by Paul Doherty
‘Why do you want to know all this?’ Father Peter asked as he led them out of the church.
‘There’s been a murder, Father, in London,’ Cranston answered, chewing his lip. ‘We hoped our journey here would yield fresh evidence. Have you noticed anything untoward in the village?’
‘Such as?’
‘Anything,’ Athelstan pleaded. ‘Any news or gossip about the Burghgesh family?’
The priest shook his head. Athelstan and Cranston looked at each other despondently as they left the church and re-entered the priest’s house where the boy was lapping a second bowl of soup as hungrily as a starving dog. At their approach he scurried into a corner. Father Peter waved them back to their seats and went across and poured them generous stoups of ale from the jar just outside the small buttery door.
‘No,’ he repeated, sitting down on the stool and cradling the blackjack of ale in his hands, ‘Woodforde is a quiet place. Even quieter now the Burghgeshes have left.’
‘What happened to their manor house?’
‘The King’s Commissioners sealed it off. No one has been there since.’ The priest coughed. ‘I should know. The Sheriff of Essex pays me a small stipend to ensure the seals on the doors and windows are not broken.’ He looked at Cranston. ‘And they are still sealed. After all, there’s nothing there. All the moveables have been removed, the roof has fallen in, the surrounding meadows and ploughlands been sold off.’
‘There was no other heir?’
‘None that I know of.’ Father Peter suddenly took the tankard away from his lips. ‘In heaven’s name!’ he exclaimed. ‘There was something. Yes,’ he murmured excitedly, ‘about three or four years ago, something very strange. It was like a dream. Now, when was it? Yes, it was at the beginning of Advent I forget the actual year. I had said morning Mass, gone across to the house to break my fast then went back to clear the altar.’ Father Peter stared into the flames. ‘I went up the nave and was surprised to see a man, cowled and hooded, kneeling at the entrance to the Lady Chapel.’
‘Where Mark Burghgesh is buried?’
‘Yes, yes. Now I trod softly, and at first the man didn’t hear me. But when he did, he rose very quickly, pulled his cowl close about his head, and brushing by me, left the church, ignoring my salutation. All I glimpsed were a few strands of grey hair and a white, neatly barbered beard.’ Father Peter picked up his tankard and sipped from it. ‘Now, it had been years since I had seen Bartholomew Burghgesh and I considered him long dead, yet I am sure that man I glimpsed that cold December morning was Sir Bartholomew himself. He had his walk, the gait and stance of a professional soldier.’
Athelstan leaned forward excitedly. Was Sir Bartholomew alive? he wondered. Was he the bloody-handed slayer stalking his victims? ‘Continue, Father,’ he whispered.
‘Well, I didn’t mention it to anyone. The villagers would think I had been drinking or wandering in my wits.’ He grinned at Athelstan. ‘You can appreciate, Brother, how the sheep like to gossip about their shepherd.’
Athelstan smiled back and stole a sideways glance at Cranston who was sitting, open-mouthed, at Father Peter’s revelation.
‘A year later,’ the priest continued, ‘on the Feast of All Hallows, I was in the village ale-house. Autumn was here, the countryside was fading under the colder, harsher weather. We were talking about death and exchanging gruesome ghost stories. The landlord, God rest him – the fellow has since died – suddenly spoke up, declaring that he had seen the ghost of Sir Bartholomew Burghgesh. Of course, the others laughed at him but he insisted and said that at about the same time I thought I’d seen Sir Bartholomew, a stranger had arrived in the village late at night and stopped at the ale-house for food and drink. The man had been cloaked and hooded and hardly ever spoke except to buy his meal.’ Father Peter closed his eyes. ‘The landlord said the fellow made it obvious he wanted to be left to himself. After all, Woodforde’s on the highway into the city. We have many people who like to keep their business to themselves. Anyway, the stranger was about to leave when a slattern dropped a tankard. The man whirled round and for a few seconds the landlord saw his face. He swore it was Bartholomew Burghgesh.’
Father Peter sighed. ‘Of course, I kept quiet about what I had seen, but I was intrigued. I journeyed out to the old manor house near Buxfield. If it was Burghgesh, I thought, surely he would have returned to his former home? Yet I discovered that nothing had been disturbed.’ He shrugged and spread his hands. ‘That’s all I can tell you. Only God knows if the man I and the landlord glimpsed was Sir Bartholomew. I heard no other rumours about his sudden return, either from abroad or beyond the grave, so I let the matter rest.’
‘Father,’ Athelstan persisted, ‘please, when was this? Three or four years ago?’
The priest stared into the fire.
‘Yes, three years ago,’ he replied. ‘But,’ he smiled, ‘I can tell you no more.’
Cranston leaned forward and clasped Father Peter by the wrist
‘Father, your hospitality is only matched by the value of what you have told us.’ The coroner glanced at Athelstan and smiled. ‘Come, Brother, it’s not yet noon. If we travel hard and fast, we can be back in the city before nightfall.’ He looked across at Father Peter. ‘I thank you for your hospitality, Father.’ He turned and tossed a penny at the lad still squatting in the corner. ‘You, boy, will either make a good squire or a merchant.’
They rose, gathered their cloaks, and within the hour were clear of Woodforde. They journeyed through Leighton, past the grisly scaffold with the freshly dug makeshift grave still visible at its foot, and back on to the Mile End Road. Cranston, who had stopped at a local tavern to refill his miraculous wineskin, was full of chatter and speculation.
‘It’s possible, Brother,’ he boomed for the umpteenth time, his bewhiskered lips red from the juice of the grape, ‘quite possible that Sir Bartholomew is still alive and hiding in or near the Tower to carry out his silent war of revenge.’
‘Sir John,’ Athelstan replied, ‘I would agree, but where would Burghgesh hide? Is he a member of the garrison? A kitchen scullion? Some tradesman who has the right of access?’
Cranston made a rude noise with his lips.
‘Or,’ Athelstan continued, ‘does Sir Bartholomew squat like some dark spider in the city whilst others carry out his dreadful commands?’
Cranston reined in his horse.
‘Strange, mind you,’ he murmured.
‘What?’
‘Well, three years ago Whitton was disturbed, agitated, as if he had seen a ghost. At the same time, Brother, a cowled and hooded figure was seen in the tavern near the Tower, and the same person, probably Burghgesh, also seen in Woodforde.’
‘You’re saying Whitton’s agitation was caused by Burghgesh’s reappearance?’
‘Of course.’
‘But, if that is so, what has happened to Burghgesh since?’
He and Cranston were still arguing rival theories when they reached Aldgate long after dark and made their way through a small postern door in the city gate. Cranston, full of wine and his own theories, was now certain they had grasped the truth. Athelstan did not demur. At least, he concluded, their journey to Woodforde had diverted the coroner’s mind from his constant agonising over the Lady Maude’s mysterious conduct.
As Athelstan and Cranston made their way back into the city, the hospitaller, Fitzormonde, was standing in the bailey of the Tower, staring at the huge bear now stuffing its cruel mouth with scraps from the Tower kitchen. Like Athelstan, Fitzormonde was fascinated by the beast and secretly admired the madcap Red Hand who was the only man who dared approach the animal. Fitzormonde, despite his travels, had never seen such a huge beast. Most bears were small and black, sometimes no higher than a man, but this great, shaggy-furred animal reminded him of stories he had heard from knights who had served with the Teutonic Orders in the wild black forests of the north. How they had seen deer twice the size of anything in England and bears such as th
is one, which would crush a horse in its huge, muscular arms.
The bear suddenly stopped eating and glared at the knight, its small, piggy eyes red with hatred. It opened its mouth, growling deep in its throat in a display of wickedly sharp teeth. The huge beast strained at the great iron chain clasped to the collar round its neck. Fitzormonde stepped away and the bear went back to its meal, shuffling its food into a dirty untidy pile as if it suspected Fitzormonde would like to take it away. The knight stamped his feet to keep warm. Tomorrow, he thought, he would leave the Tower. He had already said as much to Mistress Philippa when he had met her and her rather effeminate betrothed.
Fitzormonde gazed up at the cruel gargoyle faces on the Chapel of St Peter ad Vincula. Yes, he thought, tomorrow, he would pay the chaplain to sing one last Mass for his fallen comrades then go back into the city and request from his superiors some mission or task well away from this benighted fortress.
He started as he heard a whirring noise in the air. He looked up. A raven? No, what was it? The hospitaller suddenly stepped back in panic as the bear sprang into life, towering above him, its great paws clawing the air. The bear roared at him with fury, its black muzzle and huge jaws covered in a thick white froth. Fitzormonde’s hand went to his dagger as the bear danced like a demon, pulling at the great chain clasped in the wall. What was wrong with the animal? What had happened?
Fitzormonde made to run but, even as he turned, heard the great iron chain spring loose and saw the bear rush towards him. He tugged at his knife but had it only half-drawn when the huge taloned paw of the bear smashed his head as if it was a rotten apple. Roaring with fury, the bear dug his claws into the dying knight’s unprotected back and dragged him across the cobbles, bellows of rage proclaiming its triumph.
CHAPTER 12
Athelstan was furious. He felt the anger burn his innards until his heart pounded and the blood throbbed in his head. For a moment, the friar didn’t give a damn about anything – the teaching of his Order to be gentle or the precepts of the gospels about kindness. All that mattered was the anger raging within him as he stood in the cemetery outside St Erconwald’s church. The snow had now turned into an icy, grey slush which dripped off graves, trees, bushes and the low cemetery wall as the thaw continued under clear skies and a weak wintry sun. Athelstan cursed, using every filthy oath he had learnt from Cranston. He beat the staff he held against the loose brick, furious enough to grind the rock into sand.
Oh, he had found everything in order on his return: Bonaventura, asleep and well, curled up in the church like some fat bishop as Cecily cleaned and swept the nave. Benedicta and Watkin had set up the crib in one of the aisles, using figures carved by Huddle. The painter had also finished a vivid picture of Christ in the manger, just above the baptismal font inside the church door. Even Ursula’s pig had resisted its usual forays into his garden, and Pike the ditcher had cleared the gravel-strewn path in front of the church.
Athelstan had pronounced himself satisfied and chattered about parochial matters as he stabled, watered and fed Philomel. But even then he had sensed the anxiety in the faces of those who had come to welcome him: Benedicta, Pike, Watkin, Cecily, and Tab the tinker. They had followed him around the church, answering his questions whilst exchanging secretive, anxious glances.
At first Athelstan dismissed their concern as some petty matter. Had Cecily been flirting again, or one of Pike the ditcher’s sons peed in the church? Perhaps Ranulf borrowed Bonaventure or Watkin’s children had been drinking from the holy water stoup? The members of his parish council had fussed round him like noisy chickens. At last, just before he locked the church, Athelstan tired of their secrecy.
‘Come on!’ he demanded, confronting them. ‘What has happened?’
They shuffled their feet and looked away. Benedicta suddenly became concerned about an apparent spot on her gown.
‘It’s the cemetery, Father!’ Watkin blurted out. ‘Tosspot’s grave has been disturbed.’
‘When?’
‘The night you left.’
Athelstan had been so angry he’d used language which made even Pike the ditcher’s face blanch.
‘Perhaps Sir John will do something now,’ Benedicta tactfully intervened. ‘Or maybe if we make an appeal to the Alderman of the Ward?’
‘Aye!’ Athelstan rasped. ‘And perhaps pigs will fly and we’ll find pork in the trees tomorrow morning. The people who do this terrible thing are bastards! They are wicked and fear neither God nor man. Even the pagans honour the corpse of a dead man. Not even a dog would do this!’
His parishioners had withdrawn, more frightened of their gentle parish priest’s terrible rage than the dreadful news they had brought. Athelstan had stormed off to his house and drunk a cup of wine with a speed Cranston would have admired. He slept fitfully that night, not even thinking of climbing the tower steps to study the stars. He’d tossed and turned on his pallet bed, fuming with rage at the sinful desecration of his cemetery. The next morning he rose early, opened the church, perfunctorily fed Bonaventura, skipped through the morning office and tried hard to concentrate whilst he celebrated Mass. Bonaventura, like the cunning cat he was, seemed to sense his patron’s change of mood and quietly stole away. At the end of the Mass, before he gave the final benediction, Athelstan spoke in sharp, terse tones.
‘Our cemetery has been violated once again,’ he declared. ‘I, Athelstan, priest of this parish, say this, as God is my witness – no further burials will take place until the ground has been re-consecrated and this problem resolved!’ He glared round at his small congregation. ‘I will go to the highest in the land, be it the young King himself or the Archbishop of Canterbury. Guards will be set and, God forgive me, I shall see these villains hang!’
His parishioners had quietly left and Athelstan, now calming, felt a twinge of guilt as he glared down at Tosspot’s ravaged grave.
‘Your fiery temper, priest’ he muttered to himself, ‘is no more curbed than it was twenty years ago. And your tongue is as sharp as ever.’
He breathed deeply. Yes, he had been too hard, he reflected, far too brusque with Benedicta and the others, but especially with the widow. She had stayed for a few seconds after Mass, not to gossip but simply to say that the chief bailiff of the ward, Master Bladdersniff, had accosted her on her way to church. He wished to see Athelstan on an urgent matter.
‘Oh, yes,’ Athelstan muttered. ‘Master Bladdersniff, as usual, closing the stable door after the horse has bolted!’ Athelstan felt a fresh surge of rage. If St Erconwald’s had been one of the wealthy city churches, guards would have been set immediately and this would never have happened. Even Cranston, that fat-arsed coroner, hadn’t helped, wrapped up like some mewling maid in his own concerns. Athelstan stared once more round the cemetery, it was so cold, so bleak. He remembered Father Peter and envied the Woodforde priest’s quiet domesticity. ‘Bloody Cranston!’ Athelstan muttered. ‘Bloody murder! Bloody Tower! The bloody hearts of men and their evil doings!’ He kicked the icy mud. ‘I am a priest,’ he hissed to himself. ‘Not some sheriff’s man.’
‘Father? Father Athelstan?’
The friar turned and glared at the young pursuivant who stood, cloaked and hooded, behind him. ‘Yes, man, what is it?’
‘I have been sent from the Tower by Sir John Cranston. He wants to see you in the Holy Lamb tavern off Cheapside.’
‘Tell My Lord Coroner,’ Athelstan retorted, ‘that I’ll be there when I’m there, and he’d better be sober!’
The young man looked surprised and hurt. Athelstan grimaced and spread his hands.
‘Lord, man, I’m sorry. Look, tell Sir John I’ll be there when I can.’
He took a step closer and saw the fellow’s white, pinched face and dripping nose. ‘You are freezing,’ the friar muttered. ‘Go across to my house, there’s a jug of wine on the table. Fill a goblet. You’ll find one on a shelf above the fire hearth. Drink some mulled wine, and get some warmth in your belly before you return.�
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The pursuivant turned and scurried off like a whippet.
‘Oh, by the way,’ Athelstan yelled after him, ‘I did mean what I said. Sir John is not to drink too much!’
Athelstan walked slowly back to his church, up the steps and into the porch.
‘Father?’
Athelstan jumped as Master Luke Bladdersniff, chief bailiff of the ward, stepped out of the darkness, his lean sallow face and wispy blond hair almost hidden under a tattered beaver hat.
‘Good morrow, Master Bailiff.’
Athelstan studied the ward man: his close-set eyes were dark-rimmed and looked even more like the piss-holes in the snow, as Cranston so aptly described them. Athelstan had always been fascinated by the man’s nose. Broken and slightly twisted, it gave Bladdersniff a rather comical look which sat awkwardly with the fellow’s usual air of bombastic self-importance. Athelstan wearily waved him into the church.
‘Master Bladdersniff, I suppose you have come to discuss why my cemetery is violated and its graves robbed whilst you and the ward council do nothing about it?’
Bladdersniff shook his head, while peering over his shoulder, back into the darkness of the church porch.
‘What is it, man? What’s over there?’
The bailiffs mouth opened and shut like a landed carp. Athelstan stared more closely. The fellow looked as if he was going to vomit. His white face had a greenish tinge and the dark eyes were watery, as if Bladdersniff had been violently retching.
‘For God’s sake, man, what is it?’
Again the bailiff looked back into the darkness.
‘It’s Tosspot!’ he mumbled.
‘What?’
‘Tosspot! Or, at least, part of him,’ Bladdersniff replied, beckoning the priest to follow him.
Athelstan took a taper and went to where the bailiff stood over a dirty piece of canvas in a dark corner of the church porch. Bladdersniff pulled this open and Athelstan turned away in disgust. A man’s leg lay there, or at least part of it, cut above the knee as neatly and as sharply as a piece of cloth by an expert tailor. Athelstan stared at the bloody stump and mottle-hued skin.
