taillour was caught red-handed breaking into a warehouse. He turned king’s approver; applying for a pardon he named all his confederates in his life of robbery.’ Athelstan drew a deep breath. ‘He clearly accused Edmund Marsen as the person responsible for the murder of Scrope’s wife and manservant. Taillour swore this on oath before a local justice providing the names of other witnesses. Apparently Scrope made his pilgrimage to Glastonbury in grateful thanks and as well as to seek divine help …’
‘To indict Marsen,’ the coroner interrupted. ‘Of course,’ Cranston whispered, ‘Marsen is, or was, a royal official. Scrope was planning to appear before the Court of King’s Bench in Westminster Hall. He would swear out a true indictment which Marsen would have to answer before a jury and three royal justices.’ Cranston sat down on a stool, cradling the miraculous wineskin. ‘Now both are dead,’ he continued, ‘sent to appear before Christ’s Assize. But how was Scrope murdered? Who was responsible and how? Friar Roger claims he was sure he heard a loud knocking on Scrope’s door and that this was repeated, but that is all. Father Roger opened his door but could see nobody. The assassin could not have entered by the window as the entire tavern would have seen him. So how could the assassin enter this room, kill Scrope then leave, locking and bolting the door behind him?’ He pointed to the corpse. ‘The same quarrels were used in the Barbican, loosed from a hand-held arbalest.’ Cranston got to his feet. ‘Brother, what is the matter – what are you staring at?’
‘Go back outside, Sir John. Ask Thorne, Mooncalf and the rest w
hat our learned physician did after he arrived here two days ago. Did he go out? Were his boots cleaned? Please, Sir John.’ Athelstan smiled at the coroner who shrugged and left, shouting for Thorne. Athelstan knelt by the lantern horn, standing on a small stool. The copper casing was mud-stained around the base, the horn covering was dirt-splattered and the squat tallow candle had burnt low. Athelstan then scrutinized the heavy cloak hanging from a wall peg. It was pure wool dyed a deep green but its silver-threaded hem was splattered with crusts of mud. The expensive Spanish riding boots standing nearby were also marked; their leggings were polished but the sole, heel and toe were caked in drying dirt. He glanced up as Cranston re-entered the chamber.
‘Brother, according to what I’ve heard, Scrope remained in his own chamber, probably preparing that indictment. Mooncalf and others polished his boots to a gleam after he arrived.’
‘Nevertheless, he did go out.’ Athelstan gestured at the cloak and boots. ‘That’s what caught my attention. According to reports our fastidious physician remained closeted in this chamber, never going out, making sure the likes of Mooncalf cleaned his boots. Yet Scrope’s cloak and boots are muddied, as is the lantern horn where it’s been put down, whilst its candle must have burnt for some time. Look, Sir John, at the mud drying on your boots – it’s similar in colour and texture to this. I suspect our physician went out last night. The mud is fairly recent. I believe he entered the Palisade and approached the Barbican.’
‘Is he the killer?’
‘No, but I suspect Scrope might have glimpsed the assassin or nursed deep suspicions about who he really is. That is why he was murdered, to silence him.’ Athelstan rose to his feet, stretched and crossed himself. ‘Sir John, have Scrope’s corpse join the rest at the Guildhall then seal this chamber with the signet of the Lord High Coroner.’
‘Brother?’
‘Yes, Sir John?’
‘Marsen was hated. He was Thibault’s creature, a vile, ruthless tax collector, yet he moved with impunity. Surely the Upright Men must have heard about his depredations as well as his stay here? You seem to be implying that they are not responsible, but why shouldn’t they spring a trap and snatch Marsen’s nasty soul from his filthy body?’
‘Perhaps they did, Sir John.’
‘So this is the work of the Upright Men?’
‘Umm.’ Athelstan pulled his cowl up, a sign to Cranston that he wanted to retreat and meditate in some quiet corner. ‘Truly, Sir John, I don’t know. This could be the doing of the Upright Men or it might not be. Perhaps they left all this to their assassin, Beowulf, and yet …’ Athelstan shook his head, blessed the corpse once more and left the chamber. He walked to the top of the stairs and paused at the clatter of hooves, shouts and the rattle of steel from the stableyard. By the time he reached there the horsemen who had entered, all wearing the blue, scarlet and gold livery of the royal household, were milling about, swords drawn, shouting orders at Thorne and Mooncalf to close the gates and to allow no one in or out until they were gone. Lascelles was in charge, dressed as usual in black leather and his helmet off, his harsh, pointed face twisted into a scowl. Mine Host Thorne crossed the yard and angry words were exchanged between the two. Lascelles dismounted as Thorne ordered the gates to remain open. Fearful of an ugly confrontation, Athelstan hastened across, relieved to see Cranston also come striding out. Calm was restored, Lascelles nodding at Cranston’s whispered advice.
‘Very good, Master Taverner.’ Lascelles smirked at Thorne. ‘Go about your business even though your tavern is now the haven of murder, felony and treason. I need to view the corpses.’
Cranston objected, pointing out that all the dead had been sheeted in mort cloths and were being removed. Lascelles, peeling off his black leather gloves, again nodded understandingly, his glittering dark eyes never leaving Athelstan’s face. ‘It does not matter,’ Lascelles wetted his lips. ‘The money is gone, yes? Cannot be found? Yes? Well, well. My business here, Sir John, is you and Brother Athelstan. His Grace My Lord of Gaunt and Master Thibault want to know what happened here and discover what you will do to remedy it. They also want to have words with you on other matters.’ He pointed across at the tavern stables. ‘Get two horses saddled. I want to be out of here as soon as possible.’ He frowned at Cranston’s loudly whispered curse. ‘My Lord High Coroner of London, the hour is passing, my business is pressing. We must be gone – now!’ Athelstan caught Cranston’s gaze, warning him with his eyes to be careful. Cranston strolled off, shouting for Mooncalf to saddle two horses. Ronseval sauntered out and stayed in the porch to watch proceedings. Athelstan looked past the troubadour and glimpsed Paston, his daughter and Foulkes deep in conversation at a table in the Dark Parlour. Lascelles, holding the reins of his horse, beckoned Athelstan closer and asked what had happened. The friar replied in short, blunt sentences.
Lascelles, that raven of a man, listened intently, the arrogance draining from his face at the litany of bloody destruction. ‘Master Thibault,’ he whispered, ‘will not be pleased, such a vast sum stolen. Beowulf the assassin must be in the city. Who is he hunting, Brother?’
Athelstan sensed the deep anxiety of Thibault’s principal henchman. That same cloying, creeping fear which was spreading through the city like some invisible mist, thickening and curling its way around the men of power. The day of judgement was approaching. Only God’s good grace could divert the bloody confrontation between the lords and the seething masses they ruled. The seed had been sown for generations, now harvest time was due. The wine press of God’s anger was about to be turned. No one would be safe. Lascelles could swagger about in his black leather garb, silver spurs clinking on his riding boots, cloak swirling back to reveal his heavy leather war belt, but what real protection could they offer against the silent knife thrust or the swift sling shot? Athelstan left Lascelles to his thoughts as Cranston led across the saddled horses. Athelstan made sure he had all his possessions and was about to swing himself up when he heard a piping voice.
‘Master Lascelles, Master Lascelles?’ A ragged boy, face all dirty, his tunic no more than a discarded flour sack with holes cut for head and arms and tied around the waist with a dirty rope, caught Athelstan’s attention. He came running into the yard yelling Lascelles’ name, which he stumbled over as he held up the scrap of parchment in his grubby hand. Athelstan felt a cold, prickling premonition. The stableyard was busy. Local traders, tinkers and craftsmen were drifting in to break their fast. Slatterns and scullions hurried across. Doors slammed. Windows were unshuttered. Slops were being emptied, horses led in and out. The smith had begun his clanging. Thorne stood in the doorway shouting orders at a washer woman. Athelstan, however, watched that beggar boy. Lascelles was approaching him. The urchin handed over the scrap of parchment and fled like the wind through the main gate. Lascelles uncurled the parchment; he glanced up as Athelstan hurried towards him.
‘Brother, what is this?’ Athelstan lunged forward, knocking Lascelles away from his horse, which reared, hooves flailing as a crossbow bolt whipped the air between it and its rider. Athelstan crouched even as Lascelles tried to calm his horse, turning it to use a shield. Cries of ‘Harrow!’ were raised. The stableyard erupted in uproar as another bolt whistled through the air, smacking into the wall of an outhouse. Women screamed and grabbed their frightened children. Dogs snarled, racing about, agitating the horses further. Lascelles’ escort hurriedly grabbed kite-shaped shields from their saddle horns to form a protective ring around their master and Athelstan. For a while both men just sheltered. Athelstan closed his eyes and murmured the Jesus prayer whilst Lascelles cursed a litany of filth. Athelstan thanked God he could not understand it. At last, order was imposed. Cranston shouted how the mysterious bowman must have disappeared. The shield wall broke up. Lascelles grasped Athelstan’s hand, squeezing it, thanking him with his eyes before screaming a spate of abuse at his escort.
‘He’s gone!’ Cranston declared.
‘Where, Sir John, where was he?’ Athels
tan asked.
‘Brother, God only knows! A window or somewhere here in the tavern yard, or did Beowulf – and I think it was our mutual friend – simply slip in from the street? The tavern is thronged with every rogue under the sun, the usual beauties, the school of Tyburn scholars and Newgate nuns.’ Athelstan walked over and picked up the deadly message. This time the parchment was faded and grease-marked, the scrawling hand uncouth, but the message was the same in all its stark menace.
‘Our assassin changes his hand,’ Athelstan remarked. ‘Sir John, we should be gone.’ People were now emerging from the tavern, all busy and inquisitive. Cranston had a word with Lascelles and the order was given to mount. They were joined by a smiling Father Roger, who asked if he could join their comitatus. Lascelles shrugged and the friar pushed his sorry-looking mount alongside Athelstan. They left the tavern yard and made their way towards the battlemented gatehouse and walls of London Bridge. Athelstan immediately experienced the inner panic that washed over him whenever he entered the turbulent, frenetic streets of Southwark. He became acutely aware of what he glimpsed, as if he was studying scenes from a stained-glass window or the intricate details of one of the Hangman of Rochester’s wall paintings at St Erconwald’s. Friar Roger was chattering like a sparrow on a twig, but Athelstan was distracted by the swirling images which surged out towards him on that brisk, cold February morning. Church bells clanged, marking the end of morning Mass and the beginning of the eleventh hour. Market horns brayed. Whores screamed and cursed as they were led down to the thews to the sound of blaring bagpipes. Traders, tinkers, fripperers and geegaw-sellers set up stalls and booths, ringing the air with their shouted offers of mousetraps, ratkillers, bird cages, bottles, ribbons, collops of meat and fresh fruit. Itinerant cooks, dressed in rotten, stinking weeds, pushed their battered barrows with portable stoves; around the cooks’ unwashed necks hung strips of ancient but heavily salted meat ready for grilling. An enterprising water-seller with a tub on his back trailed behind these offering ‘the freshest water from St Mary’s spring’ to slake, salted throats. The crowd pushed backwards and forwards, thronging down the narrow lanes where the grotesquely carved gables of shops and houses jutted out above dark and dingy chambers. Slops were being emptied into the already fetid, crammed sewers. Space was narrow; people had to step aside for Lascelles’ cavalcade. Curses and threats were hurled and, on a few occasions, slops from upper chambers narrowly missed them as night jars were emptied. Southwark, however, was different from the city, where resentments rankled deeper. In Southwark the dog-leeches, sow-gelders, rumagates, runaways, jingle-brains, tooth-drawers, broom men and a multitude of lowlife were hotly against any titled authority. All these denizens from their ‘ruffians’ hall’, as Cranston described them, wandered the streets looking for mischief or anything which might brighten their lives.
